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With
general election 2014 only a few months away... Manish Sisodiya cleans Arvind Kejriwal’s face after a man threw ink at him in New Delhi on Monday. Tribune photo: Manas Ranjan Bhui
Chhattisgarh assembly elections |
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In Chambal, one who facilitates illegal sand mining will get votes
Richest candidate puts royalty behind
BSP poised to score better in MP: Analysts
SC notice to Centre, 3 states on commuting death sentence
Porn sites: SC seeks DoT response
Farooq, Nitish for Bharat Ratna to Atal
Telangana Bill to be tabled after Dec 5
SC rejects PILs on Telangana
HC dismisses pleas of Asaram, Sai
Notice to Centre, UP on Jats’ plea for probe
Salem convicted in 2001 fake passport case
BrahMos variant clears Army test
Oz to back India on NSG membership No move to regulate media: Tewari Intern deposes before panel probing sexual harassment
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With general
election 2014 only a few months away... Ananya Panda Tribune News Service
New Delhi, November 18 The activist-turned politician said he would back out from the electoral race if he is found guilty. He added if the allegations turn out to be false than Anna, whom he referred as his “guru”, should canvass for his party during the polls, clarifying on a letter sent to him by Anna during a press briefing called at a short notice here. “I have received a letter yesterday from Annaji who has raised few issues. I respect him a lot but it is important to make the whole thing public. “He mentioned that few people, who have been part of the anti-corruption movement, have pointed out whether the money received from people is being used for Aam Aadmi Party campaigns. “I’ve sent a proposal that he should ask people, such as Santosh Hedge to conduct a fresh inquiry within seven days and if the allegations are proven I will not contest elections and if found to be false than he will campaign for us,” he noted, claiming that the movement under India Against Corruption ran into deficit. The press meeting was disrupted for a while as a man, Nachiketa Walnekar, who claimed to be an Anna supporter and BJP worker from Ahmednagar (Maharashtra) threw ink on the AAP chief. The man was detained. Kejriwal said: “They (AAP) have misused Anna’s name and betrayed him.” Following pandemonium, the AAP chief said the identity of both the Congress and the BJP was at stake and they were scared of us and that was why such attacks were being carried out. Won’t ‘cross’ ECI limit
AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal on Monday said the cap of Rs 14 lakh fixed by the EC for candidates’ poll-related expenses was enough to contest elections in Delhi and he would not exceed the limit. “One can fight elections within Rs 14 lakh. Corruption starts when parties and candidates splurge money for alluring voters through unfair means,” he said.
— TNS
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Chhattisgarh assembly elections On poll eve, Congress, BJP claim victory Aditi Tandon Tribune News Service
Raipur, November 18 Vora, AICC treasurer and former Madhya Pradesh CM, said the worsening law and order in Chhattisgarh coupled with increased Naxal infestation and denial of land claims to tribals under the Forest Rights Act would work against the BJP. “The CM promised a cow to each tribal in 2008. Where’s that cow? The atmosphere here is conducive for change. The BJP hasn’t launched a single major welfare scheme having any permanent effect here. Fear is pervasive. When I was Madhya Pradesh CM, one could be out at 2 am,” Vora said. He slammed CM Raman Singh’s PDS system saying most ration cards were bogus and said the BJP would pay for slashing SC reservation in the state from 16 to 12 per cent. “The BJP has made light of the massacre of our leaders in the May 25 Naxal ambush saying it was a security lapse. They will pay for this,” Vora said adding that the increased voter turnout in Bastar and Rajnandgaon in the first phase poll for 18 decisive seats on November 11 was in the Congress’ favour. On Ajit Jogi revealing his CM ambitions in rallies, Vora said everyone could say what they wanted but the matter would be decided by victorious Congress MLAs. BJP’s JP Nadda conversely said the party would win a third term on the reputation of CM Raman Singh and his welfare policies. “There is nothing between us and victory. The enhanced voter percentage comprising women and youth will help us,” he said. On the issue of BJP using Jogi’s CM ambitions against the Congress, Nadda said, “Our election strategy is to get positive votes and not to harp on negative factors of the Opposition. Jogi has been calling himself a CM. The Congress has given maximum tickets to his men. We are only asking the Congress to come clean and not fool the people.”
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In Chambal, one who facilitates illegal sand mining will get votes
Morena, November 18 On the contrary, residents of Hetampur (a village adjacent to the fabled Chambal that now lies dotted with mounds of sand stolen from the riverbed in pitch night) and elsewhere say that they would vote for the person or the party that would make sand mining easier for them. For long, the region has plundered the Chambal sand, preferred due to its size and constituency. Ravi Pratap Singh Bhadoria, an advocate practising in Morena, in fact, says the decision of the Morena seat would be on the basis of who facilitates people in the trade. The Supreme Court and the National Green Tribunal ban may have made mining of sand from riverbeds without an environmental clearance difficult, but floodplains of the Chambal bears testimony that it is has not stopped. Shocking murder of IPS officer Narendra Singh in Morena district last year was a rude wake up call to the flourishing mining mafia in the Morena region despite the Supreme Court ban seven years back. Morena resident Adarsh Gupta says that the activity is carried out in the dead of the night and early in the morning a chain of tractors-trailers laden with river sand can be spotted carrying the sand. The illegal activity cannot be carried out without the connivance of politicians, the police and the administration. When the police and the administration strike, the price of sand increases. “A sand-laden trolley that costs around Rs 1,500 increases to Rs 2,500. Mining becomes more difficult but it does not stop. Eventually it is the customers who pays,” says Gupta. Morena has always been notorious for illegal activities like sand trade carried out by people yielding political and money power. The region has the highest number of licensed guns, all of which are currently deposited in police stations due to elections. The ban on sand mining was imposed by the apex court to protect Indian gharials in the Chambal river. Minting money
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Scooting into voters’ hearts
Raipur, November 18 The 58-year-old never uses a car to commute or to canvas and is often seen zipping through the streets of Raipur on his Honda
Activa. This first-term MLA is again in the fray from the Raipur North Assembly segment after he created history in 2008 by wresting the seat for the Congress for the first time in 30 years. A former two-time corporator of the Raipur Municipal Council,
Juneja, people of his segment say, has a natural winning streak. For one, he has never gone to the state Assembly in a car. “I always drive to the Assembly on my scooter. I keep my diary and pen handy in the scooter basket and even canvas on the scooter. I find it very satisfying as I can see the voters and they can see me,” says
Juneja, one of the only three Sikh MLAs the Congress currently has in the 90-member Chhattisgarh Assembly. As for
Juneja, scooting his way through voters’ hearts is not his only campaign skill. Instead of going door to door, Juneja squats at city chowks (crossroads) — different ones on different days — to be visible to his electorate. The BJP for its part is hoping Juneja’s scooting skills don’t last him this season.
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Richest candidate puts royalty behind
“It happens to be so,” says the Congress nominee from Ambikapur segment whose net worth is Rs 560 crore. It has grown five times over 2008 when he first became an MLA from the seat. The win didn’t come easy and Singh Deo just about managed to pull through with a 980-vote margin. Even today, he is pitted against Anurag Singh Deo of the BJP whom he had defeated in 2008. But locals say TS “Baba” has learnt his lessons and now refuses the attention he quite relished earlier. “He no longer likes people touching his feet or garlanding him in rallies. He has changed that way,” says Alok Dube, a local. Personally, Singh Deo says he never liked the attention. “As children we didn’t know until grade VII that we had a royal background. I am the 117th descendant of the family, the first being King Vishnu Prasad Singh in 195 AD,” he says. His father MS Singh Deo was Chief Secretary of undivided Madhya Pradesh and mother Devendra Kumari Deo a minister in both Arjun Singh’s and Digvijay Singh’s Cabinets. No wonder that in campaigns, TS ‘Baba’ flaunts the political part of his family history more than the royal part. Conscious of his competitor being elevated by the BJP as state youth wing president this time, Singh Deo managed to persuade Congress president Sonia Gandhi to campaign for him in Ambikapur on November 12.
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BSP poised to score better in MP: Analysts
Gwalior, November 18 The BSP won seven seats in the 230-member MP Assembly in 2008 and many analysts believe that the party is poised to better the score in the 2013 polls. Jatavs voters are adding to the social engineering formula followed by the party. Substantial Jatav voters, with years of simmering angst against upper castes’ oppression, are retaliating through votes for the
BSP. Take for example the six seats that fall in the Morena - the region that constituted the heart of notorious Chambal where many took to ravines because of oppression by the upper castes The BSP won two seats - Joura and Morena -out of the total six seats in the region. Sabalgarh and Sumawali went to the Congress and Dimani and Ambah to the
BJP.
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SC notice to Centre, 3 states on commuting death sentence
New Delhi, November 18 “The dehumanised convicts have not even a vestige of humanity left in them and therefore deserve complete extinction. The presence of these convicts even inside the jail is a menace to other prisoners within, and morally and otherwise hazardous to jail employees,” journalist Pinki Virani contended in her PIL. The death sentence awarded to all five convicts had been upheld by the apex court. Molali, a guard in the MP Cental Jail, and Santosh, a rape convict lodged in the same jail, were sentenced to death for gang raping Assistant Jailor’s 16-year-old daughter Naveen, killing her and dumping her body in the jail’s septic tank. Satish had raped a six-year-old girl and murdered her in the most barbaric manner, while Sushil Murmu had beheaded a nine-year-old boy for religious sacrifice. “The four cases are glaring examples of how routinely, without application of mind and arbitrarily, the files are forwarded by the state governments and the Union Ministry of Home Affairs to the President proposing pardon,” the petitioner pleaded.
Rarest of rare case
A Supreme Court Bench has sought reply from Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand, from where the convicts hail The notice has been issued on a PIL challenging four orders passed
in 2011-12 by then President Pratibha Patil The death penalty of five persons convicted of rape and murder and other heinous crimes falling under the rarest of rare categories was commuted to life.
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Porn sites: SC seeks DoT response
New Delhi, November 18 The Bench passed the order after Additional Solicitor General Indira Jaising pleaded that the Information and Broadcasting Ministry which had been served notice earlier was responsible only for regulating contents on radio and television, and not websites. Earlier, the Centre had told the SC that it was difficult to block international porn sites and sought time for consultation with various ministries to deal with the problem highlighted by the petitioner, Indore-based advocate Kamlesh Vaswani. The petitioner has sought a ban on such sites which had graphic scenes of violence and deviant acts accessible to
even children.
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Farooq, Nitish for Bharat Ratna to Atal
Jammu/Patna, November 18 Abdullah’s party was part of the NDA government from 1998 to 2004 when Vajpayee was the Prime Minister. The NC in general and the Abdullah family in particular had showered praise on Vajpayee every now and
then. “I am of the opinion that both Vajpayee and hockey legend Dhyan Chand should be given the Bharat Ratna,” Abdullah demanded. Expressing government’s view on the pitch for naming Vajpayee, Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari said there was a need to think with "seriousness" on Bharat Ratna when questions like his approach towards Narendra Modi government after the 2002 post-Godhra riots were still "hanging in the air." Leaving aside acrimony with his former NDA ally, Nitish said: “He (Vajpayee) deserves it. Why should not it be given to him?”
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Telangana Bill to be tabled after Dec 5
New Delhi, November 18 After a round of meeting with the Union Ministers representing the regions of Telangana and
Seemandhra, Shinde said the GoM had completed the process of discussions with others. “Now the GoM members will meet to discuss among themselves to finalise the report to be submitted to the Cabinet as soon as possible.” With a key GoM member and Defence Minister AK
Antony, on a visit to Russia, the panel is expected to meet on Thursday to give shape to a final report for the perusal of the Union Cabinet. The GoM had earlier held consultations with eight political parties from Andhra Pradesh. Today besides taking the view of Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy, who remains steadfast in pitching for a united Andhra Pradesh, Union Ministers S Jaipal Reddy, Sarvey Satyanaryana and P Balram Naik suggested that the Centre should ensure adequate power supply to the region after the formation of a separate state since the areas faces shortage. The ministers said in deference to the party decision it was willing to accept Hyderabad to be the joint capital for 10 years. Nine Union Ministers once again flagged opposition to the decision stating that several contentious issues, including sharing of river waters, employment and educational institutions have to be settled.
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HC dismisses pleas of Asaram, Sai
Ahmedabad, November 18 The court had completed hearing arguments of counsels of Asaram and Sai and the government pleader last month before reserving its order on the petitions moved by the father-son duo. Justice A J Desai today dismissed the petition after the counsels for the duo withdrew it. The court further observed that liberty has been granted to the duo to file fresh petitions after investigation in the case is over. Asaram and Sai had moved High Court seeking quashing of FIRs registered against them by two Surat-based sisters, who had alleged that they were repeatedly sexually assaulted between 1997 and 2006 by the father-son duo at their ashrams in Surat and Ahmedabad while they were staying there. After the two complaints were lodged at Jehangirpura police station in Surat, the plaint against Asaram was transferred to Chandkheda police station here because the alleged incident had taken place there.
— PTI
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Notice to Centre, UP on Jats’ plea for probe
New Delhi, November 18 The apex court had earlier sought the state’s response to another petition contending that the government was biased in favour of the minority community and was apathetic towards the plight of about 1,500 Jats who had taken shelter in the Ravidas temple in Kamalpur village in the district following the violence. A three-member Bench headed by Chief Justice P Sathasivam said the transfer plea would be heard again on November 21 along with a bunch of PILs on the issue. As many as 61 persons were killed in the September 7 violence that rocked Muzaffarnagar and adjoining areas. About 51,000 persons had fled the scene of violence and taken shelter in 58 relief camps. Of these, 40,000 have returned to their villages. About 10,000 victims in 10 camps are refusing to go back to their native places.
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Salem convicted in 2001 fake passport case
Hyderabad, November 18 Judge MV Ramana Naidu held the underworld don guilty under different sections of the Indian Penal Code for obtaining a passport under a fictitious name and address from Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh. The quantum of punishment will be pronounced on November 28. Salem had allegedly procured the fake passport under the fictitious identity of Ramil Kamil Malik by submitting bogus documents, that included forged birth date, residential proof and name of father, to the Hyderabad Regional Passport Office, allegedly in connivance with some government officials and private persons in 2001. Salem obtained three passports -- one for his wife, another for his girlfriend Monica Bedi, and one for himself.
— PTI
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BrahMos variant clears Army test
New Delhi, November 18 "The Block III variant of BrahMos with deep penetration capability is fitted with a new guidance system and the launch by the Army has successfully validated the deep penetration capability of the supersonic cruise missile system against hardened targets," BrahMos officials said here. "The missile system was successfully test fired by the Indian Army at the Pokhran test range in Rajasthan at 1055 hours," they said. The missile after launch "followed the predetermined trajectory and successfully pierced the designated concrete structure at bull’s eye owing to sheer velocity of the missile." The test-firing was witnessed by local Corps Commander Lt Gen Amit Sharma, who along with other senior officers congratulated the operational Army team for the successful launch.
— PTI
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Oz to back India on NSG membership New Delhi, November 18 “I was pleased to inform the Indian External Affairs Minister of the decision of the Australian government to support India’s full membership of the NSG, just as we will support India’s participation in all of the major export control regimes”, Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said after talks with her Indian counterpart Salman Khurshid here. She also reiterated her country’s commitment to civil nuclear cooperation agreement with India which would provide for the sale of Australian uranium to India, subject to safeguards and other requirements being met. The third round of negotiations on the accord will take place in New Delhi on November 26-27. “Australia’s decision acknowledges India's emergence as a major producer and potential exporter of nuclear energy and technology”, said Bishop. Other NSG members, including the US, UK, France and Russia, have expressed support for India's NSG membership.
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No move to regulate media: Tewari New Delhi, November 18 The minister suggested that the laws to tackle "paid news" were being amended. The minister said the issue of paid news cropped up at the meeting of MPs' consultative committee attached to his ministry. He said the Bill to amend the Press and Registration of Books Act to bring paid news into the ambit had been cleared by the Parliamentary Standing Committee but the stakeholders had asked for another round of consultations that would be held tomorrow. The meeting also discussed the Leveson Report of United Kingdom in the context of its relevance and implications in Indian context. He said the report was discussed so that the issues raised could be debated and discussed in the Indian context and be
analysed.
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Intern deposes before panel probing sexual harassment New Delhi, November 18 The law intern recorded her statement for two hours and requested the committee that confidentiality of her testimony be maintained. "The committee held its meeting today and the law intern appeared before it. She has completed the recording of her statement. "The law intern has requested maintenance of confidentiality of her statement. The next date of meeting is fixed for November 20," Ravindra Maithani, secretary general of the apex court, said about the development. Maithani, who is the member secretary of the committee comprising justices RM Lodha, HL Dattu and Ranjana Prakash Desai, however, refused to make any further comment on the issue. — PTI
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Mayawati promises 3 acres to MP’s landless people
Officials reach Bru camps Cong, BJP expel rebels Kejriwal gets notice
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Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convenor Arvind Kejriwal denied allegations that the monetary donations received during the social activist Anna Hazare-led Jan Lokpal movement in 2011 has been diverted for his party’s campaigning for the Delhi Assembly elections.
Ambikapur, November 18
Ambikapur, November 18
A three-member Bench headed by Chief Justice P Sathasivam have sought the response of the state governments — of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand, from where the convicts hailed from — to the petitioner’s contentions.
“Vajpayee stature could be gauged from the fact that former Prime Minister Pt Jawaharlal Nehru had told Vajpayee in Parliament that he would become country’s Prime Minister one day,” said Farooq.
