by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance, Economy, Investing, News, Politics
New Delhi : As many as 16,850 villages of 484 dictricts across the country are getting benefits of seven flagship welfare schemes, including Ujjwala and Saubhagya, of the BJP-led NDA government, BJP President Amit Shah said here on Tuesday.
Addressing a press conference on the achievements of Modi government in last four years, he also said the Narendra Modi-government is working to ensure that benefits of all the seven schemes reaches to all villages before it goes to election in 2019 to seek fresh mandate of the people.
“There is not even a single person who has not been getting the benefits of the seven schemes in these villages. With the efforts of Narendra Modi government, we have been successful in connecting all the houses of these villages with electricty. We have provided everyhold with gas connection and benefits of social security schemes. They were all given LED lights and all the children below the age of two are vaccinated,” Shah said.
Working on the same line, he said, the government is now aiming to extend the benefit of these seven schemes in new 45,000 villages in 115 districts soon.
“We will try to extend the benefit of these seven schemes to new 45,000 villages having the population of more than 1,000 by August 15. Our aim is to slowly extend these benefit to all the villages in the country.
“The benefit of these schemes were given to all the states in the country apart from Karnataka and West Bengal. They were not included due to elections,” he said.
Shah said that the Bharatiya Janata Party between April 14 and May 5 has held the “Gram Swaraj Abhiyan” in over 16,500 villages across the country.
Launched on the occasion of Ambedkar Jayanti, the campaign ensured that the benefit of seven programmes – Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, Saubhagya, Ujala scheme, Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana and Mission Indradhanush – reached these 16,850 villages.
During the campaign, a total of 3,68,978 programmes were launched in which over 1 crore people took part, he said while giving a power point presentation over the achievements of the government.
Under the Saubhagya Yojana, more than five lakh households were electrified and under the Ujala scheme over 25 lakh LED bulbs were distributed, while through the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, bank accounts opened for over 20 lakh people, who were added to the national economy.
About 11 lakh families were given gas connection under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, he added.
He said that Modi will address a rally at Cuttack on the completion of his government’s four years.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Rahul Gandhi
New Delhi : In a blistering attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi following the resignation of Karnataka Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa ahead of the trust vote, Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Saturday termed him “corruption” and that Modi, BJP chief Amit Shah and the RSS considered no institution “worthy of respect”.
Addressing the media here shortly after Yeddyurappa’s resignation, he said the Congress will work with other opposition parties to defeat the BJP in 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
Gandhi said Modi’s model of leadership is not that of democratic person but that of a dictator and “even Supreme Court knows that”.
Accusing Modi of promoting corruption in Karnataka to gain support for the BJP, which had emerged the single-largest party amid split verdict in by the May 12 assembly election, he cited attempts at horse-trading, including purported telephonic conversations of some BJP leaders to get support of Congress and Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) legislators, who formed a post-poll coalition.
People saw “how the Prime Minister authorised directly buying MLAs in Karnataka from our party and from the JD-S”, he said, adding Modi’s talks of fighting corruption are a “blatant lie”.
“He is corruption. He is doing everything to subvert this nation and he is doing it across the board. There are phone conversations of MLAs being approached for purchase by the BJP and that was directly authorised from Delhi,” he said.
He alleged that RSS, the BJP’s ideological patron, wants to capture every institution “and that is what we are fighting” and will “work with the opposition to defeat the BJP”.
He hoped that the BJP and RSS will learn a lesson from the developments in Karnataka where Governor Vajubhai Vala had invited the BJP to form government, “that the institutions of this country, the will of the people of this country cannot be disrespected”.
The Congress had moved the Supreme Court following th3e Governor inviting Yeddyurappa to form government and giving him 15 days to prove majority. The apex court had slashed the time for trust vote and fixed it for Saturday.
Contending that the Prime Minister is not bigger than people of India, the Supreme Court or members of parliament and assemblies, Gandhi said: “I am doubtful that Prime Minister will understand that because he had been trained throughout his life by the RSS never to respect another institution except the RSS. But that is the message that people of Karnataka and the people of India have given to the Prime Minister.”
“I am very proud to say that they have been shown that in India, power is not everything, money is not everything, corruption is not everything. In India, the will of the people is everything. We have explained to the people in the BJP and the RSS that there are limits to your arrogance, there are limits to how you are trying to run this country,” he said.
Accusing Modi, Amit Shah and RSS of believing “that every institution can be destroyed”, he said:
“You can disrespect anybody in this country simply because you happen to be in power? And the BJP and the RSS does it again and again. That there is no institution in this country that is worthy of the respect of the Prime Minister, Amit Shah and the RSS.”
He also accused the BJP of disrespecting the proceedings of the Karnataka Assembly, saying the national anthem was not played after Yeddyurappa announced his resignation and the BJP legislators and the Pro-tem Speaker left the house. “In a way, this is what we are fighting today… The idea that you can rubbish every single institution in this country.”
Asked if the state Governor should resign, Gandhi said the power was completely controlled by the Prime Minister and the RSS. “So, it is a good idea to resign, but I can guarantee you that, under the BJP regime, the next man will do exactly the same thing,” he said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
B.S. Yeddyurappa
By Amulya Ganguli,
The hopes of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) adding Karnataka to the list of 19 states where it is in power has been dashed although it came close to fulfilling it. However, the eight seats which the BJP needed to cross the finishing line in the legislature eluded the party.
In hindsight, it might have been better for the BJP if it had conceded defeat when it saw that it had fallen short of the target of 112 in the 224-member House. Instead, by opting for a floor test, it provoked all the avoidable controversies about horse-trading which have haunted the Indian political scene ever since the Aya Ram-Gaya Ram days of defections in the late 1960s.
The Governor, too, did his office no service by swearing-in B.S. Yeddyurappa as the Chief Minister when the Janata Dal (Secular)-Congress combine was pressing its claim, and allowing him a fortnight’s time to prove his majority. It was inevitable that the inordinately long period would be seen as some kind of a helping hand to the Chief Minister by not only the BJP’s opponents but also a fair number of observers.
The belief that 15 days was too long a period was confirmed by the Supreme Court’s drastic reduction of the time needed by Yeddyurappa to two days. At a time when the legislators have to be carted around from one town to another and holed up in luxury resorts to stop any of them from being lured away by the powers-that-be, it is necessary to give an aspiring Chief Minister as little leeway as possible.
In the end, the Supreme Court’s directive apparently proved crucial, for the BJP chose not to wait have its legislative strength tested on the floor of the House.
What is worrying for the BJP is that the setback in Karnataka has shown that, for once, the extra effort put in by Narendra Modi by raising the number of his rallies in the state from 15 to 21 did not pay dividends. It can even be argued that if the Prime Minister had stuck to his original plan to address 15 public meetings, the BJP might have fared worse.
Since Modi remains not only the party’s star campaigner but also the only one who can make the difference between victory and defeat, any hint that he can no longer easily enable the party to cross the winning line cannot but be of concern when the BJP faces three more crucial assembly elections in a few months’ time in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. Clearly, the burden which he already carries as the spearhead of the BJP’s campaign will become heavier after the outcome in Karnataka.
As it is, the BJP’s tally of 104 fell short of the 110 it won in 2008 with a vote share of 33.8 per cent. Moreover, its percentage this time of 36.2 is well below the 43.4 per cent it received in 2014 when Modi was at the height of his popularity. There is little doubt that the Modi magic is not as effective as it once was.
As for the state itself, the early ringing down of the curtains on what was expected to be riveting drama on Saturday afternoon can hardly be seen as a welcome development (except for the hardened opponents of the BJP) because the prospect of a hodge-podge alliance between the Janata Dal-Secular and the Congress is not a pleasant one.
For a start, no one knows how long it will last since it will take time for the two parties to forgive and forget their recent verbal duels including the Congress’s jibe about the Janata Dal-Secular being the BJP’s “B” team.
Now, as virtually the Janata Dal-Secular’s “B” team in the government of H.D. Kumaraswamy, the Congress will have to shed some of its pretences as the Grand Old Party of Indian politics. Having already been reduced to such a secondary position in UP, Bihar, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, the Congress would not like Karnataka to be added to the list, especially when it polled 640,000 more votes than the BJP with a vote share of 38 per cent, up from 36.6 in 2013.
Even as the Janata Dal-Secular-Congress tie-up has been hailed by Mamata Banerjee as being in line with her idea of a federal front, there will be many a slip between the cup and the lip before such a grouping materialises.
It goes without saying that the new ruling group in Karnataka will provide the first test of the possibility of an anti-BJP glue holding two not-so-friendly parties together. The test will be all the more crucial since the Janata Dal-Secular was supposed to have had a tacit understanding with the BJP in constituencies such as Chamundeshwari, where the saffron party was said to have put up a weak candidate because the Janata Dal-Secular was expected to have the upper hand in a direct fight with the Congress. This was what led to Siddaramaiah’s defeat there. It remains to be seen if episodes such as these will be overlooked by the new allies.
(Amulya Ganguli is a political analyst. The views expressed are personal. He can be reached at amulyaganguli@gmail.com)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Bengaluru : In an anti-climax to the hectic political developments since the split verdict in May 12 Karanataka Assembly polls, the BJP lost power in Karnataka as Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa resigned on Saturday before the trust vote, as he did not have the numbers to prove his majority.
His resignation paved the way for formation of a Congress-Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) government headed by H. D. Kumaraswamy.
Congress President Rahul Gandhi targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi after the trust vote, saying he would have learnt lessons from Yeddyurappa having been forced to resign as the Karnataka Chief Minister two days after he was sworn in.
The order for advancing the trust vote to Saturday came from the Supreme Court as the Congress and the JD-S filed a petition challenging Governor Vajubhai Vala’s invitation to Yeddyurappa to form government and his giving the BJP leader 15 days to prove majority.
While the BJP emerged as the single-largest party, the Congress and the JD-S, which formed a post-poll alliance, said they had the required numbers to form the government.
A little ahead of the appointed time of trust vote at 4 p.m, Yeddyurappa made an emotional speech, saying the BJP didn’t get the numbers needed to prove majority in the House. “I will lose nothing if I lose power, my life is for the people,” he said.
In his 15-minute address to the House, the 75-year-old BJP leader said there was no way he could have served the people of Karnataka, as the Congress was not allowing its MLAs even to speak to their family members.
Lamenting that hundreds of farmers had committed suicides across the state during the last five years, Yeddyurappa said the Congress could not ensure water for irrigating the farmlands in the state even 70 years after the Independence.
“My aim is to serve farmers till my last breath. I will also continue to serve all the people, including the Dalits, backward classes, weaker sections and the poor,” reiterated Yeddyurappa who was the first BJP Chief Minister in south India when the party came to power on its own in Karnataka in 2008 assembly election.
Expressing confidence of the BJP winning in all the 28 Lok Sabha constituencies from the state in the 2019 general elections, Yeddyurappa said the party would also win in 150 of the 224-member state assembly in the next elections.
“It was my dream to be the Chief Minister of the state at a time Narendra Modi is the Prime Minister. If only people would have given us 113 seats instead of 104, we would have made this state a paradise. But I will fight for the state till my last breath. We will get 28 out of 28 seats in Lok Sabha and I will win 150 Assembly seats for Narendra Modi (in the next assembly elections),” Yeddyurappa said.
Asserting that the mandate showed that the state’s people have rejected the Congress and the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S), he said: “People have voted against the Congress’ misgovernance. I have faced many ‘agni pareeksha’ (trial by fire) in the past and this trust vote is just another one.”
He then announced his resignation and drove to Raj Bhavan to submit his resignation to Governor Vajubhai Vala.
In Delhi, Congress President Rahul Gandhi launched a stinging attack on Modi stating that “PM is corruption” and there was no institution “worthy of respect of the Prime Minister, Amit Shah and the RSS”.
“I hope the BJP and the RSS learnt a lesson from this that the institutions of this country, the will of the people of this country cannot be disrespected,” he said.
After a favourable verdict on their petition from the Supreme Court over the Governor’s decision early on Wednesday, which was given a rare late-night hearing, the Congress and the JD-S had again moved the apex court on Friday seeking ouster of K.G. Bopaiah as pro-tem Speaker of the Karnataka Assembly.
However, as the Karnataka government informed about the live telecast of the floor test proceedings to ascertain the majority support to Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa, the petitioners on Saturday decided not to press their plea against the pro-tem Speaker.
The May 12 election across the state in 222 constituencies out of total 224 threw up a hung House, with no party securing majority. Polls in two constituencies were deferred.
Of the 222 seats, the BJP won 104, Congress 78, Janata Dal-Secular 37, and one each was bagged by the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Karnataka Pragnyavantha Janatha Party, and an Independent.
As JD-S leader H.D. Kumaraswamy won from both Channapatna and Ramanagaram segments, the party’s effective strength in the House is 36.
The Congress and the JD-S had staked claim to form government with Kumaraswamy as Chief Minister.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Srinagar : Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Leh town of the Ladakh region on Saturday beginning his day-long visit to Jammu and Kashmir amid hightended security as authorities suspended internet services and shut down schools and colleges for the day.
Modi was received at the Leh Airport by Governor N.N. Vohra and Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti.
As separatists called for protest march to Srinagar’s city centre Lal Chowk against Modi’s visit, the authorities suspended mobile internet services across the Kashmir Valley as a precautionary measure, police said.
Restrictions were also imposed in several areas in Srinagar. All schools and colleges were shut for the day.
Separatists leaders, including Syed Ali Geelani and Mirwaiz Umer Farooq have been placed under house arrest while Yasin Malik has been taken into preventive custody.
The Prime Minister has a hectic schedule that includes the unveiling of a plaque to mark the commencement of work on the Zojila Tunnel, India’s longest road tunnel and Asia’s longest bi-directional tunnel.
The state-of-the-art Zojila Tunnel would provide all weather connectivity between the Ladakh region, that remains cut off from the rest of the country during the winter months.
It will cut down the time taken to cross the Zojila pass from three-and-a-half hours to just 15 minutes, besides providing all-round economic and socio-cultural integration of the region. It also has immense strategic importance, an announcement said.
Modi would also attend the closing ceremony of the birth centenary celebration of Buddhist spiritual leader Kushok Bakula Rinpoche in Leh.
He will also dedicate the 330 MW Kishanganga hydropower project to the nation, at the Sher-i-Kashmir International Conference Centre (SKICC) in Srinagar during the day. Besides, laying the foundation stone of the four lane 41.2-km long Srinagar Ring Road.
In Jammu city, Modi will lay the foundation stone of the Pakul Dul Power Project and the four lane 58.2-kilometre-long Jammu Ring Road.
Ring Roads in Srinagar and Jammu are aimed at reducing traffic congestion and making road travel safer, faster, more convenient and more environment friendly.
Modi will also inaugurate the Tarakote Marg and Material Ropeway of the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine Board that will facilitate pilgrims visiting the shrine.
The Prime Minister will also attend the Convocation of the Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology in Jammu.
After a busy day, Modi will fly back to New Delhi in the evening.
—IANS
