by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : The Opposition on Thursday stepped up its attack on the government over the RBI’s annual report that revealed low efficacy of demonetisation, with the Congress terming the move to junk high currency notes as the “biggest scam” and the CPI-M demanding a “black paper” on the issue.
The Aam Aadmi Party also hit out at the Modi government and claimed that extra notes worth Rs 1.1 lakh crore were deposited in banks following demonetisation.
The Congress, AAP and CPI-M held separate press conferences to slam the government following the RBI annual report figures on Wednesday which said that of the Rs 15.44 lakh crore taken out of circulation in the November 8 demonetisation of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes, Rs 15.28 lakh crore had returned to the system by way of public deposits.
Congress leader Anand Sharma accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of misleading the people on demonetisation, saying that he had repeatedly made “false statements.”
Sharma said the Prime Minister had made “false remarks” in his Independence Day speech about the quantum of black money that was unearthed after Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes were scrapped.
He said demonetisation had led to a loss of GDP of Rs 2.25 lakh crore and the Prime Minister was “directly responsible”.
“People will accept the truth, they can also accept that a mistake has been made, but it is wrong to state repeatedly that everything done was right,” he said.
He said the Attorney General had told the Supreme Court that due to demonetisation an amount of Rs 4-5 lakh crore related to terror funding will not come back to the system.
“The government has not spoken the truth at every step. People have been misled, inconvenienced. This has been the biggest scam. Those who had illegal money, the government has helped them make it legal,” Sharma said.
CPI-M General Secretary Sitaram Yechury termed demonetisation a “money laundering exercise”.
“All of the (demonetisation) exercise’s stated objectives have failed. Normally we ask for a white paper on such issues but since Prime Minister Modi said it is fight against black money, I think the government should bring a ‘black paper’ on this,” Yechury said.
“Reportedly, more than 100 per cent of demonetised currency is coming back after Bhutanese, Nepalese and Co-op Banks Currency is taken in. This shows it was a very, very successful money laundering scheme,” he added.
Yechury said there was no mention of digitisation on November 8, 2016 but as the economy crashed, the government went out of its way “to help certain selected private companies” under the “mask of digitisation”.
“Lives, livelihoods and jobs have been decimated. This government is responsible for this…Why were people imposed with a burden of printing new notes costing Rs 8,000 crore and ATM recalibration cost of over Rs 35,000 crore in addition to the loss of economic activity estimated by the CMIE and others to the tune of Rs 1,50,000 crores?” he asked.
Yechury said that the government “must fix accountability for this disaster and punish those responsible”.
AAP leader Sanjay Singh raised questions over a figure in the RBI annual report and referred to a media report from November 2016 which cited the central bank as saying that Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes worth Rs 14.18 lakh crore were in circulation.
Singh said since notes worth Rs 14.18 lakh crore were in circulation and notes worth Rs 15.28 lakh crore have come back, there is a surplus of Rs 1.1 lakh crore.
“RBI is lying to the nation. Why are they lying? Why are they giving wrong facts? They didn’t know how many Rs 500 and 1,000 notes they had in circulation?” he asked.
The AAP leader questioned whether the extra money was black money or fake notes deposited by people close to the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Singh said that Rs 21,000 crore was spent in printing new notes and now a total of Rs 1.31 lakh crore will be levied from people.
“The Prime Minister and Finance Minister should answer this, else this would be the biggest corruption in Indian history,” he added.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Sitaram Yechury
Kolkata : Describing as “unthinkable” and “painful” the lynching of two persons in West Bengal for transporting cows in pick-up vans, CPI-M General Secretary Sitaram Yechury on Tuesday blamed the “competitive communalism” of the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress and the opposition BJP for such happenings.
“It’s unthinkable that such things can happen in West Bengal,” Yechury told media persons here.
The two victims – Hafizul Sheikh and Anwar Hussain – were beaten to death by a mob on suspicion of cattle smuggling on Sunday at Jharsalboni area near Dhupguri in north Bengal’s Jalpaiguri district.
“I find it painful… this is a result of the competitive communalism of the Trinamool and the BJP in order to bring about a communal polarisation,” he said.
Yechury also castigated the Trinamool government for barring immersion of Durga puja idols on the Ashura or the 10th day of Muharram – October 1.
“It is only aimed at appeasing minorities. On the other hand, the Bharatiya Janata Party is stoking majority communalism,” he said.
Banerjee has announced that the Durga Puja immersion would be allowed on Dussehra/Dashami, September 30, but not on October 1 as Muslims would observe Ashura, a day of mourning in the month of Muharram on that day. However, the immersions would be resume on October 2 and could take place till October 4.
Yechury said instead of “differentiating and interfering”, the state government should facilitate meetings of the leaders of the two communities so that they could find a solution themselves.
“They took a similar decision last year. These decisions are only allowing the BJP to grow,” he said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Omar Abdullah
Jammu : Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Tuesday accused the BJP of trying to turn the issue of Article 35A of the Indian Constitution into a Hindu versus Muslim issue.
The BJP was also trying to convert the issue into a state versus rest of the country issue after falling short of arguments to justify their moves on the matter, the National Conference Working President said while addressing people in Darhal area of Rajouri district.
Abdullah asked how could critics of the National Conference point fingers against it for opposing what he called were clandestine moves to get repealed Article 35A, which he said was a constitutional guarantee to the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh for preserving their distinct identity and dignity, irrespective of religion or caste.
He accused the Bharatiya Janata Party of dividing people on region and religion lines to further its anti-people agenda.
“Article 35A reflects our identity, it allows us to shape our destiny, and so we cannot let it go,” the former Chief Minister said.
The National Conference leader cautioned people not to remain complacent on this sensitive issue.
“The pen and inkpot party (People’s Democratic Party’s election symbol) had been conceived to further the agenda of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the BJP in this state”, he claimed.
Omar Abdullah accused the PDP of submitting to the BJP’s whims and fancies, be it on the Goods and Services Tax or the National Food Security Act.
He said GST implementation was a “tremendous setback” to the state’s fiscal autonomy while the NFSA had broken the backbone of the poor.
“I opposed the Food Security Act’s implementation despite frequent demands by our then alliance partner the Congress. By agreeing to implement the NFSA, the PDP has forced the state’s people into submission and deprived them of the bare minimum rations,” the former Chief Minister said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Opinions
By Amulya Ganguli,
When the Supreme Court excluded the “creamy layer”, or the well-off sections, among the backward castes from the benefits of reservations in its 1991 judgement, it had taken a logical step to ensure that the advantages of the quota system in the matter of social advancement were not enjoyed in perpetuity by the identified communities.
What the judicial pronouncement entailed was that once those who had suffered for centuries from the inequities of the caste system had been able to overcome much of their social disabilities via the officially sponsored affirmative action, they would lose their right for preferential treatment. The criterion for those who would be excluded from the benefits of the quota system was an annual income of Rs 100,000.
However, while deciding on the concept of the “creamy layer”, the judiciary does not seem to have taken into account the possibility of the intervention of the political class to circumvent the legal objective.
Over the years, the politicians across the board have succeeded in dodging the income limit by periodically increasing the quantum of the annual earnings of the backward castes from Rs 100,000 in 1993 to Rs 250,000 in 2004 to Rs 450,000 in 2008 to Rs 600,000 in 2013.
Clearly, to the political class, the creamy layer is an elastic concept which can keep on expanding with the express purpose of retaining within its fold even the affluent among the backward castes in order to make them eligible for reservations in employment and education.
Considering that the reservations were meant to be in force for only the first 10 years after Independence, there is little doubt that the present practice is a travesty of the original intent. As much is evident from the contention of the now-defunct National Commission for Backward Castes that the annual income should be Rs 15 lakh.
It not surprising, therefore, that the Narendra Modi government has decided to increase the annual income from the present Rs 600,000 to Rs 800,000. There will be no prizes for guessing that the amount will keep on increasing year after year and that being a part of the creamy layer will be an ever-receding goal for the backward castes.
By this token, no matter how high is the income of a backward caste person, he will always be poor in the government’s eyes — though not to his neighbours — and in need of clutches for securing jobs and education.
The reason for this oddity is the political need to secure votes even if the grant of such largesse means ignoring the concept of merit. However, it also boosts the caste system which is often deemed to be the bane of the Hindu social order.
The belief among the idealists at the dawn of Independence that the caste system will gradually wither away with the nation’s progress has proved to be a chimera.
As if to confirm this regressive trend, the Modi government is now contemplating identifying various sub-castes among the backwards for extending the benefits of reservations on the ground that the quotas have mostly been grabbed by the more dominant castes, such as the Yadavs in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
This slicing of the cake is an extension of the electoral policy which the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) successfully pursued in Uttar Pradesh by courting the non-Yadav backward castes and the non-Jatav Dalits to wean them away from the Yadav-dominated Samajwadi Party and the Jatav-dominated Bahujan Samaj Party.
Ironically, it was to counter the caste card played by the Janata Dal leader and Prime Minister V.P. Singh in 1990 that BJP leader L.K. Advani embarked on his Somnath-to-Ayodhya rath yatra to keep the party’s Hindu flock together.
Today, however, the BJP is playing the caste card with a vengeance to boost its political position. Its motivation is possibly all the stronger because of the knowledge that it will not get the Muslim vote. So, it has to try all the more to rope in the backward castes and add them to its tally of upper caste votes which the party believes are already in its bag.
In the process of wooing the backward castes, not only the age-old “varna vyavastha” or the caste system but also the concept of reservations is strengthened.
To make matters worse, since the number of government jobs is dwindling in a time of the free market, voices are bound to be raised for extending the quota system to the private sector, thereby ringing its death-knell where efficiency is concerned.
As these retrogressive steps are advocated and implemented, the “sabka vikas” or the agenda of development for all is bound to be hit.
Moreover, the calls that are sometimes given for dispensing with quotas, as by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief, Mohan Bhagwat, are likely to be ignored. For those who see Hindu society through the lens of caste, all will be well in the foreseeable future.
(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
New Delhi : Hailing the Supreme Court verdict on triple talaq, the CPI-M has alleged that the BJP was trying to impose a uniform civil code on people.
“The BJP is trying to utilise the arguments against triple talaq as grounds for imposing a uniform civil code,” an editorial in the CPI-M journal People’s Democracy said. “This is a deliberate misreading of the verdict.
“The majority judgment was clear that it is only addressing talaq-e-bidat and not all forms of talaq under Muslim personal law.
“The court did not accept the arguments of the Attorney General representing the central government to widen the scope of the court intervention to other aspects of divorce under Muslim personal law.”
A five-member Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court on Tuesday struck down instant triple talaq as illegal and violative of the rights of Muslim women.
“This majority verdict by 3 to 2 is a victory for Muslim women who have suffered under the arbitrary use of talaq-e-bidat which is instant talaq,” the Communist Party of India-Marxist said.
Amongst the majority of three, two of the judges argued that instant triple talaq violated the fundamental right to equality enshrined in Article 14 of the Constitution.
The third judge has said it was illegal as it was not sanctioned by the Quran and Islamic religious practice.
“The stance of the two judges in the minority that personal law is protected under the Constitution and therefore immune to the equality test is regressive and contrary to the secular principle,” the editorial said.
“What is required is to work for equal rights for women within each religious community and to get reforms undertaken in this direction. Uniformity is not equality.
“And a uniform civil code is no guarantee for justice.
“The BJP government is not willing to have a law against honour killings. On the contrary under this government even secular laws applicable to all women are being sought to be diluted such as Section 498 A of the IPC.
“The Supreme Court judgment will strengthen the resolve of women to continue to struggle for reform within their personal laws. This applies not only to Muslim women but to all women belonging to Hindu and other religious communities.”
—IANS
