by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
New Delhi : The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has amassed over Rs 553 crore as income from unknown sources in 2017-18, which is 80 percent of total such income and four times the aggregate declared by the five other national parties.
According to a report by election watchdog the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) released on Wednesday, a total of Rs 689.44 crore was declared as income from unknown sources by the national parties, of which the BJP pocketed Rs 553.38 crore.
Unknown sources are income declared in the IT returns but without giving source of income for donations below Rs 20,000.
Such unknown sources include donations via Electoral Bonds, sale of coupons, relief fund, miscellaneous income, voluntary contributions, contribution from meetings/morchas. The details of donors of such voluntary contributions are not available in the public domain.
“At present, political parties are not required to reveal the name of individuals or organisations giving less than Rs 20,000 nor those who donated via Electoral Bonds. As a result, more than 50 per cent of the funds cannot be traced and are from ‘unknown’ sources. While the national political parties were brought under the RTI Act by the CIC ruling in June 2013, they have still not complied with the decision,” the ADR said in the report.
As per the report, the total income of six national political parties barring the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) in 2017-18 stood at Rs 1,293.05 crore.
While their total income from known donors was Rs 467.13 crore or 36 per cent of the total income, their income from other known sources (sale of assets, membership fees, bank interest, sale of publications, party levy) was Rs 136.48 crore or 11 per cent of total income.
The total income of political parties from unknown sources (income specified in the IT Returns whose sources are unknown) was Rs 689.44 crore, which is 53 per cent of the total income of the parties.
Of Rs 689.44 crore as income from unknown sources, share of income from Electoral Bonds was Rs 215 crore or 31 per cent.
The BJP also got over 93 per cent of donations of above Rs 20,000 received by national political parties, during 2017-18, pocketing Rs 437.04 crore of the total Rs 469.89 crore donated by corporates and individuals.
Of the total donations, the BJP got the lion’s share with 2,977 donations followed by the Congress which has declared receiving Rs 26.658 crore
In the last 14 years (2004-05 to 2017-18), the national parties have collected Rs 8,721.14 crore from unknown sources.
Currently, there are seven national parties – the BJP, Congress, Bahujan Samaj Party, Nationalist Congress Party, Communist Party of India (CPI), Communist Party of India-Marxist and All India Trinamool Congress.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Asks Late. BJP Leader Gopinath Munde’s daughter and Minister of Rural Development, Women and Child Welfare Pankaja Munde to leave the Govt and take revenge from the BJP for her father’s murder.
Mumbai: Mumbai Congress, under the leadership of Sanjay Nirupam carried out a protest outside the Collector’s office in Bandra demanding scrapping of EVM Machines and bringing back the ballot paper system.
Sanjay Nirupam said, “The entire country now knows that while the BJP and RSS were busy campaigning for the 2014 polls, the BJP goons rigged the election results by hacking the EVM Machines. The BJP and PM Narendra Modi have violated our constitution and its sanctity. We are not against using technology or the EVM machines but unfortunately these machines are being used for vested interests by the BJP. The Congress Party has always been voted in power with genuine votes unlike the BJP. The Election Commission has no right to defend the EVM machines if these machines are being used for manipulating the poll results”.
Sanjay Nirupam also stated that Late BJP Leader Gopinath Munde’s daughter and Minister of Rural Development, Women and Child Welfare Pankaja Munde must exit the BJP Govt and take revenge of her father’s murder from the BJP.
Nirupam had earlier suspected the EVM machines being hacked after the 2014 poll results came out. Today he urged all the Congress party workers to go to every street of the city and educate the masses about the reality of the 2014 poll results.
General Secretary of All India Mahila Congress Nagma Morarji who was also present at the protest said, “The women as well as the Constitution of our country are in danger today. We need to bring back ballot paper system and overthrow the EVM Machines. Similarly, we need to get rid of the BJP rule and elect Shri. Rahul Gandhi as our Prime Minister in the future”.
Sanjay Nirupam also met with the Mumbai suburban District Collector Sachin Kurve and presented a resolution urging the Collector to take necessary steps in order to eliminate the EVM machines and bring the ballot paper system back in the upcoming polls.
The slogans given by hundreds of people who had gathered outside the Collector’s office clearly indicated that the masses have now lost their trust in the EVM machines.
The protest came in after cyber expert Syed Shuja on Monday claimed that the EVM Machines were hacked during the 2014 elections raising questions over the credibility of the EVM Machines. Shuja further claimed that late BJP leader Gopinath Munde was killed since he knew about the EVM Machines being hacked.
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
By Milinda Ghosh Roy,
Kolkata : Even as West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee went all out to bring leaders of 23 opposition parties on one stage and launched a stinging attack against the Narendra Modi regime at her ‘United India Rally’, political analysts said it might not be enough to catapult her as the prime face of anti-BJP politics as her party lacks a national presence.
Terming Banerjee “a national leader in her own merit”, political analyst Udayan Bandyopadhyay said the January 19 mega rally might have added more significance to Banerjee’s continuous tirade against the BJP government. But it is too early to predict whether she can emerge as the face of the opposition, with her party’s geographical limitation also being a hindrance.
“At the moment the rally might have added significance to her efforts. But her Trinamool Congress does not have any presence outside West Bengal so practically the party can’t have a lot of impact on national politics. But it is true that the more Lok Sabha seats Trinamool gets, the easier it would become for them to bargain in the post-election scenario,” Bandyopadhyay told IANS.
“She was rail minister under two governments and also a long term MP. She is a national leader in her own merit. But it is too early to say that she would be the face of the opposition. The alliance would need more time to materialise,” he noted.
The analyst claimed most of the opposition leaders attended Banerjee’s rally to fulfil their personal agenda and said Banerjee has to give these personal agendas suitable political articulation to lead them.
“Most of the leaders have come together to protect their self-interests. They want to save their parties from getting marginalised. Leaders like (former prime minister H.D.) Deve Gowda and (Karnataka chief minister H.D.) Kumaraswami of the JD(S) came here so that their government in Karnataka can be saved,” he said.
“If she can give a political articulation to these self-interests, it can be of a different significance but the parties have not reached that point yet. That would be a post-election phenomenon,” said Bandopadhyay, a professor of Political Science in Bangabasi College.
Another political analyst, Anil Kumar Jana, claimed that Banerjee’s effort to lead an anti-BJP front may fail as most leaders have come to the alliance to put pressure on the BJP and might go the other way if they are helped out by the ruling regime.
“Except Mamata Banerjee and the DMK in Tamil Nadu, most of the other leaders are busy bargaining with the BJP to solve their own crisis. The alliance for them is a pressure tactics on the BJP. They are more interested in bargaining with the BJP than forming an opposition front. So the picture of the opposition alliance is still not clear,” Jana told IANS.
“It cannot be said that Mamata successfully projected herself as the face of opposition. The absence of (BSP Chief) Mayawati, who is another prime ministerial aspirant, is also significant in this regard,” he said.
“It is very much possible that the likes of Chandrababu Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party and H.D. Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal-Secular, might backtrack on their anti-BJP stand and even form an alliance with them if the BJP negotiates with them. Banerjee’s anti-BJP rally and her efforts will lose its significance at that point,” Jana said.
However, Banerjee’s party leadership was convinced that she is now the face of the anti-BJP opposition.
“This rally in terms of attendance, duration and number of leaders is a record. She not only provided a common platform to the anti-BJP forces, but her efforts were also roundly appreciated by the leaders present on the dais.
“It’s a big achievement. Not only our party, the entire country now holds her as the prime anti-BJP face,” Trinamool Secretary General and state minister Partha Chatterjee told IANS.
The Bengal BJP leadership, on the other hand, said the people would reject Banerjee.
“She brought all corrupt leaders on one stage. Her party is the pinnacle of corruption in Bengal. It is a meeting of the corrupt, who are talking about destabilising a stable and honest government led by Modi ji. People will not like it. They will reject her,” BJP National Secretary Rahul Sinha said.
State CPI-M legislator Sujan Chakraborty claimed Banerjee’s “utopian dream” of becoming the Prime Minister would remain a dream as she has failed to convince the people about her credibility as an anti-BJP face due to her party’s “constant but secret understanding” with the saffron outfit.
(Milinda Ghosh Roy can be contacted at milinda.r@ians.in))
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance, News, Politics
New Delhi : The Congress on Friday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of compromising national security in the Rafale deal by “denying” to the IAF 90 aircraft it desperately needed and “gifted” Dassault Rs 186 crore more per aircraft at the cost of the public exchequer in the deal it signed with France.
Citing a media report that India ended up paying 41 per cent more per aircraft for the 36 fighter jets ordered in 2015, Congress leader P. Chidambaram also expressed alarm over how objections by three senior Defence Ministry officials “to all aspects of the deal announced by Modi” were overruled by the other members in the negotiating team.
“Since Modi announced the new deal in April, 2015 and scrapped the UPA era deal, one question that has loomed large is why the Modi government rejected the need and demand of 126 aircraft made by the Indian Air Force (IAF) and decided to buy only 36 Rafale fighters.
“This question has never been answered either by the Prime Minister, the Defence Minister, the Finance Minister or the Law Minister, who all at one point or the other have come out in defence of the deal,” Chidambaram told the media at the AICC.
Citing the 13 India-specific enhancements (ISEs) asked by the IAF, Chidambaram said the negotiated price was euro 1.3 billion which was to be paid under both the UPA and the Modi deal.
“If 126 aircraft had been purchased, Dassault would have recovered the Euro 1.4 billion in over 10 years and 6 months. But with only 36 aircraft being purchased under the new deal, this will be recovered in just 36 months.
“Dassault gains in two ways. Firstly the increase of price per aircraft, secondly if the government orders for another 90 aircraft, Dassault will again charge for India-specific enhancements,” he said.
“Dassault is laughing all the way to the bank. The government has wronged the country in two ways – compromised national security by denying to the IAF 90 aircraft they desperately need and cost the public money 25 million euro more per aircraft that is equal to 186 crore more per aircraft,” he said.
While the Modi government and the BJP have been citing the Supreme Court verdict to have established the deal to be clean and defeated the Congress’ attempts to malign the Modi government, Chidambaram said the issue was a matter not to be judicially scrutinised as the court does not have the jurisdiction and reiterated the demand for a probe by a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC).
“Besides the price factor, the media report revealed how every aspect of the deal has been objected by three members of the negotiating team and how their objections were overruled by 4:3 by the team. We have heard this happening only in judiciary not in the government decision-making process. We reiterate the demand for a JPC.”
“Only a parliamentary panel has the right to call people, examine documents and ask questions. That is why we are pressing for a JPC. But we know this government will never agree for that,” added Chidambaram.
To a suggestion that the coming session will be a “lame duck” sitting and a JPC cannot be formed, he said “if in the first week of January the Parliament is not a lame duck, why should it be so from the First of February.”
The former finance minister said if the government thought that it had succeeded in giving a “quiet burial” to the Rafale controversy it was wrong. “The controversy is very much alive and this morning it acquired a new dimension,” he said.
He said this also raised serious questions about the process of decision making in the NDA government. “The man who got away was Manohar Parrikar (the then Defence Minister) who passed the buck to the Cabinet Committee on Security! Clever man!.”
Should the government place an order for another 90 aircraft on Dassault it will certainly charge ISE-loaded price at which it sold 36 aircraft although the ISI cost would have been recovered on the sale of 36 aircraft. “Perhaps for this reason the government deleted ‘follow on’ clause to buy more aircraft,” he said.
The UPA government had negotiated a deal to purchase 126 Rafale fighter jets of which 18 were to be bought in fly-away condition and the remaining 108 to be manufactured in India under licence. However, the NDA government entered into an inter-government agreement with France to buy 36 jets in fly-away condition.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Mohan Bhagwat
Nagpur : Taking a swipe at the BJP-led government at the Centre, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat on Monday wondered why soldiers were dying on the country’s borders though there is no war and on the delays in constructing the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
Speaking at the silver jubilee of the Prahaar Samaaj Jagruti Sanstha here on Thursday evening, he rued that soldiers continued to be killed on the borders without a war going on.
“It is because we are not doing our job properly. Before Independence, people sacrificed their live for the country. After freedom, it was on the borders during a war. There is no war on…. still people are getting martyred,” Bhagwat said.
Maintaining that “there is no reason” why a soldier should die at the borders, he pointed out that “it is happening even without a war.”
In an obvious expression of displeasure over the delays in constructing the Ram temple in Ayodhya, RSS general secretary Suresh ‘Bhaiyyaji’ Joshi sarcastically remarked that “now, it (the temple) will be constructed in 2025.”
The reference was to the series of delays, political and legal tangles bogging the BJP’s assurances of taking up the temple construction, which its ally in Maharashtra and centre the Shiv Sena has also repeatedly criticized in the past.
Bhagwat also urged the people and society at large to contribute to make the country great.
He asked each person to strive for this and not leave everything to the government, the police and the army to do it.
—IANS
