by admin | May 25, 2021 | Interviews, Politics
By V.S. Chandrasekar & Mohd Asim Khan,
New Delhi : Ruling out the possibility of going back to paper ballots in place of electronic voting machines (EVMs), the Election Commission says it is working on a formula that will “minimise errors and maximise confidence” of the stakeholders in the working of the electronic voting machines.
It also says simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha and the assemblies are not possible now given the legal constraints. It says no political party has demanded going back to ballot papers at an all-party meeting with the Election Commission recently.
“I have been reading in the newspapers. That’s why it must be coming in the media. Some editorials have come, some lead articles have come (about EVMs) that something which has eradicated booth capturing has eradicated the muscle power. The EVMs have eradicated that stigma on the our voters that they cannot even vote; that so many votes are invalidated. Even at times victory margin is less than number of invalid votes.
“So all these issues have been flagged by even media that there is no point going back to that (paper ballots). Why do you want to bring back those days? When people never used to talk about campaigner or anything, now they would talk how many booths did you capture. If you captured 83 and I have captured 150. I am going to win,” Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) O.P. Rawat told IANS in an interview at his office at Nirvachan Sadan, the headquarters of the Election Commission of India.
He was replying to a question on the opposition demand for going back to the paper ballot system in view of the apprehensions that the EVMS could be manipulated, an allegation some major opposition parties have levelled in the past few years after electoral defeats.
The parties also demanded increasing the sample number of Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) for physical counting to cross check whether the vote had gone to the intended candidate.
Rawat also said no party demanded dispensing with the EVMs and a total return to the paper ballots during the all-party conference convened by the Election Commission last month.
“Yes, I have been reading in the newspapers,” he said when told about the claim of some leaders of having made such a demand.
“Media has been telling that and, therefore, the Election Commission is just acting as the constitutional authority to conduct the elections and in the process the Commission has to keep all major stakeholders satisfied. Therefore, we are trying to convince them since in the all-party meeting they all said that the number (of VVPATs) should be increased (for taking up sample counting).”
The CEC said at the all-party meeting basically the points raised by parties included that either more slips of VVPATs should be counted because right now the counting is done from only one randomly-selected polling station.
“So as of now, VVPATs will be counted in 4,120 Assembly constituencies that form part of the 543 Lok Sabha constituencies. But since they (parties) have suggested that more should be counted, the Commission is seized of the matter. The Commission is examining.
“There are two issues — one is our stakeholders should be happy and satisfied but at the same time, since we are operating in a global environment it will be decided whether it (sample) should be one per cent, 10 per cent or 12 per cent. It will be done on a scientific basis to minimise the error and maximise the confidence level of the stakeholders…..so statistically, it will be a sample size which minimises errors and maximises the confidence level to 99.9999 per cent…that kind of thing the Commission is looking for,” the CEC said.
Asked what would be the ideal size of samples, he said, “if that was known, we would have ordered that. We need statisticians to work on this. So I can’t predict how many days it will take but it will take more days.”
To another query, Rawat said “the issue was not of practicability but a solution that is acceptable to all and whenever this solution is available, say within the next two-three weeks, the Commission will take a decision.”
But, he said, he cannot say definitely whether the new solution could be applied in the coming round of Assembly elections in four or five states.
Asked about the demand from opposition parties for a cap on the expenses on party account, Rawat said there can be no different views on this. The Commission has already submitted a reform proposal that would like a ceiling on the party expenditure like there is a ceiling on candidates’ expenditure.
“But this question should be put to all the parties. Because it is not that this party is in power for eternity. you were in power…you could have brought it,” he said.
Asked about the simultaneous elections being pushed by BJP, the CEC said it was not possible given the current laws as the Constitution had to be amended and there should be amendments in other electoral laws.
He said even the Law Commission has said what the Election Commission had said in 2016. “But the Election Commission had said this in 2015 when we were asked that you (Parliament) will have to amend the Constitution. Sections of the Representation of the People Act have to be amended since you have to provide for logistics.
“Logistics would have three issues. One is the number of machines, number two Central Armed Police Force because generally political parties these days insist we don’t have any faith in the state police. So if you want simultaneous elections you will need more whatever is available now will not do. So more of that, then more of vehicles, more of police personnel, more of all that. So those are logistical issues that will have to be addressed before doing it.”
(V.S. Chandrasekar can be contacted at chandru.v@ians.in and Mohd Asim Khan at mohd.a@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business, Business Summit, Events, Interviews, Large Enterprise
Anand Mahindra
By Vishal Gulati,
San Francisco : India is already playing a leading role in lowering global emissions. The country’s efforts in mainstreaming renewable energy and energy efficiency are remarkable. These, and its ambition in the electric mobility space, are admired across the globe, says Mahindra Group Executive Chairman Anand Mahindra.
For him, climate change needs to be addressed and he has called on businesses worldwide to commit to science-based targets (SBTs), which aimed to reduce emissions as underpinned by the historic 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement, the first-ever legally binding treaty adopted by 197 countries that came in force on November 4, 2016.
“India’s social programmes like Ujala (bio-mass to LPG) and Swachh Bharat are very innovative and effective ways of addressing the issues of both planet and people on a large scale where they can actually create a positive impact,” Mahindra told IANS in an interview here.
He’s hereto co-chair the Global Climate Action Summit (GCAS) that aims to encourage all stakeholders to raise their ambition with many new possibilities emerging out of the discussions.
A firm believer that climate change needs to be addressed, he was categorically clear in saying that no nation can afford to ignore this.
“But as I said earlier, everyone needs to do more. There is a lot that developed countries are doing and we look forward to the steps they take as these actions help the global effort, due to advances in technology that others can learn from and emulate.”
On the status on the adoption of science-based climate targets, Mahindra said nearly three years on from Paris, the race is on to meet the target of holding global temperature rise to under two degrees Celsius, helping avoid the worst effects of climate change by achieving peak greenhouse gas emissions by 2020.
“At this summit, new evidence will be presented to demonstrate that companies around the world, and in some of the highest-emitting industries, are taking action to make the transition to the low-carbon business models of the future.”
Currently, 20 Mahindra Group companies have signed up for the science-based climate targets, with Mahindra Sanyo Special Steels being the first steel company in the world to get its targets approved.
This covers more than 90 per cent of the Group’s emissions and other Group companies are in the process of signing up for these targets, he said.
Mahindra sees business value in adopting these targets that he announced to commit at the World Economic Forum in January this year.
“We have already seen remarkable value in reducing emissions through the EP100 programme which aims to double energy productivity in our main businesses — auto, farm equipment and holiday resorts. Science-based targets are a way of ensuring that ambition is stepped up and action is aligned to the target set by the Paris Agreement.”
“The need for sustainability in business is creating a tectonic shift of mindset, as dramatic as moving from smoke signals to Skype. The scale involved in moving from combustion engines to electric, from conventional to alternative energy, opens up a new world of business possibilities.”
He said the creation of new technologies and leveraging them to create new businesses is a huge opportunity for the future.
This includes retro-fitting homes, buildings, and factories, to make them more energy efficient; and manufacturing literally billions of energy efficient appliances for lighting, heating, cooking, cooling, and washing for every home.
“We are talking about massive scale once consumers change their lifestyle. The potential investment in wind and solar energy alone, over the next two decades, is six trillion dollars.
“Beside the business case for sustainability, we as a company have discovered that everything we have done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions has given us a financial return.”
An optimistic Mahindra said the GCAS would encourage all stakeholders to raise their ambition with many new possibilities emerging out of the discussions.
The commitments made in the lead-up to GCAS have already created momentum and GCAS will help carry this through.
As a platform to address the challenge of climate change, the GCAS to my mind is already a success.
“For me, the work toward GCAS began at Davos when we issued the SBT (science-based targets) challenge to other global corporations. The challenge has gained huge momentum and more than 470 companies have already signed up for these SBTs.
“I am sure that the conversations at GCAS will sustain and even increase the momentum that has been created. We have Indian steel and cement companies that have come forward to sign onto these SBTs. These sectors are known to be hard-to-abate, yet Indian companies have shown vision and ambition in taking this action. These point toward strong signs of success for GCAS already,” he said.
The three-day climate action summit, an initiative by California Governor Jerry Brown, began here on Wednesday amidst the presence of 4,000-plus business leaders, investors, citizens and government representatives from all over the world, coming together with the united resolve to “take ambition to the next level”.
(Vishal Gulati is in San Francisco at the invitation of the Climate Trends to cover the Global Climate Action Summit (GCAS). He can be contacted at vishal.g@ians.in )
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Interviews
By V.S. Chandrasekar and Mohd Asim Khan,
New Delhi : Assembly elections will not be held in Telangana along with those in four states this year-end if the preparedness of the poll machinery in the southern state is not “statisfactory”, Chief Election Commissioner O.P. Rawat said on Wednesday.
Elections can be held in January or February in Telangana which has time upto March 5, 2019 for constitution of the new Assembly, he said.
“I can’t say. There is a compulsion that it must be held within six months but let me clarify there is no such law. This six months time frame is based on a Supreme Court ruling. The apex court says elections must be held at the first instance after dissolution of a state assembly and should not be delayed more than six months,” Rawat told IANS in an interview.
He was asked about the early possibility of polls in Telangana where the government headed by Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) has dissolved the Assembly and sought early elections.
Pressed further if there was a possibility of the polls in Telangana being held separately from those to be held in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Mizoram, he said, “If their (Telangana’s) preparedness is not satisfactory, we will not take a risk (of holding immediate elections).
“But if the state is prepared, there is no reason we can’t hold elections there along with Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Mizoram. We can hold polls if Telangana is prepared. But there is a big ‘if’,” he said.
Rawat said that since the Supreme Court wants to hold elections at the earlist or as soon as possible, “we have taken immediate steps” for the conduct of polls.
Asked if it was still a matter of work to be done before the Commission comes to a conclusion on the election schedule in Telangana, the CEC said: “Correct.”
Giving the background of the process of elections in Telangana, he said “since Telangana Assembly has been dissolved, we immediately started preparations for the next assembly polls in the state. We have asked the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of Telangana about the level of preparedness. We got his inputs and have sent a team from here.”
The Telangana CEO has said he “is battle ready, but we will wait for the report of our team. We always verify. The Commission always verifies on the ground whatever claim is made about poll preparedness,” the CEC said.
To a question whether the Telangana polls can be clubbed with the polls in the four states, Rawat said, “I can’t say if Telangana can be clubbed with the four states. The other states have been preparing for over two months, whereas Telangana was preparing for the Lok Sabha polls. But how far they are prepared, it will be assessed by the EC team.”
Rawat indicated that if Telangana polls were not held along with those in four states, then it would not be held close to completion of the polls in those states, where elections should be completed by mid-December.
Asked whether in that case polls in Telangana could be pushed to December, he said “it can be in January or February. They have time up to March 5.”
Giving reasons as to why polls cannot be held in close succession, he said: “The tradition has been to not hold elections in a series because the result of one affects the outcomes of others. It is not held in that proximity. One or two months gap is ok. Not 10 days (gap),” he added.
Asked about the controversy regarding the talk of a virtual schedule by Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao after dissolving the Assembly, Rawat said, “This is not acceptable. This is wrong. The sole authority to announce elections is vested with the Election Commission. It is for the poll authority to announce a poll schedule. Nobody else can do it. It is wrong. It is not legal.”
To a query about the Chief Minister’s claim that he had talked to the CEC, he said: “The CM never met us or talked to me.”
It was the chief secretary, who met officials in the Commission and dropped the hint about the dissolution and early polls.
A former Chief Secretary from the state also met officials and dropped the hint. Both were told by EC officials that “we don’t speak on hypothetical situation. The Assembly is still there,” he said.
To queries about lack of updated rolls in Telangana, Rawat said: “There is no point in time when there is no electoral roll. There is always a roll. In Telangana too, we have an electoral roll with reference to January 1, 2018. Only thing is when polls are to be held, the Commission takes the pain of revising the electoral rolls to provide one more opportunity to those people who missed the bus.”
In this connection, he said, the election authorities in the state have been asked to take up the second summary revision of rolls and complete it by October 8 so that the rolls are ready for the polls.
(V.S. Chandrasekar and Mohd Asim Khan can be contacted at chandru.v@ians.in and mohd.a@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Interviews
By Saket Suman,
New Delhi : Bestselling author Chetan Bhagat, who has taken a leap of faith in his upcoming novel “The Girl in Room 105” in which the protagonists are a Kashmiri Muslim girl and her lover from an RSS-affiliated family, says that Muslims, particularly from Kashmir, are victims of “unintentional racism” on a daily basis in the Indian mainstream.
“After having researched and written this book, it is my belief that the first step to understanding things would be to know what is happening. Most Indians don’t know a thing about Kashmir. All they know (about) is Indian Army and terrorists. I think that is like a very narrow-minded way of looking at the problem,” Bhagat, whose novels have sold hundreds of thousands of copies and have been inspiration for blockbuster Bollywood movies like “Three Idiots”, told IANS in an interview here.
He related that once he was on a panel interviewing MBA candidates for a business school when one of the aspirants introduced himself and said: “Sir, I am from Kashmir but I am not a terrorist.” On another occasion, Bhagat was caught in traffic on Mumbai’s Western Express highway while on way to boarding a flight.
“I didn’t know what to do. I got out of my car and asked a young boy on a bike to drop me to the airport. He took me but said that I will drop you a little further from the airport because there are some cops there. I enquired what the issue was. His reply: ‘I am a Muslim guy on a bike at the airport, they will trouble me’,” Bhagat said.
“If I am not a Muslim I don’t realise what they go through. I know there are no riots and people are not burning each other but it is this daily feeling that I better maintain a low profile, stay away from the crowd, that is more disturbing. I think that should not be the case in a free country. People need to understand that our country is becoming too polarised,” he quipped.
He acknowledged that there are some “terrible things” happening but the bigger issue, according to the author, is what the Muslims go through on a daily basis.
“I am aware that there are complex issues but broadly you first need to talk to them and they need to talk to you. The more Kashmiri youths interact with the rest of the country and vice versa, the better our prospects are.
“They don’t have cinema there, their internet goes down so many times, I mean that’s not the way the people of our own country deserve to live, right? Just because they are from Kashmir, they live with it everyday. There is an implied, unintentional racism happening all the time,” Bhagat maintained.
He said that books are “one of the best mediums” of bringing about a change.
“Right now, people see Kashmiris, and Kashmiri Muslims particularly, and think that they are different from us. But the moment they will read my story, where a Kashmiri Muslim girl is living in a hostel and doing things that any of us do, they will realise that Kashmiri Muslims are also just like me and you…It will give a clearer understanding of the issue than mere statistics and experts in TV panels can. The aim is to familiarise people with the Kashmir issue,” he said.
The father of the male protagonist in “The Girl in Room 105” is a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
“I think that in itself sparks a discussion. An author’s job is to highlight and mirror the society. I am sure there are many people who know much more about Kashmir than I do but my point is an average Indian is also not an expert. Without judgement, I have tried to present to my readers that you see if this is the country you want to create,” he said.
The book, published by Westland, will be released in October and is currently available for pre-order on Amazon.
“A fair and just society is important. It doesn’t matter what the majority opinion is. You can’t have a system work if you go by what the majority thinks all the time. Justice is justice and the weakest has to be protected first but this is being questioned right now,” Bhagat said, while also pointing out that it is difficult to maintain “a Centrist point of view” in India today.
(Saket Suman can be contacted at saket.s@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Interviews
IT Minister K.T. Rama Rao
By Prashant Sood,
Hyderabad : Notwithstanding the suspense maintained by his father and Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao, state IT Minister K.T. Rama Rao has hinted at the party eyeing early Assembly polls to cash in on its performance in the last four years.
He also appeared to keep all the options open at the national level where it seeks to play a decisive role in the formation of next government at the Centre after the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
In interview to IANS, Rama Rao, whose party held a massive rally on Sunday, said the time has come for the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) to go back to the people and seek their support.
He also said the party will contest the assembly and Lok Sabha polls on its own and work for formation of a federal front that will be opposed to both the BJP and the Congress.
He said there was a lot of speculation in the media about the party going for early dissolution of state assembly and seeking a fresh mandate from the people.
“Certainly there are advantages (of early election). Once a decision is taken, when it is taken, if it is taken, I will be able to say a lot more,” Rama Rao told IANS.
Addressing the rally, the Chief Minister, who said the state cabinet has authorised him to take any decision in the interest of the state, kept up suspense over whether the party would go for early polls merely saying would soon form an election manifesto committee which will come out with several new promises.
There is speculation that the assembly could be dissolved by September 10 and Telangana would go for elections along with four other states by December this year. The term of Telangana assembly comes to an end in June next year and the assembly polls in normal course would be held along with those to the Lok Sabha.
Rama Rao claimed that if elections are held early, the party will win both the state as well as Lok Sabha polls convincingly.
“It will give us room to talk to potential partners and friends for 2019 polls. We will play a decisive role in the national level,” Rama Rao said.
He said TRS would win at least 100 of 119 seats in the state assembly and 16 of 17 Lok Sabha seats in the state.
“Last time we won 11 Lok Sabha seats and this time we hope to improve our performance,” he said.
Rama Rao said neither BJP nor Congress will be able to form government on their own in 2019 and there are many parties which want to be equidistant from the two.
“We will bring together strong regional parties that want to be equidistant from the Congress and BJP. We will form an agenda and move forward in the interest of the country.
“We believe both Congress and BJP have let down the people of the country. There is a strong need for an alternative force to emerge in the country in the form of a federal front. And like TRS there are other a number of other parties which believe in the same theory, same ideology of non-Congress, non-BJP federal front. I believe it is imminent and possible” Rama Rao said.
He said that there was “no national party” and Congress with 48 MPs was also a regional party.
“We are confident that when 2019 election results come, there can be several possibilities and TRS will have an important role. Post election we will do, what we have to,” he said.
Asked if Chandrashekar Rao could move to the Centre after the Lok Sabha polls, Rama Rao said: ” He (KCR) has a lot of work to do here and the state needs his leadership. I am keen that he should stay as CM for at least 10 more years. This is in the interest of the state and the party.”
Answering a query, he said the party will contest the assembly and Lok Sabha on its and there will be “no coalition, no partners, no alliances.”
Asked about possibility of a tie-up with BJP for the Lok Sabha polls, he said: “none whatsoever.”
Answering a query, Rama Rao said the party’s effort was to convert its support among people into votes.
He said Telangana was witnessing a strange situation where the ruling party is signalling readiness for elections while the opposition appears against early polls.
Asked about the charge that TRS was practising dynastic politics with him and his sister K. Kavitha, MP, given important roles, Rama Rao said they had to work hard to make their way up and had come through an agitation.
(Prashant Sood was in Hyderabad at the invitation of the TRS. He can be reached at prashant.s@ians.in)
—IANS
