by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Jalpaiguri/Kolkata : Prime Minister Narendra Modi and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee exchanged a flurry of verbal punches on Friday, as he accused her of trying to save those involved in ponzi scheme scams, alleging that opposition parties were coming together to protect fraudsters, touts and criminals. Banerjee hit back by calling him the “master of corruption”.
Launching a scathing attack on Banerjee, the Prime Minister wondered why she was so scared of the probe into the scam, and charged her with inviting leaders from all over the country against whom there are either serious allegations of graft or those who were trying to protect the “corrupt” and said none of the offenders will be spared.
“It has happened for the first time in the history of the nation that a Chief Minister sat in a dharna in support of those who looted thousands of poor people. She is trying to protect the looters and those who ruined the lives of the poor,” Modi said while addressing a public rally at Churabhandar in the state’s Jalpaiguri district.
Banerjee held a 45-hour sit-in protest in the hub of Kolkata following an ugly face-off between the Central Bureau of Investigation officers and personnel of the Kolkata police, when the federal probe agency had shown up near the residence of the Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev kumar to quiz him in the ponzi scheme scam case.
Kumar had headed the Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed by Banerjee to probe the multi-billion-rupee financial scandal before the CBI took over the investigation following a Supreme Court order.
“The people of Bengal want to ask her why she is so scared of the probe into the chit fund scam. Why is she holding dharna for those who are accused of callousness in probing the scandal?” Modi questioned.
“I want to assure all the families who suffered in the Saradha, Narada and Rose Valley scams that the ‘chowkidaar’ (guard) will not spare anybody — be it the looters or their protectors, no one will be spared,” Modi said.
Refering to the January 19 rally of opposition leaders in Kolkata, Modi said: “These leaders came together to protect the fraudsters, touts and criminals… They can assemble as many people as they want to hold dharnas, and gather as many leaders as possible, the people who looted the poor will be punished”.
Upping his ante against the Banerjee government, the Prime Minister said the situation in Bengal is such that infiltrators are welcome, but there is a bar on BJP leaders.
“Obstructing rallies, refusing to allow helicopters to land and attacks on BJP functionarie are signals that the land is slipping from under the Trinamool’s feet,” Modi said, evoking cheers from thousands of party activists present at the rally ground.
In Kolkata, Banerjee minced no words in returning the fire, as she called Modi “master of corruption and arrogance”, and one “used to blaring out a bunch of lies”.
“Country has not seen any person as corrupt as Modi. From Rafale to the scheme of 59 minutes loans for MSMEs, to demonetisation, Jan Dhan — these are all scams. All the institutions have been destroyed.
“He is a master of corruption, arrogance and used to blaring out a bunch of lies. His standard is so below par, we cannot imagine it even. We respect the chair but not Maddy babu,” Banerjee said, distorting Modi’s name.
Describing the Centre’s plan to take action against five senior police officers who were involved in the face-off between the Kolkata Police and CBI officials as part of “campaign” before polls, Banerjee said the Centre cannot take action against them, as they were state officers.
Banerjee also found fault with Modi for inaugurating the circuit bench of the Calcutta High Court in north Bengal’s Jalpaiguri, alleging he was “doing politics” by inguarating projects “hurriedly” ahead of the polls.
“I am ashamed to talk about this man. The circuit bench is under the Calcutta High Court. Was anyone from the Calcutta High Court present at the inauguration? Neither state government (officials) nor anyone from high court was present there,” Banerjee said.
She alleged that the Central government did not spend a single penny on the circuit bench project in which about Rs 300 crore were spent by the state.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance, News, Politics
New Delhi : Prime Minister Narendra Modi will flag off the indigenously built Train 18, called the Vande Bharat Express, on February 15 from here, a Railway Ministry official said.
Train 18, the country’s first engine-less train manufactured by the Integral Coach Factory in Chennai, will be flagged off at 10 a.m. from the New Delhi railway station.
“He will also address people while flagging off the train,” the official said on Wednesday.
The passengers travelling from New Delhi to Varanasi in the executive class will be charged Rs 399 for morning tea, breakfast and lunch, while travellers in the chair car will need to pay Rs 344 for the same.
While the passengers travelling from New Delhi to Kanpur and Prayagraj will have to pay Rs 155 and Rs 122 for executive class and chair car, respectively.
From Varanasi to New Delhi, the passengers will be charged Rs 349 and Rs 288 in the executive class and chair, respectively. They will be served evening tea with snacks and dinner.
The Railway Ministry had earlier indicated that the fare of Train 18 would be 40-50 per cent higher than that of the Shatabdi Express.
Railway Minister Piyush Goyal had earlier said that the indigenously built train would complete the distance of 795 km in eight hours, 35 per cent faster than other fastest trains on route.
Train 18recently became India’s fastest train by hitting a speed of over 180 kmph during a trial run.
It would soon start replacing the Shatabdi Express trains and run between Delhi and Varanasi.
The gleaming blue-nosed train comes fitted with the world class amenities like high-speed on-board WiFi, GPS-based passenger information system, touch-free bio-vacuum toilets, LED lighting, mobile charging points and a climate control system that adjusts the temperature accordingly.
The 16-coach train will have two executive compartments which will have 52 seats each and trailer coaches will have 78 seats each.
The executive class will have rotating seats to match the direction of the train.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Interviews, Politics
Ruchir Sharma
By Saket Suman,
New Delhi : The popularity graph of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has fallen drastically and what seemed a year ago as another wrestling match “with only one boxer in the ring” now seems a Lok Sabha election too close to call, says global investor and bestselling author Ruchir Sharma.
Sharma, who has been chasing election campaigns in India for over two decades and has just written “Democracy on the Road”, says that this change reflects the strength of Indian democracy and is particularly significant at a time when obituaries calling the death of democracy rule the roost in many parts of the world.
This neck and neck fight at a time when there is so much despair about democracy in the world, Sharma said, shows how deeply rooted India’s democratic set up is.
He said that Modi had begun eyeing the Prime Minister’s post long before 2014 and following him closely during the election campaigns, Sharma could make out as early as 2012 what his real ambition was. On the other hand, Congress President Rahul Gabdhi was a very different person, immature, not interested in listening, and with not-so-good campaigning skills.
Cut to the present, Sharma said, Rahul Gandhi has changed, he is much more sensitive, he seems to listen and engage more.
“He seems like a full-time politician now, even his campaigning skills have changed, he implies shout-and-call technique a lot more like Modi. There has been a significant change in him,” Sharma told IANS in an interview.
But what really is going to stop Modi?
Sharma said that there is a gap between what prevails in popular media and the actual mood of the voters in the hinterland. He said the 2019 elections will be a true parliamentary election where regional leaders, instead of the prime ministerial candidate(s), will sway the votes.
“India is just not cut for a presidential election. There was a Modi wave in 2014 but even then it was restricted to the north and parts of the West but BJP’s vote share was still only 31 per cent. The mood of the voters will vary from state to state as to what alliances are stitched up,” he added.
He said that Priyanka Gandhi’s entry is too late to make an appeal in Eastern UP.
Describing her as a “charismatic leader” on the ground, Sharma maintained that her plunge is too late because of the caste blocks in Eastern UP. He, however, said that the greatest difference she can make is if she stands as “the combined Opposition candidate from Varanasi against Modi”.
She has to do something as big as that because then the energy will be focussed in one big constituency that will have a larger impact, he said.
According to Sharma, the biggest difference between the 2014 and the 2019 general elections will be that in 2014 the BJP was “far too ahead in the social media game” whereas now the other parties have caught up too and “the gap has narrowed”.
He said that in a country as diverse and heterogeneous as India, it is very difficult for one leader to dominate a nationwide election.
There is hardly any discussion about Rahul Gandhi or Modi in Tamil Nadu, it’s always about the regional leaders. That’s how our country is, it will not be easy for one centrist person to dominate the elections, he said.
(Saket Suman can be contacted at saket.s@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Kolkata/New Delhi : The unprecedented stand-off between the Narendra Modi government and the Mamata Banerjee government in West Bengal stretched to the second day on Monday as the feisty Chief Minister continued her sit-in, emboldened by the support from opposition parties from various states, some of them even joining her on the dais.
With the centre-state showdown showing no signs of abating, Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi sent a detailed report to New Delhi after Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh called for it, and central paramilitary force troopers kept strict vigil at the CBI offices here.
Parallelly, Kolkata police sent notice to a top Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officer in an old case.
The action-filled confrontation that began on Sunday evening when CBI officials showed up near the Loudon Street residence of Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar for questioning him in connection with the probe into the ponzi scheme scam, also rocked Parliament and reached the legal corridors in both New Delhi and the eastern metropolis.
Banerjee, flanked by her senior ministers and top Trinamool Congress leaders, skipped dinner and stayed up the entire night on a makeshift dais in the Dharamtala area, near the Metro Y Channel after beginning the protest around 9 p.m. on Sunday.
On Monday, Banerjee seemed completely at ease doing what she has always revelled in – street protest – and yet again lent her full backing to Kumar, a 1989 batch IPS officer who had headed the Special Investigation Team formed to probe the Ponzi scam in 2013, a year before the CBI took over the case following Supreme Court’s order.
Banerjee claimed that the centre is tagging the honest people as thieves while the “real thieves” are at large.
” I was peeved when they tried to get to Rajeev Kumar… He is leading the force. If Kumar is thief, whose money has he taken?” she asked.
She claimed her “Satyagraha” was “non-political” and not against an individual agency but to oppose the “anarchic moves” by the Modi government to destroy democracy.
“Our protest is against the attempts to divide the country and spread hate, intimidation and terror among people,” she said, as her party activists put up rail and road blockades at various parts of the state, took out protest rallies with back flags and burnt Modi’s effigy.
Banerjee claimed she was getting support from across the country and said the demonstration might continue till February 8. Interestingly, Modi is scheduled to address a public meeting in north Bengal on that day.
Samajwadi Party national vice president Kiranmoy Nanda joined Banerjee at the sit-in for some time, and dubbed the CBI action as a “conspiracy”. Later, Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Tejashwi Yadav and DMK’s Kanimozhi also came to extend solidarity to Banerjee.
Meanwhile, the strength of the Central Reserve Police Force troopers deployed at the CBI offices at Nizam Palace and the CGO Complex in Salt Lake on Sunday night, was bolstered on Monday with one more company pressed into service.
“We have come here to provide security to the CBI personnel and the documents kept here,” said a CRPF trooper on condition of anonymity.
On the other hand, in a tit for tat move, the Kolkata Police served a notice to CBI joint director and head of zone (Kolkata) Pankaj Kumar Srivastava in connection with “wrongful restraint” and “wrongful confinement” of two businessmen in August last year.
Srivastava, who left for Delhi during the day with documents to help CBI lawyers in the legal fight at the Supreme Court, said he would consult his lawyers before responding to the notice.
In New Delhi, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta sought an urgent apex court hearing on Monday itself on a CBI plea describing the situation as “extraordinary”, and fearing “evidence will be destroyed”, but Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi declined it saying “there’s no evidence of what you’re saying right now”.
The court said it would hear the matter on Tuesday.
“If you show one proof they are tampering or even remotely thinking of it, we’ll come down so heavily that they will regret it,” said Gogoi.
In Kolkata, the state government approached the Calcutta High Court pleading for an urgent hearing against the CBI’s attempt to question Rajeev Kumar at his residence despite a stay order from the court.
However, Justice Shivakant Prasad listed it for Tuesday.
Both the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha witnessed uproar as opposition parties led by the Trinamool Congress protested vehemently against the CBI raid in Kolkata, calling it a misuse of the agency against political opponents, forcing the presiding officers to adjourn the Houses for the day.
Prior to the adjournment, Rajnath Singh defended CBI action, and told the Lok Sabha that the move to stop the central probe agency from performing its duties is “unlawful” and a threat to the country’s federal system.
Senior BJP leaders questioned why Banerjee was going all out to save Kumar.
Human Resource Development Minister Prakash Javadekar asked whether she wanted to save herself or the top cop, while Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said Kumar was being protected as he knew some “secrets”.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Vijaypur (Samba) : Terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir is now being fought effectively, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Sunday.
“Our security forces including the Jammu and Kashmir Police have been battling terrorism,” Modi told a public rally in Vijaypur town in Samba district on his arrival here after visiting the Ladakh region.
“I salute martyrs like Naik Nazir Ahmed Wani, Aurangzeb Khan and others,” he added. “Terrorism is now being effectively dealt with in the state.”
Modi said the government was building 14,000 bunkers for the safety of people living along the border with Pakistan to escape frequent firing and shelling by Pakistani forces.
The border residents, he said, led “a tough life”.
Modi also spoke about the displaced Kashmiri Pandit community.
“The Central government is committed to protect the honour and dignity of our Kashmiri Pandit brothers. They have suffered due to terrorism.
“This pain has always been in my heart. The promised 3,000 jobs for the Kashmiri Pandits have been rolled out.
“We are committed to democracy. The 70 per cent voter turnout in the recently held Panchayat elections is a victory for the people and the state administration.”
—IANS
