The body of a 21-year-old girl, who had gone missing from the morning of 25 September, was recovered from a nullah in Mumbai’s Ghatkopar, a police official said on Tuesday, 30th September.
The deceased woman, identified as Deepali Bukane was a resident of Jal Prabhat area of Ramabai Nagar. On September 25, she had left her house in the morning but did not return after which her family members approached the police and filed a missing person case at the Pant Nagar police station.
Pant Nagar police launched a search operation to ascertain the whereabouts the missing girl. Three days after she went missing, the police found her body in a decomposed state from a ditch in Ghatkopar. The police said that they did not find any injury marks on the body, indicating that there was no resistance by her and prima facie appeared as a case of drowning. The body has been sent for post-mortem to determine the exact cause of death.
A 21-year-old girl had gone missing in September 2019 as well
The latest incident is redolent of the missing case of a 21-year-old girl from Mahim in September 2019. The girl had gone missing from Mahim Causeway after she informed her mother on the phone that a suspected drug addict was stalking her. Seconds after informing her mother that she is being possibly tailed by a drug addict, her mother heard a scream on the phone and the call was disconnected.
Hathras shocker: 19-year-old girl gang-raped by a group of men
Recently, the death of the victim after struggling for her life for over two weeks after being attacked by a group of men in UP’s Hathras has again stirred up debates about women’s safety issues and crimes against women. The Hathras victim was brutally strangulated by her attackers, damaging her tongue and spinal cord. The victim, in her police statement, had stated that she was gang-raped by the accused. The four accused have been arrested by the police.
The Nirbhaya gang-rape case, the brutal gang-rape and burning of a veterinarian from Hyderabad last year, and the cases like Hathras incident, raise serious concerns about the efficacy of present laws and judicial process to deter sexual crimes against women.
Finally initiating the investigation into the alleged sexual assault case against filmmaker Anurag Kashyap by actress Payal Ghosh, the Mumbai Police has summonedKashyap on 1st October. He will be to be questioned by the Mumbai police in relation to the case filed by Payal Ghosh in the Versova police station last week.
The actress had also met senior police officers to demand a swift investigation in the matter. She had reportedly stated that if she would sit in a hunger strike if the police investigation is delayed.
The FIR against Kashyap was registered under sections 376 (1), 354, 341 and 342. Reportedly, Ghosh had also filed a complaint against Kashyap under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act for allegedly consuming chemical substances.
Initial inaction by Mumbai Police
Earlier, the Mumbai police was accused of delaying action against the filmmaker. According to reports, Ghosh was made to wait in the police station till late in the night when she went to file her complaint in the police station. Not just that, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) had even declared the society she lives in a containment zone, allegedly to stop her from lodging the complaint.
Ghosh’s Allegations
Ghosh has made allegations of sexual harassment against Kashyap. She had alleged that Kashyap had forced himself on her during a meeting at his house. “I went to meet him and the next day when he took me to the other room, he opened his zip and tried to force his c**k (penis) inside my vagina by opening my Salwar Kameez”, she had alleged. Kashyap allegedly told Ghosh that physical relationships between filmmakers and actresses were very common in the film industry.
Note: This report is updated with latest information.
The Uttar Pradesh government led by CM Yogi Adityanath has constituted a three-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to investigate the heinous Hathras gang rape case.
On Wednesday, the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath constituted an SIT to probe the Hathras rape case and has asked the team to submit the report within seven days.
The Chief Minister has also directed that the trial of the case be held in a fast-track court. The Uttar Pradesh home secretary will be heading the SIT, while DIG Chandraprakash and PAC Sena Nayak Poonam will be its members.
The information was shared on the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister’s office Twitter handle.
Image Source: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister
The Chief Minister also added that the culprits of such an heinous crime in Hathras will not be spared. He added the SIT has been instructed to submit its report in 7 days.
Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath also said that he has spoken to Prime Minister Modi and added that he apprised PM Modi about the incident.
Image Source: Uttar Pradesh CM
Hathras gang rape
On September 14, the victim had visited her farm to collect fodder when she was attacked by a group of men. The teenager was dragged by a dupatta around her neck, causing the spinal injuries, to a field where she was raped and then choked.
The accused were nabbed on Saturday, who had tried to strangulate her to death as she resisted them. In the process, she had ended up biting her tongue and suffering a severe cut on it, police had said.
The 19-year-old died in Safdarjung Hospital on Tuesday, a fortnight after the brutal rape. The victim was brought to Safdarjung Hospital on Monday from Aligarh Muslim University Medical College. In her statement to the police, the victim had named four accused, stating that they had gang-raped her. All the four accused, namely Sandeep, Luvkush, Ravi and Ramu have been arrested by the police. The police had denied the media reports of brutality on the victim, which claimed that her eyes were gouged out and tongue was cut.
SHO of Chandra police station, under whose jurisdiction the incident happened, has been transferred after allegations of delay and negligence.
The Hathras gang-rape victim was cremated on the wee hours of Wednesday by her father in presence of Police and administration. The family has alleged that the police cremated the body forcefully against their wishes. They wished to wait for morning for cremation. However, since it had already been over 24 hours since her demise, Police said that the body had started decomposing.
A monetary compensation of Rs 10 lakh is being given to the family of the victim. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had a telephonic conversation with PM Modi regarding the incident and said that a special team has been formed to probe into the incident. The team will submit the report in next seven days.
The victim, 19-year-old girl had succumbed to her injuries in Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital on 29th September, 2020, a day after she was brought from Aligarh. Hours later, social media was rife with reports detailing the brutality committed against the 19-year-old Hathras gang-rape victim. Some claimed the culprits broke her spinal cord, gouged her eyes and cut off her tongue during the brutal rape. However, Police said that the medical reports state that the injuries were inflicted when she was strangulated by the perpetrators. Police said that the initial medical report suggests no sign of rape.
Detailing the incident, the Hathras police said that at around 10.30 am on September 14, an hour after the incident, the victim’s brother reached the police station to lodge a complaint against one Sandeep, who he alleged tried to strangulate her sister when she went to the field with his mother to collect fodder. Based on his written complaint police registered an FIR on September 14 under IPS sections 307 and ST/SC Act. The official confirmed that then, Satyendra, the girl’s brother had just named one accused- Sandeep behind the alleged crime.
Since the girl was critically injured she was admitted to Aligarh’s Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, where she started undergoing treatment. Meanwhile, police started investigating the case and on September 19, Sandeep was arrested.
The police furthered that when the victim was admitted to the hospital, she was not in the condition to give her statemenet. The police waited and on September 22, a lady officer was sent ot record the victim’s statement.
Fast track trial
It was then, said the police that the teenager named the other three accused and stated that she was gang-raped. Following the disclosure IPC section 376 D (charges for gang-rape) was included in the FIR, confirmed the Hathras police official.
Based on the details provided by the victim the police arrested the second accused- Luvkush on September 23. The third accused Ravi was arrested on September 25 and the fourth namely Ramu was arrested on September 26. All four accused have been sent to jail. The officer added that the case will be tried by a fast-track court.
The official furthered that on September 28 the victim was shifted to Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital, where she succumbed to the critical injuries on September 29 (Tuesday) morning.
Hathras police deny social media reports of brutality
After the death of the victim, IPC section 302 (punishment for murder) has also been invoked, said that police, furthering that under the SC/ST Act, the victim’s family has been given monetary compensation of Rs 10 lakh.
Dispelling the news which has been doing the rounds on social media, the police said that the girl’s tongue was not cut off by the perpetrators. When she was strangulated her tongue came between her teeth and that’s how it got injured.
In another byte, IG Piyush Mordiya said that during the medical examination of the victim, there were no signs of rape. He furthered that as suggested by the doctors, the details have been sent to the forensic science lab in Agra for further examination. The results of which are expected any time soon confirmed the IG.
The incident
In what traspired on September 14, the victim had gone to the field to collect fodder when a group of men attacked her from behind. The teenager was dragged by a dupatta around her neck, which probably caused the spinal injuries, to a field where she was allegedly raped.
The accused, who was nabbed on Saturday, had tried to strangulate her to death as she resisted them. In the process, she had ended up biting her tongue and suffering a severe cut on it, police had said.
The station house officer (SHO) of Chandpa police station in Uttar Pradesh’s Hathras district, under whose jurisdiction a 19-year-old Dalit woman was brutally gang-raped nearly a fortnight ago, has been transferred to the district police lines for his “failure to promptly act” on the case.
The body of the victim was brought to the village after the postmortem where she was later cremated.
Note: The report has been updated to reflect latest updates.
The United States President Donald Trump has faced significant resistance from social media giant Twitter in recent times. His tweets have been selectively censored by Twitter on many occasions. Twitter has also time and again resorted to ‘fact-checking’ the Tweets posted by Trump. Trump had accused Twitter of interfering in the US Presidential elections which are due in November.
While earlier Twitter had termed Trump’s tweets on mail-in ballots as “misleading”, this time Twitter has claimed that the mail-in ballot system of voting is a “safe” option.
The Ballots being returned to States cannot be accurately counted. Many things are already going very wrong!
Yesterday, Donald Trump had posted a Tweet raising concerns over the mail-in ballot system of voting. Twitter ‘fact-checked’ his tweet and claimed on behalf of some “experts” that mail-in ballot was “safe and secure option” especially amidst the pandemic.
Screenshot of Twitter’s Fact-check of Trump’s Tweet on Mail-in Ballot, Credit: Twitter
Why does Twitter insist mail-in votes are safe when there is already an investigation on voter fraud and election rigging?
Trump has been questioning the reliability of the mail-in ballot system of voting claiming that this could lead to voter fraud and rigged elections. He has expressed concerns that the mailboxes could be robbed thus leading to an unfair result. Apparently, Trump’s concerns are not unfounded as recently, Project Veritas, an American right-wing activist group had reported on the alleged involvement of far-left politician and Minneapolis Congress representative Ilhan Omar in what appears to be a massive voting fraud.
Project Veritas’ video on alleged voter fraud in Minnesota
Project Veritas released a video allegedly showing an associate of Omar collecting absentee ballots which if true amounts to massive voter fraud. The article was shared by Trump from his Twitter account. An investigation has been initiated by the Minneapolis police in the matter. In a tweet posted yesterday, the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD)said that they are looking into the allegations of voter harvesting.
ALLEGATIONS OF VOTER FRAUD BEING EVALUATED. ✅ The MPD is aware of the allegations of vote harvesting. We are in the process of looking into the validity of those statements. No further information is available at this time on this.
An incident of voter-fraud was reported earlier this month in New Hampshire in which a man allegedly voted twice in elections in 2016. The man named Mr Marzello, aged 65, was charged with wrongful voting after he revealed to Project Veritas in an undercover video about voting twice. A few days ago, nine ballots were found dumped in the garbage Pennsylvania out of which seven were cast in favour of Trump. The FBI has been investigating the matter with the Pennsylvania State Police.
Democrats ignoring concerns of voter fraud, insist mail-in votings are safe
Interestingly, the Democrats have been supporting the mail-in ballot system despite its patent loopholes. The incidents of ballot fraud in the mail-in ballot system of voting cast a serious shadow on the fairness of elections conducted through this system. Besides, the manner in which social media giant Twitter has been blocking and censoring Trump’s tweets on the mail-in ballot, it raises the suspicion that Twitter might suppress the genuine cases of ballot fraud and label them as fake news and thus help the Democrats rig the elections.
Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan’s daughter, Suhana Khan, on Tuesday put up a post on photo-sharing website Instagram claiming she was called ugly for having brown skin tone.
Khan claimed that while there is a lot going on right now, one of the first things that needs to be fixed is bullying because of skin tone. She claims that she was told she’s ugly because of her skin tone by full grown men and women since she was 12 years old. She claims that other than the fact that the people who called Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan’s daughter ‘ugly’ were fully grown men and women, they were also Indians, which by default makes us all brown skinned.
The star kid, who aspires to be in Bollywood, further claimed that hating our own people because of brown skin tone, which everyone has, is just ‘insecurity’. She further claimed that one should not follow beauty standards social media puts and that she is 5″3 and brown and extremely happy about it.
Suhana Khan was responding to some of the hate messages she got on her social media posts earlier where some had called her ‘dark’ and ‘ugly’.
Suhana Khan
Suhana Khan is Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan’s daughter. Khan has been brand ambassador of a fairness cream for men, “Fair & Handsome” which is made specially for men. Suhana has studied film in London and is pursuing further studies in film in New York. She made her acting debut short film titled ‘The Grey Part of Blue’ directed by Theodore Gimeno.
Sonu Sood’s humanitarian works for migrant workers and poor people across the country has been creating a lot of buzz on social media. It is understandable if someone wants to award him for his excellent work. The same happened yesterday when several news portals covered claimed that he has been awarded the SDG Special Humanitarian Action Award by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
News reports claiming that Sonu Sood received UNDP award for his humanitarian works
The confusion
There have been two recent incidents (West Bengal’s so-called UNWPA recognition for Mamata Banerjee and the case of ‘Drone Boy’) when awards that people claimed to have won were either proved to be fake, or the name of the organization was misleading. When OpIndia tried to find any announcement about the said award on the UNDP website or SDG Action Campaign Awards website, there was no info about it. The social media accounts did not have any information on the award presented to Sonu Sood, either. SDG Action Awards are still accepting applications, and the last date is 9th October 2020. The previous winners’ list has winners from 2019 and none from 2020.
The statement by UNDP India
After so much noise in the media, UNDP India had to step in. Late on Tuesday, they published a statement on Twitter clearing all doubts about the awards. In their statement, the Indian arm of UNDP wrote that the award was presented to Sonu Sood by the Department of Planning of the Government of Punjab, with Sustainable Development Goals Coordination Centre. An independent jury recommended his name, and UNDP was not involved in the selection or conferring process.
There is no doubt that Sonu Sood has helped many people during the time of need, and we congratulate him on the award he got for his philanthropic work during the coronavirus pandemic. However, the United Nations body did not confer the ‘Special Humanitarian Action Award’ on Sonu Sood.
The Hathras gangrape victim was cremated late last night in her village. As per information received by OpIndia, the last rites were performed by her father and other family members.
As per reports, the victim’s mortal remains were taken to her native village in Boolgarhi in Hathras where the horrendous incident took place a fortnight ago. The SP, DM and Joint Magistrate, all accompanied the family. The administration has promised speedy justice to the victim.
Some media reports claimed that the cremation took place without the family’s approval. However, the victim’s father accompanied the police to the cremation ground where the rites were performed. The victim’s brother has alleged that the police forced them to take the body to the cremation ground.
As per police, the situation in the village is calm but security forces are deployed.
Hathras gang-rape
19-year-old girl in Hathras, Uttar Pradesh, succumbed to her injuries on Tuesday, 29th September, after a brutal attack by four men on 14th September 2020. On 14th September, the girl had gone to field with her mother to gather fodder where the four men tried to strangulate her. Based on his written complaint police registered an FIR on September 14 under IPS sections 307 and ST/SC Act. The official confirmed that then, Satyendra, the girl’s brother had just named one accused- Sandeep behind the alleged crime.
Sandeep was arrested on 19th September. The girl was critically injured and not in a position to give a statement. On 22nd September, she gave her statement wherein she said she was raped by Sandeep and three other men. Police swung into action and arrested three men named by the victim. Following the disclosure IPC section 376 D (charges for gang-rape) was included in the FIR, confirmed the Hathras police official.
On 28th September, she was shifted from Aligarh’s Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College to Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital. Unfortunately, she could not survive and passed away a day later.
Hathras police deny social media reports of brutal gang-rape
After the death of the victim, IPC section 302 (punishment for murder) has also been invoked, said that police, furthering that under the SC/ST Act, the victim’s family has been given monetary compensation of Rs 10 lakh.
Dispelling the news which has been doing the rounds on social media, the police said that the girl’s tongue was not cut off by the perpetrators. When she was strangulated her tongue came between her teeth and that’s how it got injured.
In another byte, IG Piyush Mordiya said that during the medical examination of the victim, there were no signs of rape. He furthered that as suggested by the doctors, the details have been sent to the forensic science lab in Agra for further examination. The results of which are expected any time soon confirmed the IG.
The station house officer (SHO) of Chandpa police station in Uttar Pradesh’s Hathras district, under whose jurisdiction a 19-year-old Dalit woman was brutally gang-raped nearly a fortnight ago, has been transferred to the district police lines for his “failure to promptly act” on the case.
A unique scheme has been launched by the Madhya Pradesh Forest Department which will enable people to adopt old and retired elephants in the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve. Under the scheme, the retired elephants will be given in adoption for a day, week, month or year from Rs 500 for a day to Rs 1.50 lakh for a year. Two elephants Gautam (74-year old) and Toofan (69-year old) along with 13 other elephants in the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve are being given for adoption.
According to Principal Chief Secretary of Forest (PCCF), Wildlife, Alok Kumar, the Forest Department has initiated the scheme with the objective to reconnect the tourists and wildlife lovers with the elephants which take them on joy rides during sightseeing and also to generate funds for the maintenance of elephants amidst the pandemic.
Hathi Mahotsav
The week-long Hathi Mahotsav in the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve began this week on Monday. During the Hathi Mahotsav, the elephants in the Reserve will be provided a break from their routine work. “The rejuvenation camp for elephants began on Monday, giving them a break from their routine work. These elephants help us with patrolling, tracking and other routine works all the year round. Now, we will serve them throughout the week during Hathi Mahotsav”, said the Field Director of the Reserve, Vincent Rahim.
Vincent said that the Reserve has been affected by the intrusion of 35 elephants from Chhattisgarh and the visitors are concerned about the presence of wild elephants for over a year. He added that the adoption programme will enhance the connection with the 15 special elephants and will reduce people’s concern.
Special training programmes are also being conducted to train the forest guards, guides and villagers to deal with wild elephants and to pacify them without hurting.
Ambassador of Denmark to India, Freddy Svane, has called a report by The Hindu “twisted news” where the newspaper alleged that the country had expressed “deep concern” over the Coronavirus crisis in India. He stated clearly that the claim made by the newspaper was not true. The comment in question was made at a virtual summit where India and Denmark agreed to elevate relations to a Green Strategic Partnership.
The Hindu report makes it obvious that the newspaper was desperate to twist a comment made by the Danish Prime Minister in order to cast aspersions on the Coronavirus situation in India. In fact, the report carries just one line by Mette Frederiksen on the pandemic. It quoted the Denmark Prime Minister as saying, “The situation is very very difficult for you.”
Quite clearly, the sentiment conveyed by the Danish Prime Minister is markedly different from what The Hindu tweet suggests. The comment was deliberately twisted in order to mislead the public about the intent of the comment, which was one of condolence. The Hindu is known to engage in deliberate propaganda to target the ruling dispensation. the current instance appears to be a situation where they decided to drag in the Prime Minister of Denmark to suit its agenda.
