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Delhi government’s power subsidy scheme under the scanner, LG orders probe. Here is everything you need to know about the alleged ‘scam’

Dibakar Dutta
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Delhi government’s power subsidy scheme under the scanner, LG orders probe. Here is everything you need to know about the alleged ‘scam’

Months after recommending a CBI probe into the new excise policy of the Arvind Kejriwal-led-Delhi government, Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena has now sought a report from the Delhi Chief Secretary about irregularities in the power subsidy scheme.

As per reports, LG Saxena has questioned the non-implementation of the Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission (DERC) order of February 19, 2018, which directed the Delhi government to transfer electricity subsidies to consumers directly.

The Delhi Governor informed that he received a complaint against the Delhi Dialogue Commission Chairperson, Jasmine Shah, and AAP leader ND Gupta’s son Naveen Gupta over impropriety and discrepancy in the power subsidy scheme.

The Arvind Kejriwal-led-Delhi government holds 49% shares in private DISCOMs including that of Anil Ambani’s BSES Yamuna Power Ltd. (BYPL) and BSES Rajdhani Power Ltd. (BRPL). It is accused of appointing directors of these private DISCOMs.

Based on the complaint of a group of eminent jurists, lawyers and law professionals, the LG has now sought a report from the Delhi Chief Secretary within a period of 7 days.

Under the electricity subsidy scheme, households that use less than 200 units every month are not billed at the end of the cycle. Those consumers who use up to 400 units per month can avail upto 50% of the subsidy (up to ₹800) on the total bill. Initially, the rule applied to all but was later tweaked to include only those Delhiites, who voluntarily opt-in for the service.

Allegations of scam in the electricity subsidy scheme

According to BJP leader Vishnu Vardhan Reddy, private DISCOMs BRPL and BYPL owe ₹21, 250 to the Delhi government but no efforts were made to recover the sum of money.

“AAP allowed these companies to settle outstanding dues against future payments to be made to them by the Delhi government itself, resulting in the companies receiving an undue benefit of Rs 11,550 crore,” he accused the AAP government of impropriety.

Vishnu Vardhan Reddy further alleged that while BRPL and BYPL charged an 18% late payment surcharge to the consumers, only 12% of the surcharge was paid to the power generation companies. He stated that the government suffered a further loss of ₹8,500 in this process.

The BJP accused the Arvind Kejriwal government of removing top government officials from the Board and replacing them with party leaders such as Jasmine Shah and Naveen Gupta.

“The AAP government even blocked the audit of these companies and prevented direct subsidy transfers to the people’s bank accounts violating its own orders of 2015-16 and 2018,” Vishnu Vardhan Reddy further pointed out.

Allegations of corruption in the Delhi Excise Policy

The Delhi Excise Policy of 2021-2022, the scrapped liquor policy, was originally proposed in 2020. After coming into effect in November 2021, it changed the manner in which alcohol was sold in Delhi.

Until then, only government-owned liquor vendors were permitted to sell alcohol. The Delhi Excise Policy 2021-2022 introduced private players in the market. The National Capital was divided into 32 zones and a total of 27 private vendors were to ply in each zone.

Every municipal ward had 2-3 liquor vendors operating in the area. The private liquor shops were allowed to attract crowds by offering discounts on the Maximum Retail Price (MRP). They could deliver liquor at home, and even keep shops open till 3 am in the morning.

The drastic policy change resulted in a 27% increase in government revenue to ₹8900 crores. At the same time, it marked the complete exit of the Delhi government from the liquor business.

While the objective of Excise Policy 2021-2022 was to end black marketing and the liquor mafia, the AAP government soon came under fire over allegations of corruption. Naresh Kumar, who was appointed the Chief Secretary of Delhi in April 2022, found irregularities and procedural lapses in the new liquor policy. 

The Chief Secretary prepared a report and sought the response of Delhi’s Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, the head of the Excise Department. The report blamed the Deputy CM for making changes to the excise policy without the authorisation of the Lieutenant Governor and providing ‘undue benefits’ to the liquor vendors.

Manish Sisodia waived off ₹144.36 crores on the license fee, to be paid by the private liquor vendors, under the garb of the Coronavirus pandemic. He also caused loss to the Excise Department and benefitted liquor licensees by waiving the import pass fee of ₹50 per beer case.

All these changes were made without the final approval of the Lieutenant Governor and thus considered illegal under the Delhi Excise Rules of 2010 and Transaction of Business Rules of 1993. The CBI had therefore registered a case against Vijay Nair and 14 others.

Shashi Tharoor spills the beans, says other party leaders had asked Rahul Gandhi to get him to withdraw from Congress President race

OpIndia Staff
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Shashi Tharoor spills the beans, says other party leaders had asked Rahul Gandhi to get him to withdraw from Congress President race

On Tuesday, senior leader and Congress president aspirant Shashi Tharoor claimed that several party leaders had asked Rahul Gandhi to make Tharoor withdraw his candidature. 

The Thiruvananthapuram MP who is in Kerala for the party election campaign told the media that Rahul Gandhi has assured that he will not ask Tharoor to withdraw as this election will benefit the party.

“He reminded me that he has been saying so for the past ten years that there must be a contest for the party chief’s post.

“He also told me that some people have asked him to ask me to withdraw my candidature. He assured me that he won’t. He advised me to remain in the race and run for office, Tharoor said.

Tharoor also stated that he never expected the big-wigs of the party to support him and even now he has no such expectations. 

In addition, Tharoor stated that he would not abandon his campaign for the election in order to appease people who had up until this point supported him.

“I was not expecting any support from the big leaders of the party and I am not expecting that now either. In fact, I met party workers at Nagpur, Wardha, and then Hyderabad. They are the ones who asked me to contest and not back away from it.

Tharoor asserted that his biggest plus point is the young party leaders and workers form the majority of his supporters while also stating that he needs support from everyone.

In addition, Tharoor stated that while he respects all senior party leaders, he has noticed some “partiality” on the part of certain of their top leaders and that their votes are equally as important as those of any other Congress members or employees.

“I have seen a partiality on the part of some top leaders of the party. I respect all senior leaders, but the vote of an office bearer, senior leader, or a Congress worker has the same weightage when it is being counted.”

Notably, this statement came after Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president K Sudhakaran publicly declared his support for veteran Mallikarjun Kharge for the party president’s post.

When asked if Sudhakaran’s public backing of Kharge was meant to deter others from supporting him, Tharoor responded, “Maybe. I’m not saying that, though. I don’t have to figure out what’s going on in other people’s minds. One thing I will say is that the ballot is secret, regardless of what is spoken publicly or secretly.”

The Thiruvananthapuram MP reacted to Sudhakaran’s statement by saying that the KPCC chairman likely voiced his personal opinion and that “there is nothing wrong with that.”

“He is unable to give instructions because it is crystal obvious from the party’s circular that office holders are not permitted to support candidates. However, don’t question me about it. It is up to the electoral authority to take action if they choose to,” he said.

The election circular issued by the Congress party on Monday stated that: “ AICC general secretaries/ in-charges, secretaries, joint secretaries, Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) presidents, Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leaders, heads of frontal organizations, chiefs of departments, cells, and all official spokespersons “shall not campaign for or against contesting candidates.”

“If the office bearers want to support any candidate and participate in the campaign process, they first need to resign from their organizational post,” the circular added.

Tharoor in Nagpur had said that Mallikarjun Kharge despite being among the top 3 leaders of the party cannot bring the change and will only carry forward the existing system.

“We aren’t enemies, it’s not war. It’s a poll for our party’s future. Kharge Ji comes in the top 3 leaders of the Congress party. Leaders like him can’t bring change and will continue the existing system. I’ll bring change as per expectations of party workers,” Tharoor said.

In response to Shashi Tharoor, Kharge claimed that although he had suggested a consensus candidate to his fellow candidate, the Lok Sabha MP pushed on a contest for the “sake of democracy.”

On October 17, voting will take place in the presidential election for Congress. On October 19, the vote-counting process will begin, and the results will be announced that same day. The poll will be attended by around 9,000 Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) representatives.

Elon Musk again offers to buy Twitter at the original $44 billion bid: Says it will be the first step to build ‘X’, the everything app

OpIndia Staff
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Elon Musk again offers to buy Twitter at the original $44 billion bid: Says it will be the first step to build ‘X’, the everything app

On October 4, Elon Musk took another u-turn and proposed to proceed with the original bid of $44 billion to buy Twitter Inc. The information was made available via security filings on Tuesday. The latest proposal called for an end to a lawsuit filed by the social media giant that could have forced Musk to pay irrespective of his desire to pay up or not.

There is a chance the lawsuit that is scheduled for a hearing on October 17 could damage not only Twitter’s brand reputation but also affect Musk’s reputation in the market for erratic behaviour. Notably, Musk had offered to buy Twitter in April and take it private. However, later he tried to back out owing to ‘improper disclosure of spam account or bot accounts on the social media platform’.

Reportedly, Musk sent a letter to Twitter on Monday expressing his intent to proceed with the original deal if the Delaware judge stayed the proceedings scheduled for October 17. Reuters quoted an unnamed source from the Twitter team saying that during a court hearing on October 4, the judge requested both sides to report by evening.

In a Tweet, Musk expressed his desire to move ahead with building the “everything app” called ‘X’. He said, “Buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app.” It is noteworthy that X.com was the first company he owned that was later renamed paypal.com, one of the most used payment apps across the world. 

BBC noted that a spokesperson for Twitter confirmed that the company received the proposal with the intention to close the transaction at $54.20 per share. The u-turn by Musk showed a positive sign for the Twitter shares’ price that has plunged drastically since Musk announced he was planning to step back from the deal.

Musk offered to buy Twitter in April

In April 2022, Elon Musk offered to buy Twitter at $44 billion and said he would like to take the company private. The deal was approved by the board of directors at Twitter. However, later Musk said that Twitter was allegedly holding back information about the spam accounts on the platform. Twitter, on the other hand, denied the allegations.

Musk announced that he was stepping back from the deal that led to a legal case filed by Twitter against him. Meanwhile, a whistleblower named Peiter ‘Mudge’ Zatko made shocking allegations against the social media platform and allegedly exposed the dark side of the company. He alleged that the Twitter employees have access to the personal information of all the users, and Twitter was not updating its outdated servers and computers, leading to a potential leak of information.

Notably, after a case was filed against Musk, he had said on a social media platform that via to court case, he would get the information about the spam accounts that Twitter was allegedly hiding all along.

From the attack on Gorakhpur temple to the murder of DGP, ‘mental instability’ being blamed for crimes by ‘Samuday Vishesh’ is a very old pattern

Jhankar Mohta
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From the attack on Gorakhpur temple to the murder of DGP, ‘mental instability’ being blamed for crimes by ‘Samuday Vishesh’ is a very old pattern

Jammu and Kashmir DGP (Prisons) Hemant Kumar Lohia was found dead under mysterious circumstances with throat slit and burn marks on his body on October 3, Monday. Terror group People’s Anti-Fascist Force (PAFF), an offshoot of Pakistan-headquartered terrorist organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba, has claimed responsibility for the murder.

Prima facie it had appeared to be a case of murder and his domestic help Yasir Lohar was believed to be the primary suspect. On Tuesday, October 4, Jammu and Kashmir police arrested the 23-year-old Yasir in connection with the DG’s murder.

It was reported that Yasir first suffocated the DG to death, then used a broken ketchup bottle to slit his throat, and later tried to set his body on fire before fleeing the crime scene.

Multiple media houses reported about the arrest but did not fail to mention how Yasir, who brutally killed the police officer was ‘mentally unstable.’ The reports extensively spoke about a so-called personal diary of the accused that revealed that he had a ‘depressed’ mind fixated on death.

Well, this is not the first case where this ‘mental instability’ trope has been used to downplay a crime where evidently the perpetrator belongs to a particular community. It is a time-tested formula that keeps resurfacing from time to time. Be it the attack on the Gorakhnath temple or the incident in Telangana where two Muslim women wearing burqa tried to damage temple and church idols, the corporate English media, the left-liberals, Islamists, and their apologists, have been unrelenting in their use of the ‘mental illness’ trope to justify Muslim-committed crimes.

It is almost like a new addition to their old strategy wherein they cherry-pick cases in which the victim-perpetrator equation suits their narratives. It is essentially tailor-made to show Muslims as overwhelmingly the victims and Hindus overwhelmingly as the perpetrators. Thus, creating a false perception among minorities that they are under attack from ‘fascist’ Hindus with active cooperation from the state machinery.

Below we list a few such cases where ‘mental instability’ has been blamed for crimes committed by people belonging to the Muslim community. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list, but rather an indicative one.

2 burqa-clad Muslim ‘mentally unstable’ women vandalised the idol of goddess Durga at a Navratri pandal in Hyderabad

Last week, two Muslim women were detained for reportedly vandalising the idol of goddess Durga at a Navratri pandal in Hyderabad. The ladies barged into a pandal in the city’s Khairatabad locality and smashed a portion of the Durga statue, according to Hyderabad Police. When a local tried to stop them, one of the ladies attacked him with a metallic tool. Prior to this, the ladies had also vandalised a statue of Mother Mary outside a nearby church.

Many news outlets covered the incident, although some, understandably, focused on how the two ladies were “mentally disturbed”. Media houses like Deccan Chronicle and TOI focused on how the accused’s brother Asimduddin claimed that his mother and sister were schizophrenic.

Essentially, the liberal media attempted to propagate the narrative that the two Muslim ladies who desecrated the Hindu statue did so because they were mentally ill. The point here is, if these offenders actually have a mental illness, how can they carry out such zealous hate-filled crimes against Hindus? Thanks to the leftist media, mental instability is becoming a well-planned alibi for such hate crimes.

Jharkhand’s Rameez Ahmed breaks into Hanuman temple, vandalises idol, Police claims accused is ‘mentally unstable’

Moving on, OpIndia reported how on the night of September 27, a man identified as Rameez Ahmed broke into Bhagwan Hanuman temple in the Hindpuri Police Station area of Ranchi, Jharkhand, and vandalised the idol there.

Ahmed was subsequently arrested by the police. Notably, the police had claimed that Ahmed is mentally unstable. The locals are reportedly not satisfied with the reasoning provided by the police.

Gorakhnath temple attack wherein media tried to portray that the accused Abbasi, an ISIS sympathiser, was actually not a terrorist but merely mentally unstable

As we delve further into this topic, the Gorakhnath Temple attack deserves a special mention, given how the corporate English media simply glossed over the seriousness of what the investigators were unearthing, almost on a daily basis.

Ahmed Murtaza Abbasi, on the 3rd of April 2022, screamed Allahu Akbar and tried to enter the Gorakhnath Temple. Wielding a knife that he intended to use, Abbasi injured two cops in the tussle that followed. Several revelations came to the fore after he was apprehended and an investigation was launched. The most important revelation was that Abbasi had taken an oath of allegiance to ISIS.

With an intent to execute terrorist activities, the accused used to read online articles and watch videos on the internet related to weapons like the AK-47 rifle, M4 Carbine, and missile technology. 

Since 2013, Abbasi was involved with ISIS, therefore, by all accounts, he was a hardened terrorist who was merely looking for the right opportunity to unleash Jihad on Kafirs.

But what was the narrative in the media? Firstly, the corporate English media hardly discussed this case with the seriousness it deserved. Those who did, tried their best to allege that Abbasi was actually not a terrorist but merely mentally unstable. His father asserted the same, rather vehemently. Later, a doctor confirmed that Abbasi was mentally fit and there was no sign that he was unstable.

Muslim youth held in Agra for vandalising Hindu idols to allegedly stoke communal tension, news agency claims he was ‘mentally challenged’

In 2018, a case of idol vandalism in a Hindu temple had been reported from the Shahganj region of Agra in Uttar Pradesh. It was reported how the accused had vandalised a Hanuman and Durga idol to instigate communal tensions. The devotees then caught hold of the individual reportedly trying to flee the temple premises, who when questioned identified himself as Sonu Khan. 

As per a tweet by ANI, the accused was assaulted by the locals after being tied to a tree, following which he was handed over to the police. The news agency claimed that the accused was “mentally challenged”.

‘Mentally unstable’ Yasir desecrates Hindu temple in Jammu

Similarly, in 2016, a youth from a particular community barged into the temple at Janipur in Jammu, threw stones at windowpanes, and tried to damage the idol. The miscreant was identified as Yasir, a resident of Doda town in Jammu. Several media outlets were ready to play the ‘mentally disturbed’ card in this case as well because the offender clearly belonged to their preferred community. The Hindu reported the incident with the headline: ‘Mentally unstable’ youth desecrates Jammu temple.

The report’s headline precisely matched the narrative that the media outlet intended to push, which was that the crime was obviously not intentional but committed because the accused, here too a Muslim youth, was mentally unstable.

Punjab: Divyang chess player Malika Handa vents anger on the AAP govt for not delivering on commitments made by the previous govt

OpIndia Staff
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Punjab: Divyang chess player Malika Handa vents anger on the AAP govt for not delivering on commitments made by the previous govt

Malika Handa, a 25-year-old Divyang chess player, vented her frustration and outrage on Twitter after the Punjab state government failed to follow through on a job commitment it made in January.

Malika tweeted, tagging Punjab’s Aam Aadmi Party and Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, “On 4th Jan 2022 in CM office Official @CHARANJITCHANNI have approved & signed approval letter on 4th Jan, 2022 to give me the job of Coach Please tell Why i hav not being given appointment letter by Punjab sports office till now ?”

The erstwhile Congress government in Punjab promised Malika Handa, who has won gold and two silver medals at international level chess championships, a job and a monetary prize. She obtained a letter of approval from the outgoing CM Charanjit Singh Channi on January 4. However, the current Bhagwant Mann-led Aam Aadmi party government has similarly failed to fulfil the promises made by the previous government.

As reported by OpIndia, Malika had previously expressed her dissatisfaction with the state government’s inactivity. She tweeted in January of this year that she had not been contacted for the prize money and employment offer offered by the former sports minister. She said that the state government had duped her and that they did not care about the deaf player. She said that the district Congress members had also expressed their support, but that nothing had been done in the last five years.

She stated on Twitter in November of last year that she had been waiting for the Punjab government’s invitation for the job and financial awards for two months because she was now a graduate, but the state government was not responding to her demands.

As news portal Lallantop hires Nupoor Patel ahead of Gujarat assembly elections, activist exposes her links to AAP

OpIndia Staff
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As news portal Lallantop hires Nupoor Patel ahead of Gujarat assembly elections, activist exposes her links to AAP

As the much-anticipated assembly elections in Gujarat draw nearer, the hiring of one Nupoor Patel by news portal Lallantop has left netizens wondering if she is a journalist or an AAP worker after activist Ankur Singh exposed her links to the Aam Aadmi Party and pro-Kejriwal bias. 

A Twitter user and activist Ankur Singh shared a Twitter thread highlighting how India Today’s Lallantop seems to be working as the mainstream media wing of the AAP IT cell by hiring folks like Nupoor Patel, who had, in the past, had links with the Aam Aadmi Party and may continue to have a soft corner for the party.

Singh highlighted past tweets posted by Patel, where she made no bones about her support for the Aam Aadmi Party and her bias against the BJP. But soon after being exposed for having links to AAP, Patel went on a deleting spree, removing tweets from her profile that would expose her association with AAP.

From creating promotional videos for AAP to openly supporting Arvind Kejriwal and the party policies, Patel had been quite vocal about her political preferences on Twitter. Additionally, Patel has also not shied away from posting nasty tweets against political opponents. On one such occasion, she referred to BJP as a virus. 

While many of her tweets fawning over Kejriwal and other AAP leaders were deleted after she joined Lallantop, perhaps to erase her partisan antecedents, a recent video on the news portal extolling Kejriwal reaffirmed suspicions among social media users that she may well be continuing peddling AAP propaganda, this time working as a ‘neutral journalist’ working for Lallantop.

In one of the tweets that are now deleted, Nupoor Patel revealed that she had consumed beef in protest against the Modi government.

Source: Twitter

And not just on Twitter, but on YouTube and Facebook too, Nupoor has voiced her support for Kejriwal and AAP. 

And what’s worse? She also seems to be enthused by chronic fake news peddler and pro-AAP vlogger Dhruv Rathee, sharing videos and posts uploaded by him. 

After Singh exposed the blatant political links of a journalist hired by Lallantop, many social media users highlighted how it has become par for the course for political parties and media organisations to trade employees.

Many others criticised Lallantop Editor Saurabh Dwivedi for employing someone with a dubious track record.

Even as Lallantop comes under the firing line of social media users, it is notable to mention that the media organisation has long been accused of peddling propaganda under the pretext of reporting news. In June 2021, Lallantop played mischief over orphaned children, using information from two different data sets to cast aspersions on the Modi government.

Before that, in December 2020, Lallantop shared a video that shared misinformation on APMC mandis had shared fake news about APMC markets in Gujarat and new farm laws.

China wants to import dogs and donkeys from Pakistan: Reports

OpIndia Staff
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China wants to import dogs and donkeys from Pakistan: Reports

In a major relief to a cash-starved Pakistan, China has offered to import dogs and donkeys from the country, reported ARY News. The development was confirmed by the Senate Standing Committee on Commerce to Pakistan’s Commerce Ministry on Monday (October 3).

ARY News reported that the Committee members met in Islamabad, during which Chairman Zeeshan Khanzada was briefed about imports and exports. A member of the Committee, Dinesh Kumar, informed that China has expressed interest in the country’s dogs and donkeys.

On hearing this, Senator Abdul Qadir recollected that the Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan had held discussions, on multiple occasions, about importing meat from the country.

In 2017, it was reported that China was faced with a shortage of donkeys. But in the subsequent year, Pakistan broke ranks to emerge as the country with the 3rd largest donkey population.

Opindia had earlier reported how China and Pakistan were working on a project to breed donkeys together. The Communist country needs donkeys to prepare an exotic medicine named E’jiao.

In the 2nd century BC, a royal concubine apparently used E’jiao to prevent her miscarriage and her son became the emperor of China. E’jiao is made by boiling donkey skin.

China reportedly had the world’s largest donkey herd until about 3 decades ago. However, the growing demand for E’jiao saw most donkeys in China being skinned and boiled, and it now faces an acute donkey shortage.

Donkeys are used widely for transportation in Pakistan. They are part of the local culture, with donkey cart races being a popular sport.

Competition Commission of India grants conditional approval to Zee-Sony merger

OpIndia Staff
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Competition Commission of India grants conditional approval to Zee-Sony merger

On October 4, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) approved the merger of Zee Entertainment Enterprises and Sony Pictures Networks, but with conditions. As per initial reports, CCI has imposed limits to prevent Zee and Sony from abusing the dominating market position of the two companies.

Earlier, it was reported that Zee Entertainment Enterprises reportedly offered to shut down its Marathi Channels following the concerns raised by the CCI. Though the channels that Zee offered to close were not disclosed by the company, based on the market share these channels own, it was speculated that the Marathi channels might go off-air.

The offer was made to secure permission for a merger worth $10 billion with Sony Pictures Networks. They had also offered pricing concessions to help ease the concerns of India’s antitrust regulator.

On September 1, it was reported that Zee was in talks with the CCI to get approval for the merger. Based on BARC data, the merged entity has a 36 percent share in the Hindi GEC segment in viewership marker and a 33 percent share in Hindi movie channels segment.

Karnataka: Banned PFI issues open threat to RSS, scribble ‘will come back, watch out for us’, on Dakshina Kannada streets

OpIndia Staff
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Karnataka: Banned PFI issues open threat to RSS, scribble ‘will come back, watch out for us’, on Dakshina Kannada streets

On Tuesday, the Popular Front of India (PFI) members issued open threats to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) members in the state of Karnataka ahead of the Hindu festival of Dussehra. “We will be back with a vengeance. Watch out for us”, the members of the radical Islamist group scribbled a message directed toward RSS workers on the streets of Dakshina Kannada district.

This is days after the Central Government banned the extremist terrorist organisation and its associate organisations for 5 years. The government maintained that the organisations operated as unlawful associations under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). The affiliates banned along with the PFI include All India Imams Council, Campus Front of India (CFI), Rehab India Foundation, National Conf of Human Rights Org, National Women’s Front, Junior Front, Empower India Foundation, and Rehab Foundation, Kerala.

The ban came following two rounds of searches by the NIA in a multi-agency investigation against the organisation for allegedly sponsoring terror operations in the nation. The initial series of raids occurred on September 22, with a follow-up on Tuesday, September 27 in multiple states, resulting in the arrest of at least 250 persons associated with PFI.

According to the reports, the PFI jihadis wrote a message for the RSS leaders on Monday night when nobody could spot them. However, the message was visible on Tuesday morning after which the members of the Hindu Jagarna association requested the cops to take action against the miscreants behind this incident.

The RSS and its member have always been the targets of PFI. Earlier, the Central Government had awarded ‘Y’ category protection to five RSS officials from Kerala following a warning from central intelligence services about the possible danger to their lives from PFI.

Recently, amidst the two NIA rounds of raids on PFI, the terrorist organization happened to hurl petrol bombs at the RSS office in Mattannur. Also, the Maharashtra ATS on September 26 confirmed that the RSS headquarters in Nagpur and several top BJP leaders were on the radar of the PFI.

The NIA officials during the raids recovered several incriminating materials from the PFI hubs located in around 17 states of the country.

A huge amount of undocumented cash was also recovered from the PFI hideouts in Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu and also documents on a ‘short course on how to make IEDs using easily available materials’. Meanwhile, pen drives containing videos related to ISIS, and Ghazwa-e-Hind were found from the Uttar Pradesh PFI leadership and Marine radio sets from Tamil Nadu PFI leadership. Many other materials including wireless communication devices were also taken into custody by the officials.

Jammu and Kashmir: Police arrest househelp Yasir for the murder of top cop Hemant Kumar Lohia

OpIndia Staff
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Jammu and Kashmir: Police arrest househelp Yasir for the murder of top cop Hemant Kumar Lohia

A day after the brutal murder of Jammu & Kashmir DGP (Prisons) Hemant Kumar Lohia, the police arrested his house-help, Yasir Ahmed, on Tuesday (October 4). It must be mentioned that the accused was absconding ever since the incident.

In a tweet, Jammu and Kashmir Police informed that a massive search operation was undertaken to nab the accused. “In a major manhunt launched by J&K police throughout the night, the accused involved in (the) murder case of Shri Hemant Lohia has been apprehended,” it said.

The cops further stated that Yasir was being interrogated by them in connection to the case. The accused belongs to the Ramban district of Jammu and Kashmir.

DGP Lohia was found dead under mysterious circumstances with a throat slit and burn marks on his body on October 3. Yasir, the primary suspect, was captured on CCTV, running away from the crime scene. He was working at DGP Lohia’s residence for the past six months and was reportedly quite aggressive in his behaviour.

It is believed the killer first suffocated Lohia to death and used a broken ketchup bottle to slit his throat. He then tried to set his body on fire. Terror group People’s Anti-Fascist Force (PAFF), an offshoot of Pakistan-based terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba, has claimed responsibility for the murder.

In a press release, the terror group said that this was just the beginning of such high-profile operations. “We can strike anywhere, anytime with precision,” the statement read.

The terror group then claimed that the DGP’s murder was a ‘small gift’ to the visiting Home Minister amid such high security. “God willing we will continue such operations in future,” PAFF further warned.

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