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Maharashtra MLC Elections: What exactly happened, and what does it mean politically for the BJP and MVA? Explained

Suyash
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Maharashtra MLC Elections: What exactly happened, and what does it mean politically for the BJP and MVA? Explained

In many ways, Maharashtra Vidhan Parishad (Legislative Council) election results have charted the future course of Maharashtra Politics and the fate of the incumbent MVA Government. The MLC elections resulted in the BJP winning unexpected 5 seats out of 10 whereas, in spite of having adequate numbers, the Maha Vikas Aghadi alliance could only manage to win 5 seats out of 6 candidates fielded.

While the BJP won all the five candidates it fielded, it only had enough numbers in the assembly to get four nominees elected to the Council comfortably. BJP leaders Praveen Darekar, Ram Shinde, Shrikant Bharatiya and Uma Khapre won with comfortable margins with the BJP having a total of 106 seats in the assembly, along with some support from the independents.

The victory of the BJP’s fifth candidate Prasad Lad came as a surprise. He secured 28 votes – two votes more than the minimum number of 26 required to get elected as an MLC member. Subsequently, despite having 162 MLAs by its side, the MVA alliance managed to bag only five seats with Shiv Sena’s Sachin Ahir and Amshya Padavi, NCP’s Eknath Khadse and Ramraje Nimbalkar and Congress’ Bhai Jagtap going beyond the magic figure of 26 votes each.

Structure of Maharashtra Vidhan Parishad

The Maharashtra Vidhan Parishad or the Legislative council (MLC) is the upper house of the state legislature. Out of the 78 members in the house, 66 are elected and 12 are nominated by the Governor of Maharashtra. However, a large chunk of seats is reserved for teachers, graduates’ constituency and for members elected from amongst the local bodies of Maharashtra. A total of 30 seats are elected by the members of the Legislative Assembly.

Elections in the Legislative Council are held every two years with one-third of the elected representatives replacing the next lot. Much like the Rajya Sabha, A Maharashtra Legislative Council Member also enjoys a period of six years in the house. Hence, the induction of MLCs in the Vidhan Parishad is directly linked to the party’s candidates in the Vidhan Sabha or the Legislative Assembly.

After the 2019 state assembly elections, the BJP bagged a total of 106 seats. Shivsena with 55 seats, NCP with 52 and the Congress with 44 seats along with the support of some independent candidates, formed the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) Government with a said figure of 162 MLAs. The Maharashtra Assembly comprises 288 seats and the number required to form a government is the halfway mark of 145.

What happened at the elections

For a party to induct a large number of its members into Maharashtra’s upper house, it is imperative that its MLAs vote for their party candidates in the MLC elections. However, this was easier said than done in the recently conducted Maharashtra Legislative Assembly elections. Elections for the 10 seats (1/3rd of total 30 seats) to be elected by the sitting MLAs were held on June 20, yesterday.

The elections were held on a preferential basis, with BJP’s 4 candidates and two candidates each from the Congress and the Shiv Sena winning in the first round. Given the numbers, the BJP easily managed to win four candidates with Praveen Darekar (29 votes), Ram Shinde (30), Shrikant Bharatiya (30) and Uma Khapre (27) comfortably crossing the ’26 votes’ mark. In the first round itself, BJP bagged a total of 126 votes while it had only 106 MLAs in the Assembly.

In this case, it has been noted that the BJP got help from Independent candidates including Ravi Rana and Ashish Deshmukh deflecting to the Devendra Fadnavis-led BJP. There is also a high possibility that MLAs from Shiv Sena could have cross-voted for a BJP candidate in this round.

Two Shiv Sena candidates Sachin Ahir (26) and Amshya Padavi (26) won the election over the edge. While Shiv Sena has 55 MLAs in the assembly, it got only a total of 52 (26+26) votes in the first round. This opens up the possibility of 3 Shiv Sena MLAs voting for a BJP candidate. Alongside, Shiv Sena, the Sharad Pawar-led NCP secured its base to win two seats with Eknath Khadse bagging 29 votes and Ramraje Nimbalkar 28 votes. The NCP secured 4 extra votes so required from Independent MLAs.

In the second round, there was a nail-biting tussle between BJP’s fifth candidate Prasad Lad and Congress candidates Bhai Jagtap and Chandrakant Handore. With no substantial hold over Maharashtra Politics and having only 44 MLAs, it was difficult for the relatively laidback party to secure a minimum of 52 votes two make both of its candidates win.

While Congress’ Bhai Jagtap (Mumbai Congress Head) secured his base by winning 26 votes, Handore lost the election, securing only 22 votes. However, the emerging star of the election saga was BJP’s Prasad Lad who won 28 votes.

This time, BJP had no numbers to back the candidature of Lad, its fifth candidate. However, he bagged more votes than two of the Congress candidates in the second round. What backed Lad was a high percentage of cross-voting from other parties in his support. This means a number of Shiv Sena and Congress MLAs presumably voted for Lad instead of their party candidates. Apart from this, Fadanvis was successful in winning the Independent votes in favour of Prasad Lad.

It is being speculated that 3 votes, each from the Shiv Sena and the Congress could have been deflected in favour of a BJP candidate in the first round itself.

What happens next?

The BJP which won a total number of 123 votes in the recently held Rajya Sabha elections last week, has now secured a total of 134 votes in the MLC elections. With this, it is being speculated that a large chunk of MVA leaders may now be supporting the BJP, who could be seen secretively voting for the BJP in the Rajya Sabha and MLC elections.

With BJP originally having 106 seats, it now enjoys relative support of 134 MLAs in total, given the election results. If a floor test has to be conducted today, the party is only short of 11 seats (to reach the magic number of 145) to form a government on its own. The Maharashtra Assembly which has 288 seats, has been reduced to the current strength of 285 with the death of a Shiv Sena MLA Ramesh Latke and two NCP ministers – Anil Deshmukh and Nawab Malik arrested.

The dynamic shift in the Maharashtra Politics has been attributed to Devendra Fadnavis, the leader of the Opposition in the assembly who managed to fetch 26 extra votes from the outside and 130 votes in total in the first preference round of MLC elections. With Shiv Sena bigwig Eknath Shinde alongside said 21 MLAs rebelling against the party, the real strength of the MVA alliance has come under scrutiny.

NSA Ajit Doval hails the Agnipath scheme as a game-changer, says ‘no question’ of rollback

OpIndia Staff
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NSA Ajit Doval hails the Agnipath scheme as a game-changer, says ‘no question’ of rollback

On Tuesday, National security Advisor Ajit Doval stated that the Agnipath recruitment scheme that led to unnecessary violent protests across the country, is not a standalone scheme and it should be looked at from a perspective. He added that the scheme was introduced as a part of the government’s priority to make the country secure and strong, adding that there won’t be any rollback.

“When PM Modi came to power in 2014, one of his prime priorities was how to make India secure and strong. That required many avenues, many steps – a multitude of them. It requires equipment, changes in systems and structures, changes in technology and change in manpower, policies and they have to be futuristic”, he said in an exclusive interview with news agency ANI.

He added that the entire concept of war is undergoing a great change which involves an invisible enemy. In such cases preparing for change was important, he highlighted. “Technology is taking over at a rapid pace. If we have to prepare for tomorrow, then we have to change”, he said.

Explaining the scheme and banishing the myths revolving around it, Doval said that the scheme has been introduced to provide an opportunity to every Indian youth who has the desire and motivation to fight for the country. He said that the scheme is also meant to use the young energy and talent to make the country strong.

He also clarified that the Agnipath recruitment scheme was not at all tinkering with the concept of regiments. “As far as regiments are concerned, nobody is tinkering with it. They (regiments) will continue. The regimental system has not ended”, he said adding that Agniveers would never constitute the whole army. “Those Agniveers who become regulars eventually will undergo intensive training, acquire experience over some time”, he stated.

Commenting on the violent protests that took place after June 14, especially in the states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, the NSA said that there’s no way one can justify the vandalism of public properties. “I think that the protests, raising your voice is justified and is permitted in a democracy. But this vandalism, this violence is not permitted and will not be tolerated at all,” Doval said.

Meanwhile, the National Security Advisor also spoke on the Kashmir issue where Kashmiri Hindus are being attacked by terrorists. He said that India is dealing with the problem in Kashmir effectively. “They are a vulnerable section and need protection. The government has taken various steps in the past and probably much more has to be done and that is being done. The best thing is to go on offensive mode against terrorists and make sure they’re accounted for”, he was quoted.

He added that after the abrogation of Article 370, the mood and temper of the people of Kashmir changed. “People are no more in the favour of Pakistan”, he said. He also added that “India intends to maintain good relations with its neighbours, including Pakistan, but certainly the tolerance threshold for terrorism is very low”. He also said that India has long-pending territorial disputes with China and the country will never tolerate any type of transgression.

Lauding the Agnipath scheme and PM Modi for visualizing its long-term benefits for the country, he asked the youths who want to become ‘Agniveers’ to be positive and have faith in the nation and the leadership.

On June 14, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, along with the chiefs of three armed forces, launched the Agnipath scheme for the recruitment of youth in the armed forces. Following the launch, throngs of ‘youth’ protesters rushed to the streets and vandalised public property under the guise of ‘protests’ and marches. So-called armed forces aspirants damaged public property, set fire to trains, and brought life to a standstill in various Indian states.

In Uttar Pradesh, violent protests were executed in Varanasi, Firozabad Amethi, Ballia, Mathura, Agra, and several other areas. The rioters raised slogans against the scheme and demanded its repeal. They set a bogey of an empty train on fire and also vandalized a few other trains in Ballia, Firozabad, and Varanasi. Reportedly, the UP Police has registered 6 FIRs against the miscreants and has arrested around 260 people from various parts of the state.

Will never compromise on Hindutva for power, says ‘rebel’ Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde, Shiv Sena removes him from post of legislative party leader

OpIndia Staff
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Will never compromise on Hindutva for power, says ‘rebel’ Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde, Shiv Sena removes him from post of legislative party leader

The political drama in Maharashtra took yet another twist as Shiv Sena removed its ‘rebel’ leader Eknath Shinde from the post of legislative party leader in the assembly. Sewri MLA Ajay Chaudhary has been appointed as the new Shiv Sena Legislative Party leader. Meanwhile, Eknath Shinde, whose phone was apparently unreachable, used his phone to tweet that he will not compromise on Balasaheb’s Hindutva for power.

Shinde, who is reportedly in Surat, Gujarat since yesterday, tweeted, “We are Balasaheb’s staunch Shiv Sainiks. Balasaheb has taught us Hindutva. We have never and will never cheat for power regarding Balasaheb’s thoughts and Dharmaveer Anand Dighe Saheb’s teachings”

Eknath Shinde had reportedly gone ‘missing‘ after the Maharashtra Legislative Council elections on Monday, June 20th, along with the MLAs loyal to him. Following cross-voting by some MLAs of Shiv Sena in MLC elections which helped BJP, party supremo Uddhav Thackeray had called a meeting of all the party MLAs. However, Shinde and 13 other MLAs skipped the meeting as the crisis within MVA government continued to deepen.

While Shiv Sena is scampering to keep its flock together, their ally Sharad Pawar has said that he has full faith in Uddhav Thackeray and he is confident that they will find a way out of the situation. NCP chief Pawar is currently in Delhi for the opposition meet ahead of the Presidential elections and will meet Uddhav Thackeray tonight.

Shiv Sena is not the only party in turmoil after the MLC elections in Maharashtra. On Monday night, several Congress workers protested against the Congress party after Dalit leader Chandrakant Handore lost the elections due to cross-voting by his own party’s MLAs.

Elon Musk’s son becomes trans woman, appeals to cut all ties with ‘her’ father

OpIndia Staff
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Elon Musk’s son becomes trans woman, appeals to cut all ties with ‘her’ father

Media reports have emerged today (June 21) that billionaire Elon Musk’s son has filed a plea in court to ‘change’ his name in accordance with his new gender identity. He also wants to break all ties with his biological father. The plea was filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court in Santa Monica, a day after Xavier Musk turned 18 years old in the month of April.

In the plea, the Tesla chief’s transgender child Xavier Musk asked the court to change his gender recognition from male to female and to register his new name. He said that as he turned 18, he wanted to be recognised as a female and that his name should be changed to Vivian Jenna Wilson.

He demanded a name change and a new birth certificate reflecting his new gender identity.

According to reports, Xavier Musk had listed his reason for the name change as “gender identity and the fact that I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form.”

Basically, Xavier Musk wishes to drop his father’s famous surname and adopt his mother’s last name instead. Xavier’s mother is Justine Wilson, who divorced Musk in 2008. Elon Musk and Justine Wilson were married from 2000 to 2008. Xavier Musk also has a twin brother named, Griffin.

As per the reports, the hearing on the name change is set for June 24, Friday.

Reuters had written emails to the lawyer who represents Musk and the Tesla media office on Monday, requesting a comment on the issue but neither has responded.

KCR and his national ambitions: How and why he thinks he is showing the way

S. Sudhir Kumar
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KCR and his national ambitions: How and why he thinks he is showing the way

“We need to increase the average speed of our trucks and trains, therefore we need a new constitution.” 

Thus, enlightened KCR in one of his press monologues on why there is a need for him to enter the national political scene. If you are baffled at reading this, then all I can say is welcome to the club! You cannot help but wonder with what seriousness should one take a leader, who is aspiring a “national role” and links the travelling speed of our trucks and trains to amending the Constitution of India?

KCR’s national political dream is not a new one. He began talking about this in early 2018 with the main point that both the Congress and BJP have failed in governing the country.  We got a first peek into his thought process when he addressed his party cadre, who came to congratulate him for talking about a national role. He asked them why we can’t change our constitution and rules so that we also progress like how China and Singapore did. He proceeded to give examples on why these parties destroyed the country. Examples that he has been repeatedly citing ever since. 

Foremost amongst the examples is Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY). KCR claims that the central government has no job laying the roads in the villages because it is only the state government that can understand the actual need of the villages (Listen at 14:04 to his disparaging remarks on this in Hindi). He even questioned the need for a scheme like MNREGA where the centre directly gives money to the beneficiary in the village, bypassing the state government. He questions the need for central government to have hospitals and education institutes. Perhaps you are baffled again and also thinking that I am interpreting his speech wrong. Unfortunately not. Also, these are not one-time utterances that you would tend to ignore. He has cited these examples many times afterwards too, assuming that these are bolstering his case for an alternative national party. 

At the time KCR was making this inaugural speech of his national ambitions, most of the problems related to electricity were resolved in the country. 24*7 electricity had become a norm by then. But mysteriously, KCR told us that the centre should focus on providing electricity to the entire country instead of building roads in the villages! At that point of time, he said that the time has come for a Federal Front that isn’t reliant upon the Congress or the BJP. Later, he went about meeting leaders like Stalin, Mamata Banerjee, H.D.Kumaraswamy etc, but nothing concrete ever came out of any meeting. While his massive victory in 2018 bolstered his resolve, the 2019 Lok Sabha election results put a brake to all of these ambitions of KCR (and many such leaders). 

In addition to the setback in the 2019 Parliament elections; the subsequent losses in 2 bye-elections and the GHMC election made KCR put these plans in the backburner. In early 2021, KCR gave very strong indications that he will be making his son KTR as the Chief Minister. Everyone assumed that KCR will move on to fulfil his dream of a national role. However, nothing of such sort happened at that point of time (probably because of a severe backlash from various party leaders). 

With BJP growing stronger in his own backyard, he fell back on the same plan that almost every regional party employed – hire Prashant Kishor! His increased vitriol (it isn’t criticism anymore) on BJP set the stage again for a resurgence of his national political idea. In addition to the many reasons he was offering earlier, he now announced that the time has come to rewrite India’s Constitution. Whilst people were ready to listen what suggestions he has to offer for the same, he came up with the weirdest explanations and justifications to support his demand! 

You must now be thinking that surely, these cannot be the only reasons for him to announce a national role for himself. KCR’s contention is that when he established the TRS in 2001, he faced similar kind of mocking and criticism. It took him 13 years to realise the dream of a separate state of Telangana. His current vision for the country would also require a tapasya of that nature. He contends that the reservations system currently in place in our country is not in tune with the increasing proportion of population of certain groups and this is because of a flawed Constitution we have in place. He says that the time has now come to strip central government of its many powers (and therefore his attacks on programs like MNREGA and PMGSY). 

Next, he contends that today the country is simply following what Telangana is implementing. KCR and TRS are on the forefront of a campaign that says Modi is basically copying the schemes of Telangana and implementing them nationwide. To bolster this claim, they cite that the Jal Jeevan Mission is merely an extension of Telangana’s “Mission Bhagiratha”; the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi is merely an extension of Telangana’s Rythu Bandhu; the revival of 75 lakes in each district is merely an extension of Telangana’s Mission Kakateeya; and even the recent announcement of filling up of 10 lakh vacancies in central government came after KCR’s announcement of filling up of 1 lakh vacancies in Telangana. 

So, in KCR’s mind, he is the one showing direction to the country and not Modi, BJP or the Congress. He’s led the TRS cadre to believe that he is the true national leader of this country. Hence, we now have flexis come up in some cities across the country announcing the arrival of “Desh ki Neta” KCR. The logical next step from the “Desh ki Neta” is to “tour” the country – where he takes his own sweet time to meet a handful leaders spread over multiple days. The “Desh ki Neta” is now busy leaking his next steps to the press – latest being that he will rename the TRS to BRS – Bharatiya Rashtra Samithi and that he will be the National president of the party while continue to be the Chief Minister (though it is his son who is anyway running the show). 

He (and PK) seems to be missing the moot point – how does anyone trust KCR? His U-turns on issues and people are now legendary. His vitriol, especially on the BJP and its leaders, has isolated him from a lot of apolitical folks in the state. His lies resonate only with the cadre of the TRS. Till date there has not been a single show of support to KCR from anyone outside of the TRS party. He went city-hopping meeting CMs and Opposition leaders but not a single one of them expressed a whole-hearted support to KCR for any of his plans. As recently as last week, he didn’t attend a meeting of 17 parties who were discussing about the upcoming Presidential election. And most importantly, are the issues he is bringing up really the burning issues for the populace? For example, will he contest elections by saying that he will stop constructing roads and MNREGA? How does he intend to connect to the population with such a directionless agenda in mind? Time will only tell the scale of the failure of this experiment of KCR.  

‘Yoga is shirk’, ‘not allowed in Islam’: Islamists on Twitter ask Muslims not to practice Yoga, deride the ancient Hindu practice

OpIndia Staff
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‘Yoga is shirk’, ‘not allowed in Islam’: Islamists on Twitter ask Muslims not to practice Yoga, deride the ancient Hindu practice

As the World celebrates International Yoga Day on Tuesday, Islamists all over the social media are miffed with this ancient Hindu practice taking centre stage. With arguments like ‘Yoga is Shirk’, and ‘Yoga is not Islamic’, Islamists on Twitter have taken it upon themselves to urge Muslims not to follow this practice.

Major pushback against Yoga could be seen in the Maldives when India’s High Commission’s Cultural Centre organised International Yoga Day Celebrations in the Island nation. Apart from disrupting the actual event, Islamists from the country could be seen on Twitter flagging the event as ‘anti-Muslim’. Agitated with ‘Muslims’ being invited to the event (where everyone irrespective of their religion was invited) a Twitter user said that Yoga is Shirk and that the event is being held to humiliate Islam.

Screengrab of a Tweet from @tricolor355

Yoga was called ‘Shirk’ – a concept in Islam that considers any form of idolatry or practice from a polytheistic religion a sin. Another Twitter user reminded his Muslim compatriots that a ‘Fatwa’ has already been issued against Yoga some two hundred years back.

Screengrab of a tweet from @yahya711_

On Tuesday, Islamists in the Maldives tried to disrupt the Yoga day event organised by the Indian High Commission. When the extremist act was condemned on social media, the very act of doing Yoga was called ‘extremist’ in response by some.

Screengrab of a tweet from @Mak_nuun

Another Twitter user published clippings from a documentary to highlight the Hindu roots of Yoga and Pranayams, and worried about Muslims doing Yoga. “Watch these clips, from a documentary about the history of yoga! it’s frightening how much it is spread among Muslims,” the alarmed user tweeted.

Several Tweets from the account asked Muslims to learn what yoga really is and to stay away from this shirk. Later in the thread, the user pointed out that Yoga has been praised in the Mahabharata and Lord Shiva always sits in a Yogic pose. Several clips of Hindu gurus including Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev have been posted on Twitter to prove how Yoga, given its Hindu roots is against Islam and Allah.

“Allah is above the Throne. Not everywhere. In Hinduism Yoga is a concept of Unification with God, Which goes against the teaching of Islam,” a Twitter user wrote while posting a video clip of Sadhguru.

Meanwhile, the world celebrates the International Day of Yoga on June 21 every year. The United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution in 2015 to celebrate the day dedicated to the ancient Hindu practice to achieve physical, mental and spiritual peace.

ED opposes transfer of conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar out of Tihar, says he wanted to build a nexus of officials in another jail

OpIndia Staff
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ED opposes transfer of conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar out of Tihar, says he wanted to build a nexus of officials in another jail

On June 20, Enforcement Directorate opposed the jail transfer plea filed by conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar in the Supreme Court. In his plea, Sukesh requested to transfer him to another prison. The investigation agency told the apex court that during custodial interrogation, he has admitted to Rs 215 crore heist and warned the court that the plea came in the backdrop of a desire to set up a racket that he had allegedly run inside Tihar. The agency said he wanted to build a nexus of officials to help him in another jail just like Tihar.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta represented ED in the court before the two-judge bench comprising Justice CT Ravi Kumar and Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia. Notably, the law officer had urged the court to hear ED before considering the plea filed by Chandrasekhar.

Chandrasekhar admitted to Rs 215 crores heist, was being delivered five-star food in Tihar, had parties in the jail: ED to SC

ED told the apex court that Sukesh admitted to duping Aditi Singh, wife of former Ranbaxy promoter Shivinder Mohan, of Rs 215 crores by posing as Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla over the phone. Furthermore, the agency told the court that food was being delivered from a five-star hotel to Tihar Jail for Chandrasekhar. He also hosted parties inside a prison in which jail officials were allegedly involved.

The investigating agency opposed the transfer plea in which Chandrasekhar alleged there were threats to his life. ED said he wanted a transfer to repeat what he had done in Tihar. Agency said, “During ED custody, Chandrasekhar admitted that he impersonated Law Secretary Anup Kumar and Home secretary Ajay Bhalla. He admitted to collecting cash from Aditi Singh…He admitted that he used mobile-based applications ‘hushed’ and ‘crazy call’ for voice modulation and purchased virtual numbers.”

The court has agreed to hear ED on Tuesday (June 21) when it would consider the plea that he was facing threats to life in Tihar. It is noteworthy that several Police officials are under probe for allegedly receiving bribes from Sukesh in exchange for favours inside prison.

ED says Charasekhar a habitual offender, has been found possessing mobile phones inside the jail

Earlier on Friday, the court had asked the Central Government to make a decision if Chandrasekhar could be shifted to another Jail. On Monday, ED moved a fresh application and informed the court about the charges and the ongoing investigation involving Chandrasekhar. The agency told the court, “Chandrasekhar is a habitual offender and has been charged with cheating people and is a known conman. On various occasions inside the jail premises, he has reportedly been found possessing a mobile phone and making calls, impersonating various Government functionaries and holders of constitutional posts to gain benefits. It has been found that Chandrasekhar and his wife Leena were running an organised crime syndicate.”

ED added,” The Tihar Jail has ensured that it would thwart any future possibility of misuse of jail facilities. For any new prison to put in place similar measures or even to come to terms with the sophisticated means of con-manship by Chandrasekhar will take time and transferring the petitioners to any other prison would be hazardous as he is likely to repeat the same mischief and offences.”

The agency further added that in June 2020, Chandrasekhar impersonated the Union Law Secretary and later as Union Home Secretary to con Aditi Singh. He allegedly extorted Rs 215 crores from Aditi Singh, claiming Union Home Minister and PMO officials knew about the deal to get her husband out on bail in exchange for the money.

ED said, “The proceeds of crime were used to purchase cars, house in Chennai, various luxury items, clothes etc., and was utilised to open a salon for his wife (Leena Paulose, a co-accused who too is lodged at Tihar), to give expensive gifts to celebrities and to jail authorities to manage facilities in jail.”

ED added, “Leena further stated that she had seen Chandrasekhar having parties (consuming alcohol, chicken and mutton) in Tihar jail through video calls…she had also seen that his food used to come from Hotel Taj in Tihar jail,” while referring to Paulose’s statement on how he had parties inside the jail.

ED further said TV actors Nikita Tamboli, Sophia Singh and Chahat Khanna admitted to meeting Chandrasekhar in prison and receiving gifts and money from him. A costume designer and image consultant identified as Leepakshi Ellawadi had said in a statement to the agency that she was hired by Chandrasekhar as a stylist for actor Jacqueline Fernandes.

Arrest of Chandrasekhar

In 2017, Delhi Police arrested Sukesh Chandrasekhar for the first time for allegedly duping AIADMK leader of Rs 2 crores on the pretext he would help the politician in retaining the two leaves symbol of the party. He had claimed he would do that by bribing the Election Commission officials. Since then, 34 cases have been filed against Chandrasekhar under charges of attempt to murder, cheating, extortion, bribing public officials and more. A special cell of Delhi Police is investigating jail and police officials for alleged involvement in his crimes.

On December 31, his lawyer issued a statement on behalf of Chandrasekhar denying all the charges. He claimed government agencies were targeting him. He called himself a corporate lobbyist and refused to identify himself as a conman.

Multiple websites went down as Cloudflare system faced issue, read details

OpIndia Staff
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Multiple websites went down as Cloudflare system faced issue, read details

On June 21, several websites across the world went offline after Cloudflare, a network transit, proxy, and security provider used by most businesses around the world, faced problems in its system. The global outage affected companies like Zerodha, Discord, Doordash, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Shopify, Zendeck, Upstoxx, Groww and many others. OpIndia and other media houses using Cloudflare services were impacted by the outage.

In a statement Zerodha said, “We are getting reports of intermittent connectivity issues on Kite via the Cloudflare network for users on certain ISPs. We are taking this up with Cloudflare. In the meanwhile, please try using an alternate internet connection.” It further added, “Cloudflare (network transit, proxy, security provider) used by most of the internet businesses around the world, is having a global outage. If you are unable to use our websites or apps, please try switching to a different ISP as a different route may work.”

The Cloudflare network is back to normal and all websites are functioning now, popular stock trading app Zerodha issued a notification

Cloudflare issued statement

In its statement over the outage, Cloudflare said that it had identified the issue on June 21 at 6:57 UTC. The problem caused widespread issues with its services and/or network, and the engineers were investigating it. It added that the users might face errors and timeouts while the issue was being resolved. It added, “We will update this status page to clarify the scope of impact as we continue the investigation.”

By the time this report was written, some websites were working while many others are still facing problem.

Anish Khan murder: Calcutta HC refuses to transfer case to CBI, asks state-formed SIT to continue with the investigation

OpIndia Staff
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Anish Khan murder: Calcutta HC refuses to transfer case to CBI, asks state-formed SIT to continue with the investigation

The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday refused to hand over the murder case of ‘student leader’ Anish Khan to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for investigation. The court has further ordered the state-formed SIT to file a charge sheet and conduct further probe into the case if required, reports Live Law.

Justice Rajasekhar Mantha of the Calcutta High Court orally observed that he has perused all the relevant records and that he is of the ‘clear view’ that there is no need for the transfer of investigation to the CBI. Justice Mantha also observed that all observations made on the State constituted SIT were only for the limited purpose of determining whether the probe should be handed over to CBI or not.

Islamist organisation member Anish Khan died under mysterious circumstances

Anish Khan, a member of the Islamist outfit ‘Indian Secular Front (ISF)’, was found dead on the night of February 18, 2022, under mysterious circumstances.

The family of Khan had alleged that he was killed by 4 uniformed police officers and civic volunteers. He has allegedly pushed off the 3rd floor of his own house in Amta in the Howrah district of West Bengal.

“It was around 12:30 am that four persons came to our house and identified themselves as policemen from the Amta police station. One of them stood with me on the ground floor. He was carrying a firearm. The other three took my son upstairs. Moments later, I heard a huge thud and found that my son was lying in a pool of blood. As I raised the alarm, all the four persons fled,” Salem Khan, Anish Khan’s father has then said.

Khan’s family members had demanded a CBI investigation into his death. Claiming that the killing of Anish Khan was a “premeditated murder”, senior counsel Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, appearing on behalf of the deceased’s father, had prayed before the court that an independent investigation is ordered into it.

State constituted SIT calls Khan’s murder ‘death by accident’, family objects

The state government, meanwhile, had formed the SIT headed by Additional director general (CID) Gyanwant Singh to probe the case. In April 2022, the West Bengal government-appointed special investigation team (SIT) submitted a progress report on its investigation into the alleged murder of Anish Khan to the Calcutta High Court.

The family had objected to the report submitted by the SIT, saying that it does not disclose how and with whose permission the raid took place at Anish Khan’s home at Amta in West Bengal’s Howrah district on the night of February 18. Bhattacharya, the deceased’s family advocate, had further objected and called the findings of the SIT report ‘ridiculous’ for suggesting that the death of Anis Khan was non-homicidal.

Advocate General S.N Mookherjee appearing on behalf of the state had, however, argued before the court that Khan’s death was accidental and not homicidal. It had cited the deceased’s autopsy report to substantiate his claims.

Left-wing supporters protest the murder of Anish Khan, govt ordered a police crackdown

It may be recalled that on February 22, many Islamic student organisations had carried out protests against the alleged murder of Anish Khan. The West Bengal police had then carried out a lathi charge against these members of left-wing student organisations. The State unit of AISA claimed that over 100s students were arrested by the West Bengal police on the behest of the Trinamool Congress government.

Kerala journalist who complained against CM Pinarayi Vijayan in corruption case, now booked for ‘making porn’

OpIndia Staff
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Kerala journalist who complained against CM Pinarayi Vijayan in corruption case, now booked for ‘making porn’

On June 17, the Kerala Police arrested journalist TP Nandakumar for allegedly forcing his colleague to make an obscene video. Journalist Nandakumar, popularly known as ‘crime’ Nandakumar is the chief editor of Crime magazine and is also accused of using vulgar language and misbehaving with his female employee.

According to the reports, the Kerala police acted swift on the complaint filed by the female employee on May 27 who stated that Nandakumar asked her to produce a pornographic video to target Health Minister Veena George. She said that she looked similar to George and so was forced by the journalist to act in a pornographic film.

The complainant added that she was offered a fat amount by the journalist for the task and was verbally abused when she refused to do the video. The Kerala Police investigated the office of Nandakumar and seized his several digital devices and documents. Kochi city police commissioner CH Nagaraju meanwhile also alleged that the journalist had asked the complainant to make a fake video on Kerala Health Minister.

“He forced her to make a fake video and we will be adding sections under the Information Technology (IT) Act as well. The main charges under which the case has been registered against him are insulting a woman, and insulting her based on caste”, the police commissioner was quoted. Reports mention that TP Nandakumar has filed a counter-complaint in the case saying that his female co-worker had misbehaved with him.

This is months after journalist TP Nandakumar through his Crime magazine had published a report claiming that he had videos of Health Minister Veena George where she was seen naked. In September 2021, journalist Nandakumar was interviewing Kerala-based politician PC George, who had made derogatory remarks about the Health Minister. He had said that Veena George was was made Health Minister just because she was an ‘assistant’ to CM Pinarayi Vijayan.

The Crime magazine published the phone-in interview from its social media handle resulting in the arrest of its Chief Editor TP Nandakumar. The Kakkanad police had charged him for making defamatory remarks against Veena George and for circulating the voice clip via social media. Later, a complaint was also registered against ex-MLA PC George for insulting the modesty of state Health Minister Veena George.

Nandakumar had exposed CM Vijayan in SNC-Lavalin case

It is important to note that journalist TP Nandakumar and politician PC George have a history of engaging in legal battles against CM Pinarayi Vijayan. In the year 2006, Nandakumar exposed CM Vijayan by presenting crucial evidence to the ED in the SNC-Lavalin corruption case. He had filed a complaint with the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) against CM Vijayan and accused him of indulging in a criminal conspiracy while he was serving as the Electricity Minister of Kerala from May 1996 to October 1998.

The complaint stated that the then Electricity Minister Vijayan and Kerala State Electricity Board members awarded hydroelectric project renovation contracts to Canada-based company SNC-Lavalin at exorbitant rates. However, the CBI Court had acquitted Vijayan due to a lack of evidence then.

Gold Smuggling Case: Police say Nandakumar also behind Swapna Suresh’s allegations against CM Vijayan

Also recently, the Special Investigation Team examining the Kerala gold smuggling through diplomatic baggage case revealed that politicians PC George and Nandakumar have a major role to highlight the alleged involvement of CM Vijayan in the case. The Kerala Police team stated that the duo was behind Swapna Suresh’s allegations against CM Vijayan.

On July 5, 2020, customs authorities at Thiruvananthapuram International Airport seized gold weighing more than 30 kg and worth around Rs 15 crore. This gold was hidden in diplomatic luggage and air freighted to the UAE embassy. Customs officers took action after receiving evidence that the luggage was part of a smuggling network attempting to misappropriate the name of a diplomat with diplomatic immunity.

In the current case, ‘Crime’ Nandakumar was arrested on June 17 and was booked under the SC & ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 and sections 506 (Punishment for criminal intimidation) and 509 (Word, gesture, or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman) of the Indian Penal Code.

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