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Allegations against the CJI appears to be an attempt to undermine the court, but also raises questions about the judiciary

India Legal Team
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Allegations against the CJI appears to be an attempt to undermine the court, but also raises questions about the judiciary

For the Supreme Court, it has been an extraordinary and controversial week with charges of a conspiracy to fix benches and control judicial proceedings. This came in the wake of an unprecedented development—sexual harassment charges against the country’s highest judicial authority, Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi. The accuser is a female ex-staffer of the Court who had worked in his office and was subsequently handpicked by the CJI himself to work in his residential office.

In a sworn affidavit submitted to 22 judges of the apex court, she charged the CJI with sexually harassing her. In the affidavit, she said that after she rebuffed his advances, she was dismissed from service, asked to apologise to Justice Gogoi’s wife, as demanded by the latter, her disabled brother-in-law, who had been appointed to the Supreme Court on October 9 as a temporary junior court attendant, was served a termination letter on January 14 with no reasons given. And on April 26, the ex-Supreme Court staffer recorded her statement before a three-judge Court panel comprising Justices SA Bobde, Indira Banerjee and Indu Malhotra. The statement was recorded over two hours at the SC guesthouse on Shahjahan Road in Delhi.

The week since the drama began has seen many twists and turns, and it did not take long for the conspiracy theories to start gaining ground. According to well-placed sources, the people behind the conspiracy range from corporates, disgruntled judges and serial petitioners to a few female employees of the apex court and some sacked employees. They said that among those who prepared the 97-para complaint were two well known lawyer activists who are said to have the backing of two former Supreme Court judges. Many more, it is said, are being sounded out. With CJI Gogoi due to retire in November, there is a powerful group that is keen to virtually control the judiciary and put its stamp on the establishment.

Such theories were given credence by the manner and speed with which events were coordinated and ultimately played out. Barely had the woman ex-SC staffer despatched her allegations to 22 Supreme Court judges on April 19, than some news portals went to town with them. Not just that, some burnt the mid­night oil preparing and then despatching questionnaires to the chief justice. The editors of one portal, who partied well beyond midnight at a five-star hotel in East Delhi, went back to their offices to prepare and dispatch a questionnaire to the chief justice. In a pre-dawn reply to the questions sent to the CJI, the secretary general of the Supreme Court sent an email denying the allegations.

The CJI, meanwhile, was making his own plans. The courts were closed from April 17 on account of Mahavir Jayanti and scheduled to reopen only after the Easter weekend on April 22. Sources say the “conspirators” probably assumed that the long gap between the night of Good Friday when the letter was sent and Monday morning when courts were scheduled to open gave them enough time to drag the office of the CJI through the dirt.

They were, however, stunned when CJI Gogoi, displaying amazing reflexes, decided to call their bluff and take them head-on. He called for a three-member bench to sit on April 20 (a Saturday) to hear the complaint against himself. The CJI knew it was a decision that would draw much flak and it did. The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and the Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association (SCAORA) questioned the propriety of the CJI constituting a committee with himself on it to look into a complaint against him. But cleverly, all that the CJI did at the hurriedly called meeting was to make a few general remarks, the most critical being that “there has to be a bigger force behind this….There are people behind this conspiracy who want to deactivate the office of the CJI”. He went on to add that his Court was scheduled to hear several important cases in the coming week and he sensed a political plot to destabilise the proceedings.

Among them were two that related to politicians—one was connected with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the other involved Congress president Rahul Gandhi. In the first, Modi’s presence was not called for as it related to the biopic on him starring Vivek Oberoi and the case was about staying the release of the film until after the polls were over. But Rahul’s case was more serious, a contempt case that the Court itself had suo motu taken up against him after he had allegedly twisted the Court’s verdict in the Rafale revision petition and put in the words “Chowkidar chor hai”. The case was to come up on April 22, a Monday, when Rahul was asked to reply to the notice. But after the fast-moving events involving the CJI and the Court, Rahul apologised and promised never ever to twist the Court’s words in future.

By then, the subplot had become the main story. On April 23, a three-member bench of the Court asserted that it would get to the “root” of the alleged conspiracy if it was established that “fixers” were targeting the CJI with allegations of sexual harassment.

This came after an advocate, Utsav Bains, filed an affidavit wherein he said he had enough evidence to prove there was a conspiracy by corporate houses and “fixers” to get CJI Gogoi to resign. He reportedly handed over material in a sealed cover, which he said contained CCTV footage that “will reveal many things”. Bains also took to social media, where in one post, he wrote about a “lobby of disgruntled judges” who were also actively involved in the plot to implicate CJI Gogoi and get him to resign.

After Bains made his startling revelations, the Court summoned the chiefs of the CBI, IB and Delhi Police and after “deliberating” with them, a bench was constituted. It comprised Justices Arun Mishra, RF Nariman and Deepak Gupta and said that Bains in his affidavit had said that two court masters, both of whom were sacked after they had manipulated a Court order to favour Anil Ambani, and the former female employee who had worked in the CJI’s court had conspired to concoct these charges.

It may be recalled that four months ago, the Court had ordered the personal appearance of Ambani in a contempt plea filed by Ericsson against the now defunct Reliance Communications and its chairman for failure to pay nearly Rs 500 crore to it. However, the summons that was carried on the Supreme Court website stated that the personal appearance of Ambani was not required. After the counsel for Ericsson pointed out the discrepancy, the Court ordered a probe. The probe revealed that the summons order was deliberately changed by the two court masters. They were subsequently sacked. “We will inquire into the alleged claims of fixers at work and manipulating the judiciary. If they continue to work, then none of us will survive.… Fixing has no role to play in the system. We will inquire and take it to the logical end,” the bench said. It also ordered that the Bains’ affidavit be “kept in a sealed cover in total confidentiality as it contains highly sensitive information pertaining to the alleged conspiracy, according to him, to frame the Chief Justice of India in a case of sexual harassment”.

April 25 brought another twist in the tale as Justice NV Ramana, who was part of the three-member committee constituted to look into the original sexual harassment charges against the CJI, recused himself from the probe. The panel is headed by Justice SA Bobde, the most senior judge who will take over as the head of the Supreme Court when CJI Gogoi retires in November. It also included Justice Indira Banerjee.

Its proceedings began on April 26, but a day earlier, the woman ex-SC staffer expressed her reservations about the presence of Justice Ramana on the panel. She alleged that he was a close friend of the CJI. According to her, at a function in Hyderabad two days after she levelled her charges against CJI Gogoi, Justice Ramana rubbished them. As such, she feared she may not get an “objective and fair hearing” from a committee of which Justice Ramana was a part.

Following this, Justice Ramana, in a three-page letter to his colleagues in the SC, asked to be recused. He wrote: “My decision to recuse is based on an intent to avoid any suspicion that this institution will not conduct itself in keeping with the highest standards of judicial propriety and wisdom….” Referring to the former woman staffer’s complaint that he was a close friend of the CJI, Justice Ramana wrote in his recusal letter: “The Chief Justice of India is primus inter pares, who allots a variety of administrative duties and responsibilities to the Judges…My visits to the residence of Chief Justice of India cannot, therefore, suggest any proximity than what is absolutely normal under the circumstances. Thus, the apprehension expressed by the complainant in this regard is wholly misconceived….” His place was taken by Justice Indu Malhotra.

This scenario is virtually unprecedented in the judiciary. While an in-house committee examines allegations of sexual harassment against the CJI, another one headed by a former SC judge, Justice AK Patnaik, will probe the alleged conspiracy theory.

The core of the issue lies in what Justice Ramana stated in his letter: “Let my recusal be a clear message to the nation that there should be no fears about probity in our institution, and that we will not refrain from going to any extent to protect the trust reposed in us. That is, after all, our final source of moral strength.”

 

Originally published on India Legal on 28 April 2019, republished with permission.

NIA conducts raids in Kerala over Islamic State links, three youths arrested

OpIndia Staff
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NIA conducts raids in Kerala over Islamic State links, three youths arrested

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) arrested three youths in Kerala in connection with the Easter bombings in Sri Lanka. The arrests were made during a raid on an Islamic State (IS) module in Kasaragod, Kerala.


Abu Bakar Siddiqui and Ahmed Araffath, two of the youths who were arrested, were picked up by the NIA Cochin unit and were being questioned at the NIA headquarters.

According to reports, the three youth were detained after receiving intelligence reports that they in contact with terror leader Zahran Hashim and are said to have been inspired by his ideology. Hashim is suspected to have led the Easter bombings in Sri Lanka, and he is the leader of Sri Lanka based terror organisation National Thowheeth Jama’ath, responsible for carrying out the attacks. The youths have also been in contact with ISIS.

The NIA said in a statement, “NIA today carried out searches at three places in Kerala in connection with 2016 ISIS Kasaragod Module case. They are suspected to have links with some of accused in the said case who left India to join terrorist organisation ISIS/ Daish.”

The NIA have raided two houses in Kasaragod and one in Palakkad. Mobile phones, SIM cards, memory cards, pen drives and diaries with handwritten notes in Arabic and Malayalam were retrieved. DVDs, CDs with religious speeches, books authored by Zakir Naik and Syed Kutheb were also found by the officers.

Authorities are trying to gather more information about the bombings in Sri Lanka. India had warned Sri Lanka about probable terror attacks before the Easter bombings, based on information received from raids on ISIS modules in India. Ever since the Sri Lanka attacks, security has been increased in religious places and airports. All southern states have also been under high alert.

Rahul Gandhi knew that Rajasthan Congress leader had printed and distributed 50,000 fake NYAY forms

OpIndia Staff
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Rahul Gandhi knew that Rajasthan Congress leader had printed and distributed 50,000 fake NYAY forms

Just two days ahead of Lok Sabha polls in the state, fake forms of Congress party’s proposed NYAY scheme were circulated in Kota in Rajasthan. Videos had emerged on social media showing that Congress activists were fooling villagers in rural areas by distributing the forms among them. When the villagers went to the local government offices to submit the forms, they realised that the forms are fake. The forms have Rahul Gandhi’s photo and election symbol of Congress printed on it.

Now it has emerged that a Congress leader from Rajasthan had printed the forms, and Congress president Rahul Gandhi himself was aware of it. The forms were shown to Rahul Gandhi and Sachin Pilot at an election rally in Kota on 25th April.

Rakhi Gautam, a Congress leader from Kota who had contested the 2018 assembly elections from South Kota, has posted some photographs from the rally. And in few of the photographs, it is clearly seen that she is showing the fake NYAY forms to Rahul Gandhi and Sachin Pilot when they were sitting on the stage.

Fake NYAY form in the hands of Rahul Gandhi and Sachin Pilot

Comparing with the available image of the fake NYAY form with the images, it can be concluded that Rakhi Gautam is presenting the same form to Rahul Gandhi and Sachin Pilot on the stage.

Fake NYAY Form distributed in Kota

Rahul Gandhi is also seen holding a handwritten note along with the form, and now it is revealed that it is a note written by Rakhi Gautam addressed to the party leaders informing about the ‘prototype form’ she has printed.

A copy of the letter posted on Twitter by a Congress worker from Kota, who also posted some other photos which show both Rahul Gandhi and Sachin Pilot reading copies of the form. In the letter written using five different coloured pens, Rakhi Gautam informs that she has prepared a ‘prototype form’ for the NYAY scheme. She also writes that around 50 thousand forms have been distributed by Congress workers in 12 villages under South Kota assembly constituency.

Handwritten note about the NYAY form by Rakhi Gautam

This makes it clear that although the forms were printed and distributed by the local Congress leader from South Kota, she had duly informed about the same to top leadership of the party. She was not prevented from distributing the forms, which means that the distribution of fake NYAY forms had the endorsement of Congress president Rahul Gandhi.

The same Congress worker has also posted a video of Rakhi Gautam responding to BJP’s attack on her over the form. Interestingly, she has not denied that she distributed the forms, instead, she has attacked BJP for their ‘jhumla’ and said that all eligible families in Kota will get benefits of the NYAY scheme in Rahul Gandhi becomes PM.

Online ‘Right Wing’ makes unknown idiots famous, but it might not be that bad a deed

Rahul Roushan
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Online ‘Right Wing’ makes unknown idiots famous, but it might not be that bad a deed

One of the most often offered criticism – and a valid one too – of India’s so-called online RW (Right Wing – a diverse group that is essentially non-left, but ‘non-left wing’ term is a bit drab, hence RW it is) is that it is almost always in combative and reactive mode, and in the process, ends up making little known people on the other side famous.

Some guy with no real achievement in real life has to just put up a tweet or a placard or a short video containing some anti-Hindu or anti-nationalist rhetoric, and within no time he can flash a victim card saying he got abuses and death threats for his views. Next you know the guy is sitting in some TV studio or lit-fest regurgitating the same rhetoric, further peppered with platitudes about freedom and tolerance.

I’m sure you can think of two or three such characters already who have popped up in the last 4 or 5 years. So is the online RW acting as free PR agency for the self-declared ‘liberals’ of India? Definitely yes, if you think of those few characters that you could just recall.

However, so far as the wider ideological battle is concerned, I believe that this free PR service by a vocal section of the online RW is going to harm the left-liberals (an oxymoron, but I’ll still use it as it’s a popular term like ‘right wing’) in long term. In fact, it has already harmed them, and the signs are visible.

It appears as if the liberals have given up on creating their own heroes. They are not only happy to accept and rally behind the specimens that the online RW picks up for them, they are actually rushing to accept even the disgruntled and discarded personalities from the ‘right wing’ as their heroes.

It had started with them suddenly finding Arun Shourie an intellectual – which he always was – whose ideas must be listened to and taken seriously, only because Shourie had started speaking against Narendra Modi. Ram Guha, the conceited connoisseur of everything from gully cricket to military combat – which actually makes him the epitome of Indian liberalism – last year had declared that that Shourie was an intellectual who had “produced serious books”. The same Ram Guha had earlier said that “Shourie is a pamphleteer parading as a historian” while critiquing one of his serious books.

Coincidentally, or not, Guha had belittled Shourie during Vajpayee years. A person dismissed as pamphleteer and courtier during Vajpyee’s tenure was celebrated as intellectual and rebel under Modi regime. Well, Modi hai toh mumkin hai, as BJP says.

How much lazy and unoriginal the left-liberals have become can be gauged from the fact that almost everyone of them religiously uses “North Korean channels” to disparage those broadcast journalists who don’t hate Modi. This insult was coined by Shourie. Today, the liberals can’t even think of an original insult.

Their “activism” was already copied from whatever the Left in West does – they just used to replace ‘White’ with ‘Brahmin’ and a new intellectual movement was born – and their insults are now copied from disgruntled sections of RW. This unoriginality is so exceptional! Even Rahul Gandhi has not copied Arvind Kejriwal to this extent.

The latest hero of the liberals is Raj Thackeray. The guy who has all his life stood up for ideas that are as much liberal as… umm… ideas that are as much liberal as Pakistan is… well, I can’t think of any befitting cheeky analogy as Indian liberals reduced liberalism to a joke years ago, so actually Raj Thackeray might be a quintessential liberal.

Whatever he might be today, Raj Thackeray is another borrowed hero of the liberals, reinforcing the fact that Indian liberals have lost the ability to create their own heroes. They need RW to lend them some old ones or help them in finding new ones. Earlier, they had accepted Hardik Patel as one of the heroes, just because they thought he could create student unrest and bring back pre-Emergency days and defeat the ‘Right Wing’ party BJP in Gujarat.

This is in sharp contrast to how the left-liberals could create heroes for themselves and for the unsuspecting masses until a generation or two ago. Those born in the 80s can especially feel the difference. Just take the example of Arundhati Roy; the fiction writing (everything that she has written qualifies for this) star of the liberals at least had to write a novel and win an international literary prize to become a hero. Whereas all one need today is to write a few tweets and claim ‘trolls are attacking me’.

Just look at their current heroes – a placard holding person claiming death threats, an abusive ‘comedian’ claiming democracy under attack, a ‘fact checker’ whose superpower is that he can do reverse image search on Google, an actor who can masturbate on screen, and an array of ‘journalists’ whose lies and lack of logic can be not caught only by Umar Akmal – only thing common among them is that all of them have claimed to have received “RW troll attacks”.

What a fall. While the left-liberals were always a bunch of people who closely guarded their ranks and were ruthless with people who dared to dissent, at least there was some rigour in the selection process of selecting their heroes. They were bullies, but they worked hard.

Earlier a person will write a book, become famous, and then will claim that ‘right wing’ is intolerant. Now a person first claims that RW is intolerant, becomes famous, and then wins a book contract.

This inversion of the process of a hero’s making is not some natural evolution or innovation of the left-liberals, it is a proof of how this lot is getting lazier each day and is creating a system that is rewarding mediocrity.

For sure the online RW is not doing it as part of some grand plan or conspiracy – some of them just love trolling while some of them are instinctively reactive and rude – but they are doing a great service.

Left-liberalism is getting mediocre each day and soon it will be left with a parody of ideas and phoney heroes. And for that, let us all say a heartfelt thanks to every RW Twitter troll out there.

Exclusive: Victims reveal how an allegedly drunk Kanhaiya Kumar and his supporters brutally beat up BJP supporters

OpIndia Staff
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Exclusive: Victims reveal how an allegedly drunk Kanhaiya Kumar and his supporters brutally beat up BJP supporters

Kanhaiya Kumar’s hooliganism in Begulsari, Bihar from where he’s contesting on CPI ticket, is at its pinnacle. The incident occurred on April 25 around 8.30 pm, when a group of 3-4 locals were sitting in a vacate area when they caught the attention of Kanhaiya Kumar and his supporters, who were passing by in their car.

Victim Ankit Kumar, one of the people belonging to the group of locals had a lotus symbol batch secured to his shirt. Kanhaiya Kumar gathered that Ankit was a BJP supporter. Raged on seeing the lotus symbol on his shirt, Kanhaiya Kumar who was allegedly in a drunken state, started hurling abuses at him and beating him up profusely. Kanhaiya Kumar’ supporters immediately joined him and started assaulting Ankit Kumar.

However, Ankit Kumar has not yet lodged a police complaint against the barbarity discharged at him. He feared that police will not take any action against the CPI leader. Ankit discloses in the video that at the time the incident took place, Kanhaiya Kumar was escorted by local police personnel, who stood there like mute spectators in support of Kanhaiya Kumar and did nothing to save him from Kanhaiya’ savagery.

A local resident of Tekanpura district, Ram Vinod confirmed that angered, merely by a lotus symbol on Ankit Kumar’s shirt, Kanhaiya Kumar and his goons mercilessly attacked him. Ankit suffered severe injuries while hurting his back in the outrage.

One Adarsh Kumar, victim’s friend confirmed that Kanhaiya Kumar and his supporters were in a completely drunken state and were not even in the condition to ride their bike straight. Begusarai is in Bihar where there is alcohol prohibition.

Meanwhile, another local resident, Kanhaiya Prasad, corroborating the incident which transpired on April 25 where Ankit Kumar fell prey to Kanhaiya Kumar’ wrath, said that such incidents were not new in the district.

Earlier, we have reported, how in the videos which surfaced, locals of Begusarai, Bihar are seen complaining that they were mercilessly beaten up by CPI candidate from Bihar’s Begasarai constituency, Kanhaiya Kumar’s supporters on his instructions.

Another incident, where a young teenager also faced Kanhaiya Kumar’s goon’s fury, was highlighted by a Twitter user Ajay Kumar Banty. In a Tweet, shared by him on April 26, a video shows how a young boy pays a heavy price for hailing PM Narendra Modi. He is being seen beaten up mercilessly by Kanhaiya’s supporters for chanting ‘Jai Modi’.


Meanwhile, the locals of Tekanpura district, Bagusarai, Bihar, where the incident preceded, have condemned the incident and have said that the locals will answer back to his brutality in the form of their votes. “Kanhaiya Kumar is trying to pressurize the locals by resorting to vandalism, we will boycott him through our votes”, said the locals.

This is, however, not the first time the wannabe politician who after being ditched by the ‘mahagathbandhan‘ is contesting 2019 Lok Sabha elections on a CPI (Communist Party of India) ticket from Begusarai, has faced such resentment.

Earlier too during a campaign procession, Kanhaiya Kumar was gheraoed by Begusarai locals and questioned about the ‘Bharat tere tukde honge’ slogans that were raised by him and his opposition to reservation for the economically backward sections of the society.

Incidentally, the CPI candidate, who has been in news lately, for his huff, also has an equally interesting past. In October 2018, an FIR was filed in Patna against Kanhaiya Kumar and his supporters after they misbehaved with AIIMS doctors. From his close aide accusing him of being a ‘liar’ and a ‘casteist’, to when Kanhaiya was accused of flashing his d***k to a woman, Kanhaiya Kumar has been a paragon of disruption and a symbol of everything that is wrong with Indian politics. We had earlier also reported how Kanhaiya Kumar had used a disreputable journal, which is blacklisted internationally, to get his article published for PhD thesis submission.

You could read the article in Hindi here.

India had warned Sri Lanka about Easter bombings in advance on the basis of raids on ISIS modules in India

OpIndia Staff
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India had warned Sri Lanka about Easter bombings in advance on the basis of raids on ISIS modules in India

Several reports have come into the forefront which confirms that the Indian authorities had passed clear intel to Sri Lanka regarding the dastardly coordinated blasts at churches and hotels on the Easter Sunday in Sri Lanka, leaving 253 people dead and several hundred injured.

The NIA had procured several videos featuring Zahran Hashim, one of the nine suicide bombers involved in the blast, in the electronic devices of the seven alleged ISIS activists arrested in September last year in Coimbatore. NIA had conducted raids in several places last year in the case of an alleged plot to kill Hindu outfit leaders by ISIS-inspired terrorists. These ISIS activists were allegedly radicalised by Hashim on his visit to India. They had plotted to kill several Hindu leaders, including Hindu Makkal Katchi chief Arjun Sampath and Hindu Munnani leader Mookambikai Mani.

On the basis of these videos, the Indian Authorities identified Hashim as the leader of National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ) and led investigators to believe Hashim was planning “something big” in Sri Lanka. On the basis of this information from NIA, Indian authorities alerted their Sri Lankan counterparts on April 4 about possible attacks.

Indian investigators have found Hashim visited Malappuram in Kerala and Coimbatore, Tiruchirappalli, Tirunelveli, Vellore and Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu. He is also suspected to have been involved in a smuggling racket between Ramanathapuram on India’s eastern coast and Kalpitiya on the north-western coast of Sri Lanka.

In fact, Hashim had headed the National Thowheeth Jama’ath, a group which took the responsibility of the Sri Lankan attack.

Security forces first identified Hashim in the video circulated by Islamic State claiming to be responsible for the attacks. He was seen leading a group of seven men in an oath of allegiance to the IS chief.

Following this, the security forces have been on a desperate hunt for the 40-year-old prime suspect. Later the President of Sri Lanka, Maithripala Sirisena, confirmed to the media that Zahran Hashim, the Islamist extremist wanted for the Easter bombings in Sri Lanka was killed during the attack at Hotel Shangri-La. The terror leader himself became a suicide bomber to target the hotel.

Local Muslim leaders had, however, confirmed that they had reported against Hashim on several occasions earlier for his extremist views and behaviour, yet no action had been taken against him.

Along with Hashim, the intelligence reports have also revealed that another Sri Lanka bomber, Mohammad Mubarak Azaan, visited India twice in 2017.

Terrorists carried out eight coordinated blasts in Sri Lanka last week detonating explosives especially targetting children, taking the death count to 253 people. While several foreigners were killed in the attacks, Sri Lanka’s minority Christian community was the primary target and suffered tremendously given how crowded the churches were for Easter Mass and the hotels for holiday brunches.

Following the blasts, the Prime Minister of Srilanka had admitted that they had been warned about possible attacks by an Islamist terrorist group. PM Wickremesinghe stated that despite the warning by intelligence agencies, Sri Lanka ‘failed’ to take adequate measures.

The Sri Lankan police have been conducting anti-terror operations after Islamist terror group National Thowheed Jama’ath claimed responsibility for blasts. In a nationwide address, President Maithripala Sirisena revealed that police had arrested around 70 individuals in connection with jihadist activity since the Easter Sunday bombings.

Police in Sri Lanka conducted a series of raids Friday on suspected terrorists and recovered a stockpile of 47 swords alongside counterfeit military uniforms, a suicide bomber jacket, and machetes in one mosque in Colombo’s suburb of Slave Island. In another incident, 15 people died after terrorists detonated their suicide vests when police raided their home. The dead included six children and three women, and the terrorists exchanged gunfire with police before detonating their bombs.

‘Hindustan zindabad tha, hai aur rahega,’ PM Modi tweets after meeting actor-turned-politician Sunny Deol

OpIndia Staff
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‘Hindustan zindabad tha, hai aur rahega,’ PM Modi tweets after meeting actor-turned-politician Sunny Deol

On Sunday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi met actor Sunny Deol, who is the BJP’s candidate from Gurudaspur constituency of Punjab.

As PM Modi met the actor-turned-politician, he tweeted not only a photograph of him being with Sunny Deol but also posted a famous dialogue of Deol – “Hindustan Zindabad Tha, Hai Aur Rahega”.


The prime minister said that he was struck by the actor’s humility and deep passion for a better India and also “rooted for his victory in Gurdaspur”.

“What struck me about Sunny Deol is his humility and deep passion for a better India. Happy to have met him today. We are all rooting for his victory in Gurdaspur!” he posted on Twitter.

The popular dialogue from the movie ‘Gadar’ has been a cult classic across the country in which actor Sunny Deol had played the role of a ‘nationalist’.

During a roadshow on Saturday in Barmer, Rajasthan a huge crowd gathered to catch a glimpse of the actor-politician Sunny Deol and played his famous dialogue from the movie ‘Gadar’ – “Hindustan zindabad tha, zindabad hai, zindabad rahega” in the background as he waved at the crowd.

Earlier this week, actor Sunny Deol followed his footsteps of his step-mother Hema Malini and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party. He will be contesting from Gurdaspur. The popular actor, renowned for his roles in superhit movies such a Gadar and Ghatak.

Late actor Vinod Khanna was representing the Gurudaspur constituency till his death in 2017. Vinod Khanna had won Gurudaspur constituency four times in 1998, 1999, 2004 and 2014 making him one of the most successful Bollywood actors in electoral politics.

Modi is here to stay, whether the 600 members of ‘intolerant gang’ like it or not

ashokepandit
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Modi is here to stay, whether the 600 members of ‘intolerant gang’ like it or not

The people of India are intelligent enough to know who is right for them and who is not and they have been exercising their right to vote for the last 70 years and they will continue to do so. They will never vote for Rahul Gandhi, a dim witted man child, for whom being the PM of this great country is nothing more than a childhood tantrum. The crowds that emerge on the roads of India and polling booths for Narendra Modi do not belong to one sect, but they represent India irrespective of class, creed and religion. Unlike the intolerant group of people with blinkers, they have the ability to differentiate between a false narrative and an honest intention and that is the sole reason Modi has been winning elections and hearts for the last 18years, first as a CM and then as a PM. It is unprecedented to see such kind of fervour for a leader of the nation.

If there was any iota of truth in the narrative that the “Intolerant” group has been trying to peddle for the last 5years, then India would be on the streets stirring up a revolution, just the same way in 2013-14 it happened and the Congress govt was literally thrown out because of a mass movement for it’s massive corruption and treachery.

The Gandhi family has a history of tyranny and anarchy. A little more than 25years ago- the era of Indira Gandhi, that was the Emergency era. Indira and Sanjay Gandhi, the mother-son duo were running the country like their personal fiefdom. Throwing people in jail was very common and their only grievance was, those people weren’t subservient enough. They wanted Kishore Kumar to sing in their private durbar, he refused, he was banned. Journalists, writers, politicians, activists were being thrown into the dungeon because they were not convenient enough for the fancy of the Gandhi parivar. Sanjay Gandhi actually sterilised poor people, because he believed they clearly didn’t have the right to procreate. So your advocacy that the Gandhi parivar is the messiah of the poor is either laughable or stems out of ignorance.

Dear intolerang gang, this kind if inequity might be your kind of freedom but not New India’s.

Then came the era of Rajeev Gandhi, the Sikh killings and the justification, it’s fine if 80000 Sikhs are killed because Rajiv was a man out for cold blooded revenge- so it was rather justified to go on a carnage, might be your idea of humanity, not New India’s. Then Rajiv pioneered the era of corruption- his words, not Modi’s ” out of 100 paise only 15paise reaches the needy”. Corruption became the DNA of Gandhi’s.

But the era of Rahul and Sonia happens to be the crown jewel of the Gandhi dynasty. The mother-son duo ran a govt for 10 years pulling strings of a puppet PM and keeping the seat warm for Rahul Baba. This man’s ignorance and denseness is a must for the history books. But since you 600 odd people, are cheer leading for him, I am sure you can identify with Rahul’s level of the intellect, but majority of the country thankfully can’t. Except Rahul’s sister, who is a hobby politician, the entire family is on bail on corruption charges. They are so inefficient and inept for the job, that they shudder at the name of Modi, fearing humiliating loss, they choose to let Modi literally win uncontested than facing him in the electoral battle. Their this single step says how insincere they are about their job and most importantly about the election. Forget Rahul for a moment, let’s talk about the MahaGathbandhan- the so called coalition who ganged up to fight one man called Modi. The state of the so called MahaGathbandhan is a joke filled with selfish, egoist, power hungry people who could not even come to a consensus in something as simple as seat sharing for elections and these people want to run a coalition, imagine if it were to happen, that would be a royal mess.

You comprise of 600 odd people, your say would have a meaning, if your leader, Rahul Gandhi would have a spine. No one in Mahagathbandhan also is interested in ousting Modi. They are scared and spineless in front of Modi. Spineless creatures crawl they don’t lead. Your “Intolerant” ilk suffers from the Stockholm syndrome- a syndrome that happens when the captured considers the captor as their saviour. It is very difficult for many people who are used to the servitude of the Gandhi family to digest someone who does not have the ruler mentality while seating on the Supreme chair. Servitude is an addiction and unfortunately there aren’t many deaddiction centres. But hopefully, it should wean off with the time and if it doesn’t; then you have to continue behaving like the beast in heat coining agendas and absurd fancy terms like Intolerance.

Let’s get down to hard fact and the cold truth: Modi is here to stay, whether 600 of you like it or not. You are just a small drop of NO in the ocean of YES and your opinion does not really matter to India because come the voting day India will vote for Narendra Damodardas Modi. #BharatBoleNaMoNaMo

Leave Kashmir if Article 370 is bad, no need to take the burden of Kashmir, Mehbooba Mufti tells PM Modi

OpIndia Staff
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Leave Kashmir if Article 370 is bad, no need to take the burden of Kashmir, Mehbooba Mufti tells PM Modi

On Saturday, PDP president and former Chief Minister of J&K Mehbooba Mufti asked prime minister Narendra Modi to leave Kashmir if he thinks that Article 370 is bad. She was responding to PM saying that Article 370 has done maximum damage to the state.

Mehbooba Mufti said that if PM thinks Kashmir is a financial burden on the country, the state should be let go. She went on to say, “If the prime minister believes that our relationship has a foundation without Article 370 then leave Kashmir. If he thinks Kashmir is staring at bankruptcy then leave Kashmir. Why does he want to take the burden of this bankruptcy?”


PM Modi, in an interview to Aajtak, said that Article 370 and 35A have done maximum damage to the state of Jammu and Kashmir. “We set up AIIMS and IIM in Kashmir but top professors are not ready to go there because they can’t buy property there. The rents there are very high. There is no investment in J&K because investors feel they won’t get land there,” said the PM.

He added that Kashmir is facing bankruptcy, terrorists have ended tourism in the state and people do not invest here due to Article 370 and 35A. On being asked why the BJP wasn’t able to fulfil its promise of removing these articles, he said that people who talk about separation have no right to contest for the elections.

In the BJP manifesto, the party had promised to abrogate Article 370 and Article 35-A of the Indian constitution if they get back to power.

Mehbooba Mufti had claimed that she had fought with the BJP for two years in order to protect Article 370, during the PDP-BJP rule in the state. She said, “I had made it clear to Modi that if they tinker with the special status of the state then PDP will leave the government.”

Mehbooba Mufti had also accused the Congress and the NCP of attempting to reduce the special status of Jammu and Kashmir. When Congress leader Ghulam Nabi became the Chief Minister he sold state land to Amarnath board. NC founder late Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah became the chief minister after signing the 1975 accord with Indira Gandhi.

Mumbai restaurant asks people to ‘think about spicy beef roast’ before voting, deletes Facebook post after public backlash

OpIndia Staff
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Mumbai restaurant asks people to ‘think about spicy beef roast’ before voting, deletes Facebook post after public backlash

A Mumbai based restaurant, ‘Imbiss’ in Bandra had urged the voters to ‘think about that spicy beef roast garnished with pepper’ before voting tomorrow.

Imbiss, Bandra post on Facebook, now deleted

The image was posted on Facebook at 10:27 pm last night and had garnered over 635 shares and 123 comments. However, Imbiss has now deleted the post.

The image was a reference to the 2015 order by the then President of India, Dr Pranab Mukherjee which banned beef in Maharashtra. The bill banned the slaughter of all cattle with exception of water buffaloes. Apparently, the roast beef was one of their most popular items on the menu which was banned post the beef ban.

Imbiss got called out by people that the reference to ‘beef’ has hurt their religious sentiments and that this politicisation of food was uncalled for.

People reacted to Imbiss’ post which hurt their religious sentiments
People reacted to Imbiss’ post which hurt their religious sentiments

Later, in a statement issued by the restaurant, Imbiss has said that it does not support any political party and apologised to the patrons for hurting the religious sentiments.

Imbiss Restaurant apology posted on Facebook

Mumbai, Maharashtra will be voting tomorrow in the fourth phase of voting.

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