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New Delhi: Six bogies of the Delhi-Rajdhani Bhubaneswar Express and Sealdah Rajdhani Express caught fire at the New Delhi Railway station yard on Tuesday.
No casualties have been reported and the situation is believed to be under control.
“There are no casualties. Four coaches of Sealdah and two coaches of Bhubaneswar Rajdhani caught fire. It is under control now,” said CPRO, Northern Railway, Neeraj Sharma.
(ANI)
Photo: IE
by Jyoti Punwani, Scroll
What must Yakub Memon have felt on hearing that the Supreme Court had rejected his review petition against his conviction and death sentence in the 1993 serial Mumbai bomb blasts case. The mocking words of his brother, Ibrahim ‘Tiger’ Memon, advising him not to give himself up to the Indian authorities might have echoed in his ears. “You are returning as a Gandhiwadi, but the Indian government will see you only as a terrorist,” Tiger had told him, according to what Yakub told the special court in Mumbai set up under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Act.
On April 16, the Supreme Court rejected Yakub’s review petition against his conviction and sentence. The same court had earlier rejected his appeal against his conviction by a special court in Mumbai in 2006, and the president had rejected his mercy petition in May 2014. On the charges for which Yakub has been convicted, none of his co-accused has been given the death penalty.
Tiger Memon’s words proved prophetic. Yakub gave up life in a gilded cage in Karachi under the ISI’s watch, to come back in July 1994 and clear his name in the case of the 1993 blasts, which had been masterminded by his brother and Dawood Ibrahim. He was followed by seven members of his family. Only Tiger, another brother Ayub, and their families stayed back.
With him, Yakub brought proof of Pakistan’s involvement in the blasts, which India could not have otherwise obtained. He thought this act would earn him a reprieve. Instead, unable to get Dawood Ibrahim or Tiger Memon, the Indian authorities wrecked vengeance on the rest of the Memon family, who had chosen to surrender because of “faith in our government and judiciary”, as Yakub wrote in a letter to the chief justice of India from Arthur Road jail five years after he had set foot on Indian soil. (A copy of the letter appears at the end).
The government did not even have the grace to acknowledge that the Memons had chosen to surrender. Instead, the then home minister, SB Chavan, said in Parliament amidst much thumping of desks that the authorities had arrested Yakub from New Delhi railway station. “I’ve never seen it in my life,” wrote Yakub in his letter.
His family’s incarceration and their deteriorating physical and mental health drove Yakub to depression. In his letter, he wrote that he could not remember the events of one full year in jail when he was confined to bed. In the letter, Yakub also described his life before the March 12, 1993, blasts. It was an ordinary life: SSC with 70%, then college in the morning and work during the day, graduation, post-graduation, four years of studying to be a chartered accountant, and then establishing his own CA firm with a Hindu partner. “We were doing very well…I was very busy. The purpose of giving this brief about myself is to bring home just one single point: “WHERE WAS THE TIME TO HATE…” (upper case in the original).
In his letter, Yakub pointed out that nine of his 15-member family were NRIs settled in Dubai, and the rest would often visit them. On the day of the blasts, they were in Dubai, and got to know only later that one among them had masterminded them. After the blasts, the entire family left for Pakistan. “But we did not lost (sic) hopes of coming back to India and wipe out the stigma attached to our name,” wrote Yakub.
But the stigma would not be wiped out. “The prosecution is harping upon `Memon Family’ during their arguments as if there is a section in CrPC (as in Income Tax laws, while dealing with the HUF- the Hindu Undivided Family), wherein a family can be treated as a single unit. … The main reason for implicating us in the case is that we were in relation (to) and association of the prime accused. Now to be in relation to anyone is not a crime… We do not deny our relation and association with Ibrahim Memon …as a relative and nothing more.”
In 2007, having spent almost 13 years in jail, Yakub was sentenced to death by the TADA court. His brothers Essa and Yusuf, both seriously ill, and sister-in-law Rubeena were sentenced to life imprisonment. When his sentence was read out by the TADA court judge, Yakub cried out: “Forgive him lord, for he knows not what he does.” Seven years later, the Supreme Court upheld the judgement.
But, as both Yakub’s appeal and his review petition, argued by lawyer Jaspal Singh, asserted, Yakub was convicted on the basis of the statement of one approver and the retracted confessions of co-accused. The prosecution did not produce any independent evidence to refute Yakub’s assertion that he knew nothing about the blasts.
With the mercy and review petitions rejected, Yakub is left with little hope: only perhaps a curative petition and another mercy petition. If Yakub is hanged, the message will be clear: if you have committed a crime and have been lucky enough to escape, good for you. If you are suspected of having committed a crime but want to return to India to try and clear your name, be prepared for the worst. Far better to spend your life in luxury, even if it is in a country that is hostile to yours. Not for you the choice of bringing up your children as Indians.
The second message that Yakub’s hanging will send is that there is no place for reformation in our justice system. Among the arguments made by advocate Jaspal Singh in his review petition were his client’s record of good conduct in jail and no evidence by the prosecution that there existed no possibility of reformation. During his 21 years in jail, eight of them on death row, Yakub has obtained an MA in English from the Indira Gandhi National Open University. The authorities of the course denied him permission to attend the convocation, although it was held in Nagpur itself, where he has been lodged since 2007. The day the Supreme Court dismissed his review petition in April, Yakub got an MA from IGNOU in political science.
The third message will perhaps be the most ominous – that our criminal justice system recognises guilt by association. Dawood Ibrahim and Tiger Memon are beyond our reach. Should we rejoice that we have at least one Memon we can hang and lock the others up for life? Was Yakub right in writing: “According to the prosecution if one member does any wrong, entire family …can be punished and society can be shown that the justice is being done?”
Finally, Yakub Memon’s hanging will inevitably draw our attention to the original sin in the chain of events that led to the March 12, 1993 blasts: the Mumbai riots that followed the demolition of the Babri Masjid. Neither those who demolished the Masjid nor those found guilty of the ensuing riots, in which 900 persons were killed, among them 575 Muslims and 275 Hindus, were punished, even though criminal offences were registered against the perpetrators. Two judicial commissions also indicted specific individuals for both crimes.
Among these individuals were 31 policemen, charged with extreme communal conduct against Muslims, including murder. None of them was punished. Nearly all the offenders in both events not only went free, some of them ruled the country as central ministers.
But those who took revenge for the riots, killing 257 people, were not let off. Their punishment ranged from two years to death. All death sentences, except Yakub’s, were six years later commuted to life.
When the TADA court held him guilty, Yakub cried out: “Woh sahi bolta tha, koi insaaf nahin milega, tum log hume terrorist banake chodoge.” What he said was right; you won’t get justice; you will make us into terrorists. He was referring to Tiger Memon’s words. In his letter, Yakub wrote: ‘’Section 20(8) and other draconian provision of this Act does not allow the Designated TADA court judge to look upon us with living and merciful eyes. On the contrary we are presumed to be guilty of TERRORISM.”
The letter that Yakub Memon wrote to the chief justice of India from Arthur Road Jail, five years after he surrendered to Indian authorities in July 1994.
Here is the full text of their letter:
“The move by the central government to freeze Greenpeace India’s bank accounts and block sources of funds, is a blatant violation of the constitutional rights to freedom of expression and association. It also seems to be an attempt to warn civil society that dissent regarding development policies and priorities will not be tolerated, even when these are proving to be ecologically unsustainable and socially unjust. These are dangerous signs for the future of democracy in India.
Specific allegations of legal violation contained in the Ministry of Home Affairs’ notice are aspects Greenpeace India needs to respond to. However, the notice also charges the organisation with adversely affecting ‘public interest’ and the ‘economic interest of the State’. These charges give the impression that Greenpeace India is indulging in anti-national activities, using foreign funds. However, dissenting from the government’s development policies, helping communities who are going to be displaced by these policies to mobilise themselves, and generating public opinion for the protection of the environment can by no stretch of imagination be considered anti-national, or against public interest. Quite the contrary, any reasonable policy of sustainable development (which the government claims to adhere to) will itself put into question quite a few of the mining, power, and other projects currently being promoted.
Civil society organisations in India have a long and credible history of standing up for social justice, ecological sustainability, and the rights of the poor. When certain government policies threaten these causes, civil society has a justified ground to resist, and help affected communities fight for their rights. This is in fact part of the fundamental duties enjoined upon citizens by the Constitution of India.
In two recent court judgments involving previous attempts by the government to muzzle Greenpeace India, the democratic principle of dissent has been upheld. In January 2015, the Delhi High Court observed: ‘Non-Governmental Organizations often take positions, which are contrary to the policies formulated by the Government of the day. That by itself…cannot be used to portray petitioner’s action as being detrimental to national interest.’ In March, the Delhi High court observed that ‘contrarian views held by a section of people…cannot be used to describe such section or class of people as anti-national.’ The court also observed that there was nothing on record to suggest that Greenpeace India’s activities ‘have the potentiality of degrading the economic interest of the country’.
It is shocking that despite these clear judicial pronouncements, the government has for a third time acted against Greenpeace India. We cannot but conclude that this is an attempt to divert attention from the serious issues that Greenpeace India and many peoples’ movements and NGOs are raising, regarding the need to respect the rights of adivasis and others who depend on the forests, wetlands, coastal areas, and other ecosystems, and the need to move towards policies that are ecologically sustainable and do not cause further climate change. Large-scale mining, such as in the areas that peoples’ movements are active, are a threat to forests and other natural ecosystems, to communities that depend on them including tribal peoples. These and other issues are highlighted by organisations such as Greenpeace India, which also generate significant information on the environment, crucial for taking the right decisions regarding sustainable well-being.
It is also shocking that while alleging violations regarding FCRA, the government ordered the blocking of even those accounts where Greenpeace India uses its domestic funding (and it is relevant here to note that the majority of its funds according to its audited accounts are from thousands of Indian individuals). It has even blocked its online donation facility.
The government should immediately take back these illegitimate, unfair, and repressive moves, and provide Greenpeace India a fair opportunity to respond. More generally, it must respect the freedom of speech that all Indian citizens have a constitutional right to, including the right to dissent, upheld by court judgments. The government’s attempts to browbeat civil society will not make the issues of social and environmental injustice disappear. We assert that long as these issues remain unresolved, civil society actors will continue to do all that is necessary towards a just and sustainable society.”
Attack follows fresh report Saudi coalition is bombing warehouses storing ‘vital’ aid
Smoke rises following a Saudi coalition air strike on a mountain overlooking Yemen’s capital, Sana’a. April 20, 2015. (Photo: Khaled Abdullah/Reuters)
by Sarah Lazare, Common Dreams
An explosion tore through a residential neighborhood in Yemen’s capital on Monday, as Saudi coalition air strikes continue to pound the city amid a mounting nation-wide humanitarian crisis worsened by dangerously low supplies of food, medicine, and water.
The coalition bombing on Monday unleashed an eruption through a civilian area in the Faj Attan area of Sana. Buildings were flattened, windows were broken, and according to witnesses, the event felt like an earthquake. Media outlets say the eruption may have been caused when an air strike hit a munitions cache.
Hospitals were reportedly inundated with the dead and wounded, and efforts to retrieve survivors from the rubble are ongoing, in an area that has suffered repeated bombings since the coalition bombings began March 26.
People in Yemen turned to social media to document the aftermath.
A compilation of photos from my apartment. After today’s explosion compared with better days. #WarLife #LifeUnderFire pic.twitter.com/hWIynbzQ41
— Ammar Al-Aulaqi (@ammar82) April 20, 2015
Since March 26, the Saudi-led bombing campaign has struck markets, schools, medical facilities, power plants, and refugee camps.
The international aid organization Oxfam said that, on Sunday, the coalition bombed a warehouse containing “vital humanitarian aid” in the northern governate of Saada.
“This is an absolute outrage particularly when one considers that we have shared detailed information with the Coalition on the locations of our offices and storage facilities,” declared Grace Ommer, Oxfam’s country director in Yemen, in a press statement released Monday. “The contents of the warehouse had no military value. It only contained humanitarian supplies associated with our previous work in Saada, bringing clean water to thousands of households.”
The war, which is led by Saudi Arabia and now includes the United States, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Jordan, Egypt, Sudan, and Morocco, is being waged against one of the poorest countries in the world.
So far, 18 of Yemen’s 22 governates have been affected by air strikes, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Meanwhile, fighting continues to intensify in the south, with the port city of Aden especially hard hit.
The World Health Organization reports that at least 767 people have been killed and 2,906 wounded in the conflict since March 19, in what are believed to be dramatic under-counts of the actual toll. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says at least 150,000 people have been displaced.
Aid organizations warn that coalition partners, including the U.S., may be guilty of war crimes, and Houthi combatants have also been accused of killing civilians.
Meanwhile, from within Yemen and around the world, people are calling for an end to the fighting.
Last week, U.S. and U.K. Yemen scholars published an open letter condemning the Saudi-led campaign:
This military campaign is illegal under international law: None of these states has a case for self-defense. The targets of the campaign include schools, homes, refugee camps, water systems, grain stores and food industries. This has the potential for appalling harm to ordinary Yemenis as almost no food or medicine can enter.
Yemen is the poorest country of the Arab world in per capita income, yet rich in cultural plurality and democratic tradition. Rather than contributing to the destruction of the country, the US and UK should support a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate, unconditional ceasefire and use their diplomatic influence to strengthen the sovereignty and self-government of Yemen. As specialists we are more than aware of internal divisions within Yemeni society, but we consider that it is for the Yemenis themselves to be allowed to negotiate a political settlement.
Turkey’s ties with Egypt strained since Abdel Fattah el-Sisi toppled Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi in 2013.
“Mr Morsi is a president elected by 52 percent of the votes. They should give him his freedom,” said the Turkish president.
by Al Jazeera
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish president, says Egypt should free ousted president Mohamed Morsi from prison and lift death sentences against his supporters before Ankara could consider an improvement in relations with Cairo.
Ties between the two former allies have been strained since then Egyptian army chief Abdel Fattah el-Sisi toppled elected president Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood in 2013 after mass protests against his rule.
Egyptian security forces then mounted a fierce crackdown against the Brotherhood, killing hundreds of its supporters as they protested in Cairo, arresting thousands and putting Morsi and other leaders on trial.
“Mr Morsi is a president elected by 52 percent of the votes. They should give him his freedom,” Erdogan was quoted by Turkish newspapers as telling reporters as he returned from an official visit to Iran.
An official from Erdogan’s office confirmed his comments.
Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood has close ties with Turkey’s ruling AK Party, which Erdogan co-founded and which has emerged as one of the fiercest international critics of Morsi’s removal, calling it an “unacceptable coup” by the army.
Erdogan’s recent visit to Saudi Arabia, and his support of a Saudi-led military operation against Houthi rebels in Yemen in which Egyptian warships have taken part, had triggered speculation about a possible thaw in ties between Ankara and Cairo.
Cairo court convicts toppled president of ordering the arrest and torture of protesters in 2012 clashes.
![Morsi was overthrown and imprisoned by the military in 2013 [EPA]](https://i0.wp.com/nasheman.in/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Morsi.jpg)
Morsi was overthrown and imprisoned by the military in 2013 [EPA]
A Cairo court has sentenced former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi and 12 other defendants to 20 years in prison.
Morsi was convicted on Tuesday of ordering the arrest and torture of protesters in clashes outside the presidential palace in December 2012. The court acquitted the former president of murder charges that could have seen him face the death penalty.
Morsi also faces serious charges in three other cases, including an accusation that he passed intelligence to Qatar.
Mohammed Soudan, a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood, and an official within its affiliated Freedom and Justice Party, told Al Jazeera that the trial was a “political farce”.
“The verdict is 100 percent a political verdict. Morsi, his advisers and supporters who are accused in this case were victims … police and army officers watched as the opposition attacked the presidential palace,” Soudan said.
“They killed 11 people and nine of them were supporters of Morsi. .. the verdict is a test for the protesters in the street, and also a test for the international community.”
Amnesty International also condemned the trial as a “sham”, and called for the release of Morsi and protesters.
“This verdict shatters any remaining illusion of independence and impartiality in Egypt’s criminal justice system,” Amnesty’s Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui said in a statement released after the verdict.
Egyptian journalist, Yehia Ghanem, told Al Jazeera the Egyptian government was sending a message that it would not tolerate any opposition.
“The whole thing was calculated politically from the start. It sends a message to Egyptians and the rest of the world that there’s no future for any civil rule,” Ghanem said.
Morsi was deposed by his then military chief and Minister of Defence Abdel Fattah el-Sisi after mass protests against his rule in the summer of 2013.
Following the coup, the former president’s supporters launched a series of protests and sit-ins across the country culminating in a crackdown by security forces that left hundreds dead.
In the deadliest incident, at least 817 protesters were killed in Cairo’s Rabaa al-Adawiya Square when security forces opened fire on a sit-in. Human Rights Watch (HRW) said the killings likely amounted to “crimes against humanity”.
Thousands have also been imprisoned, with many supporters of Morsi facing mass trials facing charges of involvement in violence.
At least 1,212 people have been sentenced to death since the start of 2014, including the head of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohamed Badie.
New Delhi: Sniffing a major scam of at least Rs 4,000 crore in the railways, CBI is likely to file a case soon into alleged under-reporting of the actual weight of loaded goods wagons through the manipulation of software by officials.
CBI sources said that in the financial year 2012-13, railways transported 1,008 million metric tonnes of freight and earned Rs 85,262 crore through it, which constituted 67 per cent of the total revenue for the period.
The goods are required to be weighed at the originating station or en route or at the destination point with a view to plugging the leakage of revenue and to avoid over-loading of the wagons, the sources said.
An official in CBI said inputs were received that this system has been manipulated at several places in such a way that over-loading is concealed and weight of the wagon is shown to be within the permissible limit.
“Highly sophisticated methodology of crime by manipulating the software of the system is suspected,” the official said.
The sources said it is further suspected that the alleged manipulation has been done through collusion amongst railway officials, private vendors and freight operators.
“Even a 5 per cent under-reporting of actual weight of freight leads to a difference of Rs 4,263 crore by 2012-13 figures… It is not only causing huge financial loss to the exchequer but also (bringing) corresponding gain to private freight operators and is damaging railway tracks and wagons, thus adversely affecting railway safety,” an official said.
Railways had in consultation with Research Development and Standards Organisation (RDSO) installed 200 ‘Electronic In-Motion Weigh Bridges’ at various locations across the country to weigh the freight in transit.
Six vendors have been roped in by RDSO for setting up the bridges, which automatically measure the weight of goods train wagons passing through them at a speed of 15-km per hour, CBI sources said.
The agency recently carried out countrywide searches and surprise checks at major freight traffic points with the assistance of the vigilance department of the railways, CBI sources said.
The surprise checks were undertaken in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Jharkhand, Assam, West Bengal, Odisha, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Goa, Rajasthan and Gujarat, etc.
During the surprise operation, CBI found “systematic” under-weighing with the system programmed to give readings which were lower than the actual weight.
“It was found at some of the locations that the quantum of under-weighing increased with an increase in speed of the rake. The preliminary digital analysis of the forensic image taken at some of the locations has revealed old weighing logs showing past manipulations in weighing,” a CBI official said.
He said alleged manipulations in entries pertaining to wagon type have been revealed with consequences for the weighing.
“Systematic manipulation in weighing achieved through tampering of the software, EIMWB hardware, manual entries, etc. leads to significant loss of revenue for the railways,” he said.
CBI has already secured the locations of the in-motion weighing bridges to prevent the possibility of tampering, the sources said.
They said that test runs were conducted with rakes comprising freight wagons carrying different loads to check the accuracy of the readings. Besides, the ‘in-motion’ weighing was also done at different speeds.
CBI secured a forensic image of the hard disk of the weighing system to enable a digital forensic analysis for locating the ‘digital fingerprints’ (automatic weight logs, etc.) of past manipulation in weighing.
(PTI)
Ahmedabad: A suspicious boat carrying narcotics worth around Rs 600 crore was seized and eight Pakistani nationals onboard were apprehended from international waters off Gujarat coast, in a joint operation by the Indian Navy and the Coast Guard.
“In a closely coordinated operation undertaken by the Indian Navy and Indian Coast Guard, a boat carrying a large quantity of narcotics was apprehended in international waters, off the coast of Gujarat yesterday. The operation also resulted in apprehension of eight Pakistani nationals manning the boat,” a statement from the Defence Ministry today said.
“The boat was intercepted and apprehended by Indian Coast Guard ship ‘Sangram’ yesterday, whilst Indian Navy ship ‘Kondul’ provided support to the entire operation. The initial investigations have led to the recovery of 232 packets of narcotics (suspected to be heroin and worth up to Rs 600 crore in the international markets),” it said.
Satellite communication phones and Global Positioning Systems (GPS), which were being used to facilitate transshipment of the contraband to another boat, were also confiscated, it said.
The operation was launched on April 18 after receiving intelligence inputs. It was conducted in close coordination of the western command of Indian Navy along with north-west regional headquarters of the Indian Coast Guard, it said.
Multiple units from the Navy and the Coast Guard were deployed for the operation, which included Indian Naval ships ‘Nirghat’ and ‘Kondul’, along with Coast Guard ship ‘Sangram’, according to the statement.
The operation to nab the suspected boat was augmented by extensive aerial searches undertaken by Naval and Coast Guard aircraft, including Dorniers, IL38 and P8Is, it said.
All the persons apprehended in the operation are likely to be interrogated jointly by the Intelligence Bureau, Indian Coast Guard and the Navy.
(Agencies)
Dissident AAP leaders Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav at a news confrence at Press Club in New Delhi. (Arvind Yadav/ HT Photo)
New Delhi: Cracking the whip, AAP tonight expelled rebel leaders Prashant Bhusan, Yogendra Yadav and two others for anti-party activities and “gross indiscipline”, two days after issuing a show-cause notice to them.
The decision to sack them from the party was taken by the national disciplinary committee which said as it was not satisfied with the response it got to the show-cause notice.
“The party’s national disciplinary committee has taken a decision to expel Prashant Bhusan, Yogendra Yadav, Anand Kumar and Ajit Jha. They were expelled for gross indiscipline, anti-party activities and violation of code of conduct of the party,” said party spokesperson Deepak Bajpai.
The rebels were given show-cause notice on April 17 to explain the reason for organising ‘Swaraj Samwad’. Bhushan was charged with working for party’s defeat in the Delhi assembly polls. He was also charged with supporting AWAM, a break away group of the party.
Three of them responded to the notice except Jha.In their response to the notice, the rebels today accused party chief Arvind Kejriwal of “gross violation” of its constitution and attacked two members of its disciplinary panel for allegedly doing a “planted” story and accepting donations from dubious firms.
Responding to show-cause notices issued by AAP’s National Disciplinary Committee (NDC), Bhushan and Yadav questioned its locus standi for seeking their reply, saying the panel was formed after the “illegal” and “unconstitutional” meeting of the party’s National Council on March 28.
AAP said in a statement,”National Disciplinary Committee met on April 20 at VP House to decide on the complaints against Yogendra Yadav, Prashant Bhushan, Anand Kumar and Ajit Jha.”On the request of the respondents, the Committee had earlier extended the deadline for submitting their explanations by one day, that is, to 3 PM on April 20.
“However, the committee received the responses of Yadav, Bhushan and Kumar while Jha failed to furnish his response within the prescribed time.” The Committee carefully considered responses furnished by Yadav, Bhushan and Kumar and found them “unsatisfactory”, the statement said.
The party said that the rebels indulged in anti-party activities. “The Committee reached the unanimous conclusion that Yogendra Yadav, Prashant Bhushan and Anand Kumar had indulged in gross indiscipline and anti-party activities. “They have violated the Code of Conduct detailed in Article VI A (a) of Party’s Constitution. The Committee is of the view that Ajit Jha failed to furnish his response in stipulated time despite sufficient time to his disposal.
“After examining the evidence put before it, the Committee is of unanimous view that Ajit Jha is also guilty of gross indiscipline and indulging into anti-party activities.
“The Committee, therefore, has decided to expel all the four members from the party,” said the party statement. Bhushan and Yadav were removed from AAP’s Political Affairs Committee (PAC) on March 4.
Both the camps–one headed by Kejriwal and second by the rebel duo– resorted to talks, but the negotiations failed after which Bhushan, Yadav, Anand Kumar and Ajit Jha were removed from National Executive, AAP’s highest decision-making body.
The rebel leaders had then organised Swaraj Samvad convention on April 17. Falling short of declaring a new political outfit, the rebel camp announced of starting of Swaraj Abhiyan across the country.
Bhushan and Yadav were one of the founder leaders of the AAP. The activist-lawyer had raised several anti-corruption issues and was a key-aide of Kejriwal since its the Anna movement while Yadav went to become party’s chief spokesperson and had chalked out its policy on various issues.
(PTI)
Photo: IE
Bengaluru: The Karnataka government on Monday announced a special package for farmers affected by untimely rain and hailstorm in north Karnataka. In a prolonged debate in the Legislative Council on the issue of crop loss suffered by farmers of eight districts due to unseasonal rain and hailstorm, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said he will shortly announce the package details.
“The crop loss this time is unprecedented and severe. I am waiting for the joint survey report from the agriculture, horticulture and revenue departments to announce the package,” he said.
Revenue Minister V. Srinivas Prasad said the State will also be presenting a memorandum to the Centre urging for a special package for the losses suffered by the farmers, apart from that which is given under the National Disaster Relief Fund and the State Disaster Relief Fund.
He said preliminary reports suggested as many as 14 persons, 90 cattle heads, 774 homes, 55,405.88 hectares of agriculture land and 1,433.85 hectares of horticulture crops have been destroyed. The value of damaged agriculture land, due to heavy rain, is estimated to be Rs. 350 crore. Similarly, the value of horticulture crops lost due to the same rain is Rs. 15 crore.
The combined Opposition of the Janata Dal (Secular) and the Bharatiya Janata Party, however, staged a walkout for not waiving loans of farmers who have lost their crops in the heavy rain and hailstorm. However, Mr. Siddaramaiah said it was impossible to waive the loans.
(Agencies)