Archives for November 2021

Barabanki: All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) Chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Sunday called Modi the biggest “nautankibaaz” (actor) in the country, saying he entered politics by mistake, else he would have given a run for money to the actors in the film industry.

“Prime Minister Modi is the biggest ‘nautankibaaz’ in the country, and by mistake, he has entered politics, else what would have happened to the people of the film industry. All the awards would have been won by Modi, Owaisi said, addressing a public meeting here.

After announcing the repeal of three farm laws, the Prime Minister had said that there had been some shortcoming in his ‘tapasya’ (penance). This tells us what a big actor our Prime Minister is,” he added.

Owaisi said the real tapasya’ was done by the farmers in their protests during which around 750 of them died.

He also said Modi doesn’t leave any chance of turning himself into a hero .

Chennai: Actor Suriya starrer flick ‘Jai Bhim’ director Tha Se Gnanavel on Sunday said there was absolutely no intention of hurting any particular community and expressed regret to those who were offended.

‘Jai Bhim’ that was released on November 1 in languages including Tamil and Telugu kicked up a row in Tamil Nadu with the Vanniyar Sangam and members of the community alleging that it had portrayed them in bad light. The movie was released in OTT platform Amazon-Prime Video.

Emphasising that there was not even a “wee little bit of thought to cause affront to any individual or a community,” in the making of the film, Gnanavel said, “I convey my heartfelt regret to those offended and anguished.” The film director also expressed regret for the difficulty caused to Suriya in the wake of the controversy, who is the lead actor and Jai Bhim producer. The crux of the row is the alleged vilification of the Vanniyar community by naming a wicked police sub inspector as ‘Guru’ (Gurumurthy) and showcasing the raging fire pot symbol of the community in a calendar, in the background, in one of the scenes and the foreground had the police SI who tortured the innocent tribal man to death. “I did not know that a calendar hung in the background will be understood as a reference to a community. It is not our intention to make it a symbol of reference to a particular community and it was only to reflect the period, the year 1995,” Gnanavel claimed in a statement. During filming or post-production, the calendar footage, that appears for a few seconds did not catch their attention, he said. Also, even before the film premiered on Amazon Prime, it was exhibited for several people. “Had it come to our notice during that time, we would have changed it before its release.” After they “got to know about the calendar in the background through social media,” after its release, all efforts were made to change it on the following day morning itself, he said.

“As the calendar in the background was changed even before anyone demanded it, I believed that everyone will understand that we had no ulterior motive,” the director said. “It is unfortunate to ask Suriya to own up responsibility. As the director, this is a matter I alone has to take responsibility.” The film, though based on a true incident of custodial torture and death of a ‘Koravar’ tribal man in 1995 in Tamil Nadu it had elements of fiction. The flick portrayed the tribal man as belonging to the Irula tribes. The names of people connected to the real life incident, like that of Justice Chandru who had argued the case in the Madras High Court as an advocate were retained. Some names like that of Rajakannu’s wife (original name Parvathi, changed to Sengenni) and the police sub inspector who tortured, leading to the death of the tribal man was changed from Anthonysamy to Guru (Gurumurthy). The calendar that was replaced had an image of Goddess Lakshmi. The Vanniyar Sangam had on November 15 sent a legal notice to makers ‘Jai Bhim’ alleging that the flick tarnished the reputation of Vanniyar community and sought an unconditional apology from them.

Removal of references to Vanniyar community’s revered symbol of raging fire pot, an apology for “damning, tarnishing and damaging the reputation” of the community, desisting from similar “malicious” moves and payment of Rs 5 crore in damages were the demands made in that legal notice.

Vanniyars, or Vanniya Kula Kshatriyas, a Most Backward Community in Tamil Nadu are predominant in the northern districts of the state. The Vanniyar Sangam’s symbol is also the raging fire pot.

Agartala: Tripura police on Sunday detained West Bengal Trinamool Congress leader Sayani Ghosh for questioning following a complaint by a ruling BJP worker that she had disturbed a street corner meeting of Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb on Saturday night, according to an official.

Ghosh, the youth unit secretary of TMC West Bengal, was detained a day before a planned visit by the party’s national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee after being called in for questioning in a police station.

A police official, who did not want to be named, said a BJP worker lodged a complaint that when a street corner gathering was being addressed by Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb on Saturday night, Ghosh reached there and shouted “Khela hobey (game will happen) and claimed that there were not even 50 people in the gathering.

“Khela hobey” is a slogan used by the TMC during the assembly election in West Bengal held in March-April this year.

TMC leaders alleged that their workers were also roughed up by BJP supporters outside the East Agartala Women’s police station, a charge denied by the saffron party.

Abhishek Banerjee in a tweet accused the BJP government in the North-eastern state of disregarding Supreme Court orders on the rights of political parties to hold peaceful programmes.

“@BjpBiplab has become so UNABASHEDLY BRAZEN that now even SUPREME COURT ORDERS DOESN’T SEEM TO BOTHER HIM.

“He has repeatedly sent goons to attack our supporters & our female candidates instead of ensuring their safety! DEMOCRACY BEING MOCKED under @BJP4Tripura,” Banerjee said in the Twitter post, attaching a video of the alleged attack of Sunday morning.

The Supreme Court recently directed Tripura police to ensure that no political party is prevented from exercising their rights in accordance with the law for campaigning in a peaceful manner.

Police said some unidentified miscreants attacked a group of people who gathered near the police station during the questioning of Ghosh, but no one was injured.

The TMC is contesting the Tripura civic polls to be held on November 25. The ruling BJP has already won 112 out of 334 seats uncontested across 20 urban local bodies including Agartala Municipal Corporation. This will be the first civic election that the BJP will face after coming to power in 2018.

The Mamata Banerjee-led party is trying to gain a foothold in the state ahead of the 2023 assembly elections.

TMC Rajya Sabha MP Sushmita Deb claimed that BJP sheltered goons attacked the leaders and workers of the party on the premises of the police station after Ghosh reached there.

Our candidates were beaten up; their houses vandalized and though complaints were filed, no action was taken. Police here are acting in a one-sided manner, she told reports.

TMC West Bengal secretary Kunal Ghosh said if this is what is democracy in Tripura, “we would recommend to our leaders to do the same thing (to the BJP) in West Bengal .

Tripura BJP spokesperson Nabendu Bhattacharya denied the allegation, saying the saffron party workers did not ever attack anyone of the TMC as the party does not consider it as a political opponent to reckon with.

New Delhi: Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday said people who have “suffered false rhetoric” in the past are not ready to believe the words of the prime minister on repealing the farm laws.

He said this as farmer unions decided to continue their year-long agitation at Delhi’s borders even after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the decision to withdraw the three farm laws.

“People who have suffered false rhetoric are not ready to believe the words of the PM. Farmers’ Satyagraha continues,” Gandhi said in a tweet in Hindi, using the hashtag “#FarmersProtest continues”.

Farmers have been protesting on Delhi’s borders for the past year seeking the withdrawal of the three laws.

The farmer unions have said that they will continue their agitation till the three central laws are repealed by Parliament and legislation on a legal guarantee of MSP is brought in.

New Delhi: The Union Cabinet is likely to take up for approval on Wednesday the bills for withdrawal of the three farm laws, sources in the government said.

These bills shall then be introduced in the forthcoming session of Parliament, they added.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had on Friday announced on the occasion of Gurupurab the government’s intention to withdraw the laws in the interest of the nation.

The winter session of Parliament would commence from November 29.

Demanding the withdrawal of the laws, agitating farmers sitting at three sites on Delhi’s borders since November last year have said they will stay put till Parliament repeals them.

The government will now bring bills for the withdrawal of the three farm laws in Parliament following the prime minister’s announcement.

Jaipur: Fifteen ministers 11 cabinet and four ministers of state were sworn in on Sunday in Rajasthan, in a much-awaited expansion of the Ashok Gehlot ministry.

Governor Kalraj Mishra administered the oath of office to the new ministers.

The 11 cabinet ministers include three Mamta Bhupesh, Bhajan Lal Jatav and Tikaram Jully– who have been elevated from minister of state (MoS) to cabinet rank, while two — Vishvendra Singh and Ramesh Meena — are those who were sacked last year for rebelling and have been reinducted as cabinet ministers.

Hemaram Choudhary, Mahendrajeet Singh Malviya, Ramlal Jat, Mahesh Joshi, Govindram Meghwal and Shakuntla Rawat were also sworn in as cabinet ministers.

Zahida, Brijendra Singh Ola, Rajendra Gudha and Murari Lal Meena were sworn in as MoS.

The council of ministers in Rajasthan now has 19 cabinet ministers and 10 MoS, apart from the chief minister.

Chief Minister Gehlot and members of his council of ministers were among those present at the function.

The number in the council of ministers in the the state has reached 30. The Rajasthan Cabinet can have a maximum of 30 ministers, including the chief minister.

Mohali/Hoshiarpuri: For 62-year-old Bhupinder Kaur, who has been part of demonstrations since last year against three central farm laws, the fight is far from over, even after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement that they will be repealed.

The fight will not be over till the laws are formally repealed in Parliament and farmers’ demand for legal guarantee of Minimum Support Price (MSP) for crops is fulfilled, said Kaur as she along with other elderly women from Chilla village in poll-bound Punjab’s Mohali district prepared langar’ at a local gurudwara.

The prime minister in his address to the nation on Friday announced repeal of the laws, which triggered a year of protests by farmers, and had also said the constitutional formalities to revoke the laws will be done during the winter session of Parliament, which begins on November 29.

Kaur’s views were echoed by others as they discussed the nearly year-long protests against the laws while preparing food at a langar’.

Formally rollback the laws in Parliament and give legal guarantee of MSP on crops, these are the demands, they said, adding that families of farmers who lost their lives in protests, which began last year November, must be given financially compensation.

The prime minister’s announcement was warily welcomed on Friday by farmers’ unions spearheading the agitation but they said protests will continue till the measures are repealed in Parliament and MSP gets legal guarantee.

Chilla village has a population of around 2,000 people, and villagers, who are not aligned to any farmer outfit, are actively participating in the agitation against the laws at the Singhu border, attending it in batches.

The Singhu border between Delhi and Haryana was the fountainhead of the farmers’ protest, which started last year in November, two months after enactment of the laws. From there the movement gradually expanded to the Ghazipur border between Delhi and Uttar Pradesh and other sites.

The women of Chilla village along with their children also stand near a traffic light point every day to muster support for protesting farmers.

Similarly, residents of nearby villages of Manauli, Bhago Majra, Sante Majra, Chhota Raipur and Bada Raipur have also been going to protest sites on Delhi’s borders.

Bhupinder Kaur, who also has been going to the Singhu border regularly, told PTI: Till the three farm laws are repealed in Parliament, our struggle continues.

Malkit Kaur, who along with some other women was chopping vegetables for the langar, was sceptical about the prime minister’s statement and said the government should formally roll back the laws.

On Saturday, Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi had asked farmers to be cautious till the farm laws are repealed, saying Prime Minister Modi has only made an announcement on it.

However, the announcement on Guru Nanak Jayanti was enough to get villagers in Chilla to celebrate.

Somebody called me up and said congratulations. I thought it will be for Gurpurab but when he told me about repealing of the laws, I left my meal midway and went straight to the gurdwara and announced to villagers that we have won, Baba Sukhchain Singh, head of the gurdwara at Chilla village, said

Singh said it was a fight for existence and collective support of the people proved that they can stand against government decisions which are not acceptable.

He claimed that farmers have enough ration to stay at Delhi’s borders till 2024.

Jagtar Singh Gill said people, especially in rural areas, will remember that it took one year for the BJP-led government to repeal the laws. The anger against the BJP will not subside soon, he said.

Farmers will also not forget that they were called terrorists, Khalsitani etc, said Gill, claiming that 700 farmers died during the agitation .

On the Punjab assembly polls, slated early next year, Gill advocated the idea of farmers to take an electoral plunge.

Singh said villagers, including women, will go in large numbers to Delhi’s border on the completion of one year of the struggle.

In Hoshiarpur, farmers continued with their protests, demanding a law for legal guarantee for MSP and compensation to families of farmers who died during the stir.

Farmer Kuljinder Singh Ghuman of Jatpur village said the announcement to repeal the laws is a big success not only for the farming community but also for the common man.

Jangveer Singh of Rasoolpur village said had the farm laws been withdrawn earlier, there would not have been so many deaths.

In Amritsar, panchayat member Heir Sarbjit Singh said, Farmers are extremely happy with the announcement of repealing of the three central farm laws.

Another farmer Gurjinder Singh, who has 35 acres of land near Raja Sansi, said the government should have repealed the farm laws earlier.

Punjab has remained the epicenter of the protests against Centre — Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020; Farmers’ (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020; and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020.

But in November 2020, farmers from Punjab and Haryana moved to the Delhi borders to press the Central government to withdraw these laws.

They have also been demanding a new law to guarantee MSP for crops.

New Delhi: Schools in Delhi will remain closed for physical classes till further orders while online classes and board exams will continue, the Directorate of Education (DoE) announced on Sunday in view of the prevailing air quality situation.

The air quality remained very poor on Sunday morning, authorities here said. The city recorded its air quality index (AQI) at 382 at 9 am. The 24-hour average AQI was 374 on Saturday.

“The environment department has directed to close all the schools with immediate effect till further orders of the Commission for Air Quality Management in NCR and adjoining areas. Therefore, all government and private schools will remain closed till further orders,” Additional Director of Education Rita Sharma said.

“However, online teaching learning activities and the examinations for board classes would be conducted as per guidelines issued earlier,” the official said.

The Delhi government had on November 13 announced closure of schools and other educational institutions in view of the deteriorating air quality in Delhi.

Schools had reopened for all classes from November 1, after nearly 19 months of closure due to COVID-19.

New Delhi: The petroleum ministry’s proposal to give away ONGC’s biggest oil and gas fields to foreign companies has met with strong resistance from the officers union of the company, which has said that the government should empower and give the company a level-playing field rather than giving away its prime assets to the private sector on a platter.

The Association of Scientific & Technical Offices of ONGC petitioned Oil Minister Hardeep Singh Puri against a proposal put by Amar Nath, additional secretary (exploration) in the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, for giving away 60 per cent stake and operatorship of Mumbai High and Bassein & Satellite (B&S) offshore assets to international partners for raising output.

The union, which represents ONGC’s 17,000 officers, said the company and its employees are completely aligned with the government objective of raising domestic production to cut imports, and for this to happen ONGC should be given the same fiscal and regulatory regime as the private sector enjoys for exploring and producing oil and gas.

The government-dictated below market price gas price fixation for ONGC fields should be reviewed to make production from smaller and remote fields viable, it wrote to Puri on November 11. Also, ONGC should be given freedom to market small pools of natural gas which in present price regime are unviable.

Statutory clearances and authorities for ONGC need to be optimised and procedural aspects rejigged to help the firm take faster decisions.

Farming out stake in “existing fields shall not yield the desired results of enhancing domestic production, instead it will provide a level playing field and empower ONGC to further enhance productivity,” the union wrote.

“We would therefore request you that handing over producing fields on a platter to the private operator will not be successful and therefore, in our opinion, should not be pursued,” it added.

It said exploration of oil and gas is a highly risky endeavour where very few like to participate. “This is evident from the tepid response to the bids invited under OALP (bid rounds), where only ONGC and to some extent OIL are the only bidders.”

Private and foreign operators are unwilling to take the risk of investing millions of dollars in surveying and drilling wells to establish reserves. They instead want to enter into established fields.

“The private operators most probably are giving priority to commercial aspects, the prevailing business climate and therefore may not be taking the risk that ONGC is willing to take,” the union wrote.

The data of the last 3 years shows that ONGC has been consistently drilling more than 100 exploratory wells every year even when the international crude prices had hit an all-time low. During the low price regime most of the international and private E&P companies had stopped their exploratory plans and had drastically reduced their development investments.

“ONGC, however, bucked the trend and continued to aggressively invest in exploration and development activities,” it said, adding private exploration and production (E&P) companies have been very quick to give up fields with falling commercial returns.

“The example of Panna, Mukta and tapti fields (in western offshore) where international E&P operators did not renew their leases even though the recovery factor from these fields had not even reached 20 per cent, in fact in one case it was even less than 10 per cent,” it said pointing to ONGC’s recovery factor – percentage of reserves being recovered – at 28 per cent in Mumbai High and Bassein fields.

ONGC took over the Panna, Mukta and Tapti fields after the exit of Shell and BG Group and is producing more than the approved profile of the field.

Similarly, the Ratna field, which was given to the private sector, was put to production by ONGC. PY-3 field too was lying idle for years before ONGC took over.

“Despite the impact of COVID-19, ONGC has been able to maintain the production levels as envisaged in the annual plans. Mumbai high has been producing since 1976 and has been the cornerstone of the country’s oil production. Bassein and Satellite have been the frontrunner for gas since 1987,” the union wrote.

“ONGC has been optimally producing from these fields keeping into consideration the health of the reservoir,” it noted.

With time, ONGC has also accreted reserves in these fields and has enhanced the recovery factor.

“ONGC has plans to further enhance the production from these fields and in coming years, we shall see substantial increase from these fields,” the union wrote.

“All these efforts are in public domain and we are sure that the same must have been scrutinised by the Board of ONGC of which senior officials from the ministry are an integral part,” it added.

The Union sought an opportunity to meet Puri personally and present its suggestions for augmenting domestic crude oil and natural gas output.

“Farming out 60 per cent interest and operatorship in these fields shall have a major negative impact on ONGC’s performance, whereas such efforts in the past have not yielded desired results, for example Panna, Mukta, Ratna, Tapti and PY-3,” it added.