Archives for 2023

Shri Sammed Shikharji

Jaipur: A 72-year-old Jain monk who was on a fast against the Jharkhand government’s decision to declare Shri Sammed Shikharji as a tourist place died Tuesday in Jaipur, according to a community leader.

Police said after participating in a peace march in Jaipur against the decision, Sugyeysagar Maharaj sat on the fast at Sanghiji temple in Sanganer area of the city.

The priest was a native of a village in Banswara district of Rajasthan.

“He was on a ‘vrat’ and had not eaten anything since December 25. He passed away in the morning and the funeral was conducted at noon,” SHO of Malpura Gate police station Satish Chand said.

Rajasthan Jain Sabha president Subhash Jain said Maharaj died while fasting in protest against the Jharkhand government’s decision.

Shri Sammed Shikharji is a Jain pilgrimage centre in the Parasnath Hills of Jharkhand.

The state government has decided to turn it into a tourist attraction, which irked the community. They are concerned the decision will jeopardise the sacredness of the site.

Secretary of Ram Mandir Trust Champat Rai, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi

Ayodhya (UP): Secretary of Ram Mandir Trust Champat Rai has lauded Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for undertaking the Bharat Jodo Yatra, saying he is walking in harsh weather and that must be appreciated.

His comments came on Tuesday, a day after chief priest of Ram Janmabhoomi temple Acharya Satyendra Das “blessed” Gandhi for the Yatra.

Rai said, “I thank the young man who is walking on foot in the country, I appreciate his move. There is nothing wrong in it.

“I am the worker of RSS and the RSS never condemned Bharat Jodo Yatra,” he said in reply to a question from reporters about the Yatra which entered Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday.

“He is walking in this harsh weather and this must be appreciated. I must say every one should do Yatra of the country,” he said.

Another senior trustee of Ram Mandir Trust Govind Dev Giri also hailed Bharat Jodo Yatra.

“I pray to Lord Rama to bless him so that the nation remain united, strong and harmonious. Bharat Jodo is a good slogan and India must unite,” he said.

Patna: Taking strong exception to RJD MLA Sudhakar Singh’s objectionable remarks against Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, party leader and Deputy CM Tejashwi Yadav said the comment was “unacceptable” and tantamount to supporting the BJP.

The matter has been brought to the notice of RJD president Lalu Prasad, Yadav said.

Interacting with reporters on Monday, Singh, the former agriculture minister, compared Kumar to Shikhandi — a eunuch character in Mahabharata — and said he has no standing of his own.

“Making such comments against the person who is leading the Grand Alliance government in Bihar is simply supporting the BJP and its policies. Whatever he has said about the CM is highly objectionable,” Yadav told reporters on Tuesday.

When asked whether the party would take disciplinary action against Singh, he said, “The matter is serious. That is why it has been brought to the notice of the party supremo.”

Party leaders are advised to desist from making such statements, Yadav said.

Singh had demanded that Kumar who “has done nothing great for the state” immediately step down and offer the CM’s post to Tejashwi Yadav.

“He (Kumar) will not be remembered at all. He is like Shikhandi, who has no standing of his own,” the RJD MLA had said.

Singh had resigned as the state agriculture minister in October, after he rubbed Kumar the wrong way with his repeated outbursts against corruption in the department.

Leaders of the RJD and Kumar’s JD(U) have already criticised Singh for the comments.

On BJP president J P Nadda’s allegation that “jungle raj” has returned to Bihar, Yadav, said, “Who knows Nadda in Bihar? They (BJP) have nothing else to say. People have already rejected the BJP in Bihar.”

Former Supreme Court Judge, Justice Markande Katju has heaped praises for the people of Bhatkal where he was hosted as a Chief Guest for a event earlier this week.

Justice Katju was at Bhatkal to attend the valedictory event of Centenary celebration of Anjuman Hami-e-Muslimeen Bhatkal, an organization that runs 22 educational institutions in and around Bhatkal.

Justice Katju in a Facebook post lauded people of Bhatkal and said he was treated with great respect and his criticism was also welcomed by local Muslims.

“I criticised the bad things among Muslims, but they knew I said it for their benefits, and did not take it amiss.” He wrote in his post.

Katju was also all praises for the proficiency of local Muslims over Urdu language as well as for the local cuisine that he was presented during his three-day stay.

“I was surprised they spoke very good Urdu, as good as North Indians. There are very good hosts and I enjoyed several of their dishes, many of which I ate for the first time.” He wrote in the post.

He also lauded the efforts of Anjuman Hami-e-Muslimeen, in educational sector and termed their work “very creditable” besides posting brief history of the organisation in his post.

NEW DELHI:   The post-mortem report of Anjali Kumari has revealed the extreme damage inflicted on her body after the horrific accident on January 1. The 20-year-old was killed in the dead of night of New Year in a grotesque road accident: she was allegedly hit by a car and then her body was dragged on the road for around 10-12km under the car for around 90 minutes. Most of the flesh of her body had peeled off.

Her skull was completely fractured and the brain had popped out. There were at least 40 external injuries. Her ribs were exposed from the back. Her autopsy report, accessed by TNIE, revealed that her skull was fractured and some brain matter was missing. She also had deep-cut wounds on both arms and forehead. The report revealed that her legs were fractured at the time of the accident.

Preliminary forensic findings said that the victim was possibly stuck under the left front wheel of the Baleno car as some blood stains were found there. “Looks like her foot got stuck in that wheel,” said a senior Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) official. Forensic experts recreated the crime scene in an attempt to find out how exactly she was entangled under the car.

“The provisional cause of death is due to shock and haemorrhage as a result of ante mortem injury to the head, spine and left femur. All injuries are produced by blunt force impact. These are possible in a vehicular accident and dragging,” the report read. Special Commissioner of Delhi Police (law & order) Sagar Preet Hooda had also said that the post-mortem report indicated that there was no injury suggesting a sexual assault.

Meanwhile, Anjali’s family members rejected the charges that she was drunk at the time of the accident. These charges were leveled by key witness Nidhi, who is said to be a friend of the deceased. Nidhi was reportedly with the victim when the accident took place.  

A new CCTV footage also surfaced showing Nidhi returning home around 2.30 am. Nidhi can be seen reaching her house around 1.37 am and entering the gate. The 45-minute time gap remains unexplained. 
Sources said the first PCR caller informed the police at 2:30 am that the car fled the spot after the incident.

The second PCR call, which was received around 3:30 am, informed police that the woman’s body was stuck under the vehicle, but he was unable to give them the registration number of the car due to dense fog.

NAGPUR: A rare 16th-century copy of the Holy Quran written in gold ink preserved by a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-inspired organisation is kept on display at the 108th Indian Science Congress (ISC) currently being held here in Maharashtra.

An official of the organisation that displayed the gold ink Quran on Tuesday said there are only four copies of this holy book in the world.

The copy of the Quran and some ancient manuscripts, a few of them believed to be centuries old, are displayed at a stall put up by the Nagpur-based Research For Resurgence Foundation (RFRF) at the ISC exhibition.

RFRF is the research wing of Bhartiya Shikshan Mandal and works for preserving ancient Indian knowledge systems and implementing it in the present perspective.

The mandal was formed to accomplish a national resurgence in the field of education, according to its website.

“This gold ink Quran was written in the 16th century. There are only four copies of this Quran in the world,” RFRF Knowledge Resource Centre Director Bhujang Bobade told PTI.

Bobade, who is also the principal investigator at the National Manuscript Authority in New Delhi, said the footnotes in this Quran are written in the Nastaliq script.

He said Nastaliq and Kufi are the two scripts used in Persian. Nastaliq is considered the world’s best script.

Another speciality of the rare gold ink Quran manuscript is it contains 385 pages without a single mistake.

“There are 385 pages with miniature writings in gold ink. But despite the small size, there is not a single mistake on any of these pages. This is the uniqueness of this book,” said Bobade. He said the copy of the Quaran was given to them by the family of Diwan of the Nizam of Hyderabad.

The advisor to Iran’s President had specially visited to see the RFRF collection, he said. He said RFRF has 15,000 manuscripts of Indian history, religions and sciences of ancient India.

“The world knows about ‘Akbarnama’ written by Abu Fazal in 1577. RFRF has that book but we also have ‘Tibb-e-Akbar’ written in Persian which the world doesn’t know about. ‘Tibb-e-Akbar’ was written in the 17th century,” Bobade said.

He said RFRF’s collection also includes ‘Taarikh-e-Taj’ which explains the history of the Taj Mahal.

“The world knows about the Taj Mahal but they do not know its actual history like the exact date when Mumtaz Mahal died.

‘Taarikh-e-Taj’ states Mumtaz Mahal died on June 17, 1631 on Wednesday at 9.30 pm. Similarly, it also mentions who all worked there and the locations from where stones and marbles were brought,” Bobade said.

The RFRF collection also includes the first manuscript on Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj written by Ramchandra Dixit at Manjrath village in Beed district of Maharashtra.

“We also have the last letter written by the 17th century Maratha king in his original writing,” Bobade said.

He said the Garud Puran and the Vishnu Puran written on palm leaves, which are thousands of years old, are also in the RFRF’s collection.

The RFRF has till now digitised 1.5 lakh ancient manuscripts running into five crore pages, and made them available for researchers.

“We have collected a database of more than 25 lakh manuscripts from 3,441 archives and museums. All these manuscripts are digitised for people who want to do research. We have been working for the last 16 years to collect these ancient manuscripts and preserve them,” Bobade added.

Nationalist Congress Party president Sharad Pawar

Pune: Nationalist Congress Party president Sharad Pawar on Tuesday took a pot shot at BJP chief J P Nadda for launching the saffron party’s 2024 Lok Sabha campaign in Maharashtra with the slogan `Mission 45′.

There are 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra and not 45, he said sarcastically while also reminding the BJP chief that his party lost the Assembly elections in his home state, Himachal Pradesh.

“I am surprised….he should have launched Mission 48 as there are 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra and not 45,” Pawar said, when asked by reporters at Baramati in Pune district.

“He is the president of his party and the party has the right to choose him as president, but despite being in power in the state and Centre, he could not be successful in the elections (in Himachal Pradesh),” the NCP chief said, adding that there was no need to take such statements of BJP leaders seriously.

Asked about marches being taken out by Hindutva outfits in Maharashtra demanding a legislation against `Love Jihad’, Pawar said the BJP is in power at the Centre and in the state.

“They can take decision….Who is opposing it?” Pawar said.

`Love Jihad’ refers to unsubstantiated claims made by some Hindu right-wing groups about the existence of a conspiracy to convert Hindu girls to Islam by marrying them.

On the Supreme Court holding demonetization as valid, Pawar, a former Union minister, said it was the apex court’s decision and “we all have to accept it.”

But in future, people may write on demonetization’s economic impact and different opinions will come to the fore, he added.

To a question about Telangana Rashtra Samithi being renamed as Bharat Rashtra Samithi and its plan to start its campaign to spread across the country from Maharashtra, Pawar said every party has the right to expand its base.

“I am happy that the leadership of TRS has taken the decision to expand the base of the party,” he added.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court Tuesday said it will consider on January 10 the petition filed by sacked Gujarat-cadre IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt seeking to bring in additional evidence in an appeal filed by him in the Gujarat High Court.

Bhatt has filed an appeal in the high court challenging his conviction in a 1990 custodial death case.

At the outset, a bench of Justices M R Shah and C T Ravikumar asked senior advocate Devadatt Kamat, appearing for Bhat, if he was serious with regard to a plea seeking recusal of Justice Shah.

Kamat submitted the idea was not to attach ‘bias’ to the Judge but apprehension of ‘bias’.

He said certain issues which are the subject matter of the Special Leave Petition had been decided by Justice Shah on an earlier occasion when he was a judge in the high court.

Justice Shah then remarked, “Your objection is rejected. Merely some order has been passed in some discharge application, it has nothing to do with this controversy. Apprehension should have a reasonable nexus. If you want, we can say many things to say… we will consider.”

Kamat said he can demonstrate apprehension of bias and sought to explain his contention.

The top court said it will hear the matter on January 10.

In August 2022, Bhatt had withdrawn his plea in the apex court seeking suspension of his life sentence in the 30-year-old custodial death case.

The high court had earlier refused to suspend Bhatt’s sentence and observed he had had scant respect for courts and deliberately tried to misuse the process of law. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in June 2019 in the case.

The case relates to the custodial death of Prabhudas Vaishnani, who was among 133 people caught by Jamnagar police after a communal riot broke out following a bandh call in view of BJP leader L K Advani’s Rath Yatra.

Subsequently, his brother lodged an FIR accusing Bhatt, who was then posted as additional superintendent of police in Jamnagar, and six other policemen of killing his sibling by torturing him while he was in their custody.

Supreme Court of India

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled additional restrictions cannot be imposed on the fundamental right of freedom of speech and expression of high public functionaries as exhaustive grounds already exist under the Constitution to curb that right.

A five-judge Constitution bench headed by Justice S A Nazeer was unanimous on the larger question with regard to putting additional curbs on freedom of speech and expression of high political functionaries.

The contentious constitutional issue had cropped up following the purported statement of then Uttar Pradesh minister Azam Khan with regard to the alleged gang-rape of a mother- daughter duo on a highway near Bulandshahr in July 2016. Khan had termed the ghastly offence a “political conspiracy”.

On the key issue of whether the government can be held responsible and liable for the statements of an individual minister, the Constitution bench, by a 4:1 majority, ruled that the government cannot be held “vicariously” liable for the disparaging statements made by individual ministers.

Justice V Ramasubramanian, who wrote the judgement for himself and Justices Nazeer, B R Gavai and A S Bopanna, said the concept of collective responsibility is essentially a political concept and it is not possible to extend this concept to any and every statement orally made by a minister outside the House of the People/Legislative Assembly.

Justice B V Nagarathna, who wrote a separate judgement while concurring on the larger issue of additional restrictions on high public functionaries, however, differed on various legal questions including the one related to whether the government can be held vicariously liable for the disparaging utterances of its ministers.

She said a statement made by a minister, if traceable to any affairs of the State or for protecting the government, can be attributed vicariously to the government by invoking the principle of collective responsibility, so long as such statement represents the view of the government.

“The restrictions under clause (2) of Article 19 (Freedom of speech and expression) are comprehensive enough to cover all possible attacks on the individual, groups/classes of people, the society, the court, the country and the State…

“Under the guise of invoking other fundamental rights or under the guise of two fundamental rights staking a competing claim against each other, additional restrictions not found in Article 19(2), cannot be imposed on the exercise of the right conferred by Article 19(1)(a) upon any individual,” Justice Ramasubramanian, said in the 300-page judgement.

Article 19(2) relates to the powers of the State to make laws imposing reasonable restrictions on the exercise of the right to freedom of speech and expression in the interest of sovereignty and integrity of the country, public order, decency, morality etc.

Observing that the State is under a duty to affirmatively protect the rights of a person under Article 21 (Protection of life and personal liberty)even by a non-State actor, the apex court held that a fundamental right under Article 19 and 21 can be enforced even against persons other than the State or its instrumentalities.

On the issue whether a statement by a minister inconsistent with the rights of a citizen constitutes a violation and is actionable, the top court said no one can either be taxed or penalised for holding an opinion which is not in conformity with the constitutional values and is only when his opinion gets translated into action and such action results in injury or harm or loss that an action in tort (a wrongful action or infringement of right) will lie.

“A mere statement made by a Minister, inconsistent with the rights of a citizen under Part III of the Constitution, may not constitute a violation of the constitutional rights and become actionable as Constitutional tort. But if as a consequence of such a statement, any act of omission or commission is done by the officers resulting in harm or loss to a person/citizen, then the same may be actionable as a constitutional tort,” the bench said.

It said a fundamental right under Article 19/21 of the constitution can be enforced even against persons other than the State or its instrumentalities.

Justice Nagarathna agreed that greater restriction cannot be imposed on free speech, in addition to grounds under Article 19.

She, however, said such statements can be vicariously attributed to the government in case a minister makes disparaging statements in his “official capacity”.

“Equality, liberty and fraternity are the foundational values embedded in the Preamble of our Constitution. ‘Hate speech’ strikes at each of these foundational values, by marking out a society as being unequal.

“It also violates fraternity of citizens from diverse backgrounds, the sine-qua-non of a cohesive society based on plurality and multi-culturalism such as in India that is, Bharat,” she said.

She said freedom of speech and expression is a much needed right so citizens are well informed and educated on governance.

Justice Nagarathna said the permissible content of the right to freedom of speech and expression ought to be tested on the touchstone of fraternity and fundamental duties as envisaged under our Constitution.

“Although the questions for consideration before the Constitution bench, were with specific regard to the possible restraints on unwarranted and disparaging speech by public functionaries, the observations made hereinabove will apply with equal force to public functionaries, celebrities/influencers as well as all citizens of India, more so because technology is being used as a medium of communication which has a wide spectrum of impact across the globe,” she held.

Justice Nagarathna said public functionaries and other persons of influence and celebrities, having regard to their reach, real or apparent authority and the impact they wield on the public or on a certain section thereof, owe a duty to the citizenry at large to be more responsible and restrained in their speech.

The top court, which reserved its verdict on November 15, had said people holding public offices should exercise self-restraint and not blabber things that are disparaging or insulting to other people in the country.

A three-judge bench had on October 5, 2017 referred to the Constitution bench various issues for adjudication, including whether a public functionary or a minister can claim freedom of speech while expressing views on sensitive matters.

The need for an authoritative pronouncement on the issue arose as there were arguments that a minister cannot take a personal view and his statements have to be in sync with government policy.