New Delhi, Apr 15 : Welcoming the Supreme Court issuing notice to Rahul Gandhi for his alleged remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the Rafale issue vis-a-vis attributing words to the apex court, the BJP on Monday said the Congress president and his party stand completely exposed.

”Rahul Gandhi speaks lies loudly and everyday. This is mischief and not ignorance,” BJP leader and Union Minister Prakash Javadekar told reporters here.

Rahul Gandhi is defaming Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the institutions and this looks like a conspiracy, he said.

BJP MP Meenakshi Lekhi had filed a contempt plea in the top court on Friday in which she said the Congress president has been “misinterpreting” the apex court’s ruling on the Rafale deal with France. She also had alleged that Mr Gandhi had repeatedly put his own words as the court’s verdict.

The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to Mr Gandhi and said he should respond on or before next Monday. The matter, it said, will be heard on April 23.

Mr |Javadekar said, ”It has become a Congress habit to lie. Rahul Gandhi and Congress have become synonyms of ‘jhoot’ and ‘loot'”.

The Union Minister also maintained that Prime Minister’s credibility will not be affected by all this.

The Congress was only indulging in petty and immature politics, he alleged.

To a question, he said security, progress and leadership quality were important issues for general elections this year.

The Rafale deal was a pact between two governments and no wrongdoings took place, he said.

The Supreme Court had dismissed pleas to probe Rafale fighter jet deal with France, blunting the opposition’s attack on Mr Modi in the multi-billion-dollar purchase.

The apex court had in December said that there will be no court-monitored probe into the Rafale deal.

In its observation the Supreme Court on Monday said, “We make it clear that views, observations, findings attributed to this court in the alleged speeches, remarks made by (Rahul) Gandhi to media or public have been incorrectly attributed to this court”.

“We also make it clear that this court had no occasion to make such observation,” the media reports said quoting the court’s ruling.

Ms Lekhi has told reporters on Friday: “……this is not only contempt but a criminal contempt of court. That is misquoting, misrepresenting the facts in public and making allegations and accusations about the Supreme Court order and it is for this reason the contempt has been filed today”.

On Monday, Ms Lekhi welcomed the process of justice and said, “It’s about dragging the Supreme Court to a political battle and dragging down the dignity of the court”.

The ruling BJP on Friday had launched two-pronged attack on Congress president Rahul Gandhi for his repeated ‘chowkidar chor hai’ scathing criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and sought intervention of the Election Commission on the matter.

Earlier in the day, to mount pressure on Mr Gandhi, BJP lawmaker Meenakshi Lekhi approached the Supreme Court with a plea to initiate contempt proceedings against the Congress leader.

Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman also told reporters “We feel let down” that Election Commission chose to look the other way in spite of “our earlier complaints against Rahul Gandhi on the same issue”.

A BJP delegation comprising Union Ministers Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, Ms Sitharaman, Nalin Kohli and Anil Baluni met the poll panel and made a submission on the issue.

Bengaluru, Apr 11 : In compliance with the recent Supreme Court order, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) will install five VVPAT machines in each of the 28 Assembly seats in the City where the first phase of the polling is slated for April 18, BBMP Commissioner Manjunath Prasad told UNI.
In an exclusive interview to UNI here on Thursday, he said that ?as many as 140 VVPAT machines will be installed in 28 Assembly seats which comes under the BBMP region?, in the city. The selection of polling stations where the VVPAT machines have to be installed will be done on random basis?.
Stating that conducting a free and fair elections within the BBMP region is a challenging task, Prasad said that ?BBMP will have more than 8900 polling stations in which more than 90 lakh voters are registered. There are 2.40 lakh voters added as compared to the 2018 Assembly elections?.
?While 24 Assembly segments comes under Bengaluru Central, Bengaluru North and Bengaluru South Lok Sabha segments, BBMP also have three Assembly segments, which comes under the Bengaluru Rural and one Assembly seat attached to the Chikkaballapura Lok Sabha constituency? he added.
He said that for the first time in the country, the Election Commission have decided to supply M-3 Electronic Voting Machines, an upgraded version of the M-2 EVMs, in the Bengaluru Central Parliamentary Constituency.
?In the last Lok Sabha elections, in only one Polling station, the M-3 machines had been used to facilitate voting in the Bengaluru Central Lok Sabha segment? he added.
?With more than 90 lakh voters, who were eligible to cast their votes for the April-18 Lok Sabha elections, increasing polling per cent, is the next challenge task before us? the BBMP Commissioner said.
Stating that more than 8000 staff had been pressed into create awareness among the voters to exercise their franchise, he said that in 2014 LS election about 52 per cent of polling was recorded and it increased slightly by 3 per cent in May 2018 Assembly poll.
?This time we are making best efforts to record higher per centage of polling as compared to the previous elections. volunteers have already visited over 20 lakh eligible voters, personally and motivated them to visit the Polling station and cast their votes? he said.
Replying to a question, the BBMP Commissioner said that for the first time the voter slips, which would be delivered to the houses, by the BBMP volunteers, would contain details of Polling stations, facilities available there and also Map for the easy location of the polling booth.
?Compared to last elections, as many as 320 more polling stations were added for April-18 General elections? Manjunath Prasad added.

In a setback for the government, the Supreme Court, on Wednesday, ruled that the ‘stolen’ documents were ‘admissible in the court’. A Supreme Court bench, headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi, dismissed Centre’s preliminary objections seeking review of earlier judgment giving a clean chit to the Union Government in Rafale deal. The bench also includes Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and KM Joseph.

The court allowed the admissibility of three documents in Rafale deal as evidence in re-examining the review petitions filed against the SC’s December 14 judgement in which it refused to order probe in procuring 36 Rafale fighter jets from France.  “As far as the question of hearing of review plea on Rafale judgement is concerned, it will give a detailed hearing later on,” SC said. 

“Our argument was that because the documents relate to Defence you must examine them. You asked for this evidence and we have provided it. So the Court has accepted our pleas and rejected the arguments of the government,” Arun Shourie, who filed review plea in Rafale deal verdict was quoted as saying by news agency.

The verdict pertains to the initial objections raised by the central government that the documents that claimed ‘privileged’ could not be authenticated to reassess the ruling on the Rafale jet deal with France.

On December 14 last year, SC had rejected the petitions by former Union ministers Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie as also activist advocate Prashant Bhushan seeking a court-monitored probe into the Rafale acquisition process.

The Supreme Court had on March 14 heard the pleas to review the December 14 Rafale order and Attorney General KK Venugopal argued that the court should remove leaked pages from the petitions as the government claims privilege over the documents. The court, however, said that the petitioners had already submitted the documents.

The Centre, in an affidavit, had told the apex court that the review petitions were based on documents stolen from the Defence Ministry.

The matter comes on the backdrop that the Congress-led opposition has made Rafale an election issue and targetted the government over the offset contracts awarded to the Anil Ambani-led Reliance Defence by Dassault – the manufacturer of Rafale.

In its December 14 verdict, the apex court had dismissed the petitions and said that there was no reason to ‘really doubt the decision-making process’.

In 2016, India and France had inked an inter-governmental agreement (IGA) to purchase 36 Rafale fighters from French Dassault. The announcement, made by PM Modi during his France visit, overruled the then existing process to purchase 126 Rafale jets from France — 18 in flyaway condition and 108 to be made in India with the transfer of technology.

Agencies

Bengaluru, Apr 9 : In a hard hitting petition, the Chief Commissioner of Income Tax, Karnataka and Goa has charged that Karnataka Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy, by alerting tax evaders in the State has violated the Oath of secrecy.
In a letter addressed to Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer Sanjiv Kumar, IT Commissioner B R Balakrishnan has stated that certain developments, which took place, post raid, conducted by the IT officials on certain personalities in Karnataka, have posed a grave threat in conducting a free and fair elections in the State.
Stating that in the course of Assembly elections in Karnataka, in 2018, a modus operandi of making government funds to certain Contractors and taking cut back in cash from them was discovered, the IT Commissioner had pointed that the same modus operandi was followed ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in Karnataka.
During the last few weeks, it was observed that government work orders to certain contractors were issued along with the huge funds released on war footing in the months preceding to the elections?.
In his letter, the commissioner, said that when the IT officials were preparing to raid on the houses of Contractors, in Hassan, Mysuru and Mandya, had requested the State police to allow utilize the services of the Central forces stationed in Karnataka, which was duely approved by the Police department.
However, a day before the IT officials was to go ahead with their plans, Chief Minister had made a public statement, informing about the impending plans of the raid and seizure on certain Contractors.
Chief Minister became aware of the impending search, only our request for police protection? he had stated.
Chief Minister, while revealing the classified information to make public, also threatened to emulate ?Mamata Bannerjee? tactics against the IT officials.
The IT Commissioner, in his plaint, also brought to the notice about the protest meeting conducted by the Chief Minister, and his cabinet colleagues and also KPCC President, over the issue in front of IT Office.
Such a protest by Chief Minister and his Cabinet Ministers appears to be an attempt to browbeat and intimidate officers of the Income Tax and this should be considered, whether this amounts to preventing government officers from discharging their duties”.
This should be seen as a direct attack on the Election Commission of India?, he added.
The IT Commissioner, while demanding a through inquiry into the incident, had also appealed to consider to entrust the investigation to an outside agency.
He also appealed to the Karnataka Chief Electoral Commissioner to deploy Central Forces and kept at the disposal of the Directorate of the Income Tax department.
Meanwhile, the Chief Electoral Officer, Sanjiv Kumar, had sent the letter to the Karnataka Governor Vajubhai Vala to take necessary action over the issue.

Bengaluru, Apr 4 : The CBI officials during raid on a Income Tax officer H R Nagesh’s residence have recovered a whopping Rs 1,35,50,650 in cash, several incriminating documents, property documents, mobile phones, pen drives, documents relating to investments, on Thursday.
CBI, based on a complaint by a Managing Director of a private company laid a trap yesterday and arrested redhanded, Nagesh and another IT officer Narendra Singh, who demanded and accepted a bribe of Rs 14 lakhs from the complainant for settling the issue.
This was pertaining to an IT department raid conducted at the office premises of the complainant on March 6 and registered a case in Rc.04(A)/2019 u/s. 120-B of IPC and 7 of PC Act, 1988 and further investigation was initiated against the two IT officers caught.
Both the arrested were produced before the court and they were remanded to judicial custody. The investigation is in progress, according to an official release here on Thursday

New Delhi, March 30 Nasheman News : The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday said it has provisionally attached Holiday Inn hotel worth Rs 120 crore in connection with a money laundering case against aviation lobbyist Deepak Talwar.

The hotel is located at Aerocity in Delhi and valued at around Rs 120.20 crore, it said.

Investigation against Talwar was initiated under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in August 2017 on the basis of an FIR registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation against officials of the Civil Aviation Ministry, National Aviation Co of India Ltd, Air India and unknown private persons, the ED said in a statement. 

“It has been revealed that Deepak Talwar illegally engaged in liasoning/lobbying with politicians, ministers, other public servants and officials of Ministry of Civil Aviation for airlines such as Emirates, Air Arabia and Qatar Airways for securing undue benefits for them. 

“He illegally managed to secure favourable traffic rights for these airlines during 2008-09 at the cost of national carrier Air India,” the investigative agency said.

Investigations revealed that in lieu of securing favourable traffic rights, these airlines made payments to the tune of Rs 272 crore to Talwar in 2008-09, it added. 

The ED alleged that Talwar created a web of entities owned by him and his family members in India and international offshore havens to launder the proceeds of crime. 

“Part of these payments were made to a bank account in Bank of Singapore, belonging to a company – M/s Asiafield Ltd – registered in the British Virgin Islands and beneficially owned by Deepak Talwar. 

“These proceeds of crime were layered through a series of international money transfers, to finally integrate in India in M/s Wave Hospitality Pvt Ltd, a company beneficially owned and controlled by Deepak Talwar and his family members in the name of his son Aditya Talwar,” it said. 

“These proceeds of crime were then utilized in the construction of Holiday Inn in Aerocity, New Delhi,” it added.

Talwar fled the country in 2017 to avoid investigation. He was deported by immigration authority of Dubai on January 31 and arrested under PMLA. He is now in judicial custody.

The agency said that further investigation was in progress.

Chennai, Mar 22 : The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday conducted raids at the Tamil Nadu Waqf Board office in the city and at Madurai and Ramanathapuram following alleged irregularities in recruitment in the Board’s college.

CBI sources said the officials also raided the premises of Waqf Board Chairman and AIADMK MP Anwhar Raja at Chennai and Ramanathapuram and Board’s college Secretary and correspondent
in Madurai.

The CBI has registered an FIR against MSS Waqf Board College former Secretary Jamal Mohideen, Mr Anwar Raja and others.

The allegations against them was that assistant lectures without requisite qualifications stipulated by the UGC were appointed on payment of illegal gratification.

There were also allegations of misappropriation of the college accounts.

Mumbai, March 22 (Nasheman News) The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday arrested jeweller Abdul Kadir Najmudin Sathak here for assisting fugitive controversial Islamic preacher Zakir Naik by transferring funds of dubious origins from the UAE to him.

The agency said the funds were used to facilitate production of videos meant to spread communal hatred and radicalize a particular community. 

Sathak was director of Global Broadcasting Corp FZE LLC, which owned the Peace TV channel which broadcast the “communal and inflammatory” speeches of televangelist Naik from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to the Middle East and Africa, an ED statement said. 

“Investigation revealed that Global Broadcasting Corp was controlled by Naik through Sathak who was his trusted aide.”

The ED in December 2016 registered a criminal case against Naik and his Islamic Research Foundation (IRF) under money laundering laws after taking cognisance of a similar FIR lodged by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act against them in November 2016.

Naik, who has got permanent resident status in Malaysia, came on the security agencies’ radar after some terrorists, allegedly involved in the attack on a cafe in Dhaka in July 2016, claimed they were inspired by his speeches.

On November 17, 2016, India declared Naik’s Mumbai-based NGO IRF an unlawful association under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. 

Chennai, March 21 (Nasheman News) The Madras High Court’s Madurai bench on Thursday sentenced, to life imprisonment, nine people convicted in the 2007 Dinakaran newspaper burning case which left three persons dead.

The court also sentenced seven other accused to five-year jail terms.

The High Court’s verdict came on an appeal filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) as the lower court acquitted all the accused.

The High Court also ordered the state government to pay a compensation of Rs 500,000 to the families of the three employees of Dinakaran daily – Gopinath, Vinod and Muthuramalingan – who were killed in the attack.

Amongst the accused sentenced for life is V.P. Pandi also known as `Attack Pandi’, a supporter of former Union Minister M.K. Alagiri, who was expelled from the DMK some years back.

In 2007, the Dinakaran daily published a survey report on who would be the preferred successor for late DMK President M.Karunanidhi.

As per the survey, Alagiri was ranked below Stalin which angered the supporters of the former and they attacked the daily’s office in Madurai with petrol bombs, resulting in fire and death of three employees.

Ahmedabad, March 20 (Nasheman News) A Special SIT Court set up at the Sabarmati Central Jail in Gujarat on Wednesday sentenced one more person to life imprisonment for the 2002 Godhra train carnage.

H.C. Vora, the Special SIT judge, convicted Yakub Pataliya based on submissions made earlier in the case by five other accused.

Nearly 16 years after being booked for the train burning at Godhra, in which 59 Hindu activists died in two coaches of the Sabarmati Express in February 2002, Pataliya was arrested in January 2018.

Pataliya was accused of being a part of the mob which torched the two coaches of Sabarmati Express on February 27, sparking off state-wide riots which lasted for over a month.

In August, Special judge Vora convicted Farukh Bhana and Imran alias Sheru Batik and acquitted Hussain Suleman Mohan, Kasam Bhamedi and Faruk Dhantiya.

The five were arrested by different investigative agencies in 2015-16.

Earlier, the special SIT court convicted 31 people in the case on March 1, 2011.