Ahmedabad: Gujarat High Court today granted bail to Patel quota agitation leader Hardik Patel in two sedition cases, with a rider that he will have to stay outside the state for the next six months.

However, Hardik cannot come out of jail for now, as another case of mob violence at an MLA office is pending against him in Visnagar town of Mehsana district.

Next hearing of the Visnagar case bail application in the high court is scheduled on July 11.

Justice A J Desai granted bail to Hardik with strict conditions, one of them being that he will have to stay outside Gujarat for the next six months.

The court also directed Hardik’s lawyer to give a fresh written undertaking on his behalf which should state that he would not indulge in any activities that would lead to law and order problem.

The judge, while pronouncing the judgement, said that he has listed other conditions in written order.

The 22-year-old Patel quota stir spearhead has been behind bars since October 2015, in sedition cases that were filed against him in Ahmedabad and Surat.

During the hearing of the case, Government pleader Mitesh Amin had opposed bail to Hardik saying that the state government is apprehensive that if he is let off on bail, Hardik may repeat the offence, and his presence outside the jail may create law and order situation problems in the state.

Hardik’s lawyer Zubin Bharda had told the court that his client is ready to stay out of the state for six months if the court grants bail, in order to remove the apprehensions expressed by the state pleader.

During earlier hearings, the government had declined to accept Hardik’s offer for written undertaking for bail, in which he had stated that he will refrain from activities that may affect law and order situation, but added he will “continue to agitate for grievances of the Patidar community in a peaceful and democratic manner.”

Hardik had approached the high court for bail in the sedition cases, after the lower courts in Surat and Ahmedabad (where there are separate sedition cases against Hardik) refused to grant bail.

The Patel leader and his three associates are facing charges under IPC sections 124(A) (sedition), 121 (A) (conspiracy to wage war against government) and 120 (B) (criminal conspiracy) here.

They are accused of inciting violence to put pressure on the government to accept the demand of OBC reservation for Patels. Hardik’s mega rally on reservation held in Ahmedabad on August 25 last year had sparked violence, in which, ten people, including one policeman, were killed and public properties and vehicles worth crores of rupees were damaged across Gujarat.

(PTI)

New Delhi: India has “secured” the release of its national Regi Joseph who was abducted in March this year in Libya, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said today.

“Indian Embassy in Libya has secured the release of Regi Joseph – an Indian national from Kerala. He was abducted in March this year”.

“This has been possible with the efforts of Azar A H Khan our Ambassador in Libya,” Swaraj said in a series of tweets.

Joseph, who hails from Kozhikode in Kerala, was working as a computer engineer near the Libyan capital, Tripoli. He had been there for two years with his nurse wife and three children.

(Agencies)

New Delhi: Supreme Court today admitted for final hearing the appeal of Maharashtra government challenging the acquittal of Bollywood superstar Salman Khan in the 2002 hit-and-run case, but refused to fast-track the proceedings.

“Leave granted. Petition is admitted for final hearing,” a bench of Justices J S Khehar and Arun Mishra said.

The apex court, however, did not allow the submission of Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Maharashtra, that the appeal be fixed for final hearing after six weeks as the matter is nearly 15 years old.

“We cannot put on fast track the hearing just because X, Y, Z is involved. We have to deal with so many important matters,” the court said, adding that it may hear the appeal if the Chief Justice of India issues a direction.

During the hearing, senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who is representing the super star, said he has instructions that the matter be “decided on merits”.

Meanwhile, the bench also agreed to hear a separate plea filed by senior advocate Pandit Parmanand Katara challenging Bombay High Court’s order on the ground that a revision petition, instead of an appeal, should have been filed there.

Katara further said that the plea before the apex court was not maintainable due to alleged non-observance of the legal procedure.

The court, however, refused urgent hearing on the plea and said it would consider the matter later. The bench got irked when the lawyer insisted for an urgent hearing of his plea ahead of the petition filed by Maharashtra government saying, “are you arguing for the Press or for yourself. If you want to argue for the Press, then we are not interested.”

Earlier, the apex court on February 19, had issued notice to the actor on appeal of the state government in the case saying that exoneration from the top court would “vindicate him once and for all”.

Subsequently, another petition was filed by one Firoz Shaikh on behalf of the family members of a person who was killed in the 2002 hit-and-run case.
The plea had sought setting aside of the high court judgement and a direction to the 50-year-old actor to pay compensation to the wife and son of deceased Shaikh Noorulla Shaifik.

Maharashtra had said that the Bombay High Court had erred on two points while acquitting the filmstar. “Firstly, the High Court had erred in its finding by holding that there was ‘erroneous application’ of Section 33 of Evidence Act (relevancy of certain evidence for proving, in subsequent proceeding, the truth of facts therein stated) by the trial court,” the Attorney General had said.

On second count, he had said the High Court had erred by holding that the prosecution witness Ravindra Patil, a constable who was guarding the actor and had first called the police, was not a “wholly reliable witness” and his version needed corroboration with accounts of other witnesses.

The Maharashtra government’s appeal contained 47 grounds to assail the high court’s verdict and sought restoration of the trial court’s decision by which the 50-year-old actor was convicted and sentenced to five-year-jail term.

Among other grounds, the petition said, “High Court has erred in brushing aside the alcohol examination certificate and the evidence of the assistant chemical analyzer just because there was some alleged delay in taking the blood samples and for sending it to the chemical analyzer.”

The high court, in its verdict passed on December 10 last year, had held that prosecution had failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the actor was driving the vehicle at the time of the accident and was drunk.

The high court judgement had come on an appeal by the superstar, seven months after he was pronounced guilty by trial court of running over five people sleeping on a pavement outside a laundry in suburban Bandra with his Toyota Land Cruiser, killing one and causing injury to four others.

On May 6 last year, a sessions court had convicted Salman in the case.

(Agencies)

Bengaluru: Senior Congress MLA K B Koliwad was today unanimously elected as the 20th Speaker of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly.

Koliwad, a five-time MLA from Ranebennur constituency, had filed his nomination yesterday. He had served as Minister in the past.

Koliwad succeeds Kagodu Thimmappa, who has been inducted into the Ministry as Revenue Minister by Chief Minister Siddaramaih in the recent cabinet rejig.

Siddaramaiah proposed the name of Koliwad while Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister T B Jayachandra seconded it following which he was elected as Speaker unopposed in a voice vote.

After Deputy Speaker Shivashankar Reddy formally announced Koliwad’s election, he was escorted by Siddaramaiah, Opposition Leader Jagadish Shettar and JD(S) leader Y S V Datta to the Chair.

Earlier, as the House met for the day, BJP members entered the Well demanding a probe into the alleged site allocation scam involving Bengaluru Development Authority but later relented after the Deputy Speaker asked them to allow the business of election of Speaker.

Congratulating Koliwad, Siddaramaiah thanked Opposition for its support in electing the Speaker unopposed.

(Agencies)

(AP Photo/Ajit Solanki)

New Delhi: An expansion and reshuffle of the Modi government will take place tomorrow with a dalit tilt in the exercise possibly eyeing the Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh next year.

Prominent among the names doing the rounds for induction include Anupriya Patel, an OBC Lok Sabha member belonging to ally Apna Dal, and a number of BJP leaders, who met party chief Amit Shah today.

The BJP names include S S Ahluwalia (LS), Vijay Goel (RS), P P Chaudhary, a dalit MP from Bikaner in Rajasthan.

Sources said Ajay Tamta, a dalit Lok Sabha member from Uttarakhand, which will go to the polls with Uttar Pradesh early next year, Purushottam Rupala, a Rajya Sabha member from Gujarat, Ramdas Athawale, a RPI MP from Maharashtra (RS), Mahendra Nath Pandey, an MP from UP, are among the likely inclusions. Krishan Raj, another BJP dalit MP from UP, can also make the cut.

Some ministers can also be dropped, party sources said adding top ministers are unlikely to be disturbed. Frank Noronha, Principal spokesperson of the government, tweeted today that the cabinet expansion will take place tomorrow at 11 AM.

There has been talk of the expansion for the past several weeks amid speculation that Prime Minister Narendra Modi could induct new faces from Uttar Pradesh with an eye on polls.

There is also a vacancy in the Council of Ministers after Sports Minister Sarbananda Sonowal became the Chief Minister of Assam.

This will be the second expansion of the Cabinet after Modi came to power in May, 2014. The first expansion had occurred in November 2014.

There are currently 64 Union ministers, including the Prime Minister, and there can be a maximum of 82 of them under a constitutional bar.

Hyderabad: A local court on Thursday remanded five people, arrested by NIA on Wednesday, in judicial custody for 14 days. They were arrested on charges of involvement in a terror module suspected to be linked to Islamic State and conspiring to carry out bomb attacks.

The accused were produced in the chamber of the Metropolitan Sessions Judge by NIA amidst heavy security. The judge remanded them in judicial custody though the investigating agency has filed an application seeking their police custody for further examination. NIA’s application for police custody is likely to come up for hearing tomorrow.

The accused were later shifted to Cherlapally Central Prison. Mohammed Ibrahim Yazdani alias Ibbu, Habeeb Mohammed alias Sir, Mohammed Ilyas Yazdani, Abdullah Bin Ahmed Al Amoodi and Muzaffar Hussain Rizwan were arrested by NIA after a series of searches were conducted at 10 locations in Old City area, with the assistance of Hyderabad Police. The agency had detained six others, including a techie, during the operation.

According to NIA, the preliminary examination has revealed that the gang was preparing IEDs for commission of terror acts and were being guided by an online handler suspected to be based in Iraq/Syria.

The agency recovered firearms, ammunition, precursor chemicals for making explosives, digital exhibits and Rs 15 lakh cash from the searched locations.

NIA also seized two semi-automatic pistols with ammunition, an air gun with telescopic sight and shooting practice target boards, a large number of digital items including six laptops, about 40 mobile phones, 32 SIM cards, and a large number of hard disks, memory cards, pen drives, and digital tabs.

Meanwhile, local police today dismissed certain messages that are being circulated in social media about the threat to public safety and security in the wake of the arrests made by NIA. “There are certain messages floating in social media about the threat to public safety & security. The information being circulated in social media are all rumours and are found to be false,” Hyderabad Police said in a statement.

All necessary security arrangements have been made in the city by police to maintain peace and public order. “Law & order situation is peaceful. People of Hyderabad city are requested to not believe in rumours being circulated in social media”, it said.

Meanwhile, Mohammed Ishaq Yazdani, brother of one of the arrested persons Mohammed Ibrahim Yazdani, termed the allegation against his brother as “rumours”. “It’s all rumours. Around 15 to 20 gun-wielding persons came to our house yesterday morning and in the name of investigation threw the household belongings and took away the laptop and tab. They also took away my original Aadhaar Card,” he alleged.

He claimed that Rs 15 lakh seized during the raid belonged to Ibrahim’s in-laws.

(PTI)