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We walked the talk on electrification, says Modi

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday claimed that officials working on electrification projects under his government reached every village, remotest of areas to fulfill his promise to the nation.

“From the ramparts of Red Fort, I announced every village will be electrified. We walked the talk and went to every village. We not only focussed on electrification but also reformed the distribution systems across the country,” Modi said addressing residents of newly electrified villages via the NaMo App.

“Most of the villages were in remote, hilly areas, and in areas with poor connectivity. It was not easy to reach there but a dedicated team of people did it,” he said.

In April, Modi announced that the Rs 76,000 crore Deendayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY) project was completed with the electrification of around 18,000 villages.

“It has been 70 years since we attained independence but 18,000 villages did not have an electricity supply. This was quite unfortunate,” he said.

Taking a snipe at the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance, Modi said: “In 2005, the then government promised to electrify every village by 2009. Then President (Sonia Gandhi) of the ruling party (Congress) went a step ahead and said ‘we will bring electricity to every home’.

“Needless to say, none of that happened during their long tenure,” he added.

11 Afghan journalists killed in six months

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Eleven Afghan journalists and media workers have been killed in the first half of the year amid deteriorating security, an independent media safety group said on Wednesday.

“The first six months of 2018 was the bloodiest reporting period for journalists and the media community in Afghanistan. About 89 cases of violence and intimidation were reported, 11 of which involved the killing of journalists,” Afghan Journalists Safety Committee (AJSC) told Xinhua news agency.

A group of nine reporters was killed on April 30 in a suicide bombing while they were covering a terrorist attack at a diplomatic district. The attack was later claimed by the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group.

Two other journalists were shot dead in southern Kandahar and eastern Khost provinces in the same month.

The press safety group also expressed concern over the continuation and expansion of violence and threats to Afghan journalists posed by terrorist groups, particularly Taliban and IS affiliates.

“The intensity and scale of violence has been unprecedented during this period of 2018,” AJSC added.

Never Blamed Congress, it was misquoted statement : H D Kumarswamy.

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Days after the BJP went after Karnataka Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy, he denied on Tuesday that he had blamed the Congress or its leaders. He said he was misquoted on his statement about being not happy heading the coalition government in the state.

Speaking to the journalist he said “It was my party’s event and I got emotional. My remarks were misjudged. I didn’t say anything about Congress or any of its leaders,”

Kumaraswamy broke down at the party event on Saturday, expressing that he was “not happy” holding the top post and that he was gulping the agony like ‘Vishakantha’ (Lord Shiva) who drank poison, setting off a political slugfest.

The Chief Minister is on a two-day visit to the national capital beginning Tuesday, during which he is due to meet many Union ministers.

“Hindu Taliban” Jibe Riles BJP Amid “Hindu Pakistan” Row : Shashi Tharoor

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Senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, deep in controversy over his “Hindu Pakistan” remark, today fought back, asking if there was a “Taliban emerging within Hinduism now”. The former diplomat was expressing his outrage after the BJP and right-wing groups said he should be deported to Pakistan for his remark that India would become a “Hindu Pakistan” if the BJP returned to power in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
“They are telling me to go to Pakistan. Who has given them the right to decide that because I am not a Hindu like them, that’s why I can’t stay in this country? So is there a Taliban emerging within Hinduism now? We must ask our Hindu brothers and sisters if people can be allowed to speak with reference to our religion in this manner,” he said at a public meeting.

“As individuals, as politicians, as thinking people we are saying, BJP’s talks, BJP’s talks about Hindu Rashtra, is very dangerous. It can destroy our country,” he added.

The BJP was quick to react. Party spokesperson Sambit Patra tweeted:
Mr Tharoor triggered outrage among the BJP ranks last week after he said if the BJP wins in 2019, they will “tear up the Constitution of India and write a new one”. “That will enshrine the principle of Hindu Rashtra, will remove equality for minorities, that will create a Hindu Pakistan and that isn’t what Mahatma Gandhi, Nehru, Sardar Patel, Maulana Azad and great heroes of freedom struggle fought for,” he said.

As an outraged BJP demanded an apology from Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, Mr Tharoor’s Thiruvananthapuram office was targetted, allegedly by the local youth wing of the BJP. A court in Kolkata also summoned him on August 14 after a petition was filed.

Mr Tharoor said his statement has been misconstrued. The Hindu Rashtra envisaged by the BJP-RSS is a “mirror image of Pakistan,” he said, a state with a dominant majority religion that seeks to put its minorities in a subordinate place”.

Kerala CM-led all-party delegation to meet Modi

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Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan will lead an all-party delegation that will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday and discuss various issues concerning the state.

The issues likely to be raised include increasing the state’s ration share, besides the much-delayed projects like Palakkad Coach Factory, Sabari rail line and also the after-effects in the event of implementation of the Kasturirangan report, Vijayan’s office told the media on Wednesday.

The delegation will include Leader of Opposition Ramesh Chennithala, state Congress chief M.M. Hassan, besides Kerala Ministers K. Ramachandran, G.Sudhakaran, and former state BJP chief P.K. Krishnadas, who will be joined by Lok Sabha MP E.T. Mohammed Basheer (IUML) and Rajya Sabha MP Jose K. Mani (Kerala Congress-Mani) from Delhi.

In June, Vijayan had expressed his strong displeasure at the manner in which his earlier requests to meet Modi were turned down.

The delegation will leave for Delhi later on Wednesday.

Bengaluru city all set to receive five more outdoor stadiums

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To reduce the burden on the existing stadiums in Bengaluru, five more stadiums are coming up in the city. With this, the city will be having at least 13 outdoor stadiums. The new stadiums are being planned in Devanahalli in North Bengaluru, Gunjur in East Bengaluru, HSR Layout in South Bengaluru, Tavarakere in West Bengaluru and Anjanapura in South Bengaluru near JP Nagar.

“The Kanteerava stadium, which is in the heart of the city, is overburdened. We want to encourage more sports activities, so we have chosen four locations across Bengaluru. With these coming up, sports organizers in these four regions of the city can organize sporting events in their respective areas, so that the traveling time is reduced,’’ N Shivashankara, Commissioner, Youth Empowerment, and Sports told TNIE.

These will be multi-purpose stadiums with facilities for athletic tracks, javelin, discus, volleyball and basketball. According to Shivashankara, they need a minimum of 10 acres for each stadium. “We got funds in the recent state budget. We are soon going to get a Detailed Project Report and tenders will be called. Once the tenders are finalized, we need six months to one year to complete the stadiums. We are hoping that the entire process will be completed within a year,’’ he said.

The Anjanapura stadium will be developed by Bruhat BBMP. “We have identified 35 acres of land belonging to the state government at Anjanpura near JP Nagar in South Bengaluru. It will be mainly for cricket. There is no cricket stadium this side, so we want to have one here that will help local people, especially the youngsters,’’ a BBMP official said.

Bengaluru has eight stadiums at present, including Chinnaswamy Stadium and Alur Stadium. Both are maintained by Karnataka State Cricket Association. Five more stadiums, including Kanteerva stadium (multi-purpose stadium), Hockey Stadium, Bengaluru Football Stadium and Jayaprakash Narayan National Youth Centre at Vidhyanagar on Airport Road, are maintained by the state sports department. Kittur Rani Chennamma sports stadium (multi-purpose) is owned by the BBMP.

Israeli army turns away displaced Syrians along Golan Heights

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Scores of displaced Syrians were turned away by the Israeli army as they attempted to approach the border fence along the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

The group is among tens of thousands of Syrians who have arrived near the frontier over the past month following renewed fighting along the country’s southern Deraa and Quneitra provinces.

The incident on Tuesday happened in Quneitra, where the Syrian government is fighting to push out the last remaining pockets of rebels and fighters belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS).

The displaced Syrians stopped some 200 meters away from the fence before an Israeli soldier told them to leave.

“You are on the border of the State of Israel. Go back, we don’t want to hurt you,” the soldier shouted in Arabic through a loudspeaker at the crowd, Reuters TV footage showed.

The crowd, which included women and children, then walked back slowly towards the IDP encampment. Some stopped midway and waved white cloths in the direction of the Israeli frontier.
The Syrian regime, Russia accused of breaching ceasefire in Deraa
“Go back before something bad happens. If you want us to be able to help you, go back,” the Israeli army officer told the crowd “Get a move on.”

‘Extreme conditions’
Lama Fakih, deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa division at Human Rights Watch, told Al Jazeera both the Israeli and Jordanian governments have an obligation to not push back fleeing asylum seekers.

“The tens of thousands that have been displaced are fleeing extensive bombardment. They have left in many cases with literally the clothing on their backs,” Fakih said.

“They are living in areas where is intense heat without adequate shelter, without adequate humanitarian assistance, and despite the extreme humanitarian conditions and insecurity in the area, both the Israeli and the Jordanian government have persisted in not allowing these asylum seekers to try to seek refuge across the border.”

Al Jazeera’s Stefanie Dekker reporting from the occupied Golan Heights said the hundred or so Syrians that gathered along the border on Tuesday had nowhere else to go.

And despite both Israel and Jordan providing some tents for some of the refugees, there are concerns about their living situation.

“What we understand is that they have gone back to the tents in the makeshift camps where they’re residing,” Dekker said, adding the displaced have to deal with the rising temperatures as well as sanitary and water issues.

“There is another concern that people who have been living under rebel control of years [which] is repercussion measures by the Syrian government,” said Dekker.

“There are activists in these areas, journalists, families who are simply afraid of what will happen to them when the government takes over the villages they’ve been living in.”

The UN estimates that 160,000 Syrians have been displaced because of recent unrest, triggered largely by the Syrian government and its Russian ally’s attempts to retake rebel-controlled territory along in the south.

Israel has given humanitarian aid to IDPs in encampments close to a 1974 Israeli-Syrian disengagement line on the Golan but has said they would not be allowed to cross into the Israeli-held territory.

A witness on the Syrian side of the frontier said people were seeking shelter wherever they could as the offensive drew closer to their location.

‘Inadequate, inhumane response’
According to Fakih, the displaced group includes journalists, humanitarian aid workers and other individuals who the Syrian government has targeted, detained and executed in the past

What is the effect of Syria regime’s recapture of Jordan crossing?
Fakih said Israel’s response to developments along the border falls short of what is required to alleviate the suffering of displaced Syrians.

“Quite simply it is inadequate and inhumane. These are individuals that are desperate for assistance. The response from the Israeli government has been to provide assistance across the border which has been inadequate. There are serious concerns for displaced populations that remain in Syria.”

Government forces backed by Russian air support have recovered large swaths of territory across southern Syria in the last three weeks, advancing unopposed by Assad’s western and regional foes into the strategically vital region near Jordan and Israel.

The campaign in the southwest is now expected to target rebel-held enclaves at the frontier with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Israel signaled it would not impede the offensive, even as it struck Syrian army posts near the frontier in retaliation for a drone incursion.

Aljazeera

After backlash, Trump says misspoke on Russian election meddling

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President Donald Trump was forced into a rare admission of error after a political firestorm following his defense of Russia over claims of meddling in the 2016 US elections.

Republican and Democrat politicians in the United States, as well as intelligence officials, denounced Trump’s failure to challenge his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin over alleged interference in the elections, calling his responses at a joint news conference in Finland as “shameful” and “disgraceful”.

Speaking at the White House on Tuesday, Trump said he misspoke when he addressed reporters in Helsinki a day earlier, adding he accepts the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia did meddle in the elections won by him.

Trump faces bipartisan rebuke over ‘treasonous’ summit with Putin
“I said the word ‘would’ instead of ‘wouldn’t,'” Trump told reporters. “The sentence should have been, ‘I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be Russia.'”

But Trump maintained that Russia’s action had no impact on the result, which saw him defeat Democrat rival Hillary Clinton, and denied his campaign had colluded in the effort.

In the Finnish capital on Monday, Trump refused to say he believed US intelligence agencies over Russia’s denials of meddling and delivered no condemnation of Moscow’s interference.

‘Fake news going crazy’
Trump also blasted the media for its coverage of his meeting with Putin and NATO officials last week.

“While I had a great meeting with NATO, raising vast amounts of money, I had an even better meeting with Vladimir Putin of Russia. Sadly, it is not being reported that way – the Fake News is going Crazy,” the president said on Twitter.

reporting from the White House, said Trump “was sticking to the script” in his comments – a rare occurrence.

“He was almost reading this [statement]; very much an example of a White House in damage control mode, where the communications team has worked very hard to parse the statement of the president in Helsinki and try to turn it into something other than what many people believe they witnessed – and that was a president standing apart from his intelligence agencies and the conclusion that Russia meddled in the 2016 US election,” said Halkett.

Trump criticised
The political firestorm over Trump’s performance at the Helsinki news conference engulfed the US administration and spread to his fellow Republicans, eclipsing most of the frequent controversies that have erupted during the president’s turbulent 18 months in office.

Taking direct issue with the president who appointed him, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said US spy agencies have been “clear” and “fact-based” in their assessment that Moscow interfered in the presidential race two years ago.

Trump-Putin summit brings an end to frosty US-Russia relations

John McCain, the senior Republican senator, said Trump’s seeming acceptance of Putin’s denial was a historical “low point” for the US presidency.

The language used by Democrats was much harsher, including accusations of “treason”.

“For the president of the US to side with President Putin against American law enforcement, American defense officials, and American intelligence agencies is thoughtless, dangerous, and weak,” Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer said.

Democratic California Representative Jimmy Gomez charged: “To side with Putin over US intelligence is disgusting; to fail to defend the US is on the verge of treason.”

Some lawmakers said they would seek remedies against Russia in Congress.

Several senators from both parties backed tougher sanctions on Russia, but it was unclear if Republican congressional leaders would support such a move or what new sanctions might be crafted.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, who called Russia’s government “menacing,” said he would consider additional sanctions on Russia and reiterated his support for US intelligence findings that Russia interfered in the 2016 election.

Last week, the US Department of Justice indicted 12 Russians for hacking Democratic Party computers.

 

Aljazeera

Siddaramaiah is now member of Congress Working Committee

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Former chief minister of Karnataka, Siddaramaiah, has been given the membership of Congress Working Committee (CWC), which happens to be the highest policy-making body of the Congress in the country.

There was a perception that after the defeat of Congress in the state, Siddaramaiah was being relegated in terms of importance in his party. However, the high command, which gave him prominence when forming the coalition government, offered him the post of the chairman of the coordination committee of the state government. By making him CWC member now, the party has taken steps to assure him that he continues to be held in high esteem by the party high command.

The CWC been revamped, and veteran Congress leader from Karnataka, Mallikarjun Kharge, happens to be a member of this committee. Another senior party leader from Karnataka and former minister, K H Muniyappa, has been given the status of a special invitee.

The new list of CWC has been released with 18 members and ten special invitees. The list comprises names of leaders like Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi, Mallikarjun Kharge, Siddaramaiah, Manmohan Singh, A K Antony, Oommen Chandy, and K C Venugopal among others.

Strategy for Lok Sabha polls – Amit Shah sets guidelines for Karnataka

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BJP national president, Amit Shah, who has set the victory target of 20 to 25 seats in Lok Sabha election for the state BJP leaders, has given a list of 23 guidelines to be followed to maximize the party’s tally in the next year’s election.

Amit Shah had set 19-point guideline in the state for the assembly election. Now he has added four more points to the list. He has issued directions to appoint MLAs, state office bearers and core committee members as in-charge for every Lok Sabha constituency in the state. The guidelines include listing out failures of Congress and JD(S) leaders in the constituencies currently represented by them, presenting before the people the chargesheet of failures of the coalition government backed by figures and statistics, holding workshops for those who manage social websites of the party to make it more effective, spreading information about manifesto of the party, programmes and projects implemented by the central government etc are some of the points contained therein.
Formation of WhatsApp groups, exchanging of information with electoral Vistaraks (extension officers), entrusting additional responsibilities to Page Pramukhs, formation of core committee with important leaders for each assembly constituency, giving more responsibility to booth level committees, compulsory organizing of Navashakti meets, arranging of stay in constituencies on two days every week and two-day tours of the constituencies for those appointed as in-charge, appointment of Shakthi Kendra Pramukhs for every booth, holding of meetings on a regular basis, preparing of list of directors of cooperative societies and self-help societies falling under each of the booths, are among the list of guidelines.

Although Shah was expected to tour the state on July 28, the same has been cancelled in view of Lok Sabha session. A meeting of all the MPs has also been organized on that date at New Delhi. Therefore, Shah’s proposed tour is expected to be deferred, sources said.

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