Clashes broke out at several places in Jammu and Kashmir on Monday after protesters pelted stones at army personnel. A student sustained pellet injuries in Anantnag town.

The youth, identified as Wamiq Aijaz was brought to a hospital for treatment. “He has sustained pellet injuries,” doctors attending to him, said.

Markets in the Anantnag town shut immediately after the clashes broke out. Public transport also stopped plying.

Similar clashes between stone pelters and security personnel also broke out at two places in Shopian and Pulwama districts on Monday.

Informed sources in the police said protesting youth pelted stones at an army vehicle in Shopian’s Pinjora village prompting the army personnel inside the vehicle to fire several shots in the air to disperse the mob.

In Murran village of Pulwama, another team of the army was attacked upon with stones by protesters, following which clashes erupted between the security forces and the demonstrators.

Arrested and released on bail for uploading a false Facebook post announcing the death of ailing Manohar Parrikar, businessman Kenneth Silveira has said he was arrested two days after he filed an RTI plea with the Goa Chief Minister’s Office seeking his health status.

The 35-year-old, arrested and released on bail last week, detailed the police action in a new social media post on Monday. Parrikar is being treated for advanced pancreatic cancer in a New York hospital.

On Monday, Silveira, who unsuccessfully contested the 2017 Panaji Legislative Assembly bypoll against Parrikar, also alleged that the Crime Branch was “instructed by the Chief Minister’s Office” to “illegally arrest him”.

“BJP government is scared of me and wanted to muzzle me, one of the few reasons for my illegal arrest,” Silveira said in his Facebook post.

“This RTI was sent by me directly to the CM office after which I was arrested on flimsy grounds. BJP government stands exposed by me… Only way to silence me is to kill me,” said the resident of Vasco port town, 35 km from here.

The application filed under the Right to Information Act, a copy of which has also been uploaded to Facebook, seeks to know among other things issues related to governance in the absence of Parrikar, expenditure incurred by the state government on the treatment of the Chief Minister, copies of his medical bills and Parrikar’s expected date of return.

Kenneth was arrested by the Crime Branch of Goa Police on April 18, a day after he put up a post on the social media site claiming Parrikar was dead. He was arrested after a complaint was filed by a Goa Bharatiya Janata Party official.

On April 20, a few dozen members of civil society staged a protest outside the state police headquarters accusing the police of trying to muzzle free speech.

A race is on within the Congress in Kerala on who will be nominated for a Rajya Sabha seat the party hopes to win in June.

The three Rajya Sabha members from the state who will retire from the Upper House include outgoing Deputy Chairperson of the Rajya Sabha and veteran Congress leader P.J. Kurien, CPI-M leader C.P. Narayanan and Kerala Congress (Mani) nominee Joy Abraham.

Given the strength of the Congress-led opposition in the Kerala Assembly, the party can win just one seat. And it is for this one seat that there is an intense tussle.

Kurien, 77, is the forerunner and is most likely to be nominated on account of his closeness to the Gandhi family.

In Kerala, although the party is divided between former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and leader of opposition Ramesh Chennithala, the two factions are united in ensuring that Kurien does not get this seat on a platter.

“Kurien has had a long innings in Delhi and is a six-time Lok Sabha winner from 1980 to 1999. Since 2005 he has been in the Rajya Sabha and has lost connect with party workers. There are several others who have not got due rewards for their work. So let him step aside and contest the 2019 Lok Sabha election,” said a senior Congress leader who did not wish to be identified.

All along in the Congress in Kerala, seats and posts have been equally shared by various factions.

Chandy wants the seat to go to close aide Benny Behanan, who in 2016 failed to get his sitting Assembly seat.

Senior leader P.C. Chacko, who lost the 2014 Lok Sabha election, is also eyeing the seat.

M.M. Hassan, the present Kerala state president, wants to enter the Upper House too as he was made the state president only as a stop-gap arrangement after V.M. Sudheeran quit last year.

The women brigade in the Congress want the seat to go to a woman. Among the contenders are Shanimol Usman, Bindu Krishna and Padmaja Venugopal.

Senior leader A.K. Antony, who is expected to have the final say in the selection process, has a soft corner towards Venugopal, daughter of the late K. Karunakaran.

(IANS)

Vice President and Rajya Sabha Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu on Monday rejected the Congress-led opposition’s notice for impeachment of Chief Justice Dipak Misra.

The decision was taken before the Supreme Court began its proceedings for the day.

While reviewing the notice, Rajya Sabha officials had mentioned that making public the contents of a notice before it is admitted by the Chair, is in violation of parliamentary rules, informed sources said.

According to the provisions in the handbook for Rajya Sabha members, no advance publicity should be given to any notice to be taken up in the House till it is admitted by the Chairman.

The Chairman in the morning held detailed consultations with the legal and constitutional experts on the impeachment notice moved by the Congress and six other opposition parties.

He had cut short his visit to Hyderabad and reached Delhi on Sunday as some of the experts he wanted to consult conveyed their availability of Sunday.

Among those consulted by the Chairman, included K.K. Venugopal and and his predecessor K. Parasaran.

He also spoke to former Lok Sabha Secretary General Subhash Kashyap, former Law Secretary P.K. Malhotra and former Legislative Secretary Sanjay Singh.

Former Secretary General of the Rajya Sabha V.K. Agnihotri was also consulted.

Apart from this, Naidu also held deliberations with senior officials of the Rajya Sabha. He also spoke to former Supreme Court judge B.S. Sudarshan Reddy.

The Congress had on Sunday appealed that the Chief Justice should himself consider recusal from judicial administrative work. It said the decision should come “voluntarily” following notice for his removal.

The impeachment notice was given by Congress and six other opposition parties on Friday for the removal of Chief Justice Misra on five grounds of “misbehaviour”.

The motion was signed by 71 parliamentarians out of which seven members had retired before the motion was submitted to Naidu.

(IANS)

Many in Kerala look down upon blue-collar jobs even though thousands of Keralites do such jobs abroad and elsewhere in India. To get rid of this perception is the primary objective of state-owned Kerala Academy for Skills Excellence (KASE), said a top official.

Blue-collar jobs primarily include electricians, plumbers, carpenters, traditional craftsmen, refrigeration and air-conditioning mechanics, those involved in wall and floor tiling, bakery and restaurant services, florists and others.

Aiming to skill the young workforce of Kerala, as also elevate their skills to global standards, KASE promotes, establishes, sets up, monitors, governs and regulates institutions and academies.

Talking to IANS, KASE Director Sriram Venkitaraman, a young doctor-turned-bureaucrat, pointed out “the day the perception towards blue-collar jobs in our state changes, Kerala will have no reason to look back”.

“If one goes to the Middle East, we can see Keralites happily working at such jobs; but that’s not the case here.

“Our aim is to see that we change this perception and for that we have already started equipping all such people with additional skills. If things go as planned, all such workers will soon be making a beeline not just to Middle East but to other parts of the world as we have a huge population of the youth seeking jobs,” said Venkitaraman.

He said they have started to tap into the industrial training institutes — 91 in the government sector and 450 in the private sector — where more than 60,000 youth who have completed school education join annually.

“We had been to Singapore, which currently is the world leader in training students in these trades.

“We will soon enter into an agreement with the Singapore government which will be our knowledge partner to turn our ITIs (Industrial Training Institutes) into state-of-the-art institutes. For this, the state government has worked out a budget of Rs 800 crore, of which, in the first phase, Rs 228 crore would be allocated,” he said.

Venkitaraman, who has travelled all over the world, pointed out that in the West, blue-collars workers are respected and this attitude is what he plans to bring to India.

As part of its strategy, KASE has, in the past few months, been conducting zonal and district-level competitions aimed at identifying and training the youth to participate and win medals at the World Skills Competition that is scheduled to be held in the city of Kazan in south-western Russian in 2019.

“We ran a competition where we had just one condition — that all participants should be younger than 21. A total of 7,500 participants competed to showcase their vocational skills in 20 trades — 120 of whom have been selected for the state finals to be held at Kochi over three days from April 28.

“Of these, 40 will be selected to represent their state at the national level after which the final selection for Russia would be made,” said Venkitaraman.

He said taking part in the state-level finals are electricians, plumbers, carpenters and traditional craftsmen, and the three-day event will be a held on a “massive scale” and will also be open to the public.

“Basically, we want to showcase this event as we feel this could be one way to change the perception that prevails here,” he said.

BJP winning streak to continue in Karnataka – Prakash Javadekar

Union Minister for HRD, Sri Prakash Javadekar has said Bharatiya Janata Party
is all set to win State Assembly elections with absolute majority.
Addressing a Media Conference here today he said Congress lost power in 12 states and BJP won 11 of
them. The people of India were against Congress because of its corruption, divisive and sectarian politics. In
Karnataka too, BJP’s winning streak would continue as there had been anti-incumbency wave against
Congress regime.
Referring to Congress election in-charge, Sri K. C. Venugopal’s statement that the party would retain
power with 130 seats, Sri. Javadekar said the Congress would not even cross 50-seat mark. The Congress
leader were free to have daydreaming, he quipped.
He said Chief Minister, Sri Siddaramaiah himself was not sure of his victory in his home constituency and
he was trying to find a safe seat. Senior Congress leaders including Sri. Ambarish, were hesitant to contest on
party ticket.
Prime Minister, Sri Naredra Modi had proved that he was messiah of developments. Also, Sri
Yeddyurappa had a track record of development. So this time, the Union Minister said, it would
be “Vikasada Haadi – Yedyurappa Modi” slogan (Modi and Yedyurappa to take Karnataka on developmental
path).
Sri. Javadekar said the increasing number of suicides by farmers in Karnataka reflected the Congress
regime in poor light. Compared to Karnataka, the BJP ruled states reported minimum number of farmers
suicide. The BJP led NDA Government had come to the rescue of farmers by launching “Fasal Bhima”
scheme. However, the Congress regime failed to take the benefits of the scheme to farming community in
Karnataka.
The Union Minister said the law and order situation had been in its lowest web in Karnataka. The
common people were living in fear as the criminals had free run. The Congress regime had been punishing
the law-abiding officials, and even few of them resorted to an extreme step of ending their lives. Why no one
was arrested so far though many of Hindu activists were assassinated? The anti-national elements had
homely feeling whenever and wherever Congress was in power.
He said more than 70 corruption cases had been pending with Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) but there
had been attempts to hush up them. The price of a truck load of sand was Rs. 17,000 when Sri Yeddyurappa
was in power but the price had now been increased to Rs. 70,000. It showed the Congress regime was hand
in glove with Sand Mafia he charged.
–

Lokayukta to have free hand; Illegal slaughtering to be stopped
Bharatiya Janata Party chief ministerial candidate, Sri. B. S. Yeddyurappa has
vowed to rebuild Brand Bengulru Image through holistic planning and corruption free transparent
administration.

As part of BJP’s “New Bengaluru for New India” initiative here today Sri Yeddyurappa interacted with
people from different walks of life, and elicited their opinions on diverse topics like how to save lakes and
improve living condition in Bengaluru.

He said there was no dearth of fund but clean hands. Due to lack of commitment, vision and planning
and increased corruption, the present Congress regime had taken the IT city of Bengaluru backward. Once
the Bengaluru city was known as Garden City but now it had become a Garbage City.
He said the City of Bengaluru needed more attention as it contribute around 60 percent of State
revenue. Lack of infrastructures, traffic congestion, shrinking and polluting lakes, increasing population and
crimes etc had put pressure on city. It needed a holistic planning and political commitment to
development. More and more satellite towns should be developed to decongest Bengaluru. The new
government would do everything to create a congenial atmosphere for the growth of IT industry. Metro
projects would be speeded up with cooperation of Union Government.

Referring to poor law & order situation in Bengaluru he said the criminal elements had emboldened
under Congress regime. If the party was voted to power his government would restore the law and order
situation by posting upright officials in key positions.
On the increasing corruption cases Sri Yeddyurappa said the Congress government weakened the
Lokayukta and set up Anti-Corruption Bureau under the control of Chief Minister. It was done to hush up
their corruption cases he said and added within two months of assuming power the BJP regime would
restore the power of Lokayukta and would be given free hand.
The Chief Minister Sri. Siddaramaiah should explain – who gave a 70-lakh rupees wrist-watch to him
and why they gave him. However influential one might be but no one would be spared. All the cases of
corruptions would be taken to logical end, he asserted.

He said all the illegal slaughter houses would be closed. Farmers would be dissuaded from selling their
livestock by giving them financial incentives.
Entrepreneurs Sri. Suhas and Smt. Nina Das; noted writer, Sri. Sandeep Balakrishna; legal luminary,
Smt. Jyothi Bhat; bloggers, Sreeharsha Perla and Sri Raviraj and columnist, Sri. Chiru Bhat raised diverse
topics. State BJP spokesperson Smt. Malavika Avinash anchored.

Central ordinance is a historic step – Prakash Javadekar
Union HRD Minister and State BJP election in-charge
Sri Prakash Javadekar has termed the Central ordinance allowing courts to award
death penalty to those convicted of raping children up to 12 years of age, as
“historic step”.
Addressing a Press conference here today he said citizens were expecting some
stringent step from the Government. The revolutionary ordinance would go long
way in preventing heinous crimes from occurring. Prime Minister Sri. Narendra
Modi deserved to be commended for initiating such a deterrent law.
He denied the Union Government was forced to initiate such a measure to save
itself from the onslaught of the Opposition over recent child rape cases in JammuKashmir
and Uttar Pradesh. Bringing new law or amending the existing ones were
natural process in the democracy. There was no political consideration behind it,
he added.
Welcoming the ordinance, the General Secretary of State BJP Mahila Morcha,
Kum. Manjula said the Prime Minister Sri Narendra Modi led NDA Government had
sent a clear message that no one could go scot-free by committing crime. The
Government would not compromise on the safety of women and minors.
Kum. Manjula, who is a former Chairperson of Karnataka State Women
Commission, said the Prime Minister had shown his commitment for gender justice
by inducting 7 women in his Cabinet and assigning them important portfolios like
Defence and External Affairs. He had taken several daring decisions to bring in
reforms in administration and economy in the past. The latest step was truly
praiseworthy and she was thanking PM on behalf of women and children of the
State.
–