The war of words between chief minister Siddaramaiah and BJP state president B S Yeddyurappa is getting intense on the social media day by day in poll-bound Karnataka.

On Thursday April 12, B S Yeddyurappa criticized Congress government led by the BJP and tweeted, “The Congress govt in Karnataka has failed miserably on all fronts. 10 Percent CM Siddaramaiah has nothing to go to the voters except his misrule and misgovernance. The state is in dire need of a govt which can fulfill the aspirations of 6.5 Cr Kannadigas.”

Siddaramaiah was quick to reply to the BJP chief reminding him of corruption charges against him when he was the chief minister. He tweeted, “Big words from the man who turned Karnataka into the most corrupt state, Bengaluru into garbage city & ordered goli bar on farmers. Other than baseless allegations what do you have to offer the 6.5Cr Kannadigas?

The Election Commission on Friday announced that it will grant an oral hearing to the 20 Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLAs in the office of profit case on May 17.

The Commission, in a letter on Friday, has invited the 20 legislators who were earlier disqualified in the office of profit case as well as petitioner Prashant Patel to appear before the Commission “either in person or through authorised legal representative” at 3 p.m. on this date.

The hearing would be conducted in presence of Chief Election Commissioner O.P. Rawat and Election Commissioners Sunil Arora and Ashok Lavasa.

The EC’s decision came after the Delhi High Court on March 23 set aside the disqualification of the 20 AAP MLAs on the grounds that no oral hearing was given to the MLAs before disqualifying them as legislators of the Delhi Assembly and hence there was violation of natural justice.

Quashing the Central government’s notification disqualifying the AAP MLAs, the High Court had directed the Election Commission to hear the matter afresh.

A bench of Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Chander Shekhar had observed that the Election Commission’s recommendation against the legislators was “bad in law” and “vitiated”.

3 Three Indian inventors have been named the regional grand prize winners of the 2018 ASME Innovation Showcase (ISHOW), a global competition that offers monetary and technical support to help bring design prototypes of social entrepreneurs to populations in need.

The three inventors were judged and selected out of the eight finalists who travelled to Bengaluru to vie for a share of the $500,000 in awards and technical support, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) said in a statement on Friday.

The three winners are Sanskriti Dawle of Thinkerbell Labs in Bengaluru, Balaji Teegala of Brun Health in New Delhi, and Vinayak Nandalike of Yostra Labs in Bengaluru.

ThinkerBell Labs has won the award for Annie, an affordable audio-tactile device that makes self-learning and classroom teaching of Braille possible.

The device can help improve literacy rates among the visually impaired who cannot afford a Braille display that can cost up to $4,000.

Annie runs on a Raspberry Pi and consists of hardware components such as a refreshable braille display, a digital braille slate, and a braille keyboard — all in one device.

This combination thus helps students learn how to read, write and type, with all modules complementing one another.

Brun Health has been recognised for its labour detection tool, Brun CG, which has the potential to reduce neonatal mortality rates in India. The tool helps in monitoring vital signs and communicating foetal data with clinicians for timely interventions in distant, hard-to-access locations.

Yostra Labs created Sparsh, a portable, hand-held medical device to help clinicians screen diabetic patients for symptoms of peripheral neuropathy, the permanent damage to nerves in the feet, owing to diabetes.

India has approximately 69 million diabetic patients, of which 30 per cent develop diabetic peripheral neuropathy.

The poor are significantly at risk because of inadequate management of their condition, while conventional diabetic peripheral neuropathy screening devices are bulky, not portable, expensive and need trained healthcare workers to operate the device.

Sparsh addresses these issues and can help the poor get adequate treatment for the condition.

Union minister Smriti Irani on Friday urged the opposition parties not to politicise the Kathua rape and murder case that has triggered communal tension in Jammu and Kashmir.

“Law agencies and government are taking necessary action. As a woman, I believe and request there should be no victim shaming: ANI quoted Smriti Irani as saying
the growing incidents of crime against women. Rahul, who was joined by several senior Congress leaders, took to Twitter to invite people to join the vigil. Gandhi earlier said the “unimaginable brutality” cannot go unpunished, and called the violence against the child a crime against humanity. He was referring to Kathua gangrape in which an 8-year-old girl was raped and killed. The Kathua rape and murder was a gruesome act in which an 8 year lost her life. The Jammu police have filed its charge sheet in the case and details the most horrific crime one has seen in recent times. Following the charge sheet, protests had broken out in which some sought to defend the accused persons. The Jammu police say that the primary intention of the murder was to frighten the Bakarwal community to which the girl belongs. The intention was to dislodge the nomadic tribe, the police said. Meanwhile, An FIR has been registered against rape accused BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Senger on Thursday at the Makhi police station in Unnao. The case was registered under several sections of the Indian Penal Code (including Section 376 for rape) and POCSO Act. The four-time lawmaker and his brothers allegedly gang-raped the girl in Unnao – who later attempted suicide outside Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath’s residence in Lucknow on Sunday.

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Friday vowed to act against the detained BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar in connection with the alleged gang-rape of a 17-year-old girl in Unnao district.
Yogi said, “Investigation has been handed over to the CBI. I believe the CBI would have arrested the MLA also. Our government will not compromise on this, no matter how influential the accused is, he will not be spared.”

Earlier in the day, The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday detained BJP legislator Kuldeep Singh Sengar who has been accused with the alleged gang rape of a 17-year-old girl in Uttar Pradesh, an official said. Sengar, an MLA from Bangarmau seat in Unnao district, is being questioned at the CBI headquarters here. The horrific crimes in Kathua and Unnao have led to massive outrage across the country with protests being organised in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Uttar Pradesh and other places. The four-time lawmaker and his brothers allegedly gang-raped the girl in Unnao – who attempted suicide outside Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath’s residence in Lucknow on Sunday – and are also accused in the custodial death of the victim’s father. Her father was held by the UP police later that day. Pappu Singh, aged around 50, was allegedly roughed up by Senger’s brother Atul Singh and his aides following which he died.

With each passing day, the upcoming Karnataka Assembly election 2018 is becoming nastier. While the incumbent Congress is trying its best to grab power once again in the southern state, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is attempting to ouster the ruling party to find itself one step closer to Congress-mukt Bharat. Thus both the political opponents are engaged in allegations and counter-allegations to thwart each other’s efforts to grab power in Karnataka. The latest allegation, courtesy the BJP, that Congress chief minister Siddaramaiah has to face is that he is like now-dead al-Qaeda founder terrorist, Osama bin Laden.

The Karnataka CM has been compared with the dreaded terrorist behind the 9/11 attacks in the United States (US) after he said that the Congress would defeat the likes of Union minister Anant Kumar Hegde who professes the idea of changing the Constitution.
“The issues before the #KarnatakaElection2018 are Constitutional democracy & its survival, development with social justice & fulfilling the aspirations of our youth. We will defeat Anant Kumar Hegde & his likes who have declared that BJP is in power to change the #Constitution,” tweeted Siddaramaiah.
In reply to the Karnataka CM’s tweet, the BJP ended up calling him Laden. “CM Sir, come on! Congress speaking of protecting Constitution is akin to Osama Bin Laden speaking for world peace! You may keep chanting about need to protect Constitution, but people won’t forget the history of utter disregard shown to constitutional values by Congress,” tweeted the BJP.
This is not the first time that the BJP has used derogatory words against the incumbent CM. Earlier the saffron party had called Siddaramaiah pro-Jihadi. “Our karyakartas get constant phone calls from their families asking them about their safety. Hindus have understood that this govt will not protect them. Fear of annihilation grips every Hindu household in Karavali. Pro jihadi Siddu must go. We must create #JihadiMuktaKarnataka,” the BJP tweeted. In March, the Election Commission (EC) announced the date for the polls in Karnataka. While the voting will take place on May 12, the counting of votes will be held on May 15. The state Assembly has 224 seats.

When the most eloquent man in the nation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, known for his oratory skills, goes silent on two of the most horrendous rape cases the nation has witnessed in the recent times, it speaks volumes about the total collapse of administration in the country. While the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ministers in Jammu and Kashmir openly supported the accused in the Kathua rape case, in Uttar Pradesh’s Unnao incident, the alleged perpetrator of the crime is n


In spite of the direct involvement of BJP and right-wing men in both the cases where human bestiality will put even animals to shame, Modi on Thursday was seen in the high-profile defence expo in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Modi spoke on various issues in the southern city, but he remained mum on the rape cases when protesters on roads and social media soldiers demanded answers from him.
The unfortunate unfolding of both the rape cases–one, where an 8-year-old girl in Jammu’s Kathua was kidnapped, drugged, gang-raped and killed to instill fear in people belonging to the nomadic Bakerwal Muslim community by eight men in January, and the second, in Unnao, Uttar Pradesh, where a 16-year-old girl was raped last year by the BJP MLA but the authorities failed to give her justice till date–can’t be brushed under the carpet. The agony of the teenager in Uttar Pradesh has been further aggravated, after the girl’s father died in the police custody because of the brutal physical assault on him by the accused MLA’s brother. Both the crimes showcase how rape is used as a tool to silence people belonging to the minority community (in the Kathua incident) and how powerful people like Sengar (in Unnao case) can move scot-free even after an FIR was registered against him.

The two shameful cases will surely be remembered in the future where power and politics joined hands to kill the justice system which is otherwise accountable to women/girls. It is a well-known fact that the PM remains silent on all unpleasant episodes that have hit the country in the last four years of the BJP government. Modi spoke only to woo young voters before their board exams, but he remained stoically silent when CBSE question papers were leaked threatening to damage the career of lakhs of children.
Similarly, Modi spoke on the birth anniversaries of Dalit icons but remained quiet when Dalits were killed during the nationwide protests to oppose the alleged dilution of the SC/ST act recently. Again, Modi always ‘stands tall’ to talk about his pet project, Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao (Save the girl child, educate the girl child) during public events. Now, when the nation is asking him to at least condemn the heinous crimes against the minors, the PM seems to be too detached from the ground reality. The PM’s silence is not his lack of awareness about the happenings in the nation. Like all, Modi knows the direct involvement of his own party colleagues and their continuous attempts to subvert the justice system in both the cases. By turning his back on crimes against women/girls, Modi in a way gives an impression about his government’s tactical support to the accused. Like Modi, till yesterday,
most of his cabinet ministers and opposition leaders were silent over the rape cases. Till now, not a single BJP woman minister in the Modi cabinet has spoken about the horrific crimes against the humanity. Perhaps, for them saving their ministerial berths by avoiding any sort of confrontation with their party is more important than speaking on behalf of the country’s women. It is only Union minister VK Singh who condemned the rape and killing of Kathua girl Asifa on Thursday. Congress president Rahul Gandhi was also silent before he was nudged on social media to break his maun vrat (vow of silence) too. On Thursday,
Rahul tweeted and lead a midnight candlelight march to protest crimes against women in the national capital. Next time when Modi will speak during a well-organised PR event on women, India’s betis won’t be able to bear his words, as the chowkidar has not only failed to ensure their safety but betrayed them when they needed him the most. On Friday too, a shell-shocked nation is talking about Kathua and Unnao rape cases. Here we bring you some tweets expressing outrage over the denial of justice to two minors:

The Congress high command on Thursday shot down the proposal of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president G Parameshwar to contest from two seats in the May 12 Assembly elections.

With growing clamour among many leaders to contest from two segments, the party has decided to reject all proposals and will give an opportunity to other leaders to contest the elections, top sources in the Congress leaderhsip told Deccan Herald.

“It is up to Siddaramaiah to choose between Chamundeshwari in Mysuru district or Badami in Bagalkot district from where he wanted to contest. Though the chief minister earlier showed an inclination towards Chamundeshwari, the party asked him to finalise his choice by Friday morning before the scheduled Central Election Committee meeting.

Apprehending that the chief minister may face a strong fight at Chamundeshwari, where a sizable number of voters belong to the Vokkaliga and Lingayat communities, the party top brass advised him to opt for a safe seat like Badami in Bagalkot district as the constituency has a large number of Kuruba community voters, the caste to which Siddaramaiah belongs.

However, apart from Badami, Siddaramaiah planned to contest from Chamundeshwari too as it is close to Varuna segment from where his doctor son Yathindra is trying for a ticket. The chief minister believes that contesting from Chamundeshwari would also help his son, a political greenhorn, to win the elections.

However, Parameshwar agreed to contest only from Koratagere from where he lost in the 2013 Assembly elections and decided to drop his plan to file his nomination from Pulakeshinagar, in Bengaluru. The party will decide whether to field JD(S) rebel and sitting MLA Akhanda Srinivasmurthy or former Congress MLA Prasanna Kumar from Pulakeshinagar, sources said.

“If we allow Siddaramaiah to contest from two seats, we will have to oblige Parameshwara too. If we allow both these leaders, others will also start making similar demands. Besides, allowing top leaders to contest from two seats will give ammunition to political opponents to attack the ruling party saying that their leaders are on the backfoot in the elections,” sources added.

The chief minister, who arrived from Bengaluru at Delhi in the evening, held a meeting with the party screening committee headed by Madhusudhan Mistry. The party’s leader in the Lok Sabha Mallikarjuna Kharge was also present at the meeting.