Maharashtra Election News

We lost because of lack of leadership and diluted ideology
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

Congratulations to the Congress Party for its emphatic victory. Victory has many fathers and defeat is an orphan. Let us try to see how this loss for the BJP came about. The Karnataka 2023 election throws up interesting issues and challenges for the BJP. It is now apt and important to introspect.After a fractured mandate in 2018 (with the BJP as the single-largest party with 104 seats with 36.35 per cent of total votes, 77 for Congress with 38.14 per cent of total votes, 37 for JDS with 18.3 per cent of total votes, one each for BSP and KPJP and one independent), BJP could topple the coalition of Congress and JDS to form the government in 2019, by inducting MLAs from the other parties. That was by far the greatest achievement of the BJP in Karnataka in the last four years. The rest is now history.If we have to narrow down the causes for the abysmal performance of the BJP in this election, four stand out.The first is lacklustre governance. Despite the discounting factors of Covid and economic constraints, the incumbent BJP government had nothing great to showcase in terms of development, infrastructure or welfare. Fourteen ministers of the government lost the election. It says something. The last-minute tweaking of reservation also did not help.The second is the muck of corruption. Every successive government seems to take corruption to new levels. The trend was not reversed by the BJP government. The disputable allegation of “40 per cent commission” stuck very strongly and the Madal Virupakshappa episode added to it. The experiences of the common people in dealing with government offices reinforced the feeling of dismay.The third is the lack of decisive leadership. Basavaraj Bommai, B S Yediyurappa’s protégé, was not able to capture the imagination of either the electorate of the state or the karyakartas of the party. No one found in him a strong leader and he was always regarded as a compromise candidate. As has been the experience of the BJP elsewhere as well, the lack of strong CM candidates has proven very costly.Fourth, there was no ideology. BJP earlier prided itself on being the “party with a difference”. It stood out for its ideology of nationalism, idealism and fresh thinking. The induction of diverse and oftentimes persons having strong ideological opposition into the party, diluted the ideological commitment. And more than this, it brought down the morale of the karyakartas. Additionally, ideology, which has been a strong factor for the BJP, did not play any part in this election.Congress saw blood in the water and it was quick to grab the opportunity. The “carrot and stick” approach paid rich dividends. On the one hand, it promised freebies for all sections, and on the other, it systematically and consistently developed the narrative that the incumbent BJP government was corrupt (although Congress itself does not have a great track record on corruption).Despite all this, the committed BJP karyakartas toiled hard. Prime Minister Narendra Modi did his part. He undertook long and arduous road shows and made speeches in the scorching summer. The cadres were once again enthused and the party pulled up its socks and worked really hard in the slog overs.The BJP has to face and answer the following challenges: How can it increase its vote share and go beyond 35 per cent? How can it bring about new leadership in the state? How can the dependency on PM Modi be reduced? How can corruption be weeded out when it’s in government? How can the party be more careful in the selection of candidates? How can a sense of purpose be re-infused in the karyakartas? How can the BJP once again capture the imagination of the masses? And finally, how can the party keep from becoming complacent?The answers to these questions can be found with greater introspection, connecting with the public and consulting experienced and well-meaning karyakartas.The writer is Karnataka BJP spokesperson

We lost because of lack of leadership and diluted ideology
Mayawati accuses BJP of misusing govt machinery in UP mayoral polls
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

A day after results of the urban local body polls in Uttar Pradesh were announced, Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati Sunday accused the ruling BJP of misusing government machinery, and said her party will not sit silently over it.The BJP on Saturday swept the mayoral elections, winning the posts in all the 17 municipal corporations in Varanasi, Lucknow, Ayodhya, Jhansi, Bareilly, Mathura-Vrindavan, Moradabad, Saharanpur, Prayagraj, Aligarh, Shahjahanpur, Ghaziabad, Agra, Kanpur, Gorakhpur, Firozabad and Meerut.In a series of tweets in Hindi on Sunday, Mayawati said, “The BSP is not going to sit silently over the BJP’s misuse of government machinery.” She also accused the ruling party of using any means (‘saam’, ‘daam’, ‘dand’, ‘bhed’) at its disposal, and said, “When the time comes, the BJP will definitely face the consequences.”2. साथ ही, तमाम विपरीत हालात का सामना करते हुए बीएसपी पर भरोसा करके पार्टी उम्मीदवारों को वोट करने के लिए लोगों का तहेदिल से आभार व शुक्रिया। अगर यह चुनाव भी फ्री एण्ड फेयर होता तो नतीजों की तस्वीर कुछ और होती। बैलेट पेपर से चुनाव होने पर बीएसपी मेयर चुनाव भी ज़रूर जीतती।— Mayawati (@Mayawati) May 14, 2023Thanking people for extending support to her party, the BSP chief said, “Gratitude and thanks to the people for reposing faith in the BSP and voting for its candidates despite facing a host of adverse circumstances. Had this election been free and fair, the results would have been something else. If the mayoral elections were conducted using ballot papers, the BSP would had won.”The BSP had fielded mayor candidates on all the 17 seats in the state but none could register a win.“Whether it’s the BJP or the SP, both parties are equally adept at winning elections through misuse of power. This is why the ruling party often manages to secure more seats through manipulation, and this election was no different. It is a matter of great concern,” Mayawati added.

Mayawati accuses BJP of misusing govt machinery in UP mayoral polls
Kerala boat disaster: Rumblings in IUML grow as it fights shy of targeting Vijayan govt on turf
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

The soft approach of the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), a key constituent of the Opposition Congress-led UDF, towards the ruling CPI(M)-led LDF seems to have again come to the fore in the wake of the May 7 boat capsize at Tanur in Malappuram, in which 22 passengers, including several children, were killed.Amid allegations of violation of safety norms that led to the boat disaster, the Pinarayi Vijayan government announced a judicial probe into the incident.While the Congress has alleged that the tragedy was a “state-sponsored crime”, the IUML has been maintaining a silence over the incident, despite the point that it happened in the Muslim-dominated Malappuram district, which is known to be the party’s stronghold.Although there have been various reports indicating that the boat capsize occurred allegedly due to violations of various safety regulations and norms, the IUML has shied away from hitting out at the Vijayan government over the loss of lives in the disaster that convulsed the party’s turf.In the 2016 Assembly election, the IUML had lost from the Tanur constituency, which marked its first defeat in the seat since 1957. A former Congress leader and businessman V Abdurahiman had then won from the seat while contesting as a CPI(M)-backed Independent candidate. Abdurahiman retained the seat in the 2021 election, going on to become the minister for fisheries and harbour engineering in the Vijayan government.Two days after the boat tragedy, senior Congress leader and Leader of the Opposition (LoP), V D Satheesan, alleged that the boat had been operating its illegal service with the support of minister Abdurahiman.“It is a state sponsored tragedy. People had complained to Abdurahiman about the illegal and dangerous service, the minister had reacted in a coarse manner. The boat owner had got every support from the ruling parties for the illegal service,” the LoP charged.The BJP has also slammed the government over the row, with state party president K Surendran charging that minister Abdurahiman and tourism minister Mohammed Riyas were aware of the “illegal boat service”. “The boat operator enjoyed political patronage. That is why the officials did not act against the service. These people are responsible for the tragedy. The issue cannot be solved with Chief Minister Vijayan conducting discussion with IUML leaders. Vijayan is trying to settle the issue after meeting with IUML leaders,” he said.A day after the disaster, Vijayan had rushed to Tanur to pay his respects to the deceased passengers. Almost all senior IUML leaders, led by state party president Sayyid Sadiq Ali Shihab Thangal, were present there. After holding a review meeting, when Vijayan announced the judicial probe into the disaster, he was flanked by Thangal, with several cabinet ministers standing behind them.A section of the IUML cadre has been upset that the party leadership did not take on the LDF government for its alleged failure to “ensure safety of boat passengers or corruption behind the tourism venture”. In a bid to address their concerns, Thangal wrote in the party daily “Chandrika” on Thursday: “Politics is not above humanism. The party does not want to make political capital out of this tragedy. The government has announced a judicial probe. Let us wait for justice.”However, reflecting the simmering resentment within the party ranks against the IUML leadership’s stand on the issue, the party’s youth wing, Youth League, on Friday took out a march to the office of minister Abdurahiman at Tanur. The march, led by Youth League state secretary P K Firoz, demanded a probe into the alleged deal between the boat operator and the minister.Despite being the second major constituent of the UDF, the IUML has steered clear of various campaigns against the Vijayan government in recent months, leaving the Congress to go after the Left dispensation on its own steam.

Kerala boat disaster: Rumblings in IUML grow as it fights shy of targeting Vijayan govt on turf
How Congress's '40 per cent' cut charge cost BJP 40 per cent seats in KarnatakaPremium Story
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

On April 12, 2022, Santosh Patil, a 40-year-old contractor who had accused senior BJP leader and Rural Development and Panchayati Raj minister K S Eshwarappa of harassing him for a 40 per cent commission, was found dead in a hotel in Udupi.The BJP tried its best to stem the damage — easing out Eshwarappa from the Bommai Cabinet and, more recently, denying him a ticket to the Assembly elections.Yet, agonisingly for the BJP, what stuck was the “40 per cent” tag and the image of a party that winked at corruption, a burden that the BJP bore during the poll campaign and is said to have cost the party the election.In the Assembly election results announced on Saturday, the party finished with 65 seats in the 224-member House, down 40 per cent from the 104 seats that it won in the 2018 polls.In the run-up to the elections, the Congress was quick to latch on to the ’40 per cent commission’ tag, using corruption as its key poll plank and taking on the BJP government that was already battling anti-incumbency and a regime change at the top. The party rode on the election slogan: “40% Sarkara, BJP means Brashtachara”.Working on an idea proposed by Sasikanth Senthil, a former IAS officer who joined the Congress, the party’s planning and strategy team led by poll strategist Sunil Kanugolu launched a series of publicity campaigns targeting the government on corruption. The most innovative of these was the ‘Pay CM’ campaign — posters with a QR code and photograph of Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai titled ‘PayCM’ sprung up across Bengaluru. The posters had followed Bommai even to Hyderabad, with banners reportedly saying, “Welcome to 40 per cent commission CM”.Despite multiple FIRs being filed against unknown persons for putting up the posters, the Congress continued its Pay CM campaign.What aided the Congress campaign was a series of press meets held by Karnataka State Contractors’ Association (KSCA) president D Kempanna, accusing the government of corruption and saying its ministers were demanding commission to clear files. A few months before contractor Santosh Patil’s death, KSCA had shot off a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi alleging corruption in the government.BJP minister Muniratna (he defeated his Congress rival Kusuma H from RR Nagar) filed a defamation case against Kempanna, but by then, the Congress campaign had picked up.Corruption, along with price rise, was a consistent grouse against the BJP government and a major talking point in almost all the seats that The Indian Express’s team of reporters covered during the campaign.State Congress chief D K Shivakumar and Leader of Opposition Siddaramaiah also launched advertisements with “rate cards” detailing the commission allegedly sought by government functionaries in various sectors. It charged that the going rates for bribes for Covid-19 supplies were 75%, PWD contracts 40%, mutt grants 40%, and egg supplies 30%. The ads earned the Congress a notice from the Election Commission.While the Congress’s digital and print campaigns relentlessly targeted the BJP on corruption for nearly a year, the ruling party mostly attempted to duck the charges.Congress state general secretary B S Shivanna asserts that the party’s “40 per cent commission” campaign was one of the major factors that led to the BJP’s defeat. “People were fed up with the BJP government’s corruption. The Congress took it to the people and we managed to convince them. The campaign really helped to counter the BJP.”BJP spokesperson M G Mahesh disagreed. “From what I understand, people have elected a government which is ready to distribute freebies. The JDS’s 6 per cent votes swung towards the Congress, reducing our chances. In at least 15 segments we lost with less than 1,500 votes. Also, our move to increase SC/ST reservation did not pay dividends in areas like Kalyana Karnataka and central Karnataka.”D Kempanna, president of the contractors’ association which took on the government over corruption, said he was happy with the results but would now watch the Congress government. “The ruling BJP government was corrupt and harassed the contractors in every possible way for money. We will not sit quietly if the Congress indulges in the same. But I am happy with the results.”Speaking to The Indian Express, Prashanth Patil, elder brother of contractor Santosh Patil — whose death brought alleged corruption in the government to the centrestage — said the family was still “awaiting justice”.“My brother had written a letter to the Prime Minister alleging 40 per cent commission and then he followed it up as well. But the government ignored his pleas and left him in deep debt. Hope the new government orders a fair investigation into the case,” he said.Patil, who identified himself as the national secretary of right-wing group Hindu Vahini, had written to the Central government alleging that Eshwarappa and his associates were harassing him for commissions. Eshwarappa claimed that he did not know Patil.

How Congress's '40 per cent' cut charge cost BJP 40 per cent seats in KarnatakaPremium Story
Supremacy or Democracy?
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

On Saturday, May 12, Aishwarya Thatikonda, an Indian citizen, 27, died in Allen, Texas, United States. She was visiting a mall with a friend, a usual weekend pastime. She was killed, reportedly, by Mauricio Garcia, a former security guard. Seven other persons were also killed. The killer did not know any of the eight victims and he had no motive against any of them.Scouring the social media pages of Garcia, it was found that he was a white supremacist. The colour of the skin, white, he apparently believed, made the race superior to people of colour — black, brown, yellow or mixed — and therefore a cause to hate them. There is no scientific, evolutionary, biological, anatomical, empirical or rational explanation to support the theory that white people are superior to people of any other colour in any field. The world’s best athletes are black. The world’s largest bank belongs to the Chinese. The world’s largest oil company belongs to the Arabs. Indians are the largest producers of cotton, milk and films.White supremacy is not a new phenomenon. The Nazis considered white Germans a superior ‘master race’ and they looked upon people of other races — black, Slavs, Roma, Jews and other ethnic groups — as inferior. Fascists believed in ultra-nationalism but in course of time, absorbed racist ideas and became antisemitic. The Nazis and the Fascists were comprehensively defeated in World War II by an alliance of forces belonging to many races.White supremacy is not the only supremacist theory around. There is religious supremacy, casteist supremacy, linguistic supremacy and so on. India is home to every kind and sub-kind of supremacist theory. Caste and sub-caste hierarchies and casteist supremacists have prevailed for centuries until reformists such as Basaveswara, Jyotiba Phule, Narayana Guru, E.V.R. ‘Periyar’ Ramaswami, Babasaheb Ambedkar and others campaigned relentlessly against caste.  Yet the scourge of caste grips India.Religious supremacy has got a new lease of life thanks to the believers in Sanatana Dharma, the RSS, the BJP and the many Hindutva organizations. However, until the advent of the Narendra Modi government, the Indian State remained, by and large, secular. Jawaharlal Nehru, born in a patrician Brahmin family and who became India’s first prime minister, preached and resolutely upheld secularism. B R Ambedkar, born in a Dalit family, crafted a Constitution that declared India will be a secular state.The Constitution protected the minorities and their rights against a possible dominance or exclusion by the Hindus who were — and are — an overwhelming majority. Save a few aberrations, the State and religious institutions were separate for over 60 years. The Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis, Jews and non-believers, although they suffered discrimination in social life, felt safe against the power of the State. The State did not practice discrimination against religious minorities. In cases of discrimination, the judges struck down the State’s action and upheld secularism.  Most Hindus respected religious diversity. Political parties played by the rules.All those seem to be things of the past. Secularism has become a discredited word. Many political parties seem to vying with each other to identify themselves with one religion or another, even as their leaders profess secularism. The rapid descent into religion-based politics was witnessed in the just-concluded elections in Karnataka. A reference to the Bajrang Dal, a strong-arm political outfit that indulges in hate speech and often violence, was twisted as a reference to Bajrang Bali (devotees of Lord Hanuman).The BJP desperately tried to convert the political contest into a contest between the worshippers of Lord Hanuman and others. None other than the Hon’ble Prime Minister began and ended his election speeches with the slogan ‘Jai Bajrang Bali’. BJP’s campaign took a dangerous turn when it appealed to voters to chant ‘Jai Bajrang Bali’ before they cast their votes.This was an egregious violation of the election laws and a supine Election Commission did absolutely nothing about it.Karnataka’s population has 12.92 per cent Muslims and 1.87 per cent Christians (Census 2011). Snubbing them, the BJP did not field a Muslim or Christian candidate in any of the 224 constituencies. BJP’s leaders openly said “we do not want the votes of Muslims”. The unstated theme of its campaign was ‘Hate non-Hindu, vote Hindu’.Mr Satyapal Pal Singh Baghel, a minister in the Union government, captured the unarticulated views of BJP cadres when he said, “Tolerant Muslims can be counted on fingers…..Even that is a tactic. People keep talking about the Constitution’s basic structure and how it cannot be tinkered with. The basic structure of this nation is that of Akhand Bharat Hindu Rashtra before 1192.” And he is the country’s minister for law and justice!As far as I know, not once has the leadership of the BJP condemned the lynching of Muslims, the vandalizing of Christian churches, the threats to young couples or the violence unleashed by vigilante groups.  Religious supremacists are on the rampage. Karnataka’s voters have the first opportunity to stop the dangerous slide into tribalism and save democracy from religious supremacists.When you read this column on Sunday, you will get a clue to what the future holds.

Supremacy or Democracy?
Karnataka sends a clear messagePremium Story
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

Well done, Karnataka. I say this not because I have suddenly become a fan of the Congress Party. Or the Dynasty. I say it because there was an ugliness to the campaign that the BJP ran that needs to be called out and put on record. They deserved to lose. For me personally the most offensive thing was not the religiosity and the hysterical Hindutva. This has become the leitmotif of every BJP election campaign, so there is no point in whining on about the dangers and hatred this sort of campaigning unleashes. It is something we have all learned to accept. For me it was the deliberate attempt to link the Bajrang Dal to Bajrang Bali that was both dishonest and disgusting.In this column last week, I pointed out that the Congress Party’s manifesto was stupid to put the Bajrang Dal in the same bracket as the jihadi Popular Front of India (PFI). This meant only that the bracketing was invalid because the Bajrang Dal is not an international terrorist organization in the way that the PFI is. But the Bajrang Dal is filled with criminals who have been convicted of rape, murder, and hatemongering. So, for senior BJP leaders to link this outfit to one of the most beloved and revered Hindu gods was wrong and I am happy that the attempt misfired. The deliberate targeting of Muslims by endless references to hijab, halal and Tipu Sultan was also a mistake and that misfired as well.There is another message for the BJP from Karnataka. In a state election when you make the Prime Minister your main campaigner and send him off on endless roadshows in convoys of SUVs decked with marigold petals you take a serious risk. If the Prime Minister is the main candidate, then he will be personally blamed when defeat comes instead of victory. Early in the campaign I began to believe that the BJP was likely to lose Karnataka and I based this on the speeches of the BJP’s senior leaders. The speeches they made were almost exactly the speeches that were made in the West Bengal election, and we know that did not turn out well. So, it might be a good idea for the BJP’s senior leaders to stop saying ad nauseum that they are certain of a full majority because they have ‘never seen such crowds, never seen so much love.’ They should remember that it is easy to gather crowds at election time but those who come are not necessarily going to vote for you.In Karnataka the BJP ran a terrible government. Corruption was at such high levels that builders contracted to build government projects went public months ago to admit on camera that they were being forced to pay forty percent of their contracts to officials. Alarm bells should have gone off and action should have been taken against the corrupt officials. This did not happen. Instead, when the election campaign began, BJP leaders made the stupid mistake of saying that in Congress times it was 85% of the money that was stolen. This was a reference to a speech made by Rajiv Gandhi, nearly forty years ago, when he admitted with admirable honesty that his government’s welfare schemes were leaking so badly that only fifteen paise of a rupee reached beneficiaries. I happened to be at that public meeting and remember being impressed with his honesty.It is true that Winston Churchill once said that the best argument against democracy was a five-minute conversation with the average voter. This is no longer true. The average voter has changed and understands well why he should or should not vote for a particular candidate. In this he seems to have got way ahead of not just politicians but the media. Before sitting down to write this piece I spent more than five hours switching news channels to find some clear analysis of what the real issues were in Karnataka and finally got fed up with hearing what the Lingayat community was planning to do and what the Vokaliga community would do. In all the hours that I watched all I heard was analysis of caste equations. Is caste really all that matters in a state that has a literacy rate that is over 75%? It seems hard to believe.The results from Karnataka have cheered me up because those who make up the higher echelons of the electoral juggernaut that the BJP has become since it became Modi’s party will be forced to introspect.  The Prime Minister needs to ask himself if it is wise to spend weeks and months on the campaign trail. When he demotes himself to the status of a regional satrap, it reduces him to being one and this is surely not something he wants. His more ardent supporters and his spokesmen insist that it is only the ‘Modi magic’ that will win them elections, and this is why he campaigns so tirelessly. In Karnataka he campaigned more relentlessly than he has in almost any other state election and the ‘magic’ did not work. This is probably because even magic has its limitations.Meanwhile, congratulations to the voters of Karnataka for stopping the BJP juggernaut. And we must hope that the Congress Party will now put its best foot forward and give this state an efficient, caring and uncorrupt government this time.

Karnataka sends a clear messagePremium Story
‘PM Modi has lost’: Congress’s first reaction to Karnataka Assembly election results
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

In its first official reaction to the Karnataka Assembly results, Congress said Saturday that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had “lost” as the Bharatiya Janata Party had made its election campaign “a referendum” on the PM.Senior party leader Jairam Ramesh, on Twitter, said: “As the results firm up in Karnataka it is now certain that the Congress has won and the PM has lost. The BJP had made its election campaign a referendum on the PM and on the state getting his ‘ashirwaad’. That has been decisively rejected!”As the results firm up in Karnataka it is now certain that the Congress has won and the PM has lost. The BJP had made its election campaign a referendum on the PM and on the state getting his ‘ashirwaad’. That has been decisively rejected!The Congress party fought these…— Jairam Ramesh (@Jairam_Ramesh) May 13, 2023“The Congress party fought these elections on LOCAL issues of livelihood and food security, price rise, farmer distress, electricity supply, joblessness, and corruption. The PM injected divisiveness and attempted polarisation. The vote in Karnataka is for an engine in Bengaluru that will combine economic growth with social harmony,” he added.The results of the Karnataka Assembly polls, which took place on May 10, show Congress leading in 122 of the 224 seats and BJP leading in 71 others. Congress leaders like DK Shivakumar, Siddaramaiah, Priyank Kharge, Laxman Savadi and Satish Jarkiholi are among the early winners in the state.

‘PM Modi has lost’: Congress’s first reaction to Karnataka Assembly election results
By arresting Imran Khan, Pakistan’s army has pushed country to the brink
The Indian Express | 3 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
3 weeks ago | |

On Tuesday, the Pakistani establishment compounded the hydra-headed crisis confronting it by arresting Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) leader Imran Khan. In a heavy-handed operation, he was picked up from the Islamabad High Court, where he had gone to get bail in some cases. This has come at a time when the mood on the street has turned ugly owing to the lack of employment and economic opportunities and hardship.Imran Khan was arrested by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the Al Qadir Trust case, for his and his wife’s alleged role in causing a loss of 190 million pounds to the exchequer in the course of his government’s dealings with a property tycoon. He has been hoisted by his own petard. After all, he had come to power in 2018 with more than a helping hand from the army. His ascent to office followed Nawaz Sharif’s disqualification from holding public office and subsequent conviction in a corruption case through a dubious judicial process. As PM, he hounded his political opponents with accountability cases.Having gained popularity on an anti-army nationalist plank since his ouster from power, his quest for an early election has pitted him against the Shehbaz Sharif government, which has brazenly delayed the election to the dissolved assembly of the all-important Punjab province against constitutional norms. The bitter fight has seen all key institutions of the state — the president, the government, backed by its parliamentary majority, the chief justice of the bitterly divided supreme court, the chief election commissioner and the army — play a partisan role.Bereft of an effective political counter to Khan’s popularity and weighed down by the people’s anger against its harsh economic measures to stabilise the economy, the government has been trying to corner him with multiple court cases, mostly alleging corruption and arrest him, paving the way for his disqualification. This strategy had not been successful owing to the government’s inability to pin him down in a serious matter, but reportedly also because of a lack of backing of Army Chief Asim Munir, despite his known aversion to Khan, who as PM had shunted him out of the post of DG (ISI).This changed with Khan recently voicing his old allegation that Major General Faisal Naseer, the head of counter-intelligence at ISI, engineered attempts on his life, including as recently as March 18. The army reacted sharply with the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) describing Imran’s allegation as “fabricated and malicious”. Referring to a consistent pattern of targeting military and intelligence officials with insinuations and sensational propaganda, the ISPR statement called upon the political leaders concerned to stop making false allegations, failing which the army would take recourse to legal action. Khan’s arrest came within two days of this statement. Significantly, he was picked up by Punjab Rangers who, though nominally under civilian control, are commanded by army officers. The NAB is headed by a retired Lieutenant General.The arrest provoked violent agitation by PTI supporters across Pakistan with reports of ransacking and burning down of public and army properties. The state authority seems to have virtually collapsed. The deployment of the army in Islamabad, Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is an indicator of the serious situation.In an uncharacteristically quick dispensation of justice, a three-member bench of the Supreme Court headed by the Chief Justice, who has been in open confrontation with the government, ordered his release, declaring his arrest from judicial premises as illegal. While the violent protests have abated, the political tussle is far from over.The army will use all means, including an attempt to tame the Chief Justice, to take Khan out of the political equation by disqualifying him. It may be counting on the second-rung leadership of the PTI — many of whom have been close to it and gravitated towards Imran Khan at its behest — not being able to sustain the momentum in the absence of the charismatic Khan. Some other senior leaders of the party have also been arrested. The result will be heightened turmoil in Pakistan and a further sapping of the government’s energy to address more pressing problems.As things stand, the PTI will most likely emerge victorious in a free and fair election later this year. If the army-ruling coalition combine prevents that outcome through unconstitutional means, it will pave the way for a bigger crisis. After all, the current political crisis is the result of former chief Qamar Javed Bajwa’s political engineering.The international community looks on with anxiety as the troubled and troublesome Pakistan inches closer to the brink. Deeply invested in Pakistan, the Chinese must be a worried lot. During Foreign Minister Qin Gang’s recent visit to Islamabad, China expressed the hope that political forces in Pakistan would build consensus, uphold stability and address the domestic and external challenges more effectively. The advice seems to have fallen on deaf ears. The US reaction has been low-key, calling for the respect of democratic principles and the rule of law. But they would be concerned at the prospect of a meltdown in a nuclear-armed country.That should be a matter of concern to India. We have little leverage over Pakistan’s internal developments. But we have been an exemplar to all constructive forces in the region as a stable and inclusive democracy, making economic strides and willing to share success with regional partners. We need to preserve this strength and keep the above vision of India open to the sizeable constructive thinking population in Pakistan that does not see eye to eye with its establishment, rather than lumping it with the actions of the establishment and our responses to them.The writer is a former High Commissioner to Pakistan

By arresting Imran Khan, Pakistan’s army has pushed country to the brink
PM Modi's roadshows impress Bengaluru, but voter turnout stuck at 56%
The Indian Express | 4 weeks ago | |
The Indian Express
4 weeks ago | |

Lakhs of supporters lined along both sides of the road as Narendra Modi passed down in a vehicle covered with marigold flowers – the two roadshows through Bengaluru marked the culmination of the Prime Minister’s high-decibel campaign for the Karnataka Assembly elections, and occupied centrestage in the political landscape in the run-up to the polls.However, as far as voting goes, the roadshows covering around 30 km and 22 constituencies of Bengaluru appear to have made little difference. The average polling in the seats – which are traditionally low voting and a BJP stronghold — was 56%, which was 17% less than the state average of 73.19%.While the 56% voting was a 3% jump from 2018, it was around 1% less than 2013, before Modi became the prime factor in BJP campaigns.The voting percentage was also the same as the constituencies in Bengaluru which the roadshows did not cover. The overall turnout in Bengaluru district was 54%.The Election Commission had conducted extensive SVEEP (Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation) programmes in the IT capital, and officials said they were expecting a voter turnout of at least 70%. But even that appears to have made little difference.In fact, Bommanahalli and CV Raman Nagar constituencies, covered by Modi’s roadshows on both May 6 and May 7, recorded the lowest turnouts in the state – of 47% and 49%, respectively.Both the seats have been won by the BJP in the past three elections – with Satish Reddy the MLA from Bommanahalli and S Raghu from CV Raman Nagar.Apart from these two, Modi’s roadshows crossed Rajarajeshwari Nagar, Mahalakshmi Layout, Yeshwanthpur, Dasarahalli, Bangalore South, BTM Layout, Jayanagar, Basavanagudi, Padmanabanagar, Chickpet, Chamarajpet, Gandhinagar, Rajajinagar, Vijaynagar, Govindaraj Nagar, Malleswaram, Mahadevapura, K R Puram, Shanitnagar and Shivaji Nagar constituencies.Out of these total 22 constituencies, 11 were won by the BJP in 2018, 7 by the Congress and 1 by the JD(S). After the 2019 defections from the Congress and JD(S), the BJP tally in these 22 seats had gone up to 15.Some exit polls released on Wednesday have predicted that the BJP may not do as well as 2018 in these 22 seats.Mallikarjun C K, a voter in the Govindaraj Nagar constituency, said, “As a citizen I might be happy seeing the Prime Minister at my doorstep, but that does not mean I might side with the BJP. To me, the local MLA and his work matters when I go to the polling booth.”However, Mallikarjun added, the roadshows might have laid the ground for the BJP for next year’s Lok Sabha elections.A senior BJP politician on condition of anonymity said they were not worried about the exit poll predictions. “Of the constituencies covered by Modi roadshows, we are facing an uphill task in Rajaji Nagar and Basavangudi because of various reasons, and to some extent, in Govindaraj Nagar. Besides these, I don’t think we will have much of a problem in other seats.”According to him, the low voter turnout was a combination of several factors, such as non-updation of voter lists. “In Bengaluru, we should consider 60% turnout as 100%. Because the rest 40% are either floating population or who have passed away.”Turnout in four regions of Bengaluru districtAn election official speaking to The Indian Express agreed with this, saying: “The main reasons (for the low turnout) were that the voting lists were not updated, by removing names of the floating population and those of the deceased. When officials went door-to-door for survey purification, nobody was ready to give information.” According to the official, this might also be because many settlers from other states are afraid of government benefits they enjoy being taken away in case of any discrepancy.A BJP leader in the campaign team of the party also said the exit polls were wrong. “The roadshows helped us create a wave. They defeated the anti-incumbency which was looming large… We are set to gain at least three (more) seats because of the Modi wave, while the rest would remain our strongholds.”In the run-up to Modi’s roadshows, concerns had been expressed over disruption in normal life in the city, which is notorious for its traffic mess, with traffic diverted and several bus services halted. This had led the BJP to split the plan for a single-day roadshow that would have lasted all of May 7 over two days.Still, officials admitted there were concerns as the roadshows coincided with two big competitive examination days – for a chartered accountant entrance and NEET. However, the roadshows passed without any incident.

PM Modi's roadshows impress Bengaluru, but voter turnout stuck at 56%
Silence is spurious golden
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

Karnataka is known throughout India — and the world — for many reasons. The most notable reason is the state’s capital is Bengaluru, the acknowledged Information Technology capital of India. ‘Bangalored’ became a dreaded word in the US for flight of business and capital. The inflow of business and capital made Bengaluru a coveted workplace for young professionals, especially in IT. Karnataka’s rank in per capita state domestic product (in current prices) is an impressive 4 among all states.All these and more should have placed Karnataka among the top five states of the country. Unfortunately, it is not. Look at some Education and Health indicators during 2019-21 (source: The Hindu, dated April 25, 2023):That is not the end of Karnataka’s woes. After the 15th general election to the Karnataka Assembly in 2018, there have been four short-lived governments whose life-spans were 6 days, 1 year 64 days, 2 years 2 days, and the current one since July 28, 2021 (whose term will end after the next election on May 10, 2023). The villain of this sordid nataka (drama) of instability is, without dispute, the BJP.The consequences of unstable and short-lived governments were predictable.In the people’s perception, the current government is the most corrupt government in the state’s history and is deservedly called the ‘40 per cent sarkara (government)’.That phrase was taken from the Karnataka Contractors’ Association’s official letter accusing the government of demanding and accepting 40 per cent commission or bribe for every decision of the government. Moreover, there is a long list of broken promises of the BJP spanning agriculture, education, healthcare, employment, infrastructure and the economy. Besides, the social and political discourse in the last four years has centered around useless controversies like hijab, halal, love jihad, the anti-conversion Bill and even Tipu Sultan who ruled between 1782 and 1799!One would have expected that the debate during the ongoing election campaign would revolve around the real issues that concern the people and which are thrown up in every survey or opinion poll — unemployment, inflation, infrastructure and corruption. 2,58,000 government posts are vacant. Since 2020, 1,258 companies have shut down. 13 PSUs are non-functional. There are multiple allegations of scams.Sadly, the debate has been surreal. When a reference was made to an allegedly corrupt chief minister, it was portrayed as a charge that the entire Lingayat community to which the chief minister belongs was corrupt. The Union Home Minister warned the voters that if the Congress was elected to power “there will be riots in Karnataka”. Leading lights of the BJP (which has not fielded any Muslim candidate in the 224 constituencies) openly declared “we do not want the votes of Muslims”. A statement in the Congress’ manifesto to the effect that decisive action would be taken under law against hate-mongering by organizations like Bajrang Dal and Popular Front of India, including a ban, was distorted to mean that worshippers of Lord Hanuman (Bajrang Balis) would be thrown into jail: the prime minister magically transformed Bajrang Dal (a right-wing organization) into Bajrang Balis (devotees of Lord Hanuman)!More shocking was the appeal of the Union Home Minister to the people of Karnataka to “hand over the state to Mr Modi”. Notwithstanding a federal system, will the prime minister rule every state, municipality and panchayat? The BJP’s manifesto promised to push the idea of a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC). Both issues have divided and polarized many states in northern and north-eastern India.The Congress party, in its manifesto, gave “five guarantees” that would cost, additionally, Rs 30,000 to 35,000 crore a year. Not to be outdone, the BJP’s manifesto promised three subsidized gas cylinders a year to coincide with three Hindu festivals; one-half litre of milk daily to every BPL family; and a subsidized canteen scheme serving a meal (pictured) consisting of a bowl of rice, dal, sambar, curd and six cups of vegetables! Meanwhile, the prime minister warned against the ‘freebie’ culture!The top two leaders of the ruling party — PM and HM — made no attempt to defend the record of the state government. They were silent on the real issues that concerned the people; the silence was certainly not golden. Their speeches became shriller by the day and the campaign was entirely about the ‘abuses’ suffered by the prime minister; about Lord Shiva; about Lord Hanuman; about Bajrang Balis. The scene looked like a battleground from the pages of history going back to the era of the Mahabharata where an entrenched ruling class was challenged by the former rulers. Will history repeat itself?

Silence is spurious golden
  • P Chidambaram writes | Silence is spurious golden
  • The Indian Express

    Karnataka is known throughout India — and the world — for many reasons. The most notable reason is the state’s capital is Bengaluru, the acknowledged Information Technology capital of India. ‘Bangalored’ became a dreaded word in the US for flight of business and capital. The inflow of business and capital made Bengaluru a coveted workplace for young professionals, especially in IT. Karnataka’s rank in per capita state domestic product (in current prices) is an impressive 4 among all states.All these and more should have placed Karnataka among the top five states of the country. Unfortunately, it is not. Look at some Education and Health indicators during 2019-21 (source: The Hindu, dated April 25, 2023):That is not the end of Karnataka’s woes. After the 15th general election to the Karnataka Assembly in 2018, there have been four short-lived governments whose life-spans were 6 days, 1 year 64 days, 2 years 2 days, and the current one since July 28, 2021 (whose term will end after the next election on May 10, 2023). The villain of this sordid nataka (drama) of instability is, without dispute, the BJP.The consequences of unstable and short-lived governments were predictable.In the people’s perception, the current government is the most corrupt government in the state’s history and is deservedly called the ‘40 per cent sarkara (government)’.That phrase was taken from the Karnataka Contractors’ Association’s official letter accusing the government of demanding and accepting 40 per cent commission or bribe for every decision of the government. Moreover, there is a long list of broken promises of the BJP spanning agriculture, education, healthcare, employment, infrastructure and the economy. Besides, the social and political discourse in the last four years has centered around useless controversies like hijab, halal, love jihad, the anti-conversion Bill and even Tipu Sultan who ruled between 1782 and 1799!One would have expected that the debate during the ongoing election campaign would revolve around the real issues that concern the people and which are thrown up in every survey or opinion poll — unemployment, inflation, infrastructure and corruption. 2,58,000 government posts are vacant. Since 2020, 1,258 companies have shut down. 13 PSUs are non-functional. There are multiple allegations of scams.Sadly, the debate has been surreal. When a reference was made to an allegedly corrupt chief minister, it was portrayed as a charge that the entire Lingayat community to which the chief minister belongs was corrupt. The Union Home Minister warned the voters that if the Congress was elected to power “there will be riots in Karnataka”. Leading lights of the BJP (which has not fielded any Muslim candidate in the 224 constituencies) openly declared “we do not want the votes of Muslims”. A statement in the Congress’ manifesto to the effect that decisive action would be taken under law against hate-mongering by organizations like Bajrang Dal and Popular Front of India, including a ban, was distorted to mean that worshippers of Lord Hanuman (Bajrang Balis) would be thrown into jail: the prime minister magically transformed Bajrang Dal (a right-wing organization) into Bajrang Balis (devotees of Lord Hanuman)!More shocking was the appeal of the Union Home Minister to the people of Karnataka to “hand over the state to Mr Modi”. Notwithstanding a federal system, will the prime minister rule every state, municipality and panchayat? The BJP’s manifesto promised to push the idea of a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC). Both issues have divided and polarized many states in northern and north-eastern India.The Congress party, in its manifesto, gave “five guarantees” that would cost, additionally, Rs 30,000 to 35,000 crore a year. Not to be outdone, the BJP’s manifesto promised three subsidized gas cylinders a year to coincide with three Hindu festivals; one-half litre of milk daily to every BPL family; and a subsidized canteen scheme serving a meal (pictured) consisting of a bowl of rice, dal, sambar, curd and six cups of vegetables! Meanwhile, the prime minister warned against the ‘freebie’ culture!The top two leaders of the ruling party — PM and HM — made no attempt to defend the record of the state government. They were silent on the real issues that concerned the people; the silence was certainly not golden. Their speeches became shriller by the day and the campaign was entirely about the ‘abuses’ suffered by the prime minister; about Lord Shiva; about Lord Hanuman; about Bajrang Balis. The scene looked like a battleground from the pages of history going back to the era of the Mahabharata where an entrenched ruling class was challenged by the former rulers. Will history repeat itself?

Congress gets it wrong againPremium Story
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

It is both ironic and hilarious that it is the Congress Party’s manifesto that has brought Hindutva to the fore in the Karnataka election campaign. We now have the Prime Minister himself taking full advantage by encouraging cries of ‘Jai Bajrangbali’ at his election rallies. Rama has taken a temporary backseat and his loyal soldier Hanuman has taken his place. In the only southern state the BJP has ever won, temples since last week began recitations of the Hanuman Chalisa, and a senior Congress leader has been forced to publicly declare that if his ‘secular’ party wins Karnataka this time, he will build Hanuman temples in every district.All of this has happened because some idiotic advisor in Rahul Gandhi’s inner circle decided to insert a paragraph in the party’s manifesto that puts the Bajrang Dal in the same bracket as the Popular Front of India (PFI). Clearly whoever did this is unable to distinguish between thugs and terrorists. The Bajrang Dal is made up of thuggish goons who spend their time spreading hatred against Islam and Christianity and obsess about assaulting girls who celebrate Valentine’s Day or go dancing in short skirts.This is not to deny that the Bajrang Dal is capable of murder as well as mayhem. We saw this in the brutality with which Muslims were massacred in the Naroda Patiya district of Ahmedabad in the 2002 riots. One of the leaders of the murderous mob was called Babu Bajrangi and he along with the killers he led have never hesitated to boast about the pleasure they got in killing Muslim women and children. Since Narendra Modi became prime minister, this bunch of despicable lowlifes has spent much time seeking out Muslims to lynch on suspicion of killing cows. Like all religious fanatics, they are ugly, narrow-minded brutes. But they are not jihadis with clear links to the worldwide jihad.The Popular Front of India (PFI) is made up of exactly such jihadi terrorists whose main purpose has been to introduce in India the kind of Islam that the Taliban has used to ruin Afghanistan. The PFI until it got banned organized military parades of its cadres. They never deny that for them Islam is more important than India. After that incident in Kerala in 2010, when they hacked a Christian professor’s hand off for allegedly blaspheming the Prophet of Islam, their activities have been more insidious but, in every sense, dangerous and divisive.In Karnataka, it was the PFI that organized the hijab protest in schools and colleges. Exactly when the brave women of Iran risked imprisonment and torture to defy the Ayatollahs by publicly removing and burning hijabs, young Muslim girls in Karnataka were demanding the right to go to classes wearing hijab. It was an absurd and ludicrous protest but there is more to hijabs than modesty. Experts who have studied the worldwide jihad have found that the first signs of radicalism are when Muslim communities suddenly decide to force women to start wearing Arab clothes. In India, the PFI has led the movement to radicalize the very gentle Islam that was once practised here. It was a religion associated with refinement, elegance, romantic poetry, and romantic films. This was the Islam I grew up with in northern India and I have seen it change before my eyes.There are those, mostly leftists and liberals, who like comparing Hindutva with radical Islam but these are people blinded by liberalism and a defunct ideology. Hindutva has done real harm to the great Sanatan Dharma, and it has been responsible for many acts of violence against Muslims and Dalits, but it has so far not become an international terrorist movement. It has spread hatred but not come anywhere near close to creating a Hindu version of the barbaric Islamic State.The world is a better place with that wretched country dead and gone but the return of Taliban rule in Afghanistan indicates that the founding ideas that the Islamic State espoused have found a new country. The worst sufferers have been Afghan women who have lost the right to education and the right to work. Nothing like that has happened in India or will ever happen because fanaticism of the kind that bred the Bajrang Dal has no religious sanction.The Congress Party has in the past made the mistake of equating Hindutva with jihadism. BJP leaders never fail to remind us that a senior Congress leader tried to blame the 26/11 attack on Mumbai on the RSS, or that Rahul Gandhi himself told an American ambassador that in his considered opinion Hindu terrorism was more dangerous than Islamic terrorism. Since then, Rahul and his sister have done their best to wear their Hinduism on their sleeves by trotting off to temples at election time and making it a point to post pictures of themselves at prayer on social media.This does the Congress Party more harm than good. And the reason is that with the BJP ranting and raving about gods and religion what we need most now is a political party that proudly flaunts its secular credentials. This is best done by reminding Indians that there was a time when election campaigns were not conducted like religious festivals. It is with deep nostalgia that I remember elections past when political leaders did not ask for votes in the name of gods and goddesses.

Congress gets it wrong againPremium Story
  • Tavleen Singh writes | Congress gets it wrong againPremium Story
  • The Indian Express

    It is both ironic and hilarious that it is the Congress Party’s manifesto that has brought Hindutva to the fore in the Karnataka election campaign. We now have the Prime Minister himself taking full advantage by encouraging cries of ‘Jai Bajrangbali’ at his election rallies. Rama has taken a temporary backseat and his loyal soldier Hanuman has taken his place. In the only southern state the BJP has ever won, temples since last week began recitations of the Hanuman Chalisa, and a senior Congress leader has been forced to publicly declare that if his ‘secular’ party wins Karnataka this time, he will build Hanuman temples in every district.All of this has happened because some idiotic advisor in Rahul Gandhi’s inner circle decided to insert a paragraph in the party’s manifesto that puts the Bajrang Dal in the same bracket as the Popular Front of India (PFI). Clearly whoever did this is unable to distinguish between thugs and terrorists. The Bajrang Dal is made up of thuggish goons who spend their time spreading hatred against Islam and Christianity and obsess about assaulting girls who celebrate Valentine’s Day or go dancing in short skirts.This is not to deny that the Bajrang Dal is capable of murder as well as mayhem. We saw this in the brutality with which Muslims were massacred in the Naroda Patiya district of Ahmedabad in the 2002 riots. One of the leaders of the murderous mob was called Babu Bajrangi and he along with the killers he led have never hesitated to boast about the pleasure they got in killing Muslim women and children. Since Narendra Modi became prime minister, this bunch of despicable lowlifes has spent much time seeking out Muslims to lynch on suspicion of killing cows. Like all religious fanatics, they are ugly, narrow-minded brutes. But they are not jihadis with clear links to the worldwide jihad.The Popular Front of India (PFI) is made up of exactly such jihadi terrorists whose main purpose has been to introduce in India the kind of Islam that the Taliban has used to ruin Afghanistan. The PFI until it got banned organized military parades of its cadres. They never deny that for them Islam is more important than India. After that incident in Kerala in 2010, when they hacked a Christian professor’s hand off for allegedly blaspheming the Prophet of Islam, their activities have been more insidious but, in every sense, dangerous and divisive.In Karnataka, it was the PFI that organized the hijab protest in schools and colleges. Exactly when the brave women of Iran risked imprisonment and torture to defy the Ayatollahs by publicly removing and burning hijabs, young Muslim girls in Karnataka were demanding the right to go to classes wearing hijab. It was an absurd and ludicrous protest but there is more to hijabs than modesty. Experts who have studied the worldwide jihad have found that the first signs of radicalism are when Muslim communities suddenly decide to force women to start wearing Arab clothes. In India, the PFI has led the movement to radicalize the very gentle Islam that was once practised here. It was a religion associated with refinement, elegance, romantic poetry, and romantic films. This was the Islam I grew up with in northern India and I have seen it change before my eyes.There are those, mostly leftists and liberals, who like comparing Hindutva with radical Islam but these are people blinded by liberalism and a defunct ideology. Hindutva has done real harm to the great Sanatan Dharma, and it has been responsible for many acts of violence against Muslims and Dalits, but it has so far not become an international terrorist movement. It has spread hatred but not come anywhere near close to creating a Hindu version of the barbaric Islamic State.The world is a better place with that wretched country dead and gone but the return of Taliban rule in Afghanistan indicates that the founding ideas that the Islamic State espoused have found a new country. The worst sufferers have been Afghan women who have lost the right to education and the right to work. Nothing like that has happened in India or will ever happen because fanaticism of the kind that bred the Bajrang Dal has no religious sanction.The Congress Party has in the past made the mistake of equating Hindutva with jihadism. BJP leaders never fail to remind us that a senior Congress leader tried to blame the 26/11 attack on Mumbai on the RSS, or that Rahul Gandhi himself told an American ambassador that in his considered opinion Hindu terrorism was more dangerous than Islamic terrorism. Since then, Rahul and his sister have done their best to wear their Hinduism on their sleeves by trotting off to temples at election time and making it a point to post pictures of themselves at prayer on social media.This does the Congress Party more harm than good. And the reason is that with the BJP ranting and raving about gods and religion what we need most now is a political party that proudly flaunts its secular credentials. This is best done by reminding Indians that there was a time when election campaigns were not conducted like religious festivals. It is with deep nostalgia that I remember elections past when political leaders did not ask for votes in the name of gods and goddesses.

  • What the political debate in Karnataka ignoresPremium Story
  • The Indian Express

    The current competitive electoral discourse of parties in Karnataka reveals a certain lack of engagement with what are arguably critical issues in the state’s political economy. Undoubtedly, Karnataka is a fast-growing state, a leader in IT, ITeS and exports, in cutting-edge sectors such as biotechnology, and is an epicentre of tech-driven start-ups.Despite this impressive post-1990s growth profile, poverty in Karnataka (at 13.2 per cent in 2021), continues to be highest among the southern states (4.89 per cent in Tamil Nadu, 0.71 per cent in Kerala and 12.3 per cent in Andhra Pradesh). Similarly, estimates from 2021 show that Karnataka does not feature in the high HDI list of eight states and in fact, the state’s overall HDI ranking amongst all states is 17th.To take a single example, Karnataka’s infant mortality rate (IMR) in 2022 was 20 per 1,000 live births, compared to six in Kerala, and 13 in Tamil Nadu. The multidimensional poverty index, which was released by the Niti Aayog in 2021 highlighted that in Karnataka 34 per cent remained nutrition deprived (to Kerala’s 15 per cent, Tamil Nadu’s 24 per cent, and Andhra Pradesh’s 26 per cent).The continuing north-south divide in the state and the specific pattern of urban development that is taking place provide keys to the contradictions of high growth and high poverty/low HDI. Despite long-standing public concern, poverty continues to exceed 35 per cent in the historically poor northern districts of Chitradurga, Bellary, Koppal, Raichur, Gulbarga, Bagalkot and Bidar. Predominantly rural and lacking irrigation and infrastructural facilities, the northern districts have remained outside of the radar of governments.Karnataka’s rate of urbanisation, at 38 per cent, has been higher than the national average of 31 per cent ( 2011 census). However, more than 65 per cent of the urban population is concentrated in the three major transport corridors: Bengaluru-Belgaum, Mysuru-Kolar and Mangaluru-Karwar. The urban population of Bengaluru district accounted for 37 per cent of the state’s urban population in the last census (2011). In terms of district-wise urbanisation, Bengaluru district at 88 per cent is way ahead even of relatively urbanised districts, Dharwad at 55 per cent, Dakshina Kannada and Mysuru at 38 per cent and 36 per cent respectively. The window of urban opportunities has thus been confined primarily to Bengaluru.Expectedly, despite the state’s IT-led urban glitter, agriculture remains the largest employer. In 2019-20, agriculture’s share in GSVA was 12 per cent, but employment was as high as 46 per cent; the share of industry in GSVA and employment was 21 per cent and 19 per cent, while in services it was 66 per cent and 33 per cent respectively. Agriculture provides subsistence livelihoods, particularly in the context of repeated agrarian crises in drought-prone northern Karnataka. This explains the influx of migrants into Bengaluru city.The total proportion of intra-state migrants in Bengaluru increased from 60.68 per cent in 2001 to 65.64 per cent in 2011; those moving specifically for employment, mainly agricultural labourers or small farmers, remained around 25 per cent over this 10-year period. The insecurities of urban work and income, mainly in construction and low-level services, compel many to retain a dual rural-urban work and home life. Covid-19 only intensified these vulnerabilities and highlighted the inherent weaknesses of this model of urbanisation that is in place.On the other hand, industrial jobs have increasingly disappeared, caused by the shift to capital-intensive industrialisation brought on by globalisation, international competition in technology and pricing. A declining public sector and small-scale industries sector, and closed textile mills have ceased to be potential destinations for unskilled or semi-skilled job seekers. While the diminishing importance of industry relative to services is an all-India trend, a few of the economically advanced states have managed to retain a higher share of industry in GSVA (Maharashtra at 28.4 and Tamil Nadu at 33 per cent), while at the same time developing their service sectors. Although successive governments in Karnataka have voiced concerns about industry’s low share in GSVA (21 per cent), substantive policies, with a view to raising industrial employment, have not been taken in this regard.A growing — but small — professional and upwardly mobile middle and upper class employed by IT and related sectors represents Karnataka’s national and global profile. As a spill-over effect, the creation of service-based employment for urban working classes has been much hyped. However, much of the expansion of employment has occurred in the low-value-added bottom rungs of the services sector. Thus we see an emerging class of service providers in transportation, deliveries, security, hospitality, retail and housekeeping. Although service providers may receive a monthly salaried wage, and in some cases, limited social security, the reality of these jobs is that even a minimum wage may not be paid, there is no security of tenure, and hours of work may be erratic and unregulated.Karnataka’s unemployment rate of 2.7 per cent is lower than the national average of 4.2 per cent. However, the condition of low-skilled workers, even those working in the so-called organised corporate sector, or as contract workers in government service, demonstrates that it is possible to be employed but poor. Whether it is women workers in the ready-made apparels export industry, or as Anganwadi teachers and helpers, or contract pourakarmikas, their long and arduous battles for an increase in salaries and regularisation of services — led by left-leaning trade unions and civil society organisations — have made possible only limited gains.The Congress regimes elected in 1999 and 2013, the BJP’s intermittent rule since 2008, seem to share a common faith in a market and technology-led, predominantly urban growth model, unchallenged by the Janata Dal’s brief two-year stints in power (2006, 2018). Work and wage-related issues and regional disparities have remained peripheral in these regimes. The pre-election mandates and politics of parties now possibly need to be re-examined in the context of these critical blind spots of political representation.The writer is visiting professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru

Where funds come from: 5 big metros account for 90% of electoral bonds sold so farPremium Story
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

Pointing to a concentration of political funding, five cities, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, New Delhi and Chennai, accounted for nearly 90% of all electoral bonds sold so far, while the tech capital of India, Bengaluru, accounted for just over 2% of total sales, as per State Bank of India data accessed under the Right to Information Act by The Indian Express.On May 4, SBI said that electoral bonds worth Rs 12,979.10 crore had been sold since the start of the scheme in 2018 until the most recent tranche, the 26th, of sales held in April.In the same period, Rs 12,955.26 crore in electoral bonds had been encashed by political parties. The SBI reply to the RTI application stated that 25 political parties opened designated bank accounts with the bank to redeem these bonds under the scheme that enables anonymous political funding by Indian citizens and corporates.Since 2017, the Supreme Court has been hearing a batch of petitions challenging the scheme’s validity on various grounds. The court is yet to decide whether the case should be sent to a Constitution Bench. As per the court’s automated listing system, the next hearing is scheduled for May 9.Mumbai, the country’s financial capital, accounted for 26.16% of the total electoral bonds sold so far, the highest among the 29 SBI branches where the scheme is offered, with Rs 3,395.15 crore.Kolkata, Hyderabad, New Delhi and Chennai rounded out the top five with Rs 2,704.62 crore (20.84%); Rs 2,418.81 crore (18.64%); Rs 1,847 crore (14.23%); and Rs 1,253.20 crore (9.66%) respectively in sales.Bengaluru, the capital of election-bound Karnataka, was in seventh place with Rs 266.90 crore in sales or 2.06% of the total, after Bhubaneswar that had Rs 407.26 crore or 3.14% of the sales.While sale data shows that funding to parties is flowing mainly from five big cities, when it comes to redemption of the electoral bonds, the New Delhi branch of SBI is the preferred choice.Of the total amount of bonds redeemed so far, 64.55% or Rs 8,362.84 crore was encashed in New Delhi, where national parties are likely to have their accounts.Hyderabad was a distant second with 12.37% (Rs.1,602.19 crore) followed by Kolkata in third place with 10.01% (1,297.44 crore), Bhubaneswar with 5.96% (Rs 771.50 crore) and Chennai with 5.11% (Rs.662.55 crore). Although Mumbai accounted for over 26% of all sales, it had only 1.51% of all electoral bonds redeemed.The Electoral Bond Scheme was launched in January 2018 and the first tranche of sales was held in March that year. The scheme was initially introduced for a period of 10 days each in January, April, July and October and an additional 30-day period for a year with Lok Sabha elections. In November 2022, the Finance Ministry amended the scheme to allow another 15 days of sales in any year with an Assembly election.To redeem electoral bonds, a party needs to have a designated bank account with one of the 29 authorised SBI branches and to open an account, the party needs to have secured at least 1% of the votes in the most recent Lok Sabha polls, or Assembly elections in case of a state party.Since the scheme is meant for anonymous donations, the SBI does not disclose which party has an account in which branch.

Where funds come from: 5 big metros account for 90% of electoral bonds sold so farPremium Story
K'taka battle lines: many Hindutvas bump up against layers of caste
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

The Congress party’s decision to bracket the Bajrang Dal with the banned PFI in its manifesto, and its promise to ban the former if voted to power, is a striking departure from its policy of general silence and evasion on Hindutva issues, especially ahead of a crucial election. To understand why it does in Karnataka what it does not in other states where it takes on the BJP, it may be helpful to look closer at Hindutva in Karnataka — or Karnataka’s many Hindutvas.Because even as Hindutva is a growing force, its homogenising project has not had an easy ride in this complex state so far. Beyond the coastal belt, that is, where it had an early start and where it now rides on the back of mobilisations over decades. In the state’s other regions, Hindutva co-opts, but it also collides with local cultures dominated by caste.In the caste game, moreover, the Congress is also an active player in Karnataka, and not, as in many states in the north, a spent force, giving the BJP a free pass. It has a strong local leadership and a pan-state leader in Siddaramaiah, its past governments are associated with popular welfare schemes like the Indira canteens, and it has held on to a social coalition, Ahinda (OBCs-SCs-Muslims), that it can call its own.That is probably why in this election, amid speculation about Hindutva’s efficacy in the southern state, the Congress has raised the demand for a caste census. And while trying to shake off the “pro-Muslim party” tag the BJP tries to saddle it with, its manifesto talks about Hindu militancy.In the coastal belt, however, where Hindutva’s story began in Karnataka and where it is still going strong, the BJP remains the dominant player. Here, the more it changes, the more it remains the same.Yashpal Suvarna is one of the BJP’s 73 “new” candidates. Meet him in his home-office in Udupi, dominated by a large painting of an animated Modi addressing a docile audience, and you can pick holes in the BJP’s newness claim. Suvarna is a first-timer in the assembly arena, but in the Sangh Parivar, he is no newbie.A Sangh full-timer, district office-bearer in the VHP-Bajrang Dal, active in the BJP since 2004, he is All-India National General Secretary of its OBC morcha. He is better known as a prime accused in the 2005 case of the stripping and parading of a father and son who were allegedly transporting calves — he was later acquitted by a special trial court.He was also vice-president of the Development Committee of Udupi Government PU Girls’ College, where the hijab controversy blew up in December 2021 — Suvarna had then described the Muslim women students who went to court against the hijab ban as “anti-national” and “members of a terrorist organisation”.Now, ahead of the election, he speaks of the “responsibility of each and every Hindu” to “safeguard Hindu samaj” and “protect nationalism”, by putting a “full stop” to cow slaughter, “love jihad” and “matantara (conversion)”. “You (Muslims) can avail of all the facilities, but you should not be against our nationalism”, he says.Candidate Suvarna represents a hard saffron. The BJP’s poll-eve decision to do away with the 4 per cent Muslim quota, and redistribute it among Lingayats and Vokkaligas, belongs to the same category — the Congress has promised to bring back the quota if it wins. “300 medical seats, 1,600 engineering seats, 3,000 government jobs” — in Hubli, AM Hindasgiri, former minister in two Congress governments, spells out what the BJP proposes to take away from the state’s minority community.But step away from the coast and there are softer shades of saffron in Karnataka, a distance yet to be covered between Hindu and Hindutva, and a push-back from more defined caste identities.In fact, even in Udupi on the coast, it is possible to hear a different saffron tone, especially among women, particularly among the young.In Byndoor town, Pragathi Ganesh Shetty, a doctor, says firmly: “Being a student, being a Hindu, being BJP, I say that they (Muslim students) have a right to wear the hijab”. And in Mangalore’s St Aloysius College, Aakanksha, 18 and a first-time voter, says Modi has “done things that have brought positive change, like in sanitation”, but his party is wrong on the hijab. “They (Muslim students) feel safe in it, that’s what matters”, she says.Away from the coastal belt, on the campus of GSSS Institute of Engineering and Technology for Women in Mysore, a group of students disagree with each other on their political preference, but agree that the ban on hijab is unjust. She supports Modi at the Centre, Akshata says, but “burqa might have been a problem, not the hijab”.Voices such as Akshata’s could be speaking for a younger generation of women coming of voting age. But they also draw upon the longer and larger resources of syncretism on the ground in Karnataka.Hindutva’s hardness on the coast owes to a special set of circumstances, says Muzaffar Assadi, dean at the faculty of Arts, Mysore University, which do not extend beyond it. In the coastal belt, “economic competition and communal polarisation went together” — the contest for economic opportunities between Hindus and Muslims amid a linking of the local economy with international markets, especially the Middle East, gave impetus to mobilisations by the Sangh Parivar.These mobilisations also drew fuel from the greater visibility of Muslims here in public spaces. In Mangalore, Prof Valerian Roderigues points out: “In other parts of Karnataka, Muslims are marginalised, live in poverty. Here, they are more visible in trades and occupations, media and education. They have powerful networks and associations. Their greater visibility, especially of Muslim girls, challenges the homogeneous social space the RSS wants to create”.Outside the coastal belt, however, the Hindutva project finds the ground less hospitable. “No memories of Partition that are transmitted across generations, our experience of it is mostly textual. Second, no ruler who can be constantly castigated, no Aurangzeb-like figure”, says Assadi. The narratives about Tipu Sultan that abound in South Karnataka, for instance, are also highly contested.In the state’s other regions, instead, there are memories and legacies of a culture more syncretic. In north Karnataka, the Lingayat movement began as a revolt against the inequalities of Brahmanical Hinduism in the 12th century. Much has changed, the Lingayats are now seen as a BJP votebank, but the shift of the community to the BJP after their alienation from the Congress and the collapse of the Janata Party in the late ’90s was political, driven by the demand for representation, not because they were groomed in the Sangh Parivar.South Karnataka saw the liberal princely ruler and an inclusive state. In the early 20th century, Maharaja Krishnaraja Wadiyar brought caste to the centre, by implementing a reservation policy to break Brahmin domination in public services and provide representation to other castes, setting in motion the creation of caste elites that are now over a hundred years old.Across the state, except the coastal region, therefore, Hindutva’s unifying vision bumps against diverse local cultures primarily shaped by caste, organised around local deities and powerful mathas. The mathas own land, run hostels, educational institutions and hospitals.In village Bettadatunge on the edge of Mysore, at the ancestral home of Devaraj Urs, the Congress chief minister who constituted the Havanur commission for OBC reservation, and spearheaded land reforms in the ’70s, long before the 1990s’ Mandal revolution upended caste equations in the country’s north, his great grandson talks of the salience of caste over Hindutva in Karnataka. “North India thinks one way, South India thinks another way”, says Srinath Raj Urs.Srinath is a leading light of the Urs association in his village, which acts as a support structure — giving scholarships and short-term loans for marriage and hospitalisation, helping young men in the community in getting jobs by activating networks that reach inside private sector offices and government corridors, easing their journeys from the village to Bangalore.Of course, the Urs association is only one of the many caste associations. “Election to the Vokkaliga Sangha is conducted like an MLA election”, says Srinath’s cousin, Aruna.Ahead of this election, then, amid the heat and dust, a distinctively Karnataka question for the BJP — how much, and in what manner, can it count on the politics of Hindutva to help it to flatten the ground and broaden its appeal in the state, as opposed to merely energising its core base? And for the Congress, in Hindutva’s more bumpy southern ride, an opportunity it can miss or seize.

K'taka battle lines: many Hindutvas bump up against layers of caste
Sharad Pawar, In Memoir, Recounts Nephew Ajit Pawar's Shock Oath With BJP
Ndtv | 1 month ago | |
Ndtv
1 month ago | |

Sharad Pawar said he was "shocked" when he learned that Ajit Pawar was "taking oath".Mumbai: Senior Maharashtra politician Sharad Pawar has revealed what went down on the day his nephew Ajit Pawar suddenly took oath along with the BJP's Devendra Fadnavis in 2019, when he was trying to stitch up a coalition with Uddhav Thackeray's Shiv Sena and the Congress. In an updated autobiography released today, Sharad Pawar also talks about what he called the BJP's attempts to "eliminate" the Sena, its former ally.Sharad Pawar, leader of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), writes that he was "shocked" when he learned that his nephew was "taking oath" at the Raj Bhavan."I was shocked when I got a call on November 23, 2019, around 6.30 am that Ajit and a few NCP MLAs were at Raj Bhavan and Ajit was taking oath with Fadnavis," Mr Pawar says in the second part of his memoir 'Lok Majhe Sangti'."When I made calls to a few MLAs who were at Raj Bhavan, I got to know that only 10 MLAs have reached there and one of them told me that it is happening because I support this. But this was a plan for the central BJP to fail the plan of MVA (Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi). I called Uddhav Thackeray immediately and told him that whatever Ajit has done is wrong and NCP and I don't support that. My name was used to take NCP MLAs to Raj Bhavan. I asked him to join me in the press conference at 11 am," Mr Pawar writes.After the abortive attempt at taking power, Ajit Pawar subsequently returned to the NCP fold, unable to persuade enough MLAs to defect with him.Mr Pawar's reveal comes at a time when there is raging speculation about Ajit Pawar switching sides again in order to become Chief Minister. Ajit Pawar has denied it, declaring that he will work for the NCP "till I'm alive".In more startling revelations, Pawar Senior has alleged that the BJP had plotted to eliminate then ally Shiv Sena in the 2019 Maharashtra election as it was convinced that was necessary for its own growth in the state. The BJP put up rebels in several seats against Sena candidates, he claims."The BJP was out to eliminate its 30-year-old ally, the Shiv Sena, during the 2019 Assembly election, as the BJP was convinced that it could not gain prominence in Maharashtra unless Shiv Sena's existence was downplayed in the state," Mr Pawar writes.The BJP and the Sena fought the 2019 election together but a power tussle after their victory ended their alliance of nearly three decades. Uddhav Thackeray, who had refused to play second fiddle to the BJP, teamed up with the ideologically opposite Congress and NCP and became Chief Minister. Mr Thackeray lost power last year following a coup by his aide Eknath Shinde, who split the Sena and partnered with the BJP to form a new government in Maharashtra."The simmering anger in the Shiv Sena against the BJP post the 2019 assembly polls, the expose on what led the Shiv Sena to split from the BJP and form the Maha Vikas Aghadi amid rumours of political turmoil, sent ripples in political circles," Mr Pawar writes in his book."The BJP rubbed salt on the Sena's wounds by merging Narayan Rane's Swabhiman Party with it. Rane is seen as a traitor by the Shiv Sena," says the former Union Minister.PromotedListen to the latest songs, only on JioSaavn.com"The BJP fielded and supported rebel candidates in nearly 50 constituencies against the Shiv Sena. It was an attempt to damage the Sena by decreasing their numbers to have an undisputed claim on power."The rift between the Sena and the BJP kept widening and "it was a positive signal for us", says the veteran leader.

Sharad Pawar, In Memoir, Recounts Nephew Ajit Pawar's Shock Oath With BJP
  • Ajit Pawar's Cryptic Message About Sharad Pawar, Inspired By Raj Thackeray
  • Ndtv

    There is political speculation about Ajit Pawar leaving the NCP. (File Photo)Pune: Nationalist Congress Party or NCP leader Ajit Pawar on Thursday said he would "pay attention" to his uncle, party chief Sharad Pawar, the same way Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray paid to his (Bal Thackeray).Ajit Pawar's retort came in response to Uddhav Thackeray's 'advice' to him in an interview, conducted by Amruta Fadnavis, wife of Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, and NCP MP Amol Kolhe.Uddhav Thackeray said that Ajit Pawar should pay his uncle the same kind of attention he pays outside.Asked by reporters in Mumbai about the remark, Ajit Pawar said, "The way Raj Thackeray paid attention to his own uncle (Bal Thackeray), I will also pay attention to my uncle (Sharad Pawar)."PromotedListen to the latest songs, only on JioSaavn.comNotably, the MNS chief parted ways with his uncle, Shiv Sena founder late Bal Thackeray, in 2006 to start his own outfit. (Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

  • Sharad Pawar Calls For Dialogue With Villagers Opposing Refinery Project
  • Ndtv

    NCP leaders will visit the site and talk to the locals, Mr Pawar added.Mumbai: Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Sharad Pawar on Wednesday said the Maharashtra government should hold a dialogue with local villagers who are opposing a refinery project in the coastal Ratnagiri district.If the issue was not resolved even after that, an alternative site should be found, he said.Mr Pawar spoke to reporters in Mumbai after state industries minister Uday Samant met him to discuss the issue.Residents of Barsu village in Ratnagiri district's Rajapur tehsil, more than 400 km from Mumbai, are up in arms against the project and the Shiv Sena (UBT) and Congress, the NCP's allies in the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) coalition, are supporting them.Mr Pawar said his party did not oppose development projects in Konkan, but finding out the opinion of the locals was a must."The government needs to find out why the locals are angry... having a dialogue with them is the only solution. If the matter is not resolved through a dialogue, an alternative site should be found,'' the former Union minister said.On the state government's contention that Uddhav Thackeray, when he was chief minister, had suggested Barsu as an alternative instead of Nanar, the original site, Pawar said he was not aware of that.''Industries minister Uday Samant who met me assured that a dialogue will take place tomorrow. Yesterday only soil testing was being done at the site,'' he further said.NCP leaders will visit the site and talk to the locals, Mr Pawar added.Mr Samant, who is the guardian minister of Ratnagiri district, told reporters that the women protestors detained at the project site have been released."The government will speak to the villagers," he added.Mr Pawar, meanwhile, told reporters that he would be visiting Punjab on Thursday for Shiromani Akali Dal leader Parkash Singh Badal's last rites.To another question, he said he was not aware of any proposal by Uddhav Thackeray that an NCP leader should become the chief minister if the MVA wins the next Assembly elections."If Sanjay Raut is saying this, he is a journalist.....the media knows more than we do. I am not aware,'' the NCP supremo said.PromotedListen to the latest songs, only on JioSaavn.comAbout the posters describing his nephew Ajit Pawar as a future CM coming up in some places, Mr Pawar said Ajit Pawar himself had told his supporters not to do such things.(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

'Brains' of the family, guilty by association due to brother Mukhtar, say supporters
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

On Saturday, a special court in Ghazipur sentenced BSP MP Afzal Ansari, elder brother of jailed gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari, to four years’ imprisonment in the Uttar Pradesh Gangsters and Anti-Social Activities (Prevention) Act case from 2007. Afzal, who was out on bail, was taken into custody and sent to jail.This is the first case in which Afzal Ansari (68) has been convicted and he now faces the prospect of losing his Lok Sabha membership. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, incidentally, Afzal had defeated the BJP’s Manoj Sinha, who was seen as one of the Chief Minister contenders at the time, and is currently the Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir.In his around four-decade political career, Ansari has won five Assembly and two parliamentary elections, but has grabbed limelight only when the issue of Mukhtar Ansari has been raised by the government, police or the media. Afzal would often be the face giving explanation on behalf of his family and Mukhtar.“We have never seen Afzal Ansari involved in criminal activities and harassing people. In a few criminal cases, he has been made co-accused with Mukhtar. Because of his knowledge of law and politics, Afzal is the ‘brains’ in the family, planning all its moves, be it regarding poll campaigns, or fighting legal battles,” a local resident of Ghazipur says.He also adds that Afzal is good at connecting with people, and that this is why his winning margin has been rising every election.Political workers say Afzal used to work like Mukhtar’s shadow, looking after his cases in court and election campaigns. Five-time MLA Mukhtar has been lodged in jail since 2005, and has won three Assembly elections from inside there. “Initially, Afzal may have benefited from Mukhtar’s terror, but now he has good influence on his voters.He too could easily win Assembly elections from Mohammadabad from inside the jail,” another local resident says.A resident of Ghazipur district, Afzal started his political career with the 1985 Assembly elections, when he contested from his hometown Mohammadabad on a CPI ticket. He defeated Congress candidate Abhai Narain Rai by around 3,064 votes. He went on to win the Assembly seat thrice in a row on a CPI ticket. In the 1989, 1991 and 1993 Assembly elections, Afzal defeated the BJP’s Vijay Shanker Rai by 8,575, 9,263 and 13,572 votes, respectively.Afzal contested his fifth Assembly election – in 1996 — on a Samajwadi Party ticket and defeated the BSP’s Virendra by a margin of 19,602 votes. Afzal got 63,468 votes.In the 2002 Assembly elections, though, Afzal lost to the BJP’s Krishnanand Rai by 7,772 votes. He was again an SP candidate, and secured 53,277 votes.Three years later, on November 29, 2005, Krishnanand Rai was murdered in Ghazipur along with six associates. Afzal and Mukhtar were prime accused in the case, and its trial was transferred to Delhi by the Supreme Court. In 2019, a special CBI court in Delhi acquitted Afzal, Mukhtar and five others in the case, and an appeal is still pending in the Delhi High Court.When the Krishnanand Rai murder case was lodged against Afzal, he was the SP MP from Ghazipur. After Rai’s murder, Afzal lost two consecutive Lok Sabha polls. In 2009, he contested on a BSP ticket and lost to the SP’s Radhey Mohan Singh. In 2010, while with the BSP, Afzal floated his own political outfit, Quami Ekta Dal (QED), and became its president. He contested the 2014 Lok Sabha from Ballia on a QED ticket, and lost to the BJP’s Bharat Singh. Finally, he won as an MP on the BSP ticket from Ghazipur.As per UP Police’s record, there are seven criminal cases lodged against Afzal. The first case against him, of violation of Model Code of Conduct, was lodged in 1996; interestingly, the last case lodged against him, in 2014 at Chandauli district, is also the same charge.In between 2005 and 2007, Afzal was booked in three murder cases, including Krishnanand Rai’s, and one case of UP Gangsters’ Act. In the first murder case lodged at Mohammadabad police station in Ghazipur in 2005, the police found he had been wrongly named and gave him a clean chit. In the Krishnanand Rai case, an appeal against his acquittal is pending. The third murder case was expunged as it was found that the allegation against Afzal was false.It was in the Gangster Act case that a court sentenced Afzal on Saturday.

'Brains' of the family, guilty by association due to brother Mukhtar, say supporters
After surviving PFI ban, SDPI hopes to open political account with a Mysuru seatPremium Story
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

The Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) office in Mysuru’s Udayagiri seems muted for a campaign day, ahead of the May 10 Karnataka Assembly polls. About 30 party workers trail in as 53-year-old Abdul Majeed, a key Karnataka SDPI leader who was instrumental in building up the party cadre among the Muslim community in the city, enters at 10 am.The SDPI was the only affiliated outfit of the radical Popular Front of India (PFI) to escape the ban on it, and months later, it is struggling to keep its feet planted in the state. Of the 16 seats it is contesting across Karnataka, after a scaling down of ambitions, Narasimharaja constituency in Mysuru from where Majeed is contesting is where it has the best prospects of registering a presence.After the day is planned – speech venues, meetings with community organisations, a television appearance – the group of 30 set off to visit segments of Narasimharaja.On several instances in the past, Majeed, also the SDPI president of Mysuru, has made headlines for his fiery, aggressive speeches. In March last year, after right-wing Hindu activists announced that they would perform religious rituals near Mangaluru’s Malali Mosque, claiming that it was built on a temple, he declared: “Not even a handful of mud of the Malali Masjid will be shared.”But, the opinion in Narasimharaja, a Congress bastion the SDPI leader contested the last two times too without winning, seems to be that Majeed has toned down his approach since his first election in 2013. That was the year the SDPI made its political debut in Karnataka as the PFI’s political outfit.A 45-year-old trader standing close to the SDPI office, who does not wish to be named, says: “Things have changed a lot from 2013. The kind of following Majeed had then was phenomenal and he could have even won. But he did not capitalise on it. Also, he has not been active in local areas. There was a time when huge groups of young Muslims would gather around and cheer as he spoke. But now you do not see the same Abdul Majeed or his followers.”Majeed, who is a B.Com graduate, too seems to agree. “It is true that I am not aggressive as I was in 2013. But you also look at the politics in the country… It has transformed in the last 10 years (of the Modi government at the Centre). I am aware of it, and as part of a strategy, I have toned down aggressive speeches. However when it comes to nation or state issues, my speeches will be aggressive. In the constituency, we are working with associations and organisations, they won’t be,” he says, admitting that he is betting on the fact that 60% of voters in the constituency are Muslim.In 2013, when the SDPI contested 24 seats in Karnataka in alliance with the BSP, Majeed had finished second in Narasimharaja, 9,000-odd votes behind three-time Congress MLA Tanveer Sait. But, in 2018, when the SDPI contested just three seats, Majeed got half of Sait’s votes with the BJP’s S Satheesh finishing ahead of the SDPI leader.All the three candidates are making a return in Narasimharaja this time.While the SDPI had announced as recently as the beginning of this month that it would field 100 candidates, it has ended up fielding only 16 (see map).Majeed distances the SDPI from the PFI, while saying the PFI ban won’t impact them. “The SDPI is an independent political party, with democratic and secular values, unlike the PFI. Among the candidates we have fielded, there are Hindus and a Christian as well.”The SDPI had been at the centre of the row in Karnataka when the state government banned hijab in pre-university colleges. The SDPI had extended its support to students who were fighting for their hijab rights and also participated in protests.Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai recently said hijab and halal – which has also seen Hindutva protests — will not be an election issue. However, Majeed does not agree, stressing that these will matter, especially in the coastal districts. “Muslims were hurt by the state government act going against the constitutional rights of citizens. Even the Congress did not stand with the students or the Muslim community, only we did. It will help us during the elections.”A Congress insider concedes Majeed will get a good amount of Muslim votes, but says his only chance of a win is if there is “a revolt within the constituency’s Congress unit” — of which there is a possibility.The leader adds: “Ayub Khan, a former mayor of Mysuru City Corporation, has been waiting to get the Congress ticket from Narasimharaja for two terms, but this time also he was disappointed. Before he was fielded again, Sait had announced political retirement. This had brought hopes to Ayub Khan’s supporters, but then the Congress gave the ticket to Sait.”The only time the BJP made a mark here was in 1994, in the wake of the Babri Masjid demolition, when the party’s Maruthirao Pawar had won.

After surviving PFI ban, SDPI hopes to open political account with a Mysuru seatPremium Story
PM Modi’s inability to better India’s political culture is one of his biggest failuresPremium Story
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

Until the Congress President called the Prime Minister a poisonous snake last week, the campaign for Karnataka was on such predictable lines as to become a big fat bore. The BJP offered voters its usual mixture of aggressive Hindutva and that dream of a ‘new India’ that Narendra Modi assures us will soon make India an economic superpower. And, from the Congress Party’s star campaigners, Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi, came the usual charges of corruption against Modi, the usual promise of freebies and the usual reminders of ‘sacrifices’ made by long gone ancestors.As I listened to Rahul make reckless promises of free travel and pocket money for Karnataka’s women and Priyanka bang on about her ‘Dadi’, I understood why every time these siblings make a speech Modi gets a few more votes. He is a clever enough politician to know that when an election campaign begins, the best strategy is to pick on your opponents’ weaknesses. So, the gist of nearly every speech he has made is that dynastic democracy ‘parivaarvaad’ is directly linked to corruption because when politicians bring their families into politics it is with personal profit in mind and not public service. Rahul, alas, continues to concentrate on Modi’s strengths. In election after election, he has tried to paint Modi as corrupt and greedy. These are charges that do not stick because whatever Modi’s other flaws, and there are many, nobody seriously believes that he is personally corrupt.Why has nobody advised Congress leaders to focus instead on the criminals that fill the ranks of the BJP? How can Modi promise a ‘new India’ when the worst people from that old India continue to thrive? The wrestlers’ protest in Jantar Mantar remained unheard in the highest echelons of the ruling party for so long because the man they charge with sexual exploitation is a ‘baahubali’ from Uttar Pradesh and this makes him more than just an MP.Ever since that superhit Telugu film called ‘Baahubali’, there is an aura of heroism attached to this word when the ugly truth is that in political terms it means a gangster. Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, who heads the Wrestling Federation of India, was not the only gangster in the news last week.In Bihar, the chief minister who was once called Mr. Good Governance (Sushasan Babu) shamelessly tweaked a law that forbade remission to those who murdered public officials, just to release the murderer of a district magistrate. So powerful is this thug that when he was in jail his constituency was saved for him by handing it to his wife. And Anand Mohan Singh’s son adorns the Bihar legislature’s treasury benches.What makes gangsters so powerful in Indian politics? Simple. They use guns and terror to force people to vote for them. Nitish Kumar should hang his head in shame for releasing a man who incited a mob to kill a high official by tearing him to pieces in public. This murderer certainly did not deserve remission but if you can shorten the sentences of Bilkis Bano’s rapists, who also smashed her baby girl to death, then how can the BJP dare object to what just happened in Bihar?Modi’s inability to change India’s political culture for the better is one of his biggest failures but this never becomes an election issue because there is not a political leader who can throw the first stone. But there are other failures that can and should be raised. Of these possibly the two biggest are that during his long tenure, when the BJP has ruled most major states, there has been no improvement in government schools. And a statistic that showed up on social media last week says that the only country that has fewer doctors per thousand people than India is Mali. What is the use of boasting about having organized the largest COVID vaccination programme in the world if we cannot give people basic healthcare?Every state election this year is going to be seen as a rehearsal for the general election that will happen at about this time next year. And as a reckless optimist, I keep hoping that it is real issues like schools and hospitals that will come up. But from the campaign in Karnataka, we can be sure we will be forced to choose in 2024 between those who offer us temples and belligerent religiosity and those who offer us the glory of dead leaders and the stench of dead ideas. Does it really matter who wins Karnataka? Probably not.What does matter is who wins the general election and those who predict that Narendra Modi will become prime minister again are almost certainly right. He may not have succeeded yet in creating that ‘new India’ he bangs on about but what he has certainly achieved is to sell ordinary people the dream of a prosperous, developed India. It might remain an impossible dream, but a dream is better than offering voters tales of heroism, sacrifice, and glory from a past that was not that heroic or glorious. When voters decide who to vote for, they are more interested in the future than the past and this is something that the Congress Party appears not to have discovered yet. By the time its ruling family decides to change course it could be too late, but it would help if the Congress President minded his language.

PM Modi’s inability to better India’s political culture is one of his biggest failuresPremium Story
  • Tavleen Singh writes: PM Modi’s inability to better India’s political culture is one of his biggest failuresPremium Story
  • The Indian Express

    Until the Congress President called the Prime Minister a poisonous snake last week, the campaign for Karnataka was on such predictable lines as to become a big fat bore. The BJP offered voters its usual mixture of aggressive Hindutva and that dream of a ‘new India’ that Narendra Modi assures us will soon make India an economic superpower. And, from the Congress Party’s star campaigners, Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi, came the usual charges of corruption against Modi, the usual promise of freebies and the usual reminders of ‘sacrifices’ made by long gone ancestors.As I listened to Rahul make reckless promises of free travel and pocket money for Karnataka’s women and Priyanka bang on about her ‘Dadi’, I understood why every time these siblings make a speech Modi gets a few more votes. He is a clever enough politician to know that when an election campaign begins, the best strategy is to pick on your opponents’ weaknesses. So, the gist of nearly every speech he has made is that dynastic democracy ‘parivaarvaad’ is directly linked to corruption because when politicians bring their families into politics it is with personal profit in mind and not public service. Rahul, alas, continues to concentrate on Modi’s strengths. In election after election, he has tried to paint Modi as corrupt and greedy. These are charges that do not stick because whatever Modi’s other flaws, and there are many, nobody seriously believes that he is personally corrupt.Why has nobody advised Congress leaders to focus instead on the criminals that fill the ranks of the BJP? How can Modi promise a ‘new India’ when the worst people from that old India continue to thrive? The wrestlers’ protest in Jantar Mantar remained unheard in the highest echelons of the ruling party for so long because the man they charge with sexual exploitation is a ‘baahubali’ from Uttar Pradesh and this makes him more than just an MP.Ever since that superhit Telugu film called ‘Baahubali’, there is an aura of heroism attached to this word when the ugly truth is that in political terms it means a gangster. Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, who heads the Wrestling Federation of India, was not the only gangster in the news last week.In Bihar, the chief minister who was once called Mr. Good Governance (Sushasan Babu) shamelessly tweaked a law that forbade remission to those who murdered public officials, just to release the murderer of a district magistrate. So powerful is this thug that when he was in jail his constituency was saved for him by handing it to his wife. And Anand Mohan Singh’s son adorns the Bihar legislature’s treasury benches.What makes gangsters so powerful in Indian politics? Simple. They use guns and terror to force people to vote for them. Nitish Kumar should hang his head in shame for releasing a man who incited a mob to kill a high official by tearing him to pieces in public. This murderer certainly did not deserve remission but if you can shorten the sentences of Bilkis Bano’s rapists, who also smashed her baby girl to death, then how can the BJP dare object to what just happened in Bihar?Modi’s inability to change India’s political culture for the better is one of his biggest failures but this never becomes an election issue because there is not a political leader who can throw the first stone. But there are other failures that can and should be raised. Of these possibly the two biggest are that during his long tenure, when the BJP has ruled most major states, there has been no improvement in government schools. And a statistic that showed up on social media last week says that the only country that has fewer doctors per thousand people than India is Mali. What is the use of boasting about having organized the largest COVID vaccination programme in the world if we cannot give people basic healthcare?Every state election this year is going to be seen as a rehearsal for the general election that will happen at about this time next year. And as a reckless optimist, I keep hoping that it is real issues like schools and hospitals that will come up. But from the campaign in Karnataka, we can be sure we will be forced to choose in 2024 between those who offer us temples and belligerent religiosity and those who offer us the glory of dead leaders and the stench of dead ideas. Does it really matter who wins Karnataka? Probably not.What does matter is who wins the general election and those who predict that Narendra Modi will become prime minister again are almost certainly right. He may not have succeeded yet in creating that ‘new India’ he bangs on about but what he has certainly achieved is to sell ordinary people the dream of a prosperous, developed India. It might remain an impossible dream, but a dream is better than offering voters tales of heroism, sacrifice, and glory from a past that was not that heroic or glorious. When voters decide who to vote for, they are more interested in the future than the past and this is something that the Congress Party appears not to have discovered yet. By the time its ruling family decides to change course it could be too late, but it would help if the Congress President minded his language.

Man held for ‘faking’ PMO access lent money to J&K L-G, got OK for subsidyPremium Story
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

SANJAY Prakash Rai ‘Sherpuria,’ who was arrested by the Special Task Force of the Uttar Pradesh Police Tuesday, for allegedly faking his access to the Prime Minister’s Office and fraudulently “misusing” the PM’s name for personal gain, had lent Rs 25 lakh to Lieutenant Governor of Jammu & Kashmir Manoj Sinha before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.Sinha declared this as an “unsecured” loan in his election affidavit. Sinha was elected to Lok Sabha from Ghazipur, UP, in 2014 but in 2019 he lost to Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) candidate Afzal Ansari.He was appointed Governor of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2020, almost a year after the state was split and Article 370 was abrogated.Sinha’s 2019 Lok Sabha election affidavit mentions five “unsecured” loans adding up to Rs 57 lakh. The loan from Sherpuria is the highest — there are loans of Rs 3 lakh, Rs 6 lakh, Rs 8 lakh and Rs 15 lakh from four other individuals.Sinha, who had been elected as MP from Ghazipur in 1996 and 1999, was quite politically active in the area even after he lost the Lok Sabha polls in 2019. But after his appointment as L-G of Jammu & Kashmir, given his Constitutional position, he has stayed away from party activities.The Indian Express sent a detailed questionnaire to Sinha. He was unavailable for comment but a source close to him claimed that Sinha has had no contact with Rai since 2015-16.“The L-G was transparent and declared the money received as unsecured loan in the affidavit”, the source said. The source added that the L-G has “made many attempts to reach out to him and return the money,” but Rai has been unavailable.When contacted Bhanupratap Singh, president of Ghazipur district BJP, distanced the party from Rai.“Rai is neither a member nor an office bearer of the BJP. He used to visit Ghazipur and meet us but he has nothing to do with the party,” said Singh. A prominent BJP leader in Varanasi, who spoke on the condition that he not be named, said: “Rai was known for his proximity to senior party leaders and whenever he came here, local party leaders regularly met him.”

Man held for ‘faking’ PMO access lent money to J&K L-G, got OK for subsidyPremium Story
'None of us are in the CM race. Only Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar are': Jarkiholi
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) working president Satish Jarkiholi is a three-time legislator from Yemkanmardi, a constituency in Belagavi district reserved for the Scheduled Tribe (ST) community. In an interview, he tells The Indian Express that the BJP government’s new reservation policy would not cause a major shift in the SC-ST vote to the ruling party. The “insult” the BJP has meted out to Lingayat leaders will benefit the Congress as some of these politicians have joined the Opposition party, Jarkiholi says, but adds, “It is not possible that the votes will swing completely in our favour.”Excerpts:The Congress had a higher vote share than the BJP in 2018, but it won fewer seats.Jarkiholi: Without a doubt, we will secure more votes than we did last time. The number of seats will also increase as is being indicated by various surveys and the party cadre on the ground. People have decided to give the Congress another opportunity. We will definitely secure a simple majority.Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai claims the new reservation policy will help the BJP, with SC/ST communities now supporting it. You are an ST leader. How do you see it?Jarkiholi: Irrespective of the benefits they perceive, communities which have backed one party for years will not shift their loyalties in a go. For 70 years, these communities have benefited from the Congress. Similarly, those who think BJP policies have helped them will not return to the Congress immediately.People may say there has been some benefit, but it was we who gave reservation in the first place. These communities have benefited from it since Independence. Therefore, there would not be a major swing in the votes of these communities (due to the reservation policy). Swing, if any, will be marginal.There is a lot of discussion on wooing Lingayats or having a Lingayat CM. Does this focus on one community affect other communities?Jarkiholi: Nothing like that. The Lingayat issue is being discussed because the BJP has thrown out many Lingayat leaders without giving them a ticket. There is a lot of talk about how the BJP insulted those leaders and wants to finish them.It is not certain how much the Congress will benefit, until the elections are over. But, due to the induction of senior Lingayat leaders, there will be a small shift in votes in our favour. But, it is not possible that the votes will completely move to us.The BJP had projected (Cabinet) minister B Sriramulu as the deputy CM candidate in the last election, but now he is largely sidelined. The party has now roped in actor Kichha Sudeep, who belongs to an ST community.Jarkiholi: This is the BJP’s strategy — those who take the lead in one election are sidelined in the next one. Once a leader is in the BJP, they do not care about them. They try to attract other leaders. Once the vote bank of a particular community is secured (with the help of a leader), then the person is ignored.There are a lot of CM aspirants in the Congress, including Opposition leader Siddaramaiah and KPCC president D K Shivakumar. Congress leader M B Patil has said he is also an aspirant. Are you an aspirant too?Jarkiholi: No, I do not have any claim to the post at all. Our only objective is to ensure that the Congress forms the government. None of us are in the CM race. Only Siddaramaiah and D K Shivakumar are.What are the top issues in this election?Jarkiholi: Inflation, lack of development and rampant corruption have been prominent under BJP rule. These factors will definitely help us.The Congress has made several guarantees to voters. Have they resonated with voters?Jarkiholi: We have got very good feedback. Various sections of society, especially the poor, are attracted to our assurances. They feel that it will help them lead a better life. They have come to a decision (to vote for us).What is your view on the prospects of the JD(S)?Jarkiholi: The JD(S) has its presence largely in the old Mysore region. We have to wait and see. All surveys have said they will win 25 to 30 seats or around the number of seats they won in 2018 (39).

'None of us are in the CM race. Only Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar are': Jarkiholi
  • Congress working president Satish Jarkiholi: ‘None of us are in the CM race. Only Siddaramaiah and D K Shivakumar are’
  • The Indian Express

    Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) working president Satish Jarkiholi is a three-time legislator from Yemkanmardi, a constituency in Belagavi district reserved for the Scheduled Tribe (ST) community. In an interview, he tells The Indian Express that the BJP government’s new reservation policy would not cause a major shift in the SC-ST vote to the ruling party. The “insult” the BJP has meted out to Lingayat leaders will benefit the Congress as some of these politicians have joined the Opposition party, Jarkiholi says, but adds, “It is not possible that the votes will swing completely in our favour.”Excerpts:The Congress had a higher vote share than the BJP in 2018, but it won fewer seats.Jarkiholi: Without a doubt, we will secure more votes than we did last time. The number of seats will also increase as is being indicated by various surveys and the party cadre on the ground. People have decided to give the Congress another opportunity. We will definitely secure a simple majority.Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai claims the new reservation policy will help the BJP, with SC/ST communities now supporting it. You are an ST leader. How do you see it?Jarkiholi: Irrespective of the benefits they perceive, communities which have backed one party for years will not shift their loyalties in a go. For 70 years, these communities have benefited from the Congress. Similarly, those who think BJP policies have helped them will not return to the Congress immediately.People may say there has been some benefit, but it was we who gave reservation in the first place. These communities have benefited from it since Independence. Therefore, there would not be a major swing in the votes of these communities (due to the reservation policy). Swing, if any, will be marginal.There is a lot of discussion on wooing Lingayats or having a Lingayat CM. Does this focus on one community affect other communities?Jarkiholi: Nothing like that. The Lingayat issue is being discussed because the BJP has thrown out many Lingayat leaders without giving them a ticket. There is a lot of talk about how the BJP insulted those leaders and wants to finish them.It is not certain how much the Congress will benefit, until the elections are over. But, due to the induction of senior Lingayat leaders, there will be a small shift in votes in our favour. But, it is not possible that the votes will completely move to us.The BJP had projected (Cabinet) minister B Sriramulu as the deputy CM candidate in the last election, but now he is largely sidelined. The party has now roped in actor Kichha Sudeep, who belongs to an ST community.Jarkiholi: This is the BJP’s strategy — those who take the lead in one election are sidelined in the next one. Once a leader is in the BJP, they do not care about them. They try to attract other leaders. Once the vote bank of a particular community is secured (with the help of a leader), then the person is ignored.There are a lot of CM aspirants in the Congress, including Opposition leader Siddaramaiah and KPCC president D K Shivakumar. Congress leader M B Patil has said he is also an aspirant. Are you an aspirant too?Jarkiholi: No, I do not have any claim to the post at all. Our only objective is to ensure that the Congress forms the government. None of us are in the CM race. Only Siddaramaiah and D K Shivakumar are.What are the top issues in this election?Jarkiholi: Inflation, lack of development and rampant corruption have been prominent under BJP rule. These factors will definitely help us.The Congress has made several guarantees to voters. Have they resonated with voters?Jarkiholi: We have got very good feedback. Various sections of society, especially the poor, are attracted to our assurances. They feel that it will help them lead a better life. They have come to a decision (to vote for us).What is your view on the prospects of the JD(S)?Jarkiholi: The JD(S) has its presence largely in the old Mysore region. We have to wait and see. All surveys have said they will win 25 to 30 seats or around the number of seats they won in 2018 (39).

SC quashes criminal case against Parkash Singh Badal, his son; says summons issued was ‘abuse of process of law’
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

The Supreme Court Friday quashed criminal proceedings against Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) patriarch Parkash Singh Badal, who died two days ago, and his son Sukhbir Singh Badal in a forgery case, saying the summons issued by the trial court was “nothing but abuse of process of law”.A bench of Justices M R Shah and C T Ravikumar, which had reserved its verdict on a batch of pleas filed by Badals and senior Akali leader Daljit Singh Cheema on April 11, quashed the summons issued by the Hoshiarpur trial court in Punjab and upheld by the Punjab and Haryana High Court.“The summoning order passed by the trial court against the appellants (Badals and Cheema) is nothing but abuse of process of law,” Justice Shah, who pronounced the verdict on behalf of the bench said.Akali stalwart Parkash Singh Badal died on Wednesday at a private hospital in Mohali. He was 95. The Badals and Cheema had moved the top court challenging the August 2021 order of the Punjab and Haryana High Court refusing to quash the summons against them by additional chief judicial magistrate, Hoshiarpur in a private complaint filed by Social activist Balwant Singh Khera on the charges of forgery, cheating and concealing facts.Khera had filed a complaint in 2009 alleging that the SAD has two constitutions — one that it submitted to the Gurdwara Election Commission for registration as a party to manage gurdwaras and the other to the Election Commission of India (ECI) to seek recognition as a political party. He contended it amounted to cheating.On April 11, the top court had said merely being religious does not mean a person cannot be secular.It had reserved its verdict on a batch of pleas filed by Badals challenging summons issued against them in an alleged forgery case.

SC quashes criminal case against Parkash Singh Badal, his son; says summons issued was ‘abuse of process of law’
Congress files police complaint against Amit Shah for 'spreading hate, making false statements'
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

With Karnataka polls around the corner, Congress leaders Randeep Singh Surjewala, Dr Parmeshwar and DK Shivakumar on Wednesday filed a police complaint in Bengaluru’s High Grounds police station against Union Home Minister Amit Shah for allegedly “spreading enmity and hatred, knowingly making false statements and attempting to malign the opposition”.“Amit Shah claimed that there will be communal riots in Karnataka if Congress comes to power. Shah also claimed that Congress has promised to remove the ban on PFI. Both these claims tantamount to spreading hatred, disrupting communal harmony and attributing false motives to the Indian National Congress,” Surjewala told reporters in a briefing, citing the Home Minister’s recent speech in the poll-bound state.On Tuesday, at a rally in Terdal, Bagalkot district, Shah attacked the Opposition and said, “If the Congress is voted even by mistake, then it will lead to all-time high corruption, appeasement and all-time high dynastic politics, and the entire state will suffer from riots.”He went on, “This election is not just to make our candidates MLAs or ministers … This election is to hand over the future of the state to Modi ji. This election is to make Karnataka a fully developed state.”Countering Shah’s speech, Congress leader Siddaramaiah had stated, “In a democratic system, citizens vote for such representatives who serve them rather than those who are slaves to rulers. Amit Shah, you have not only insulted the democratic set-up but also self-respecting Kannadigas.” 

Congress files police complaint against Amit Shah for 'spreading hate, making false statements'
Karnataka Election: BJP Faces Tough Contest For First Time In This Party Stronghold In 2 Decades
Ndtv | 1 month ago | |
Ndtv
1 month ago | |

Karnataka election: Ramesh Jarkiholi is contesting on a BJP ticket from Gokak.Belagavi: Belagavi district with the second highest number of assembly seats after Bengaluru Urban -- is expected to face a tough contest between the BJP and Congress as Lingayat politics surmounts the local issues, but the Maharashtra Ekikaran Samiti (MES) could play spoilsport in a few seats as it wants to keep the border issue alive.There are 18 assembly constituencies in the border district which is a Lingayat stronghold and has been a BJP stronghold in the last two decades.As in the last three elections, it is likely to be a straight contest between the BJP and Congress in most of the assembly seats barring five where the Shiv Sena-NCP supported MES -- a vocal proponent of the inclusion of Belagavi and other Marathi-speaking areas in Maharashtra -- has fielded local candidates.The leadership vacuum in the Lingayat community after sidelining of stalwart leader B S Yediyurappa, deaths of some prominent local Lingayat BJP leaders like Suresh Angadi and Umesh Katti and the rising clout of politically influencial Jarkiholi family belonging to scheduled tribes community -- are expected to resonate among voters.The exit of many disgruntled BJP leaders including three-time MLA and former Deputy Chief Minister Laxman Savadi from Belagavi, over denial of the ticket for the upcoming assembly election -- is likely to dent some votes here.On the other hand, MES is trying hard to keep the border issue alive in Belagavi, which was part of the erstwhile Bombay Presidency and constitutes nearly 40 per cent Marathi-speaking population. The triangular fight could dent votes of national parties in five Marathi-speaking dominated constituencies.Five of the constituencies in the district are dominated by Marathas, while Lingayats form a majority in most of the 13 remaining constituencies. There is a sizable population of OBCs and SCs/STs as well, with two seats reserved for these groups in the district.In the district, where many elected representatives are sugar barons, three powerful political families -- the Jharkiholis, the Jolles and the Khattis -- enjoy electoral dominance.From the Jharkiholi family, Ramesh Jarkiholi and Balachandra Jarkiholi are contesting on a BJP ticket from Gokak and Arabhavi assembly constituencies, respectively. Another member of the family, Satish Jarkihol is contesting on a Congress ticket from theYemkanmardi seat.The Jarkiholi brothers are known to change parties. Ramesh Jarkiholi was a minister in the Congress-JD(S) coalition government before joining the BJP ranks. He was among the 17 MLAs who defected from the Congress and helped BJP to topple the Congress-JDS coalition government in 2019.His clout in the district is hard to ignore as he has ensured BJP ticket to his followers who defected from Congress, which has upset the traditional party leaders especially his political rival Laxman Savadi. Another prominent family are Jolles represented by the incumbent Muzrai (Religious and Charitable Endowments) minister Shashikala Jolle who is contesting on a BJP ticket from Nippani constituency. Her husband Anna Saheb Jolle is the BJP Lok Sabha member from Chikkodi in Belagavi district.From the Khatti family, Ramesh Khatti -- who represented the Chikkodi parliamentary constituency from 2009-2014 -- is contesting on a BJP ticket from the Chikkodi-Sadalga MLA seat this time, while his nephew Nikil Katti from Hukkeri assembly constituency after untimely death of his father Umesh Khatti, who was an eight time MLA and six time minister.After quitting BJP over denial of a ticket, Laxman Savadi is contesting on a Congress ticket from the Athani assembly seat to avenge his humiliation from the BJP, especially Ramesh Jarkiholi. He has to face Mahesh Kumathalli, then in the Congress, now the BJP nominee Ramesh has differences with some Congress leaders like Laxmi Hebbalkar who is contesting from Belagavi Rural seat. Both of them are contesting from different constituencies but are trying hard to defeat each other to settle personal grudges.PromotedListen to the latest songs, only on JioSaavn.comThere are 39.01 lakh voters in the 18 assembly constituencies of Belagavi district. Out of which, 19,68,928 are male voters, 19,32,576 women and 141 registered as Others, as per the official data.In the 2018 polls, the BJP won 10 and Congress 8 seats, which changed after the defections in 2019. Three Congress MLAs — Ramesh Jarkiholi (Gokak), Mahesh Kumathalli (Athani) and Shrimanth Patil (Kagwad) — resigned and joined the BJP.

Karnataka Election: BJP Faces Tough Contest For First Time In This Party Stronghold In 2 Decades
Raghav Chadha: ‘BJP sees AAP as its challenger nationally; only Kejriwal can take on PM Modi’Premium Story
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

Raghav Chadha is among the dynamic young leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), who has seen it grow both in Delhi and Punjab. His toughest challenge was to build the party organisation ground up in the Majha belt of Punjab, once the hotbed of militancy. Apart from manning election backrooms, Chadha has emerged as an articulate party spokesperson.We didn’t inherit a golden state. Everything was in a shambles — be it a fragile law and order situation, a bankrupt economy, defunct welfare schemes, poor infrastructure, schools and hospitals. In the past year, the Bhagwant Mann government has done some remarkable work. From starting 117 schools of excellence, to getting an adequate number of trained teachers and redoing the entire school infrastructure similar to what we had done in Delhi, we have kickstarted an education drive. In healthcare, we are strengthening the primary health care structure with more than 500 mohalla clinics. In terms of finances, Punjab had a debt of roughly Rs 3.75 lakh crore. But our excise revenue this financial year has increased by about 40 per cent. Our GST has increased by roughly 17 per cent and our income from property sale and registration has gone up by 78 per cent. This is unprecedented growth in the revenue stream of the government. So finances are being taken care of, revenue leakages are being plugged, compliance is being ensured. And all this has happened without any increment in the rate of taxes or any additional levies. As regards law and order, we have ended gun culture, busted 80 modules and cracked down on pro-Khalistani sympathisers. The government is developing low cost housing, townships, redoing cities, putting up sewage and water treatment plants. We’ve provided 300 units of free electricity. Anybody would tell you that they had not seen any government in the last four decades of the post-militancy era perform so much in their first year.Being a border state, Punjab has been critical for Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) which wants to destabilise it and Jammu and Kashmir for its ulterior motives. Amritpal is a factory-made product commissioned to tinker with the peace and harmony of the state. But we have  the right political will to counter them.Under the current BJP regime at the Centre, federalism has been thrown out of the window. We are struggling to get our Rural Development Fund of Rs 3,000-odd crore, which is our right. When it comes to national security, we work closely with the Centre. Politics should take a backseat. We have been receiving some support on this.Solving the drug menace is a multi-tier activity. When you curtail supply and when you nab the dealers, you also have to give a parallel healthcare support system to the addicts and help rehabilitate them. So, the government is working on both fronts. As you have seen that the government of Punjab petitioned the High Court on the previous sealed reports submitted by the SIT (Special Investigation Team). These sealed envelopes were never opened by successive governments for fear of the big fish tumbling out. Give us some more time.There is complete political will to get him. The Punjab Chief Minister himself comes from the artist fraternity and feels the pain of loss. In fact, the Punjab government has acted against those who didn’t surrender and counter-fired at the police, who were the principal attackers. We are in contact with the Central government, foreign law enforcement agencies, Interpol. Forget administration, we’re also his fans.Look, I have been fortunate enough to work with Bhagwant Mann for the longest time. I was his first friend and have assisted him in his first tenure as an MP since 2014, when I was assigned the responsibility of being the secretary of the parliamentary group of our four MPs. I’ve had a working and personal relationship with him all these years. I am being accused wrongly by the Opposition. I am not the super CM. I’m just the super brother of the super CM, that’s all.Quite frankly, there is a tried and tested model of governance in Delhi, which many states are learning from. The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin inspected schools in Delhi. If other state governments can borrow a leaf from our book, why can’t our own state government? There is a fantastic working relationship between the Punjab government and the Delhi government of Arvind Kejriwal.  The two states signed a knowledge-sharing agreement to learn from the best practices of each other.Allegedly he was there in Bathinda jail when these interviews were done but within a 100-metre radius around the jail, there is no network because jammers have been installed. So there cannot be a video call or an internet-based conversation or a VoIP call that can take place. The Punjab Police has already issued a clarification. We are given to understand it could be Rajasthan because he was there for a while.In Delhi, before the first financial year of this policy could be completed, active efforts were made by the Lieutenant Governor (LG) and the BJP-run MCD to stall its implementation. Shops were not permitted to be opened, stakeholders involved were denied permissions. Much before we could come out with the results of the increase in revenue, we saw cases being lodged and people being investigated for some alleged scam that happens to be only present in the minds of BJP leaders. Punjab is a full state, there was no interference from any stakeholder and a proper implementation of the policy took place. The policy wasn’t flawed, the BJP’s intent was. They could interfere in Delhi because it is not a full state; the Lieutenant Governor, the MCD and other stakeholders are involved.This is a classic misunderstanding. It was never withdrawn by the political executive. Every year, the excise policy of every state government is presented afresh when the budget is presented. When it came to renewing this policy, the LG stalled it, saying we had to revert to the old system. The political executive did not withdraw it.Work distribution and allocation of portfolios as per the Constitution are the responsibility of the Chief Minister. However, as a spectator, the size of the Delhi Cabinet is 10 per cent of the overall strength of the Delhi Legislative Assembly. It is just seven people, including the Chief Minister. But portfolios are many. So even if you were to equally divide them among these people, everyone would end up holding more than a dozen.  We have to increase the size and number of the constituencies, amend the Constitution, make 20 per cent of the MLAs as ministers. Quite frankly, it’s the prerogative of the Chief Minister.We have maintained from day one that the BJP’s objective is not to arrest just Manish Sisodia or Satyendar Jain or Raghav Chadha. The idea is to destroy AAP and its leader Arvind Kejriwal. The objective is not one alleged excise irregularity, the idea is to completely eliminate the AAP, the idea of the AAP. They perhaps think we’re the only challengers to the BJP. I have been saying this for a very long time, pre-Punjab and post-Punjab, that if there is one man that can challenge the might of the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, it is Arvind Kejriwal. BJP leaders fear only AAP and Kejriwal.  The only challenge they see at the pan-India level is Kejriwal because AAP has certain ingredients that other political parties lack. In Gujarat, where I was co-campaign in-charge, I came to know that the BJP’s national leadership had given a message to its people and cadres not to worry about the Congress, even if it won three to six seats more than what they got last time. But they were told to eliminate AAP.However, we have maintained that if you arrest one Sisodia, hundreds of Sisodias will come up. He is the name of an institution that has redefined Indian politics and school education. And by putting him behind bars, you can’t kill the institutional idea of him. He’ll be out soon.We’ve seen the blatant misuse of Central agencies over the last eight years. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has had only 23 convictions in the last eight years although it registered 3,550 new cases. This translates to a conviction rate of less than 0.05 per cent. With the pre-trial arrest being the only agenda of the ED, it is trying to eliminate the Opposition in general, and the AAP in particular, from Indian politics.AAP doesn’t think about filling spaces. We function as a family, we work together, live together, eat together, govern together. And the void that Mr Sisodia has left will be filled the moment he’s back in action. We have full faith in the judiciary. You will see the streetfighter he is once he is out.I’m not privy to the exact numbers and the metrics used. Having gone to villages over the last two-and-a-half years, the primary education is in a shambles. There are no schools. Even if school buildings exist, neither students nor teachers show up.A minimum educational qualification is mandated by the Election Commission. As a people’s party, we’re only advancing what people have been asking for a while.We no longer have the Anti-Corruption branch (ACB) with us unlike the first 49 days of our first term in 2013. The Sheila Dikshit-led Congress government had it for 15 years and prior to that, all chief ministers of Delhi had it. When we got into office in 2015, two key elements of administration were snatched from us. One was the services, which meant we couldn’t have a say in bureaucrats’ transfers and postings. The second was the ACB. Both these mechanisms now come under the jurisdiction of the LG. The Supreme Court has reserved its judgment on which office should have a say over these departments and we hope to have clarity in one month. With the full administration in Punjab, there’s a complete crackdown on corruption irrespective of the offender’s political colour or bureaucratic might. Chargesheets have been filed and people have been convicted.It is the Central government’s resolve to fight corruption that is being questioned. People are asking how, out of the total number of cases registered by the CBI, 95 per cent are against Opposition parties. The Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) of 2022 has been amended in such a manner that you can keep a person in jail for months under the garb of an investigation. Between 2014 and 2019, there has been a 1,000 per cent rise in the number of cases registered under this Act.It’s not about comparing one individual’s qualifications with another. The question before us is should the elected representative have a bare minimum education or not? Why is the BJP so scared? In fact, the LG recently made an obnoxious remark. He said a degree is only the receipt of the fee that you pay at a college. Is he belittling the entire education system of India?AAP’s individual strategy is not important, what is important is the collective strategy of the people of India to defeat the BJP.  If you rewind to 1977,  everyone got together — the socialists, communists, Jan Sangh and the people of India — under a strategy of pitting one candidate against the one Congress candidate and they ended up defeating the mighty Indira Gandhi. Something similar is required in 2024 to defeat the mighty BJP and Prime Minister Modi.  Unemployment is at a 45-year high, inflation at a 30-year high.  The average debt of a farmer has gone up by 53 per cent. More than 30 farmers commit suicide every day. The BJP polled about 31 per cent in 2014 and 39  per cent in 2019 as its overall vote share. That means more than 60 per cent of the population is voting against the BJP. The Opposition and people need to think about fragmentation of this vote.As somebody who considers Kejriwal as his mentor, leader, friend, philosopher and guide, I would certainly say that my leader is the only one who can take on the might of the BJP and PM Modi. A new brand, vocabulary and a new idea of politics is  required to challenge the BJP. If people like the alternative, they will vote.Not at all. It’s been a fantastic debut. A political party in its first outing in a state, where the BJP is considered invincible, wins five seats and gets 13 per cent of the vote. It becomes a national party. It’s a huge achievement. If you want to juxtapose this with 2017, you can draw a parallel with Punjab that year and Gujarat in 2022. A few years on, you should see AAP  in Gujarat.As somebody who’s been on foreign soil and been asked about domestic politics, I have maintained that we should not rake up domestic politics. When we go to a foreign country, we don’t go there as BJP or AAP or Congress leaders, we represent the country. Having said that, let’s not make a political leader’s questions about the conduct of the ruling party the same as questioning India’s credentials overseas.The existing collegium system has been upheld by the Supreme Court from 1992. Any attempt to tinker with the independence of the judiciary is per se unconstitutional. When names are sent by the collegium, they keep sitting on it and bargain with the judges. Then they will spoil the internal evaluation status of names suggested; they will manufacture reports and make a case to convince everybody the person is unfit to be a judge. Every right-thinking individual needs to oppose this.When communal violence happened in Delhi, ministers, MLAs and the CM were on the streets. We summoned the public policy head of Facebook. We took each of the stakeholders to task to ensure that peace and harmony are not tinkered with. We took a stand against bulldozer politics.Raghav Chadha is among the dynamic young leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), who has seen it grow both in Delhi and Punjab. His toughest challenge was to build the party organisation ground up in the Majha belt of Punjab, once the hotbed of militancy. AAP posted an overwhelming win in Punjab despite the strong footprint of both the Congress and Akali Dal. It was because of this success in Punjab that Chadha was sent to Gujarat as the co-campaign in-charge for the Assembly elections there. AAP may have got five seats but notched up a vote share of 13 per cent. Apart from manning election backrooms, Chadha has emerged as an articulate party spokesperson.

Raghav Chadha: ‘BJP sees AAP as its challenger nationally; only Kejriwal can take on PM Modi’Premium Story
Television to telescopic vision: Sambit Patra keeps Puri in sight
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra landed in hot soup recently over an unfortunate photo capturing him enjoying a meal all by himself at a poor tribal home in Jamuganda village under Puri Lok Sabha constituency, as three children looked on intently. However, Patra, the aspiring politician, won’t mind the attention.It was in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections that the BJP first threw the surgeon-turned-combative TV face of the party into the Puri poll ring. Patra got the ticket just a month before the polls, but his penchant in constantly remaining in the news, with eye-catching tactics like above, ensured he came within breathing distance of defeating the BJD’s sitting MP, Pinaki Mishra. As much a familiar TV face as Patra, Mishra won by a margin of just 11,714 votes, in a seat where the BJP did not have much organisational presence.This time, a year to go for the next Lok Sabha polls, Patra, 48, is already at work. If the meal at the tribal home was a wake-up call for his rivals, Patra on April 11 walked on a hot coal bed at Samang panchayat in Puri district as part of a ritual to appease the goddess at a local festival – not a feat for the faint-hearted.Even during his month-long campaign stint in 2019, Patra had gone the distance to shed the image of being an “outsider”. This included spending almost the entire April heat in traditional dhoti-kurta, a saffron gamcha thrown across his shoulders and sandalwood paste on his forehead; dropping in for meals at homes of his constituents; feeding at least one family with his own hands; spending nights at houses of voters; riding pillion on the back of motorcycles; joining fishermen in Puri slums in singing Telugu songs; and bathing in ponds to the chant of mantras, explaining: “People who bathe in tiled bathrooms cannot know the problems of villagers.”A picture of Patra carrying the idol of Lord Jagannath while campaigning had even led him into a minor scrap, with the Congress complaining to the Election Commission over the use of a religious symbol for polls.Referring to the above, a BJP leader said: “People may have trolled Patra on social media, but he connected with the people, and successfully countered the perception that he was a ‘Delhi neta’. Patra proved that he was a simple man and one of them.”Sources in the BJP said Patra has got a go-ahead from the central leadership to prepare to fight the Puri Lok Sabha seat again in 2024, and hence the recent flurry of activities. In recent days, he has spent more time in Puri than in Delhi.Surama Padhy, former BJP minister and an ex-MLA from Ranpur Assembly segment under Puri constituency, says Patra has “great acceptance” among people across all the seven Assembly constituencies in the Lok Sabha seat.“He has been visiting these constituencies despite having lost the seat. Voters here compare Patra to the BJD MP (Pinaki Mishra), who has not visited any village here once since winning,” Padhy says, confident that the BJP will do better in Puri in 2024.Besides, even while he himself lost, Patra’s efforts and the BJP’s growing popularity helped the party win two Assembly segments — Puri and Brahmagiri — under the Lok Sabha seat last time.BJP leaders also point to the fact that the party’s vote share in the Puri Lok Sabha constituency in 2019 saw a 25% rise over the previous general election.In 2014, the BJP’s Ashok Sahu had bagged 2.15 lakh votes, comprising 20.76% of the total. Patra got more than double: 5.26 lakh votes, or 46.37% of the total.BJD general secretary Bijay Nayak dismisses Patra’s efforts, saying the BJP national spokesperson was known for resorting to such “theatrics” and that people of Puri had given him a “befitting reply” in 2019.“We don’t need to do such antics as BJD leaders always connect with the people, as directed by our leader and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. We believe in hard work and our work always speaks. We remain with the people, which has been proven time and again as people of Odisha have blessed the leadership of Naveen Patnaik successively,” says Nayak.

Television to telescopic vision: Sambit Patra keeps Puri in sight
After a journalist’s killing, how his story exposing corruption came to lifeSign In to read
The Indian Express | 1 month ago | |
The Indian Express
1 month ago | |

“If you have to kill me, kill me. But I am telling you to your face: you won’t silence me.”It was with these words, spoken in a 37-minute Facebook live on July 21, 2022, that Colombian journalist Rafael Moreno defied his detractors and predicted his own demise.In the video, Moreno cites artificially inflated contracts, unfinished public works projects and companies profiting off rampant corruption and embezzlement.Three weeks prior to posting the video, Moreno found an anonymous note on his motorcycle, accompanied by a bullet. Months later, on October 16, 2022, just after 7 pm, Moreno was closing his bar and grill when a man wearing a baseball cap came into the restaurant. The man took out a revolver and fired three times at Moreno, killing him instantly. The assassin is still on the loose.Several days before his assassination, Moreno had been in contact with Forbidden Stories with the aim of joining the SafeBox Network, which allows threatened journalists to upload and protect their sensitive information. On October 7, 2022, Moreno started to share elements of the final investigation with the SafeBox Network team.Through ground reporting, Moreno had discovered that dozens of trucks were being driven out to a river abutting a national park in Cordoba, where, he said, they pilfered sand for use in public construction projects. All of it was illegal, Moreno said.In late September 2022, Moreno filmed himself, this time from what he believed to be the scene of the crime: a plot of land belonging to Carmen Aguas, the wife of Gabriel Calle, the patriarch of the Calle family – one of six families in the Cordoba area fighting over political influence.In a statement to the consortium, Gabriel Calle Demoya denied all responsibility for the extraction of sand.If the Calle family formed the basis of Moreno’s final investigation, the journalist’s white whale was another politician – Espedito Duque, who was, ironically, his mentor. Duque was elected in 2015 and Moreno came to work for the new mayor. In due course, he felt that the changes Duque had promised were slow to arrive. So, in December 2018, he made a career change, became a journalist, and launched Voces de Córdoba to investigate the excesses of the administration he once worked for. He started by analysing public contracts signed by Duque.Moreno’s work was made easier by the lax regulatory climate that followed the 2016 Peace Accords — signed between the Colombian government and rebels — which made public money easily accessible in areas like Puerto Libertador that were particularly affected by the more than 50-year armed conflict.In total, over $100 million has been invested in the five municipalities of the region since the accords. These were earmarked for use on more than 130 public works projects, including road repairs, education, and health care, as well as housing and energy infrastructure projects.Moreno published his investigations on his Facebook page. But this type of reporting also led to threats from local armed groups. These groups regularly take a cut of the money invested into public works, a sort of keep-the-peace tax Moreno called “la vacuna,” or “the vaccine”. That year, Moreno was designated as a target by an organized crime faction called the Caparrapos. Two years later, he was briefly kidnapped and interrogated by members of the Gulf Clan, an armed group that shares territory with the Caparrapos.In Moreno’s email inbox, the SafeBox Network discovered a key document: a formal administrative complaint he had filed against Espedito Duque and his cronies for “acts of corruption, embezzlement of public funds, influence trafficking and clientelism” on January 5, 2021. The 21-page alleges “various types of crimes against the public administration.” Moreno specifies the operative mechanism Duque put in place: creating “a certain number of structures” for his close friends and family and then contracting with them in order to “facilitate the appropriation of public resources.”Among the dozens of NGOs Moreno named in the complaint were two linked to Duque. One, Serviexpress ATP SAS, was founded by an individual close to Duque’s wife, Julieth Arroyo Montiel. Another, Renacer IPS SAS, represented by the son of a government employee who worked for Duque, obtained two contracts worth more than $75,000 dollars.As part of the Rafael Project, the Colombian investigative news outlet Cuestión Pública, which specialised in corruption and public abuse of power, and CLIP, a consortium of Latin American news outlets, picked up where Moreno left off. Their analysis shows that between 2016 and 2022, the Duque and Soto administrations signed 99 contracts with 13 businesspeople close to the Duque “clan,” contracts worth a combined $3 million dollars.Of those, just five companies, some of which had no prior experience with public markets, won 96 per cent of the total value. The majority of these companies belong to Martín Montiel Mendoza, who is close to Espedito Duque. Between 2016 and 2022, the mayor’s office signed 56 contracts, more than half of them by mutual agreement – meaning a public offer was never opened – with three companies owned by Mendoza, for a total of just under $1 million dollars.The first of these companies, Corporación Visión Juvenil, was formed as a nonprofit in 2014, just one and a half years before Duque’s election as mayor. As of this writing, the company has provided logistics solutions for sporting and cultural events, signing 36 contracts worth about $600,000 dollars. A second company, Innova Construcciones e Inmobiliaria, founded in 2017, signed four consecutive contracts with the mayor for managing parks, libraries and the municipal town hall. The first of these contracts was signed just 10 months after it was registered with the Chamber of Commerce. The third company, Serviexpress Colombia, was also created in 2017, and provides services including transport, advertising, human resources and assistance for elderly and handicapped people. Between 2019 and 2022, Serviexpress inked no fewer than 16 contracts for a total of $200,000 dollars, primarily for providing food and cleaning products to the mayor’s office.Montiel Mendoza did not respond to multiple requests for comment sent by the consortium.Cuestión Pública and CLIP also looked into the company that treats wastewater in Puerto Libertador, Agualcas. During a municipal plenary session, Moreno had identified a discrepancy between the number of streets with sewers in Puerto Libertador and the number shown in official maps released by the mayor’s office. Agualcas, which is supposed to furnish the infrastructure, nevertheless received various public contracts for installing sewers.The consortium’s investigation revealed that this company, too, was under the influence of the Duque “clan.” In the years since his election as mayor, this company has been owned by three people close to Duque, all of whom worked on his election campaigns. During this period, Agualcas benefitted from 13 public contracts worth around $800,000 dollars. Agualcas did not respond to multiple requests for comment.Researching municipal contracts, Cuestión Pública and CLIP were also able to identify a presumed associate of the infamous Gulf Clan – one of the groups believed to have been involved in the kidnapping of Moreno — among Duque’s entourage.For his part, Duque is allegedly thinking of running for election in Puerto Libertador this October. He did not respond to questions about his potential candidacy. Gabriel Calle Aguas, the son of the Calle “clan” Moreno had investigated, remains candidate for the regional governorship in those same elections. Only this time, the two are running without the sharp eyes of Rafael Moreno trained on them.

After a journalist’s killing, how his story exposing corruption came to lifeSign In to read