The designer is also accused of demanding Rs 10 crore from the Amruta Fadnavis. (File)Mumbai: A court in Mumbai on Monday granted bail to designer Anishka Jaisinghani, arrested for allegedly offering a bribe to Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis's wife Amruta for intervening in a criminal case and attempting to extort Rs 10 crore from her.Anishka Jaisinghani's bail plea was allowed by Additional Sessions Judge DD Almale.She was arrested by the police on March 16 after a case was filed at the Malabar Hill police station in south Mumbai on February 20 on a complaint of Amruta Fadnavis.The designer is also accused of demanding Rs 10 crore from the latter, according to the police.Anishka Jaisinghani has denied all the charges.In the bail plea, she had claimed the FIR (first information report) against her was based on "concocted and fictitious facts" to falsely implicate her.The arrest and consequent remand of the applicant to the police custody was in total violation of the tenets of the Constitution and the procedure of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPc), said the bail application filed through advocate Manan Sanghai.Based on Amruta Fadnavis's complaint, the police had registered a case against Aniksha and her father Anil Jaisinghani, a suspected bookie.They have been booked under IPC sections related to conspiracy, extortion and also provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.PromotedListen to the latest songs, only on JioSaavn.comThe police have claimed 17 cases were pending against Anil Jaisinghani, who was arrested from Gujarat and was currently in judicial custody.(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
The police produced Aniksha before sessions court judge DD Almale at the end of her previous remand.Mumbai: A court in Mumbai on Friday sent Aniksha Jaisinghani, arrested for allegedly offering a bribe to Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis's wife Amruta and also threatening her, to 14-day judicial custody, turning down the cops' plea to extend her police remand.Aniksha was arrested by the city police on March 16 based on a case filed at Malabar Hill police station on February 20 on the complaint of Amruta Fadnavis. She is also accused of demanding extortion of Rs 10 crore from the latter.The police produced Aniksha before sessions court judge DD Almale at the end of her previous remand.The police, represented by special public prosecutor Ajay Misar, sought her custody for three more days to confront her with a witness.Aniksha's lawyer Manan Sanghai submitted that no new ground was made out for extending the police remand.The court, after hearing both sides, rejected the investigators' plea and remanded the accused in judicial custody.Police have also arrested her father and suspected bookie Anil Jaisinghani and their relative Nirmal Jaisinghani in connection with the case. The duo are in police custody till March 27. They have been booked under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections for conspiracy and extortion and provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.As per the FIR, Aniksha was in touch with Amruta Fadnavis for the past 16 months and also visited her residence.In her statement to the police, Ms Fadnavis said she first met Aniksha in November 2021. Aniksha claimed that she was a designer of clothes, jewellery and footwear and requested the BJP leader's wife to wear them at public events saying it would help her promote the products, the police have said.After gaining Amruta's trust, Aniksha offered to provide her with information on some bookies through which, she claimed, they could make money. She then directly offered Amruta Rs 1 crore to get her father off the hook in a police case, as per the FIR.Ms Fadnavis also told the police that she was upset by Aniksha's behaviour and blocked her number, the police said.PromotedListen to the latest songs, only on JioSaavn.comThe woman then allegedly sent Amruta video clips, voice notes and many messages from an unknown number. She and her father indirectly threatened and conspired against Ms Fadnavis, said the official citing the FIR. (Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
As the police began its crackdown on Waris Punjab De and its chief Amritpal Singh in Punjab last week, many sought to draw parallels between the present situation in the state and that of the early 1980s. But nothing could further from the truth. Those were very different times. But then, like now, there was a chase of sorts.It was in September 1981 that the Punjab Police decided to arrest Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, head of the Sikh seminary Damdami Taksal, for his alleged role in the conspiracy to assassinate Lala Jagat Narain, a Member of Parliament, and chief editor and proprietor of the Jalandhar-based Hind Samachar Group of papers, who was shot dead on September 9.The arrest warrants were issued on September 12, and a team of the Punjab Police led by DIG D S Mangat was sent to Chando Kalan in Hisar, Haryana, where Bhindranwale was camping, to arrest him. But Bhindranwale, who got wind of the impending action, managed to rush back to his headquarters at Chowk Mehta in Amritsar, overnight, without being stopped anywhere by the Haryana Police. The free run for 200 km also gave rise to the speculation that the Harayana Police deliberately let him go because they didn’t want any trouble in their state.Prof Jagroop Singh Sekhon, a political observer with a long academic career at Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, remembers how Bhindranwale’s eventual arrest took place against the backdrop of the battle of political one-upmanship between then Union home minster Giani Zail Singh and Punjab chief minister Darbara Singh, both from the Congress party. The latter negotiated with Bhindranwale for his surrender, who put up a list of preconditions.In his book, Turmoil in Punjab, Ramesh Inder Singh, who was then deputy commissioner of Amritsar in 1984, wrote how Bhindranwale refused to have anything to do with DIG J S Anand, who was first sent by the state government for a dialogue on his arrest, just because he had trimmed his beard and was hence not a ‘pure’ Sikh. The state government acceded to his demands, and sent an SP-rank officer who met Bhindranwale’s standards and got him to agree to surrender on September 20. That day also saw what is arguably the first case of indiscriminate firing by militants at Jalandhar in which four persons were killed.The preacher declared that he wanted to be taken to the Golden Temple to pay his obeisance and take a dip in the holy sarovar before he is arrested.Accordingly, a senior DIG-rank police officer drove him to the temple and back before daybreak on September 20. By then, a mammoth crowd had gathered at Chowk Mehta near Amritsar, headquarters of the Damdami Taksal, and leaders cutting across party lines gave fiery speeches lauding Bhindranwale.Upon his arrest, the crowd, already fired up by the speeches, turned violent and clashed with the police, which opened fire, killing eight persons.Ramesh Inder Singh writes that then CM Darbara Singh, apprehending trouble, had requested for Army help, both from the Centre and the Western Command, but did not get it.High drama surrounded Bhindranwale’s imprisonment as well. In his book, Living a Life, Ravi Sawhney, a former Punjab bureaucrat, recounts the state’s flip-flop on the plans laid out to make a it a smooth affair. Since the news got out that he would be held in the Ludhiana district jail, a large number of people turned out to welcome him. There was an air of festivity with welcome arches at the entrance of the city.Sawhney, who was then deputy commissioner of Ludhiana, says he decided that they would divert Bhindranwale’s car from the convoy bringing him to Ludhiana and hold him in a secluded guesthouse. But this plan was shelved half an hour before Bhindranwale’s arrival when he was told by the then SSP that there were orders from the state police chief to let the preacher’s car enter Ludhiana along with a convoy of police vehicles. Sawhney writes how he called up the CM, who, in turn, told him that the orders had come from none other than Giani Zail Singh. As expected, the convoy turned into a procession as people followed it in various modes of transport and pro-Bhindranwale slogans filled the air.As demanded by him, Bhindranwale was escorted by Gurdaspur SSP Chahal, who came with a list of instructions given by the preacher. Sawhney writes, “Bhindranwale was still sitting in the Ambassador car with two companions when Chahal came across to where the Deputy Inspector General, Police, Patiala Range, SSP Bhatti and I were discussing security arrangements to convey the conditions Bhindranwale had attached to his surrender.”In his book, Sawhney then goes on to list Bhindranwale’s conditions:1. Two companions, his cook and his sewak, would stay with him2. When he is interrogated, it must be only by a gursikh (a Sikh who observes all five tenets of Sikhism)3. When he is interrogated, he should be sitting at the same level or higher but not lower than the interrogator and4. If he chooses not to answer any question, no third degree method should be used.“I listened aghast and quipped to Chahal, ‘Who is under arrest, Bhindranwale or the Punjab government?,’” wrote Sawhney.Later, the police failed to find any evidence against Bhindranwale and he was set free on October 15, 1981. The state, however, continued its descent to violence that consumed it for over a decade.
The political import of Rahul Gandhi’s two-year conviction in a defamation case is not merely for Rahul himself. The story of his disqualification from Parliament is about the further shrinking of the the Opposition space — and, ironically, under “due process” of law.In the run-up to the 2019 elections, Rahul had said, “Nirav Modi, Lalit Modi, Narendra Modi…how come they all have Modi as common surname. How come all the thieves have Modi as a common surname?”The BJP says Rahul needs to be punished for his tendency to get carried away and that the law must follow its course. Rahul has gone over the top in his political formulations on more than one occasion rather than make nuanced observations.Yet, the fact is that a lot is said in poll heat. A maximum punishment of two years that disqualifies an MP has huge political consequences in a democratic set-up. Especially in a cacophonous democracy like ours, where politicians get carried away during an election campaign.And if individuals and parties take legal recourse in every instance, there will be no end to those who get disqualified from the legislature to which they were elected by the people of India.The disqualification is a setback to Rahul and the Congress party but, even more important, it is a message to all Opposition leaders to carefully vet their words before speaking – or some judge in some part of India can take note and can end their membership of Parliament or Assembly.As it is, worryingly, FIRs have recently been lodged against two printers in Delhi for printing anti-Modi posters with the tagline, “Modi hatao, desh bachao”. Could the Surat verdict now send its own message to printers in small town, and big town, India: “Opposition ka poster mat chhapo” or else there will be trouble.It is unclear what political advantage accrues to the BJP from Rahul’s disqualification in the last year before general elections. Even though his Bharat Jodo Yatra had traction, it’s not as if he was set to dethrone Narendra Modi in 2024, who, as things stand, seems set to come back.Rahul is no VP Singh who dethroned his father Rajiv Gandhi in 1989 to replace him as PM.The disqualification of Rahul — unless the Surat verdict and the sentence get stayed or reduced —could paradoxically make it easier for the Opposition parties to make common cause. Some, who are not dependent on the Congress to run their governments in the states, like Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress, Arvind Kejriwal’s AAP, or K Chandrashekhar Rao’s BRS, have chafed against working under the leadership of the Gandhis.It used to be said that the only way the impasse within the Opposition to dissolve was for Rahul to take a back seat. This has now happened.Within hours of Rahul’s conviction, Arvind Kejriwal was the first to lend his support to a beleaguered Rahul. This signals a break from the past; for there has been no love lost between the Congress and AAP which has grown at the Congress’s expense in both Delhi and Punjab. The Congress had not come to Manish Sisodia’s rescue when he was arrested in the excise scam and is in jail.Other Opposition leaders have followed Kejriwal in supporting Rahul. Among them is Akhilesh Yadav who had only the other day threatened that this time in 2024 the Samajawadi party would field candidates against the Congress in Amethi and Rae Bareilly, two Nehru-Gandhi family fiefdoms. How does Opposition politics pan out in the absence of Rahul in the lead role, will evolve in the weeks to come.Besides being targeted by the ED and the CBI, Opposition leaders are now a worried lot for another reason. They are asking if they are being jailed and disqualified in BJP’s second term, what will happen to them in its third term in office?Can the Surat judgement create a sense of sympathy for Rahul? His disqualification comes on the heels of a relentless demand by BJP leaders that he be disqualified—unless he apologises for his UK remarks about the undoing of democracy in India. Though it is early days, the more relevant question is this: even if sympathy is generated for Rahul, does the Congress have the will and the wherewithal to take advantage of it?Indira Gandhi, Rahul’s grandmother had also been disqualified from Parliament in December 1978 for breach of privilege. Her MPship was undone within a month of her being elected to the Lok Sabha from Chikamagalur in a bypoll. Her six-day jail term marked her political turnaround, and she said later that when the sentries in Tihar jail started to salute her, she realised the mood in the country was undergoing a change.Can Rahul do a 1978 in 2023?That’s a very tall order. In 1978, within hours of Indira’s arrest, lakhs had come out on the streets and courted arrest. A pan-Indian party like the Congress should have been able to mobilise protests against the Surat judgement against Rahul. “But,” as a Congress leader lamented, “it has become a party on Twitter.”Congressmen are also questioning why the party did not approach the Supreme Court the moment Rahul’s conviction came. After all, within two hours, Pawan Khera got relief from the Supreme Court. In 1978, the Government, led by Morarji Desai was a weak and a faction-ridden entity; in 2023 the Modi government is a monolith.Nor is the Congress the same as it was in 1978. Nor is the rest of the Opposition the united entity it had become in 1977 sinking their differences to oust Indira Gandhi of the Emergency years. Nor for that matter is the Indian voter what she was. And yet political parties should not forget that history shows the worm can turn — and what bestirs it is arrogance of power.(Neerja Chowdhury, Contributing Editor, The Indian Express, has covered the last 10 Lok Sabha elections)
With the advantage of hindsight, it is easy to say that Amritpal Singh should have been arrested at the earliest possible stage after his return to India in August 2022. His transgressions commenced almost immediately thereafter, even as his support base appeared to grow. Worse, both in political and administrative statements and in media projections, a larger-than-life image was being built up, far out of proportion with his actual significance. And while the state and its agencies must certainly be called to account for their failures, much of the irresponsible myth-making was the doing of the uncritical and sensation-seeking media. “Bhindranwale 2.0”, the purported return to the 1980s, the incessant coverage of his obviously attention-seeking antics, and a series of fawning interviews — these and other exaggerations and distortions in reportage enormously inflated Amritpal Singh’s actions, providing him with the very platform he would otherwise have struggled to occupy.These processes have not ended. Hysterical and sweeping reports, tying Amritpal Singh with gun-running, narcotics smuggling, drone intrusions from Pakistan and almost every ill in Punjab continue, even as the manhunt to put him where he belongs — in jail — is ongoing. That there is, yet, little evidence to tie Amritpal Singh with these many trends and offences, all of which have a history that long precedes his arrival on the stage, appears to elude the notice of the many anchors and commentators on the subject, and consequently, the impression that this narrative is being orchestrated can hardly be avoided. These matters, moreover, are for the enforcement and intelligence agencies to deal with and should not be the subject of ignorant and frenetic media speculation.While there are many, and clear failures on the part of both the state and central government agencies, it is important to recognise, first, that ideal solutions exist only in an ideal world. Second, and crucially, this entire issue is, above all, a contest of perceptions, not of power. Managing perceptions in a calibrated political campaign is a very different challenge.It is important to recognise that, by intent or omission, the state has now established the upper hand in the narrative around Amritpal Singh. Before his return and usurpation of the Waris Punjab De banner – another element that the commentary largely ignores is that Deep Sidhu’s Waris Punjab De still exists and is headed by his long-time associate Sanjeev Uppal — Amritpal was an unknown entity. The very rapid rise of his profile in Punjab and the quick support that he received from conservative elements in the Sikh community, including the implicit support of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), as well as the open support of the radical SAD-Amritsar headed by Simranjit Singh Mann, made it difficult to predict the possible consequences of any action against him. Nevertheless, delay only allowed the myth around him to grow, making state action potentially even more costly.Nevertheless, over the past months, Amritpal has clearly overplayed his hand. Each of his prominent actions will have alienated much of the population base that he seeks to mobilise. In particular, the fracas at Gurdwara Singh Sabha in Jalandhar on December 13, 2022, and the burning of chairs and benches meant for elderly devotees, may have secured some publicity, but would certainly have alienated the devout Sikh. That this is the case is substantially borne out by the commentary on the subject in print, TV and social media. Thereafter, there was much adverse commentary on the issue of the abduction and assault on Varinder Singh, which led to the arrest of Amritpal’s associate, Lovepreet Singh aka Toofan, and subsequently to the Ajnala fiasco. Amritpal’s effort to project his personal animus against Varinder as a Sikh issue attracted significant criticism. Further, the siege on the Ajnala Police Station, and Amritpal’s visible efforts to shield himself behind the motorised Palki on which the Guru Granth Sahib was being carried, even while his associates broke through the police barricades, have not gone unnoticed by the larger Sikh community. This was, at once, an act of beadbi (sacrilege) and cowardice. And finally, after all his brave declarations challenging the police to arrest him, his abandonment of his supporters and flight in the face of actual arrest — as well as multiple social media clips demonstrating panic and desperation, both on his part and on part of his supporters — is likely to take a great deal of the sheen off his image.The absence of any significant protests and demonstrations in the wake of the eventual action against Amritpal tends to bear out his loss of credibility, though this has occurred under a massive police and internet clampdown. The coming days will confirm or negate these arguments. What will be crucial, however, particularly for the state and the media to remember, is that what is currently playing out in Punjab is, overwhelmingly, a contest of perceptions, and it is far from over.While the state and its agencies appear to dominate the present narrative, it remains to be seen how they will handle evolving themes. Amritpal is likely to be arrested in the near future or may reappear abroad. In the latter case, he will merely join the minor ensemble of frustrated extremists in the Sikh diaspora, to rant ineffectually against India. If, on the other hand, he is arrested, the state and the political leadership will again be tested; and not just the Aam Aadmi Party, but also the various political groupings it has marginalised in the recent assembly elections. The Shiromani Akali Dal has already sought to communalise the police action, condemning the supposed “undeclared emergency and reign of repression and terror”, and the targeting, especially, of “innocent Amritdhari youth”. While the Congress and the BJP currently support the police action, it is uncertain when the default setting of polarising politics will be restored. These, and not so much the Khalistanis, are the critical threats to peace and security in Punjab.The writer is Executive Director, Institute for Conflict Management & South Asia Terrorism Portal
The Bengaluru police Saturday rescued a 40-day-old toddler and handed her over to family members hours after a woman kidnapped her from her house at Kalasipalya.The police identified the accused as Nandini alias Ayesha, a resident of Shivajinagar and a native of Kolar’s Mulbagal.The toddler’s mother Farheen Begum said in the complaint to the Kalasipalya that she had come to her mother’s house for delivery and was staying there. She said she had slept off in the hall after feeding the baby in the morning and when she woke up, the baby was missing.After the family approached them in the afternoon, the police alerted the control room, which flashed the message across all police stations in Bengaluru.Meanwhile, a woman on the street noticed Nandini with the child, and she was unable to handle the crying toddler. The woman asked Nandini what she had fed the baby, to which she replied upma and milk. The woman got suspicious as no mother would give upma to her newborn baby and alerted the neighbours, who informed the police control room.The police took custody of Nandini and discovered that she had kidnapped the baby from the Durgamma temple street in Kalasipalya. The baby was handed over to her mother within a few hours of her kidnap. In between, another woman in the area had breastfed the baby as she was hungry.The Kalasipalya police approached the Magadi Road police and took custody of the accused and the baby. The Kalasipalya police contacted the complainant and handed the baby to her mother.The police said that as Begum’s house’s main door was open, Nandini easily entered and kidnapped the baby around 7.30 am. She also stole a mobile phone from the house, the police added.Deputy Commissioner of Police (West) Laxman B Nimbargi appreciated the efforts of citizens Balu Subramanian, Bhoopal, Vishnu, Nagamma, and Hemanth, who helped find the kidnapped baby.
The Bengaluru police Saturday rescued a 40-day-old toddler and handed her over to family members hours after a woman kidnapped her from her house at Kalasipalya.The police identified the accused as Nandini alias Ayesha, a resident of Shivajinagar and a native of Kolar’s Mulbagal.The toddler’s mother Farheen Begum said in the complaint to the Kalasipalya that she had come to her mother’s house for delivery and was staying there. She said she had slept off in the hall after feeding the baby in the morning and when she woke up, the baby was missing.After the family approached them in the afternoon, the police alerted the control room, which flashed the message across all police stations in Bengaluru.Meanwhile, a woman on the street noticed Nandini with the child, and she was unable to handle the crying toddler. The woman asked Nandini what she had fed the baby, to which she replied upma and milk. The woman got suspicious as no mother would give upma to her newborn baby and alerted the neighbours, who informed the police control room.The police took custody of Nandini and discovered that she had kidnapped the baby from the Durgamma temple street in Kalasipalya. The baby was handed over to her mother within a few hours of her kidnap. In between, another woman in the area had breastfed the baby as she was hungry.The Kalasipalya police approached the Magadi Road police and took custody of the accused and the baby. The Kalasipalya police contacted the complainant and handed the baby to her mother.The police said that as Begum’s house’s main door was open, Nandini easily entered and kidnapped the baby around 7.30 am. She also stole a mobile phone from the house, the police added.Deputy Commissioner of Police (West) Laxman B Nimbargi appreciated the efforts of citizens Balu Subramanian, Bhoopal, Vishnu, Nagamma, and Hemanth, who helped find the kidnapped baby.
