6 held for pelting stones at BJP lawmaker’s car in Ranchi

Source: hindustantimes.com

Police in Jharkhand’s capital Ranchi have arrested six men for allegedly attacking the BJP’s Rajya Sabha lawmaker Samir Oraon’s vehicle with stones on the outskirts of the city on Monday, officials said on Tuesday.

The arrests on Tuesday morning came after Oraon lodged the first information at the Itki police station after the incident near Gadgaon area.

“Six persons – Gulam Sarvar, Arman Mansoori, Sohrab Mansoori, Aryan Mansoori, Irfan Mansoori and Umesh Lakra – have been arrested in this connection,” said Itki police station in-charge Prithvi Sender.

“All the accused used to smoke marijuana at their fixed base on the road flank. They have confessed that one of their friends pelted stone on the vehicle but he is absconding,” Sender said.

He added, “We are investigating the case further to ascertain if it was a coincidence or a planned activity.”

The Bharatiya Janata Party leader was coming back from Lohardaga district after attending the Budhu Bhagat Football Tournament when he was attacked. On his way back at around 8.30pm, some men started pelting stones on his Scorpio SUV. The parliamentarian and other passengers escaped unhurt.

“It appeared that bullets were being fired from all sides. We speeded up the vehicle to escape and finally took a halt at a petrol station. We then informed the police,” Oraon said.

He added, “We were six people sitting in the vehicle, including Binod Kumar Bhagat, the leader of Jharkhand movement, and my brother Alok Oraon. But we all escaped unhurt.”

The member of Parliament said they were escorted by a police team to Ranchi. He also said he doesn’t know why he was targeted and who the attackers were.

“It can’t be deduced for sure that I was the target. It may be a coincidence but it’s a serious issue and ought to be investigated thoroughly, “ he said.

Parliament nod for central rule in J&K, key reservation bill

Source: hindustantimes.com

The government’s approach to managing strife in the state of Jammu and Kashmir will be guided by former prime minister, the late Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s approach of “Jamhooriyat (democracy), Insaniyat (humanity), and Kashmiriyat (the spirit of Kashmir)”, home minister Amit Shah said in the Rajya Sabha on Monday during a discussion on the state. At the end of the debate, the Upper House adopted a resolution to extend President’s Rule in J&K by six months, and passed a bill to ensure 3% reservations in jobs and education for people living near the International Border.

But the velvet glove of Vajpayee’s approach would also include an iron hand, Shah said in the Rajya Sabha, promising a tit-for-tat response to anyone trying to disrupt peace in the state. “They will be given a response in their language.”

In the course of the discussion, Shah added that assembly elections would be held in the state on the Election Commission’s advice and the government would not delay the polls “even by a day.”

During the debate, the leader of Opposition in the House Ghulam Nabi Azad said the government’s zero-tolerance policy didn’t seem to be working as attacks against security forces had spiralled during the last five years. “If you have zero tolerance, how come there have been 16 attacks including Pathankot, Nagrota and Uri,” he asked.

“When it comes to assembly elections, the government is hesitant. You want to run the government without accountability,” Azad added.

During his speech, Shah went on to elaborate on each aspect of his government’s policy regarding the state.

He spoke of the end of Sufi traditions and Kashmiri pandits being driven away from the state. “Were Sufi saints not a part of Kashmiriyat? Were Kashmiri Pandits not a part of Kashmiriyat? If we talk about Kashmiriyat today, we have to think of them too. A time will come when the Pandits and the Sufi saints will offer prayers alongside at the Kheer Bhawani temple,” he said.

He said the concept of Jamhooriyat was not limited to electing MLAs. “For 70 years, 40,000 people who could have become sarpanchs were sitting at home.

We have taken Jamhooriyat to the villages,” he said. He asked the Congress why panchayat and municipal elections were not held before and why democracy in the state be restricted to “just three families”.

Speaking about Insaniyat, he said that under President’s Rule, schools were restarted, bureaucrats ordered to go to villages to take schemes forward, and residents were provided with electricity, toilets and food.

“We want development in the Valley. The Valley is ours and we want people to prosper like the rest of India. But we will not tolerate any separatist movement and terrorism. Terrorists who do not want to join with India have no place in the government’s scheme of things. They will face severe action and difficulties,” he said. Unlike in the past, foreign and defence policies have been segregated keeping national security at the core, he said, while talking of the 2016 surgical strikes and the Balakot strikes. “We want peace with the world but there cannot be peace with those who do not respect our borders,” he said.

Responding to a question from some members on the government’s continued criticism of India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s handling of the Kashmir situation, Shah asked why Nehru agreed to ceasefire when a third of Kashmir was with Pakistan, why India went to the United Nations after the instrument of accession was signed, and why a plebiscite was required. “Was it not a mistake? Will we not learn from our mistakes?” If the Kashmir problem has not been solved from 1947 to 2019, surely it is time to go for a new approach, he added.

Azad accused the government of using President’s Rule as a ploy to run the state from New Delhi. “Stop running the government from Delhi. That will be the biggest confidence-building measure,” he said.

Shah dismissed the allegations in his detailed, one-hour long reply to the five-hour discussion on two bills. “We have no drought of governments. We are there in 16 states. We have no desire to rule through the President’s Rule,” the minister said.

Responding to the criticism that if elections could be held for panchayats and Lok Sabha, why couldn’t they be held for the assembly, Shah said security forces had their reservations about being able to provide security to more than 1,000 contestants and had conveyed it to the Election Commission.

The Jammu and Kashmir Reservation (Amendment) Bill, 2019 will allow people living near the International Border to benefit from a 3% reservation that was so far available only to those living along the Line of Control and Line of Actual Control. Shah said this would benefit more than 350,000 people living in 435 villages scattered across the districts of Jammu, Kathua and Sambha.

Former chairman of the National Commission for Minorities and former divisional commissioner of Kashmir Wajahat Habibullah said there was no choice but to extend President’s Rule at this point. He said the people living close to the International Border faced the same vulnerabilities that those near LoC faced and the reservation bill was a good move.

Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha from Bihar

Source: indiatoday.in

Union minister and Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan on Friday was elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha from Bihar.

Ram Vilas Paswan was declared elected and the certificate was handed over to him, Bateshwar Nath Pandey, the Returning Officer and secretary to Bihar Legislative Assembly, told PTI.

The certificate of election was given to Ram Vilas Paswan in presence of a host of senior NDA leaders including Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi.

The Lok Janshakti Party chief has been elected to the Upper House in a by-poll necessitated after the resignation of his cabinet colleague Ravi Shankar Prasad, who got elected to the Lok Sabha from the Patna Sahib seat in the recently concluded 2019 general elections.

This is the second time that Ram Vilas Paswan, who began his political career as a Sanyukt Socialist Party MLA in the 1960s, has been elected to the Rajya Sabha.

Ram Vilas Paswan’s previous election to the Upper House was in 2010 when he entered the Parliament with support of his then ally the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) a year after having lost his Hajipur Lok Sabha seat.

Ram Vilas Paswan resigned from the Rajya Sabha in 2014, two years ahead of the expiry of his term, when he wrested back the Hajipur contesting as an NDA candidate.

Ram Vilas Paswan had announced his decision not to contest the Lok Sabha polls this time and to choose the Rajya Sabha route instead when the NDA in Bihar, comprising BJP, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar JD(U) and LJP came out with its seat-sharing plan last year.

The Hajipur seat, which he won a number of times, on a couple of occasions with a record margin, has been retained for his party by Ram Vilas Paswan’s younger brother and state LJP president Pashupati Kumar Paras.