BJP accuses Rahul Gandhi of disrespecting Vande Mataram at election rally

Agencies
April 28, 2018

A controversy erupted on Friday after a video purportedly showing Congress president Rahul Gandhi “disrespecting” national song ‘Vande Mataram’ at a public rally here surfaced and went viral.

The BJP slammed Rahul, saying he does not have respect for the national song, a charge dismissed by the Congress as “absolutely false.”

“He (Rahul) does not have respect for national song. What can we expect from him,” tweeted BJP on its handle, after a local TV channel showed a brief video clip of the purported incident even as the Congress dubbed it as a “fake video”.

The video showed Rahul sitting on the dias with senior Congress leaders, including Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, and looking at his watch gesturing something to AICC general secretary in charge of Karnataka K C Venugopal, apparently to wrap up quickly.

A person is then heard telling the singer to “just sing a line (of Vande Matram) and finish it off.” As the singer began singing “Vande Mataram”, Venugopal is seen nudging Rahul to stand up. Seizing on this, the BJP tweeted, “Today, RG asked to cut it to just one line, reminding us of INC’s total disregard for the song.”

The BJP further asked, “Do we need more reasons for Cong Mukth Bharath? Shame on you, RG.”

Criticising Rahul’s act, the BJP said that in 1937 Jawharlal  Nehru had dropped last three stanzas of Vande Mataram just to pacify Mohammad Ali Jinnah who had said the song irks the Muslims.

Senior BJP leader and Union Minister Ananth Kumar also took to twitter saying, “Common proud Indians like us say - Janani Janmm Bhumischa Swarga Daapi Gariyasi. Arrogant, Ignorant dynast says “cut short Vande Mataram.”

Former Union minister and Congress leader Rajeev Shukla dismissed it as “absolutely false” allegation and called it a “fake video”. “It is the work of theirs to release fake video. Who else believes in Vande Mataram than Congress. The Vande Mataram was started to be sung from 1896 Congress session,” he told reporters in Bengaluru.

The Congress always complied with Vande Mataram. “Each of our session starts with Vande Mataram and ends with the national anthem. They teach us Vande Mataram. It is neither sung in their office, nor in the RSS headquarters,” he said, hitting out at BJP.

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News Network
August 3,2020

Aug 3: Iqbal Ansari, who was a litigant in the Ayodhya land dispute case, has decided to gift a 'Ram nami' stole and a copy of the Ramcharitmanas to Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he attends the bhoomi pujan ceremony for the Ram temple here on Wednesday.

"Yes, I have received the invitation from Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust for the bhoomi pujan ceremony. I will certainly attend it. The dispute is over now after the court's verdict," Ansari, 69, told .

"Our Prime Minister is coming. I will meet him and give him a 'Ramnami' stole (with Ram's name written on it) and Ramcharitmanas as a present," Ansari said.

His father Hashim Ansari, the oldest litigant in the Babri Masjid-Ram Janmabhoomi land dispute case, died at the age of 95 in 2016 after which the son started pursuing the case in the court.

Talking about Wednesday's ground-breaking ceremony to mark the beginning of the construction of a grand Ram temple here, Ansari said, "I belong to Ayodhya. All this (temple's construction) will change the fate of Ayodhya. We all want our child to get better opportunities".

He further said, "I respect sadhus and saints. I am happy to have received the invitation for the ceremony. I think it is Lord Ram's will that I attend it".

When asked what he would have done had the court decided the case in his favour, Ansari said he had wanted the construction of a school and a hospital on the disputed land.

"I feel the city needs development. The future of our children should be safe and secure and they should get employment. Dispute in the name of religion should end now and we should let the city witness a new beginning," he said.

The Supreme Court had in November last year paved the way for the construction of a Ram temple by a Trust at the disputed site of the Babri Masjid's demolition in Ayodhya, and directed the Centre to allot an alternative 5-acre plot to the Sunni Waqf Board for building a new mosque at a "prominent" place in the holy town in Uttar Pradesh.

The state government has allotted a five-acre land in Dhannipur village in Sohaval Tehsil of Ayodhya for the mosque's construction.

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News Network
May 18,2020

May 18: Goldman Sachs expects India will experience its deepest recession ever after a poor run of data underscored the damaging economic impact of lockdowns in the world’s second-most populous nation.

Gross domestic product will contract by an annualized 45% in the second quarter from the prior three months, compared with Goldman’s previous forecast of a 20% slump. A stronger rebound of 20% is now seen for the third quarter, while projections for the fourth quarter and first of next year are unchanged at 14% and 6.5%.

Those estimates imply that real GDP will fall by 5% in the 2021 fiscal year, which would be deeper than any other recession India has ever experienced, Goldman economists Prachi Mishra and Andrew Tilton wrote in a note dated May 17.

India’s government has extended its nationwide lockdown until May 31, while further easing restrictions in certain sectors to boost economic activity, as coronavirus cases escalate across the country. The announcement followed Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s fifth briefing in as many days, in which she outlined details of the country’s $265 billion virus rescue package, which is equivalent to 10% of India’s GDP.

 “There have been a series of structural reform announcements across several sectors over the past few days,” the Goldman economists wrote. “These reforms are more medium-term in nature, and we, therefore, do not expect these to have an immediate impact on reviving growth. We will continue to monitor their implementation to gauge their effect on the medium-term outlook.”

Infections are surging across the South Asian nation of 1.3 billion people, with more than 91,300 infections, including 2,897 deaths as of Sunday, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

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News Network
March 3,2020

New Delhi, Mar 3: Delhi's Tihar Prison authorities had made all necessary preparations for the hanging of four convicts in the Nirbhaya gangrape-and-murder case which was scheduled for Tuesday, officials said Monday.

However, on Monday evening, a city court deferred the hanging till further orders.

Postponing the execution, Additional Sessions Judge Dharmender Rana said the hanging cannot be carried out pending disposal of Pawan Gupta's mercy plea before the President, observing any condemned convict must not meet his "Creator" with grievance against courts for not acting fairly on the opportunity to exhaust legal remedies.

"We had made all the necessary arrangements for the execution of the four convicts which was scheduled for Tuesday at 6 AM. Now, the execution has been postponed and we are waiting for the further order by the court," a senior jail official said.

The hanging of the four men -- Mukesh Kumar Singh (32), Vinay Kumar Sharma (26), Akshay Kumar Singh (31) and Pawan -- who are lodged in Tihar jail, was fixed for March 3 in Tihar jail on a court order.

"We had checked the ropes. Hangman was called and dummy executions were carried out," another senior jail official said.

Barring Pawan, the other three had in the previous weeks moved curative petitions and mercy pleas which were all dismissed.

The first date of execution -- January 22 -- fixed on January 7 was postponed by the court to February 1. But on January 31, the court indefinitely postponed the hanging. On February 17, the court again issued fresh date for execution of death warrants for March 3 at 6 AM.

The court in its orders observed that the four convicts cannot be hanged since a mercy plea of one or the other convict was pending.

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