Aiyar gave 'supari' in Pakistan to get me 'removed': PM Modi

Agencies
December 9, 2017

Bhabhar (Guj), Dec 9: Prime Minister Narendra Modi accused suspended Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar of giving 'supari' (contract) while on a visit to Pakistan to get him "removed" from the way to ensure peace between India and the neighbouring country.

Targeting the diplomat-turned politician for the second time in two days after the Congress leader's 'neech aadmi'(lowly person) jibe at him yesterday, Modi also alleged that the Congress tried to suppress this episode and did not take any action against Aiyar.

Attacking the Congress over its work culture, Modi alleged that the party believes in--'atkana' (to stall) 'latkana' (to keep the issue hanging) and 'bhatkana' (to divert an issue).

The prime minister's remarks come a day after Aiyar set off a political firestorm when he called Modi a "neech kism ka aadmi". The Congress yesterday suspended Aiyar from the primary membership of the party and issued him a show cause notice for his remarks.

"Shriman Mani Shankar Aiyar...you know what he did?" Modi asked a gathering of people in this small town of Banaskantha district in North Gujarat.

"He gave this 'gaali' (abuse) to me or you? Did he abuse me or Gujarat? Did he abuse the cultured society of India or me?" Modi asked.

"Let us not talk about that abuse, as people of Gujarat will look into it and give a reply and they (Congress) will know the result on December 18," he said.

"But, after I became prime minister, this man (Aiyar) went to Pakistan and met some Pakistanis. All this thing is available on the social media. In that meeting, he is seen discussing with Pakistanis that 'jab tak Modi ko raste se hataya nahi jata' (until Modi is not removed from the way), relationship between India and Pakistan cannot improve," Modi added.

"Someone tell me what is the meeting of 'raste se hatana'. You had gone to Pakistan to give my 'supari', you wanted to give Modi's 'supari' (contract killing)," the PM said.

However, people need not worry as 'Maa Ambe' (goddess) is protecting me, he added.

"This conversation took place three years back. The Congress party had tried to suppress this episode...They did not take any action against him for last three years," Modi alleged.

"What is my crime? This country's people have elected me in a democratic way, and you go to Pakistan and say that this man is coming in the way and remove him!" he said. Modi was referring to a controversy that had erupted in 2015 when Aiyar during a talk show in Pakistan had reportedly made the controversial statement. Yesterday, during a rally in Surat, he had said, "Shriman (Mr) Mani Shankar Aiyar today said that Modi is of 'neech' (lower) caste and is 'neech' (lowly). Is this not an insult to Gujarat?...This is a Mughal mentality where if such a person (who comes from a humble background) wears good clothes in a village, they have a problem."

During today's rally, Modi further said the issue here is of Congress' mentality and the party's work culture means "atkana, latkana and bhatkana".

"What Congress has done so far is-atkana, latkana and bhatkana. They will either stall, keep an issue hanging or try to divert it," Modi said adding that they are not interested in solving people's problems.

When our brave jawans conducted the surgical strike then, I think that all the people of the country felt proud, but only Congress was not happy, he said.

"They raised questions about the surgical strike- did this (surgical strike) happen or not? Pakistan is saying that it did not happen...why none of our soldiers were killed... Would you believe Pakistan or India in such matters?" Modi asked.

Comments

Jameel
 - 
Monday, 11 Dec 2017

modi, are you worth the supari. hehehe.

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News Network
February 24,2020

New Delhi, Dec 24: The Delhi Police said that a head constable was killed during clashes over the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in northeast Delhi today.

Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shahdara, Amit Sharma was also injured during clashes, a senior official said. Sharma suffered injuries to his head and hand. He was hospitalised and is doing fine, the official added.

Tension escalated in northeast Delhi with protesters torching at least two houses and a fire tender in the Jaffrabad and Maujpur areas, where pro and anti-CAA groups clashed for the second consecutive day on Monday and hurled stones at each other.

Violence was also reported from the Chandbagh area in Jaffrabad.

Police fired tear gas shells and also resorted to lathicharge to disperse the protesters.

According to officials, a fire tender was damaged by the protesters after it responded to a fire call in the area.

The Delhi Metro closed entry and exit at the Jaffrabad and Maujpur-Babarpur stations as an uneasy calm prevailed in the area.

"Entry & exit of Jaffrabad and Maujpur-Babarpur are closed. Trains will not be halting at these stations," the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) said in a tweet.

Entry and exit were closed at the Jaffrabad metro station for over 24 hours.

Clashes broke out on Sunday evening between pro and anti-CAA groups near Jaffrabad after a large number of people protesting against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) blocked a road, while similar sit-ins were launched in several other parts of the national capital.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal has urged lieutenant governor of Delhi and the Union home minister to restore order.

Nobody should be allowed to orchestrate violence, he said.

Delhi Lt Governor Anil Baijal instructed the police commissioner to maintain law and order in the national capital in the wake of violence.

"Instructed @DelhiPolice and @CPDelhi to ensure that law and order is maintained in North East Delhi. The situation is being closely monitored. I urge everyone to exercise restraint for maintenance of peace and harmony," Baijal tweeted.

Delhi minister and Babarpur MLA Gopal Rai on Monday urged the people in the area to maintain peace, saying some people were purposely trying to disturb the atmosphere.

"With folded hands, I request people in Babarpur Assembly to maintain peace. Some people are purposely trying to spoil the atmosphere. I have spoken to Delhi LG and he has assured me that more policemen will be deployed to bring the situation under control," Rai said in a tweet.

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Agencies
January 8,2020

New Delhi, Jan 8: Jawaharlal Nehru University Students Union (JNUSU) President Aishe Ghosh has filed a complaint over the violence that took place at the varsity campus on Sunday.

"I am filing this complaint for the incident in which a mob conspired and acted with common intention to assault, intimidate and attempt to murder me, and request you to register an FIR and apprehend culprits at the earliest," the complaint read.

She said that on January 5, in the afternoon, she received information from students in the campus that some students affiliated to ABVP along with other unidentified men and women had gathered with weapons like rods, sledgehammers and lathis near Ganga Bus Stop.

"I along with Nikhil Mathew (MA Labour Studies) who was also present there, were surrounded by a group of persons of that mob most of whom were wearing masks. The mob of 20-30 persons dragged me behind a car standing near the 24*7 and surrounded me and despite my pleading did not let me go and attacked me with rods while I had fallen down. I remember that one of the people was of medium height wearing a brownish-red sweatshirt with UCLA written on it. I saw his face as he was facing me and did not have a mask on and can identify him if I see him," Ghosh wrote in her complaint.

"I was attacked by the above-mentioned persons collectively and was hit on the head multiple times with iron rods. I fell to the ground and my head started bleeding, and some of them kicked me and hit me with the rod on my hand and rest of the body including my head, chest and back."

"I am attaching with this complaint a copy of the MLC which details my injuries. Nikhil Mathew tried to save me but was also hit with an iron hammer and other weapons on his head and arms. The intention of the group of men and their acts was definitely to murder me and other persons associated with me," she said.

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News Network
January 1,2020

Kolkata, Jan 1: US-based Bangladeshi author and playwright Sharbari Zohra Ahmed feels that the people of the country of her origin are more alike than different from Indians as they were originally Hindus.

But Bangladeshis now want to forget their Hindu roots, said the author, who was born in Dhaka and moved to the United States when she was just three weeks old.

Ahmed, who is the co-writer of the Season 1 of 'Quantico', a popular American television drama thriller series starring Priyanka Chopra, rues that her identity as a Bengali is getting lost in Bangladesh due to the influence of right-wing religious groups.

"How can Bangladesh deny its Hindu heritage? We were originally Hindus. Islam came later," Ahmed said while speaking to PTI here recently.

"The British exploited us, stole from us and murdered us," she said about undivided India, adding that the colonialists destroyed the thriving Muslin industry in Dhaka.

Ahmed said the question of her belief and identity in Bangladesh, where the state religion is Islam, has prompted her to write her debut novel 'Dust Under Her Feet'.

The British exploitation of India and the country's partition based on religion has also featured in her novel in a big way.

Ahmed calls Winston Churchill, the British prime minister during World War II, a "racist".

"He took the rice from Bengal to feed his soldiers and didn't care when he was told about that.

"During my research, I learnt that two million Bengalis died in the artificial famine that was created by him. When people praise Churchill, it is like praising Hitler to the Jews. He was horrible," she said.

The author said her novel is an effort to tell the readers what actually happened.

"Great Britain owes us three trillion dollars. You have to put in inflation. Yet, they (the British) still have a colonial mentality and white colonisation is on the rise again," Ahmed, who was in the city to promote her novel, said.

The novel is based in Kolkata, then Calcutta, during World War II when American soldiers were coming to the city in large numbers.

The irony was that while these American soldiers were nice to the locals, they used to segregate the so-called "black" soldiers, the novelist said.

"Calcutta was a cosmopolitan and the rest of the world needs to know how the city's people were exploited, its treasures looted, people divided and hatred instilled in them," she said.

"Kolkata was my choice of place for my debut novel since my mother was born here. She witnessed the 'Direct Action Day' when she was a kid and was traumatised. She saw how a Hindu was killed by Muslims near her home in Park Circus area (in the city)," Ahmed said.

Direct Action Day, also known as the Great Calcutta Killings, was a massive communal riot in the city on August 16, 1946 that continued for the next few days.

Thousands of people were killed in the violence that ultimately paved the way for the partition of India.

'Dust Under Her Feet' is set in the Calcutta of the 1940s and Ahmed in her novel examines the inequities wrought by racism and colonialism.

The story is of young and lovely Yasmine Khan, a doyenne of the nightclub scene in Calcutta.

When the US sets up a large army base in the city to fight the Japanese in Burma, Yasmine spots an opportunity.

The nightclub is where Yasmine builds a family of singers, dancers, waifs and strays.

Every night, the smoke-filled club swarms with soldiers eager to watch her girls dance and sing.

Yasmine meets American soldier Lt Edward Lafaver in the club and for all her cynicism, finds herself falling helplessly for a married man who she is sure will never choose her over his wife.

Outside, the city lives in constant fear of Japanese bombardment at night. An attack and a betrayal test Yasmine's strength and sense of control and her relationship with Edward.

Ahmed teaches creative writing in the MFA program in Manhattanville College and is artist-in-residence in Sacred Heart University's graduate film and television programme.

Comments

abdullah
 - 
Wednesday, 1 Jan 2020

Is she trying to take over Shoorpanakhi Taslim Nasreen? 

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