Congress-BJP having tacit deal: Kejriwal

April 29, 2014

Varanasi, April 29: The AAP convenor asked why Congress president Sonia Gandhi and BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi had not campaigned in each other’s constituencies.kejriwal

Raking up both the snoopgate and Robert Vadra land deal controversies, AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday accused both the Congress and the BJP of having a tacit pre-poll understanding and not taking any action against each other on the two issues.

He also asked why Congress president Sonia Gandhi and BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi had not campaigned in each other’s constituencies.

Targeting the Gujarat Chief Minister, Mr. Kejriwal said, “Narendra Modi should clarify his stand on Vadra issue. If BJP is really serious on this issue, why BJP-led Rajasthan government doesn’t register an FIR against him.

“BJP and Congress have joined hands. They just pass comments against each other, but their party-led governments don’t take action against their ‘men’,” he told reporters here.

“If I could register an FIR against Sheila Dikshit and Mukesh Ambani, why BJP-led government cannot register an FIR against Vadra in the last four months in Rajasthan,” he asked.

Going on to target Congress, Mr. Kejriwal said, “If Congress-led UPA Government is really serious on Adani issue, so why doesn’t it ask CBI to probe his role. They (BJP and Congress) don’t do nothing, but only pass comments against each other.”

The AAP leader accused both the parties of having an understanding.

“It has been four months since probe in the snoopgate scandal was handed over to CBI. If CBI wanted, Mr. Modi would have been arrested. BJP and Congress have their deals,” he charged.

Referring to Mr. Modi’s remarks on the issue of taking action against Mr. Vadra, he charged, “There is an internal setting between Congress and BJP“.

Mr. Modi had recently said there will be no witch-hunt against Mr. Vadra.

Condemning the attack on his party volunteers here, he alleged that BJP “goons” were trying to create an environment of fear among the people of Varanasi and also among AAP supporters.

The former Delhi Chief Minister alleged that BJP workers were beating AAP supporters in different parts of Varanasi.

“Violence is not the culture of Varanasi. BJP is creating an atmosphere of terrorism in Varanasi. They (BJP) threaten AAP supporters. BJP workers also tore posters of AAP installed on autos,” he charged.

Mr. Kejriwal claimed that Mr. Modi will lose the elections from Varanasi seat so this is BJP’s ‘baukhalahat’ (restlessness) that they are resorting to such physical attacks.

“Earlier these attacks were confined to me but now BJP goons are targeting AAP supporters. If this is the kind of situation before elections then what will happen after elections if even by mistake Modi wins from here. Imagine what kind of situation will be there in Varanasi and this country,” he said.

“I want to tell them that we will not get scared by such attacks and fight for the country to save the culture of Varanasi and country,” he said.

He demanded that central forces be deployed in Rohania and Sevapuri constituencies of the city as people in villages might be “stopped from voting“.

“It’s the feedback that we have got from villages in both these constituencies,” said Mr. Kejriwal.

He also said that if need be, central forces must be deployed in the rest of the city so that people can go to vote freely and free from any fear of BJP.

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News Network
January 9,2020

New Delhi, Jan 9: Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos will be visiting India next week and is likely to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and officials, besides industry leaders, according to sources.

The top executive will also attend SMBhav – an event focussing on small and medium businesses in India - that is slated for January 15-16 in the capital city.

When contacted, Amazon declined to comment.

Amazon, which has seen significant growth in its business in India, has also witnessed protest from a section of traders in the country who claim that e-commerce giants including Amazon and Walmart-owned Flipkart offer deep discounts and engage in unfair business practices.

Last year, the government had tightened rules for e-commerce marketplaces with foreign investment. These rules barred such platforms from offering products of sellers in which they hold a stake and banned exclusive marketing arrangements among other clauses. Following this, Amazon restructured its joint ventures to ensure compliance.

Bezos is likely to discuss regulatory issues in his meeting with the government officials.

He is also slated to engage with SMBs during the SMBhav event. The event - which will focus on discussions around how technology adoption can enable SMBs in India - is slated to see participation from industry experts, policymakers, solution providers and Amazon leadership.

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News Network
May 29,2020

New Delhi, May 29: With the highest spike of 7,466 more COVID-19 cases and 175 deaths reported in the past 24 hours, India's COVID-19 tally reached 1,65,799 on Friday, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

The number of active coronavirus cases stands at 89,987 while 71,105 people have been cured or recovered and one patient has migrated, it said. The death toll due to the infection has reached 4,706 in the country.

Maharashtra is the worst affected state with 59,546 cases. Tamil Nadu has recorded as many as 19,372 cases while Gujarat and Delhi have recorded 15,562 and 16,281 coronavirus cases respectively.

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News Network
January 22,2020

Jan 22: India's ranking in the latest global Democracy Index has dropped 10 places to the 51st spot out of 167 owing to violent protests and threats to civil liberties challenging freedoms across the country.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government has been criticized by rights groups and western governments after shutting off the internet and mobile phone networks and detaining opposition politicians in Kashmir.

Modi’s government has also responded harshly to ongoing protests against a controversial, religion-based citizenship law. Muslims have said their neighborhoods have been targeted, while the central government has attempted to ban protests and urged TV news channels not to broadcast “anti-national” content. Some leaders in Modi’s ruling party called for “revenge” against protesters. India’s score in 2019 was its worst ranking since the EIU’s records began in 2006, and has fallen gradually since Modi was elected in 2014.

The Economist Intelligence Unit’s 2019 Democracy Index, which provides an annual comparative analysis of political systems across 165 countries and two territories, said the past year was the bleakest for democracies since the research firm began compiling the list in 2006.

“The 2019 result is even worse than that recorded in 2010, in the wake of the global economic and financial crisis,” the research group said in releasing the report on Wednesday.

The average global score slipped to 5.44 out of a possible 10 -- from 5.48 in 2018 -- driven mainly by “sharp regressions” in Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and North Africa. Apart from coup-prone Thailand, which improved its score after holding an election last year, there were also notable declines in Asia after a tumultuous period of protests and new measures restricting freedom across the region’s democracies.

Asia Declines

Hong Kong, meanwhile, fell three places to rank 75th out of 167 as more than seven months of violent and disruptive protests rocked the Asian financial hub. An aggressive police response early in the unrest, when protests were mostly peaceful, led to a “marked decline in confidence in government -- the main factor behind the decline in the territory’s score in our 2019 index,” the group said.

In Singapore, which ranked alongside Hong Kong at 75th, a new “fake news” law led to a deteriorating score on civil liberties.

“The government claims that the law was enacted simply to prevent the dissemination of false news, but it threatens freedom of expression in Singapore, as it can be used to curtail political debate and silence critics of the government,” EIU analysts said.

China’s score fell to just 2.26 in the EIU’s ranking, placing it near the bottom of the list at 153, as discrimination against minorities, repression and surveillance of the population intensified. Still, in China “the majority of the population is unconvinced that democracy would benefit the economy, and support for democratic ideals is absent,” the EIU said.

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