Delhi govt did not seek advice on Jan Lokpal Bill: Bhatt

February 8, 2014

New Delhi, Feb 8: Former Additional Solicitor General K N Bhatt today said he was not consulted on the Jan Lokpal Bill but only on the validity of some rules.

Bhatt was reacting to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's statement yesterday that the government had taken opinion of four lawyers including Bhatt and all of them were of the view that the Home Ministry order was "unconstitutional".ari

The Home Ministry order says that Delhi government has to take permission from the Centre before enacting any law.

"I was not consulted on question of the Jan Lokapal Bill, but on validity of certain rules. As far as I am concerned, I was asked about the validity of rule 55 of the Transaction of Business rules," Bhatt said.

"I gave them an opinion that that rule may be invalid. But a remedy is not to calls names to Lt Governor. The remedy is to go to a court of law and challenge validity of rules," he said.

To a query on future of the Jan Lokpal Bill, Bhatt said, "I don't see a great future for Jan Lokpal Bill. No body can prevent it from debating it in Delhi Assembly and then Congress also supports it and pass it.

"Then the logical step is to present it to Lt Governor for his approval. He may send it to the President. He got that option. It will take quite some time and if it at all has a passage.

"I doubt that whether it (Jan Lokpal Bill) can at all see the light of the day. AAP can then legitimately say they made an effort, but could not succeed," Bhatt said.

Kejriwal had yesterday asked Lt Governor Najeeb Jung not to protect the interest of Congress and the Home Ministry, which were keen on stalling his government's Jan Lokpal bill.

The Chief Minister had said he had taken opinion of noted lawyers Pinaki Mishra, K N Bhatt, P B Kapur and former Chief Justice of Punjab and Haryana Court Mukul Mudgal and all of them were of the view that the Home Ministry order was "unconstitutional".

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Agencies
August 7,2020

New Delhi, Aug 7: India's COVID-19 cases tally crossed 20 lakh mark with the highest single-day spike of 62,538 cases on Friday, said Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

The COVID-19 tally rises to 20,27,075 including 6,07,384 active cases, 13,78,106 cured/discharged/migrated and 41,585 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health.

Maharashtra with 1,46,268 active cases and 3,05,521 cured and discharged patients continues to be the worst affected. The state has also reported 16,476 deaths due to the infection.

Tamil Nadu has 54,184 active cases while 2,14,815 patients have been discharged after treatment in the state. 4,461 deaths have been reported due to COVID-19 in the state.

Andhra Pradesh with 80,426 active cases is the third on the list. There are 1,04,354 cured and discharged patients and 1,681 deaths reported from the state.

Delhi now has 10,072 active cases and 1,26,116 cured and discharged patients. 4,044 people have lost their lives due to the disease in the Union Territory so far. 

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Agencies
March 14,2020

New Delhi, Mar 14: A Delhi court on Friday granted bail to three alleged members of the Popular Front of India (PFI) -- Parvez (Delhi President), Iliyas (Delhi Secretary) and Danish -- in connection with the organization's role in the northeast Delhi violence last month.

Metropolitan Magistrate Prabhdeep Kaur granted bail to all three accused on furnishing personal bail bonds of Rs 30,000 each.

The court said that "Investigating Officer (IO) has nowhere mentioned that any of the non-bailable offences has been disclosed or has come out during investigation till now, therefore, accused be enlarged on bail."

According to police, the three men were arrested for allegedly spreading fake propaganda during the anti-CAA protests.

Delhi police, while opposing bail and seeking remand, stated that police custody is required because accused were involved in a conspiracy of communal riots which resulted in the death of 50 innocent people and injuries to approximately 300 persons and huge loss of government and public properties.

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Agencies
July 23,2020

Expressing concern over the ban imposed on TikTok by the government of India, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has reportedly called the development in the south Asian country “worrisome”.

TikTok was amongst the 59 Chinese apps that were banned in India but why it hogs the maximum limelight because TikTok had the second-largest user base in India with over 200 million users.

As per The Verge writer Casey Newton, Zuckerberg was worried about TikTok’s India ban. Although it soon cashed into the opportunity and released a TikTok clone “Reels”, the government’s reason behind banning the app in India wasn’t received well by Mark Zuckerberg. 

He had said that if India can ban a platform with over 200 million users in India without citing concrete reasons, it can also ban Facebook if something goes amiss on the security and privacy front.

Why Mark finds it particularly worrisome because Facebook is already involved in a lot tussle with the governments across the world involving national security concerns. 

“Facebook already faces fights around the world from governments on both the left and the right related to issues that fit under the broad umbrella of national security: election interference, influence campaigns, hate speech, and even just plain-old democratic speech. Zuckerberg knows that the leap from banning TikTok on national security grounds to banning Facebook on national security grounds is more of a short hop,” the report by Casey read.

Facebook till now has not faced any kind of issue in India but considering the debacle with the other governments, it is not entirely wrong to worry about its future in India if any national security issue arises. Back in 2016, Facebook’s Free Basics service, which means a free but restricted internet service, was banned in India by the telecom regulators. 

The TRAI had said that the Free Basic services were banned in India because it violated the principles of net neutrality. With Free Basics services, Facebook had planned to bring more unconnected users online. But since 2016, there has been no major tussle between the Indian government and Zuckerberg due to national security issues.

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