IPL a platform for money laundering: Former Indian captain

Agencies
January 27, 2018

Kolkata, Jan 27: Former India captain Bishan Singh Bedi today questioned the source of big bucks being spent during the Indian Premier League auction and alleged that the tournament is a platform for "money laundering".

The former left-arm spinner could not have timed his attack on the league with millions spent on day one of the IPL-XI auctions in Bengaluru. "IPL is also responsible for bringing in somebody called Justice Lodha Commission. I have never known anything so cheap going so expensively. People have accused me that I am maligning IPL as I don't get anything out of it. I said see if you can rope me in, you can try."

"Can anyone justify one wicket's price at Rs one crore and Rs 97 lakh for one run. I am not against the money part of it as players deserve to get more money playing for the country than playing for a wretched club. But do we know where all this money is coming from and where it is going? If this is not money laundering I don't know what is," Bedi said on the concluding day of the Kolkata Literary Meet.

"You find a person like Virat who has been retained by 17 crore... He deserves it. But in the same dressing room, there will be a youngster who will fetch Rs 10-15 lakh. Now he will try to catch up with Kohli. Now how does he do it? There are ways and means to do it and there is a platform which encourages you to do it which is match-fixing. IPL is an easy target," he said pointing out the spot-fixing scandal of 2013.

Bedi spoke highly of Nawab Pataudi and also named MS Dhoni as a gentleman on the field who "never swore". "My favourite cricketer was Pataudi. He was the greatest thing that has ever happened to Indian cricket. Besides Pataudi, the other gentleman was Dhoni who never swore on the cricket field. He (Pataudi) was my first captain and all credit to him as I learnt a lot from him. He was the first Indian captain to bring in a fair amount of Indianness in the dressing room. He always used to tell, we are not playing for Maharashtra or Delhi or Bengal. We are playing for India."

In the same vein, he also mentioned about Sourav Ganguly. "He is one of the finest Indian captains we have had and he was also responsible, in many ways, for the culture that prevails today. The golden period of Indian cricket was when Sourav Ganguly was captaining the side. He had at his disposal Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Laxman," he concluded.

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News Network
January 21,2020

Lucknow, Jan 21: Defending his brainchild, the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), Union home minister Amit Shah on Tuesday said the new law will not be scrapped despite the countrywide protests against it.

Addressing a rally here to drum up support for the CAA, Shah also declared that construction of a Ram temple "touching the skies" in Ayodhya will begin within three months.

He said there is no provision in the amended law for taking anyone's citizenship away. "A canard is being spread against the CAA by the Congress, SP, BSP, and Trinamool Congress. The CAA is a law to grant citizenship," he added.

"I want to say that irrespective of the protests this will not be withdrawn," he added.

Shah challenged Congress leaders to hold a discussion with him on CAA at a public forum.

He named Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, Samajwadi Party's Akhilesh Yadav, Bahujan Samaj Party's Mayawati and TMC chief Mamata Banerjee while throwing the "challenge".

Congress has become blind due to vote bank politics,"he said. He also blamed the Congress for Partition.

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Agencies
February 5,2020

New Delhi, Feb 5: Days after a gunman opened fire in Delhi's Shaheen Bagh, the epicentre of anti-CAA movement, YouTuber Gunja Kapoor was detained at the protest site on Wednesday after she was caught covertly filming the protests in a burqa.

Kapoor runs the channel ‘Right Narrative’ on YouTube and her pinned tweet on Twitter says she is followed on the microblogging site by PM Narendra Modi.

According to police, the protesters turned suspicious after Kapoor asked them "too many questions". She was caught by some of the women protesters after they identified her as the popular YouTuber. The incident led to a commotion at Shaheen Bagh, the epicentre of protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), a senior police official said.

She was taken to Sarita Vihar police station where her identity was ascertained, police said.

The incident sparked outrage on social media. Many took to Twitter to question why Kapoor was at the protest in disguise. Others expressed concern about her motives at secretly filming the protests.

Meanwhile, praises flew in for the women of Shaheen Bagh who can be seen defending Kapoor from angry protesters after she was caught.

This is not the first time that a right wing social media activist has landed in trouble in Shaheen Bagh where residents and other women and children have been sitting in protest for nearly two months since the passing of the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 in December last year.

In January, Deepa Sharma had posted videos online about the "traumatic" experience she had when she was allegedly heckled and harassed by Shaheen Bagh protesters. While the woman's claim could never be verified, other pieces of rampant fake news aimed at delegitimising and villainising protesters has taken social media by storm.

From doctored videos of women protesters allegedly accepting they were paid Rs 500 to attend protests to alleged fights over biriyani and anti-India sloganeering, trolls on social media seem to be working overtime to taint the ongoing protests.

The latter, however, show no signs of giving up. In fact, as Delhi nears elections on February 8, protesters have arranged for music performances by eminent artists, including pop celebrity Prateek Kuhad, till February 7.

Sit in protests take place 24x7 with women showing up in thousands to spend the night and sing songs of protest. And with polls around the corner, the protests have become an active part of political discourse with Aam Aadmi Party's Manish Sisodia expressing his support for the protesters at a recent press conference.

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News Network
February 9,2020

New Delhi, Feb 9: The Indian Fed Cup team will travel to Dubai for this year's competition as the ITF has named the desert city as the new venue for the matches, to be held from March 3 to 7.

The ITF named the new venue after moving out the matches from then Chinese city of Dongguan due to Coronoavirus threat. The Asia/Oceania Group I matches were originally scheduled to be played from February 4-8.

"The event will be held in the week following the ATP Dubai tournament at the same venue, and will see six nations China P.R., Chinese Taipei, India, Indonesia, Korea Rep. and Uzbekistan - compete for a place in the Fed Cup Play-offs in April," an ITF release said.

The six teams will vie for two spots in Fed Cup Play-offs.

"Being in Dubai makes no difference. But the dates give enough time to Sania for her recovery. Doubles is an important point. Ankita is playing well. The other team members will also get some tournament to play under their belt," India's Fed Cup captain Vishal Uppal told news agency.

Sania's participation was under doubt due to a calf injury she aggravated during the Australian Open, where she pulled out of the mixed doubles before retiring mid-way into her women's doubles opening round match.

"I think we have a good chance but we will have to be at our best and fight hard for every point, every game, every set, every match," Uppal added.

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