Plea to review verdict on convicts in polls dismissed

November 20, 2013

New Delhi, Nov 20: The Supreme Court today dismissed Centre's plea seeking review of its judgement debarring arrested persons from contesting polls, saying it is not necessary to look into the issue in view of amendment in law by Parliament.sc_copy

The apex court, however, said that the issue of constitutional validity of the amendment will be considered separately after an NGO Lok Prahri opposed Centre's petition and said it has challenged the amendment in Representation of People Act in this regard.

"You challenge it. It will be separately considered," a bench of justices A K Patnaik and S J Mukhopadhyay said.

"As a consequence of amendment a person does not cease to be elector only by reason of his being in police custody or in imprisonment. Therefore, he can contest election to state legislature as well as Parliament," the bench said in its order.

It initially said the review plea of Centre has become infructuous in view of the amendment but it passed the order saying the plea is dismissed after the NGO pressed for the word dismissal.

The apex court in its judgement on July 10 had held that a person, who is in jail or in police custody, cannot contest election to legislative bodies, bringing to an end an era of under trial politicians fighting polls from behind bars. It said that only a voter can contest election and a person in police custody has no right to vote.

Negating the apex court order, Parliament in September passed a bill that maintains the right of those in jail to contest polls, with the government saying the court verdict was wrong and the Legislature has Constitutional duty to correct it.

The Representation of the People (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2013 was rushed through in the Lok Sabha and passed within about 15 minutes after a brief discussion. The Bill was passed by Rajya Sabha on August 27.

The Amendment Bill seeks to add a proviso to sub-section (2) of section 62 of the RP Act to state that a person cannot cease to be a voter while in detention as his or her right is only temporarily suspended.

The amendment came into effect from July 10, 2013, the day the Supreme Court gave the judgement.

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News Network
March 28,2020

Mumbai, Mar 28: Industrialist Ratan Tata on Saturday announced that Tata Trusts has committed Rs 500 crore for the medical supplies and equipments which will help combat the coronavirus outbreak.

"The COVID-19 crisis is one of the toughest challenges we will face as a race. The Tata Trusts and the Tata group companies have in the past risen to the needs of the nation. At this moment, the need of the hour is greater than any other time," said Ratan Tata, in an official release.

"Tata is committing Rs 500 crore for: personal protective equipment for the medical personnel on the frontlines; respiratory systems for treating increasing cases; testing kits to increase per capita testing; setting up modular treatment facilities for infected patients and knowledge management and training of health workers and the general public," Tata added.
Tata Chairman also expressed his deep gratitude for the members of all the organizations who are fighting coronavirus at the frontline, puting their life at risk.

"The Tata Trusts, Tata Sons and the Tata group companies are joined by committed local and global partners as well as the government to fight this crisis on a united public health collaboration platform which will strive to reach out to sections that are underprivileged and deprived," he added.

According to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW), there are 873 confirmed cases of coronavirus cases in the country and 19 fatalities have been reported.

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coastaldigest.com news network
May 6,2020

New Delhi, May 6: The government on Wednesday said no data or security breach has been identified in Aarogya Setu after an ethical hacker raised concerns about a potential security issue in the app.

The app is the government's mobile application for contact tracing and disseminating medical advisories to users in order to contain the spread of coronavirus.

On Tuesday, a French hacker and cyber security expert Elliot Alderson had claimed that "a security issue has been found" in the app and that "privacy of 90 million Indians is at stake".

Dismissing the claims, the government said "no personal information of any user has been proven to be at risk by this ethical hacker".

"We are continuously testing and upgrading our systems. Team Aarogya Setu assures everyone that no data or security breach has been identified," the government said through the app’s Twitter handle.

The tweet gave point-by-point clarification on the red flags raised by the hacker.

"We discussed with the hacker and were made aware of the following... the app fetches user location on a few occasions," it said, but added that this was by design and is clearly detailed in the privacy policy.

The app fetches users’ location and stores on the server in a secure, encrypted, anonymised manner - at the time of registration, at the time of self assessment, when users submit their contact tracing data voluntary through the app or when it fetches the contact tracing data of users after they have turned COVID-19 positive, it said.

On another issue that users can get COVID-19 stats displayed on the home screen by changing the radius and latitude-longitude using a script, Aarogya Setu said that all this information is already public for all locations and hence does not compromise on any personal or sensitive data.

"We thank the ethical hacker on engaging with us. We encourage any users who identify a vulnerability to inform us immediately...," it said.

Responding to Aarogya Setu's clarification, Alderson tweeted, "I will come back to you tomorrow".

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Agencies
February 26,2020

New Delhi, Feb 26: The death toll in northeast Delhi communal violence over the amended citizenship law rose to 20 on Wednesday, according to GTB Hospital authorities.

On Tuesday, the death toll was 13.

"The death toll has risen to 20 today," Medical Superintendent of GTB Hospital, Sunil Kumar, told PTI.

Earlier, at least four bodies were brought to the Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital from the Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital, a senior official said.

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