Historic battle in MP's Chhindwara: Kamal Nath debuts in Assembly poll, son Nakul in Lok Sabha election

Agencies
April 29, 2019

Chhindwara, Apr 29: Madhya Pradesh's new power centre is witnessing a unique father-son electoral show with Chief Minister Kamal Nath and his son Nakul in the fray, hoping to boost not just the Congress but also strike roots as deep as the tree from where this region takes its name.

While the chief minister, a nine-time MP from the area, is contesting an assembly bypoll, Nakul Nath is hoping to get elected to the Lok Sabha from Chhindwara, named after the wild date palm tree known as Chhind.

A Doon school product and an MBA from the US, Nakul Nath, 44, is making his debut in electoral politics. His chief minister father is also a debutant, contesting assembly polls for the first time in his 40-year career. Nath senior needs to get elected to the state assembly as he recently took over as chief minister.

While 14 candidates are contesting the Lok Sabha seat, nine contestants are in the fray for the assembly polls, said District Electoral Officer and Collector Srinivas Sharma.

Sharma told PTI that all arrangements have been made to ensure that voters get to press their choices on two different EVMs in Chhindwara on Monday.

Locals and political pundits are of the view that the contest in Chhindwara, which borders Maharashtra and is about 300 km from state capital Bhopal, is lopsided and both father and son will have an easy win as the seat has been Kamal Nath's stronghold for decades.

The duo's main contest is with the BJP, which has pitted former MLA Nathan Shah Kavreti against Nakul Nath, and local party leader and businessman Vivek Sahu against the chief minister.

"This is a historic election as it is the first time in the country that a son and father are contesting polls on the same day and in the same district. I seek your blessings as not your 'neta' (politician) but 'beta' (son)," Nakul Nath said at a rally in Ambada village near here recently as his father looked on.

Nath, 72, is leaving no stone unturned to ensure a handsome win for his son. He has been camping in Chhindwara city and holding six to seven rallies and meetings everyday, often beginning his day early on a blue Bell helicopter stationed right next to his home here in Shikarpur area.

It has been a family run campaign right through, said local Congress leaders.

Kamal Nath's wife Alka and daughter-in-law Priya have also been travelling from village to village to ensure the transition of the Chhindwara Lok Sabha seat from father to son is accomplished with a mega win.

The chief minister kept track of his work, clearing files early in the morning or late evening at his camp office across the road from his residence, an aide said.

The MP CM, also the state Congress chief, invoked his 40-year association with locals and his "development model that gave Chhindwara an unique identity" to seek the blessings of voters for his elder son.

"Tear Nakul's clothes if he does not deliver," he said at a rally, underscoring his familiarity with the electorate.

"He is your son and in any case I am behind him," Kamal Nath assured the gathering. The campaign seems to have hit home.

"Chhindwara has traditionally voted for the Nath family. Even if Kamal Nath had placed any of his trusted lieutenants to take his place, he or she would have won. Now that it is his son, people will feel they are voting for the father only," Sanjay Kumar, a hotel manager and resident of the city, told news agency.

The BJP's leaders fighting the father and son have, however, not lost hope and are determined to snatch the citadel.

Former legislator Kavareti invoked the recent income tax raids against the aides of Nath senior to say his campaign "is a fight between the poor and the mafia who have money".

"How did Rs 281 crore worth of unaccounted funds get detected? Whose money is it? It is the money of the poor and the deprived. I am sure of a victory," the tribal leader said, referring to the recent tax department's charges in the case.

Kamal Nath has denied the allegations.

His BJP colleague Sahu, who is vying for an assembly seat, invoked the "capable" leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

He added that he would ensure that the benefits of the Ujjwala scheme and housing for poor reaches the people here.

Arvind Uikey, an investment agent, said it would be interesting to see the margin of victory for the father-son combine.

"I think it will be a record of sorts either way. If Kamal Nath and Nakul Nath win by a huge margin, which looks to be the case, or even if they get defeated. But that is highly unlikely considering Chhindwara has seen development under the senior Congress leader," Uikey said.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, Kamal Nath won the seat defeating BJP's Chandrabhan Kuber Singh by a margin of 1,16,537 votes. The LS seat has over 15,12,000 voters.

The seat has been a Congress bastion since 1957. The only time the party lost it to BJP was in the 1997 by-election when BJP candidate Sunder Lal Patwa won.

Kamal Nath's wife Alka has also represented the seat once.

The Chhindwara Lok Sabha constituency has seven assembly segments Junnardeo, Amarwara, Chorai, Saunsar, Chhindwara, Parasia and Pandhurna. All seven were won by Congress in the 2018 assembly polls.

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News Network
February 10,2020

Hyderabad, Feb 10: All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi continued his tirade against PM Modi and Amit Shah against Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), National Population Register (NPR) and National Register of Citizens (NRC). "We are ready to take bullets in our chests but we will not show our papers.

We are ready to take bullets in our chests as we love our country," Owaisi said further.

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Agencies
January 12,2020

Lucknow, Jan 12: The controversy over renowned Pakistani poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz's iconic poem 'Hum dekhenge' may have caused an upheaval in the literary world but it has also helped in resurrecting the famous poet for the young generations.

Students and young professionals are making a beeline for books on Faiz, his biography and his poems and book sellers are ordering supplies of Faiz books.

"Earlier, we sold hardly one book in a month or on Faiz but after the controversy, people are curious to know more about the poet and his poems. We have placed orders for the entire literary range on Faiz Ahmad Faiz," said a leading book seller in Hazratganj in Lucknow.

The bookseller said that the highest demand was for books written in Devnagri script.

"Not many in the young generation can read or write Urdu so they prefer Devnagri," the book seller said.

In Kanpur, most of the leading bookshops have already run out of stocks and book stalls in the ongoing Handloom Expo are drawing huge crowds for Faiz books.

Suchita Srivastava, B.Ed student in Kanpur said, "I have never been fond of Urdu poetry because I do not understand much of the language but after the controversy, I want to read poems of Faiz to understand what he wanted to say. I am taking help of Google to understand difficult words in Urdu."

Krishna Rao, another student at the Chandra Shekhar Azad University of Agriculture and Technology, said that since books on Faiz had been sold out, he had ordered a Kindle edition and was reading them.

"Reading his poems actually widens one's perspective of things and becomes even more precious if you take into account the time and context in which they were written," he said.

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News Network
June 30,2020

Srinagar, Jun 30: On the deadly attack at Karachi Stock Exchange on Monday morning, a Kashmiri social activist and journalist warned that the incident is a stark reminder to all those in Pakistan supporting Jihad and attacked Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan for ignoring development agenda in Balochistan.

Yana Mir, the editor-in-chief of The Real Kashmir News, said, "Karachi Stock Exchange attack is a reminder to all those in Pakistan supporting Jihad. Remember @imrankhan that Youth is restless and they want development agenda. These young boys of BLA are also looking for a life which is settled and peaceful. Wake up Imran Khan and you Kashmiris also. Pakistan is going to finish you. Open your eyes."
Four heavily armed terrorists attacked the busy Pakistan Stock Exchange building in Karachi with grenades today, killing four security guards and a police officer before being shot dead in an exchange of fire, authorities said.

The terrorists, who arrived in a car, stormed the Karachi Stock Exchange building by firing indiscriminately and lobbed grenades at the main gate of the multi-storey building situated in the city's high-security commercial hub.

Balochistan is a well-known region rich in natural resources but the Balochis have always been deprived of basic facilities. No hospitals are available in Balochistan. If there are some then medical facilities and equipment are not available in hospitals. The education system is pathetic and similar is the case with the infrastructure: the roads, water system, agriculture and almost all fields of life.

It is pertinent to mention that enforced disappearances and abductions by the Pakistani military establishment have also been carried out regularly and for innumerable times in Balochistan. Leaders, activists, and vocal members of various student organizations have been detained by the security forces and kept in confinement. While others have been shot dead.

This crime against humanity has been going on for so long and so systematically in Balochistan that it has come to be considered as a normal state of affairs in the province. Many social and human rights activists have flagged the issue of oppression by the Pakistani establishment before the United Nations and other international agencies.

According to the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances, an entity established by the Pakistani government, about 5,000 cases of enforced disappearances have been registered since 2014. Most of them are still unresolved.

Independent local and international human rights organisations put the numbers much higher. Around 20,000 have reportedly been abducted only from Balochistan, out of which more than 2,500 have turned up dead as bullet-riddled dead bodies, bearing signs of extreme torture.

Before being elected as Prime Minister, Imran Khan had admitted in multiple interviews about the involvement of Pakistan's intelligence agencies in enforced disappearances as well as extrajudicial killings and vowed to resign if he was unable to put an end to the practice, holding those involved responsible. But times have passed and only reports are available to narrate the true story.

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