BSP unusually silent as corruption probe looms

May 18, 2012

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Lucknow, May 18: The skeletons are tumbling out of the corruption cupboard, but Uttar Pradesh's former ruling party, the Bahujan Samajwadi Party (BSP), is unusually quiet — not even reacting to Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav's allegation that it was involved in scams of over Rs400 billion (Dh26.8 billion).

Yadav, who is from the Samajwadi Party (SP), accused his predecessor Mayawati late on Tuesday of presiding over the plunder of the state and said her government was involved in scams of over Rs400 billion. The normally pugnacious Mayawati, who is now in the Rajya Sabha, has been quiet.

And her party has gone into a huddle in the state, trying to fight the growing public perception in the wake of evidence that the Mayawati government was mired in a series of political and financial irregularities.

Even BSP leaders like Mayawati's close aide Swamy Prasad Maurya, who has been accusing Yadav and the SP of indulging in political vendettas, have chosen not to speak on the issue.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a senior BSP leader said that much of the party was still smarting from the debacle in the state assembly polls two months ago and was not mobilised enough to take on the onslaught by the SP government. The party's tally in the assembly slipped from 206 to a paltry 85.

"Behenji [Mayawati] is sitting in Delhi, attending parliament, as we are faced with such an attack against us. How do we cope with all this? Nobody knows," a BSP office-bearer told IANS.

Maximum mileage

The SP is extracting the maximum mileage out of the situation.

Yadav told reporters late on Tuesday that scams were being unearthed slowly and steadily and a commission would be constituted soon.

"In [the] days to come you will see many more multi-crore scams being unearthed," he said.

Health minister Ahmad Hassan told IANS: "It is beyond doubt that Mayawati had her hands in the loot and I am sure that in due course of time, the long arm of the law will catch up with her and her cronies."

Yadav has already directed officials to escalate the probe into the sprawling Dalit Prerna Sthal park in Noida, which was inaugurated by Mayawati near the end of her five-year term.

Ombudsman's report

The Lokayukta has already given his report against many ministers of the BSP government, said a senior official.

The SP government is understood to be on the verge of okaying the demand for a CBI probe against some ministers, he added.

As former chief minister and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Rajnath Singh put it: "If the chief minister alleges that there were scams to the tune of Rs400 billion, we have to take the charge seriously. And the complicity of Mayawati in such scams cannot be ruled out, direct or indirect."

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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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News Network
March 26,2020

Jaipur, Mar 26: Two new COVID-19 positive cases were registered in Rajasthan taking the total number of coronavirus cases to 38 in the state.
The Union Health Ministry had on Wednesday reported 606 positive COVID-19 cases in India including 43 foreign nationals.

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News Network
March 4,2020

Mar 4: Twenty-one Italian tourists and three Indian tour operators have been sent to an ITBP quarantine facility in Delhi on Tuesday for suspected coronavirus exposure, official sources said.

Health Ministry sources said these foreigners, 13 women and eight men, were in the same group of which an Italian and his wife have tested positive in Rajasthan capital Jaipur.

“His (Italian in Jaipur) condition is stable,” a source said.

Three Indians, who were accompanying this Italian group as tour operators, have also been sent to the ITBP facility in Chhawla area of south-west Delhi, they said.

All these people, staying at a five-star hotel in south Delhi, have been put in “preventive isolation” at the ITBP camp and their samples will be taken on Wednesday, sources said.

The centre already has 112 people, 76 Indians and 36 foreigners, since February 27 after they were evacuated by an IAF plane from Wuhan in China, the epicentre of the coronavirus.

The first samples of these 112 people had tested negative when reports came in last week.

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