Rahul Gandhi writes to Manohar Parrikar, says he never shared their meeting details

Agencies
January 31, 2019

New Delhi, Jan 31: Congress President Rahul Gandhi Wednesday said he empathises with Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar for being "forced" to accuse him of doing petty politics over a courtesy visit and asserted he never shared any details of their meeting.

Replying to Parrikar, hours after the former defence minister wrote to him, Gandhi said in his two speeches since their meeting in Panaji, he had only referred to what is already in the public domain on the Rafale deal and what the chief minister had said earlier.

The ailing Goa chief minister Wednesday accused the Congress chief of using his courtesy visit to him for "petty political gains", asserting that there was no mention of the Rafale issue in their five-minute meeting.

Several BJP leaders, including party president Amit Shah, also attacked Gandhi. Gandhi said he was forced to write back to Parrikar to clarify his position on the issue as the chief minister's letter to him has created an "unfortunate and unnecessary controversy".

"Parrikar Ji, I empathise with your situation. I understand the immense pressure you are under after our meeting yesterday.  Pressure that has forced you to take the highly unusual step of demonstrating your loyalty to the PM and his cronies by attacking me in this uncharacteristic manner," Gandhi said in his letter, which he also posted on Facebook and Twitter.

Wishing the Goa chief minister a speedy recovery once again, the Congress chief said he is "disturbed" to hear about a letter which Parrikar has supposedly written to him, "but instead leaked to the press before I have had a chance to read it".

"I have not shared any details of my conversation with you when we met in Goa yesterday. In my two speeches since we met, I have referred to what is already in the public domain," Gandhi claimed.

"Respectfully, my visit to you was strictly personal and driven purely by my empathy for your situation. You will no doubt recall that I also called you when you were undergoing treatment in the United States to enquire after your health and wish you well.

"However Parrikar Ji, regardless of my visit, I am a democratic representative, elected to serve the Indian people, and as such I reserve the absolute right to attack the corrupt PM on his blatant dishonesty in the RAFALE deal," he said.

The Congress chief claimed that in April 2015, when Parrikar was inaugurating a fish market in Goa, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the Rafale deal in France with the then French president Francois Hollande.

"It is also a fact that you clearly stated to the press that you had no idea about the new deal engineered by the PM. This has been widely reported in all sections of the media," he said in his letter.

"Again, it is a fact that there is an audio recording of your own Cabinet colleague in Goa, claiming you told ministers in a cabinet meeting that you have the RAFALE papers in your 'bed room', implying that you have power over PM Modi and his cronies," he claimed.

The BJP had at that time dubbed the tape as forged. On Tuesday, hours after meeting Parrikar at the Goa Assembly complex in Panaji, Gandhi had told Congress workers in Kochi that the former defence minister had said he had nothing to do with the Rafale fighter jet deal.

"Friends, the ex-defence minister Mr Parrikar clearly stated that he has nothing to do with the new deal that was orchestrated by Mr Narendra Modi to benefit Anil Ambani," he had said.

Ripping into Gandhi, BJP chief Shah charged him with "lying" in the name of a person fighting a disease and claiming that people of India are "disgusted by your reckless behaviour".

In his letter, Parrikar asked Gandhi not to use his visit to an ailing person to "feed political opportunism", saying that paying a courtesy visit and then stooping so low to make a false statement for petty political gains has raised in his mind questions about sincerity and purpose of the visit.

He said he felt let down that Gandhi used this visit for his petty political gains as the five minutes they spent together, neither did the Congress president say anything about Rafale nor did they discuss anything related to it.

"Here I am fighting against a life-threatening illness. Due to my training and ideological strength, I wish to serve Goa and its people against any/all odds. I thought your visit would give me your good wishes in that cause of serving our people. Little did I know that you had other intentions," Parrikar wrote.

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News Network
February 5,2020

New Delhi, Feb 5: Taking on Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal after Shaheen Bagh shooter Kapil Baisala was identified as an AAP worker by police, BJP chief J P Nadda on Tuesday said it exposed the party and Kejriwal who were playing with the country's security.

The Aam Aadmi Party hit back, questioning the police investigation.

In a series of tweets, Nadda said people of the country and Delhi today have seen the "dirty face" of AAP.

"For political longing, Kejriwal and his people even sold the security of the country. Earlier, Kejriwal used to insult the Army and advocate terrorists, but today relations with those who carry out their terrorist activities came to light," he said.

Nadda said he wanted to make it clear to Kejriwal that this country is bigger than any election, any government, and "this nation will not forgive those who play with its security. Kejriwal and his entire team have been exposed. The people of Delhi will give a befitting reply".

He claimed the entire country has seen "photos of Imam Hussain, the MLA and former minister of the Delhi government, with a radical terrorist organisation, PFI".

Days before Delhi goes to polls, police claimed that Baisala is a member of the Aam Aadmi Party. They said Baisala joined the party in early 2019 along with his father.

Police said it had photos of Baisala purportedly joining AAP along with his father Gaje Singh last year.

AAP's Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh alleged that photos which were part of investigation were leaked to the BJP. He also said the party will approach the Election Commission to raise this issue, which has cropped up four days before the polling date.

"On whose instance, the police is giving statement? How did the photos which were part of the investigation reach the BJP? Before the news came out, Manoj Tiwari in the morning stated that the accused was from AAP. How did Manoj Tiwari get this news," Singh questioned in a press conference.

Union minister and BJP's in-charge for the Delhi polls, Prakash Javadekar, in a press conference alleged that "their (AAP's) designs are very clear from the beginning and they are trying every trick".

The whole conspiracy of AAP is to "divide society, cause fear in a community and create a vote bank," he charged.

Javadekar also claimed that photos of Baisala were recovered by police from his mobile phone although they were erased.

He also claimed that Baisala and his father were welcomed by Sanjay Singh at their joining of AAP.

"This proves AAP misleads youth and pushes them on the wrong path. AAP's strategy is to divide two communities, they want to instigate riots in Delhi," Javadekar alleged.

He further alleged that AAP leader Sanjay Singh had said violence would take place in Delhi. Their "conspiracy has been exposed by Delhi Police," he claimed.

"We condemn this politics of AAP," he said.

Javadekar also claimed this was "not an isolated incident" as AAP member Amanatullah Khan made a "very provocative speech" and the party supported Shaheen Bagh and did not give permission for the prosecution of members of the "tukde-tukde gang".

He hinted the BJP could approach the Election Commission against AAP over the issue.

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News Network
March 20,2020

New Delhi, Mar 20: The four men convicted of the gang rape and murder of a Delhi woman on December 16, 2012 were hanged in the darkness of pre-dawn on Friday, ending a horrific chapter in India's long history of sexual assault that had seared the nation's soul. Mukesh Singh (32), Pawan Gupta (25), Vinay Sharma (26) and Akshay Kumar Singh (31) were executed at 5.30 am for the savage assault in an empty moving bus on the 23-year-old physiotherapy intern who came to be known the world over as Nirbhaya, the fearless one.

This is the first time that four men have been hanged together in Tihar Jail, South Asia's largest prison complex that houses more than 16,000 inmates. The executions were carried out after the men exhausted every possible legal avenue to escape the gallows. Their desperate attempts only postponed the inevitable by less than two months after the first date of execution was set for January 22.

They were hanged at 5.30 am, Director General of Prison Sandeep Goel said.

After raping and brutalising the woman, the men, one of whom was a juvenile at the time, dumped her on the road and left for dead on the cold winter night. Her friend who was with her was also severely beaten and thrown out along with her. She was so severely violated that her insides were spilling out when she was taken to hospital. She died in a Singapore hospital after battling for her life for a fortnight.

Six people, including the four convicts and the juvenile, were named as accused.

While Ram Singh allegedly committed suicide in the Tihar Jail days after the trial began in the case, the juvenile was released in 2015 after spending three years in a correctional home.

The road to the gallows was a long and circuitous one, going through the lower courts, the High Court, the Supreme Court and the president's office before going back to the Supreme Court that heard and rejected various curative petitions.

The death warrants were deferred by a court thrice on the grounds that the convicts had not exhausted all their legal remedies and that the mercy petition of one or the other was before the president.

On March 5, a trial court issued fresh death warrants for March 20 at 5.30 am as the final date for the execution.

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News Network
January 7,2020

Jan 7: Body of the senior Iranian military commander, Qasem Soleimani killed in a U.S. drone strike in Iraq last week, has arrived in his home town of Kerman in southeast Iran for burial, the official IRNA news agency said on Tuesday.

State TV broadcast live images of thousands of people in the streets of the town, many of them dressed in black, to mourn Soleimani's death.

Soleimani was widely seen as Iran’s second most powerful figure behind Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 80, who wept in grief along with hundreds of thousands of mourners who thronged the streets of Tehran for Soleimani’s funeral on Monday.

Khamenei led prayers at the funeral in the Iranian capital, pausing as his voice cracked with emotion. Soleimani, 62, was a national hero even to many who do not consider themselves supporters of Iran’s clerical rulers.

He was killed while leaving Baghdad airport last Friday. Mourners packed the streets, chanting: “Death to America!” - a show of national unity after anti-government protests in November in which many demonstrators were killed.

The crowd, which state media said numbered in the millions, recalled the masses gathered in 1989 for the funeral of the Islamic Republic’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

The killing of Soleimani has prompted fears around the world of a broader regional conflict, as well as calls in the U.S. Congress for legislation to keep President Donald Trump from going to war against Iran.

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