Tripura: BJP emerges as major challenge to CPI-M as Cong leaders turn saffron

New Delhi, Mar 5: Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan assuring that the government has the coronavirus crisis under control, is like the Titanic captain telling passengers not to panic as his ship was unsinkable, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said on Thursday.

Gandhi's remarks came after Vardhan's assurance in Parliament that the government is taking all necessary measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19 (coronavirus disease) in India.

“The health minister saying that the Indian government has the coronavirus crisis under control, is like the Captain of the Titanic telling passengers not to panic as his ship was unsinkable,” Gandhi said in a tweet.

“It's time the government made public an action plan backed by solid resources to tackle this crisis,” he said.

RMS Titanic was a British passenger liner that sank in the North Atlantic Ocean in the early morning hours of April 15, 1912, after striking an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York.

Gandhi has been raising concerns over the coronavirus infection since long. In a February 12 tweet, he had said coronavirus is an extremely serious threat to “our people and our economy”.

“My sense is the government is not taking this threat seriously. Timely action is critical,” he had said.

Earlier this week, Gandhi had hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the detection of fresh coronavirus cases in the country, saying he should quit wasting India's time “playing the clown” with his social media accounts when India is facing an emergency.

With the message of “Here's how it's done”, Gandhi had also tweeted a video of Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong addressing Singaporeans on how to deal with the coronavirus.

The number of coronavirus cases in India is 29, including 16 Italians, the government had said on Wednesday, adding all international passengers will now be screened at airports, amid growing concern over the spread of the respiratory infection.

New Delhi, May 12: Stranded for over 50 days due to the lockdown and suspension of passenger train services, many people in the national capital will finally be able to reach their destinations in different parts of the country after the railways resumed services on Tuesday.

Three special AC trains will leave the New Delhi railway station for Dibrugarh, Bengaluru and Bilaspur.

The train to Dibrugarh in Assam will leave at 4.45 p.m, while the one leaving for Bilaspur in Chhattisgarh and Bengaluru in Karnataka will leave the New Delhi station at 5.30 p.m and 9.15 p.m respectively.

Entry to the station has been facilitated from the Paharganj side for all confirmed ticket holders. No entry for passengers holding such tickets will be permitted from the Ajmeri Gate side, the railways said.

Railway authorities have put barricades outside the station premises and only those with confirmed tickets are being allowed to enter.

All passengers are undergoing thermal screening before entering the station premises. For this purpose, they have also been asked to reach the station 90 minutes prior to the departure of the train.

A senior Railway Police Force officer said every passenger is being subjected to thermal screening. Hand sanitiser machines have also been placed at the entrance and the passengers are being advised to sanitise their hands before entering the station premises.

Syed Yasir, a private retail sector executive, said due to the resumption of services he will now be able to go to Nagpur to be with his family on Eid. 

Surendra, an engineer with a PSU, was on an assignment in Agra when the lockdown was announced. After the Railways decided to resume passenger train services, he came to Delhi in a private vehicle to board the train to Bengaluru.

"I was on an assignment in Agra where I was stuck. I have come from Agra in a private vehicle and now going to board the train to Bengaluru," Surendra, who identified himself with his first name, said.

Five more trains bound for Delhi will leave from Patna, Bengaluru, Howrah, Mumbai and Ahmedabad, the railways said.

Panaji, Jan 28: Bureaucrat-turned-activist Kannan Gopinathan on Tuesday said even some "RSS people" are convinced the Citizenship Amendment Act is a bad law but are keeping quiet as the NDA government at the Centre is their own baby.

Speaking in Panaji, he further said the Narendra Modi government was behaving like a "drunken teenager" which needs to be questioned or else it will end up destroying homes.

"I was detained twice in UP, kept the whole day, because they (government) do not want the questioning (of CAA). I have met so many RSS people, they also understand this...if you have this conversation, they also understand the government has done something (wrong) and they have been asked to support it," he claimed.

He said the line of thought among these RSS people (he met) was "just support it (CAA)" as they don't want an altercation because the "government is their baby".

"He (government) is not a normal baby, he is a drunken teenager. He should be asked questions because when he starts destroying, he does not destroy somebody else's home but your own home," Gopinathan said.

He also hit out at those who have been claiming that the people protesting against the CAA are unaware about the law and have not even read it.

Gopinathan claimed if one had asked supportive MPs about the CAA on the day it was passed in Parliament, several of them would not have been able to speak on it as "they would not have known what was passed, because they were not given time (to go through the bill)".

He said, earlier, such legislation was passed after several rounds of consultation but "now, by night, it becomes an Act", adding (now) "everything is a surgical strike".

Gopinathan, in a possible reference to the National Register of Citizens exercise carried out in Assam, also claimed "thousands of people are in detention centres".

"It is your fundamental right to peacefully assemble without arms, Article 19 (1) (D) (of the Constitution)," he said at a function organised by a group opposed to CAA.

Gopinathan said people "always felt they were in a democracy" because they never tried to fly, when in reality "you are in a cage".

"The moment you want to fly you realise you are in a cage," he said, adding that "we have to question, we have to ask ourselves where are we going".

"When you don't allow a person to speak against an incorrect legislation, then what is democracy? What is freedom of expression?" Gopinathan questioned.

Gopinathan, a 2012 batch AGMUT cadre Indian Administrative Service officer, was the secretary, Power Department of the Union Territories of Daman and Diu, and Dadra and Nagar Haveli when he resigned on August 21 last year.

At the time, he had claimed the people of Jammu and Kashmir were being denied freedom of expression following abrogation of Article 370 by the Centre.