Tuesday, November 19, 2024
Home Blog Page 6795

Man fined Rs 2 lakh for giving Triple Talaq, but we don’t know his name or age

Hemant Bijapurkar
-
0
Man fined Rs 2 lakh for giving Triple Talaq, but we don’t know his name or age

The archaic practice of triple talaq has recently been a very hotly debated topic. While various corners of the society including many Muslim women want the practice banned, there have been pockets of resistance which have chiefly been led by the All India Muslim Personal Law board.

Now there seems to be some sensitization among the Muslim community against the practice of Triple Talaq and one such incident has come to light from Uttar Pradesh, but the details are all sketchy.

According to reports, a Panchayat in the Sambhal district of Uttar Pradesh has set a deterrent against the practice of triple talaq after fining a man Rs 2 lakh for giving all three talaqs in one go to his wife.

Their marriage reportedly was not a happy one and it was accompanied with constant quarrels. Recently things took turn for the worse and the man pronounced triple talaq on his wife. After this, the wife returned to her parents’ home and her brother approached the head of their Panchayat, asking him to take up his sister’s matter. As a result a Panchayat was constituted on Sunday and was attended by the Turk community members from 52 villages.

When the man wasn’t able to justify the use of triple talaq, the Rs 2 lakh fine was slapped on him. Apart from that, he was also reportedly asked to pay a ‘mahar’ of Rs 60,000 and was ordered to return whatever dowry he had received from his wife’s family.

Even though the incident is very encouraging, various media outlets ended up providing inconsistent pieces of information, which put a dent on the details and thus credibility of the news.

The Indian Express report claimed that the couple were married two years ago i.e. in 2015, but the Times of India (TOI) got them married a year earlier in 2014. Small inconsistencies are understandable, but what made things entirely muddled is a Zee News report claiming that the couple were married for just 10 days.

Even the identities of the couple were all mixed up. While The Asian Age, Zee News, The Telegraph and Dainik Jagran didn’t bother to give out the names of the couple, Indian Express called them as Raees Ahmed and Rehana Begum, while TOI called them Salman Turk and Sabiha Begum.

The ages of the couple too were inconsistent. Indian Express claimed the man and woman were 45 and 34 years of age respectively, while the TOI claimed they were 45 and 35 years of age. Asian Age and Zee News quoted them to be 45 and 22 years of age respectively, and Telegraph claimed that the man was 40 years of age while being silent on the age of the woman.

Such glaring inconsistencies when it comes to specifics does raise serious question about both the credibility of the incident as well as that of the media houses. One hopes it is just lazy journalism, and not something worse like a fake news.

How a VIP status for Robert Vadra helped him in business deals

OpIndia Staff
-
0
How a VIP status for Robert Vadra helped him in business deals

The then Congress government in Haryana, led by Bhupinder Singh Hooda, in 2008, had granted licences to Robert Vadra’s Skylight Hospitality for building a colony in Gurgaon simply on the ground that the director of the firm was a VIP and the son-in-law of Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

This has been revealed by the testimonies of the officers of Department of Town and Country Planning (DTCP), Gurgaon before the Justice (retd) SN Dhingra Commission of Inquiry whose remit is to look into land deals involving Robert Vadra and circumstances under which licences were granted to Skylight Hospitality for development of colonies in Gurgaon.

According to reports, the Gurgaon Town Planning officer has informed the Dhingra Commission that granting of license to Skylight Hospitality was determined on the basis of the “status” of its director.

“Vadra was Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law and since he was a VIP, he had the capacity to build a colony.” This was what Gurgaon Town Planning officer had recommended. This officer’s report was subsequently approved by senior officials in DTCP and then by the then Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda.

It could be noted that the DTCP is also responsible for granting change of land use (CLU) certificates. The Haryana Development and Regulation of Urban Areas Act doesn’t specify that a CLU applicant should have the capacity to build the project, but a licence applicant must have the capacity to build the colony.

Justice (retd) SN Dhingra Commission of Inquiry was set up in May 2015 by the BJP government led by Manohar Lal Khattar. The Commission had submitted its report to Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar in August last year.

Even as the contents of the probe panel is still under wraps, Justice Dhingra has reportedly said that he has done his job and it is up to the courts to decide whether the report should be made public.

The Congress chose to challenge the constitutional validity of the Dhingra Commission and alleged that the BJP government had set up the Commission in “pursuit of a political vendetta”.

Earlier the commission had discovered a land transaction undertaken by Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s daughter and Robert Vadra’s wife Priyanka Gandhi. Priyanka had bought 5 acres of agricultural land in Amipur village in Faridabad district of Haryana for Rs 15 lakh on April 28, 2006. That piece of land was resold to the original owner around four years later on February 17, 2010 at over five times the original price.

Tejas Express leaves Goa 3 hours late but reaches Mumbai a minute early

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Tejas Express leaves Goa 3 hours late but reaches Mumbai a minute early

The Tejas Express, Indian railways’ premium semi-luxury train has unfortunately been in the news for the wrong reasons ever since its launch. The train which boasts of features such as on-board entertainment system, LCD screens, WiFi, coffee vending machines, snack tables, smart windows with automatic blinds had one of its windows damaged after a stone was allegedly thrown at it.

The maiden trip of the train from Mumbai to Goa was practically ruined after a few passengers travelling on the train decided to steal the headphones and vandalize the LCDs which have been provided as part of the on-board entertainment system. Some of the passengers even littered in the train and also didn’t flush properly after using the toilets.

Now though a positive news regarding the train is doing the rounds. As reported the train’s departure on Sunday from Goa was unfortunately delayed by 3 hours as the empty coach from Mumbai came late, owing to the change of train’s timetable.

Two timetables have been introduced for the train, regular and a monsoon one. During the monsoon season the train would take about 12-15 hours as opposed to its usual 8.5 hrs. The revised time table has been put in place in order to hedge against the rough terrain the monsoon rain brings with it.

The train departed from Goa at 10:30 AM instead of the scheduled 7:30 AM but made up time by travelling as fast as 153 Kmph between the Karmali and Kudal sector.

This incident shows that the Indian Railway authorities are doing all they can in order to maintain the premium standard of the train. It remains to be seen if the passengers too take a lesson from the dedication of the authorities to try and responsibly use the facilities provided on-board the train.

This punctuality when it comes to the Tejas Express would also contribute in improving the image of Indian trains which are infamous for having regular delays.

GST launch is not getting deferred, don’t believe these WhatsApp rumours

Hemant Bijapurkar
-
0
GST launch is not getting deferred, don’t believe these WhatsApp rumours

The Good and Services Tax (GST), which is a watershed moment in Indian Taxation is scheduled to be launched on 1st July 2017 and rates of almost all goods and services have been fixed and then have also been subsequently revised.

The implementation of the GST is already going to be a challenge for the government but as it turns out some unscrupulous elements want to cause further troubles by spreading baseless rumors in order to create panic among people directly affected by the new tax.

As it turns out recently rumors are floating on social media which claim that the government has decided to defer the launch date from 1st July to 1st September. The rumors are reportedly being spread chiefly on WhatsApp but are also being circulated on Facebook and Twitter:

whatsapp rumour
A sample WhatsApp message

Then there are such messages on Twitter:


A few professionals on the ground too seem to have fallen for this rumour:


The propaganda seems to have been effective as there were various queries for clarification by concerned citizens:

All this today prompted Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhiya to clarify that such reports were false:


The Central Excise board too carried a notification:


We contacted our columnist Ashutosh Mugikar for more clarity on this issue. He stated that the rumour was chiefly being circulated on WhatsApp. He stated that he too had received such messages on various professional groups which include members like lawyers, company secretaries, chartered accountants etc. The reasons given for this rumoured delay are:

GST technology backbone is not ready

GST technology backbone has not yet been tested

He dubbed these messages to be plain scaremongering and also pointed out that various associations had called for the deferment of the GST launch till September due to the unpreparedness of various industries. Thus he speculated that people who want GST deferred might have seeded in this rumour.

Maoists spreading footprints in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Maoists spreading footprints in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra

The Maoists, who have been wreaking havoc in the Bastar region of southern Chhattisgarh, are reportedly in the process of creating an entirely new red corridor along the western border of the state.

According to reports, a 25-page-long document, retrieved by the Chhattisgarh Police in April, states that the new Maoist zone will cover the forest pockets in Balaghat district in Madhya Pradesh, Gondia district in Maharashtra and Rajnandgaon, Kabirdham and Mungeli districts of Chhattisgarh.

It could be noted that Rajnandgaon is not new to Maoist violence. In 2009, the then SP Vinod Choubey was killed in a Maoist ambush along with 29 other policemen. Mungeli have not seen any Maoist activity so far, though there have been some reports of Maoist movement in Kabirdham, which incidentally is the home district of Chief Minister Raman Singh.

The document describes the new area as the MMC (Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh Confluence) zone. The Maoist document further indicates that the idea is to create an entity like the Dandakaranya Special Zonal Committee in Bastar.

MMC is the second red zone that the Maoists are building after they had built BBM (Bolangir, Bargarh, Mahasamund) division, in 2006, under Odisha State Committee. This marks the first expansion by Maoists in Chhattisgarh region in eight years.

The contents of the document, said to be have been drafted by “MMC Leading team” in March 2017, highlights issues specific to the area that the Maoist leadership must take up such as land, differential pricing of bamboo and even demonetisation.

The Maoist document states that efforts need to be taken to increase “political awareness of the Naxal movement”. “We have to familiarise village level committees of the strategies and policies of the people’s war,” reads the document.

The document mentions that that there have been encounters in September, December last year and February this year, where the Maoists lost key papers, leading to security forces learning of their plans.

The Maoist document cautions its cadre to remain mobile and instead of staying in one place and attack security forces by laying ambush. Intelligence sources suggest that the Maoists have sent 58 senior and middle level cadres – headed by a Maoist commander Surender – to operationalise the MMC.

There are also indications that the top Maoist leadership, possibly members of the Central Committee, have visited the region to push the process.

It appears that Maoists are concentrating to increase their strength entirely in and around Chhattisgarh after reports indicated that they were being weakened in other regions of India.

Pakistan sentences Shia man to death for alleged blasphemy on Facebook

OpIndia Staff
-
0
Pakistan sentences Shia man to death for alleged blasphemy on Facebook

An anti-terrorism court (ATC) in Pakistan has sentenced a 30-year-old man, belonging to the minority Shia community, to death for allegedly posting blasphemous content on Facebook.

The sentence is the harshest among cyber-crime related sentences handed down so far in Pakistan. This is perhaps the first ever case in the world when a social media user was sentenced to death by the court of law.

ATC Judge Shabbir Ahmed announced the sentence for 30-year-old Taimoor Raza on 10 June in Bahawapur jail of eastern Punjab province. The trial was conducted amid tight security.

Raza hails from Okara, situated at a distance of 200 km from Lahore. He was convicted for allegedly making derogatory remarks against about Sunni religious figures, Prophet Mohammad, his wives and companions.

According to reports, Raza was arrested in April last year after a debate about Islam on Facebook with a man who turned out to be a counter-terrorism agent. He was arrested by a counter-terrorism officer following a complaint that he was showing onlookers “objectionable material” on his cell phone at a bus terminal in Bahawapur.

It is rare for a counter-terrorism court to hear a blasphemy case. But the sections under which Raza has been charged included counter-terrorism offences linked to hate speech. Raza was charged under section 295C of the Pakistan Penal Code (use of derogatory remarks, etc in respect of the Holy Prophet) and Section 9 and 11w of the Anti-Terrorism Act (which deal with whipping up sectarian hatred).

“Raza had been charged with two unrelated sections of the law to ensure the maximum penalty,” Raza’s defence attorney Fida Hussain Rana was quoted as saying.

It could be noted that Pakistan, which is a predominantly a Sunni Muslim country, remains indifferent to the Shias and other religious minorities.

Blasphemy is an extremely sensitive issue in Pakistan. Under Pakistan’s blasphemy law, anyone accused of “insulting” Islam can be sentenced to death. Dozens are sitting on death row in the country for alleged blasphemy.

According to Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, the country last year had arrested 15 people – 10 Muslims and five non-Muslims – on blasphemy charges. Several other violent incidents linked to alleged blasphemy have alarmed human rights groups in the recent times.

Figures obtained from independent records suggest that there have been at least 67 murders in Pakistan over unproven allegations since 1990.

In April this year, a stick-wielding mob in Abdul Wali Khan University in Mardan beat up a student named Mashal Khan to death following a dorm debate about religion.

In January 2011, a provincial governor was shot dead by his police guard who accused him of blasphemy after he criticised the law and defended a Christian woman sentenced to death.

Asia Bibi, a Christian woman, was convicted in 2010 for alleged blasphemy. Bibi is still in solitary confinement.

According to Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, four people were sentenced to death for blasphemy last year.

Pakistan, last year, had passed a controversial cyber crime bill called Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act 2016 that proposed strict punishment for cyber crime offences. Recently, the Federal Investigation Agency of Pakistan detained dozens of social media users under the act.

Pakistani Authorities have asked Twitter and Facebook to help identify users sharing “blasphemous content”. Pakistani Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar had threatened to block these social-networking websites in the country if they failed to cooperate.

Jagendra Singh : the journalist who was burnt alive but failed to shake Lutyens

Abhishek Banerjee
-
0
Jagendra Singh : the journalist who was burnt alive but failed to shake Lutyens

These days the discourse in the Indian media is high on “freedom”. Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, religious and cultural freedoms, academic and intellectual freedoms. I can open any English language newspaper today and read about how Modi has wrecked press freedom. I can hear them shouting from the rooftops that their voices have been stifled.

Whatever virtues the Indian media might have, irony is clearly not their strong suit.

The voices have recently grown louder with the CBI raid on Prannoy Roy. In a clear violation of press immunity, the CBI raided residence of NDTV founder-promoter Prannoy Roy in connection with an alleged financial fraud.

Oops! Did I say “press immunity”? I meant “press freedom”. I always struggle with these concepts of having immunity vs having freedom. Anyway…

But there is one voice that I cannot hear. A voice that is gone forever. All that we have left is a few screams on tape.

Jagendra Singh
Somehow this was not ‘attack on press’

That’s the job of a journalist. Asking questions. And Jagendra Singh wanted to ask why “they” had to burn him alive? On his death bed, the helpless man wanted to ask why the “minister and his goondas” – which included police officers – could not have given him a lesser punishment, such as beating him up.

Who is Jagendra Singh?

Well, there are journalists who are burnt alive and have to beg for the more merciful “punishment” of being beaten up. And then there are journalists who have to be rushed to TV studios and Thinkfests  with severe third degree injuries from getting trolled on Twitter.

Jagendra Singh belonged to the former category. His journalism was a no-frills operation, for he ran a mere Facebook page called “Shahjahanpur Samachar” – basically he did not even have a proper job, but he had a passion for journalism.

For those who don’t know, Shahjahanpur is one of those sleepy little towns in Uttar Pradesh that never make the news. Shahjahanpur is definitely a bigger town than Dadri, though, but I digress.

On the Facebook page of Shahjahanpur Samachar, this man Jagendra Singh ended up writing extensively about alleged corruption of one Ram Murti Singh Verma, a minister in the then Akhilesh Yadav government of Uttar Pradesh.

So, a journalist accuses a minister of corruption. The next thing, the journalist is burnt alive and leaves behind a dying declaration (caught on video, no less) accusing people in power of burning him. (the video contains strong words and visuals, discretion advised).

Jagendra Singh was taken to a hospital. Apparently a police officer told the doctors not to tend to Singh and just let him die. The doctors did not listen to this ‘advice’ and transferred the grievously injured o Lucknow hospital, but Jagendra died of his burns a week later, back in June 2015.

What happens next? Does the Press Club hold an emergency meeting to begin a nationwide movement for justice to this journalist? Do intellectuals start returning heaps of awards to stir the national conscience?

No, of course not! The minister in question was secular, a member of the Samajwadi Party. The state of Uttar Pradesh was ruled at the time by the “Achche Ladke” team headed by Akhilesh Yadav.

Lutyens crowd was more interested in discussing Gajendra (Chauhan) than Jagendra.

So, nothing happens. Intellectuals keep their awards. Journalists keep raising awareness against the scourge of internet trolls. And activists demand FTII be saved.

Nothing to see in Shahjahanpur. A few months later, Dadri would go on to happen in “Modi’s India”. That’s when the cameras came, crying aloud for freedom.

Meanwhile the family of Jagendra tries to fight back, alone. They don’t get prime time television slot that may shake the conscience of the nation.

Accusation
Details that have been forgotten and not fit for prime time debate?

But the law had to take the case to its logical conclusion. Something had to be done about the complaint lodged by Jagendra Singh’s son.

Pressure
No one could smell any ‘pressure’?

Oh thank god! Jagendra Singh’s sons had earlier lodged a complaint against the minister. That was before they had a chat with their mother and discovered that his father had planned to threaten self-immolation all along. So nice of these two upright young sons to come forward and actually “demand a clean chit” for the minister.

Lest I am accused of not acknowledging good work by the Akhilesh government, let me also tell you that earlier the then state government announced 30 lakh rupees as compensation and two government jobs for the believed family. All of these just a day before media reports suggested a suicide angle. Kaam bolta hai, you see.

Who says that “ghor kaliyug” has come? It is moments like these that restore our faith in humanity.

pressure
A u-turn that didn’t raise any eyebrows

Fortunately, the alleged sole eyewitness in the alleged murder of the alleged journalist (hope I have used “alleged” sufficiently many times) also remembered just in time that it was actually a self-immolation. What an awful  misunderstanding that could have hurt the image of one very upright individual minister in the secular government of Akhilesh Yadav.

Here ends the story of Jagendra Singh. You won’t hear him telling his wild stories ever again. His Facebook page has not been updated since then.

His voice was not silenced. His freedom was not curbed. He did not need a press conference at the Press Club of India in Lutyens’ Delhi.

People amused as NDTV journalists tweet against Fake News

Hemant Bijapurkar
-
0
People amused as NDTV journalists tweet against Fake News

Twitter users had a reason to be amused today after two NDTV journalists, Vikram Chandra and Nidhi Razdan decided to tweet against the practice of spreading Fake News:


Such a stance was perplexing for many as there there have been numerous occasions where NDTV itself has been caught spreading fake news. One of the more recent incidents was when the NDTV decided to report the slaughtered cow by the Congress Kerala workers, first as a slaughtered buffalo and then finally as a slaughtered ox.

Undoubtedly people were ready with reactions:


//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Nidhi Razdan didn’t stop at that and decided to give a full-toss to her critics:


And people did what was asked:

Now allegations of unexplained land acquisition against Lalu’s daughter and wife

Hemant Bijapurkar
-
0
Now allegations of unexplained land acquisition against Lalu’s daughter and wife

BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi has reportedly made serious allegations of unexplained land acquisition against Hema Yadav, the 5th daughter of Lalu Prasad Yadav. According to Modi, in February 2014 Hema had received land worth Rs 62 lakh from a man named Lallan Choudhary.

The BJP leader has further claimed that this same Lallan Choudhary was involved in gifting a house worth Rs 30 lakh to Lalu’s wife Rabri Devi just 19 days before his transaction with Hema. Apparently even though Choudhary had given such high profile ‘gifts’ to Lalu’s family, his name still featured in the BPL category.

Sushil Modi also asked questions as to how Choudhary, who worked at Lalu’s farmhouse feeding animals was able to acquired property worth Rs 1 crore. He urged the Lalu family to clear all the doubts or else people would start to perceive that Lallan Choudhary was used in order to buy Benami property.

In recent days there have been various land related allegations against the family of Lalu Prasad Yadav. We had reported how Lalu’s son Tej Pratap – the incumbent minister for Health, Minor Water Resources, Environment and Forest in Bihar – had allegedly secured a petrol pump from the state-run Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) by falsely claiming ownership of the land. According to a complaint, the land actually belonged to a company called M/S AK Infosystems.

There have also been other troubles for Lalu. The Income Tax officials have recently raided the associates of Lalu in Delhi-NCR over allegations that they were involved in Rs 1000 crores worth land deals. It was alleged that Lalu Yadav, his daughter Misa Bharti and her husband had acquired luxury properties under suspicious circumstances.

There have also been allegations of a Zoo scam where the Lalu’s son Tej Pratap had given a Rs 90 lakh contract by Patna Zoo to a company in which he, his mother and siblings were shareholders.

Sushil Modi had also made allegations regarding the zoo scam. He had alleged that this Rs 90 lakh contract was used to just buy soil which was extracted from a mall construction site in Patna. The land from which the soil was extracted was also registered under a shell company allegedly owned by Lalu and his family.

Now it might be difficult for Kejriwal to make wild allegations against the Election Commission

Hemant Bijapurkar
-
0
Now it might be difficult for Kejriwal to make wild allegations against the Election Commission

AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal hasn’t had the best electoral fortunes in recent times after his party came a disappointing 2nd in Punjab assembly elections and lost deposits in 38 out of 39 seats in Goa. The party too has not been fairing well on the home front after it lost both the MCD elections and the Rajouri Garden by-poll in Delhi.

Rather than introspecting about the possible flaws of the party or pondering upon the reasons for voter disillusionment, Kejriwal and co decided to embark upon a campaign to blame the EVMs and the Election Commission for their woes.

In the process of doing so, Kejriwal has spread a blatant lie about EVM tampering, made a false claim that 25% of AAP’s votes during the Punjab polls were shifted to other parties due to faulty EVMs and has even hacked a fake machine by labeling it as an EVM.

Kejriwal has unfortunately not restricted his defamatory tactics only to the EVMs and has also dragged in the Election Commission into the mess. In February Kejriwal had made a shocking allegation that the Election Commission had completely surrendered before PM Modi and at the same time had called the organisation spineless and shameless.

Kejriwal didn’t stop at that and in April had alleged that two out of three election commissioners were close to the Modi government. The basis of his allegation was that one of them was a Chief secretary of Gujarat under PM Modi and the other had come from Madhya Pradesh and as Kejriwal alleged was close to Shivraj Singh Chouhan. Kejriwal in the same month had also alleged that it appeared as if the only aim of the Election Commission was to bring the BJP to power.

Now the Election Commission seems to have had enough of all the allegations and has reportedly written to the law ministry to ask for powers which would allow it to act against those who question the organization’s credibility via baseless allegations. In the letter the Election Commission has reportedly asked for a modification in the 1971 Contempt of Courts Act in order to bestow it with the required powers.

Under the current act the party if found guilty can be imprisoned for a duration of 6 months. This letter to the law ministry was reportedly written a month ago and is currently being considered by the authorities.

If this demand is indeed fulfilled, politicians like Kejriwal might have to think twice before making unsubstantiated claims against the Election Commission and would have to back their statements with solid proof.

1...6,7946,7956,796...6,967Page 6,795 of 6,967

Contact: [email protected]

About us

News and opinion website that brings you reports and narrative from a perspective often ignored or suppressed by the mainstream media of India.

Follow us

© OpIndia.com