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Congress stands ‘shoulder to shoulder’ with Mamata whom they once accused of ‘looting’ Bengal

OpIndia Staff
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Congress stands ‘shoulder to shoulder’ with Mamata whom they once accused of ‘looting’ Bengal

Even as Congress President Rahul Gandhi extended his support to Mamata Banerjee who is currently protesting against a CBI probe in the Saradha Chit Fund scam, Congress seems to have forgotten its own stand on Mamata and the Chit Fund scam from a couple of years back.


Interestingly, Congress President Rahul Gandhi who is now standing ‘shoulder to shoulder’ with Mamata Banerjee seems to have forgotten the fact that it was the UPA government in 2013 which had first registered a case against the Saradha chit fund scam and had accused Mamata Banerjee of ‘looting’ the money from the public.

Rahul Gandhi, who has a habit of distorting facts today claimed that the BJP has been trying to destroy the institution while saying that he and his party are willing to join hands with Mamata Banerjee to defeat the incumbent NDA government. However, Rahul Gandhi in May 2014 had himself accused the Mamata Banerjee government of involving in massive chit fund scam and had said that 20 lakh people had lost their money from chit fund scams like Saradha and Rose Valley.


Rahul Gandhi had also accused Mamata Banerjee of shielding the corrupt by saying that she has been protecting those people who had looted the people in Bengal through chit fund scams.


In 2016, calling it a “biggest scam” in the country, Rahul Gandhi had also targetted PM Modi for not uttering a word against Mamata Banerjee. At a time when CBI has proceeded to investigate the Saradha chit fund case, Rahul Gandhi strangely seems to be in some sort of discomfort.


Similarly, Sonia Gandhi, the UPA Chairperson during a rally in West Bengal had thrashed Mamata Banerjee questioning the audacity of WB CM Banerjee for speaking against the corruption while accusing Mamata Banerjee of involving in the chit fund scams.


Senior Congress leader Sanjay Jha had also accused Mamata Banerjee of involving in chit fund scams.


However, on Monday it has appeared that Congress party is willing to compromise over the issue massive scams involving Mamata Banerjee to save themselves from an existential crisis. Recently, senior Congress leader P. Chidambaram’s wife, Nalini Chirambaram was charge sheeted in the Saradha scam. According to the charges filed by CBI, Nalini Chidambarm had received ₹1.4 crore from Sudipta Sen, the prime accused in the case. CBI says that Nalini Chidambaram conspired with Sudipta Sen with an intention of cheating and misappropriation of funds. She took the amount of ₹1.4 crore between 2010 to 2014, according to the chargesheet.

The West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has been sitting on a ‘Dharna’ against the central government after a team of CBI had landed over in Kolkata to interrogate  Kolkata Police chief Rajeev Kumar to obtain crucial information regarding the massive Saradha scam, which allegedly involves senior functionaries of ruling Trinamool Congress.

However, miffed by the surprise strike of the CBI officials, Mamata Banerjee had resorted to detaining of eight CBI officials leading to the CBI interim chief M Nageshwar Rao expressing his fear over the destruction of evidence related to the Saradha scam by the Kolkata police to save their political masters. Meanwhile, the CBI has also moved to Supreme Court regarding the non-cooperation of the Bengal government and the state police.

Soon after the West Bengal Chief Minister showed her desperation to detain the CBI officials, the leaders of the ‘Mahagathbandhan’ or grand alliance soon jumped into the ring to support Mamata Banerjee. Opposition leaders like Chandrababu Naidu, Omar Abdullah, Lalu Prasad Yadav, former PM HD Devegowda expressed their solidarity with the West Bengal Chief Minister Banerjee.

Mamata vs CBI: The CBI moves SC against Kolkata top cop, CJI to hear the matter tomorrow

OpIndia Staff
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Mamata vs CBI: The CBI moves SC against Kolkata top cop, CJI to hear the matter tomorrow

In the ongoing showdown in Kolkata, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has moved the Supreme Court seeking directions to Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar to cooperate in the Saradha Chit Fund case. In its petition, the CBI has said that despite being summoned multiple times, Kumar failed to cooperate and created hurdles in the investigation.


Despite the CBI push to list the case for hearing today, the Chief Justice of India (CJI) said that the hearing will be held tomorrow.


CJI Gogoi further said that if the Kolkata Police Commissioner even remotely thinks of destroying the evidence, CBI should bring the material before the court and the court will come down on him so heavily that he will regret it.

High drama has been taking place in Kolkata since last night as the CBI reached Police Commissioner’s residence last night for the Saradha Chit Fund case probe. Five CBI officials were detained by Kolkata Police. Mamata Banerjee came to Kolkata top cop’s rescue and pushed her weight behind him calling him the best police ever. She then sat on a dharna, claiming that the CBI action was carried out on behest of PM Modi, BJP President Amit Shah and NSA Ajit Doval.

Cattle thieves stole a cow and slaughtered it in Hathras, Uttar Pradesh, three people arrested

OpIndia Staff
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Cattle thieves stole a cow and slaughtered it in Hathras, Uttar Pradesh, three people arrested

In another unfortunate incident of cow slaughter, a cow was stolen and slaughtered by cattle thieves in Purdilnagar in Hathras district of Uttar Pradesh.

The incident took place on Friday night when the cow owner Bhuvnesh Sharma went on a look-out for his cow with few other people when he did not it in the tin shed. As he reached the nearby slaughter house he saw six people attacking the cow with axes and knives. As Sharma and the people accompanying him shouted at the thieves they thieves fled the scene, however the cow was already dead. The cow owner could identify three of them in the torch light. The incident sparked tension in the area. Police and the PAC reached the crime scene on getting the information of the incident. Police seized the weapons left behind by the thieves. The carcass of the cow was sent for postmortem in the night.

A case has been registered under the Uttar Prevention of Cow Slaughter Act, 1955 against six people out of whom three were identified as Bunty son of Ibne Hassan, Bunty son of Babbu Mamu and Chahat son of Sukhe. According to Kotwal Manoj Sharma, police teams have been formed to arrest the culprits. A police team has been deployed considering the tension in the area.

Yamuna Expressway Scam: CBI officer, UP revenue official arrested Rs 126 crore scam

OpIndia Staff
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Yamuna Expressway Scam: CBI officer, UP revenue official arrested Rs 126 crore scam

Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has registered case against two of its own officials and some officials of the Uttar Pradesh Police in Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority land scam case. The officials against whom the case has been registered are Inspector CBI V S Rathore, ACB Ghaziabad, ASI Sunil Dutt, Tehsildar (UP) Ranveer Singh and one other official. Inspector Rathore and tehsildar Ranveer Singh have been arrested by the CBI.


They have been booked for allegedly influencing the probe in the case. A separate case has been registered by the UP police to investigate the case as claimed by the CBI. As per reports, around 10 lakhs were allegedly paid to Inspector CBI V S Rathore and ASI Sunil Dutt by the suspects against whom the investigation was going on.

The FIR lodged by the CBI says: “Criminal conspiracy for obtaining an undue advantage by the public servants for the dishonest performance of duty, an undue advantage to influence public servant by corrupt or illegal means and bribing of public servants.”

As per reports, the Police has claimed that some YEIDA officials, including former CEO P C Gupta along with some private firms purchased 57 hectares ‘useless’ land in 2014 from seven Mathura villages in lieu of compensation to their owners. However, the compensation amount was much higher than what was defined by the Authority for such land. Hence, the police have claimed that the transaction not only caused loss to YEIDA but the officials also made personal gains fraudulently.

Common man saves 27% on taxes after implementation of GST under BJP government

Dhairya Roy
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Common man saves 27% on taxes after implementation of GST under BJP government

Goods and Services Tax (GST), at its core, presents a vision of a single unified tax structure with numerous benefits such as consolidating all indirect tax levies into a single tax, replacing multiple tax levies, overcoming the limitations of the existing indirect tax structure, creating efficiencies and reducing fraudulent practices in tax administration.

Historically, France was the first to implement GST, before it spread to an estimated 160 countries. India implemented GST on 1st July 2017, with the initial list encompassing more than 1,800 goods and services.

(Picture source: https://blog.gstedge.com/gst-basics/)

A brief history of GST in India

GST promised to be a single tax provision in the supply chain where each person can avail tax benefit of all the taxes already paid during each step of the supply chain, eventually resulting in low product prices for end users.

The challenge though lies in implementing such a massive overhaul of the taxation system, and analysing whether the common man has truly benefitted from overriding the previous tax structure.

A majority of the population in India belongs to the middle class and lower middle class where people either belong to service class or they depend on agriculture for their living. Key questions raised are what is the impact of GST on a common man or a middle-class family? Is there anything new for him or is it like an old material in a new package? Is there any tax relaxation for him in new tax provisions or it will increase the prices of goods and services for him?

The government, in the most recent GST Council meet, ensured that 99% of items attracted GST of 18% or lower, leaving only sin or luxury items to be taxed at the highest rate of 28%.

Daily use items like tea, coffee, frozen vegetables, vegetable fats and oils, soups, soap, hair oil, milk beverages have all seen fall in their prices from before. In the household appliances, LPG for domestic supply, copper utensils and iron/steel/kerosene stoves have come under 5% slab from their earlier 18-19% rate slab.

To truly analyse the impact of GST, we compared the household expenses before and after the implementation of GST.

Methodology

We have taken a family of 5 comprising of 2 couples and a child in a tier 1 city. We have assumed a base rate of 100 for all items to reduce the complexity and directly applied the rates to each item. For a middle-class family earning 6L-9L per annum, how much tax are they paying for their household items?

Table 1 shows everyday items, with the base price set at 100 per item. A total of 29 products have been considered for the basis of this calculation, with the individual pre-GST tax rate, post-GST tax rate. Each tax rate has been multiplied with the individual base price, to calculate pre-GST and post-GST market prices at the predetermined base rate. The calculation does not take into account changes in inflation in prices for simplification of data.

  • Total items considered for the calculation as the base price of 100 for each item
  • Pre GST tax rate for each item and price of an item after tax
  • GST for each item and price of an item after tax
Table 1

Table 2 shows

  • The total base price
  • Pre-GST total bill and the post-GST total bill
  • The difference in tax paid between pre-GST and post-GST expenses
Table 2

The above calculations take into account the items purchased at the base rate. For monthly expenditure, the above items need to be multiplied into two, to estimate monthly expenditure for each family.

Table 3

Following is the Calculations for annual expenses per family (refer to table 3):

The above calculation shows that there will be a drop in taxes paid for the household expenses. A middle-class family pays 27% less taxes on the household taxes, resulting in estimated savings of Rs. 2,044.8 per household per annum.

Conclusion

With the GST impacting almost all sectors barring the milk, petroleum products, and some others, it is a foregone conclusion that there will be a substantial reduction on the prices of different commodities and goods, which are an integral part of one’s daily life.

GST simplifies how goods and services are taxed by eliminating a large number of intermediate taxes such as excise duties, octroi charges, VAT, etc.

We saw in the above tables that the taxes paid for household expenses have come down despite an increase in taxes on services. While expenses on services have slightly increased, commodities have become a lot cheaper. Daily consumables like FMCG, chocolates, groceries, milk products and meat have become cheaper and hence alleviate the burden on middle-class pockets. Eating out also has become cheaper as it attracts only 5 % GST.  The Indian middle class, which is estimated to grow to 475 million by 2030, is reaping benefits of better tax reform in the form of GST.

Implementation of GST is one of the best decisions taken by the Indian government. July 1 was celebrated as Financial Independence day in India when all the Members of Parliament attended the function in Parliament House. The transition to the GST regime which is accepted by 159 other countries is not an easy task. Confusions and complexities were expected and it happened at the time of implementation and albeit its initial day struggle, this tax structure makes India an incredibly more attractive investment destination for foreign investors.

Hitherto, India was a union of 29 small tax economies and 7 union territories with different levies unique to each state. GST is a much needed, accepted, appreciated and applauded regime because it does away with multiple tax rates by Centre and States.

There are 1469 types of goods categorised under GST. All these goods were grouped and sub-grouped and been placed under the tax slab of 0%, 5%, 12%, 18% and 28%. On a time to time basis, based on the suggestions, GST council is reviewing and restructuring the tax rates for goods.

Apart from bolstering ease of doing business, reducing complexities, making India an attractive investment destination, the GST brings in much-needed transparency and lucidity in the tax regime as it requires each business owner to make/file its business activity statement each week. On its way to becoming a global superpower and a financial behemoth, the GST is a landmark implementation that benefits all stakeholders as below:-

Government- Simplifies heavy tax machinery and bureaucratic inefficiencies. Attracts foreign investment.

Treasury- Balances tax collections as lower taxes on essential items but higher taxes on luxury consumption.

Common Man- GST benefits the common man most as it reduces the tax bill by a staggering 27%.

Business Owners- Simplified tax filing mechanism, eliminates multiple taxations, easier to do business.

ONE NATION, ONE TAX.

West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee to continue her ‘Dharna’ politics, CBI to move to Supreme Court seeking contempt of court

OpIndia Staff
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West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee to continue her ‘Dharna’ politics, CBI to move to Supreme Court seeking contempt of court

The state of West Bengal is amidst massive chaos as the Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has resorted to ‘dharna’ politics to allegedly save herself from Saradha chit fund scam investigation. In unprecedented scenes, the Kolkata Police had forcefully detained eight CBI officials who had gone to visit police commissioner Rajeev Kumar to obtain crucial information regarding the Saradha scam.

According to the reports, the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who had announced sit-in protest over CBI’s attempt to question the Kolkata Police chief is set to continue her ‘Dharna’ politics till as she claims that “the country and its Constitution are saved”.

Mamata Banerjee reportedly skipped her meals and remained awake the whole night on a makeshift dais along with some senior ministers and party members. Interestingly, Rajeev Kumar, who was reportedly absconding from the CBI officials had joined the West Bengal CM at the dharna spot. Many other top cops had also joined the dharna as per reports.

“This is a Satyagraha and I’ll continue till the country is saved,” Banerjee said while speaking to the media.

The Central Bureau of Investigation will move the Supreme Court on Monday after a face-off with Kolkata Police officials on Sunday. The CBI will inform the Supreme Court about the non-cooperation of the Bengal government and its police. The CBI has accused the West Bengal government of preventing the investigation of a Supreme Court-ordered probe into two Ponzi schemes and is expected to demand action against the state government and its police.

However, the Central Bureau of Investigation has also expressed fear over the destruction of evidence after the Kolkata police had taken charge of all evidence and seized all documents. Interim CBI Chief M Nageshwar Rao said that a lot of evidence is being destroyed or being caused to disappear. Earlier, too, the CBI had claimed that the West Bengal government was obstructing investigation in Saradha Chit Fund scam. It has alleged that the “hostile” government is delaying the filing of the final charge sheet.

Meanwhile, a delegation led by senior Bharatiya Janata Party leaders to meet the Chief Election Commissioner tomorrow to complain about the West Bengal government led by Mamata Banerjee blocking rallies of senior BJP leaders in the state.

The West Bengal government led by Mamata Banerjee seems to be fearful of the BJP as earlier she denied permission for landing Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s helicopter when he was to address a rally in the state. Later, Yogi addressed the rally through the telephone. In January, the West Bengal government had denied permission for landing to BJP President Amit Shah’s chopper for a rally in Malda.

Prior to that, after being denied permission for their proposed ‘rath yatra‘ or the ‘Gantantra Bachao yatra’ in West Bengal, BJP had announced dates for the public meetings the party intends to carry out in the state of West Bengal.

BJP to send high level delegation to Chief Election Commissioner to complaint against Mamata government

OpIndia Staff
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BJP to send high level delegation to Chief Election Commissioner to complaint against Mamata government

The delegation led by senior Bharatiya Janata Party leaders to meet the Chief Election Commissioner tomorrow to complain about the West Bengal government led by Mamata Banerjee blocking rallies of senior BJP leaders in the state.

Earlier today, West Bengal government had denied permission for landing Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s helicopter when he was to address a rally in the state. Later, Yogi addressed the rally through the telephone. In January, the West Bengal government had denied permission for landing to BJP President Amit Shah’s chopper for a rally in Malda.

Prior to that, after being denied permission for their proposed ‘rath yatra‘ or the ‘Gantantra Bachao yatra’ in West Bengal, BJP had announced dates for the public meetings the party intends to carry out in the state of West Bengal.

There is a complete breakdown of law and order in Kolkata right now as West Bengal Chief Minister has begun a dharna to ‘save constitution’ after the CBI reached Kolkata Police chief’s residence as part of probe in the Saradha chit fund scam. Putting her weight behind Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar, Mamata called the Supreme Court ordered CBI probe as a political vendetta by Modi and Amit Shah.

Kolkata: CBI claims Kolkata Police chief Rajeev Kumar destroyed evidence, Mamata Banerjee begins her dharna in support of Kumar

OpIndia Staff
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Kolkata: CBI claims Kolkata Police chief Rajeev Kumar destroyed evidence, Mamata Banerjee begins her dharna in support of Kumar

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee started her dharna today in support of Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar against whom CBI launched a probe in connection with the Saradha scam. Earlier today, when CBI officials arrived at Kumar’s residence, five of them were detained by Kolkata Police. They were later released. Following this, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee came out in support of Kumar and called the CBI probe against him a political vendetta.

TMC MP Derek O’Brien also blamed Modi and Shah for the CBI probe and said that the investigation is being carried out on behest of NSA Ajit Doval.


Interim CBI Chief M Nageshwar Rao said that there is evidence against Kumar and he has been instrumental in causing the destruction of the evidence and obstructing justice.


Rao said that they have taken charge of all evidence and seized all documents and are not cooperating with the CBI. He even said that a lot of evidence is being destroyed or being caused to disappear. Earlier, too, the CBI had claimed that the West Bengal government was obstructing investigation in Saradha Chit Fund scam. It has alleged that the “hostile” government is delaying the filing of the final charge sheet.

Meanwhile, the Opposition has come out in support of Mamata. Former Prime Minister, JD(S)’ Deve Gowda has extended his support and said that the situation is like that during the Emergency. AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal, too, expressed solidarity with Mamata and blamed Modi and Shah for an SC directed move.

The Saradha Scam was brought to light in 2013. Many political leaders were connected with this Ponzi scheme that was run by a consortium of over 200 companies. The Saradha Group had reportedly collected more than 200 billion rupees from lakhs of small investors. The Group had collapsed in April 2013 and a year later, the Supreme Court of India had ordered the CBI to take over the investigation from the state SIT.

Silent protests held at Delhi against Twitter’s left-wing bias and deliberate silencing of opposite ideology

OpIndia Staff
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Silent protests held at Delhi against Twitter’s left-wing bias and deliberate silencing of opposite ideology

On Sunday, several social media users protested against the bias of microblogging site-Twitter, which has lately begun censoring social media users for criticising left-wing and ultra left-wing accounts, causing concern among users.

According to the reports, an organisation named Youth for Social Media Democracy (YSMD) conducted a silent protest from Delhi’s Saket to Lado Sarai where the regional office of Twitter is situated, accusing the micro-blogging site of deliberate bias against right-wing accounts ahead of Lok Sabha elections.


The press release published by the outfit reads, “Over the last few months, Twitter and Facebook have been systematically trying to curb free-speech of individuals who subscribe to the non-left-wing ideology by suspending their handles, restricting their reach and removing trends from the trends list. However, it has been ignoring offensive, abusing and threatening tweets from left-leaning ideologues and senior leaders of the Congress.”


The curious case of Twitter censoring social media users for disagreeing to left-wing and ultra wing ideology at the time of crucial general elections has upset several social media users. With opposition parties and Lutyens media ecosystem backed by the Congress party indulging in false narratives and propaganda, right-wing users have expressed fear that more fake news may emerge in the social media platforms.

It is also accused that several prominent right-wing accounts are shadow-banned by Twitter. This means while the account is not blocked or suspended, the Tweets posted by that account do not appear on the timeline of the followers of that accounts. Tweets from such ‘shadow-banned’ accounts do not appear in search results also, effectively meaning that tweets of such persons remain invisible to users, unless they visit the Twitter account page of such persons.

This is not the first time that right-wing accounts, fact-checking accounts and other social media users who disagree with the left-wing accounts have faced bans and scrutiny from the Twitter. Recently, tweets from Scientist Anand Ranganathan, a free speech warrior and filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri were withheld by the Twitter ‘in response to a legal demand’.

Twitter is fast becoming a platform where ideological battles are fought, at times, by stifling the voice of those they disagree with and Twitter’s ‘hateful conduct’ policy reveals a definite left-wing bias. Facing accusations of discriminating against conservatives on the social media platform, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey in an interview to CNN had admitted that most of the employees of Twitter have a left-leaning bias.

Recently Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey had created a furore in India by posing with a placard that declared ‘Smash Brahminical Patriarchy’, an extremist Leftist trope of demonising an entire community. Later Twitter India’s legal head had apologised profusely to everyone for hurting their sentiments. A local court in Jodhpur, Rajasthan has also admitted a plea against Dorsey over the anti-Brahmin placard.

OpIndia Evening Dispatch: Sunday, 3rd February, 2019

OpIndia Staff
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OpIndia Evening Dispatch: Sunday, 3rd February, 2019

In the hustle and bustle of the day, it is only natural to miss some of the biggest developments that impact the nation. The OpIndia Evening Dispatch will catch you up on the day’s event even if you have been busy thus far.

1. Bihar: Seemanchal Express derailment claims seven lives, relief and rescue operations on

As many as seven people have lost their lives in the Seemanchal Express derailment accident that took place in Bihar’s Sahadai Buzurg earlier this morning. Rescue and relief operations are currently underway and two teams of NDRF have reached the spot. Indian Railways has issued helpline numbers for Seemanchal Express derailment.

2. BJP sounds the poll bugle, launches the ‘Bharat Ke Mann Ki Baat’ campaign

With the high-stakes Lok Sabha elections just a few weeks away, the BJP today got into its campaign mode with the launch of ‘Bharat Ke Mann Ki Baat’ campaign through which it plans to reach out to as many as 10 crore families across India to finalise the manifesto. The committee, headed by Home Minister Rajnath Singh, will finalise the manifesto which will be compiled after consultation with various stakeholders, which include state units of the party and its supporters. The manifesto is being called ‘Sankalp Patra’.

To compile the manifesto, BJP President Amit Shah flagged off a ‘Rath Yatra’ on Sunday, through which mobile vans will be sent across the country to collect the suggestions. There will also be as many as 7,500 physical kiosks to collect the same. Apart from soliciting and accepting such suggestions through social media, phone calls, WhatsApp, etc. The BJP aims to reach out to 10 crore families through various means for compiling the manifesto.

3. After being denied to enter West Bengal by Mamata government, Yogi Adityanath addresses rally via telephone

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath addressed a public rally at Balurghat in West Bengal’s district of South Dinajpur by telephone, after he was denied permission to address a public rally by Trinamool Congress government of the state. The West Bengal administration had denied permission for landing of UP CM’s helicopter earlier today.

4. Bangladesh: Mosque makes an announcement to save cows, two cow thieves get killed by locals

The grave issue of cow smuggling and illegal cow slaughter is not just a worry for India but also for the neighbouring country Bangladesh. Dhaka Tribune reports that two suspected cattle smugglers were allegedly killed by an angry mob at Kaliakair Upazila in Gazipur of Bangladesh.

As soon as an incident of cow theft occurred, an announcement was made through the local mosque microphone. An angry mob who spotted the cattle smugglers chased down two of them while the others got away. The two cattle smugglers were beaten up heavily after they were captured by the mob. Their bodies were recovered by police and sent to Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmad Medical College and Hospital in Gazipur for post-mortem.

5. Amit Shah asks opposition to clarify their stand on building Ram temple in Ayodhya

Bharatiya Janata Party President Amit Shah while addressing the Booth Adhyaksh Sammelan in Amroha, Uttar Pradesh, reminded the booth workers the importance of  2019 general elections saying that the states of West Bengal, Odisha, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Telangana are yet to be won.

Speaking on the Ram Temple issue Shah assured the workers that the party is committed to building a Ram Temple at the Ram Janmabhoomi in Ayodhya at the earliest. He blamed the Congress party for delaying the proceeding of the Ram Mandir case in the Supreme Court. Shah urged Congress President Rahul Gandhi to clarify before the elections whether he wants Ram Mandir to be built in Ayodhya or not. He even urged Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati to also make their stand clear on the issue.

6. Four months after ED froze their bank accounts, Greenpeace India shuts its Delhi and Patna office

Four months after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) decided to freeze the accounts of the Greenpeace, the controversial NGO has decided to shut two of its regional offices in India and has asked its staff to leave due to a block on its bank account after accusations of illegal donations.

According to the reports, the centre had cancelled the registration of Greenpeace India under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, 2010, (FCRA) and froze foreign funding in 2015. Following that the Enforcement Directorate had accused them of receiving illegal donations while freezing its accounts. Greenpeace has decided to shut down its offices in Delhi and Patna, will also lay-off around 40 staffers. Reportedly, its campaigns and operations in Mumbai, Pune and Hyderabad were closed down in 2015.

7. Arvind Kejriwal moves on from ‘EVMs are rigged’ conspiracy, ‘your name is removed from voter list’ is the latest

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has moved on from ‘EVMs are rigged’ conspiracy to ‘your names are deleted from voter list’ conspiracy theory. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal while addressing a public rally at Badarpur in Delhi on Saturday, said that the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) hates Muslims and people from eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. That is why he claimed their names are removed from the voter list.

In recent times, it has been found that the Aam Aadmi Party is indulging in a misinformation campaign against the BJP by calling people randomly on their phones and telling them that their names have been removed from the electoral rolls of New Delhi.

8. We will stand with all the people who were ever part of India: PM Modi pitches for passage of Citizenship (Amendment) Bill

Speaking at a rally in Vijaypur, Jammu and Kashmir, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a strong pitch for the passage of Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, which seeks to grant citizenship to immigrants belonging to six minority religions —Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis, Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan.

Prime Minister Modi said that people belonging to ‘Bharat’ who are residing in neighbouring countries of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh have been inflicted with severe torture and added that nobody in the past gave attention to address the plight of these people who are now seeking India’s refuge.

9. Bihar is centre for unemployment: Congress President Rahul Gandhi insults Bihar

While addressing a rally at Gandhi Maidan in Patna, Congress President Rahul Gandhi today said that Bihar is famous only for unemployment. “Bihar is centre for unemployment,” said the Congress President.

“Do you know what is Bihar a centre for? Unemployment. Bihar is a centre for unemployment. Go to any village in Bihar and ask the youth what they do, you will get the answer that they are not doing anything,” said Rahul Gandhi.

10. Unprecedented: High drama in Kolkata as CBI reaches top cop’s residence, CBI officers detained by Kolkata Police

Major drama took place in Kolkata as the CBI team which had reached Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar’s residence was detained. A showdown ensued as Kolkata Police took away some of CBI officers to Shakespeare Sarani Police Station amid the commotion. Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar, a 1989 cadre IPS officer of West Bengal cadre, is being investigated in connection with the Saradha scam.

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