Author: Vividh Bharathi

Agartala, Dec 11 (IANS) Amid Bangladeshi parties’ reported march towards Indian borders along Agartala, security along the frontiers with Tripura has been further tightened, officials said.

West Tripura district Superintendent of Police, Kiran Kumar, said that due to various reasons, the security along the India-Bangladesh border has been further beefed up.

“The two-day plenary session of the North Eastern Council (NEC) will be held in Agartala on December 20-21. Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) Minister, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Governors and Chief Ministers of all eight northeastern states will attend the meet,” he told the media.

The NEC meet is one of the reasons for heightening security along the border, other sensitive and respective places, the SP said.

Since the unrest began in Bangladesh a few months ago, the BSF has intensified its vigil along the entire frontiers, the district police chief said.

Security presence has been visibly increased near the Agartala-Akhaura (Bangladesh) Integrated Check Post (ICP), the second-largest trading point along the India-Bangladesh border after Petrapole-Benapole ICP in West Bengal.

Kumar said that he has learnt that Bangladeshi security forces have stopped the Indian border bound march of parties from their country.

Bangladesh media reported that leaders and activists of three associate bodies of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), the Jubo Dal, Bangladesh Jatiotabadi Chatradal and Swecchasebak Dal, on Wednesday morning started a long march towards Agartala in India from Dhaka.

According to the Bangladeshi media, the long march has been organised in protest against the December 2 incident in the Bangladesh Assistant High Commission (AHC) in Agartala, where alleged ‘desecration’ of the national flag of the neighbouring country was reported.

After the breach of security at the Bangladesh AHC office in Agartala on December 2, the mission suspended all visa and consular services for an indefinite period from the next day.

The breach of security at the Bangladesh AHC reportedly took place during a protest by an organisation against the atrocities on the Hindu community in Bangladesh.

West Tripura District Superintendent of Police suspended three Sub-Inspectors — Dilu Jamatia, Debabrata Sinha, and Joynal Hossain — and Assistant Commandant (a DSP rank officer) Kanti Nath Ghosh was withdrawn from his posting due to their negligence of duty during the December 2 protests against the atrocities on Hindus in Bangladesh.

The Tripura government also ordered an enquiry into the December 2 incident and the Deputy Inspector General (DIG), Southern Range, will conduct the probe.

In view of the atrocities on Hindus in Bangladesh and arrest of ISKCON preacher Chinmoy Krishna Das in Bangladesh, various organisations have been holding series of protests, demonstration and rallies in different states of the northeast region almost daily.

–IANS

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Patna, Dec 11 (IANS) Two people died after consuming suspected hooch in Bihar’s Begusarai district.

The deceased were identified as Chunchun Prasad Singh, a rural medical practitioner, a resident of Ward-8, Maida Shahpur in Cheria Bariyarpur police station area and a 50-year-old compounder Hareram Tanti.

Both reportedly consumed liquor on Tuesday night, which their families said caused their deaths.

The incident has triggered a panic in the district.

While Singh’s autopsy was yet to be done, the district administration conducted the post-mortem of Tanti under the supervision of a special team of the District Health Department.

Begusarai Civil Surgeon Pramod Kumar Singh claimed: “Earlier too, Tanti had undergone treatment at Sadar Hospital and partially lost his eyesight. But this time, Tanti died.”

“The family members confirmed Tanti had a habit of alcohol consumption. It seems that he died due to consuming liquor. However, his post-mortem report has not come yet,” the civil surgeon said.

Begusarai SP Manish stated that both individuals fell ill under suspicious circumstances.

“We are questioning the family members to gather more information. The case remains under active investigation to determine the exact cause of the deaths,” Manish said.

The district administration has heightened vigilance to address potential issues related to illicit liquor, particularly in the affected areas of Cheriya Bariyarpur block.

Earlier in the second week of October this year, 62 persons reportedly lost their lives in Siwan and Gopalganj districts. However, the state police had confirmed 37 deaths.

In Siwan, the incident occurred in Maghar Kodia Panchayat under the jurisdiction of Bhagwanpur Haat police station.

Similarly, in Saran, an FIR was registered at the Mashrakh police station after the incident in Brahimpur village. Investigations in both districts were conducted and state police admitted that the deaths had happened due to spurious liquor.

–IANS

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New Delhi, Dec 11 (IANS) A delegation of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) led by its National Convener Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday met the Election Commission and presented a 3,000-page document as evidence on the alleged deletion of voters’ names from the electoral rolls ahead of the forthcoming Assembly elections in the national Capital. He raised concerns over a “conspiracy” to forcibly delete voters’ names in Delhi Assembly constituencies and was assured of due diligence by the poll panel.

“We have presented documents of 3,000 pages before the Election Commission and raised our concerns on voters’ name deletion from the electoral rolls. These voters are mostly poor people, Dalits and slum dwellers whose names are being deleted. We have presented the complete data before the Election Commission,” Kejriwal said.

He also wrote to Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Rajiv Kumar, alleging large-scale irregularities in applications for voter deletion.

Citing an example from the Shahdara Assembly constituency, Kejriwal stated, “It has come to our knowledge that in the past six weeks, the BJP submitted applications to delete 11,018 voters on the grounds of relocation or death. However, these lists are being modified without being uploaded on the Election Commission’s website.”

According to Kejriwal, as of December 5, only 487 deletion applications from Shahdara were displayed on the Commission’s website. This discrepancy raises questions about the remaining applications and the transparency of the process.

Kejriwal further alleged that the AAP conducted its own verification by visiting 500 randomly-selected addresses from the BJP’s list. The investigation revealed that 372 of these voters were still residing at their registered addresses.

Kejriwal urged the Election Commission to reject the BJP’s applications for deleting the 11,000 voter names and called for an FIR against the Booth Level Agents (BLAs) involved.

He also demanded disciplinary action against election officials in Shahdara who allegedly processed these applications without due diligence process or public disclosure.

Kejriwal expressed concerns that similar actions might be taking place in other constituencies. He called for an investigation into all voter deletion lists submitted by BLAs, insisting they be made public and FIRs lodged against those violating election rules.

He mentioned some of the alleged malpractices across Delhi in the letter and shared data from other Assembly segments.

Kejriwal said that in Janakpuri, 24 BJP workers applied to delete 4,874 votes; in Tughlakabad 15 BJP workers filed applications to remove 2,435 voters; in Palam 9 BJP workers sought to delete 1,641 voters; in Rajouri Garden 6 BJP workers filed to remove 571 voters; in Hari Nagar 4 BJP workers sought deletion of 637 votes; in Karawal Nagar 2 BJP workers applied for the removal of 3,260 votes; in Mustafabad a BJP official applied for 534 voter deletions.

Kejriwal called the alleged activities a systematic attempt to disenfranchise voters and undermine the democratic process.

He said that the ECI assured him that there would be no mass deletion before the elections. Their officers will go and look into the issue and if someone has applied to delete votes of more than five people, the SDM will visit the spot and inspect.

Kejriwal said the ECI also assured him that an FIR will be registered against those who are deleting voters’ names fraudulently.

–IANS

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Shimla, Dec 11 (IANS) A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) delegation led by former Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur on Wednesday submitted a memorandum to Governor Shiv Pratap Shukla and exposed the “misdeeds” of the Congress-led state government on completing two years in the state.

“The two-year term of the Congress government will be known as a black chapter in the state’s history as the government is neck deep in corruption, brought the state to the brink of bankruptcy by unethically benefitting its friends, promoting wasteful expenditure and economic mismanagement, besides flouting the law and order,” Leader of Opposition Thakur told the media.

In its two-year stint, the Congress government has proved to be one of scams, he said.

“First, the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) has become a den of corruption. As soon as Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu took over as the Chief Minister, an employee of the CMO wrote an anonymous letter to the Prime Minister’s Office, alleging that an officer working in the CMO was committing corruption in connivance with a senior officer of the state electricity board,” LoP Thakur added.

“Now this allegation seems to be true because the government is providing benefits to the said company through Himachal Pradesh Power Corporation Ltd. (HPPCL) as it has extended its completion timeline for the second time at its board meeting. Instead of imposing a penalty of Rs 162 crore for not completing the project on time, the period was extended by 1,765 days,” he said.

Secondly, the loss-making company has been given a work of Rs 150 crore, which was increased to Rs 288 crore, he added.

“Not only this, the rate of debris removal was also increased from Rs 67 per cubic metre to Rs 88 per cubic metre and the quantity of debris has also increased from 1,74,000 cubic metres to 3,74,000 cubic metres, which is clear evidence of corruption.”

Pointing towards a liquor scam, LoP Thakur said the State Excise and Taxation Department has auctioned liquor contracts for February-March 2024 in which a scam took place.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has taken major action in the state and temporarily seized the immovable property worth Rs 9.31 crore of a liquor company based in Nalagarh.

“The ED has seized property worth Rs 5.31 crore, including an industrial plot with factory, of Kala Amb Distillery and Brewery Private Ltd. Nalagarh… It has taken this action under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act in a case of illegal supply of liquor in Bihar. Liquor is also being brought illegally from outside states and sold in Himachal Pradesh, causing a huge loss to the government treasury,” the former Chief Minister said.

The Congress government is also accused of changing the liquor policy, he added.

“Now instead of writing the maximum retail price on the liquor bottle, the minimum sale price is being written. Taking advantage of this, liquor contractors are selling liquor at their desired prices,” he said, adding that due to this favoured contractors are getting benefits but the government treasury is being defrauded.

State BJP President Rajeev Bindal, Himachal BJP co-incharge Sanjay Tandon, Shimla Lok Sabha MP Suresh Kashyap, former Minister Suresh Bhardwaj and other party leaders accompanied Jai Ram Thakur while submitting the memorandum to the Governor.

–IANS

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Jammu, Dec 11 (IANS) J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Wednesday assured civil society members in Jammu that the annual ‘Darbar Move’ will be restored to preserve the uniqueness of Jammu.

Speaking to a cross-section of civil society including businessmen, industrialists, lawyers and people connected with other professions, Omar Abdullah said, “Jammu’s uniqueness will not be allowed to diminish. The government will restore Darbar move.”

The six-monthly sojourn of all the top offices of the J&K government between Srinagar and Jammu, a practice started by the Dogra Maharajas of the erstwhile state, was called the ‘Darbar Move’.

In order to save on the huge costs involved in shifting the offices lock, stock and barrel between the twin capitals of Srinagar and Jammu, the Lt Governor-led administration had dispensed with the practice in 2021.

“Darbar Move is an issue that I fail to understand as to why it was not projected during campaigning for Assembly polls. The issue gained momentum only after the election result, although we mentioned it in our manifesto and meetings,” the CM said.

“We assure you that the Darbar Move will be restored. Jammu has its own importance and we will not allow its uniqueness to diminish,” Omar told reporters after chairing over three-hour long meeting with representatives of civil society at his official residence.

Omar, alluding to the decision to cancel the Darbar Move, said the government takes its own decision which does impact the public.

“After a decision, whether its impact is right or wrong, there is a need to get feedback. Sometimes it becomes difficult to get the right feedback within the government system because you are mostly surrounded by people who only praise you. So when a meeting of civil society takes place like this, mostly the participants come without any agenda and they put forth their feedback and suggestions which turns out to be beneficial,” he added.

“The purpose of this meeting was to get feedback and suggestions as well so that those are implemented,” he said adding that such meetings will be convened twice a year both in Jammu and Srinagar.

–IANS

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Jaipur, Dec 11 (IANS) An accident involving the convoy of Rajasthan Chief Minister Bhajan Lal Sharma occurred at the Akshaya Patra crossing in Jagatpura, Jaipur, which left seven people, including five police officers injured.

The incident took place when a car travelling on the opposite side collided with two vehicles in the Chief Minister’s convoy.

The Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) officials told IANS that the rashly driven car coming from the opposite side collided into a Bolero which was part of the Chief Minister’s convoy.

It slightly hit another vehicle too, they added.

The accident has left five police officers injured while those in other private cars were also injured, they said.

The convoy left from the Chief Minister’s residence at 3 p.m., heading to the inauguration of the Sohan Singh Smriti Skill Development Centre, organised by Laghu Udyog Bharati.

At the Akshaya Patra crossing, a car from the opposite direction struck the lead vehicle in the convoy, causing a collision.

Following the accident, CM Sharma immediately moved out of his vehicle to assist the injured.

The Chief Minister personally ensured that the injured persons were taken to nearby hospitals.

Two of the injured are receiving treatment at the Mahatma Gandhi Hospital, while three others, including police officer Surendra Singh, are admitted to the Jeevan Rekha Hospital.

Surendra Singh remains in critical condition with a head injury and is currently on a ventilator.

The driver of the car, Pawan, is also hospitalised at the Mahatma Gandhi Hospital, while his companion is admitted to the Sawai Mansingh Hospital, sources said.

The collision caused significant damage to three vehicles, including two government cars and one taxi.

The injured police personnel have been identified as Balwan Singh, Devendra Singh, Assistant Commissioner of Police Amir Hasan, Rajendra, and Surendra.

Eyewitnesses reported that the car from the opposite side first hit the lead vehicle in the convoy with such force that both vehicles veered off the road. The sudden incident caused other vehicles in the convoy to apply brakes abruptly, leading one of the cars to mount the divider.

In light of the incident, CM Sharma cancelled his scheduled programme and stayed with the injured at the hospital to ensure they received proper care.

–IANS

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