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Rahul Gandhi ups ante against PM Modi; Kejriwal reacts to Maliwal assault row
As the country prepares to vote for the penultimate sixth phase Lok Sabha polling, Gandhi has upped his ante against PM Modi
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi continued his verbal tirade against Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led central government accusing him of working for industrialists. As the country prepares to vote for the penultimate sixth phase Lok Sabha polling, Gandhi has upped his ante against PM Modi.
Modi govt is Adani govt: Rahul Gandhi in Haryana
“The Modi government is ‘Adani government’,” Gandhi remarked while addressing an election rally to garner votes for party candidate Rao Dan Singh from Bhiwani-Mahendergarh seat.
Expressing confidence that the INDIA bloc will form the next government, he said the alliance will discontinue the Agnipath scheme after coming to power on June 4.
“The PM office has introduced the Agnipath scheme without consulting army officials and is playing with youths’ futures. Modi has divided martyrs into two groups. Those recruited through Agnipath scheme are not considered martyrs even after sacrificing their lives on the border. They will not be given pension or government job benefit, while those recruited earlier are getting all benefits. We will not allow division of youths protecting the borders,” he said.
Kejriwal’s first reaction on Swati Maliwal issue
Delhi chief minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) convenor Arvind Kejriwal, in an interview to news agency PTI, spoke for the first time on the Swati Maliwal assault row and said he wants justice and a fair investigation of the incident as it has two versions.
Maliwal accused Kejriwal’s aide Bibhav Kumar of physical assault inside the chief minister’s residence on May 13 when Swati Maliwal went to visit him.
Mamata threatens ₹1,000 crore defamation case against BJP
The Calcutta high court’s decision to scrap all entries in the OBC category after 2010 came as a huge setback for the Trinamool Congress (TMC) government in West Bengal, which came to power in 2011.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday said the verdict that struck down the OBC status granted to “77 classes” in West Bengal, was a “tight slap” to the Opposition’s INDIA bloc.
Meanwhile, chief minister Banerjee said she would not accept the verdict, and her government might move the Supreme Court against the judgment.
She also warned the BJP of a ₹1,000 crore defamation suit for allegedly tarnishing her government’s achievements with false claims.
Striking down the quota eligibility, the high court observed that “religion appears to have been the sole criterion” for terming these classes as backward (OBCs).
ECI asks Congress, BJP to correct campaign discourse
In separate but similarly worded guidances that take no names and are addressed to the presidents of the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Election Commission of India (ECI) has asked the two parties to rein in their star campaigners.
ECI’s letters to JP Nadda of the BJP and Mallikarjun Kharge of the Congress are a follow up to its notice dated April 21 to the two party chiefs, and a response to the reply provided by them.
Specifically (and this is the only substantive difference between the two advisories), ECI has asked Kharge to ensure that the Congress’s star campaigners do not make statements like “anyone can either abolish or sell or tear apart the Constitution of India etc.” as it “is alleged to be instilling fear in the mind of voters about an uncertain future and an attempt to spread anarchy in the country”.
The poll body noted that such practices may “prejudicially affect the prospects of certain candidates and thus, may border as a corrupt practice under section 123(4) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951”.
Kejriwal claims he doesn’t want to become PM
Kejriwal said on Wednesday that he didn’t want to become the next prime minister if the INDIA bloc wins the Lok Sabha elections.
His main goal is to protect the country and democracy from “dictatorship”.
Naveen’s witty response to AI speech allegations
Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik on Wednesday dismissed BJP’s claim that his videos were manipulated using artificial intelligence (AI).
In a video put out by Biju Janata Dal (BJD) leader VK Pandian, he is heard reacting to the claim, “That’s great. They should use their own intelligence.”
Pandian, who became a member of the chief minister’s office in 2011, has been a close confidant of Patnaik. His responsibilities grew notably earlier this month when he was named the ‘5T Secretary,’ a role created to spearhead transformational projects across various government departments.
Meanwhile, BJP’s Odisha unit chief Samir Mohanty on Tuesday cast doubts over the authenticity of CM Patnaik’s short video messages, suggesting that AI technology might be used to create deepfake videos.
Mohanty argued that if the videos were genuine, the chief minister would have conveyed those messages in public forums as well.
