Learning from East Asia, India must reform its district administration with performance, accountability, and vision to achieve the goal of Viksit Bharat, points out Deepak Mishra.
Zakia Jafri, the wife of former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri who was killed in the 2002 Gujarat riots, died on Saturday in Ahmedabad at the age of 86. Ehsan Jafri was among 69 persons who were killed inside Gulbarg Society, a Muslim neighbourhood in Ahmedabad, on February 28, 2002, a day after coaches of the Sabarmati Express train were burnt in Godhra, resulting in the deaths of 59 'karsevaks' returning from Ayodhya. The incident triggered horrific rioting across the state. Zakia Jafri hit the national headlines as she waged a legal battle all the way to the Supreme Court in a bid to hold top political leaders accountable for the large conspiracy for the riots post the Godhra train burning episode. Her son Tanveer Jafri said that his mother was visiting his sister's house in Ahmedabad when she complained of feeling uneasy. The doctor who was called in declared her dead at around 11:30 am. Social activist Teesta Setalvad, who was co-complainant in Jafri's protest petition in the Supreme Court, posted on X that Zakia Jafri was a compassionate leader of the human rights community.
United States President Donald Trump for the fourth time in recent days claimed that the Biden administration allocated $21 million funding to India for 'voter turnout', evoking a sharp response from the Congress which urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to 'talk to his friend' and strongly refute the allegation.
Bhatt was earlier sentenced to life imprisonment in a 1990 custodial death case in Jamnagar and 20 years in jail in a 1996 case relating to planting drugs to frame a Rajasthan-based lawyer in Palanpur. He is currently lodged in the Rajkot Central Jail.
On the eve of Durga Puja in October 2008, industrialist Ratan Tata announced that Tata Motors would withdraw from the nearly completed Nano car plant in Singur, attributing the decision to Mamata Banerjee's anti-land acquisition movement, which he claimed had derailed what was meant to be a "groundbreaking project" -- the world's cheapest car.
The Lokpal was functioning without its regular chief since Pinaki Chandra Ghose completed his term on May 27, 2022.
Gujarat was labelled Hindutva's crucible and Modi was to become the chief 'chemist'. A revealing political saga excerpted from Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay's The Demolition, the Verdict and the Temple: The Definitive Book on the Ram Mandir Project.
For someone who is such an indefatigable litigant, what is stopping Mr Saxena from using the law to depose Mr Kejriwal? Maybe we will get the answer after May 25, notes Aditi Phadnis.
'I am not a person who would do such things from behind the scenes.' 'I don't believe in taking somebody else's support for speaking out my mind.'
'Another term for the government under the prime minister would likely be a step forward on the path to Hindu Rashtra.' 'No question of going back or any slowing down.'
It's just not a date. It's just not about selecting a candidate. It's not about helping some candidate win. It's about expressing emotion, after ten years, that could reach out in India and beyond it, notes Sheela Bhatt.
In a major victory for Tatas, an arbitral tribunal has awarded Tata Motors a compensation of over Rs 766 crore for the losses incurred because of protests by Trinamool Congress that stalled its small car project at Singur in West Bengal. The tribunal asked the West Bengal government to pay Tata Motors the compensation, along with interest, according to a stock exchange filing by the Mumbai-based auto major on Monday. The company stated that the arbitral tribunal has asked the West Bengal Industrial Development Corp (WBIDC) to pay the company Rs 766 crore compensation, in connection with losses incurred on its manufacturing site in Singur.
A sessions court had recently rejected her discharge plea in the case, even as the Supreme Court granted her bail after the Gujarat high court denied her relief.
Now, the chief justice of the high court will allot the case to a new judge.
A sessions court in Ahmedabad on Thursday rejected activist Teesta Setalvad's application seeking discharge in a case related to alleged fabrication of evidence related to the 2002 Gujarat riots.
Zakia Jafri, the widow of former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri who was killed along with 68 others in the Gulberg Society in Ahmedabad during the Gujarat riots of 2002, visited the Gulberg society on the 21st anniversary of the massacre on February 28, 2023.
The state government had opposed his bail plea saying the alleged offence is a "very heinous crime" and there is a prima-facie case against him and the role attributable to him in support of the charge.
The counsel of social activist Teesta Setalvad on Thursday told a sessions court in Ahmedabad that affidavits which the prosecution claims are false were signed by witnesses and submitted in different courts in the past.
In switching over, Nitish has sent out a message that if he could not now become the NDA's PM, then he would need to stay on as CM at the very least, which a third term for Modi would not let him have, N Sathiya Moorthy points out.
A special court in Gujarat on Thursday acquitted all the 67 accused, including former Bharatiya Janata Party minister Maya Kodnani, in the 2002 Naroda Gam riots case in which 11 people were killed.
A sessions court in Ahmedabad on Saturday rejected the bail applications of activist Teesta Setalvad and former director general of police R B Sreekumar, arrested for allegedly fabricating documents to 'frame innocent people' in 2002 riots cases.
Ishrat, a resident of Mumbra near Mumbai, and three others, were killed in an alleged staged encounter on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on June 15, 2004.
Additional metropolitan magistrate MV Chauhan committed the case to the sessions court in Ahmedabad for trial against Setalvad, former state director general of police RB Sreekumar and ex-Indian Police Service officer Sanjiv Bhatt.
Additional sessions judge DD Thakkar took the SIT's reply on record and posted the hearing on the bail application on Monday.
Bhatt is the third accused arrested in the case after social activist Teesta Setalvad and former Director General of Police of Gujarat R B Sreekumar.
A court in Ahmedabad on Tuesday deferred till Thursday its order on the bail pleas of activist Teesta Setalvad and former DGP RB Sreekumar in a case of fabricating evidence to frame innocent persons in connection with the 2002 Gujarat communal riots.
The Supreme Court on Monday stayed for a week the Centre's order dismissing Satish Chandra Verma, a senior IPS officer who assisted the Central Bureau of Investigation in its probe in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case, a month before his scheduled retirement.
The court also stated in its order -- the copy of which was uploaded on the court's website on Saturday -- that the accused were trained to carry out mass killings to target the Hindu population.
She had been lodged in the Sabarmati Central jail in Ahmedabad since her arrest on June 26.
Nanavati was appointed as judge of the Supreme Court with effect from March 6, 1995, and retired on February 16, 2000.
From the voter-level, traditionally anti-BJP, anti-Hindutva minorities and other secular voters would have an option, especially in the face of the mounting anti-incumbency against the ruling party -- as it happened in the 2001 assembly polls, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The two were produced before metropolitan magistrate SP Patel after their police custody ended.
Ehsan Jafri was killed during the riots. Zakia Jafri, his wife, had filed the petition challenging the special investigation team's report giving a clean chit to Modi and 63 others.
'Modiji did not say anything so that there was no influence. He endured all this silently'
A group of noted former civil servants on Wednesday sought withdrawal of the Supreme Court's "gratuitous observations" against social activist Teesta Sitalvad and others while upholding the SIT's clean chit to the then Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi in the 2002 communal riots in the state.
Following is the timeline of events in the case in which the Supreme Court on Friday upheld the Special Investigation Team's (SIT) clean chit to then Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and 63 others in the 2002 riots in the state.
A special investigation team (SIT) on Wednesday submitted a charge sheet against activist Teesta Setalvad, retired director general of police R B Sreekumar and former IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt in a case of alleged fabrication of evidence in connection with the 2002 Gujarat riots cases.
Justice A M Khanwilkar, the second senior-most judge of the Supreme Court, retired on Friday and thanked bar association leaders for their 'love and affection'.
Terming as "infructuous", the Supreme Court on Tuesday closed as many as 11 petitions, including the one filed by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), almost 20 years ago seeking an independent probe into the 2002 Gujarat riots cases.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday alleged that Congress president Sonia Gandhi was the "driving force" behind the "conspiracy" to implicate then Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi in the 2002 riots case in the state.
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