Nation 3
THE ECHO OF INDIA SILIGURI
Tuesday March 1, 2016
JNU row: HC reserves Jat agitation: Can't order military to shoot at crowd, says SC
verdict on Kanahiya's
bail plea for March 2
NEW DELHI, FEB 29 /--/ The Delhi High court today reserved its verdict on the bail plea of JNU students union president Kanhaiya Kumar, who refuted the allegation of police
that he was raising anti-India slogans at an event on February 9 at the campus. Justice Pratibha Rani, before whom the
Delhi Police claimed that they have witnesses who have identified Kanhaiya and others raising anti-India slogans, will
pronounce the order on March 2. Kumar, who is in the judicial custody, submitted through senior advocate Kapil Sibal,
that anti-India slogans inside the campus were raised by
people with covered face.
The senior advocate also questioned the conduct of the
Delhi police on registering the FIR on the basis of a TV video.
He asked why the FIR was not registered on that day itself
if Kanhaiya and others had raised anti-India slogans as police
personnel were present in plain cloths during the event and
had witnessed the incident. The High Court was told by him
that the application for organising the event in question was
filed by Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya, also accused in the case and are presently undergoing custodial
interrogation. "Obviously, Kanhaiya had no part to play as
he had not applied for the event. There itself the case against
Kanhaiya goes," the counsel said.
Sibal, who was assisted by another senior advocate
Rebeca John, submitted that the court can itself find from
the video that Kanhaiya himself was seen asking people with
muffled face, also accused of raising anti-India slogans, for
their identity cards.Meanwhile, the Supreme Court today
asked a lawyer to get the opinion of the Attorney General
before it accords hearing to his plea seeking contempt action against jailed JNUSU president Kanhaiya Kumar, former
DU lecturer SAR Gilani and few others on the ground that
they allegedly termed the execution of Afzal Guru as "judicial killing". "You will have to g et the opinion of the AG
(Mukul Rohatgi) because that is the legal requirement. You
please go to the AG again," a bench comprising Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justices R Banumathi and U U Lalit said.
The remarks came when Pune-based lawyer Vineet Dhanda
sought an urgent hearing of his plea saying that the terming hanging of Afzal Guru as "judicial killing" amounted to
contempt of the highest court of the land which had delivered the verdict. The contempt plea has referred to the apex
court verdict, pronounced on August 4, 2005 in the case, by
which Guru was handed down death penalty for being part
of the conspiracy in the attack on Parliament. "The so-called
cultural event's pamphlets spoke about the judicial killing
of Afzal Guru. The main topic of the 'cultural event' organized
was judicial killing of Afzal Guru which outright tantamount
to criminal contempt as the respondents are calling the judges
of the apex court as killers who have been projected to have
committed judicial killing of Afzal Guru," the plea said.
"Afzal and Yakub Memon were no martyrs as projected by
the group of students of JNU. The Supreme Court has already
passed a detailed judgement in both cases after giving due
consideration as per law after going through the evidence,"
it further said.(PTI)
Govt offers postings to non-IAS,
IPS officers in North-East
NEW DELHI, FEB 29 /--/ Seeking to tackle shortage of IAS
and IPS officers in the north-east, the Centre has decided to
post officers from other services to the region. "Central Service
and Central Secretariat Service officers who are willing to
work in the north-east may be posted on non-cadre posts in
the secretariat of the states," said a draft policy finalised by
Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT). Besides, the
officers of all-India services --Indian Administrative Service
(IAS), Indian Police Service (IPS) and Indian Forest Service (IFoS) -- belonging to the north-east cadre may be allowed
to shift to one of the cadres in the regions except their home
state, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram which are part of the
union territories cadre, it said. The DoPT has decided to relax
the existing guidelines to allow officers from other cadres
to work in the north-east on inter-cadre deputation. "It is proposed that eligibility service for inter-cadre deputation may
be fixed as seven years of service. The entire period of inter-cadre deputation should be finished by 25 years of overall
service of the officer.
"The maximum term of deputation including home deputation will be nine years instead of five years subject to availability of deficit in the cadre. The inter-cadre deputation
may be availed in two or more spells," it said. At present, one
has to complete nine years of service to be eligible for inter-cadre deputation. A woman all-India services officer
belonging to a North East cadre is allowed to go on intercadre deputation after completion of six years of actual service in the north-east. Such woman officer would also be eligible
for deputation for a maximum of nine years instead of five
years. "The same may be continued," the new policy proposes.
As per existing guidelines, if officers from outside cadres
go on deputation to North East cadres, the conditionalities
of cooling off would be waived, provided the person completes a term of deputation of at least five years. In other
words, an officer from any cadre would be allowed to go on
deputation to the north-east directly after a full period of
central deputation without cooling off. The DoPT has decided
that existing guidelines regarding cooling off period with
regard to inter-cadre deputation to the north-east cadres may
be continued. All ministries have been asked to send their
comments on this new policy by March 15.(PTI)
NEW DELHI, FEB 29 /--/ It
can't order the military to
shoot at the crowd, the Supreme Court today said
while dismissing a plea
seeking giving free hand to
Army to control "unruly
mob" during the Jat agitation in Haryana. A bench
headed by Chief Justice of
India T S Thakur said that
Army was capable enough
to deal with any situation
and as and when the situation arises things will be
taken care of. "You want us
to issue direction to Army to
shoot at the mob. We can't issue such directions. We can't
allow the army to open fire at
the mob. As and when the
situation arises things will
be taken care of. Army is capable enough to deal with
any situation," the bench
also comprising justices R
Bhanumathi and U U Lalit
said. It said that whoever
will take law in his own
hand will be prosecuted as
per the law and dismissed
the petition as withdrawn.
The bench observed that
had the petitioner advocate
Ajay Jain sought compensation to the victim of the violent agitation, it would have
thought of considering it.
"Had you asked for compen-
servant) of the Prevention
of Corruption Act. The
court, however, acquitted
two other accused -Lakhpa Tsering and
Krishna -- in the case.
Thungon was the Minister
of State for Urban Affairs
and Employment at the
time of the alleged offence
when Cong ress g over nment was led by Prime
Minister P V Narsimha
Rao. Apart from them,
then Urban Affairs and
Employment Minister
Sheila Kaul, and one Tulsi
Balodi were also accused
in the case. Proceedings
against Kaul and Balodi
were abated as they died
during the pendency of
trial. The court, however,
has also found Kaul guilty
in the case for conspiring
and committing the illegal
act. "Vide separate judg-
He, however, later agreed to
withdraw his plea. The petitioner in his plea has sought
direction for Haryana government to give complete
free hand to the Army/Para
Military forces to control
the situation which includes inter alia to fire at the
mob to bring the situation
under control.
He has also sought direction to local administration
of Rohtak, Haryana to hand
over the administration to
Army and not to interrupt in
any manner whatsoever in
the Army's affair in dealing
with the situation. "Direct
the Union of India to provide
adequate number of Army/
Para Military forces as is required to deal with mob of
20,000 people roaming in or
around district Rohtak," the
plea had said.(PTI)
HC asks Maha govt to expedite
probe in Pansare murder case
MUMBAI, FEB 29 /--/ The
Bombay High Court today
asked Maharashtra government to expedite further investigations by the state CID
into the murder of rationalist Govind Pansare. A division bench of Justices Ranjit
More and V L Achilya has
been hearing petitions seeking probe by independent
agencies into the murders of
Pansare and another rationalist Narendr a Dabholkar.
The CBI is probing the role
of right wing organisation
Sanatan Sanstha in the murder of Dabholkar while the
state CID is investigating the
killing of Pansare. "There
appears to be a good coordination between the investigating agencies probing the
murder of Pansare and rationalist
Narendra
Dabholkar," the bench observed today while asking
the authorities to speed up
probe in Pansare murder
case. Arguing on behalf of
Pansare's family, lawyer
Abhay Nevgi informed the
court that charges are likely
to be framed against the accused, Sameer Gaikwad, on
March 8. Gaikwad, an activPrime Minister Narendra Modi with Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan and others pose for a photograph after paying homage to former Prime Minister Morarji
Desai,on his Birth Anniversary at the Central Hall of Parliament house, in New Delhi.
Defence budget hiked by nearly 10%
NEW DELHI, FEB 29 /--/ The defence
budget was today increased by 9.76 per cent
to Rs 2.58 lakh crore for the next fiscal as compared to the revised estimates of Rs 2.33 lakh
crore for 2015-16 even as military pension
zoomed to Rs 82,000 crore mainly due to the
One Rank One Pension scheme. The capital
outlay for the three services, for modernisation, stood at Rs 78,586.68 crore. However,
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley made no
mention of the defence allocation for 201617 in his Budget speech. The defence budget
accounts for nearly 17.2 per cent of the total central government expenditure for the
year 2016-17 which is Rs 19.78 lakh crore. This
includes the pension budget along with the
defence budget. The highest jump has been
in the pension expenses. While the revised
estimate for the current fiscal was Rs 60,238
crore, it has jumped to Rs 82,332.66 crore for
the coming financial year. In comparison,
there has been a marginal increase of Rs
4287.07 crore in the capital expenditure of
the three services which are in the process
of modernisining their equipment. One reason for small hike could be that the Defence
Ministry was unable to utilise the full capital
budget for the current fiscal. The budget
comes at a time when the three services are
in the last stages of negotiations for multibillion dollar deals for Rafale fighter jets,
Apache, Chinook and Kamov helicopters and
the M777 light weight howitzers. Incidentally,
the total value of these projects exceeds the
capital outplay. "The payments are done in
a phased manner and no payment is paid in
full," defence sources said. According to
defence sources, 86 deals worth approximately Rs 1,50,000 crore are close to the final stage of approval. Defence Minister
Manohar Parrikar had recently directed all
concerned to make concerted efforts to get
these deals cleared in the next 4-5 months
within the first quarter of the next fiscal. India
has once again emerged as the world's larg-
est importer of arms, with Russia being the
top supplier garnering 70 per cent of the Indian market. India's imports, accounting for
14 per cent of global arms imports, were three
times greater than those of China and Pakistan in teh period 2011-15. "You want us to
issue direction to Ar my to shoot at the mob.
We can't issue such directions. We can't allow the army to open fire at the mob. As and
when the situation arises things will be taken
care of. Army is capable enough to deal with
any situation," the bench also comprising
justices R Bhanumathi and U U Lalit said. It
said that whoever will take law in his own
hand will be prosecuted as per the law and
dismissed the petition as withdrawn. The
bench observed that had the petitioner advocate Ajay Jain sought compensation to the
victim of the violent agitation, it would have
thought of considering it. "Had you asked for
compensation to the victims of the agitation,
we would have thought of considering it," the
bench said. Petitioner then sought court's permission to amend the prayer in his petition
which the bench denied, saying it can't allow him to do so. The bench also refrained
itself from imposing the cost on petitioner
after he kept on insisting for consideration
of his plea. He, however, later agreed to withdraw his plea.
The petitioner in his plea has sought direction for Haryana government to give complete
free hand to the Army/Para Military forces
to control the situation which includes inter
alia to fire at the mob to bring the situation
under control. He has also sought direction
to local administration of Rohtak, Haryana
to hand over the administration to Army and
not to interrupt in any manner whatsoever
in the Army's affair in dealing with the situation. "Direct the Union of India to provide
adequate number of Army/Para Military
forces as is required to deal with mob of
20,000 people roaming in or around district
Rohtak," the plea had said.(PTI)
P K Thungon gets 3 and half years jail in 1993-94 graft case
NEW DELHI, FEB 29 /--/
Former Union minister P
K Thungon was today
awarded a three-and-a
half-year jail term in a
graft case relating to allotment of government shops
here during 1993-94.
Apart from the jail term,
special CBI judge Sanjeev
Aggarwal also imposed a
fine of Rs one lakh on
Thungon, who was also a
former chief minister of
Arunachal Pradesh. The
court has convicted
Thungon for the offences
under section 120B (criminal conspiracy) of IPC read
with section 13d(iii)(if
while holding office as a
public servant, obtains for
any person any valuable
thing or pecuniary advantage without any public
interest) and 13(2) (criminal misconduct by public
sation to the victims of the
agitation, we would have
thought of considering it,"
the bench said. Petitioner
then sought court's permission to amend the prayer in
his petition which the bench
denied, saying it can't allow
him to do so. The bench also
refrained itself from imposing the cost on petitioner after he kept on insisting for
consideration of his plea.
ment..., it was found that
there was a clear cut conspiracy between accused 1
(deceased Kaul) and accused 2 (Thungon) for committing the illegal act or to
commit the offence punishable under the provisions of the Prevention of
Corruption Act. "Since
accused Sheila Kaul has already expired and the proceedings against her has
stood abated, therefore
only accused P K Thungon
stands convicted under
the 120B (criminal conspiracy) of IPC read with
the provisions of the PC
Act," the judge has said. In
Jul y 2015, Thungon was
awarded a four-and-a-half
year jail term in a 1998
graft case relating to misappropriation of central
funds. A case was registered by CBI in 1996
against Kaul, Thungon,
Tsering, Krishna and
Balodi for allegedly hatching a conspiracy in allotting shops and stalls in
1994. According to CBI,
the five accused had allegedly conspired during September 1993 to June 1994
for dishonestly and
fraudulently obtaining
undue benefit in the allotment of shops on economical licence fee basis in contr avention of rules g overning such allotments.
CBI had claimed Kaul and
Thungon allegedly committed offence of criminal
breach of trust to cause
undue pecuniary advantage to their relations and
friends, Tsering, Krishna
and Balodi and dishonestly allowed these three to
convert to their own the
g over nment shops entrusted to the minister. It
had said that in pursuance to conspiracy, Kaul
abused her official position as minister and in the
capacity of custodian of
g over nment shops, dishonestly and without any
public interest sanctioned
allotments of three shops
without calling for any
tenders of applications
from general public on
mere recommendation of
Thungon in a market opposite Red Fort.(PTI)
ist of right-wing outfit
Sanatan Sanstha, was arrested in September last year
in connection with the murder of Pansare. Maharashtra
CID had earlier told the court
it had filed charge sheet
against Gaikwad, the only
arrested accused in the
Pansare murder case, and
further probe was underway
as other accused were yet to
be arrested.
The high court judges today asked how can charges
be framed if investigations
are still going on. The bench
asked the prosecution to
make an application in the
trial court praying to defer the
framing of charges, as investigations were in progress.
Earlier, dissatisfied by the
probe, the family of Pansare
had moved the High Court
following which it had ordered a CID investigation into
the murder.
The high court is also
hearing another petition filed
by Dabholkar's family and
had earlier ordered a CBI
probe into the rationalist's
killing. Both the petitions are
being heard jointly by the
bench. The CBI had earlier
this month informed the high
court it was considering to
take a third opinion on the
weapon used in the murders
of rationalists Narendra
Dabholkar, M M Kalburgi
and Pansare, after Bengaluru
and Mumbai forensic labs
differed on the issue. While
the Bengaluru-based forensic
science laboratory (FSL) was
of the opinion that different
weapons were used in the
murders, the Kalina FSL in
Mumbai said that the
weapon used in all the three
cases were the same. Advocate Nevgi, appearing for the
kin of both Dabholkar and
Pansare, had on last occasion
sought the probe in both the
cases to be transferred to the
National
Investigation
Agency (NIA).
The court, however, noted
that CBI was in touch with
NIA, and hence there was no
need to hand over probe to
the latter at this stage.
Dabholkar was shot dead in
Pune on August 20, 2013.
Pansare was shot at in
Kolhapur by assailants on
February 16, 2015. He succumbed to his injuries three
days later in Mumbai.(PTI)
Hate speech:
Centre opposes
Swamy's plea in SC
Man gets life term, Rs 7L fine
for raping handicapped woman
NEW DELHI, FEB 29 /--/
The Centre today termed as
"not maintainable" and opposed in the Supreme Court
the plea of BJP leader
Subramanian Swamy challenging constitutional validity of certain IPC provisions
on hate speech and writing.
Solicitor General Ranjit
Kumar, appearing for the
Centre, told the bench comprising justices Anil R Dave
and Adarsh Kumar Goel that
the plea is not a "writ petition
but a personal interest litigation" as NBW has been already been issued against
him with regard to alleged
hate speeches. "He is aggrieved because a non-bailable warrant (NBW) has
been issued against him by
a court with regard to his hate
speeches. He is being
personaly prosecuted for an
offence and, hence his plea
is infact a personal interest
litigation," he said, noting
that the plea was not maintainable. The bench then
asked Swamy whether converting the warrant from nonbailable to bailable one
would suffice his cause or
not. Swamy vehmently opposed the contention of the
Solicitor General and said
that his plea has already been
considered by the previous
bench headed by Justice
Ranjan Gogoi which has
agreed to examine the constitutional validity of 156(3) of
IPC and he is not on the issue
of bailable warrant. "The
previous bench of the Supreme Court had in its last
order asked all the parties to
file their affidavits with regard to the matter and it has
agreed to examine the provision of IPC constitutionally,"
he said. He argued that his
plea for quashing of NBW
was already before the
Gauhati High Court. The Solicitor General intervened
and contended that Swamy
can also raise the same issue
of constitutional validity
before the high court which
is seized of his NBW issue. To
this, the bench asked Swamy
whether he has challenged
the provisions before the high
court or not and asked, "Why
can't you raise the issue
there." "How many high
courts should I go to. Across
the country, FIRs are being
lodged against me by several
state governments.
This is a question of my fundamental right. This court is
an approrpiate forum to examine the validity of the provisions of the IPC," Swamy
said, adding that he has not
challenged the validity before the high court. (PTI)
NEW DELHI, FEB 29 /--/ A man, who was held guilty of
deceitfully marrying and raping a differently-abled
woman, has been sent to life imprisonment by a Delhi court
which said he ravished the victim physically and mentally
knowing well that she was totally dependent upon him. The
court also said that the 36-year-old convict, who in connivance with his first wife had trapped the victim, was a "manipulating man" who tried to take advantage of the woman's
"vulnerability" being a handicapped. The convict's wife,
who was also an accused in the case, was acquitted by the
court. "In the present matter, the convict not only ravished
the prosecutrix physically but also mentally, knowing very
well that she is a 'Divyang' (handicapped) and is totally dependent upon him," Additional Sessions Judge Devendra
Kumar Sharma said while awarding him life term and also
imposed a fine of Rs seven lakh on him. The judge said,
"From the act of the convict, it is clear that he is a manipulating man and he tried to take all kind of advantages because of the vulnerability of the prosecutrix being a
'Divyang' and contracted the second marriage, even cohabited with her and established physical relationship..." The
court, while taking a stern view, said in such cases there are
no mitigating circumstances to take a lenient view while
awarding the sentence and "such cases must set an example
in society that once there is conviction, there is no undue
sympathy while awarding the sentence". According to the
prosecution, the man and his wife had on August 30, 2010
succeeded in their plot to get him married to the differently-abled woman in order to grab her property. After seeing a matrimonial advertisment posted by victim's father
in a newspaper, the couple a pproached him posing as
brother and sister and convinced the family for marriage.
The man after marrying the victim started living with
her in her parental house, it said. The man was convicted
under sections 376 (rape), 493 (cohabitation by a man deceitfully inducing a belief of lawful marria ge), 495 (concealing former marriage), 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the
IPC. The court also directed that half of the fine of Rs 7 lakh
imposed on the convict be paid to the victim as compensation. "Any amount of compensation though would not be
sufficient to the agony suffered by prosecutrix but at least
she will be compensated for the litigation costs which she
had incurred in the case as throughout the trial, she was represented through counsel who assisted the court with full
diligence. "Therefore, out of the fine amount, 50 per cent
amount be given to prosecutrix as compensation/ damages," it said.(PTI)
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