1. Prison or Palace? Tick-Tock
The Supreme Court is expected to pronounce on Tuesday the verdict in an assets case involving VK Sasikala, making or wrecking her recently articulated political ambitions.
Jayalalithaa, Sasikala and two relatives of Sasikala have been accused of amassing disproportionate assets of Rs 66.65 crore during Amma's first term as chief minister from 1991 to 1996. Since Jayalalithaa passed away in December, the case against her stands abated.
The judgement is scheduled to be delivered at 10:30 am by a bench of Justices Pinaki Chandra Ghose and Amitava Roy.
If the top court upholds the high court acquittal, Sasikala will be on course to face a floor test within seven days. The contender to the Poes Garden legacy has claimed the support of over 120 legislators in a House that requires a simple majority of 118.
(Source: The Telegraph)
Price of Power: How Much is Camp Sasikala’s Resort Bill?
How much will a stay of more than 200 people, including 100 legislators, for six days and nights at a luxurious beach resort on East Coast Road cost?
There are about 60 rooms of three different types at the Golden Bay beach resort – tranquil rooms costing Rs 5,500 per day, bay view rooms Rs 6,600 per day and paradise suite rooms for Rs 9,900.
Considering that all the rooms were booked at a tariff of Rs 7,000 flat for mass booking, the boarding expenses alone might run up to roughly Rs 25 lakh for six days.
This figure does not include food, water, snacks, fruits and other essential items besides non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages. Sources said every night was filled with entertainment programmes to keep the MLAs in high spirits, maybe literally too. If each of these 200 people staying at the resort consumed food and beverage on an average of Rs 2,000 per day, the bill will be another Rs 25 lakh for six days.
(Source: Times of India)
Uttarakhand Poll: Remember Shaktiman? MLA Who Flogged the Horse Asks for Votes
This MLA insists that his critics are flogging a dead horse. But try as he might, Mussoorie’s BJP candidate cannot erase the memories of that infamous image from 14 March 2016. It shows Ganesh Joshi with a raised lathi, taking aim at Shaktiman, the horse from Uttarakhand Mounted Police, during a BJP protest in Dehradun.
There are two versions of what happened next. It was alleged that Joshi hit the horse, breaking its hind leg. Joshi, who is out on bail in the case, claims the horse stumbled while stepping back, and broke its leg. What happened next made national headlines: Shaktiman underwent an amputation, got a prosthetic leg and, a month later, died of infection.
With Uttarakhand going to polls Wednesday, Joshi is on the final leg of his campaign in Mussoorie, and all that he wants to talk about is Prime Minister Narendra Modi, or even US President Donald Trump. Anything, but the horse.
(Source: The Indian Express)
UP Polls: Akhilesh Takes Cues from Hillary Campaign, Ups Social Presence Ahead of Phase 2
Live streaming on Facebook of CM Akhilesh Yadav’s rallies, a ‘sentiment analysis’ tool to assess audience reactions, 10 youngsters back from the US with lessons from Hillary Clinton’s campaign and a war room led by four ‘UP ke ladke’ — this is how the SP is driving its electioneering in UP, seeking to outdo the BJP’s publicity machinery.
One of five teams with multiple camera set-ups is always positioned at each of the CM’s rallies to provide the feed that is streamed live on Facebook, akin to what the BJP does for PM Modi’s speeches.
Yadav is expected to address almost 300 rallies by 6 March evening. At the war room in Lucknow, four youngsters from the state are running the show — ex-BBC employee Ashish Yadav is in charge, Piku lyricist Manoj Yadav pens campaign songs, Gozoop CEO Ahmed Aftab Naqvi is the chief digital strategist and Fullbright fellow from Harvard University Anshuman Sharma handles research.
(Source: Times of India)
Lords on Modi Lips
Prime Minister Narendra Modi today said the land of Krishna and Ram had been destroyed by the governments of the Samajwadi Party, the Congress and the BSP.
The subtle invocation of the figures of worship capped the campaigning for the second phase of elections in Uttar Pradesh, which covers several minority-dominated areas.
The BJP had deployed a controversial MP, the saffron-robed Yogi Adityanath, in the belt, fuelling speculation that the party was trying to consolidate Hindu votes against the backdrop of apprehensions that the first phase was an uphill climb.
(Source: The Telegraph)
Hindu Population Decreasing Because They Don’t Convert People, Says Kiren Rijiju
Responding to Congress’ charge that the BJP was converting Arunachal Pradesh into a Hindu state, Kiren Rijiju on Monday said that the Hindu population is decreasing for the very reason that Hindus don’t ask other communities to convert to Hinduism.
He also said that because of this, minorities are flourishing in India, which is not the case in other countries. “Hindu population is reducing in India because Hindus never convert people. Minorities in India are flourishing unlike some countries around,” he tweeted out Monday.
(Source: The Indian Express)
In Wake of Burhan Wani’s Killing, Blasts in J&K More than Doubled Over 2015
The number of bomb blasts in Jammu and Kashmir rose sharply in 2016 over 2015, with the spike coming after the encounter in which Hizbul Mujahideen militant Burhan Wani was killed. The Bombshell, the annual report of the National Bomb Data Centre (NBDC) of the National Security Guard (NSG), considers the killing of Burhan Wani in July 2016 the turning point for the situation in the Valley.
Months of violent protests followed, and Kashmir, the report says, witnessed an increase of 121 percent in Improvised Explosive Device (IED) explosions in 2016 over the previous year — from 14 in 2015 to 31 last year. Five people died in these blasts, one more than the number of fatal casualties in 2015. Thirty-six people were injured, 71 percent over the 2015 number of 21.
“J&K saw an increase in blast incidents and casualties particularly after the death of Burhan Wani,” the report has observed.
(Source: The Indian Express)
Unsafe Capital: There’s a Rape Every Four Hours in Delhi
Crime in Delhi increased for the third straight year and three out of the four cases registered in 2016 went unsolved, official data released on Monday showed.
The numbers, released by Delhi Police as part of an annual disclosure, cement the national capital’s reputation of being a dangerous city — particularly for women who made a distress-call to helplines every 9 minutes on an average.
Of the 2,09,519 cases reported last year, 1,53,562 cases — or 73.29 percent of them — could not be cracked. In 2015, the proportion of cases that were unsolved was 72.78 percent.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
Fresh Trouble for Calcutta High Court Justice CS Karnan
Even as Calcutta high court judge justice CS Karnan on Monday failed to appear before the Supreme Court in a contempt case, more trouble spelled for him after wife of a sitting Madras high court judge accused him of harassing their family and levelling false allegations against her husband.
As neither Karnan nor his lawyer appeared before the court, the seven-judge bench headed by Chief Justice JS Khehar was forced to defer proceedings in the case by three weeks.
“We are not aware of reasons for his non-appearance. We, therefore, refrain from proceeding with the matter,” the court said, indicating it would not hesitate in issuing a warrant against him if he does not appear on 10 March, the next date of hearing.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
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