India

New Delhi, Oct 2 (IANS) The relationship between the ruling BJP and the principal opposition party Congress has been quite bitter in the last few years, with both parties slamming each other at regular intervals over a number of issues.

The scenario, however, looked a bit different for a change on Sunday when Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the interim president of Congress Sonia Gandhi came face-to-face in the Parliament.

Both leaders faced each other at the Central Hall of Parliament House on the occasion of the wreath laying ceremony organised on the birth anniversary of Father of the Nation -- Mahatma Gandhi, and late former Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri.

PM Modi, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh offered garlands on the portrait of Mahatma Gandhi and Lal Bahadur Shastri.

After a while, Sonia Gandhi also proceeded to put garland on the portrait of the two departed leaders.

Modi greeted Sonia Gandhi by saying "Namaste", and in her response, the Congress leader also greeted the Prime Minister with folded hands.

Despite the exchange of greetings, a tinge of tension was visible.

Several group photographs were also clicked in which both PM Modi and Sonia Gandhi were also present but none of them neither communicated with anyone not made any eye contacts.

Later, both Rajnath Singh and Sonia Gandhi greeted each other with a "Namaste".

--IANS
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New Delhi, Oct 2 (IANS) The government will set up 100 5G labs across the country and some of these labs will become incubators to train students, promote innovation, research and experiment, IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Sunday.

"We are going to set up 100 5G labs across the country. I request the telecom industry to come together and convert at least 12 of these 100 labs into telecom incubators to train students and do experiments," he said on the second day of the Indian Mobile Congress (IMC) 2022 here.

Vaishnaw said the government is working significantly towards simplifying the license regime for all telecom players.

"I am really happy to see the energy of startups and MSMEs who are going to rural areas to benefit people," he told the gathering.

The minister also invited comments for the draft of the Indian Telecommunication Bill, 2022.

Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said that the launch of 5G is going to be a defining moment for not only India but for the world.

"A large economy like India which has talent is emerging from the shadows to take a leadership role. We are now indigenously designing, developing and manufacturing goods and showing the world the scale and speed with which we will take 5G through the length and breadth of India," he said at the event.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday launched 5G services and India ushered in an era of ultra high-speed Internet.

"Today, 130 crore Indians are getting a wonderful gift in the form of 5G from the country and from the telecom industry of the country. 5G is a knock on the doors of a new era in the country. 5G is the beginning of an infinite sky of opportunities. I congratulate every Indian for this," he had said.

--IANS
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Mumbai, Oct 2 (IANS) The Maharashtra government resolution (GR) directing all employees of the state to greet with 'Vande Mataram' instead of the internationally familiar 'Hello!' kicked off a political fracas, here on Sunday.

The decision, first mooted in mid-August, was implemented on the occasion of the 153rd birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of the Nation, as part of the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav.

The GR was issued by the General Administration Department, headed by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde -- and applies to employees across government, semi-government, local civic bodies, aided schools, colleges and other institutions.

It mandated all employees to henceforth answer phone calls with 'Vande Mataram' and also while addressing staff, speaking to citizens or making public announcements, instead of the traditional globally recognised 'Hello'.

The drive for it was formally launched in Wardha by Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Cultural Affairs Minister Sudhir Mungantiwar.

To queries by the media, Mungantiwar said: "It's a campaign launched on the occasion of Gandhi Jayanti. In fact 'Jana Gana Mana' penned by Rabindranath Tagore is the national anthem and 'Vande Mataram' written by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee is national song."

"The slogan 'Vande Mataram' played an important role in our Freedom struggle.... Martyr Bhagat Singh's last words were 'Vande Mataram'. We must bring it back in our daily routine again... from today onwards, we start the 'Vande Mataram' movement," said Fadnavis.

However, the issue snowballed into a major row with political parties expressing reservations, suggesting other greetings, and even sections of people opposing it.

Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi too had their take on the issue.

Maharashtra Samajwadi Party's President Abu Asim Azmi firmly said that the move was not acceptable.

"We would like to greet 'Saare Jahan Se Accha' and not 'Vande Mataram'. Besides, Muslims cannot utter 'Vande Mataram' as it is against their faith," he said.

Azmi also demanded to know whether Shinde had discarded 'Jai Maharashtra' and taken up 'Vande Mataram' under the pressure of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

"I had met Balasaheb Thackeray a few times... He would always say 'Jai Maharashtra' and Shiv Sainiks would respond with that," Azmi pointed out.

Congress state president Nana Patole said he was not against the 'Vande Mataram' greeting, but said keeping in mind the farmers construction, the Congress would prefer 'Jai Kisan' or 'Ram Ram'.

Shiv Sena national spokesperson and farmers leader Kishore Tiwari, who is from the ex-CM Uddhav Thackeray group, said: "Saying 'Vande Mataram' is a welcome development. However, to respect farmers, there should be a campaign to say 'Jai Kisan' and to have a corruption-free government 'Jai Seva'."

NCP national spokesperson Clyde Crasto feels that 'Vande Mataram' invokes "a sense of pride and a feeling of patriotism among Indians".

"But forcing the people to say so is not right. This is an infringement of their Right to Freedom of speech and also imposition of a particular mindset on the people, Let them say Vande Mataram with pride, don't force them to say so," urged Crasto.

Mumbai Congress Working President Charan Singh Sapra said: "It is yet another a ploy to divert attention from major issues of concern... inflation, unemployment, fall of Rupee.

"This is also an attempt towards polarisation! Completely goes contrary to the ideals of Bapu on Gandhi Jayanti," said Sapra.

--IANS
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New Delhi, Oct 2 (IANS) The recent police complaint by Kerala MP Hibi Eden against the manipulation of the 'Bharat Jodo Yatra' pictures of Rahul Gandhi by the BJP's "online hate factory", has once again put the focus on the use of social media in India for peddling misinformation and hate.

Over the years, social media has turned into a battleground of the dirty tricks departments of the major political parties.

As per a research paper by S Md. Al-Zaman in 2021 titled "Social Media Fake News in India" published in the Asian Journal for Public Opinion Research, fake news shared on social media has six major themes: health, religion, politics, crime, entertainment and miscellaneous; eight types of content: text, photo, audio, and video, text & photo, text & video, photo & video, and text & photo & video; and two main sources: online sources and the mainstream media.

Health-related fake news is more common only during a health crisis, whereas fake news related to religion and politics seems more prevalent, emerging from online media. Text & photo and text & video have three-fourths of the total share of fake news, and most of them are from online media: online media is the main source of fake news on social media as well. The research paper said previous literature hints that online fake news in India serves mainly two purposes -- political and religious, utilized by two groups, the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) digital army and digital archiving as history-making to support the Hindu-nationalist government and gau-rakshaks ("cow protectors" or "cow vigilantes") to harass or lynch the minorities, mainly the Muslims.

Four reasons may be helpful to define India's current fake news problem: (a) higher social media penetration, (b) a growing number of Internet-illiterate people using social media, (c) the existing law that makes tracing fake news producers difficult (d) the rise of Hindutva (an ideology of Hindu-domination) and religious nationalism, the research paper said.

Social media is used widely in India to mobilize political activists for assembly and/or demonstration, and general public and vigilante groups for religious vigilantism and/or mob lynching, the research paper said.

Religion and politics often intertwine, creating a new type of fake news: religio-political, and WhatsApp is mostly used for such fake news propagation because of its instant messaging capacity, easier usability and wide reach, it added.

For example, WhatsApp fake news triggered the Muzaffarnagar riot in Uttar Pradesh in 2017, eight months before the federal election, and had both political and religious purposes, the paper said.

Also, fake, doctored, and old videos and photos are mainly used in creating religious and political misinformation in India. For these reasons, visual content is responsible for many of India's health, religious, and political fake news. Previous studies also stated that Indian fake news is mostly WhatsApp-based, which is conducive for visual content.

Fake news has two main sources, online media and mainstream media. Online media produces almost seven times more fake news compared to mainstream media and previous studies suggested similar results, it added.

From 2014 to 2019, the Internet users in India increased by 65%, surpassing the appeal of mainstream media. In addition, thanks to social media's political benefits, the BJP government promotes Internet-based alternative media that helps to reduce the effects of mainstream media to some extent, the research paper said.

Social media has a wider reach -- only 19% of Dalits, the most underprivileged community in India, have access to water, but 65% of them have access to the Internet. It is easy to manipulate content and mobilize people; digital archiving is used in history-making in favour of the BJP's Hindu nationalism and other political agendas, the research paper said.

Although it has been said that social media has democratised India, it makes unregulated information production and dissemination commonplace.

Also, a large share of the users lack digital literacy, which makes them more susceptible to fake news, the research paper said.

As per a July article in the Lowy Institute, in May 2021, when the Information Technology Rules came into effect, Twitter again fell foul of the Modi government when the company labelled posts by politicians from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party as "manipulated media" - the same labelling it had applied to some of US President Donald Trump's tweets while he was still in office.

"The problem in India is much bigger: hate speech is rife, bots and fake accounts linked to India's political parties and leaders abound, and user pages and large groups brim with inflammatory material targeting Muslims and other minorities. Disinformation is an organised and carefully mined operation here. Elections and "events" like natural calamities and the coronavirus pandemic usually trigger fake news outbreaks", the BBC reported in October 2021.

"With a surfeit of hate speech, trolling and attacks on minorities and women, Indian Twitter is a polarised and dark place. WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned messaging service, remains the largest carrier of fake news and hoaxes in its biggest market", BBC reported.

A publication of the Stimson Center, South Asian voices in July 2021 carried an article which said the 2014 general elections --egarded as the "First Social Media Election" in India's political history -- kicked-off a social media revolution in Indian politics.

The Bharatiya Janata Party's success in mobilizing India's digital generation using social media platforms has forced contending parties to revamp their social media engagement. As a result, millions of politically motivated messages now flood India's digital space, making elections susceptible to social media manipulation, the article said.

The BJP reportedly operates around 2-3 lakh WhatsApp groups. The party has developed an effective IT wing linked to disinformation and propaganda, both of which it uses to stoke communal divisions to reap electoral benefits. The spread of disinformation, and polarizing, BJP-led social media campaigns promoting Hindutva, deepen tensions among Hindu and Muslim communities, the article said.

According to the 2017 CSDS-Lokniti survey, one-sixth of India's WhatsApp users were part of a WhatsApp group either managed by a political party or its leader. Signifying the volume of politically motivated content, a 2019 CSDS-Lokniti and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung survey determined that one in every three Indian citizens on social media consumes political content daily or regularly, the article said.

Political content voters absorb through WhatsApp and other platforms influences political perceptions in a two-step manner. First, political accounts generate an influx of positive narratives concerning a party, drowning out criticism. For instance, widespread nationalist content from BJP-affiliated right-wing groups praised the army and the Balakot air strikes while evading content on rising unemployment and debilitating economic crises in India. Second, disinformation - spread particularly through fake social media handles - consolidates nationalist support against perceived "enemies", the article said.

In early 2020, BJP IT wing head Amit Malviya tweeted a fake video of Anti-CAA protestors raising "Pakistan Zindabad" banners. This was intended to deepen Hindu-Muslim communal divisions and advance the BJP's political efforts, the article said.

The BJP's social media campaign has evolved significantly since 2014: then it largely focused on highlighting its leader, now it seeks to control the content citizens consume. The core focus of the BJP's social media campaign in 2014, aided by professional agencies, was building the brand of then Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, promoting its development agenda and criticizing the ruling Congress government.

The BJP's social media campaign adopted more polarizing methods in the 2017 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections and the 2019 general election, it said.

The BJP's savvy social media presence and electoral success has created incentives for other parties to expand their presence in the digital space. Faced with continuous electoral setbacks since 2014, and a tarnished image of leader Rahul Gandhi as "Pappu" (a mocking name for an immature and half-witted boy in popular media) by the BJP IT cell, the Congress' social media spending increased tenfold in 2019 compared to 2014.

Even the Communist parties, which have a history of opposing computerisation, have begun training their cadres.

The BJP has used "anti-national" messaging to delegitimise the farmers' protest, unmasking its weaponisation of digital platforms to thwart voices of dissent, the article said.

In November 2020, BJP IT head Amit Malaviya shared a video on Twitter countering the allegations of police brutality against protesting farmers. Later, Twitter flagged this video as "manipulated." Then, a host of BJP leaders, including Tajinder Bagga (BJP Delhi spokesperson), Varun Gandhi (BJP MP) and Harish Khurana (Delhi BJP spokesperson), propagated disinformation and linked protesting farmers to the Khalistan movement, the article said.

A significant part of the success of the BJP's social media strategy has been its ability to propagate messages that are more personal and thus have greater potential to influence a wide range of citizens' political perceptions.

For instance, it employed trolls and campaign ads using memes from the Game of Thrones series. Ample financial resources to set up IT cells, recruit techies, and hire professional agencies, combined with an efficient and vast network of organizational machinery on the ground to ensure the social media campaign reaches ordinary voters, helped the BJP far surpass competing parties in the digital outreach, the article said.

--IANS
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By Nishant Arora
New Delhi, Oct 2 (IANS) As political parties continue to misuse social media platforms to spread propaganda, misinformation, and fake news in the absence of a central cyber regulatory body, industry experts have reiterated the need to appoint a nodal cyber regulator to deal with Twitter, Facebook, WhatsApp and others.


Several countries have appointed their own cyber regulators who separately deal with Big Tech when they fail to address the laws of the land, especially before big-ticket elections.

"Propaganda, misinformation, and fake news have the potential to polarise public opinion. It is often seen that social media is used to promote violent extremism and hate speech against political parties, communities, and religions and, ultimately, to undermine democracies and reduce trust in the democratic processes," Nitin Pandey, senior cyber consultant with UP Cyber Crime, Police Headquarters, told IANS.

Pandey explained that such anti-social elements, using bots of paid Twitter users, spread misinformation.

"With modern artificial intelligence (AI) tools, it has become very easy to morph, and create deep fake, altered voices, videos, and text. And as these messages are circulated in such large numbers many believe them as true," he noted.

As India prepares for any big state poll, WhatsApp gets heavily misused by various political parties as well as individual candidates to woo millions of voters via the automated bulk messaging route.

According to experts, IT cells of various political parties prepare lakhs of WhatsApp groups and broadcast lists to reach smartphones of voters with targeted political messaging.

"WhatsApp is a big beneficiary of such unauthorised bulk messaging, even though the Election Commission has imposed stringent restrictions on conventional campaigns. Influencing and impacting elections in such an unauthorised manner is a crime under the Indian Penal Code and the Representation of People's Act," Supreme Court lawyer and cyberlaw expert Virag Gupta told IANS.

Pandey said It is very important to provide netizens with a solid education on media and information literacy as part of the curriculum.

"There are various fact-checking platforms available online. Before believing any hate or fake news, netizens should cross-verify the content before sharing it with others," he told IANS.

Section 66A of the IT Act has been enacted to regulate the social media law in India and assumes importance as it controls and regulates all the legal issues related to social media law in the country.

The New Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics) Rules was announced in February 2021 to increase the accountability of the social media platforms (such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter etc.) to prevent their misuse and abuse.

"Political parties and marketing companies have been using bots, automation scripts, algorithms and time intervals to bypass rules of the land," according to Gupta.

Recently, the Madras High Court held that social media companies may also be treated as accused in criminal cases.

"In this context, the Election Commission must take immediate action against candidates, parties, and social media platforms for such systemic and large-scale violations of its laws and rules," said Gupta.

"Contempt proceedings can also be initiated against such social media platforms for violation of rules framed under the directions of the Supreme Court," he added.

--IANS
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By Saiyed Moziz Imam Zaidi
New Delhi, Oct 2 (IANS) Congress seems to be on the upfront and is now giving timely response to the BJP on social media. It all started with senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh taking over as the party's General Secretary in-charge of communication.


On Thursday, Delhi Congress lodged a complaint about a "fake video" of Rahul Gandhi which attempted to establish that the former Congress President was refusing to perform Ganga Arti.

Commenting on the matter, Jairam Ramesh said, "Last night, a police complaint was filed in Delhi against a totally fake video on Rahul Gandhi. The offender deleted his social media post after it was exposed, but he will face the law for his atrocious deed. We will not allow such people to get away lightly."

Delhi Congress has filed complaint against filmmaker Ashoke Pandit for spreading "fake and distorted news, incite, provoke the public and create enmity between groups". The party said that the accused has committed offences that are punishable under the Indian Penal code, 1860 and other legal provisions.

"Janeudhaari Rahul Gandhi is refusing to perform aarti. The reasons are clear," Ashoke Pandit wrote in his now-deleted tweet.

Delhi Congress alleged that the tweet was accompanied with a "maliciously distorted video clip" of Rahul Gandhi, wherein it was sought to portray that the former Congress president was refusing to partake in religious rituals being performed in Rajkot (Gujarat) while worshipping goddess Durga. "It must be pointed out that the video was created by morphing (through deliberately editing) an older video in which Rahul Gandhi was indeed offering prayers in direct contradiction to what was being portrayed by Ashoke Pandit."

The Congress has appointed Supriya Shrinate to head all the Social and Digital media to counter any narrative against the party. Shrinate is a former journalist.

The Congress is fighting on two fronts, says party leaders, on one end with the BJP and on the other with the "so-called news channels". Jairam Ramesh, referring to a news item, said, "Don't take the Congress party for granted any more... This evening a Hindi news channel ran a mischievous graphic image in connection with PFI. This was a blatant attempt to tarnish Congress party's reputation. Our team acted at once and the reference to us was corrected immediately."

Recently, Congress MP Hibi Eden filed a police complaint accusing BJP leader Priti Gandhi of spreading fake and divisive news to disrupt Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Yatra.

Eden alleged that the BJP leader in a tweet shared a set of picture that sought to convey that former Congress president Rahul Gandhi is posing with an individual who had been accused of sloganeering "Pakistan Zindabad" in past.

Jairam Ramesh shared the copy of the Congress MP's complaint on Twitter itself, saying that he had initiated legal action against the "online hate factory" of BJP leaders and their devotees and the Congress will not take such a case lightly.

He further stated: "The impression these pictures sought to convey was that Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was posing with an individual who had been accused of sloganeering 'Pakistan Zindabad' on a previous occasion."

Eden noted (in the complaint) that "the individuals in the photographs were two separate and distinct people".

"The distortion was not an innocent one because it sought to falsely and maliciously suggest that former Congress President Rahul Gandhi, who is on a yatra to unite Indians, had demonstrated sympathy for individuals who supported Pakistan and approved their illegal sloganeering and was ultimately attempting to 'break India'," Eden alleged in his complaint.

The Congress leader further said that several users as well as fact-checking social media handles corrected Priti Gandhi and explained that the individuals in the photographs were two separate and distinct people. In fact, the BJP leader even deleted the tweet then "immediately uploaded another one to double down on her messaging making base and vulgar insinuations without the scantest regard for the individuals involved".

"...it is clear that this malicious post was designed to (1) create a dangerously false impression in the minds of the viewers regarding the Congress leader's approach towards Pakistan and individuals involved in illegal sloganeering in support of Pakistan; and (2) to foment social tensions in the 'Bharat Jodo Yatra' rallies led by Rahul Gandhi," the complaint said.

Eden sought that an urgent and immediate FIR be registered by under relevant provisions of the Indian Penal Code.

The Congress in July targeted BJP national president J.P. Nadda and demanded an appropriate apology from the party for sharing a "doctored video clip" of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.

The Congress alleged that in the original video Rahul Gandhi was commenting on the SFI's violence on his Wayanad office but it was "deliberately and mischievously doctored to establish as if it was a comment on the heinous murder of Kanhaiya Lal in Udaipur".

The Congress said that it was immediately brought to the attention of all concerned that the reportage was "false and deliberately misleading".

Jairam Ramesh had then sought apology from the BJP and had threatened to take appropriate legal action against the party and its leaders "who insist and persist in using the social media in such a blatantly irresponsible and criminal manner".

--IANS
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New Delhi, Oct 2 (IANS) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday paid homage to Mahatma Gandhi on his birth anniversary, and urged people to purchase khadi and handicraft products as a tribute to him.

PM Modi also tweeted a video of his thoughts on Mahatma Gandhi on this occasion.

"Paying homage to Mahatma Gandhi on #GandhiJayanti. This Gandhi Jayanti is even more special because India is marking Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav.

"May we always live up to Bapu's ideals. I also urge you all to purchase Khadi and handicrafts products as a tribute to Gandhi Ji."

"His ideals reverberate globally and his thoughts have provided strength to millions of people," PM Modi wrote in his tweet

--IANS
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BY VISHAL GULATI
Chandigarh, Oct 2 (IANS) With the mass exodus of leaders, comprising loyal and veteran lawmakers, and the sudden rise of the saffron brigade in Punjab, the weakened Congress, which faced a humiliating ouster at the hands of greenhorn Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) legislators in the recent Assembly polls, is a boat about to turn down, political observers believe.


They say the party, which had been making waves till the helm of Capt Amarinder Singh, a BJP man now, has been reduced to a marginal player with one "immature" and "childish" decision by central leadership like razing to ground 100-metre-high Noida twin tower -- taller than Delhi's iconic Qutub Minar -- in seconds like a pack of cards.

In a legislative House of 117, the Congress, which won 77 seats in 2017, managed to win only 18 this time with most of its stalwart faces like former Chief Minister Charanjit Channi and state party chief Navjot Singh Sidhu facing humiliating defeat from their respective strongholds.

The BJP, which had won three seats in the 2017 when it had contested in alliance with the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), secured only two seats this time, while SAD won four and the others won one.

Interestingly, Channi is missing from the political scene after biting the dust, while Sidhu, the blue-eyed of the Gandhis, is undergoing a one-year jail term in a road rage case of 1988 in which one person was killed.

The latter is politically finished after his conviction.

In the present lot of legislators, a tug of war of supremacy is on between senior-most leader Partap Singh Bajwa, the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader in the state assembly, and firebrand young face and three-time legislator Amarinder Singh Raja Warring, who is the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC) chief.

On most of the party affairs, both Bajwa and Warring are not on the same page, admitted a senior Congress leader, resulting in a fight for one-upmanship and lack of strong leadership and well oiled organisational machinery.

"The party leadership has all dressed up with nowhere to go. The cadre at grassroots is demoralised and confused too," added the Congress leader.

Accepting his defeat with all humility, Congress rebel and two-time Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh, whose outfit Punjab Lok Congress (PLC) had fought the elections in alliance with the BJP, had said people of Punjab had rejected communal and divisive politics of the Congress by first rejecting one leader as the chief minister for being a Hindu and then trying to play the caste factor.

He was purportedly referring to the appointment of Channi, the state's first Dalit Chief Minister, overlooking then former Punjab Congress chief Sunil Jakhar.

Prominent Hindu face Jakhar, who played a crucial role in strengthening the party's organisation at grassroots under the helms of Capt Amarinder Singh, had defected from the Congress and joined the saffron brigade.

Well ahead of announcement of the chief minister's face by the Congress for Assembly polls, Jakhar had spilled beans by saying Sidhu and Channi were least favoured as the Chief Minister's probable after Capt Amarinder Singh's exit.

He had said he was the first choice with 42 of the 79 legislators favoured his name, replacing incumbent Capt Amarinder Singh in September 2021.

Riding high on the Modi wave, Capt Amarinder Singh, whose wife Preneet Kaur is still a Congress MP, is saying he has a mission to accomplish after joining the BJP.

"I have a mission to accomplish and that is to work for the interest of the state and the country," he said.

Addressing his maiden press briefing last week after joining the party, Capt Amarinder Singh said he wanted to strengthen the hands of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and party President J.P. Nadda.

Besides thanking Modi for opening the Kartarpur Corridor and withdrawal of three agricultural laws, he said the Prime Minister has special fondness for Punjab as whenever as Chief Minister he met him with any demand for the state, he readily accepted it.

"The Congress realised his importance after the devastating 2022 drubbing and defeat when it was reduced from 82 seats to mere 18," said a Congress rebel legislator, who too joined the BJP.

Describing the Congress and the BJP as twin faces of the same coin, Cabinet minister and AAP leader Aman Arora accused Congress leader Bajwa of working secretly for the BJP to implement their dubious agenda in the state.

"The House was supposed to transact business till 3.30 pm but the Congress had failed to raise any issue in the session and preferred to disturb it. The session was extended from one to four days only on the request of Opposition members, but they did not utilise the time properly," he told the media.

Dubbing Partap Singh Bajwa as Partap Singh 'Bhajpa' (BJP), Arora said he is working at the behest of the BJP and they want to implement 'Operation Lotus'.

Slamming the Congress for its irresponsible behaviour in the House on Friday, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann said Congress leaders have wasted the precious time of the House by frequent disruptions.

The Congress leaders have mercilessly wasted the taxpayers' money by creating ruckus during the proceedings of the House.

Mann categorically said there "is no difference between the BJP and the Congress".

"As a matter of fact the fake Congress has emerged as the B-team of the saffron party. Earlier, the Chief Minister of the Congress had ruled the state at the behest of the BJP and now the entire Congress party is acting on directions of the saffron party," he added.

(Vishal Gulati can be contacted at vishal.g@ians.in)

--IANS
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By Haresh Jhala
Gandhinagar, Oct 2 (IANS) The BJP's Kisan Morcha's 'Namo Kisan Panchayat' is receiving a mixed response in the villages. At numerous places, BJP workers have faced tough questions, even having to wind up the programme instead of educating the farmers about the state and Central governments' agriculture related programmes and policies. However, at a few places it also receiving a warm welcome.


Party leaders had launched the 'Namo Kisan Panchayat' on September 5. The motive is to reach out to each farmer through 14,000 kisan panchayats and explain to them about the agriculture programmes and benefits to the farmers, and at the same time collect data from the farmers about the benefits they have availed from these programmes.

Till Friday evening, the 'Namo Kisan Panchayat' had covered 8500 villages, claimed Hitesh Patel, president of the BJP Kisan Morcha. He also claimed receiving a very good response.

The farmers are not at all enthusiastic about the BJP's propaganda and the claims made by the BJP of success are blatant lies, alleged Jagmal Arya, president of the Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS), a wing of the RSS. Farmers are facing severe issues of not receiving the minimum support price for their crops, shortage of irrigation water and power and many others.

According to Arya, BKS members are protesting and not allowing the holding of these panchayats in districts like Banaskantha, Sabarkantha, Mehsana, Junagadh, Kheda and others.

Farmers have not participated in the panchayats at many locations, said Sagar Rabari, a farmer and AAP leader. The BJP workers are not talking about compensation for damage to crops in the heavy rain. Diesel prices have shot up and so the production cost of crops, MSP and open market rates are too low to meet the production cost. These issues are not addressed in the 'Kisan Namo Panchayat' and so the farmers are unhappy and not participating, he added.

Workers don't have ground knowledge of the agriculture sector, they are just tutored about the government policies and programmes. So when the farmers put questions and ask for solutions, the BJP workers cannot answer, which angers the farmers and they force the workers to leave the village, claimed Dahyabhai Gajera, president of the leftist Kisan Sabha.

--IANS
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Srinagar, Oct 2 (IANS) Union home minister Amit Shah will begin his three-day packed schedule visit to Jammu and Kashmir on October 3.

Officials said the Union Home Minister has a busy schedule ahead of him during his visit to the Union Territory. "The Union Home Minister will arrive in Jammu around 5 p.m. tomorrow (Monday). He will meet delegations of Gujjars/Bakarwals and Yuva Rajput Sabha in the evening."

His schedule for October 4 and 5 includes paying obeisance at the Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine in Reasi district.

Shah will lay foundation of several developmental works and will also visit Rajouri, Srinagar and Baramulla districts where he will meet various delegations.

Tight security arrangements have been made at all the places being visited by the Home Minister, officials added.

"After paying obeisance at Mata Vaishno Devi shrine in the morning of October 4, he will fly to Rajouri where he will address a public rally," officials said.

Shah is likely to announce Scheduled Tribe (ST) status for the Pahari community during his Rajouri visit. Pahari community has sizeable population in Rajouri, Poonch, Baramulla and Handwara districts of J&K.

On his return to Jammu, he will lay the foundation of many developmental works including Jammu Convention Complex on the pattern of the Sher-e-Kashmir International Convention Complex (SKICC) in Srinagar.

A delegation of senior BJP leaders will call on him in Jammu, where the political situation in the UT and party affairs will be discussed.

On October 4, he will fly to Srinagar around 5 p.m.

On October 5, the Home Minister will address a public rally in Baramulla and lay foundation of several developmental works in the Valley.

In Srinagar, Shah will also chair a high level security review meeting along with the Lt Governor, Manoj Sinha in the afternoon.

The meeting will be attended by senior officials of civil administration, police, central armed police forces (CAPFs) and intelligence agencies of J&K and the Centre.

He will return to New Delhi in the evening on October 5.

Shah's address to the public rallies in Rajouri and Baramulla is politically significant for the BJP. However, there is no possibility of assembly elections in J&K in 2022.

On its part, the BJP has already fulfilled two important commitments with the declaration of September 23 as a public holiday to commemorate the birth of Maharaja Hari Singh, the last Dogra King of J&K.

The BJP also, for the first time, nominated a Gujjar, Ghulam Ali Khatana to the Rajya Sabha thereby giving representation to the Gujjar/Bakarwal community in the Parliament.

The election commission is scheduled to publish the final electoral rolls of J&K on November 25.

This has to be followed by other time bound electoral processes like filing of nomination papers, their scrutiny, time for withdrawal of candidature and the poll campaign period.

Harsh winter sets in J&K by the middle of December which makes holding of elections impossible in the later part of the month.

The earlier J&K can have assembly elections is April-May 2023 and the democratic process is expected to be largely people participative after the abrogation of articles 370 and 35A.

--IANS
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