Tag: completely

Election Commission completely compromised: Aaditya Thackeray

[ad_1]
Mumbai: Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Aaditya Thackeray on Sunday alleged the Election Commission is “completely compromised” and said its decision to recognise the faction led by Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde as the Shiv Sena and allot it the bow and arrow symbol was dangerous for democracy.
He said the acronym “CM” of Maharashtra currently stands for a “corrupt man”, and that the “illegal and unconstitutional chief minister will surely go”.
Addressing a meeting of the party workers in North Mumbai, Thackeray said the flaming torch (Mashaal) symbol allotted to Shiv Sena (UBT) is the only light that will brighten the darkness caused by the betrayal and back-stabbing.
He said the rebel MLAs led by Shinde had done the “dirty work” of toppling a government which had done good work of tackling the COVID-19 pandemic and alleviating hardships of farmers affected by the cyclone and unseasonably rains when in power.
“The Maha Vikas Aghadi government was leading Maharashtra to a golden period. An investment of Rs 6.5 lakh crore was made during the MVA rule of 2.5 years and 93 per cent of the investment proposals had been implemented,” the former minister said.
Thackeray said the Bharatiya Janata Party must be wondering whether the happening (the pulling down of the government) was right or wrong.
He said the most important work of the MVA government was granting a loan waiver to farmers.
“Maharashtra didn’t like betrayals and this is the reason the local body elections, which are overdue, are not being held,” the Worli MLA said.

He said the investments attracted by Maharashtra during the MVA rule were shifted to Gujarat (under the Eknath Shinde-BJP dispensation).
He exuded confidence that Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) will win the Mumbai civic polls whenever they are held.
“You need to have a clean heart and strength to carry the bow and arrow. Merely getting the bow and arrow (symbol) is not enough,” he said.
Thackeray said none of the 40 MLAs who defected to the Shinde camp has categorically stated that they haven’t taken money to do so.
The Thackeray camp has alleged the exchange of money in rebel MLAs switching their loyalties to the Shinde camp and often taunts them with “50 khoke” (boxes) jibe.
“The 40 MLAs betrayed Uddhav Thackeray. How can they remain true to the people and the state?” he asked.
Thackeray said their Hindutva is “inclusive and everyone’s blood is red”.
[ad_2]
#Election #Commission #completely #compromised #Aaditya #Thackeray
( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

March 13, 2023
‘Punjab completely ignored in the Union Budget,’ says Bhagwant Mann

[ad_1]
Chandigarh: Ruling Aam Aadmi Party, opposition Congress, and Shiromani Akali Dal on Wednesday slammed the Union Budget, with Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and State Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema saying the state has been completely ignored in it.
Mann said that first, on Republic Day, the state’s tableau “was kept out of the parade,” now Punjab has been “completely ignored” in the Union Budget, as he criticised the Centre for presenting a budget that was “anti-Punjab, anti-people, anti-farmers and directionless.”
“Don’t understand what revenge they are taking from Punjabis,” he said.
Cheema also said, “I think Punjab has been completely ignored in this budget.”
Punjab’s farmers and youths have been left disappointed and there is nothing in the budget for the common masses, Cheema told reporters here.
Punjab Congress chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring dubbed the budget “anti-poor” and “anti-people” while Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal said it had failed farmers, ruralites, poor, and the youth.
Mann said the Centre in its budget shortchanged the sacrifices made by hardworking people of the state.
“It is shameful that going by its myopic mindset the Union government has completely ignored the state thereby bringing a huge disrespect to countless sacrifices made by the brave and hardworking Punjabis in pre- and post-independent era,” an official statement quoted Mann as saying.

He said that all “genuine demands of Punjab have been blatantly ignored and state figures nowhere in the Union budget.”
He said that being a border state, they had demanded Rs 1,000 crore for the modernisation of the BSF and state Police from Centre, which, he said, was necessary to combat the smuggling of drugs and weapons from across the border especially through the hi-tech drones.
The Union government, instead, gave the cold shoulder to this demand, he said.
He said that during the pre-budget meetings the state had flagged the need to start Vande Bharat trains from Amritsar and Bathinda to Delhi, but this demand too was completely ignored, along with another demand of connecting all five ‘Takhts’ of the Sikhs through rail route.
Mann alleged that the budget has exposed the “anti-farmers stance of the Modi government” and added the government has run away from giving remunerative MSP on crops to farmers which, he said, was very unfortunate.
The Chief Minister said that his government had been pursuing the Centre to extend Rs 1,500 crore financial assistance for the farmers, but that too failed to materialise.
He said that though the Scheduled Tribes have been offered various facilities in budgets, the Scheduled Castes and Backward classes “have been completely ignored.”
He cautioned the Union government “to stop playing with fire by ignoring the state on key issues.”
“India cannot be imagined without Punjab and the BJP-led Union government’s attempt to ignore the contribution of Punjab and Punjabis will not be tolerated,” he said, as he called Punjab the grain bowl of the country.
Warring said the budget has actually turned out to be a “classic jumla” of the BJP government at the Centre.
He also alleged it was “an anti-poor and anti-people budget with key focus on increasing income of corporations only.”
Senior Congress leader and Punjab’s Leader of Opposition Partap Singh Bajwa said there is nothing in the budget for the farmers and also “no legal guarantee for the MSP as expected by the farmers all across India.”
SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal said farmers were promised that their agriculture income would be doubled, “but far from doing anything to realise this goal, the government has not been able to ensure procurement of all food grains on minimum support price.”
Speaking about the government thrust on millets, Badal said this would succeed only if all millet crops were procured as per remunerative MSP.
[ad_2]
#Punjab #completely #Union #Budget #Bhagwant #Mann
( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 1, 2023
Judge sanctions Trump, Habba nearly $1 million for ‘completely frivolous’ Clinton suit

[ad_1]
The judge ordered Trump and Habba to pay $938,000 to cover the legal costs for the 31 defendants Trump linked in his year-old lawsuit. It’s the second time Middlebrooks has sanctioned Habba in the Clinton lawsuit. The first time was a $50,000 order sought by a single defendant, Charles Dolan. The new round of sanctions was sought by the remaining defendants.
In the new order, Hillary Clinton got the biggest award of fees for a single defendant: almost $172,000.
It’s the latest legal setback for Trump, who continues to face peril in advancing criminal probes and civil lawsuits related to his effort to overturn the 2020 election and his retention of sensitive national security records at his Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving office.
Middlebrooks’ ruling included a point-by-point recitation of the flaws in Trump’s initial lawsuit, noting that it often misstated, distorted or cherrypicked from key documents he claimed supported allegations of a grand conspiracy between Clinton and the Justice Department to target Trump for criminal prosecution.
“The Amended Complaint is a hodgepodge of disconnected, often immaterial events, followed by an implausible conclusion. This is a deliberate attempt to harass; to tell a story without regard to facts,” Middlebrooks, an appointee of former president Bill Clinton, wrote.
He specifically cited Trump’s claim that Clinton conspired with former FBI Director James Comey to seek a Trump prosecution — one that Middlebrooks noted never occurred — as “categorically absurd.” He also noted that Trump and Habba repeatedly mischaracterized the findings of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report. They also cited Russian intelligence — shared by then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe with Sen. Lindsey Graham — as a basis for one of their claims, without noting that it was Russian intelligence and that Ratcliffe said it was unverified.
“Mr. Trump’s lawyers saw no professional impediment or irony in relying upon Russian intelligence as the good faith basis for their allegation,” Middlebrooks wrote.
In his order, Middlebrooks cited Habba’s attacks on him in a Fox News interview, which he said continued to distort the facts of the case and make baseless allegations of improprieties by federal judges and magistrates. He also recounted a litany of other cases filed by Trump and his attorneys that bore similar hallmarks of frivolity.

[ad_2]
#Judge #sanctions #Trump #Habba #million #completely #frivolous #Clinton #suit
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

January 20, 2023