The Amit Shah Files Even before the trial is concluded, a CBI court finds reason to discharge a powerful man

The Trail…

• Despite SC order that the same trial judge who starts hearing the case should conclude it, Sohrabuddin case has seen three judges

• One year after being assigned the trial in the CBI special court, J.T. Utpat was transferred in June 2014

• Utpat’s successor Brijmohan Loya died at a government guesthouse in Nagpur on November 30, 2014

• Loya’s successor M.B. Gosavi heard Amit Shah’s discharge petition from December 15-17, and delivered a 75-page order on December 30, 2014

• Dropping of charges against Shah has led to a flurry of discharge petitions being filed by other accused

***

The tantalising phrase “somewhat opposed to common sense” is likely to ring in the ears of BJP national president Amit Anilchandra Shah for a long time to come. The five words were uttered on the penultimate day of 2014 by a trial judge in a CBI special court in Mumbai to let Shah, 50, off the hook in the infamous Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case.

Dasrath Patel and Raman Patel, two builders from Ahmedabad produced as star witnesses against Shah by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), had told investigators that police officers close to Shah extorted money from them and had dispatched Sohrabuddin’s henchmen to issue threats. The officers, notably Abhay Chudasama and D.G. Vanzara—both now on bail, Chudasama reinstated by the Gujarat government—would not only drop Shah’s name but even make extortion targets speak to the all-powerful minister of state (home) on phone. Shah, they claimed, had also directed them to be discreet while giving statements on Sohrabuddin Sheikh to the CBI after the central agency was ordered by the Supreme Court in 2010 to investigate the case.

The builders had video-recorded one of the conversations they had with Shah’s officers. They gave three statements to the CBI, two under Section 161 of the CrPC and the other under Section 164. (Statements under Section 161 are given to the police and are not accepted as evidence; statements under Section 164 are recorded before a judge and are adm­issible evidence.)

The CBI special court of M.B. Gosavi, however, refused to accept the builders’ statement, recorded in court. The duo, noted Gosavi in his order on December 30, 2014, had not deviated even gramm­atically in the three statements, each of which were recorded after gaps of weeks and months. This he found “somewhat opposed to common sense” as he threw out their testimony. Many lawyers say such exact reproductions of statements often dog trials, forcing judges to disregard them as evidence as they seem tutored. This is what seems to have happened here and shows the prosecution may have failed to build the case. Gosavi, however, contradicts him­self in the same order by claiming the builders had made ‘improvements’ in the statements. To accept both arguments, quipped a prom­inent Supreme Court law­yer, would be ‘somewhat opposed to common sense’ indeed.

Gosavi also found no merit in the CBI producing Call Detail Records to show that, on the days Sohrabuddin Sheikh and his wife Kauserbi were abducted and subsequently killed in 2005, Shah was in regular touch with the police officers who were executing the deed. The CBI came up with details of the outgoing and incoming calls including the duration in seconds (see graphic) to suggest Shah knew what was happening on the ground. While a home minister is expected to give directions to the dgp and home secretary, CBI argued, there was no occasion for him to be in touch with SPs and DySPs. But the CBI court chose to accept Shah’s plea that phone calls proved nothing. He was a proactive, hands-on minister and liked to be in direct touch with field officers, the court was told by his counsel. The trial judge found merit in the submission and held that while the CBI was at liberty to think a powerful minister directly calling field officers was unusual and strange, actually there was no reason to question such conduct when terrorism stalked the world

The argument can cut both ways tho­ugh, because, if one accepts that Shah was an effective minister in constant touch with field officers and who kept his eyes and ears open all the time, surely he would have been aware of fake encounters taking place right under his nose. For, had not Gujarat police conducted its own investigation and found the officers guilty of killing Sohrabuddin Sheikh, his wife Kauserbi and prominent eyewitness Tulsiram Prajapati in fake encounters? In two separate chargesheets, filed in 2007 and 2008, Gujarat police claimed the trio was killed because the officers wanted “name, fame and promotion”. The SC, which had directed the state police to conduct the investigation, remained unconvinced. Pointing out discrepancies in reports submitted to the SC and the chargesheets, the apex court ordered a CBI inquiry in 2010 and directed the agency to probe the “larger conspiracy” and the involvement of ‘high officials of the state of Gujarat’.

Trashing the voluminous chargesheet (22,000 pages, including statements from 710 prosecution witnesses) against 38 accused, including Shah, Gosavi, in his discharge order, held the case was foisted on Shah for ‘political reasons’. Since then, he has discharged two other accused top cops, P.C. Pande and Rajkumar Pandyan, from the case, raising questions about the role of the CBI as well as the judiciary.

One For Sorrow, Three For Joy

Brijmohan H. Loya (52) looked forward to a relaxed weekend as he boarded a train at Mumbai for Nagpur. He had taken charge of the Sohrabuddin fake encounter trial as a judge in July; subsequent months were stressful. He looked forward to attending a wedding at Nagpur the next day, November 30, 2014, a Sunday. He planned to stay overnight at the state government guesthouse, Ravi Bhavan, and return to the court on Tuesday. But he did not wake up on Monday morning, having succumbed apparently to a massive cardiac arrest. The news of his sudden death shocked and saddened lawyers and judges in Mumbai; the Indian Express (Dec 2, 2014) reported that “sources close to him (Loya) said he had sound medical history”. Advocate Vijay Hiremath remembered him as an exceptionally cheerful judge who had looked fit and fine.

As the judge was cremated in his native Latur, in faraway New Delhi a group of MPs demonstrated outside Parliament against his “mysterious death” and demanded a CBI probe. The event only found cursory mention on the inside pages of newspapers. The day after, on December 4, in a letter addressed to the Chief Justice of India from Ujjain, Sohra­buddin Sheikh’s brother Rubabuddin (see box) wrote: “I am disturbed by the incident and am in a deep state of shock. I am writing the present letter on suspicion that the unti­mely death of a sitting judge of a sessions court may be part of a larger conspiracy, possibly made with intention to threaten the coming judge….”

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“Acche Din” are here: 40 fake encounter accused released

Ahmedabad, February 08:

40 accused police officers who were in jails in connection with 21 fake encounters had been granted bail within a year, according to Gujarat Siyasat; an Ahmedabad based Gujarati Muslims fortnightly predicted.

When the Modi man, Amit shah clearly got clean chit from encounter cases, the release of Gujarat fake encounter cops was expected, say activists.

With the news of the last two accused IPS officers Vanzara and Pandey being granted bail in the Ishrat case, families of the encounter victims have all faced disappointment, they vow to go on with their struggle for justice.

When Vanzara was granted bail, his advocate V D Gajjar told mediapersons, “Acchhe din aa gaye hain (Good days have come)”.

When get in touch with Pune resident Asif Shaikh, who was Javed Sheikh’s close buddy said, “These are the so-called ‘Achhe Din’ (good times) promised by the party in power. Now it is time to wait and watch for the final outcome of the case. We will protest if the verdict does not bring justice for those who were killed and their families,” he said. Asif had married Javed’s widow Sajida in 2007.

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Extremism has distorted image of Muslims

“Extremism has tarnished Islam and the image of Muslims around the world,” said a top official at the King Abdul Aziz Center for National Dialogue (KACND), underlining the importance of dialogue in communities.

Abdullah Al-Mutlaq, KACND chairman and member of the Council of Senior Ulema, made his observation at the Abha forum on Thursday as part of the nationwide dialogue on extremism and its effects on national unity.

He said KACND seeks to get from these meetings various points of view to determine the root cause of extremism and ways of overcoming the challenge.

Al-Mutlaq urged the participants to promote the culture of dialogue and spirit of moderation to confront the phenomenon of extremism.

The Abha meeting was attended by various representatives of the community, including scholars, academics and media representatives. Fahd Al-Sultan, KANCD deputy secretary general, read out the resolutions. Participants reaffirmed that extremism in Saudi society has manifested itself in religious, sports and social affairs and stressed the need for a comprehensive approach to deal with the risk to the individual and society

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Yemen’s Brotherhood reject Houthi declaration

Yemen’s Al-Islah Party, the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood movement in the country, on Saturday rejected a constitutional declaration announced by the Shia Houthi group on Friday.

The party called for abolishing the declaration, which dissolved the Yemeni parliament, formed a national assembly instead and created a presidential council to run Yemen during its transition.

Al-Islah Party described the declaration in a statement on its website as a “unilateral step” saying it did not recognise the consequences of this move.

“There can be no way out without abolishing all unilateral moves and returning to dialogue,” the party said.

It accused the Houthis of staging a “coup” against a United Nations-sponsored dialogue among Yemen’s political forces.

Yemen’s Shia Houthis, who have controlled Yemeni capital Sanaa in September of 2014 and extended their control to other provinces, on Friday took an additional move to consolidate their power in Yemen by forming a presidential council and dissolving parliament.

There are fears that the growing power of the Houthis would open the door for more violent confrontations in Yemen.

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The Law Is Under Trial Here

“If the government does not do anything in the next few days, I will do what even Damini did not do. I will set myself and my sons on fire in the middle of Muzaffarnagar city,” says S on the phone, two days after two rape accused in her case were granted bail. When I had met her in July, S was about to start her ‘Stitching Training Centre’ along with her husband, determined to fight her case till justice was hers.

The Damini she refers to you may know as Nirbhaya, or more baldly as the “Delhi gangrape victim”. S was gang­raped by three men from her village in Lankh on September 8, 2013, in Shamli district (see Outlook story Shadow Lines, Aug 4, 2014), but her ordeal, as well as that of hundreds of women sexually abused and gangraped, was subsumed within a broad category that came to be called ‘the Muzaffarnagar riots’. It was a madness that—according to the ‘official’ record of the Uttar Pradesh government—led to 60 deaths, seven rapes and the displacement of 40,000 people. Never mind if we could actually be looking at some 200 deaths, 1,20,000 people displaced and hundreds of unreported mass rapes.

S’s trajectory has crossed the Nirbhaya case in several ways. The Criminal Amendment Act, 2013, drafted by the Verma Commission set up in the wake of the protests following the December 16, 2012, Delhi gangrape, came into force in February 2013. While the Act introduced multiple amendments in laws related to sexual violence, lawmakers for the first time also took cognisance of the systematic violence against women during communal riots in India. As a result, a crucial amendment—Section 376(2)(g)—­was included in the Indian Penal Code

Among other things, the section states, “Whoever commits rape during communal or sectarian violence shall be punished with rigorous imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than ten years, but which may extend to imprisonment for life, which shall mean imprisonment for the remainder of that person’s natural life, and shall also be liable to fine.”

The Muzaffarnagar riots broke out five months after this vital addition to the law. The violence erupted on September 7 and continued well into the next day. Seven women, all gang­raped on the morning of September 8, filed cases. These would be the first in Indian history to be tried under Section 376(2)(g). The legal trajectory of these cases needs to be examined in the light of its precedent-setting import.

FIRs: The first information report for five out of the seven petitioners was filed within three weeks of the gang­rapes. The sixth case was filed on October 9, 2013, while the seventh case, that of S, took the longest to register. S had sent her FIR on October 22, 2013, five weeks after the incident, to the Fugana police station in Muzaffarnagar through registered post in which she also named the three accused. The police neither filed the FIR nor ack­nowledged receipt of her complaint. It was only when her counsel, Vrinda Grover, who is representing the seven women in court, handed over a copy of her complaint to the lawyer representing the UP government that the FIR was filed on February 18, 2014.

Medical examination: The law mandates a medical examination within 24 hours of filing the complaint. All the seven women were gangraped on Sep­tember 8, 2013. Their medical examination, however, was conducted bet­ween September 29, 2013, and February 22, 2014. It is because of this gap between the dates of the incident and the tests that the medical reports remained inconclusive in ‘proving’ rape.

The Allahabad High Court made the delay in the filing of FIRs and medical examination to grant bail on October 15, 2014, to the gangrape accused in the case of Fm, one of the seven women. It did so on grounds that “there was an inordinate delay of 14 days in filing FIR and that her testimony could not be accepted as it was not corroborated by medical evidence in the marks of injury on her body”. The state authorities chose not to appeal against this order.

Compensation: The Supreme Court, on March 26, 2014, while responding to several writ petitions related to the Muzaffarnagar communal violence, including one by Vrinda Grover and Kamini Jaiswal on behalf of the seven women, directed the UP government to pay compensation to all the seven gangrape survivors within four weeks, before April 26, 2014. The seven women had filed applications for compensation on April 9, 2014.

This compensation amounted to five lakh rupees in addition to other benefits. While five of them received the compensation on May 8, 2014, the sixth got it on May 22, 2014, and the seventh only on October 25, 2014, more than a year after the incident when counsels Grover and Jaiswal filed a contempt of court petition in the Supreme Court on September 15, 2014.

The apex court had, in addition to this compensation, also asked the UP government to provide financial and other assistance to these women to help them rehabilitate themselves. The state government, however, provided the same blanket compensation for loss of moveable and immoveable property that it provided to all families who were victims of the communal violence

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A Padma award from Modi government has reopened an old rift in Ayodhya

By: Dhirendra Jha

The conferment of a Padma Vibhushan award on Chitrakoot-based Swami Rambhadracharya has reignited an old feud among the ascetics of the Ramanandi order, a sect that was founded by the 14th century philosopher Ramandacharya and accounts for the largest number of Hindu sadhus in India.

The feud had erupted in 2005, when Rambhadracharya, a blind Ramanandi preacher known for his leanings towards the Vishva Hindu Parishad, published a critical edition of Tulsidas’s Ramcharitmanas.

His book greatly incensed Ramanandi sadhus, who worship Lord Ram as their titular deity and consider the Ramcharitmanas as their most sacred text. They accused Rambhadracharya of committing “blasphemy” by changing the wording of several verses. Ever since, they have not allowed Rambhadracharya to enter Ayodhya, which is considered the birthplace of Lord Rama and is therefore the nerve centre of the Ramanandi order.

“Ramcharitmanas is like mantra (sacred words) for us,” said Satyendra Das, chief priest of the Ramjanmabhoomi temple, who was incensed at Rambhadracharya getting the Padma Vibhushan. “How can anybody dare to play around with it?”

Rambhadracharya told Scroll.in that he had merely edited Ramcharitmanas. “Nothing in it has been altered,” he said. “The sadhus of Ayodhya are fools. They want to malign me and extort money.”

’Appropriate lesson’

In November 2009, the sadhus of Ayodhya asked him to withdraw the edited version of the Ramcharitmanas. Rambhadracharya refused, though he expressed regret for any annoyance or pain caused by the book.

The feud peaked during the Haridwar Kumbha Mela of 2010. There, one morning, while Rambhadracharya was preaching to his followers, a group of Ramanandi sadhus entered into his camp and assaulted him badly. They removed his tents, threw out his belongings and debarred him from the Ramanandi order.

“He later acknowledged his mistake and sent an apology,” says Baba Hathyogi, a Haridwar-based Ramanandi sadhu, who was part of the group that taught Rambhadracharya “an appropriate lesson”. “But we didn’t allow him to return to the Ramanandi order till he gave us a bhandara (community feast) of [Rs] 5 lakh.”

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Muzaffarnagar riot accused dies of injuries

Written by Manish Sahu

A riot accused who surrendered before police and was sent to the Muzaffarnagar district jail barely a week ago has died of head injuries. His family alleged that jail officials assaulted him and delayed medical treatment, causing his death. But the jail officials said the injuries were self-inflicted — he banging his head on the walls. They, however, failed to explain why he would do that.

Brijpal Malik (47) sustained the injuries on Wednesday morning, but was referred to Meerut hospital next day only after his wife visited the jail and came to know about the injuries. She created a ruckus over the delay in medical treatment following which Malik was sent to hospital. He was declared brought dead by doctors at Meerut hospital on Thursday.

Malik, a resident of Hasanpur village in Shamli district, surrendered at a police station on January 30 in a riot case lodged against him on September 8, 2013 at the Phugana police station in Muzaffarnagar. His 17-year-old son is also an accused in the case; he is absconding. The two faced charges of arson and dacoity, said Malik’s lawyer Chandraveer Singh.

Inspector General, UP Prisons Department, R R Bhatnagar said, “According to information, there was no delay in providing treatment to him as the jail doctor had stitched his wounds and given him medicines soon after he was brought to the jail hospital. Malik complained about severe pain next morning following which he was referred to the district hospital from where he was shifted to Meerut hospital.”

He said Malik appeared disturbed since he came to jail. Other inmates had seen Malik banging his head on the wall in the barrack, he said, dismissing the allegations of his family. However, Bhatnagar said an inquiry would be conducted by DIG Jail, Meerut range, Raghubeer Lal.

Muzaffarnagar District Jail Superintendent Seva Ram Choudhury said that on February 4 morning Malik suddenly started hitting his head against the iron grills and the walls. Some inmates tried to stop him but he ran out of the barrack and banged his head against a tree on the jail campus. By the time the jail staff arrived, he had suffered injuries on his head.

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Bhai Ka To Encounter Hua, Par Meri Bhabhi Ke Saath Jo Hua Woh?

He has absolute faith in the written word, having once got the telephone lines to work at their village in Madhya Pradesh by writing to the authorities. So when Rubabuddin suspected that policemen had killed his brother Sohrabuddin, he wrote to the Chief Justice of India, seeking that the Supreme Court and top central agencies investigate the fake encounter.

That was in November 2005. He wrote every month till his voice was heard. He attended every court hearing. In the end, in December last year, a special CBI court discharged Amit Shah, who was minister of state (home) in Gujarat when the killing took place and one of the accused in the case.

“The CBI is like a courtesan, a prostitute. It has to go with whoever is in power,” Rubabuddin says. “I’m disappointed, but we won’t give up.” Tall and lean, Rubabuddin is a successful farmer. He says his children go to good schools and that he doesn’t need much money to live comfortably. He has had police protection since 2007, and the Jan Sangharsh Manch, a rights group, supports him in his fight for justice for his brother and sister-in-law. Every time there is a case hearing, he travels from his village Jhirniya, in Ujjain district of Madhya Pra­desh, spending his own money. He wants to see that justice is done to his brother and his “missing” bhabhi.

“Mere bhai ka toh encounter hai, par meri bhabhi ke saath jo hua uska kya? Aaj tak koi thos baat samne nahin aai jab ki unka koi kasoor nahin tha. Unke baare mein toh koi bol hi nahin raha (My brother may have been killed in an encounter, but what about my sister-in-law? She was innocent, but till today nothing has been uncovered about her disappearance, or how and why it happened. No one says anything about her?),” Rubabuddin says.

But he has not stopped raising questions—whether it is about the case or about transfers or the deaths of the previous two CBI judges. All his questions and doubts are set out in black and white—in letters addressed to the Supreme Court.

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65% of secondary schoolgirls of Saudi Arabia smoke

The number of smokers among Saudi secondary schoolgirls reached 65 percent, while the rate among intermediate schoolgirls stands at 45 percent, a recently-published survey said.

The survey, conducted by the Faculty of Medicine at the Jeddah-based King Abdulaziz University, said the phenomenon poses a real threat to the health of Saudi women in the long term.

In a similar study earlier, Najran University founded that one-third of the Saudi population smoked on a regular basis.

The Kingdom ranked second and fifth at the GCC and global levels respectively, in terms of the number of female smokers, Al-Madina daily said. However, the GCC countries have taken steps to curb the increasing number of smokers by raising the prices of cigarettes by 200 percent.

The move did not have the desired effect, and the number of smokers has risen alarmingly.

The reasons for the rising number of smokers among teenage girls has been attributed to wider exposure to the culture of foreign countries in light of the increased use of social media, mobile applications and the spread of e-cigarettes.

Nagwa Mousa, mother of two daughters, said smoking is the outcome of lack of guidance and monitoring by parents at home. She pointed out that parents should befriend their children and listen attentively to their needs to ensure a healthy relationship

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Vishwa Hindu Parishad wants Akbar’s fort in Allahabad to be replaced with night shelter

Kicking up a controversy, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad on Saturday said the fort built by Mughal emperor Akbar on the banks of the river Yamuna in Allahabad is a “symbol of subjugation of Hindus” and wanted the imposing structure to be replaced with a night shelter for poor pilgrims visiting to have a dip in the holy Sangam.

“During Muslim rule in India, countless temples were pulled down and replaced with mosques. These mosques were erected as symbols of subjugation of Hindus. The VHP had sought to remove only three of such symbols – at Ayodhya, Kashi and Mathura. The Fort situated nearby is another such symbol,” VHP patron Ashok Singhal said.

Singhal was speaking at a ‘Virat Hindu Sammelan’ organised at Parade Ground in the vicinity of the Sangam and the fort, to mark the golden jubilee of the establishment of the Sangh Parivar outfit.

“Why should there be a fort so close to the confluence of Ganga, Yamuna and mythical river Saraswati, where Hindus come from across the country every year to take a holy dip on festivals and where millions converge whenever the Kumbh Mela is organized?” the VHP patriarch asked.

“Everybody knows that this fort was built to commemorate a Mughal emperor’s victory over Hindus,” Singhal said, alluding to the Second Battle of Panipat in which Akbar had defeated Hemu, a Hindu king, thereby establishing the hegemony of the Mughal Empire across north India.

He alleged that the “Akshayvat” – a banyan tree which is held sacred by Hindus – was “made inaccessible to devotees through the imposing structure”.

“Even today, people are being fooled in the name of allowing worship at the Akshayavat as the original sacred tree is situated in deep, inaccessible corners of the fort. Why should not the structure be replaced with a ‘rain basera’ (night shelter) for poor pilgrims who sleep in the open in cold weather to have a holy dip at the crack of dawn on bathing festivals,” Singhal added.

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GCC condemns ‘coup’ in Yemen

RIYADH: The Gulf Cooperation Council has accused the Houthi movement of staging a coup in Yemen after they announced they were dissolving parliament and forming a new government, Kuwait’s news agency said.

“The Houthi coup marks a grave and unacceptable escalation… and endangers the security, stability, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Yemen,” the GCC said in a statement from its Riyadh headquarters.

The GCC had urged the Houthis to pull out of Sanaa, which the militia overran in September.

The GCC said its own security was linked to that of Yemen and vowed to take “all the necessary measures to defend their interests.”

The Gulf states called on the UN Security Council to intervene and put an end to the “coup which has placed Yemen and its people in a dark tunnel.”

The turmoil in Yemen has raised fears that the country could become a failed state. The opposition of the GCC may signal growing isolation for Yemen and reflects Sunni Muslim hostility toward the Houthi group.

“This Houthi coup is a dangerous escalation which we reject and is unacceptable. It totally contradicts the spirit of pluralism and coexistence which Yemen has known,” the GCC statement added.

Thousands of demonstrators gathered in three cities in central Yemen to protest the Houthis seizing power. Houthi gunmen dispersed dozens of activists near the capital’s main university by firing into the air.

Protesters chanted slogans calling the Houthi moves a “coup” and demanded the group withdraw its forces from major cities.

The Houthis dissolved parliament on Friday and set up a five-member presidential council to form a transitional government to govern for two years.

Abdel Malik Al-Houthi, the group’s leader, said he was open to all parties playing a role in Yemen’s future.

“Our hand is extended to every political force in this country … the space is open for partnership, cooperation and brotherhood and now everybody bears their responsibility for building, not destruction,” he said in a televised speech.

Tensions ran high in Sanaa on Saturday, with armed Houthis out in force near main government buildings.

A rudimentary bomb exploded outside the republican palace in Sanaa, wounding three militiamen, eyewitnesses said.

Yemen’s Houthi movement dissolved parliament on Friday and said it would set up a new interim government.

The Houthis entered Sanaa in September and began to fan out into more cities in Yemen’s south and west.

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Egypt’s Nero burns his country

Dr Amira Abo el-Fetouh

The leader of Egypt’s coup stood proudly amid his supporters, including politicians, decision-makers, and intelligence and media agencies that flow in and out of his office. “I will not hold you back from avenging the officers and soldiers who were killed in Sinai,” he said. “You chose to go down my path and I will not die alone.” Minutes later, his media mouthpieces and supporters called on the people to pull out their knives, saying it is either “us” or “them”; that’s how one TV presenter put it, while another called for the killing of civilians and anyone promoting the Muslim Brotherhood ideology. “I want to see blood,” said yet another, while a fourth called for the destruction of Sinai. This crazy thirst for blood continued to be broadcast by the media outlets and no one stopped them.

Unfortunately, there are no longer any wise men in power to curb this craziness in Egypt. The leader’s calls and incitement for civil war were clear and explicit. It wasn’t essential for him to turn the people against the Brotherhood and get them to take to the streets and burn and kill all those opposed to the brutal, fascist regime, but he did it. The coup leader is trying to escape like the murderer Bashar Al-Assad, who turned the people’s revolution into a civil war in which Syrians are killing their fellow citizens. Now Egypt’s Killer-in-Chief is calling on fellow Egyptians to kill each other in order to save himself at the expense of their lives. He will then be able to enjoy life amongst the ashes after the country is burned to the ground.

That’s right: Egypt’s Nero wants to burn the country after burning the hearts of millions and fragmenting the social fabric of the Egyptian people, splitting them into two camps. You either support him, in which case you will be popular; or you oppose him, in which case you won’t be. It doesn’t matter if you were in opposition from the beginning of the coup or have just woken up to the cruelty and injustice of the regime and turned against it. Either way Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi will turn his media dogs on you for being with the “others”, who are killed on the streets or tortured to death in prison.

Egypt must be saved from its home-grown Nero who wants to burn the country and its people so that he may stay in power, even if this means the ruin of the nation. The Egyptian people must wake up. Tyrants do not distinguish between supporters and the opposition; everyone is a slave in their eyes, to be commanded or killed at will. They live on the skulls of their own people and it is a dangerous path down which Al-Sisi is walking. The man is bent on killing and annihilating his opponents in order to rid the world of them but, unfortunately for him, they won’t just disappear, no matter how many are killed. Instead, they are multiplying, day by day. Thus will God defeat all arrogant unjust sinners.

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UN chief calls for donors to fulfil Gaza pledges

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called on Friday for international donors to fulfil their pledges to rebuild the Gaza Strip, Anadolu has reported. The financial assistance was pledged at a donor conference held in Egypt following the Israeli war against the people of Gaza last summer.

Ban made the appeal jointly with the Secretary General of the Arab League, Nabil Elaraby. “The Secretaries-General of the United Nations and the League of Arab States express their deep concern over the situation in Gaza,” a UN statement said. “They appeal urgently to donors to honour and disburse as soon as possible their financial commitments made at the October 2014 Cairo Conference.”

Pledges worth $5.4 billion were made at the conference, half of which was allocated for the reconstruction of Gaza’s infrastructure destroyed by the Israeli attack on the besieged coastal territory. The balance was intended for the urgent needs of the Palestinians in Gaza, who have lived under a strict Israeli-led blockade and three deadly wars waged by Israel since 2006.

Last month, the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which looks after Palestinian refugees, announced that it was halting certain operations in Gaza due to a lack of funds. UNRWA revealed that it has received just $135m out of the $724m that it had sought from donors. It warned that the problems facing displaced Palestinians in Gaza are getting worse.

“The pace of reconstruction in Gaza remains slow,” said UNRWA. “It is crucial now to expand the scope of reconstruction efforts thus far to bring hope to the people of Gaza and ensure stability, based on international responsibility in reconstruction and lifting the siege.”

Such support, added a spokesman, should also include funding for UN agencies that are carrying out vital operations in Gaza, in order to prevent a further deterioration in the already dire humanitarian situation there.

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Government has to draw a line between “nationalism and jingoism”: Delhi High Court to Govt

Greenpeace activist Priya Pillai cannot be allowed to travel to London as she would indulge in anti-national activities there, government told the Delhi High Court on Friday.

However, the court termed her not being allowed to visit London as inappropriate, saying the government has to draw a line to distinguish between “nationalism and jingoism”.

Pillai, who was on January 11 offloaded from a flight to London at the IGI airport here, had sought permission again to visit the British capital to make a presentation before British MPs on alleged human rights violation at Mahan in Madhya Pradesh.

During the hearing, Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Sanjay Jain, appearing for the Centre, told Justice Rajiv Sakhdher that a lookout circular issued against Pillai on the advice of the Intelligence Bureau was in national interest.

But the court said the government has to draw a line between “nationalism and jingoism”. It said there are many who indulged in anti-national activities but were travelling abroad.

Jain, however, said Pillai’s visit to London was “a serious threat to the nation” and her tickets were from a group on the Home Ministry watchlist. Submitting a set of documents, he said the government was stopping her only for this trip as it has specific IB inputs. The next hearing is on February 18.

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Tens of thousands of Muslims flee Christian militias in Central African Republic

By Sudarsan Raghavan

BANGUI, Central African Republic – Tens of thousands of Muslims are fleeing to neighboring countries by plane and truck as Christian militias stage brutal attacks, shattering the social fabric of this war-ravaged nation.

In towns and villages as well as here in the capital, Christian vigilantes wielding machetes have killed scores of Muslims, who are a minority here, and burned and looted their houses and mosques in recent days, according to witnesses, aid agencies and peacekeepers. Tens of thousands of Muslims have fled their homes.

The cycle of chaos is fast becoming one of the worst outbreaks of violence along Muslim-Christian fault lines in recent memory in sub-Saharan Africa, tensions that have also plagued countries such as Nigeria and Sudan.

The brutalities began to escalate when the country’s first Muslim leader, Michel Djotodia, stepped down and went into exile last month. Djotodia, who had seized power in a coup last March, had been under pressure from regional leaders to resign. His departure was meant to bring stability to this poor country, but humanitarian and human rights workers say there is more violence now than at any time since the coup.

“Civilians remain in constant fear for their lives and have been largely left to fend for themselves,” Martine Flokstra, emergency coordinator for the aid agency Doctors Without Borders, said in a statement Friday, adding that the violence had reached “extreme and unprecedented” levels.

On Friday, thousands of Muslims hopped aboard trucks packed with their possessions, protected by soldiers from Chad, and drove out of Bangui, as Christians cheered their departures or tried to loot the trucks as they drove through Christian areas. At least one Muslim man, who fell from a truck, was killed by a mob. Meanwhile, thousands more Muslims huddled at the airport in a crowded hangar, waiting to be evacuated.

“They are killing Muslims with knives,” said Muhammed Salih Yahya, 38, a shopkeeper, making a slitting motion across his throat. He arrived at the airport Wednesday from the western town of Yaloke with his wife and five children. “I built my house over two years, but the Christians destroyed it in minutes. I want to leave.”

For More:

http://wapo.st/1AIbMDJ

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Religious intolerance in India would have shocked Mahatma Gandhi: Obama

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama on Thursday said the “acts of intolerance” experienced by religious faiths of all types in India in the past few years would have shocked Mahatma Gandhi.



The comments by Obama came a day after the White House refuted suggestions that the US President’s public speech in New Delhi in which he touched upon religious tolerance was a “parting shot” aimed at the ruling BJP

“Michelle and I returned from India – an incredible, beautiful country, full of magnificent diversity – but a place where, in past years, religious faiths of all types have, on occasion, been targeted by other peoples of faith, simply due to their heritage and their beliefs – acts of intolerance that would have shocked Gandhiji, the person who helped to liberate that nation,” Obama said in his remarks at the high-profile National Prayer Breakfast.

The US President, who has just returned from India, was referring to violence against followers of various religions in India in the past few years. He, however, did not name any particular religion and said the violence is not unique to one group or one religion

“Humanity has been grappling with these questions throughout human history. And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ.

“In our home country, slavery and Jim Crow (racial segregation state and local laws) all too often was justified in the name of Christ,” he said, addressing the gathering of over 3,000 US and international leaders.

“There is a tendency in us, a sinful tendency that can pervert and distort our faith. In today’s world, when hate groups have their own Twitter accounts and bigotry can fester in hidden places in cyberspace, it can be even harder to counteract such intolerance.

“But God compels us to try.

“And in this mission, I believe there are a few principles that can guide us, particularly those of us who profess to believe,” he said.

In a US-style Town Hall address in New Delhi on January 27, the last day of his India trip, Obama had made a strong pitch for religious tolerance, cautioning that India will succeed so long as it was not “splintered along the lines of religious faith”.

The White House yesterday strongly refuted allegations that Obama’s remarks on religious tolerance was aimed at the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saying the speech in its entirety was about the “core democratic values and principles” of both the US and India

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It’s official: Chhattisgarh renames V-Day as ‘Matru-Pitru Diwas’

RAIPUR: In line with the saffron agenda against Valentine’s Day celebrations, the Raman Singh government has given standing instructions to government schools across Chhattisgarh that February 14 from now on will be observed as ‘Matru-Pitru Diwas’ or the ‘Parents’ Worship Day’ every year.

The government schools in Chhattisgarh had started this ritual two years ago after Asaram Bapu, now in jail facing rape charges, suggested to the chief minister that Valentine’s Day should be replaced with ‘Matru Pitru Diwas’.

However, from this year, the state government has institutionalized this practice. “Now, parents’ day is being celebrated. No separate orders will be issued every year in this regard,” a circular from the Directorate of Public Instruction, which controls the government schools, said.

As per the new February 14 rituals, parents are invited to schools where their children garland them, perform aarti, and offer them sweets.

Incidentally, just four days ago, the Hindu Mahasabha — in news for its failed bid to install the bust of Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse had issued a statement, calling upon the youth to celebrate Valentine’s Day as Mata Pita Pujan Diwas.

The Mahasabha has elaborate plans against Valentine’s Day celebrations. Couples found celebrating the Valentine’s Day, dubbed as a ‘foreign festival’ by the Mahasabha, will face a variety of punishments. While a prompt Arya Samaj wedding will be forced on Hindu couples, inter-faith partners will have to sit through a ‘shuddhikaran’ (purification) ritual, the Mahasabha said.

Mahasabha national president Chandra Prakash Kaushik tolf TOI: “India is a country where all 365 days are days for love, why then must couples observe only February 14 as Valentine’s Day?”

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US hostage killed in Jordanian airstrikes, claims IS

Amman, February 06:

The Islamic State (IS) jihadi group claimed Friday that Jordan’s retaliatory air strikes, following the execution of its pilot have led to the death of a US hostage being held by the militants.

The online post by the IS said that the female US hostage was killed in Jordanian airstrikes on the Syrian city of Raqqa – the de facto capital of the IS, CNN reported.

The post showed a picture of a collapsed building that the IS claimed the woman was being held in. However, it did not show the hostage, or provide any proof of her death.

Jordanian Interior Minister Hussein Majali firmly trashed the IS claim, calling it “another PR stunt by ISIS (IS).”

“They tried to cause problems internally in Jordan and haven’t succeeded,” Majali said. “They are now trying to drive a wedge between the coalition with this latest low PR stunt.”

The IS jihadis are known to have held a number of people from the US, Britain and Japan hostage. Currently, at least two people from the West are thought to be in the militants’ custody — British journalist John Cantlie, who has appeared in a number of IS videos, and a 26-year-old female American aid worker.

Most of IS hostages have been executed by the terror group, which have released videos of the grisly deaths online.

The gruesome execution of Jordanian pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh by the IS, the video of which was released Tuesday, drew widespread condemnation, from even within the Arab world.

Jordanian officials said later that they have reason to believe al-Kasasbeh was actually killed in early January. In the interim, IS had suggested that he was still alive while signaling its openness to a prisoner exchange with Jordan.

Jordan executed two jihadi prisoners in retaliation Wednesday and launched airstrikes against several IS targets in Syria Thursday.

–IANS

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After Obama’s shots, NYT asks Modi to break his ‘dangerous silence’

Submitted by IANS on 7 February 2015 – 10:17am

By Arun Kumar,

Washington : As President Barack Obama’s comments that religious intolerance in India would have shocked Mahatma Gandhi raised a storm in India, the New York Times asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to break his “deafening silence.”

Mahatma Gandhi’s legacy is an inspiration for the US too, said the White House, while a bipartisan commission praised the president for his “timely comments” and the State Department said it encouraged all governments around the world to respect religious freedom.

“What will it take for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to speak out about the mounting violence against India’s religious minorities?” asked the New York Times Saturday in an editorial titled “Modi’s Dangerous Silence”

“Attacks at Christian places of worship have prompted no response from the man elected to represent and to protect all of India’s citizens,” said the influential daily. “Nor has he addressed the mass conversion to Hinduism of Christians and Muslims who have been coerced or promised money,” it said.

“Modi’s continued silence before such troubling intolerance increasingly gives the impression that he either cannot or does not wish to control the fringe elements of the Hindu nationalist right,” the Times suggested.

Citing Obama’s speech in New Delhi last month that “India will succeed so long as it is not splintered along the lines of religious faith,” it said “Modi needs to break his deafening silence on religious intolerance.”

The bipartisan US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) commended Obama for deepening relations with India while also recognizing religious freedom concerns during his India trip and at National Prayer Breakfast Thursday.

“President Obama’s timely comments underscore the importance of India getting religious freedom right,” said USCIRF Chair Katrina Lantos Swett. “This is a challenge that India must and can address, given its diversity and long history of democratic values,” she said noting Obama’s “concerns come at a time of increasing abuses against India’s minority religious communities.”

Since 2009 USCIRF has designated India as a Tier 2 country, noting since 2014 increased communal and religiously-motivated attacks and slow and ineffective redress for victims of past incidents, leading to a culture of impunity.

Meanwhile, Mark Stroh, a White House spokesman, said “Mahatma Gandhi’s legacy is one we look to for inspiration in dealing with intolerance in the United States and around the world.”

Obama’s message in India and at the National Prayer Breakfast was a universal one “that every nation is stronger when people of all faiths are free to practice their religion free of persecution and fear and discrimination,” he said.

At the State Department, spokesperson Marie Harf declined to make an assessment of the situation of religious freedom in India specifically as she repeated Obama’s universal message.

“So certainly, we encourage all governments around the world to respect and ensure freedom of assembly for individuals who are worshiping or who are doing so for religious reasons, and that’s a universal right we think should be adhered to,” she said.

Earlier this week, White House had refuted suggestions that Obama’s last speech in New Delhi referring to the need for religious tolerance in India was a kind of a parting shot at Modi, who had been denied a US visa for a decade over his alleged inaction during 2002 Gujarat riots.

“I think that’s been somewhat misconstrued, if you look at the context of the entire speech, it’s really about inclusivity. It’s about the power of diversity,” Phil Reiner, White House’s senior director for South Asian Affairs, told foreign media.

“I don’t believe that this was a parting shot by any means. This was simply the President speaking to what makes us great democratic nations,” he had said.

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US drone strikes resume in Yemen despite power vacuum

Yemen – On a road flanked by mountains and dusty plains, sixth-grader Mohammed Taeiman was travelling with a family friend to the Hareeb region of Marib province, east of the capital Sanaa, when the car was targeted in a drone strike.

It wasn’t long before the news broke out locally.

The younger Taeiman had been killed in a CIA drone strike, the first since the prime minister and president resigned amid a standoff with the Houthi rebels on January 26.

When Mikdad Taeiman, Mohammed’s older brother, saw the charred black Suzuki Vitara, he knew his brother was inside. By then, pictures of the incident were circulating on mobile phones.

“My brother was going to school. He was a good student. He knew nothing,” said the older brother, vehemently denying suggestions that his brother was involved with al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP)

On hearing the news, Mahla Aamer Saila, Mohammed’s mother, fainted, and was taken to hospital. She blamed the president and the minister of defence for “cooperating with America”.

Mohammed’s father and older brother were killed in a drone strike in 2011. A third brother was wounded in another drone attack

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Who can claim the moral high ground? : By – Yvonne Ridley

The horrific killing of Jordanian pilot Muath Al-Kasasbeh prompted scores of world leaders and politicians to rush to the podium and condemn the vile method and brutal nature of his murder. ISIS, it seemed, had reached plumbed new depths in the group’s attempts to shock and repel its enemies. Personally, I didn’t seek out the sordid porn video showing the wholly unIslamic killing because, having witnessed first-hand what fire does to the human body, the very thought was too repugnant.

However, out of all the words penned and spoken it was some brief comments submitted by two men, representing East and West, which stood out from the hysterical sound-bites churned out by governments and palaces alike.

The first of the two was the Facebook offering of Al-Jazeera anchor Mahmoud Murad, whose response was brief: “It happened in Egypt before ISIS did it! For everyone whose feelings were hurt by these pictures, I apologise. But my little heart can no longer bear this vast amount of hypocrisy.”

The second came in a tweet from an American known only as @Mr.LV426, who observed wryly: “If you’re going to burn people alive, have the common courtesy to do it remotely from a video game console 1000s of miles away.”

Of course both were highlighting the double standards coming from the mouths of leaders who, while reluctant to flaunt the results of their own military actions via public video, also burn people alive.

Murad was targeting the double standards of Egypt’s leader Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi who came to power in a military coup which killed hundreds of innocent people. In at least one incident this involved the burning alive of some protestors during the Rabaa Al-Adawiyya massacre of August 2013.

The American tweeter was alluding to the hundreds of innocents in Pakistan who have been burned alive in their homes by Hellfire missiles during US drone strikes. The victims who survive missile attacks, including many children, often suffer disfiguring burns and limb amputations while the charred remains of those killed are usually unidentifiable.

@Mr.LV426 was, quite possibly, also referring to the antics of US forces in Fallujah who sent “rains of fire” on Iraqi citizens in 2004 when they showered them with chemicals, including burning white phosphorus. (See http://ind.pn/1zdseFk) Albeit reluctantly, US generals were also forced to admit that at the start of the Iraq war they used incendiary bombs and Mark 77 firebombs containing a fuel-gel mixture that was similar to napalm, near bridges over the Saddam Canal and Tigris River.

So there you have it; death by burning is not exclusive to ISIS after all. However, there is a difference; while most leaders like Obama and Al-Sisi prefer to do their killing under the publicity radar, the leaders of the so-called Islamic State catalogue and video their gruesome work deliberately for public display. The result is complete shock, disgust and revulsion, but why the White House is surprised is anyone’s guess, for Barack Obama knows all about this sort of outrage. He is still trying to conceal all the videos and photographs sitting in archives which show CIA and military torture on Obama’s watch and that of his predecessor, George W Bush.

There are literally thousands of pictures showing in awful detail the US government’s brutal treatment of its prisoners, in Afghanistan, Iraq and other dark sites around the world. They are so gruesome that former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki warned US officials years ago that if Obama released them “Baghdad will burn”. That particular view from the Iraqi politician was shared by senior generals sitting in the Pentagon, which implies that whatever those archives contain they cross all acceptable cultural sensitivities, geographic boundaries and notions of human decency.

Of course it’s not just America and Egypt which target and burn civilians. Their close ally Israel used white phosphorus shells during the second Lebanon war and also in the 2008 war against the Palestinian civilians locked into the besieged Gaza Strip. Just like the ill-fated Kasasbeh, they too had no chance to escape the flames. Israel at first denied that it used white phosphorus in Gaza but, facing mounting evidence which exposed its lies, it then claimed that it was using all weapons in compliance with international law.

All of the white phosphorus shells that Human Rights Watch found in Gaza were manufactured in the United States in 1989 by Thiokol Aerospace, which was running the Louisiana Army Ammunition Plant at the time. The US government had supplied Israel with the deadly chemical weapons.

Another of America’s — and Britain’s — allies is Uzbekistan’s President Islam Karimov, whose chosen method of disposing of those who cross him has been to boil them alive. Now, it seems, he prefers to freeze them to death, according to Abdurakhmon Tashanov of the Tashkent-based Ezgulik (Goodness) human rights centre. In an interview with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Tashanov said that he has “information about the existence of special torture cells that are extremely cold and in which the guards and interrogators put cold water on the floors to increase the suffering of the inmates.”

Quite why the nihilistic and morally bereft ISIS shows these videos is up for debate but I doubt that it has anything to do with exposing the double standards and hypocrisy at play in the West. Nevertheless, it has to be said that, sadly, when it comes to burning, torturing and slaughtering people there is no moral high ground which can be claimed by political leaders in either the East or the West.

Most religions urge clemency and mercy when dealing with captives and Islam promotes this clearly. I can testify personally to this having emerged from captivity in Afghanistan largely unscathed and unharmed after being held by the Afghan Taliban in October 2001. Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who was captured by Hamas resistance fighters from his tank stationed on the Gaza border in 2006 and held for 5 years, can no doubt vouch likewise.

Perhaps the world’s rulers need to take a long, hard look at their own ethics and morality in such matters. The reality is that they are little better than the thugs who call themselves ISIS

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Turkish Foreign Minister pulls out of Munich conference due to Israel

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has decided not to attend the 51st Munich Security Conference because of Israeli participation at a session on the Middle East.

Cavusoglu made the announcement at a press conference in Berlin Friday after participating in Turkey’s West Europe Consul-Generals’ meeting.

The foreign minister planned to attend the conference where around 20 heads of states, 60 foreign and defense ministers gathered.

“But we have decided not to participate in the Munich Security Conference because they have subsequently invited Israeli representatives to the Middle East session,” Cavusoglu said.

He also said that relations between Turkey and Germany were not restricted to the conference. “This is not an approach against Germany,” the foreign minister stressed.

Later Friday, Cavusoglu said at a televised interview at the Turkish Embassy in Berlin: “The seating arrangement was so that we would have to sit next to the Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs (Yuval Steinitz). Everybody knows that Turkey-Israel relations have not been normalized yet. And he is such a radical minister as well.”

“Turkey’s sensitivity was known by all, and it should not have been disregarded,” he added.

Although the foreign minister will not attend the conference, Turkey will be represented by Foreign Ministry Under Secretary Feridun Sinirlioglu at the event, Turkish Foreign Ministry sources said.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pawlo Klimkin are among participants of the conference which will continue until Sunday

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Israeli forces detain 11 teenagers in West Bank, Jerusalem

RAMALLAH (Ma’an) — Israeli forces detained 11 Palestinian teenagers in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem early Wednesday, the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society said.

In Hebron, soldiers detained Muhammad Munqith Abu Atwan, Ahmad Hreibat, Ahmad Awad, Rashid Awada, Qusayy al-Atrash, Muamin Abu Hawwash and Ahmad Shanan.

Salim Abbasi and Ali Abbasi were arrested in Silwan while Faysal Abu al-Hawa and Muhammad Abu al-Hawa were detained in al-Tur.

All of the detainees are teenagers, the PPS said.

Israeli forces routinely detain Palestinians in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, usually under the pretext of security questioning.

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Chad military claims killing Boko Haram fighters

Clashes between Chadian troops and Boko Haram fighters during a raid on a northeastern Nigerian town have killed 200 fighters and nine soldiers, Chad’s military says.

“We regret nine dead and 21 wounded. On the enemy side: more than 200 deaths,” a statement cited by the AFP news agency said in reference to Tuesday’s clashes.

It added that the toll could rise since clean-up operations in the town of Gamboru on Nigeria-Chad border.

Earlier, Cameroon soldiers clashed with Boko Haram fighters in the border town of Fotokol as the fighters fled an offensive by Chad’s army, security sources said.

The fighters “entered this morning,” a Cameroonian security source said, after Chadian troops recaptured Gamboru just across the border.

“Fighting between them and our soldiers is really intense.”

In a deserted Gamboru, Chadian forces carried out clean-up operations after entering the town on Tuesday and retaking it from Boko Haram, which seized control months ago.

“When the Chadians entered Gamboru, the Boko Haram members who were in the town and some villages fled to meet up this morning in Fotokol,” the security source said.

Regional military efforts

While a bridge separates Fotokol from Gamboru, it is possible to also cross over from surrounding villages.

Chadian jet fighters had also bombed Gamboru before its troops entered.

The regional military efforts have highlighted the failure of Nigeria’s army to stop the six-year Boko Haram insurgency that has killed thousands.

Nigeria’s military said on Tuesday the country’s sovereignty was not compromised despite the presence of Chadian ground troops and claimed to be “driving the present onslaught”.

The offensive comes at a crucial moment, with Nigeria’s presidential and parliamentary elections set for February 14.

Boko Haram opposes Western education and wants to impose Islamic law in all 36 states of Nigeria, which is roughly equally divided between a predominantly Muslim north and a mainly Christian south.

The group operates mainly in the northeastern Nigerian states of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe, where the government has declared a state of emergency since May 2013.

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Anyone found displaying love on Facebook, Twitter or WhatsApp will be forced to get married: Hindu Mahasabha

MEERUT: If you thought you can stay indoors and avoid being forced into marriage on Valentine’s Day by the Hindu Mahasabha, here’s reason to think again – the saffron outfit’s leaders say they are monitoring social networking sites, and those posting love-you messages will be caught hold of and forced to tie the knot.

“Display of love in the entire Valentine’s week is equivalent to not following Indian traditions. Anyone found displaying love on Facebook, Twitter or WhatsApp will be caught hold of. A total of eight teams have already been formed in Delhi to keep a check on social media,” said Chandra Prakash Kaushik, national president, Hindu Mahasabha.

The right-wing outfit had earlier warned that couples found celebrating Valentine’s Day in public places, like malls and restaurants, will have to face a variety of punishments. While an impromptu Arya Samaj wedding will be forced on Hindu couples, inter-faith partners will have to sit through a ‘shuddhikaran’ (purification) ritual, the Hindu Mahasabha had said.

The outfit had said the couples caught with roses in hands and those who indulge in public display of affection at malls and parks will be their prime targets.

However, after their new diktat, it seems even social media is on their radar.

“We will be prompt about our social media campaign from Feb 8 onwards. Once Delhi elections are over, our teams will first apprise masses about what true love is and that a western festival should not be celebrated in the country. But if they do not adhere to our advice, we will inbox them and ask for their contact numbers and addresses, reach their house and get them married,” Kaushik said.

“If they refuse to share their numbers, we will contact their parents — especially those who are active online — and ask them to get them married if they really love each other,” the Mahasabha president said.

But like Kaushik, even cops have their plans.

Inspector general Alok Sharma told TOI: “It might be Valentine’s Day or any other day, no one has the right to do moral policing. But if the members of the outfit involve themselves in any such activity, they should be ready to face legal action.”

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Parbhani blast: Police rules out terror angle; MIM demands CBI probe

Submitted by TwoCircles.net on 4 February 2015 – 9:23pm

By TwoCircles.net Staff Reporter,

Parbhani (Maharashtra): The police associated with the investigation into February 1st blast in an apartment here that caused death of a chemical engineering professor has ruled out terror angle and have indicated it to be instance of suicide.

On February 1 Atul Bhagwanrao Waghmare (29 years), a chemical engineering professor who was employed with Yogeshwari Polytechnic College in Ambejogai, Beed was found dead in a mysterious condition with his charred body in an apartment located in Anand Nagar on Basmat Road of Parbhani. He was resident of Pathri taluka of Parbhani.

The witnesses claimed to have heard loud explosion from the apartment with smoke coming out of it and when police entered inside they found windows were broken due to explosion and a dead body was lying on the floor. Police later on confirmed the identity of the body to be of Waghmare.

ToI reported Additional superintendent of police Niyati Thakar as saying , “The body was handed over to the family on Sunday evening. We are awaiting the autopsy report and suspect that he died of burn injuries. We have also studied the background of the deceased and there are bleak chances of terror angle in the incident. There is a possibility that he may have committed suicide but we are probing all the angles.”

The police have ruled out terror angle although the forensic team has concluded that petroleum hydrocarbons were found at the spot of the explosion.

“The forensic reports have concluded that the chemical content that fuelled the fire was petroleum hydrocarbons. We are awaiting chemical analysis and histopathology reports. The findings leave less scope for any terror angle,” Special inspector general of police (Aurangabad range) Amitesh Kumar said to ToI.

The investigation of the police found Waghmare was depressed and hence are suspecting it to be the more probable case of suicide.

Although investigation team has ruled out possibility of terror angle but Waghmare’s unreported absence from the college since last 16 days has created a suspicious doubt in the case.

College principal Raman Deshpande told TOI, “Atul Waghmare had joined the institute as a lecturer on 16 August, 2014 and was very normal and cooperative with the students. We never felt that he was upset about anything nor did he skip college without informing us. He did not report to the college since January 16 and all our efforts to contact him failed as he had switched off his cell phone.”

Meanwhile, the local unit of All India Majlis Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) has demanded a thorough investigation of the matter by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

Members of MIM handed over a letter of demand to SP office and have also insisted the local police to explain to the anxious people of the city about the reasons and findings in the case so far.

In Nanded a similar blast had occurred very early on the morning of April 6 2006, at the residence of a retired irrigation department engineer and RSS worker, Lakshman Rajkondawar. It killed his son Naresh Lakshman Rajkondawar, and one Himanshu Venkatesh Panse. Three others, Yogesh Ravindra Deshpande Vidholkar, Maroti Kishore Wagh and Gururaj Jayaram Tuptewar, were seriously injured. Another injured, Rahul Manoharao Pande, managed to flee from the scene of the explosion, but was arrested later.

In 2006-2007 there were blasts in the Mosques of Purna, Parbhani and Jalna which were blamed on the right wing activists. State ATS probed the case, arrested some right wing activists against whom the trial is pending.

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Demonstrators call for Israel to free Palestinian girl

Palestinian demonstrators gathered yesterday in the West Bank city of Ramallah calling for Israel to release 14-year-old prisoner Malak Al-Khatib, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed reported.

The gathering, which was organised in front of the Red Cross office, was called for by the Palestinian Prisoners’ Committee.

Women, ex-prisoners and children took part in the demonstration carrying pictures of the Palestinian girl who was sentenced to two months in prison and a 6,00 shekel ($1,500) fine by an Israeli military court last week.

Head of Palestinian Committee for Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners Issa Qaraqea called for the Israeli occupation to release the Palestinian girl and all the other Palestinian minors held in Israeli jails.

“The Israeli occupation arrests children and grabs confessions from them through violent interrogations and puts them on trial in a military court without respecting their rights,” he said, calling for the world to stop the Israeli occupation’s continuous violations of the rights of Palestinian children.

Malak was arrested from Battin village, near Ramallah, on December 31 2014 under the pretext of throwing stones at the Israeli occupation’s soldiers and having a knife.

Israel arrested more than 7,000 Palestinians, including 200 under the age of 18.

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Protests in Assam over BJP’s ‘immigrant’ reference in document

GUWAHATI: Protests erupted across Assam on Wednesday against the BJP’s ‘Vision Document’ for Delhi assembly polls in which it described people from the northeastern states as “immigrants”, with the ruling Congress and the opposition Asom Gana Parishad saying the statement had hurt the sentiments of the people.



Even as the BJP termed it as a “clerical error”, the protests continued to rock various places of Assam.

The Congress took out a protest rally with banners and placards to the Kamrup (Metro) district deputy commissioner’s office in Guwahati raising slogans “we from the North East region are Indians and not foreigners”.

The Krishak Mukti Sangram Parishad (KMSS) activists were seen lying down on the main road near Dighalipukhuri here to register their protest.

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Thailand’s prime minster denies government’s role in Bangkok blasts

Thailand’s junta chief brushes aside allegations that his military administration has been behind the recent twin bomb blasts outside a shopping mall in the capital, Bangkok.

Thai Prime Minister and Army Chief General Prayuth Chan-ocha said on Tuesday that he became upset by remarks on social media speculating that the bombings help justify the continued imposition of martial law in the country.

“Some have countered that this was work of the government in order to maintain martial law. They are brains damaged [sic],” media outlets quoted Prayuth Chan-ocha as saying.

However, he did not rule out the possible involvement of some ‘rogue elements’ within security forces in the bombings.

“If this was the work of rogue policemen or soldiers they must be punished,” the premier noted.

He assured that security forces were looking for two men seen on CCTV shortly before the explosive devices detonated in the commercial area.

At least two people were injured after homemade explosive devices went off outside the Siam Paragon mall on February 1.

The blasts are considered to be the first major disruption to an uneasy peace imposed after the military took over in a coup in May 2014.

The developments came ten days after ousted prime minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, was impeached by the parliament.

Shinawatra was impeached and banned from politics for five years. She faces criminal charges over allegations of corruption. She was widely accused of using her political office to facilitate the return of her deposed brother and former prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra.

Political factions loyal to Shinawatra family have won every election since 2001, in the process facing two coups and the disposal of three premiers by Thailand’s courts.

The democratic development in Thailand has been interrupted by 19 actual or attempted coups since 1932.

JR/HSN/SS

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What If America Had Never Invaded Afghanistan?

Robert L. Grenier

Mullah Akhtar Mohammed Osmani, the Taliban’s military leader for southern Afghanistan, sat stolidly, his great bulk sup­ported in an overstuffed chair to my left. It was October 2, 2001, and events had been hurtling forward since the terrorist attacks of September 11. President George W. Bush had delivered an ultimatum to the Taliban in his State of the Union address on September 20: Hand over al-Qaeda’s leadership or share their fate. But the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan had not yet begun, and I still saw a chance, however small, for a peaceful way out. That was why, as the CIA station chief in Islamabad responsible for both Pakistan and Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, I was having this meeting with a top Taliban official.

The day President Bush had delivered his ultimatum, the Supreme Council of the Islamic Clergy, a committee of 700 Islamic scholars that Taliban chief Mullah Omar had convened to advise him on the correct course to pursue toward Osama bin Laden, had partially opened the door to an acceptable settlement. The council had recommended that the Taliban government seek bin Laden’s voluntary departure from the country. A day later, on September 21, Mullah Omar slammed the door shut, stating that he would neither turn over bin Laden nor ask him to leave.

On September 28, Lieutenant General Mahmud Ahmed, Pakistan’s top spy as the director-general of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), led a group of eight Pakistani Islamic scholars, well-known religious extremists all, to meet with Omar in one final, desperate attempt to induce the Taliban to, in Mahmud’s own words, “get the gun to swing away from their heads.” If there was nothing for the moment to be done about bin Laden, Mah­mud suggested, perhaps the Taliban leader could agree to release eight humanitarian workers who had recently been arrested for Christian proselytizing in Afghanistan; or perhaps he could hand over some of bin Laden’s lieutenants; or at least he could allow Americans to inspect the al-Qaeda camps to demonstrate that their occupants had fled. All suggestions were in vain

As the alternatives to all-out war against the Taliban were being sys­tematically foreclosed, I could sense that attitudes in Washington were hardening in tandem. Even a few days before, the tone had been quite different, at least at the White House. I had already had one meeting with Mullah Osmani, on September 15, and he had told me that the Taliban would not sacrifice its country for the sake of Osama bin Laden. He hadn’t made specific concessions, but I saw a clear opportunity; for his part, the president, who had not yet delivered his public ultimatum of the 20th, had reacted to CIA Director George Ten­et’s report of my meeting—and the implicit possibility of a shift in the Taliban policy of sheltering bin Laden—with open interest.

“Fascinating,” he had said.

Similarly, in late September, the president and his cabinet principals still held out the possibility of a continued role for the Taliban in Afghanistan, provided its leaders agreed to break with Omar and meet U.S. demands. All, including National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice and Vice President Dick Cheney, agreed that the United States should not hit the full Taliban leadership at the outset of its military operations, lest it dis­courage an intra-Taliban split.

Over a week later, though, in the face of Mullah Omar’s recalcitrance, I could feel the political landscape shifting. One could sense that all American efforts were now vectoring inexorably toward war. It was no longer clear to me that Washington would accept any deal, even if an alternative Taliban leadership were prepared to offer one. Once the mental break is made, and war has been deemed inevitable, events take on their own momentum.

I also knew that my mission to the Taliban, no matter how carefully pursued, would carry with it the taint of negotiation, which had become anathema from what I could divine of the current climate in Washing­ton. The president himself had said that there could be no ambiguity—you were either with us or with the terrorists—and that his demands of the Taliban were not up for negotiation or discussion. As a practi­cal matter, however, even finding ways for the Taliban to meet U.S. demands would require discussion, if not negotiation, and a refusal of all dis­cussions would scuttle any chance of non-military success. In my own discussion with Mullah Osmani, I hoped at a minimum to sow serious divisions within the Taliban leadership.

I could not rule out greater success, however, and had to contemplate the possibility that the commander and the rest of the Taliban shura, the leadership council, would reject Mullah Omar, accept U.S. demands, and find a way to turn bin Laden and his 14 most senior al-Qaeda lieutenants over to us in a bid to retain power. However remote the chance of such a peaceful conclusion to the crisis, I felt, it should not be cast away lightly. I was haunted by the thought of the disasters that had befallen both the British and the Russians in Afghanistan, and I feared that a similar fate could befall us.

* * *

I was not concerned about exceeding my authority, per se; I es­sentially had none, and I knew it. I had no specific instructions, really no mandate whatsoever, beyond the verbal permission for the meeting that I had made sure to get from George Tenet. Actually, I saw that lack of guidance as a blessing. In the prevailing climate, I feared, a request for guidance would have elicited a series of narrow, sterile, and pugnacious ultimatums, which would inevitably elicit a similarly knee-jerk response from the Taliban. No, I thought: better to go without talking points. If I could come up with some formula to meet Washington’s demands in a way pal­atable to the Taliban, I could at least present Washington with a clear proposal to which they could respond as they chose.

However it might look, my country would lose nothing from what I was doing. The worst that could happen would be that I would mis­lead Osmani and others in the Taliban leadership into thinking that if they broke with Omar and accepted American demands, the Ameri­cans would deal with them as a legitimate authority. If the Americans later refused to abide by such a tentative “agreement,” the damage to the Taliban’s leadership cohesion might already be irreversible—which could only be to our advantage.

The ISI had arranged for me and my translator, whom I’ll call Tom, to meet with Osmani in a small villa in the Pakistani city of Quetta. There had been no way to avoid the Pakistanis’ playing host to the meeting, but I wanted to try to keep it secret, and it seemed likely that if they wanted to monitor us, they would have to use what we referred to in the business as a “quick-plant” transmitter. Hav­ing placed one or two of these myself, I looked under every piece of furniture, searching for the telltale signs; I found none. The most obvi­ous and simple candidate was a small handheld radio buzzer used for summoning the tea boy. I had seen such devices in ISI facilities any number of times. I had no way of knowing whether it had been tampered with, but in a surfeit of caution I disassembled it, removed the battery, and muffled it in a drawer in the bathroom.

When at last Osmani made his entrance, our meeting soon settled into the formal, almost Victorian rhythm typical of meetings conducted with a translator. I would speak a paragraph at a time, and then wait as the translator con­veyed what I’d said. The advantage of that pace is that you have ample time to formulate arguments while your words are being con­veyed. When receiving the response, you can devote full attention to the speaker’s body language and expression, and wait for the words to arrive later. Such meetings thus often take on the deliberate cadence of a chess match.

This one started with a rapid exchange of moves. I began by pointing out that Mullah Omar had, in effect, declared himself an enemy of America by refusing to ask bin Laden to leave Afghanistan. “Will the rest of the Taliban join him as declared enemies of America?” I asked.

Osmani saw where this was going, and jumped ahead: “You won’t be able to replace the Taliban with oppositionists,” he told me.

“Look,” I countered, “only Afghans can make a permanent solution for Afghanistan. The United States will be able to chase the terrorists away, but without a responsible Afghan government, they can come back. If the Taliban is willing to be that government, this will be acceptable to us; but if not, war will inevitably come. … No one knows how it will turn out. All that is sure is that it will be a disaster for Afghanistan, and the end of the Taliban.”

For More:

http://theatln.tc/1CqcA0u

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Muslim youths involved in evils instead of excelling in Science and Technology

Hyderabad , February 01:

Society has high hopes in its youths but they are involving themselves in various evils and crimes instead of excelling in the fields of Science and Technology. Parents should pay special attention to admonish their children falling prey to evils.

These thoughts were express by Maulana Sadiq Mohiuddin of Jamia Nizamia while addressing organized by Jamat-e-Islami, Hyderabad yesterday at Khilwath ground. Maulana Syed Tariq Khadri, Dr. Abdul Majeed and Maulana Jaffar Pasha also addressed the gathering.

Maulana Sadiq Mohiuddin told that by making the youths follow the Quranic Injunctions, they could be corrected. He also expressed his anxiety over the increasing waywardness of the girls in the name of education. He told that due to the negligence of parents the girls are going astray. He advised the parents to have strict vigil on their daughters.

Poor Muslims are falling prey to the money lenders. Interest taking and giving is a major social evil. There is a need for the Muslim leaders to save the community from the evil of interest.

There should be a common platform to eradicate this evil. There is also a need to have a common platform to end the evil propaganda against Islam. He condemned the concept of a small family which is part of western civilization. He told that Allah (SWT) is responsible for providing food to everybody. Muslims are getting deprived of the blessings of Allah (SWT) by restricting their families to two children.

Attempts are being made through various conspiracies to intervene in Muslim Personal Law. He stressed the need for concerted efforts and an organized movement to eradicate evils from Muslim Society. Maulana Khaja Arifuddin, Ameer of Jamat-e-Islami of A.P. and Orisha also addressed the gathering.

–Siasat News

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Modi Govt targets Muslim educational institutes in the name of national security

Submitted by TwoCircles.net on 1 February 2015 – 11:19am

Those running study centers are worried that now madrassa students have been declared officially as suspects and opposed such branding and ‘social profiling’ of Muslim institutions.

By Mohd Ismail Khan, TwoCircles.net,

New Delhi/Hyderabad: National Council for the Promotion of Urdu Language and National Security in the same sentence may appear awkward to many; but for the Union Home Ministry, NCPUL is the new archery bow to take arrows of for the purported ‘war on terror’ for its desire target, the Muslim run educational institutes.

In the month of January, hundreds of NCPUL study centers, mainly madrassas and other Muslim run institutes affiliated to its different diploma programmes, across the country received a rather murky message from Union Home Ministry, disguise as NCPUL notice asking ‘to detect and counter radicalization efforts.’

NCPUL, under HRD Ministry, is the highest regulatory body which is responsible for the regulation of Urdu education in India.

The notice addressed to the Center In-charge of Urdu, Arabic and Persian Study centers – a copy of the notice is available with TwoCircles.net – has the subject titled, “Implementation of the recommendation of the Task Force on National Security approved/accepted by the cabinet committee on security.”

The notice referred to the recommendation of high profile Naresh Chandra Committee, which was formed by the UPAII in June 2011 to review the defense management of the country.

The NCPUL notice said, “The Task force recommends that the Intelligence Bureau (IB) should develop capabilities for detecting and countering radicalization efforts and to take counter measures through Government and Non-Government structures.”

The notice went on to explain, “Both Radicalization and deradicalization is multi-disciplinary efforts requiring inputs from Intelligence Agencies, The Ministry of Human Resource Development, The Ministry of Minority Affairs, the state police forces and all developmental departments, Ministry of Home Affairs will take the lead, but this require the involvement of entire government.”

The notice sent to all the centers has asked the Center In-charge to submit action taken report on national security issues, by maintaining security at their accredited centers.

Kalimullah, In-charge and Research Officer of Functional Arabic Centers of NCPUL, under whose name the notice was issued (the copy is available with TCN), expressed surprise when TwoCircles.net contacted him. “It was meant for our study centers not for journalists,” he said.

When inquired about the purpose of issuing this kind of notice to study centers, he explained, “They will have to maintain the records of the students studying there, and should make sure that they don’t get involved in any anti-social activities.”

Asked if it was proper to drag in madrassas in national Security process, he replied, “We acted on the direction received from the Central Government.” He said that the NCPUL received the circular from the Central Government asking them to implement recommendations of the Task Force on national security one month back. Later an inner departmental circular was issued to all NCPUL departments to implement the same, thus the notice was issued to study centers.

Kalimullah also clarified that the notice was not meant only for madrassas, “Our study centers are run by NGOs and different educational societies. These notices were sent to them, not to any specific madrassa.”

A quick look at the registered study centers list at NCPUL website will make it clear that all of them are either madrassas or Muslim run other professional educational institutes.

Kalimullah said he can speak only about his department and conceded that notice was served to all the centers under his department.

Across India there are 278 study centers of functional Arabic of NCPUL, further there are 759 study centers for Diploma in Urdu, 308 Arabic certificate course centers, 27 advance computer training centers, 53 calligraphy and design centers, and 50 centers for diploma in electronic appliance.

For More:

http://bit.ly/1z4XTJ8

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