The Indian Panorama

Tag: Akhilesh Yadav

  • Politics over Kumbh: Pilgrims lost, accountability missing

    Opposition leaders have accused the Uttar Pradesh government of downplaying the scale of the tragic stampede at the Maha Kumbh Mela on January 29. Official reports claim 30 people were killed and over 60 injured. However, the figures are being hotly contested, with opposition leaders like Akhilesh Yadav alleging that the real death toll is significantly higher, with many still missing. The state’s response has been both evasive and inadequate. The UP government, while deploying a judicial commission to investigate, stands accused of suppressing information and failing to provide transparency. The Supreme Court termed the incident “unfortunate” but redirected the matter to the Allahabad High Court, highlighting judicial reluctance to confront administrative lapses directly. Meanwhile, bereaved families continue searching for missing relatives, as official silence fuels public anger and distrust.

    More troubling is the emerging angle of a possible conspiracy. With over 16,000 mobile numbers under investigation and facial recognition technology being used to identify suspects, authorities suggest foul play may have contributed to the chaos. Yet, the specifics remain murky. This raises critical questions about security preparedness and the state’s ability to protect its citizens during mass gatherings. Beyond political blame games and conspiracy theories, this tragedy underscores a recurring issue: inadequate crowd management at religious events. The National Disaster Management Authority has long recommended comprehensive policies for such gatherings, yet implementation remains lackluster.

    As millions continue to gather for subsequent bathing rituals during the ongoing Maha Kumbh, which is a grand confluence of faith, tradition and humanity, the pressing need is not just for better protocols but also for transparent governance that respects both the living and the departed. Faith may guide the pilgrims, but safety must be ensured by those in power.
    (Tribune, India)

  • DNA of events in Ayodhya, Sambhal, Bangla same: Yogi

    DNA of events in Ayodhya, Sambhal, Bangla same: Yogi

    Ayodhya (TIP)- Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath on December 5, accused the Opposition of trying to divide the society, saying the actions of Babur’s commander in Ayodhya and Sambhal around 500 years ago and ongoing events in Bangladesh shared the same nature and intent.
    “Look at the kind of acts our enemies are committing in neighbouring countries. Around 500 years ago, a general of Babur committed certain deeds in Ayodhya, similar acts were observed in Sambhal, and now what is happening in Bangladesh — the nature and DNA of all three events are the same,” he added.
    The CM, who was in the temple town for the inauguration of the 43rd Ramayan Mela, cautioned people against dismissing these issues as distant or irrelevant.
    “Had we given importance to unity and not let the strategy of nation’s enemies succeed in creating social animosity, this country would have never become a slave. Our pilgrimages would not have been desecrated. A handful of invaders would not have dared to invade us and would be crushed by India’s brave soldiers,” he added.
    The Opposition shot back at the Uttar Pradesh CM, saying he was indulging in “divisive politics” and peddling “false narratives”.
    When asked to comment on Adityanath’s remarks, Congress MP Tariq Anwar said his language did not behove that of a chief minister. “It is surprising and saddening that being a big leader of the BJP and the Chief Minister of a large state like Uttar Pradesh, he uses such language that is aimed at dividing people,” Anwar said.
    ‘First get your DNA checked’:
    Akhilesh Yadav attacks Yogi
    Reacting to Yogi Adityanath’s remark that the DNA of what happened in Ayodhya under Babur’s rule, Sambhal and Bangladesh is the same, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav said the Uttar Pradesh chief minister must get his DNA tested before making such remarks.
    “I don’t know how much science the chief minister knows and how much biology he has studied… But I want to request that he not talk about DNA,” he was quoted as saying by news agency PTI. The former UP CM said he would also get his DNA checked.
    “Through you (media), and I am saying this with full responsibility, that he should not talk about DNA…and if he talks about DNA then we all want to get our DNA checked. The chief minister should also get his DNA checked… I want to get my DNA checked and the chief minister should also,” he added. Akhilesh Yadav said being a saint, Yogi Adityanath must refrain from using such language.
    “This talk of DNA does not suit him (Adityanath). Being a saint, a yogi in saffron robes, this language should not be used and this talk about DNA should not be done,” he said.

  • Hemant Soren begins fourth innings as Jharkhand Chief Minister

    Hemant Soren begins fourth innings as Jharkhand Chief Minister

    RANCHI (TIP): Hemant Soren on Thursday, November 28, 2024, was sworn in as the 14th Chief Minister of Jharkhand at Morabadi Ground here.
    Governor Santosh Kumar Gangwar administered the oath of office and secrecy to Mr. Soren.

    The Swearing-in ceremony was attended by the top leaders of INDIA bloc including Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal and his wife Sunita Kejriwal, Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and RJD leader Tejaswi Yadav, Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar, Tamil Nadu Deputy CM Udhayanidhi Stalin, Congress leader Tariq Anwar, Purnea MP Pappu Yadav, Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation, General Secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya and many more leaders. Hemant Soren said that unity is our biggest weapon. We can neither be divided nor silenced.

    Before taking oath, he touched the feet of his father Shibu Soren and mother Rupi Soren who were also present on the stage. He took oath as Chief Minister for the fourth term and with this, Mr. Soren is the only leader to win the term for the second time in succession.

    Mr. Soren was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on January 31, 2024, followed by resignation and Champai Soren, now with the BJP, was made the Chief Minister. He later won the legal battle and Jharkhand High Court granted him bail on June 28, 2024 and he came out of jail.

    Ahead of oath-taking ceremony, Hemant Soren’s plea for exemption from court appearances was rejected

    After his release from the jail, he was sworn in as Jharkhand Chief Minister for the third term on July 4, 2024 and INDIA bloc emerged victorious by winning a whopping 56 out of 81 assembly seats in the recently concluded assembly election.

    Mr. Soren inherited politics after the death of Shibu Soren’s elder son Durga Soren and played a pivotal role in Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM). For some time, he was also a Rajya Sabha member and Deputy Chief Minister of Jharkhand during the coalition government of Arjun Munda.

    He was a student of BIT Mesra but he left his studies midway and entered politics. Mr. Soren contested the assembly elections for the first time in 2005 from Dumka seat but lost to JMM rebel Stephen Marandi. However, in 2009, he became MLA for the first time.

    He took charge as Chief Minister for the first time in 2013 with the help of Congress, RJD and others. He became MLA for the second time from Barhait assembly of Santhal Pargana region. In the 2014 assembly elections, JMM became the second largest party and Mr. Soren was made the leader of the opposition.

    After the results of the Assembly elections held in 2019, Mr. Soren on December 29, 2019 took oath as the Chief Minister of the state for the second time.

    His wife Kalpana Soren entered politics soon after he went to jail and during his jail time she won bypoll and emerged winner from Gandey assembly seat. She defeated BJP’s candidate Muniya Devi in Gandey by 17142 votes. Even Mr. Soren retained the Barhait seat by defeating BJP’s Gamliyel Hembrom by a margin of 39,791 votes.

    National Democratic Alliance won 24 seats in the 81-member Jharkhand Assembly, with the Jharkhand Loktrantrik Krantikari Morcha led by Jairam Tiger Mahto picking up the remaining seat.

    Except Mr. Soren no other minister took oath. However, as per the informed sources, the formula has already been discussed in which JMM will get 6 ministerial berths, Congress 4 and RJD 1. CPI(ML)L may not opt to be the part of the cabinet like in the previous government.

    After taking oath, Mr. Soren posted a message on a social media platform in Hindi saying, “Today’s historic occasion is dedicated to the struggle of the immortal brave martyrs, great revolutionaries and agitators of Jharkhand… Today’s emotional moment is dedicated to the crores of people of Jharkhand… Abua Sarkar – Government of every Jharkhandi.”

  • Priyanka’s poll debut: Congress takes right call to field her from Wayanad

    The Congress’ encouraging performance in the recent Lok Sabha elections has prompted former party president Rahul Gandhi to retain the Raebareli Lok Sabha seat in Uttar Pradesh and vacate the one in Wayanad, Kerala. His sister, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who was appointed Congress general secretary in 2019, will make her electoral debut in the Wayanad bypoll. The grand old party, which had been reduced to a nonentity in UP, made a comeback in the 2024 parliamentary polls in alliance with the Samajwadi Party (SP). The Congress bagged six seats, including the Gandhi family bastions of Raebareli and Amethi. Priyanka is believed to have played a key role in helping the party win the two prestigious seats, especially Amethi, where Rahul had suffered a shock defeat in 2019.

    It is obvious that the Congress wants to build on the gains made in UP and actively assist the Akhilesh Yadav-led SP in dislodging the ruling BJP in the 2027 Assembly elections. Rahul’s long-term presence in the state is a must to energize the party rank and file. For the record, the Congress had hit a new low in the 2022 Assembly polls, winning just two seats in the state with the highest political stakes.

    Having made major inroads into the South in recent years, the Congress has chosen a presumably easy seat for Priyanka. The Congress-led United Democratic Front swept the Lok Sabha polls in Kerala, winning 18 of the 20 seats, even as the BJP managed to open its account. Both the BJP and the CPI have trained their guns on Rahul, alleging that he did not inform voters of Wayanad beforehand about his plan to contest from two constituencies. Nevertheless, the Congress is confident that the electorate of this constituency will send another Gandhi to Parliament, that too a first-timer, thus strengthening the resurgent Opposition.

    (Tribune, India)

  • BJP victim of own negative campaign, will lose in UP, says Akhilesh Yadav

    BJP victim of own negative campaign, will lose in UP, says Akhilesh Yadav

    Lucknow (TIP)- The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) focussed on the politics of negativity in the ongoing Lok Sabha polls but its campaign got trapped in its own negative agenda, Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav said on Thursday, expressing confidence about trouncing the ruling party in Uttar Pradesh.
    In an interview, Yadav said that the SP will emerge as the single-largest party in Uttar Pradesh and the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) will have the most seats, argued that problems such as unemployment and exam paper leaks had angered the people, and alleged that former ally Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) was hand-in-glove with the BJP.
    “The N in NDA (the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance) means negative; theirs is the politics is of negativity,” he said, contrasting it with the INDIA bloc’s campaign focussed on PDA, the Hindi acronym for backward classes – pichde, scheduled castes – Dalit, and minorities – alpsankhyak; a term the SP leader has repeatedly used this election season.
    “P is also for progressive and P is also for Purvanchal (the key region of east UP going to polls on Saturday)… I have been saying that we are winning 79 seats and have a fight in one seat.”
    Yadav’s comments came ahead of the sixth phase of the general elections on May 25, when 58 seats across eight states and Union territories will go to the polls. This includes 14 seats in the crucial eastern UP region.
    He said the BJP was wary of losing and hence added a communal edge to its campaign. “The government has failed and is allowing businessmen close to them to exploit common people to make profits. The failure of the government has made us confident…When the BJP leaders found that they are losing the elections, they moved to a negative narrative. They are raising the issue of Hindu-Muslim, Pakistan. Speeches of both the PM and the CM are depressing,” he said.
    Akhilesh said that people had understood the “game plan” of the BJP to “amend” the Constitution.
    “The followers of Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar and those who want to strengthen democracy and the Constitution have united and have joined the PDA family of the SP. Now the BJP is finding itself out of the contest,” he said, adding that the SP had successfully built a big social base.
    He also hit out at the BSP, a party he fought with in 2019 only to fall out later. In 2019, the SP-BSP alliance won 15 seats, with the former winning five and the latter winning 10.
    The BJP won 62 seats, the Congress one and BJP ally Apna Dal winning two.
    “The BSP is hand-in-glove with the BJP. There is a secret understanding between the two. Today, I am coming back from Jaunpur. People are openly talking about the BJP-BSP bonhomie there,” he said, pointing to a seat where the BSP changed its candidate at the last minute amid controversy.
    He said that the people felt cheated by the BJP government because of rising prices and unemployment, and that the so-called guarantees of Prime Minister Narendra Modi were finding no traction. “The guarantees are hollow and the people have decided to remove them from power.” Source: HT

  • Strain in INDIA bloc as Akhilesh Yadav accuses Congress of ‘betrayal’ in MP

    Strain in INDIA bloc as Akhilesh Yadav accuses Congress of ‘betrayal’ in MP

    New Delhi (TIP)- The first signs of friction in the anti-BJP INDIA bloc emerged on October 19 with Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav accusing the Congress of betrayal in Madhya Pradesh. Akhilesh, whose party has so far announced 31 candidates for the 230-member Assembly elections due on November 17, said the Congress leaders first gave the SP an impression that they were interested in an alliance, held detailed strategy meetings and then “betrayed us”.
    The former UP CM also accused the Congress of “helping the BJP”. “These people are aligned with the BJP,” said a visibly upset Akhilesh after the Congress did not leave the desired seats for the SP, despite alliance talks. The Congress has so far named 144 candidates for the state polls.
    Akhilesh said he had no idea until now whether the INDIA bloc understanding was limited only to the Lok Sabha elections. “Had I known earlier that there is no state-level INDIA alliance, we would never have gone to meet their leaders. We would not have shared our lists with them nor would we have answered the phones of Congress leaders,” he said.
    SP leaders earlier met former CMs and Congress veterans Kamal Nath and Digvijay Singh to discuss seat-sharing in the state.
    Akhilesh said his leaders kept awake until 1 pm discussing with the Congress their strengths and weaknesses in the state. “We shared with them our lists, told them when our MLAs were elected and even told them where we stood second. They assured consideration of six seats but when the lists came, SP was given nil. Now, we know INDIA is not a state-level alliance. So when discussions happen for an alliance in UP for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, we will see. We will behave with them the way they behave with us,” he said.
    Earlier, AAP, another constituent of INDIA bloc, declared 39 candidates for MP where the Congress is directly pitted against the BJP. In 2018, the Congress, a few seats short of a majority, had formed the government in MP with support from SP and BSP MLAs. Source: TNS