Akal Takht, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee and many Sikh organisations are upset as the revamp plan for Amritsar railway station has a “saffron tinge” and, they complain, it has ignored the Sikh heritage of the holy city. The Indian Railways Station Development Corporation, under the public-private partnership mode, is revamping the station at a cost of Rs 300 crore. Sikh organisations are not liking the proposal to construct a lotus-shape pond at the main entrance. Akal Takht officiating Jathedar Giani Harpreet Singh told The Sunday Guardian that “it as an attempt to tarnish the heritage of the holy city and instead glorifying a particular party’s symbol”.
However, outgoing Punjab BJP president Shwait Malik said, “How can lotus be associated with the BJP only? The domes of the railway station building will be matched with the ones located over the Golden Temple. The model of the Golden Temple, which is at the entrance, will be part of the revamp plan.”
Women’s Initiative For Political Power
A new initiative, Ab Hai Meri Baari, was launched at the IIC in New Delhi on Wednesday demanding greater women’s empowerment in national electoral governance by an NGO—Women’s Association for Training Empowerment and Resettlement (WATER). The spirit behind the nationwide campaign is Shilpi Arora, a social activist working in Delhi and Uttarakhand. “We have given a call for parity in electoral governance. Women are half of the country’s population but we are still not being given a respectable share in electoral politics,” WATER’s president Shilpi Arora told The Sunday Guardian.
WATER organised a round table discussion to spark a new national change regarding women participation. “The initiative is aimed to reduce the gender gap in electoral politics,” she said. Rajya Sabha BJP MP and former Minister of State for Tourism, K.J. Alphons, Udit Raj, Congress spokesperson, Kirti Azad, Delhi Congress polls campaign committee chairman, Sanjay Dalmia, industrialist and former Rajya Sabha MP, along with many other prominent personalities discussed various political perspectives and claimed Ab Hai Meri Baari as the much needed and thoughtful action to empower women on political grounds.
Rajya Sabha’s Star Questioner
In both Houses of the Parliament, Question Hour attracts lot of attention from members. Recently, the Rajya Sabha Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu wanted to know details on opportunities that members of all parties get to raise questions. The Rajya Sabha Secretariat carried out a study of the level of participation of the members in Question Hour during the 249th and 250th sessions. It revealed that the AIADMK’s A. Vijayakumar asked the highest number of 13 starred questions in the last two sessions. He led the 249th session with seven questions to his credit, and stood second in the 250th session with six questions. The Trinamool Congress’ Santanu Sen was the lead questioner with seven questions in the 250th session.
Ayush Ministry’s Calendar In Demand
The government’s New Year calendars and diaries are rarely sought after as they mostly carry official propaganda. But it is happening in the case of the 2020 calendar of the Ayush ministry, headed by Minister of State (Independent charge) Shripad Yesso Naik. Its New Year calendar is quite catchy and educative. The calendar is so much in demand that it is selling on Amazon.
BJP loses senior leader
Ahead of the Delhi elections, BJP has lost a seasoned party leader, Meya Ram Arya (81), former MLA from Delhi’s Patel Nagar, who was a strategist for the party. For the past several months, Arya was working hard, despite his illness and hospitalization, to strengthen the BJP’s strategy to regain its lost glory. Arya had come to the BJP from the Congress (O) after the Emergency along with his two close colleagues, Prof P.K. Chandla and Shanti Desai. At a big prayer meeting, Dr Harsh Vardhan, Union Health Minister, said Arya had played an important role in expanding the party’s base in the jhuggi-jhopri colonies. Arya was two-time Metropolitan Councillor and one-time MLA. In Delhi’s first Assembly, Arya was judged as the “Best MLA”. Arya’s closest friend and former BJP MLA, P.K. Chandla said, “Arya was always respected for his frank opinion. He was also a great guiding spirit behind Citizens’ Council, Delhi.”
20-Quintal Butter Idol in Himachal
At Bajjreshwari temple in Kangra, Himachal Pradesh, a large number of devotees began coming on Tuesday evening to pay obeisance and have a glimpse of the 20-quintal butter idol on the Pindi of the Goddess on the eve of the Makar Sankranti festival. The temple priest, Ram Prasad Sharma, told this newspaper that the legend was that when the Goddess was injured during a fight with the demons, butter was applied on her wounds on Makar Sankranti by the Gods. The butter idol was made by 11 priests in nine hours and was decorated with dry fruit.
