Photo Missing in Gadkari-Yogi’s Advertisement
Eyebrows are being raised over a Central government advertisement which appeared in all prominent newspapers of Delhi and Uttar Pradesh on 11 September. It announced that Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari would lay the foundation stone of Delhi-Saharanpur National Highway along with UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath that day. And Gadkari did lay the foundation stone of the 154 km four-lane highway in the presence of Yogi Adiyanath and Union Ministers Satya Pal Singh and General (Retired) V.K. Singh and UP’s Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Yadav at two events, first in Badot and later at Saharanpur at the appointed time. The project worth Rs 1,505.72 crore, to be developed in three phases, will be executed by the National Highways Authority of India. The advertisement carried only Gadkari and Yogi Adityanath’s smiling faces. The usual picture of Prime Minister Narendra Modi was missing from it. Since Modi came to power in 2014, his picture has always appeared prominently in all Central and BJP state governments’ advertisements. So, the absence of the photo was immediately noticed. Of course PM Modi would never notice or bother about such trifles.
Many Marwari brides’ names missing from draft NRC
In Assam, the final draft of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) has left out names of 40.07 lakh people out of the 3.29 crore applicants. But not all of them, as the general perception is, are “illegal Bangladeshis”. The names of many members of Marwari families, who had migrated to the Northeast from Rajasthan, are missing from the draft NRC. Most of them are women who have come from Rajasthan as brides over the years.
A big contractor working for Assam’s Public Works Department says that all his Bangladeshi workers have found their names in the NRC, “But the names of my two daughters-in-law are missing.” “Most of the Marwari families still get brides for their sons from Rajasthan and elsewhere. Obviously, these women’s ancestors’ linkage in the state cannot be proved,” the contractor points out, commenting that they are challenging the ‘flaw’ in the NRC.
Mahatma was hypertensive
Mahatma Gandhi was a frail looking person. But not much is known about his health history. When India was heading towards freedom, he must have gone through lots of mental and physical stress. Soon some health records of Gandhi will be made public that would show he was hypertensive. The Union Health Ministry is going to publish the blood pressure details of Gandhi as part of its efforts to commemorate his 150th birth anniversary. A special issue will be released by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) in an in-house journal in two months. It will focus on the interventions Gandhi had on malaria, filaria, cholera and leprosy. It will also carry a research piece on Gandhi’s history as a hypertensive.
“The idea behind publishing Gandhi’s BP records is to tell everyone that hypertension is an old disease and now perfectly manageable,” according to the ICMR head, Dr Balram Bhargava, who is also Secretary, Health Research.
“These records are available with the Gandhi Museum and anyone can access these. At the time when Gandhiji had high BP, there was hardly any medicine to treat it. The available medicines were toxic,” says Dr Bhargava. “Our aim is to create awareness on hypertension and help people take to low-salt diet to fight the disease.”
First Sikh in U.S. President’s security
A Sikh family in Ludhiana is rejoicing over the induction of their family member, Anshdeep Singh, in President Donald Trump’s security. Punjab’s Sikh community too is proud that Anshdeep found a place in Trump’s security detail without compromising on his religious identity. Ludhiana-born Anshdeep had challenged the job’s requirement to be clean shaven and turban-less in court and got a decision in his favour. He joined the US President’s security detail last week.
The family, which has roots in Kanpur, was a victim of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots there. After that most of the family members moved to Ludhiana and eventually to the US in 2000. Anshdeep’s father Devendra Singh was injured in the Kanpur attack and had received three bullet wounds.
Punjab’s sacrilege bills rile ex bureaucrats
The Congress is finding itself in a spot on two anti sacrilege Bills the Punjab Assembly recently passed seeking to make desecration of religious texts a major offence, punishable with life imprisonment. The Punjab Assembly’s move to pass the Bills has attracted condemnation from certain quarters, including some former bureaucrats. The Bills have come at a time when the Congress is trying to project 2019 general elections as a battle between the “fascist and illiberal BJP” and a “liberal and secular Congress”. But the party is at pains to explain why these Bills were brought.
A group of 34 senior ex-bureaucrats issued an open letter to the Punjab Chief Minister urging him to withdraw the Bills describing these as “non secular and unconstitutional”. They include Harsh Mandher, Sujatha Rao and Keshav Desiraju, and also Julio Ribeiro. In their letter to Amarinder Singh, the former civil servants have said they were alarmed at the passage of the two Bills and were confident that the CM “won’t allow political expediency to trump secular principles”. Their letter says, “The Congress has a chequered history occasionally fishing in communal waters for short term political ends.” “Rather than reduce the role of religion from the matters of the state, expected of a secular polity, this move will strengthen the hands of religious extremists and create a chilling effect on the free speech,” they have warned. They have cited global research to say that blasphemy laws were particularly prone to misuse against minorities and weaker sections.
Haryana wants to compete with Bollywood
Haryana has unveiled a bonanza for film producers in the forms of cash incentives up to Rs 2 crore, industry status for the film world and single window regime for clearances—besides putting in place an institutional mechanism aimed at making Haryana the next destination of the film industry.
The Haryana Film Policy, cleared by the Manohar Lal Khattar government on Wednesday, has created a Haryana Film Cell (HFC), which, with the help of senior government officers, professionals and experts from the film industry will decide on how to promote Haryanvi and non-Haryanvi films.
Haryana’s locations for shooting will be developed. On the basis of shooting locales, cast, talent and other infrastructure in the film, the producers would be eligible to obtain cash incentives ranging from Rs 1 cr to Rs 2 cr. Fifty per cent of the total budget will be allotted to the fiscal incentives for the Haryanvi films. The idea is to promote and preserve culture, folk music, heritage and traditions of Haryana. “We want to position Haryan