Two militants, who were arrested from Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir, were part of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) module and had come to the town to ferry weapons to the Kashmir Valley, a senior police officer said on Thursday.
Senior Superintendent of Police, Poonch, Rajiv Pandey said a special investigation team (SIT), headed by a sub-divisional police officer (SDPO), was formed to probe the case.
Auqib Ahmad Bhat and Shabir Ahmad Dar, both hailing from Pulwama district of south Kashmir, were arrested during a joint operation by police and the Army in Mendhar area of the border district on Wednesday.
Two AK-56 rifles, two magazines, 60 rounds, and four hand grenades were seized from their possession.
“Prima facie, it was established that they were part of LeT module and were assigned the task to shift weapons from Poonch to the Kashmir Valley,” the SSP told reporters.
Presenting the arrested persons before the media persons, he said that preliminary investigations revealed that they were not in the district to carry out any terror activity.
“They are associates of militants and their only motive was to shift the weapons from Poonch to Kashmir,” Pandey said.
The rural areas of Assam are all set to become Open Defecation Free (ODF) by December 31 this year with 98 per cent of the target is already achieved, a central government official said on Thursday.
Assam and Tripura are the only two northeastern states where rural areas are yet to become ODF, while the remaining six states in the region have already achieved it much ahead of the October-2, 2019 deadline, secretary to the union ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation Parameswaram Iyer said.
“Assam has already achieved 98 per cent ODF in the rural areas, while Tripura has met 89 per cent of the target. Both the states are likely to be ODF by the end of this year,” he said.
The major challenge faced by Assam is the short working season of four to five months due to heavy rain in most parts of the state, he said.
Several villages are located in remote areas of the districts like Dhemaji, Dima Hasao, Karbi Anglong and the riverine areas where work has been delayed due to connectivity issues, he said.
The focus on the other six ODF states – Sikkim, Nagaland, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, and Manipur – will be now on ensuring sustainability, he said adding that all ODF villages would be ensured water supply on a priority basis. Solid and liquid waste management would also be given importance.
He also said that the government wanted to get every toilet geo-tagged with 86 per cent is already done, double verification and rapid response to reports of poor quality of toilets under the Swachh Bharat Mission (Grameen).
Stan Lee, the creator of the Marvel superheroes, has left a lovely message for his adoring fans.
The video message comes two days after the 95-year-old left for his heavenly abode on Monday.
In the video posted on his official Twitter handle on Wednesday, the creator of superhero characters like Iron Man and Thor revealed his immense love for the numerous fans around the world.
So many wonderful moments with Stan came spontaneously. As we were setting up the camera one day, he casually started talking about his fans. We know how much Stan meant to you, and we thought it would be nice for you to hear how much your support meant to him. pic.twitter.com/WTX8U1afLm
In the 90-second video, Lee speaks his hearts out, and says, “I cannot tell you how much I love my fans. Sometimes at night, I am sitting here thinking, what’s it all about? And then I get a letter from a fan or I read something or I see something or I remember something. And I realize, it’s so lucky to have fans, fans who really care about you.”
Lee added that it is wonderful to have caring fans who live in a different part of the world. He signed off by confessing his love for the fans once more.
The creator of iconic superhero characters like Black Panther, Spider-Man, Iron Man, The Avengers and The Incredible Hulk amongst an array of well-loved superheroes, Lee had started Marvel comics with Jack Kirby in 1961 with ‘Fantastic Four’. He also made cameo appearances in all of the Marvel movies.
He had suffered major medical ailments over the last year. Lee is survived by his daughter. His wife, Joan passed away in 2017.
Channing Tatum almost confirmed his new relationship with singer Jessie J with a lovely post.
Tatum, on Tuesday, posted a video on Instagram, praising his rumored girlfriend for her performance at the Royal Albert Hall in London, England. “This woman just poured her heart out on stage at the Royal Albert Hall. Whoever was there got to witness something special. Wow,” he wrote in the caption.
According to a leading portal, the concert was also attended by Jessie J’s mom, who sat several seats away from the ‘Magic Mike’ actor.
It seems like the two lovebirds share a similar feeling of admiration for each other. Earlier this week, the ‘Bang Bang’ singer attended the opening night of his Magic Mike Live show and cheered for her rumored beau.
Earlier in April, Tatum, and ex-wife, Jenna Dewan announced their separation almost after nine years of their marriage. The two had been together since 2006 when they met on the sets of the film ‘Step Up’.
Hollywood star Idris Elba’s daughter, Isan has been named as the ambassador of Golden Globe awards, set to be held next year.
Traditionally, a son or daughter of a celebrity is the one who to be chosen for the role. One of the responsibilities of an ambassador is to help in distribution of the Golden Globe trophies. Also, the honorary official has to work towards raising awareness for any charitable cause.
In accordance with the norm, Isan chose to raise awareness on mental health. Speaking to a online portal she said that she chose to raise awareness on this issue because she claimed that people suffering from it are afraid to come forward and ask for help.
Notably, the role was known as Miss or Mister Golden Globe. It was only last year that the awards authorities decided to change it. Elaborating on it, Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) President Meher Tatna, in a statement, revealed that the title was renamed to make it a gender-neutral role.
The nominations for the Golden Globe Awards 2019 will be announced on December 6. The awards ceremony will be held on January 6, 2019.
Meanwhile, HFPA has decided to donate $300,000 (approx Rs 2.16 crore) to those affected by incidents of shootings and the wildfires ravaging the state of California.
Opposition parties were facing a credibility crisis in Chhattisgarh as well as in the country, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said Thursday, accusing the Congress of resorting to “blatant lies” for political gains.
Talking to reporters here, Singh also said Naxalism was “on its last leg” in India and assured that it would be wiped out in the next three to five years.
In Chhattisgarh since Wednesday to address campaign rallies for the second phase of Assembly polls on November 20, Singh said, “Congress and other opposition parties are struggling with credibility issues in the country”.
“The condition of Congress has weakened in the country and it has lost its strength. That is why Congress has not named its chief ministerial candidate in Chhattisgarh. It is like Congress has taken out a ‘baraat’ (marriage procession) without a groom,” he said.
Terming the Congress poll manifesto as a “post-dated cheque of a bankrupt bank”, he said the party has made “false promises” in it.
“The manifesto released by the Congress is an admission that the party has lost its credibility. Its manifesto is as meaningless as a post-dated cheque of a bankrupt bank. The manifesto is meaningless,” Singh said.
“Congress takes support of blatant lies. It talks about loan waiver, but in Karnataka, warrants are being slapped on farmers (for not repaying loans) and they are being arrested,” he said.
Singh said Congress gave slogans of removing poverty but the poor suffered during its rule. “In 1969, when the Congress was in power, nationalisation of banks was carried out, but it did not benefit the poor,” he said.
Naxalism was going through its last phase in India, he said. “Earlier, 90 districts were in the grip of Naxalism, but now it has come down to 10-11 districts. Very soon the country will get rid of the (Naxal) menace,” he said.
It will take three to five years to end the Naxal menace in the country, he said.
“Earlier, more number of security personnel used to be killed in the Naxal violence, but the situation has now reversed. Now, more Naxals are gunned down,” he added.
Singh appealed to Naxals to “drop their weapons and join the mainstream”. “We have a good rehabilitation policy. Naxals who surrender get benefits of the policy,” he said.
To a query on non-payment of bonus to grain producing farmers by the state government for a couple years, he said, “It is true that bonus was not paid to farmers for a couple of years due to certain circumstances. But the Chhattisgarh government paid the bonus this year and will continue to do so subsequently”.
Singh did not specify why did the state government fail to pay bonus to farmers for the last few years.
The Opposition has slammed the Raman Singh-led BJP government in the state for paying bonus to farmers ahead of polls, adding the measure is aimed at reaping “political gains”.
Despite being in power for the last 15 years, the Raman Singh government in Chhattisgarh is not facing a credibility crisis, he said. “In fact, people’s faith in the BJP-led government has increased,” he added.
AJ McLean, who has been vocal about his struggles with substance abuse, has revealed that suffered a relapse in the year gone by.
The 40-year-old member of Backstreet Boys said he is not ashamed of admitting the slip-up as drug and alcohol addiction is a “daily struggle”.
“You know, it’s interesting about sobriety with family and with kids you still have to put yourself first, and that’s been a real big struggle for me.
“Look, I have no shame in saying, I’ve relapsed over the past year. It’s no secret that this is a disease, and that it’s a daily struggle,” McLean told a leading magazine.
The singer-musician said due to his people-pleasing behaviour he often finds it difficult to not put the wellbeing of his loved ones before his own.
“Because in my mind, that’s what you should do, you should put family first.
“You should put your kids first. But because I’m still very codependent, I’m Mr People Pleaser and I think a lot of that comes from being a performer, and wanting to see the crowd happy, and seeing everybody around you, and loving the attention I want to make sure everyone’s cool,” he said.
McLean said one has to engage with the problem to get through “the worst days possible”.
“One of the best things I was told, from my sponsor, from my friends, is the only way around is through… But if you surround yourself with a good support group, if you go to meetings, if you talk to other addicts you have to make it a lifestyle, you truly do.”
The singer checked into rehab in 2001, 2002 and 2011 for depression and excessive alcohol consumption.
1) Indian authorities should take immediate action
It was disheartening to learn about Donjeta Sadiku who has not got a visa to travel to the national capital since India does not recognise Kosovo, as a result, she cannot participate in the AIBA Women’s World Championship. This refusal will be a great blow to Sadiku’s future as she worded “I will consider quitting my future in boxing”. I think Indian Foreign Ministry should consider that it is not about a boxer only rather it could affect India’s chances of hosting major international events in the future. I request Indian authorities to take an immediate action to make sure so that Sadiku shall be able to take part in the AIBA Women’s World Championship, because it is the matter of her future and career.
– M.F.U.Tandvi
2) Deprivation to the people of Bengal
Encircled in the news clip is the statement of the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in which she accused centre of sitting on her government’s plan to change the name of West Bengal. According to her, the Centre’s delay is a “deprivation” to the people of the state. At a time when name changing trend is growing rapidly, her statement has much significance to show that BJP’s purpose behind name changing of historical places is not to meet the people their demands as BJP always claimed. Despite West Bengal Assembly has passed an unanimous resolution to change the name of the state in all three languages and sent it to the Union Home Ministry, why is the government delaying to go through the resolution? The constant delay of centre clearly shows deprivation to the people of Bengal as Didi also said.
– F.R.Murad
3) Name changers or game changers?
As the 2019 national elections are drawing near its time for the people of India to decide whether they want the name changers or the game changers?
After Allahabad and Faizabad, Ahmedabad and Aurangabad are on the chopping block. I suggest the BJP should pay heed to its party members taking precedence over cities and roads, for instance, Amit Shah, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and so on…
Seemingly, the major cause behind this name game is polarisation of votes by catering the biases of an important segment of the ruling party’s constituency to garner electoral support and get some political mileage, the demand for the imminent erection of the Ram temple in Ayodhya regardless of the Supreme Court’s judgement is a part of the same strategy.
A question kept striking in my mind ever since these hardliners of Hindutva brigade came up with their crap stuff that even after centuries of Muslim rule, neither Prayag nor Ayodhya vanished. Ayodhya coexisted with Faizabad and Allahabad kept Prayag alive in it.
Is this what the BJP leaders blame Muslim rulers for?
Apparently, it’s a ploy to deflect our attention from the government’s incompetence over unemployment and development issues.
– Arshad Delhiwala
4) Adopting spiritualism and sainthood at student-age
It refers to reports that one young IAS aspirant girl from a very well-to-do Jain family from Surat having left coaching-classes for preparations for IAS examinations in Delhi in between to become a Jain monk. Two other schoolgoing sisters from another affluent Jain family of Surat have finally decided to become Jain monks even though their parents gave them full opportunity for a change of mind by sending them for an extra luxurious world tour. Only some time back, a topper in examinations left all materialistic world to become a Jain monk.
Leaving materialistic life and adopting spiritualism by becoming a Jain monk does give much required mental peace in the present era full of tensions. But if such trend becomes the latest craze amongst intelligent students of affluent families, it will prove disastrous for Jain-community with intelligent minds of the community not coming to serve the country and humanity through their prospective future jobs including top government postings. Youngsters should first complete their study, and then may join sainthood so that they may be full of practical knowledge gained through studies before joining the University of spiritualism. The Jain community should decide to impose an age-bar of say 25 years before allowing youngsters to become monks.
– Madhu Agrawal
5) Merciless attitude should not be prevailed
Avni was a five-year-old tigress identified as “T1” who had caused a widespread fear in Maharashtra’s Vidarbha forests. She was shot dead and it was a spot decision. It is nothing but a straight case of crime. Despite requests from his own forest department and people, Sudhir Mugantiwar gave orders for the killing. This is the third tiger being killed on his directions. We cannot allow this kind of insensitive and merciless attitude towards animals to prevail. As per the Supreme Court directives, forest department officials were required to first tranquilise and trap her.
– C.K. Ramani
6) Finance Minister must accept his failure
Now the Finance Minister Arun Jaitley says in retaliation of the former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan’s accusation, that the GST implementation was a “monumental reform”, which had disruptionist impact on growth only for two quarters, and growth increased to 7 per cent, then till 7.7 per cent and went up to 8.2 per cent last quarter. But his statement contradicts ground reality, as GST has increased the prices of all the commodities three folds than before. I bear witness that after implementation of GST many businesses were stemmed, real estate agents were drowned in lamentation and public became miffed. He claimed before imposing GST repeatedly that GDP will go up by 2 points, the price of goods will come down which will benefit consumers, and more jobs will be created, but where is 2 per cent growth? Goods are much more expensive than earlier and jobs are nowhere to be seen. After all his boastings nothing budged. It is baffling that ignoring main objectives of GST he is beating about bush and calling Rajan “critic and cynic”. He must take his allegations seriously and accept his failure to make strong and long-term fiscal policy.
– Qayyum Patel
7) Once bitten twice shy!
Once bitten twice shy and Ranveer Singh and Deepika’s wedding a few days ago, is labelled as ‘the wedding of the year’. The top actress has gone through hell in life in spite of stardom and had candidly admitted before of her stress and depression in public. Everything that glitters is not gold and Deepika-Ranveer have put their past behind to begin a new inning together for which the nation should pray for their well-being.
Ranveer-Deepika are made for each other and make a happy couple. The country’s top badminton player of yesteryears Prakash Padukone must be a proud father as her doting daughter finally settles down in life with her dream man. Wishing Deepika-Ranveer a Very Happy inning together and hope their life of togetherness is a memorable one!
– S.N.Kabra
8) Confusing system of naming HC
Allahabad High Court now joins the list with High Courts of Bombay and Madras which are still to be renamed after the change in the name of cities where these are situated.
It is significant that except for some High Courts, all other High Courts are named after states of their jurisdiction. An RTI response had revealed that while all the High Courts constituted after independence were named after respective main states of jurisdiction, High Courts constituted by British regime in the pre-independence era continue to be named as per British legacy on basis of cities of their existence even after 70 long years of independence.
Union government should end the British legacy by naming all High Courts after names of states rather than in particular cities. Proposed legislation should incorporate a feature that names of High Courts may be automatically changed with the change in name of states or cities without needing any separate legislation.
– Subhash Chandra Agrawal
(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)
In a world of exhausted fossil fuels, solar panels can provide a sustainable solution to energy problems. However, they also come up with a couple of issues for one, solar farms are massive and they to be set up somewhere that gets a lot of sunlight. Now, if only we had a large mass of unused land, that gets guaranteed sunlight every day. Could we cover an entire desert in solar panels and would that be enough to power the whole word? This is what if and here is what would happen, if we covered the Thar Desert with solar panels.
The Thar Desert, also known as The Great Indian Desert, is a largely arid region in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent that forms a natural boundary between India and Pakistan. It is the world’s 17th largest desert and the world’s 9th largest subtropical desert. If we covered the Thar Desert with just 1.2 per cent of the large land on the sand in solar panels, we could harness enough power to meet the energy needs of the entire country. How would we overcome the obstacles? How could this project change the climate of the desert?
Usually, a solar farm is build to prevent changes to the environment, but if we built one in the Thar Desert, it might cause some changes of its own. If we lined the desert floor with giant solar panels, it would double the rainfall in the region and increase vegetation cover by about 20 per cent. It sounds a little unbelievable and appears to be a miracle, but you look at the benefits then you can get a clear picture. Thar sand is usually light in colour, which means it tends to reflect a lot of light and heat back up in the air, if we covered the sand in dark solar panels and the ground temperature would increase warmer air rises to areas in the atmosphere, where it’s cooler and moisture and there it condenses and falls as rains.
Before you knew it, one of the most extreme climates on Earth would undergo a significant makeover. To provide sustainable energy solutions, but also add much-needed greenery to our largest desert, then why we wait so long and make our dreams of having continuous power supply through solar energy. We may now think why we have not this already and solved our power problem. It may appear little more complicated than it appears to be.
For one thing, it is great to produce enough energy power to the country but then you have to worry about how you are going to get it in our daily usage. The most likely place this energy would travel to first Central India. Energy so produced can be used for our indigenous requirement in the industry and the need for coal, electricity, and diesel can be curtailed to the minimum. We should have the will to do it.
Currently, electrical grids in India are not reliable and they are wide and far away and it is somewhat difficult to get where they need to go. Transporting power over long distances leads to power loss up to 10 per cent, which cost most dear and the struggle for energy would go on. It would probably better to attempt it on a small scale first and assess the success and make an all-out attempt to try on a larger scale. Solar panels have come up in Pune, Manipal, Bengaluru, and some other southern states as well and other places in India as well. It is time to start the process from grass root level from housing societies and save energy to the hilt. We all need to make the solar endeavour a popular one and gain the optimum benefit of lower cost once it is established.
(This is the first part of the Diary and the latter part will continue tomorrow.)
(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)
Several Right-wingers especially BJP’s Member of Parliament Prahlad Joshi raised objections on the celebrations of ‘Tipu Jayanti’. Tipu Sultan, the controversial 18th-century ruler of the erstwhile Mysore Kingdom, is liked by many and equally hated by the most. While BJP and some Hindu organisations see Tipu as a “religious bigot” and a “brutal killer”, few Kannada outfits call him “anti-Kannada” citing that he had promoted Persian at the cost of the local language. Tipu Sultan, however, is a debatable figure in Kodagu district as Kodavas (Coorgis), a martial race believes that thousands of their men and women were seized and held captive during his occupation and subjected to torture, death, and forcible conversion to Islam. He is also accused of the execution of Mandayam Iyengars at the temple town of Melkote in Mandya district on the day of Deepavali, as they supported the then Maharaja of Mysuru. However, the scale of such suppression is disputed by several historians, who see Tipu as a secular and modern ruler who took on the might of the British.
Forget about Tipu Sultan and the controversy, the irony is that most of the Indians are not even aware of their History. In India, myths have always been more important than historical facts. In ancient India, contemporary authors created epic saga, drama, poem about the Kings and their kingdoms but never wrote any historical account. Noting down of the historical accounts by daily or yearly events probably started after the Arab invasion in the Indian subcontinent. We came to know about our great Indus civilisation in 1921. Asoka and his inscriptions were discovered from a forest and later deciphered by James Principe in the mid-19th century. It tells a lot about the carelessness of the Indians about their history. The best example of unawareness is the current stand of the Indian society regarding homosexuality. Many Indians tag it as a perverted western culture. But, the Truth is that homosexuality was very much prevalent in the ancient India or maybe even in the medieval era. There is no account of punishing homosexuals in the Delhi Sultanate or the Mughal rule. It were the Britishers who criminalised homosexuality calling it an ‘unnatural act’ in 1860 by introducing IPC 377. It was an incarnation of the Victorian morality which was not Indian at all.
First the European Ideologists and the Britishers abused the Indian history in a way to make the Indians hate their own ancestry and then in the post-independent India, the Marxist historians with their ardent Muslim appeasement schemes (all in the name of avoiding communal tensions) falsified the Indian history so as to present a picture that is horribly distorted. And whenever any attempt to correct the official textbooks was made, they used typical communist techniques of calling their opponents as fascists, Hindu right-wingers, and so on. They not only whitewashed Islamic tyranny, gave undue weightage to the Mughals, but also selectively kept the descriptions of Hindu kingdoms to a minimum and mostly denigrated the Hindu culture. Not only that, the new research done in the last 3-4 decades, which has changed many of the views propagated by the racist colonial historians, doesn’t find a place in our history books. Domination of the academia by the Islamo-leftists in India has been the main reason. Islam used extreme inhuman means to establish itself in India; it became an obstacle for the coming together of the Indian and Islamic cultures.
Sultan Mahmud looted valuables worth 2 crore dirham from the Somnath Temple and used the Shivling as a step leading up to the Masjid in Ghazni. Repeated destruction of the temples took place by the Muslim raiders who also destroyed documents/records kept there what we’re calling the Puranas. Surviving records are still kept hidden by the ignorant custodians (e.g. Shankaracharya records). The Britishers were the culprits. They created their own histories that suited them to show the Indians in poor light. History written by William Jones was struck down by the English rulers and the Archbishop of Ireland since as per them “The world was created only on October 4, 4004 BC”, any dates beyond was not acceptable to them. The British and the western historians created 326 BC as the “sheet anchor of the Indian history” and accordingly added and subtracted kings, rulers, dynasties, etc. Thereby, they obliterated almost 1,200 years of history, Max Mueller too was the chief reason for this. The British imposed their version of history to be the “official version” which was followed by the Indians without amendments. The British and the western historians gave too much credit to the non-existing accounts of Megasthenes which were in fact lost and only a few passages were reproduced (with errors) by others. Chandragupta of Maurya dynasty was mistaken for Chandragupta of Gupta dynasty. No attention/relevance was given to the existing and surviving Puranas that have detailed accounts. All Indian history beyond 326 BC was taken as hearsay, imaginary, and false fables. The Communist Party of India supported the Congress views of accepting history as the British told. Any changes were not acceptable since they could “harm the sentiments of the Muslims and Christians” in India. Basically, it was the “appeasement policy” of the successive governments who were unwilling to bring forth the true history since they could harm the minorities who were to be blamed for the destruction of the Indian records and properties. Any changes now based on even firm evidence will be taken up as an attack on Secularism and threat to the minorities. And therefore, Indian ancient history will remain captive to our own politics.
Under Nehru’s pseudo-secular rule, “Hindu-bashing became a popular pastime.” Moreover, Nehru “had a great sympathy for communism. He encouraged Marxist think-tanks such as the Jawaharlal Nehru University [JNU] in New Delhi, which has bred a lot of ‘Hindu-hating scholars’ who are adept at negating Muslim atrocities and running to the ground the greatness of Hinduism and its institutions.” These Marxist “historians,” well-ensconced at the JNU, have long been masterminding the politically correct textbooks of India’s history used in the Indian schools. No doubt that the Mughals are covered in great detail in the Indian school textbooks. And the logic behind this is not hard to find. The Mughals ruled over large paths of India, produced some remarkable rulers, and left behind great architectural structures as well a significant amount of literature to ensure their imprint on the Indian subcontinent would be hard to forget. But there are equally great Hindu, Sikh rulers here, who gave Moguls a tough time, their history is still unknown to the common public of India, somewhere people have woken up to make changes and adhere to the History of the Hindu leaders.
(Any suggestions, comments or dispute with regards to this article send us on feedback@www.afternoonvoice.com)
