Gujarat CM suffers major setback ahead of results to the "all-important" polls to local self-governing bodies

By RK Misra*
Even as Gujarat waits with bated breath for the results of the all important local self-government elections on Wednesday, the last three days have been harbinger of bad news for the Anandiben Patel government.
If it was the Gujarat High Court which on Tuesday quashed the charges of waging war filed against 22-year-old Patidar quota leader Hardik Patel, two days earlier on Monday, Vipul Chaudhary who had been pushed out as chairman of the powerful Mehsana district, Dudhsagar dairy swept the polls and is expected to be reinstalled soon.
Both developments constitute a setback for the Gujarat chief minister on the eve of results to the local self government elections in the state which is seen as a semifinal encounter before the all important State Assembly elections in 2017.
The Anandiben Patel government had left no stone unturned to keep both Hardik Patel and Vipul Chaudhary out of circulation.
On Tuesday, Justice JB Pardiwala waived the charges of waging war against the government filed by the the Gujarat Police against Hardik Patel and his five associates.
But retained the sedition case against them. He directed removal from the FIR of IPC sections 121(waging war against the government),153A(promoting enmity between different communities) and 153B (assertion prejudicial to national integrity).The court, however, turned down plea to drop IPC,section 124(conspiracy to wage war against the government.
Babubhai Mangukia, Hardik’s lawyer who spoke to mediapersons thereafter said that the Court ruling would clear the way for obtaining bail for Hardik and his associates who have been behind bars ever since the charges were slapped. Hardik was picked up by the Rajkot police on October 18 and subsequently the cops have been passing him on to each other under different jurisdictions with the aim of keeping him behind bars until the local self government elections get over. Lawyer Mangukia said that he has already moved the plea for bail in the lower court.
In the case of Vipul Chaudhary, both the erstwhile chief minister Narendra Modi and later his successor Anandiben Patel had pulled out all stops in a desperate bid to remove him from important positions in the milk cooperatives. Though belonging to the BJP, Chaudhary ran foul of the ruling dispensation after his presence was noted at a press meet addressed by Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi in Ahmedabad.
In the period thereafter, Chaudhary was unceremoniously ousted from the chairmanship of the Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), the apex marketing body of milk cooperatives in the state grossing an annual turnover of over Rs20,000 crores through a no-confidence motion.
Subsequently, he was also removed from the chairmanship of the Dudhsagar dairy, Mehsana, through a notification issued by the registrar of cooperatives who also debarred him from contesting elections for the next three years. However, Chaudhary knocked at the doors of the supreme Court which removed the bar on his contesting elections.
In the elections to the dairy cooperative held subsequently, Vipul Chaudhary and three of his supporting members were re-elected uncontested from Mansa while his panel won 13 of the total 16 seats routing the official BJP panel which was headed by Ashok Chaudhary, the general secretary of the Mehsana district BJP.in both the case of Hardik as well as Vipul chaudhary, the state government had gone out of it’s way to make them issues of prestige.

Now all eyes are set on the local self government election results of Gujarat on December 2.

---

*Senior journalist based in Gandhinagar. Blog: http://wordsmithsandnewsplumbers.blogspot.in/

Comments

Green revolution "not sustainable", Bt cotton a failure in India: MS Swaminathan

Counterview Desk
In a recent paper in the journal “Current Science”, distinguished scientist PC Kesaven and his colleague MS Swaminathan, widely regarded as the father of the Green Revolution, have argued that Bt insecticidal cotton, widely regarded as the continuation of the Green Revolution, has been a failure in India and has not provided livelihood security for mainly resource-poor, small and marginal farmers.
Sharply taking on Green Revolution, the authors say, it has not been sustainable largely because of adverse environmental and social impacts, insisting on the need to move away from the simplistic output-yield paradigm that dominates much thinking. Seeking to address the concerns about local food security and sovereignty as well as on-farm and off-farm social and ecological issues associated with the Green Revolution, they argue in favour of what they call sustainable ‘Evergreen Revolution’, based on a ‘systems approach’ and ‘ecoagriculture’.
Pointing out that Evergreen Revol…

Rejoinder: Inescapable to have Central Water Commission as strong technical body in India

By BN Navalawala*
This is with reference to Counterview Blog (December 5, 2018), "Modi govt 'shelves' water reforms report, shows 'no interest' in its recommendations", below mentioned are my comments/observations thereon:
A committee was constituted under the Chairmanship of Dr. Mihir Shah, Former Member, Planning Commission, for restructuring of Central Water Commission (CWC) and Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) for optimal development of water resources in the country in the backdrop of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM).

Some Hindu bodies in US defending BJP-RSS' divisive, violent activities: Agnivesh

Counterview Desk Last week, Washington DC saw speakers at a religious freedom roundtable, chaired by the US Ambassador for Religious Freedom, Sam Brownback, express concern over "eroding" space for religious freedom in India. Dr Mike Ghouse, executive director, of the Center for Pluralism in Washington DC, referring to the roundtable, said in an email alert that Indian-Americans have "a moral duty to prevent India from being labeled as a Country of Particular Concern by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF)".

Preventing childhood deaths: India performs worse than Bangladesh, "equals" Pakistan

By Rajiv Shah
A just-released study, “The Pneumonia and Diarrhea Progress Report 2018”, prepared by the International Vaccine Access Centre (IVAC) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, has identified India among 15 other countries which are still far off the mark in achieving the targets of the Global Action Plan for the Prevention of Pneumonia and Diarrhea (GAPPD).

Karnataka: NGO Akshay Patra "not sensitive" to nutrition demands of school children

Counterview Desk
Well-known civil rights organizations, Right to Food Campaign and Jan Swasthya Abhiyan, have sent a letter to the Union minister of human resource development, the Chief Minister of Karnataka, other concerned ministers and officials of the state expressing concerns regarding the mid-day meal (MDM) to school children, insisting, all contracts to the Akshay Patra for supply of MDM should be immediately terminated.

India's rewritten textbooks talk of demerits of democracy, praise Hitler, underrate Mughals

Counterview Desk
A detailed, 3,800-word review of the books rewritten under directions of the BJP rulers across India since Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power in May 2014 has suggested that one of aims of the books is to instill a sense of doubt about India’s democratic polity among the country’s young minds. Reviewed in the prestigious US journal, “The New York Review of Books”, in its latest issue (December 6, 2018) by Alex Traub, the scrutiny insists, the effort has also been to paint Indian history from the angle of “Hindu triumphalism”, even as creating “Islamophobia”.

Govt of India "tarnishing" NGO reputation, dossier leaked selectively: Amnesty

Counterview Desk
Amnesty International India has said that a deliberate attempt is being made to tarnish its reputation by leaking a dossier, supposedly made by investigating agencies, to media without giving it access to any such information. The high profile NGO’s claim follows a Times Now report about proceedings launched by investigative agencies, including Enforcement Directorate (ED) against the rights body for “violations” of rules pertaining to overseas donations.

World Bank clarifies: Its 26th rank to India not for universal access to power but for ease of doing business

By Our Representative
In a major embarrassment to the Government of India, the World Bank has reportedly clarified that it has not ranked India 26th out of 130 countries for providing power to its population. The top international banker’s clarification comes following Union Power Minister Piyush Goyal’s claim that India has “improved to 26 position from 99” in access to electricity in just one year.

Four children die after poor UP Dalit, Muslim families forced to flee to forest area: PVCHR

Counterview Desk
Peoples’ Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR) has said that the forest department police’s crackdown, allegedly without any prior notice, on Dalit and Muslim households in Dakhin Tola, Churk Bazaar, Sonbhadra district, Uttar Pradesh, beating up “children and old people, women, and men in an inhuman way”, has led to “forced displacement, starvation and discrimination”. This has reportedly affected about 350 people.

Vedanta is out but corporate loot continues in Odisha: Local activists tell NAPM yatra

By Our Representative
Lok Shakti Abhiyan leader Prafulla Samantara, winner of the Goldman Environmental (also known as Green Nobel) Prize in 2017, has regretted that though Sundergarh in Odisha, like other forest areas, is a fifth schedule area, where Forest Rights Act (FRA) and Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act (PESA) is applicable, but these laws are being “outrightly violated to facilitate corporate loot.”

Counterview

Search This Blog