Junior Digest

Feb 22,2024: Israeli lawmakers have voted to back Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s rejection of any “unilateral” recognition of a Palestinian state as international calls have grown for the revival of Palestinian statehood negotiations.

Wednesday’s symbolic declaration, issued during Israel’s war on Gaza, also received backing from members of the opposition with 99 of 120 lawmakers voting in support, a Knesset spokesperson said.

The Israeli position is that any permanent accord with the Palestinians must be reached through direct negotiations between the two sides and not by international dictates.

That is despite Netanyahu openly stating his opposition to a Palestinian state, and presenting himself to the Israeli public as a bulwark against any such state. No talks on Palestinian statehood talks have been held since 2014, when Israel refused to accept a state encompassing all of the Palestinian territory illegally occupied by Israel.

“The Knesset came together in an overwhelming majority against the attempt to impose on us the establishment of a Palestinian state, which would not only fail to bring peace but would endanger the state of Israel,” Netanyahu said.

The vote was condemned by the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates, which accused Israel of holding the rights of the Palestinian people hostage by occupation of territories where Palestinians seek to establish a state.

New Delhi Feb 3,2023: Former Deputy Prime Minister and veteran BJP leader L K Advani will be conferred with Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian award of the country.

The announcement was made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his social media handle X.

Through his post, the PM said that he spoke to LK Advani and congratulated him on being conferred this honour.

Narendra Modi on X said, “I am very happy to share that Shri LK Advani Ji will be conferred the Bharat Ratna. I also spoke to him and congratulated him on being conferred this honour”.

“One of the most respected statesmen of our times, his contribution to the development of India is monumental. His is a life that started from working at the grassroots to serving the nation as our Deputy Prime Minister. He distinguished himself as our Home Minister and I&B Minister as well. His Parliamentary interventions have always been exemplary, full of rich insights,” he added.

Moradabad, Feb 21,2024: Putting an end on the speculations about a rift between Samajwadi Party (SP) and Congress over seat sharing in Uttar Pradesh, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav on Wednesday made it clear that both the parties will jointly contest the Lok Sabha election and asserted that there is no dispute between the two parties.

Akhilesh said that there will be an alliance between SP and Congress in UP and both the parties will contest the upcoming Lok Sabha election together.

He said that there is no dispute regarding seat sharing.

The SP President said, “Discussions have taken place between the two parties. Both the parties will contest the Lok Sabha election together. An agreement has been reached regarding seat sharing.

There is no dispute between the two parties now. Everything will become clear to you very soon.”

About participating in the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra of Rahul Gandhi, Yadav said that ‘all is well that ends well’.

Ranchi, Feb 2,2024: Veteran Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) leader Champai Soren was sworn in as the new Chief Minister of Jharkhand alongside two other ministers belonging to the coalition constituents Congress and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) here on Friday.

Sixty-seven year old Soren was administered the oath of office and secrecy by the state Governor C P Radhakrishnan at a solemn function in the Darbar Hall of the Raj Bhavan.

Congress legislature party leader Alamgir Alam and Satyanand Bhokta of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) took oath as ministers after Soren, who has been asked to prove his majority on the floor of the Assembly within ten days from the date of his appointment.

Sixty-seven-year-old Soren replaces his party leader Hemant Soren, who resigned on Wednesday night and has been arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case linked to an alleged land scam.

Champai Soren, who represents the Saraikela constituency in the Assembly, is the seventh Chief Minister of the tribal-majority eastern state. He is a four-time member of the Jharkhand Assembly. Earlier, he was elected once as a legislator in Bihar before Jharkhand’s formation.

The 1956-born Champai Soren was the minister in charge of Transport, Scheduled Tribes, Scheduled Caste & Backward class welfare in Hemant Soren’s cabinet. Both Alam and Bhokta also were members of Hemant Soren’s cabinet since 2019.

After taking the oath, Soren told the media his government would speed up and ensure the timely completion of the initiatives taken by the coalition government under the leadership of Hemant Soren for the holistic development of the tribals and all other people of Jharkhand.

“We will work to fulfill the hopes and aspirations of the people of the state,” he said.

New Delhi, February 18,2024: Looking back at 10 years of the government at the Centre under his leadership, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said the past decade at the helm bears testimony to courageous and far-reaching decisions.
Addressing party leaders and supporters on the closing day of the BJP’s National Convention at the state-of-the-art Bharat Mandapam on Sunday, Prime Minister Modi said, “The last 10 years of our government stands testimony to courageous and far-reaching decisions. We resolved tasks that had been pending for centuries. We fulfilled a dream and a wish going back five centurues by building the Ram Temple in Ayodhya. The country, in general, and Jammu and Kashmir in particular, were rid of Article 370 after nearly seven decades. Also, it took us six decadaes after independence to rename ‘Rajpath’ as ‘Kartavya Path’. The demand for ‘One Rank, One Pension’ was also fulfilled after four decades by our government,” PM Modi said.
Expanding on the signifcance of the ‘Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam’, a legislation aimed at raising the representation of women in Parliament and state legislatures, Prime Minister Modi said, “We brought a law that guarantees more reservation for women in the Parliament as well as state legislative assemblies after three decades. We also showed the courage to implement a law that puts an end to the practice of Triple Talaq (among Muslims). The requirement for a new Parliament House had been felt by many for long. It was our government that fulfilled this long-pending requirement.”
PM Modi further said the BJP workers are fortunate to have witnessed ‘revolutionary changes’ across the country over the last 10 years.
“The BJP workers are fortunate to have witnessed revolutionary changes over the past 10 years of our government. Any country can progress and reach its promised place when the people come to appreciate and cherish its heritage and history. During our decade in governance, the country has not only come to cherish its heritage but also flaunt it with pride,” PM Modi said.
Earlier, on the inaugural day of the national convention on Saturday, the BJP passed a significant political resolution titled ‘Viksit Bharat’, highlighting the achievements of the BJP-led NDA at the Centre under Prime Minister Modi. It added that the BJP would return for a third term at the helm and carry forward its roadmap for holistic development and welfare.
With the Lok Sabha polls around the corner, the BJP National Convention was aimed at fleshing out the party’s strategy and charging up cadres ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.

Quetta, Pakistan,Feb 07,2024: A pair of bombings at the election offices of a political party and an independent candidate in southwest Pakistan killed at least 24 people and wounded more than two dozen others, officials said Wednesday. The blasts came one day before parliamentary elections are to be held across the country.

The first attack happened in Pashin, a district in Baluchistan province, said Jan Achakzai, the spokesperson for the provincial government. Officials said at least 14 people were killed in the attack and the wounded are being transported to a nearby hospital. Police said some of them were listed in critical condition.
Later Wednesday, another bombing at the election office of politician Fazlur Rehman’s Jamiat Ulema Islam party in Qilla Saifullah town of Baluchistan killed at least 10 people, Acahkzai and local authorities said. CBS News’ Sami Yousafzai said the JUI party is seen as close to the Afghan Taliban, which retook power in the neighboring country in August 2021.
Attack comes despite tight election security

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing, which came despite the deployment of tens of thousands of police and paramilitary forces across Pakistan to ensure peace following a recent surge in militant attacks in the country, especially in Baluchistan.

Achakzai sought to reassure the public that peaceful elections would go ahead in Baluchistan on Thursday despite the attack.
In recent years, Pakistan has struggled to rein in surging militancy, especially in the former stronghold of Pakistan Taliban. Militants have a presence in Baluchistan and have targeted civilians in recent years. The Pakistani Taliban and other militant groups also have a strong presence in the province.

Feb 15,2024: IN a historic verdict barely weeks before the Lok Sabha polls are set to be notified, the Supreme Court struck down Thursday the Narendra Modi government’s 2018 electoral bonds scheme of anonymous political funding.

Highlighting that “the information about funding to a political party is essential for a voter to exercise their freedom to vote in an effective manner”, a five-judge Constitution bench, headed by Chief Justice of India

D Y Chandrachud, said that changes made in the laws to implement the scheme were unconstitutional.

Holding the scheme “violative” of the constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression and right to information, the court did not agree with the Centre’s contention that it was meant to bring about transparency and curb black money in political funding.

In its two separate but unanimous verdicts spanning 232 pages, the court also directed the SBI, the authorised financial institution under the scheme, to submit by March 6 the details of electoral bonds purchased since April 12, 2019 till date to the Election Commission which will publish the information on its official website by March 13.
“SBI must disclose details of each electoral bond encashed by political parties which shall include the date of encashment and the denomination of the electoral bond,” the bench said.

On April 12, 2019, the SC, in an interim order, had asked political parties to submit details of donations via electoral bonds to the EC in a sealed cover to be kept in the safe custody of the commission till further orders.

The SC also directed that electoral bonds which are within the validity period of 15 days but have not been encashed by political parties shall be returned by the political party or the purchaser — depending on who is in possession of the bond — to the issuing bank which shall refund the amount to the purchaser’s account.

The bench, also comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna, B R Gavai, J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, struck down a set of amendments. “The Electoral Bond Scheme, the proviso to Section 29C(1) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 (as amended by Section 137 of the Finance Act 2017); Section 182(3) of the Companies Act (as amended by Section 154 of the Finance Act 2017); and Section 13A(b) (of the Income Tax Act) (as amended by Section 11 of the Finance Act 2017) are violative of Article 19(1)(a) and unconstitutional,” the bench said.

It held that “the deletion of the proviso to Section 182(1) of the Companies Act, permitting unlimited corporate funding to political parties is arbitrary and violative of Article 14”.

Section 29C of the RPA as amended by the Finance Act 2017 stipulated that the political party need not disclose financial contributions received through electoral bonds. Section 13A of the IT Act as amended said that the political party does not have to maintain a record of contributions received through electoral bonds. Section 182 of the Companies Act 2013 was amended by the Finance Act 2017 by which the earlier requirement of disclosure of particulars of the amount contributed by companies to political parties in their profit and loss accounts was deleted and donors were only required to disclose the amount contributed without disclosing particulars about the political party to which the contribution was made.

The court did not agree with the Centre’s submission that the political party which receives the contribution does not know of the identity of the contributor as neither the bond would have their name nor could the bank disclose such details to the party.

The court argued that “de jure anonymity of the contributors does not translate to de facto anonymity.” Saying that the scheme is not fool-proof, the court said that there are “sufficient gaps” in the scheme which enable political parties to know who paid how much.

For example, Clause 12 of the scheme says the bond can be encashed only by the party by depositing it in the designated bank account. “The contributor could physically hand over the electoral bond to an office-bearer of the political party…or the contributor could after depositing the electoral bond disclose the particulars of the contribution to a member of the political party for them to cross-verify. …ninety four percent of the contributions through electoral bonds have been made in the denomination of one crore. Electoral bonds provide economically resourced contributors who already have a seat at the table selective anonymity vis-à-vis the public and not the political party,” the court said.

The government had argued that the scheme was intended to curb black money and ensure that contributions to parties flow through legitimate banking channels.

But the bench held that the scheme does not satisfy the least restrictive test necessary for imposing curbs under Article 19(2) on the right to information under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution. “The purpose of curbing black money is not traceable to any of the grounds in Article 19(2)”.

The court added that the scheme “is not the only means for curbing black money in Electoral Financing” and “there are other alternatives which substantially fulfil the purpose and impact the right to information minimally when compared to the impact of electoral bonds on the right to information”.

For contributions below Rs 20,000, electronic transfer is the “least restrictive” and “Electoral Trust” for amounts above that, it pointed out.

The bench held that “the right to informational privacy extends to financial contributions to political parties which is a facet of political affiliation” but added that “the Constitution does not establish a hierarchy between the right to information guaranteed under Article 19(1)(a) and the right to informational privacy to political affiliation, traceable to Articles 19(1)(a), 19(1)(b), 19(1)(c), and Article 21”.

The SC said, “we are unable to see how the disclosure of information about contributors to the political party to which the contribution is made would infringe political expression. .. Under the current Scheme, it is still open to the political party to coerce persons to contribute. Thus, the argument of the Union of India that the Electoral Bond Scheme protects the confidentiality of the contributor akin to the system of secret ballot is erroneous”.

On the amendment to Section 182 of the Companies Act permitting unlimited political contributions by companies as manifestly arbitrary, the SC said “the ability of a company to influence the electoral process through political contributions is much higher when compared to that of an individual.”

A company, the bench said, has a “much graver influence on the political process, both in terms of the quantum of money contributed to political parties and the purpose of making such contributions.” It added: “Contributions made by individuals has a degree of support or affiliation to a political association. However, contributions made by companies are purely business transactions, made with the intent of securing benefits in return. The amendment to Section 182 is manifestly arbitrary for treating political contributions by companies and individuals alike”.

The apex court said, “Companies before the amendment to Section 182 could only contribute a certain percentage of the net aggregate profits. The provision classified between loss-making companies and profit-making companies for the purpose of political contribution and for good reason.. the underlying principle of this distinction was that it is more plausible that law-making companies will contribute to political parties with a quid pro and not for the purpose of income tax benefits”.

“The provision as amended by the Finance Act of 2017 does not recognise that the harm of contributions by loss-making companies in the form of quid pro quo is much higher. Thus the amendment…is manifestly arbitrary for not making a distinction between profit-making and loss-making companies for the purposes of political contribution”.

The court pointed out: “The purpose of Section 182 is to curb corruption and electoral financing. For instance, the purpose of banning a government company from contributing is to prevent such companies from entering the political fray. Amendment to Section 182 by permitting unlimited corporate contributions authorises unrestrained influence of companies in the electoral process. This is violative of the principle of free and fair elections and political equality captured in the value of one person, one vote.”

The verdict said financial contributions to political parties are usually made for two reasons — they may constitute an expression of support to the political party or the contribution may be based on a “quid pro quo”.

“The huge political contributions made by corporations and companies should not be allowed to conceal the reason for financial contributions made by another section of the population: a student, a daily wage worker, an artist, or a teacher. When the law permits political contributions and such contributions could be made as an expression of political support which would indicate the political affiliation of a person, it is the duty of the Constitution to protect them,” it said.

In October last year, the bench began hearing arguments on the four petitions, including those filed by Congress leader Jaya Thakur, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the NGO Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).

Chennai, Feb 18,2024: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has chargesheeted one more accused in a case related to the revival of the proscribed Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Sri Lanka and India.
A NIA statement here said, the chargesheet was filed on Saturday evening before the Special Court for NIA cases/Sessions Court for exclusive trials of Bomb Blast cases at Poonamallee here by the NIA Kochi branch.
Lingam.A alias Adilingam is the 14th accused to be chargesheeted in the case, in which 16 people were arraigned as accused so far.
Adilingam has been charged with conspiring and acting to revive the proscribed terrorist organisation through illegal trade in narcotic drugs and arms.
He had also acted as an agent for collection of hawala money obtained from the sale of narcotic drugs, which were being further distributed to promote LTTE activities.
In the supplementary chargesheet filed before the court, the agency has elaborated on the role of Adilingam in the entire conspiracy.
The chargesheet reveals that the accused was working as Production Executive in the Tamil film industry while he was clandestinely working as a key operative of the major LTTE leaders/cadres and drug traffickers, including Gunasekaran and his son Thilipan, both citizens of Sri Lanka.
Earlier, on June 15, 2023, the NIA had filed a chargesheet before the Special Court against 13 accused, charging them with hatching conspiracies in various parts of Tamil Nadu to carry out terrorist activities and drug trafficking in the territorial waters of the Indian Ocean.
One such case was registered and investigated by the NIA Kochi Branch following the seizure of a huge consignment, intercepted by central agencies in 2021. The consignment consisted of over 300 kgs of heroin, five AK-47 rifles and 1,000 rounds of Pakistan-made ammunition.

WASHINGTON, Feb 7 ,2024: An array of unconventional, privately funded plans to exploit the moon, including as a site for human ashes and sports-drink containers, has gathered steam in recent years as NASA pushes to make Earth’s natural satellite more accessible.

Concerns about possible gaps in U.S. oversight and legal questions about proper use of the moon have rocketed to the forefront.

Landers built by private companies and emerging space powers are expected in the next few years to join the U.S. flag and other vestiges of past programs to the moon. Other initiatives could include using the moon as a site for capsules of human remains, advertising sports drinks, and maybe even a two-story-tall Christian cross made of the moon’s own dirt.

“We’re just at the beginning of exploring the moon, and … we need to be careful we’re not contaminating it – not just with biological and chemical contamination but with litter,” said Leslie Tennen, an attorney practicing international space law.

Among the payloads aboard a recent private moon mission by U.S. company Astrobotic – which ultimately failed to reach the moon’s surface – were dozens of capsules of human ashes and a can of Japanese sports drink Pocari Sweat. The exact purpose of the can was unclear.

Under U.S. law, those items and anything else can go to the moon, as long as the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and other agencies certify a rocket payload’s launch off Earth does not “jeopardize public health and safety … U.S. national security … or international obligations of the United States.”

The issue will gain more attention as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration leans heavily on private companies to cut the costs of its trips to the moon. At present, there are no U.S. laws or standards outlining what is acceptable on the celestial body’s surface. NASA envisions long-term moon bases and hopes to spur a competitive commercial marketplace.

Lawyers with space-law expertise worry that the absence of regulations could pit U.S. companies against other countries operating on the lunar surface or spark international disputes over which private endeavors could be considered land appropriation or claims of sovereignty.

The lack of guidelines has some eying the possibilities.

Justin Park, a Washington, D.C.-based entrepreneur, wants to build a Christian cross on the moon potentially as big as a two-story building and made of hardened lunar dirt, an estimated $1 billion undertaking he has discussed with U.S. lawmakers and Catholic organizations.

“Nobody owns the moon,” Park said. “You don’t want to stomp on traditions, but you can’t hold the rest of the world back.” Overly restrictive regulations for moon activities, he said, would “destroy an industry before it gets off the ground.”

The crescent Earth rises above the lunar horizon in this NASA photograph taken from the Apollo 17 spacecraft in lunar orbit in 1972. REUTERS/NASA Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
‘RELIGIOUS TEST’

Texas-based Celestis, which launches cremated human remains into space and had arranged the ashes on Astrobotic’s Peregrine lander, drew ire from the Navajo Nation, which regards the moon as sacred and considered the company’s memorial mission sacrilege.

Celestis CEO Charles Schafer said memorials of the dead in space are inevitable as more humans traverse the cosmos.

“We don’t make space mission decisions on the basis of a religious test,” Schafer said. “I have a photo of 20,000 Buddhist monks celebrating our launch. So which religion rules?”

NASA officials overseeing the program that helped fund Astrobotic’s mission have said they have no control over what companies put on their landers, and that payload standards could be created in the future.

“You’ll see that evolve quite a bit over time,” said Chris Culbert, head of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program. “But I think the first step is a successful landing – that’s what we care about most in these early steps.”

Some officials at NASA and space agencies from other countries have privately regarded the ashes and sports drink as obstructions and trash that would set a negative precedent, according to two U.S. officials who asked not to be identified.

With another private U.S. lunar lander due to launch next month, the lack of lunar regulation risks bringing Washington in conflict with the widely ratified 1967 Outer Space Treaty, lawyers said. That pact says countries must authorize and supervise the activities of nongovernmental entities.

That raises the stakes for the space industry, Biden administration and lawmakers who have battled for months over how to regulate novel commercial space activities, with industry groups resisting what they call innovation-stifling regulations.

Few countries have adopted standards for moon behavior, and rules remain unclear in international law, lawyers said.

Some feel too little has been done internationally to guide moon behavior.

“We are already late, and we are very urgently in need to start now, to discuss the moon at an international level,” said Martha Mejía-Kaiser, a Mexican-German space lawyer and board member of the International Institute of Space Law.

MOSCOW/KYIV, Feb 18,2024: Russia on Sunday said it had full control of the Ukrainian town of Avdiivka after Ukraine withdrew though Moscow said that some Ukrainian troops were still holed up in a vast Soviet-era coke plant after one of the most intense battles of the war.

The fall of Avdiivka is Russia’s biggest gain since capturing the city of Bakhmut in May 2023, and comes almost two years to the day since President Vladimir Putin triggered a full-scale war by ordering the invasion of Ukraine.

Russia’s defence ministry said its troops had advanced 8.6 km (5.3 miles) in that part of the 1,000-km (620-mile) front line, and that Russian troops were pressing forward after a deadly urban battle that has left the town an almost completely depopulated wreck.

Ukraine said it had withdrawn its soldiers to save troops from being fully surrounded after months of fierce fighting. Putin hailed the fall of Avdiivka as an important victory and congratulated Russian troops.

After the failure of Ukraine to pierce Russian lines last year, Moscow has been trying to grind down Ukrainian forces just as Kyiv ponders a major new mobilisation and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy appoints a new commander to run the war.

“The head of state congratulated Russian soldiers on this success, an important victory,” the Kremlin said in a statement on its website.

But Russia said some Ukrainian forces were still holed up at the Soviet-era coke plant, once one of Europe’s biggest, in Avdiivka, which is key to Russia’s aim of securing full control of the industrial Donbas region.

“Measures are being taken to completely clear the town of militants and to block Ukrainian units that have left the town and are entrenched at the Avdiivka Coke and Chemical Plant,” Russian Defence Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.

There was no public comment yet by Ukrainian authorities on this. Russian state television showed blue and yellow Ukrainian flags being taken down in Avdiivka and Russia’s white, blue and red tricolour flag raised, including over the coke plant.

Russia cast the Ukrainian withdrawal as rushed and chaotic, with some soldiers and weapons left behind. The Ukrainian military said there had been casualties but that the situation had stabilised somewhat after the retreat.

Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in February 2022, triggering the full-scale war after eight years of conflict in eastern Ukraine between Ukrainian forces on the one side and pro-Russian Ukrainians and Russian proxies on the other.

Avdiivka, which is called Avdeyevka by Russians, has endured a decade of conflict. It holds particular symbolism for Russia as it was briefly taken in 2014 by Moscow-backed separatists who seized a swathe of eastern Ukraine but was then recaptured by Ukrainian troops who built extensive fortifications.
WEAPONS SHORTAGES
U.S. President Joe Biden had warned that Avdiivka could fall to Russian forces because of ammunition shortages following months of Republican congressional opposition to a new U.S. military aid package for Kyiv.

A White House statement said Biden called Zelenskiy on Saturday to underscore the U.S. commitment to continue supporting Ukraine and reiterated the need for Congress to urgently pass the package.

New Delhi, Feb 7,2024: Addressing the logjam on the issue of funds devolution to Karnataka, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said that making false claims against the Finance Commission in the media shows the separatist mindset of the Congress.

“Through this advertisement in the media, the Congress is taking forward the language of separatism. This is one of the ways to break the country into pieces, and that way is by making false claims against the Finance Commission,” she told reporters here.

Sitharaman said the Karnataka government has given full-page national newspaper advertisements by using taxpayers’ money, in which six claims have been made, but two of them are outrageously false.

“One, it says zero has been given by the Centre for drought, which is disaster relief. Not zero. I told you a total of Rs 12,476 crore, has been given for disaster management and capital investment.

“If we have given money for disaster relief, how are they (Karnataka government) mentioning it in the advertisement?” she asked.

Sitharaman also dismissed the Karnataka government’s claim on non-release of special grants to the state.

She said, “The ad also claims the special grant is a mirage. I mentioned in the beginning that the special grant was not even there in the final recommendation. So, there is no recommendation of the Finance Commission but you are mentioning that here.”

These false claims by the Congress are the offshoot of a separatist mindset, Sitharaman said.

“I would like to humbly say that all of these things are arising out of just one mindset – the mindset of separatism – what the Deputy CM’s brother said. Congress party today is with separatists and they don’t condemn them.

“In this case as well, through this advertisement, the Congress is taking forward the language of separatism. This is one of the ways to break the country into pieces. The way is by leveling false allegations on the Finance Commission,” she said.

Earlier, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah led a “Chalo Delhi” protest by the state Congress leaders against the central government’s tax devolution policies.

Siddaramaiah alleged that for every Rs 100 given to the Centre, the state gets Rs 13 in return. He also said though Karnataka is the second-highest tax contributor nationwide, the centrally sponsored schemes grants have witnessed a consistent decline.

“From Rs 20,986 crore in 2021-22, it has sharply dropped to Rs 13,005 crore in 2023-24 – an alarming Rs 7,000 crore reduction,” he said.

The Centre is yet to release funds for flood relief and farmers issues in Karnataka, Karnataka CM alleged. “The reduction in our state’s share of central taxes from 4.71 percent in the 14th Finance Commission to 3.64 percent in the 15th Finance Commission has led to a staggering loss of approximately Rs 62,098 crore to Karnataka over five years,” he said.

Feb 16,2024: Farmers demanding higher prices for their crops will postpone a planned protest march to New Delhi until unions hold another round of talks with government ministers on Sunday.

Agriculture Minister Arjun Munda, who met farmers’ representatives on Thurdsay along with Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal and Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai, said the talks were “positive”.

“We have decided that the next meeting to take the discussion forward will take place on Sunday at 6 pm…We believe we will all find a solution together peacefully,” he told reporters following Thursday’s meeting.

Protest leader Jagjit Singh Dallewal also told reporters the farmers would hold off their march for now.

SANAA, Feb. 6 ,2024: The U.S.-British coalition launched three airstrikes on Yemen’s northern province of Saada on Tuesday before dawn, Houthi-run al-Masirah TV reported.

The strikes targeted sites in the eastern part of the province’s capital city, which bears the same name, the Houthi television said without elaborating further.

Feb 02,2024: Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the Union Budget — the one for the forthcoming financial year (2024-25). Since it’s the last one before Lok Sabha elections, the Budget is an interim one.

No changes were introduced to tax slabs. Meanwhile, the fiscal deficit target — the gap between government’s revenue and expenses — for 2024-25 (FY25) was set at 5.1% of the gross domestic product (GDP).
Budget 2024: Top Highlights from Union Budget 2024-25 by FM Nirmala Sitharaman

🔴 The revised fiscal deficit — the gap between government’s revenue and expenses — is at 5.8% of the GDP for 2023-24 (FY24). Fiscal deficit in FY25 is expected to be 5.1% of GDP. The target is to reduce the fiscal deficit to below 4.5% of the GDP in 2025-26 (FY26).

🔴 No changes to income tax slabs.

🔴 In a major announcement, the government has decided to withdraw outstanding direct tax demands up to Rs 25,000 for the period up to financial year 2009-10 and up to Rs 10,000 for financial years 2010-11 to 2014-15.

🔴 The number of tax filers swelled by 2.4 times, Sitharaman said. The direct tax collection has trebled since 2014. In 2024-25, the tax receipts are projected at Rs 26.02 lakh crore.

🔴 Tax exemptions given to start-ups extended till March 31, 2025.
🔴 In a bid to improve operations of passenger trains, the Sitharaman announced three major economic railway corridor programmes — energy, mineral and cement corridors, port connectivity corridors, and high traffic density corridors. “They will improve logistics efficiency and reduce cost. The resultant decongestion of the high-traffic corridors will also help in improving operations of passenger trains, resulting in safety and higher travel speed for passengers,” Sitharaman said. This will also reduce logistics cost.

🔴 The Finance Minister also announced 2 crore more houses under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana – Gramin ( PMAY-G).

🔴 “For our tech-savvy youth, this will be a golden era. A corpus of Rs 1 lakh crore will be established with 50-year interest free loan provided. The corpus will provide long term financing and re-financing with long tenures at low or nil interest rates. This will encourage the private sector to scale up research and innovation significantly in sunrise domains.”

🔴 “We need to have programmes that combine the powers of our youth and technology. A new scheme will be launched for strengthening deep tech technology for defence purposes and expediting atma nirbharta,” Sithraman said.

🔴 Sitharaman also announced plans to set up more medical colleges through utilisation of the “existing hospital infrastructure under various departments”. “A committee for this purpose will be set up to examine the issues and make relevant recomendations,” she said.

🔴 “Making triple talaq illegal, reservation of 1/3rd seats for women in Lok Sabha and state assemblies, and giving over 70 per cent houses under the PM Awas Yoajana in rural areas to women have enhanced their dignity,” Sitharaman said.

🔴 “Through roof-top solarisation, 1 crore households will be enabled to obtain up to 300 units of free electricity every month. This scheme follows the resolve of the Prime Minister on the historic day of the consecration of Shri Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.” The government aims to achieve ‘net zero’ by 2070.

🔴 For boost to tourism, “long-term interest free loans to be provided to States to encourage development.”

🔴 Starting off her speech, Sitharaman noted that the Indian economy has witnessed positive transformation in the last 10 y ears.

🔴 “Poor, women, youth and farmers — their needs, their aspirations will guide country’s growth.”

🔴 “The government is working towards making India ‘Viksit Bharat’ by 2047…Our focus is sabka sath, sabka vikas,” Sitharaman said.

🔴 “The government is equally focused on GDP – Governance, Development and Performance.”

🔴 On social justice, Finance Minister said, “Our government is working with an approach to development that is all-round, all pervasive and all inclusive.”

The next ‘full budget’ will be presented in July, once a new government has been sworn in after the Lok Sabha elections.

Feb 19,2024: Vladamir Putin believes that he is “untouchable” after years of an iron grip on Russia, the wife of jailed opposition figure Vladimir Kara-Murza has said, as she accused the autocrat of murdering Alexei Navalny.
Jailed Russian opposition figure and outspoken Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny, who made global headlines when he was poisoned with a nerve agent in 2020, has died aged 47, the Russian prison service said.
Navalny, a 47-year-old former lawyer, rose to prominence campaigning against corruption in Putin’s Russia. He was known for his fiery rhetoric at public protests and in courtrooms, vocal presence on social media, and his team’s elaborate video investigations into state graft.

The cause of his reported death remained unclear, but the news drew a forceful reaction from Western leaders Friday, including US President Joe Biden, who pinned the blame on Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying that “what has happened to Navalny is yet more proof of Putin’s brutality.”

Navalny had returned to Russia in 2021 from Germany, where he had been treated after being poisoned with Novichok, a Soviet-era nerve agent. On arrival, Navalnvy was swiftly arrested on charges he dismissed as politically motivated.

He has been incarcerated ever since, with longstanding concerns for his welfare growing more intense after he was transferred to a penal colony north of the Arctic Circle.

The Russian prison service on Friday said Navalny “felt unwell after a walk” and “almost immediately” lost consciousness. It said it was investigating his “sudden death.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Putin had been informed of the reports and that it is for doctors to determine the cause of Navalny’s death.

Navalny’s wife, Yulia Navalnaya, meanwhile, called for Putin to be brought to justice.

“I want them to know that they will be punished for what they have done with our country, with my family, and with my husband,” she said in emotional remarks that prompted a standing ovation at the Munich Security Conference (MSC), adding that she did not have confirmation of her husband’s death.

“They will be brought to justice and this day will come soon.”

Lyudmila Navalnaya, Navalny’s mother, told Russian independent news outlet Novaya Gazeta she had last seen her son on February 12 – four days before his death – when he had been “alive, healthy and cheerful.” She said: “I don’t want to hear any condolences.”

At least 100 people were detained across the country for attending vigils and rallies for Navalny on Friday, according to OVD-Info, a group that monitors Russian repression.

In Moscow, a crowd of mourners lay flowers in the snow before a monument to victims of political repression in a growing tribute to the late opposition figure, according to video from the scene.

Navalny was “a symbol of opposition, a symbol of hope for some brighter future for Russia. And there’s a feeling that with his death, this hope dies,” Valeria, a 23-year-old tour guide, told Agence France-Presse in Moscow. “If there had been still been any hope left, it is even less now than it was before,” she said.

Navalny was sentenced to 19 years in prison in August, after he was found guilty of creating an extremist community, financing extremist activists and various other crimes. He was already serving sentences of 11-and-a-half years in a maximum security facility on fraud and other charges he denies.

Four months later, his lawyers said they had lost contact with Navalny, who was believed to be imprisoned in a penal colony about 150 miles east of Moscow.

He failed to appear at several scheduled court hearings in December. His legal team said on December 22 that he’d been missing for 17 days.

After filing 680 requests to locate Navalny, his team announced on December 25 that they had “found” him more than a thousand miles away at the IK-3 penal colony in Kharp, known as “Polar Wolf.”

Navalny joins a long list of Russian dissidents who died after challenging Putin’s legitimacy. Many questioned why he continued his campaign despite the clear risks to his safety.

Navalany’s reported death comes shortly before Russia’s presidential election, set to take place on March 17, which is widely seen by the international community as little more than a formality that will secure Putin a fifth term in power.

Even from detention, Navalny had continued to agitate against Putin’s government. In one of his final court appearances on February 8, Navalny urged prison service workers to “vote against Putin.”

Navalny posed one of the most serious threats to Putin during his rule, which has spanned more than two decades. He organized anti-government street protests and used his blog and social media to expose alleged corruption in the Kremlin and in Russian business.

His struggle earned him global fame when he was poisoned with Novichok in 2020. Navalny was airlifted from the Siberian city of Omsk and arrived comatose at a hospital in Berlin.

A joint investigation by CNN and the group Bellingcat implicated the Russian Security Service (FSB) in Navalny’s poisoning. The investigation found that the FSB toxins team of about six to 10 agents trailed Navalny for more than three years.

Navalny later duped one of the spies, Konstantin Kudryavtsev, into revealing how he was poisoned. He posed as a senior official from Russia’s National Security Council tasked with carrying out an analysis of the poisoning operation, and phoned Kudryavtsev, who provided a detailed account of how the nerve agents was applied to a pair of Navalny’s underpants.

Russia denied involvement in Nalvany’s 2020 poisoning. Putin said at the time that if the Russian security service had wanted to kill Navalny, they “would have finished” the job.
Western condemnation of the Kremlin was swift and fierce following news of Navalny’s death.

Dehradun, Feb 7,2024: The Uttarakhand assembly on Wednesday passed the landmark Uniform Civil Code (UCC) bill, that proposes the same set of laws governing issues like marriage, divorce, and inheritance for all religions.

Uttarakhand has become the first state in India to pass such a legislation in its Assembly.

Speaking in the assembly during the discussion on the issue, Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said that the UCC was introduced under constitutional provisions. The bill will become law once it is cleared by the governor.

“After independence, the makers of the Constitution gave the states the right under Article 44 to introduce the UCC at an appropriate time… People have doubts regarding this. We made the draft as per the constitutional system,” he said.

The UCC bill proposes to have the same set of laws governing issues like marriage, divorce, and inheritance for all religions.

Among the many proposals, the legislation makes it compulsory for live-in relationships to be registered under the law.

Once the proposed UCC Bill is in place, “live-in relationships” must be registered under the law within 1 month from the “date of entering into the relationship.”To live in a live-in relationship, adults must obtain consent from their parents”.

The bill also imposes a ban on child marriage and introduces a uniform process for divorce.

UCC provides equal rights to women of all religions in their ancestral property.

Feb 13,2024: Elon Musk has denied selling his Starlink internet service to Russia after Ukraine claimed the terminals were being used by Russian troops on the front lines of the war.

“A number of false news reports claim that SpaceX is selling Starlink terminals to Russia. This is categorically false,” Musk, who leads SpaceX and several other companies including Tesla, said in the post on X on Monday.

“To the best of our knowledge, no Starlinks have been sold directly or indirectly to Russia.”

Moscow also rejected Kyiv’s claim that Starlink terminals had been smuggled into Russia and were being used on a “systematic” basis in Russian-occupied Donetsk.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Starlink is not certified for use in Russia.

“It cannot be officially supplied here and is not officially supplied here,” Peskov told reporters on Monday.

On Sunday, Ukraine’s military intelligence agency GUR said that intercepted conversations among Russian forces revealed that Starlink terminals had been deployed among troops operating near the towns of Klishchiivka and Andriivka.

BRUSSELS ,Feb 13,2024: The United Arab Emirates, host of last year’s COP28 climate summit, and Azerbaijan and Brazil, the hosts of the next two U.N. climate summits, said on Tuesday they would team up to push for more ambitious emissions-cutting goals.

Preparations for the 2024 and 2025 climate talks are taking place amidst a political push-back on climate action in some countries – even as extreme weather becomes more frequent and temperature records are smashed nearly every month.

The UAE’s COP28 presidency said on Tuesday the summit hosts would form a three-way “troika” to focus on ensuring that more ambitious CO2-cutting pledges are made ahead of a deadline at 2025’s COP30 summit in Belem, Brazil.
“We cannot afford to lose momentum, we must do everything we can to keep 1.5 C within reach,” said Sultan Al Jaber, the UAE’s president of last year’s negotiations. The target of containing global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels was set out in the 2015 Paris Agreement.

The main task for this year’s COP29 summit in November in Baku, Azerbaijan, is to agree a new global target for climate finance for developing countries.

But some climate diplomats are already looking ahead to Brazil’s summit in 2025 as the next major milestone for global climate diplomacy. Nearly 200 countries are required to submit updated national CO2-cutting pledges in time for COP30.

The next round of countries’ climate targets is seen as a crucial last chance to prevent global warming exceeding 1.5C, a target fast slipping out of reach, as global greenhouse gas emissions continue to climb.

In a bumper year for elections, some politicians – from Republican frontrunner Donald Trump in the United States, to far-right parties seeking gains in the EU’s upcoming election – have pushed back on climate policies as they court voters.