Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu on Friday said that uniting every individual irrespective of caste, creed and religion is nationalism.

Addressing a gathering during Sankranti celebrations at Swarna Bharat Trust here, Naidu, quoting Swami Vivekananda, called upon the youth to draw inspiration from his teachings and contribute towards nation building.

“Youth must take lead from Swami Vivekananda’s teachings and rise to the present day needs – awake, arise and stop not till the goal is reached,” he said.

The Vice President said that Vivekananda taught us to do true service by helping people who are in need.

Quoting tall figures of Telugu literature like Sri Sri and Gurajada, he said that serving humanity is like serving God.

“Reaching the unreached, serving the unserved will give us more happiness and satisfaction,” he said.

Naidu also said that art goes beyond boundaries of religion, region and one must respect and appreciate the talent irrespective of caste, creed or religion and serve the country.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday accused Congress of politicising the “internal affairs” of the Supreme Court.

“Today we had a press conference which was addressed by four respected judges of Supreme Court. All those issues in the press conference pertained to interior issues of judiciary. It pertained to administrative issues of the highest court in the country. It was an internal affair of the judiciary,” BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said.

The BJP’s reaction came after Congress called a press conference and read out a statement calling the comments made by four Supreme Court judges “extremely disturbing” and appealed to the full Supreme Court to find solutions to preserve the independence of the judiciary.

Also read: 4 SC judges slam Chief Justice Dipak Misra over allocation of cases

Congress President Rahul Gandhi demanded that the PIL concerning the death of Judge B.H. Loya, who was hearing the Sohrabuddin fake shootout case, should be entrusted to the senior-most judges of the Supreme Court who should ensure a thorough and impartial investigation of the case by an independent SIT.

But Patra, slamming the Congress, said that Indian democracy “has shown the mirror” to the party, and termed its attempt “to fish (for) an opportunity where none existed politically” wrong.

“None of us should politicise issues of judiciary and this is an advice to Congress party. The people of this country are watching Congress party exposing itself,” he added

Divisions in the Supreme Court burst out in the open on Friday when four senior-most judges took an unprecedented step of addressing the media to accuse Chief Justice Dipak Misra of breaching rules in assigning cases to appropriate benches, with one of them pointing to the plea regarding the mysterious death of Special CBI judge B.H. Loya.

At a hurriedly-called press conference at his residence, Justice J. Chelameswar and three other colleagues said the Supreme Court administration was “not in order” and their efforts to persuade Justice Misra even this morning “with a specific request” failed, forcing them to “communicate with the nation” directly.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday blamed the BJP and RSS for the January 1 casteist riots in Koregaon-Bhima which claimed one life.

The Aam Aadami Party supremo said that “if people want riots, then they should elect the BJP, which follows a specific pattern in this”.

He alleged that BJP-RSS workers attacked Dalits in the Pune village of Koregaon-Bhima which led to caste tensions all over Maharashtra subsequently, including a statewide shutdown on January 3.

Kejriwal, who was on a day’s Maharashtra tour, addressed a public rally at Sindkhedraja, the birth place of Rajmata Jijabai, the mother of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, in Buldhana district.

He also targetted state Education Minister Vinod Tawde, “for shutting down thousands of schools permanently,” and said those who can’t run schools, how can they be expected to run the state government efficiently.

Incidentally, Kejriwal has earned kudos for improvements and empowement of public schools in Delhi state.

“Maharashtra is the land of great personality like Mahatma Jyotiba Phule and his wife Savitribai Phule, who dedicated their lives for the education of women and children. They started India’s first school for children but the BJP led government here is shutting down thousands of schools,” he said.

He urged the people to think whether they had they voted the BJP-led government to shut down schools.

The Delhi CM alleged that the BJP in Maharashtra had “crushed” the dreams of the Phules and Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj by its actions.

He stressed the need for the Maharashtra government to allocate more funds to the education sector, considering its annual budget is Rs 3 lakh crore, as compared to the Delhi budget of Rs 48,000 crore.

Accusing the Maharashtra government of corruption, Kejriwal said: “You have to choose between riots or food, employment, education and peace. If you want riots, then vote for the BJP.”

He highlighted the achievements of the Delhi Government in the education, power and farming sectors and lamented the plight of farmers in Maharashtra.

On the occasion, Col. Sudhir Sawant (retd), a former Congress Member of Parliament from Konkan, joined the AAP.

US President Donald Trump will extend sanctions relief on Iran under the 2015 nuclear deal, while warning that it will be the last waiver, senior Trump administration officials said on Friday.

Trump is seeking for an overhaul of the landmark deal with the European countries in the next 120 days, or he will pull the US out of the multilateral pact, the officials told reporters at a background briefing, Xinhua reported.

As Trump agreed to the sanctions relief, US Department of Treasury said on Friday that it has imposed sanctions on 14 individuals and entities over Iran’s alleged human rights abuses and ballistic missile programme.

Trump, who has more than once threatened to scrap the Iran nuclear deal inked by the six world powers and Iran in 2015, decertified to Congress Iran’s compliance with the pact last October.

Six persons have been arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting a minor girl in a park in the national capital, police said on Friday.

The accused were arrested on Thursday from their hideouts and sent to 14-day judicial custody, the police said.

According to the police, the incident took place on Monday in a park in Mandawali area of east Delhi.

“The victim, 15, came to the Children Park on January 8 around 3.00 p.m for walk. She was spotted by the three accused, identified as Sachin Gujjar, Shrikant and Harish. They befriended her and convinced her for an outing at some other place,” a senior police officer said.

“The accused, as per plan, took her to a park in Madhu Vihar and consumed liquor. They also served liquor to the girl,” he said.

They stayed there until evening and when it was dark around 6.00 p.m, Sachin called up his three more friends and asked to join them in the park, the officer said.

“The accused knew about the guard room inside the park. They took the victim there and sexually assaulted her,” he added.

The police officer, however, claimed that only three accused gang-raped her and the other three played helping hands in the crime.

Before leaving the victim, the accused also threatened her of dire consequence if she disclosed the incident to anyone, he said.

But, the victim narrated her ordeal before her parents, following which the police was informed.

A major twist has come in case of death of a teenager girl after self immolation due to stalking by boys after the police version of suicide as she had affair with one of the accused boys. The incident was reported in village Pachgaon Amar Singh Patta and succumbed to her burn injuries in the Medical college on Thursday.

SSP Meerut Manzil Saini ‘s press conference on Friday afternoon gave a twist to the case . In the PC all four accused of the case who were arrested were produced  and claimed that stalking or attempt of rape was not the reason of the self immolation of deceased Sakshi. The police version of the story says that Sakshi had friendship with one of the boys Shobhit of village Gawari and used to speak to him on phone. He also introduced her to Ankit and Ravi of his village and Mohit of Garhi village and she spoke to them as well. This came in the knowledge of the family members and on their strong objection she attempted for self immolation.

Deceased Sakshi(14) was daughter of Susheel Gupta of Village Pachgaon Amar Singh Patti . She was studying in class 8th in KVSS Inter college .  She burnt herself alive  throwing kerosene oil  on her. After immolation on Saturday she was admitted to Meerut Medical College with 80 percent burns and finally lost the battle of life on Thursday.

Unfortunately Medical college administration approached the Bhawanpur police twice but they did not paid any heed to visit the patient. SHO came just before the death of the girl.

” The family members did not approach the police neither after the incident nor after her death and in the Medical college as well they said that Sakshi met with an accident with the stove ,” told the police.

The SHO Bhawanpur Kartar Singh however   has been sent to the police lines in view of his reported  negligence in the case and the probe ordered by the SSP  Manzil Saini.

The Himachal Pradesh (HP) Chief Minister (CM) Jai Ram Thakur has announced that the various kinds of organised syndicate crime (mafia raj) in the state will be dealt with an iron hand. CM announced this during the reply to the discussion on the Motion of Thanks on Governor’s Address on Friday.

Reiterating his governments stand on zero tolerance on corruption, he said that the priority would be to provide a clean administration. He sought the support and co-operation of the Opposition to eliminate the various kinds of mafia that include drug mining mafia, mining mafia and liquor mafia in the state and said any suggestions from the Opposition were welcome for the progress and development of the state.

He said that the ‘Gudia’ rape and murder case and the death of Hoshiyar Singh, both being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had brought bad name to the state. He also announced a sum of Rs Three Lakh to the family of Suraj, the alleged accused who died in police custody and is survived by his widowed wife and two minor children.

He said that he was taking a feedback of the role of police officers in the ‘Gudia’ case and custodial death of Suraj and it will take time to restore the faith of the people in the police.

While blaming the previous Congress government for opening a large number of educational institutions in the name of expansion, he said that his government will review the same. He also confirmed that a large number of institutions, health services had been opened without taking into consideration the paucity of the staff.

Discrimination had been done by the previous Congress government, while disbursing funds from the CM Relief Fund, he said. He said that his government will expedite the various developmental works that were hanging in balance despite funds having been provided by the Central government. The state was reeling under the debt of Rs 46,500 Crore and it was necessary that the public should be aware of it, however, the Opposition was resenting this disclosure, he added.

Thakur apprised the house that the Centre had assured help to bail out the government from the financial crisis.

Earlier, during the discussion Congress Legislative Party leader MukeshAgnihotri blamed the BJP government at the Centre for Opposing the initiatives of the UPA government, which however, were given a nod after the BJP came to power. “The future of the BJP government is roll back, go back and later follow what the previous Congress government had done,” he said.

A health worker from the Sapnot village of Karsog Tehsil in Mandi district, GeetaVerma has figured in World Health Organization (WHO) calendar for the year 2018 for carrying out the Herculean task in ensuring almost 100 per cent coverage under measles and rubella programme in her area of operation.

Posted at Health Sub Centre, Shakardehra, in Block Jhanjeli of Mandi district, GeetaVerma massively undertook the campaign of inoculating children villages in remote areas of Mandi.

She travelled long distance to serve remote area people, whenever any immunisation campaign was launched by providing the service at the grass root level.

She went on foot and her own two wheeler to immunise children of shepherds and the Gurjar community in the remote areas of Raygarh in temporary camps measles and rubella programme.

Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister (CM) Jai Ram Thakur has extended his felicitations to Geeta for making it to the WHO calendar.

He said all the employees should have this type of commitment towards their job and an impulse for serving the people with dedication.

She has brought pride for the state.

Punjab Congress dares Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) to come clean on their stand over waiving of farmers’ debts on Friday. Punjab Congress chief Sunil Jakhar accused the SAD for failing on loan waiver during their ten-year rule.

He questioned the Akalis that what prevented them from waiving off the debts during ten-year regime in the state. “If at all they were sincere to debt-ridden farmers, let them approach the Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi as the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, of which SAD is also a constituent, to get all kinds of debts written off,” he said. For the past three years, the SAD leaders failed to take up the issue with Centre, despite of suicides committed by hundred of farmers in Punjab, which is known as the grain-bowl for the nation, he said.

Recalling that the Parkash Singh Badal led government had passed the ‘Punjab Settlement of Agricultural Indebtness Bill, 2016’ in March 2016, Jakhar said that the previous government failed in constituting district and state level agricultural debt settlement forums.

After about six months in September 2016, Akali government appointed District Agricultural Debt Settlement Forum chairman only in five districts out of 22 districts, but that emerged as another eyewash exercise since no staff was provided, further process too came to a grinding halt, he added.

The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday demanded complete loan waiver for all farmers including labourers and Dalits.

A SAD-BJP delegation urged Punjab governor VP Singh Badnore to direct the Congress led state government to implement a complete Rs 90,000 Crore farm loan waiver for all farmers. The delegation also urged the governor to ask the state government to get all sacrilege cases during the previous SAD-BJP government and present Congress tenure inquired by a sitting judge of the Supreme Court (SC).

The delegation also urged the governor to direct the state government to register a criminal case against the Sanaur leader Harinderpal Mann for allegedly instigating Congress workers to murder their Akali counterparts.

The joint delegation, which was headed by SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal and BJP state president Vijay Sampla accused the state government for betraying farmers by refusing to honour its commitment to implement a complete loan waiver. The delegation said besides ensuring a complete loan waiver, the governor should enjoin the government to waive of all loans of farm labourers and the dalit community also.

Sukhbir Badal said only a limited loan of a few per cent of the indebted farmers was being considered for waiver despite Cabinet decisions. He said that small farmers who had incurred a loan of more than Rs Two Lakh had been kept out of its ambit and even marginal farmers with 2.5 acres of land were virtually kept out of the scheme. The delegation leaders, including SAD Member of Parliaments (MPs) Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa and Prem Singh Chandumajra, said, suicides by farmers, which had already reached the 350 figure mark, were increasing by the day.

Meanwhile, in a separate memorandum, the SAD-BJP delegation also urged the governor to ask the state government to set up an inquiry headed by a SC sitting judge to go into all cases of sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib during the tenure SAD-BJP government and the present government. It was alleged in the memorandum that inquiry was being presently done by a Justice (retd) Ranjit Singh, who had always worked to further the interests of the Congress party and had always discriminated against the SAD.

The delegation alleged the contents had been prejudged by both the Chief Minister (CM) Amarinder Singh and Punjab Congress chief Sunil Jakhar before the commission had submitted its report.

Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Amarinder Singh on Friday directed the state industry department to explore the possibility of setting up a designated help desk to facilitate Indians settled abroad, especially those in Canada, who wanted to invest in Punjab.

The directive came during an interaction with members of the Indo-Canada Chamber of Commerce, who called on the CM at his official residence this afternoon. The CM suggested the delegation to explore investment opportunities in sectors of mutual interest, such as Education, Skill Development, Agro-based Industry and Information Technology. The CM called upon the visiting Canadian delegation to harness the positive industrial environment prevailing in the state. He assured them of his government’s complete support and co-operation in this regard.

The CM assured the delegation of continued synergy at all levels to ensure overall development in the core sectors of health, education, agriculture and skill development in Punjab through transfer of technology and forging of technical collaborations between Punjab and Canada.

Citing the government’s ‘Connect with Your Roots’ programme, which he launched during his United Kingdom (UK) visit in September last year, Amarinder Singh said that this programme would go a long way to help connect youngsters, especially the third generation, who had roots here in Punjab. It was an excellent forum to apprise them of the state’s glorious heritage, cultural legacy and rich traditions, he said, adding that a similar programme should also be initiated for the youth whose parents or grandparents had immigrated to Canada from Punjab.

The CM said both Punjab and Canada should facilitate the frequent exchange of such delegations, based on their expertise and experience, for mutual benefit. The CM also suggested introduction of certain courses and changes in current academic curriculum to conform with the Canadian education system in order to enable the local youth to get gainful employment in Canada.

Assuring the CM of their wholehearted support to the government’s efforts to promote development and prosperity in Punjab, the visiting Canadian delegation led by Kanwar Dhanjal said that, as the sons and daughters of the Indian soil, it was their moral duty to contribute something tangible for the growth and prosperity of Punjab. They emphasised the need for concerted efforts to boost the level of trade between Punjab and Canada.

Haryana Chief Minister (CM) Manohar Lal Khattar on Friday said that the state government was contemplating to implement an insurance scheme in the health sector for the people of the state.

The scheme would not only benefit the common man, but also ease the growing pressure on doctors in the government health institutions, he added. While speaking at the ‘Meet the CM’ programme organised on the occasion of ‘National Youth Day’ to commemorate the birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda in Panchkula, he said, “Under the insurance scheme, in case a patient visits any private doctor, his fees would be reimbursed by the state government. Patients visiting the government hospitals in the state are already being provided free treatment facility. Apart from this, about 570 different medicines are being provided free of cost to the people of the state.”

While reiterating the state government’s commitment to provide quality health care facilities to the people, Khattar said that with a view to meet the requirement of doctors in the government health institutions, it has been decided to open one medical college in each district of the state.

This would help in getting 2,000 doctors every year. He said that 14 to 15 such colleges have already been opened whereas, the remaining would soon be opened. Apart from this, new dental hospitals are also being constructed to accommodate the BDS doctors, he added.

The Punjab government seems to be at loggerheads as a large number of doctors working in state’s rural areas apparently not supporting the government’s move to merge them with the strength of the state Health Department in an attempt to meet the staff shortage.

However, the Cabinet sub-committee headed by Health minister Brahm Mohindra is yet to take a final decision on the issue, but it is expected that the ‘merger’ is most likely finalised. Sources said that the out of 850 doctors, only 150 medical officers working in the rural areas had given their consent to the state government to merge them with state Health Department.

On the other hand, a majority of doctors do not want merger as they claimed that their appointment in 2006 was based on then notification stating about their posting in rural areas.

As per the data available with the Health Department, against 1,770 sanctioned posts of specialist doctors only 1,368 posts are filled. Adding to it, there are as many as 750 less doctors in rural and urban health centres as well. There are as many as 1,185 subsidiary health centres in rural areas of the state.

“We have mooted a proposal regarding the merger of doctors working in rural areas with those who are working in urban areas. This will help us to shorten the gap between demand of doctors in rural and urban areas. The proposal will be placed in the upcoming Cabinet sub-committee meeting,” Health and Family minister, Brahm Mohindra told The Statesman.

Congress MP Deepender Singh Hooda has accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – led government at Centre of overlooking the Haryana by not announcing any major project for the state in past three and half years.

While speaking to The Statesman, Hooda said, “The Central government led by the BJP has ignored the state of Haryana when it came to development works as no mega project was announced by the Centre for the state.

None of the budgets presented during the present regime had any such announcement for Haryana while during the previous regime led by the Congress, more than a dozen mega projects were announced for Haryana.”

Further accusing the BJP government in the state of failing to persuade the Centre and bring any big venture, Hooda alleged that even the ruling party’s MPs from Haryana do not raise the said issue in the Parliament.

Earlier also, Hooda had accused the Centre of shifting development works from Haryana to other states including the International Airport approved for Meham in Rohtak which was later on allegedly shifted to Jewar in Greater Noida  in Uttar Pradesh.

Succumbing to sentiments of the aggrieved Rajput community, the Gujarat government has decided not to allow the release of controversial film Padmaavat, the Sanjay Leela Bhansali film which had to drop the “I” from the legendary Rajasthan queen’s name as per the advice of the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC).

Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani told journalists that the film would not be released in the state, where it was disallowed earlier too in view of the Assembly elections.

The film’s screenings have already been banned in the neighbouring states like Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.

The controversy around Padmaavat has arisen due to alleged ‘improper’ portrayal of the legendary Rajput queen, but even otherwise Gujarat has a history of banning films over trivial issues like hurting sentiments of some sections of people.

Parzania, a film based on a child missing since the 2002 riots following the Godhra train inferno, was not allowed to be screened in Gujarat due to violent protest by VHP and Bajrang Dal activists who had ransacked theatre halls.

Actor  Aamir Khan’s film Fanaa  too was not screened simply because he had espoused the cause of villagers displaced from the catchment area of the Narmada dam project which was supposed to supply irrigation water to Gujarat.

The film has been granted clearance from the Central Board for Film Certification (CBFC) after shortening of the title and some modifications in the script.

The Income Tax department on today reported that it has substantially increased criminal prosecution proceedings initiated in a large number of cases of tax offenders and evaders.

During FY 2017-18 (up to the end of November 2017), the department filed prosecution complaints for various offences in 2,225 cases compared to 784 for the corresponding period in the immediately preceding year, marking an increase of 184 per cent, according to a release issued by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT).

Besides, 48 persons were convicted for various offences during the period as compared to 13 convictions for the corresponding eight months of 2016, marking an increase of 269 per cent, a finance ministry statement said.

Prosecutions have been initiated for various offences including wilful attempt to evade tax or payment of any tax, wilful failure in filing returns of income, false statement in verification and failure to deposit the tax deducted/collected at source or inordinate delay in doing so, among other defaults.

The cases where courts have ruled in favour of the I-T department include that of a Dehradun court convicting a defaulter for holding undisclosed foreign bank account and sentencing him to two years imprisonment for willful attempt to evade tax and two years imprisonment for false statement in verification along with monetary penalty for each default.

The department has given examples of other cases as well. In Bengaluru, the managing director of a company engaged in infrastructure projects was found guilty of non-deposit of TDS of over Rs 60 lakh (within the prescribed time), and was sentenced to rigorous imprisonment of three months along with imposition of fine.

The state government is all set to launch its tourism policy by the end of this month. The contours of the draft tourism policy has more or less been finalised and after the vetting of the same by the chief minister this will be announced at the end of this month.

Announcing this, Atri Bhattacharya, state home and principal secretary of tourism said,”The Draft tourism policy has been finalised. However, as the tourism is a pet project of the chief minister it will be announced in consultation with her.”

Elaborating on the Destination East-the Eastern India’s largest Travel Mart  which will be co-organised by the CII and the state tourism department at the newly-built convention Centre, at Rajarhat between 18 and 19 January will focus on investment in the tourism sector.

“The current investment in the sector is Rs 3,600 crore. And the focus will be to increase the investment to about Rs 5,500 crore in the next five years,”  said Manish Jain, secretary Tourism.

Dwelling on the state tourism, Jain said state tourism is on upswing and if the statistics are to be believed state ranks 5th in the footfall of international tourists while in domestic footfall it ranks 8 th.

“That the state tourism is on upswing  is proved by the inflow of tourists that is recorded 15.28 lakh during 2015-16. It has peeped Rajasthan in terms of volume of inflow of tourists in the state,”  secretary state tourism said. “Of them 40 tourists will take a trip to Gajaldoba-where the state government has taken up an ambitious project to showcase the state. Besides, trips will entail hills in North Bengal, sundarbans, heritage torurism will also be explored,” Bhattacharya said.