Court asks ACB to file report in complaint against Kejriwal
A Delhi court has directed Delhi Police’s Anti Corruption Branch (ACB) to file an action-taken report on its probe into alleged irregularities in PWD work against Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal.
The court gave the order after observing that there is a delay in filing the report that had stalled the hearing on the complaint.
It rapped Delhi Police for its “indecisiveness” in selecting which of its branches would probe the complaint seeking lodging of the FIR against Kejriwal and others in the alleged PWD scam.
Metropolitan Magistrate Abhilash Malhotra pulled up the police for its failure in filing the report on the complaint in nearly two months.
“The Additional Commissioner of Police and the Assistant Commissioner of Police are directed to look into the matter and ensure that no further delay is caused in filing of the ATR. The report be filed positively on or before the next date that is April 20,” the court said.
The court is hearing a criminal complaint filed by Roads Anti-Corruption Organisation founder Rahul Sharma and its secretary Viplav Awasthy, who sought registration of a case against Kejriwal, his brother-inlaw Surender Kumar Bansal, and a public works department officer on charges of cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy.
Others like the Lok Jan Shakti Party, Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party, Nationalist Congress Party, and the Communist Party of India contested from less than 100 seats. Delhi BSP president CP Singh said the party will not be weighed down by past failures. “Whatever may have happened in the Uttar Pradesh elections, we will contest with full strength in Delhi,” he added.
The party used to be a key player in the capital, and was the third major contender after the BJP and Congress. It won 15 seats in the 2012 municipal elections, with over 10% vote share.
A source said its strongholds were Muslim-dominated areas as well as places in Outer Delhi. In the 2008 assembly election, the BSP won the Badarpur and Gokalpur seats, and came second in Narela, Badli, Deoli, Tughlakabad and Babarpur. The party also secured 10,000-30,000 votes in 40 other seats.
However, that was before AAP entered the scene in 2013. The BSP’s vote share dipped from 14.05% in 2008 to 5.35% in
The first Hindu ever elected to US Congress, Gabbard has forged a unique bond with Indian Americans who have adopted her as one of their own brushing aside whatever sets her apart — white, un-hyphenated American, born in the US.
And she has been a willing and active accomplice — Gabbard is often more culturally Hindu than her Indian American colleagues in Congress and American politics generally. She greets Indian Americans, for one, with “namaskar” and not the standard local fare. Gabbard has also struck up a close relationship with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who sent senior BJP official Ram Madhav to represent him at her wedding in Hawaii in 2015, with a gift of a pashmina shawl and Ganesh idol made of five metals.
Homelessness is relatively low in other Delhi districts. East, South West, North West, and North East districts have fewer than two homeless people per thousand.
The government has set up 197 shelters in the city that are run by different NGOs. These are meant for 16,000 people, but crowding is a big problem, especially in the city’s harsh winter. This season, an additional 61 tents were set up to meet the rush. The census likely undercounted homeless people in the country, and the number could be three times higher, said former police officer Amod Kanth, who runs the NGO Prayas. Prayas manages about 22 shelters in Delhi.
Delhi’s unofficial count, too, varies – from 50,000 to 250,000. A Supreme Court appointed panel estimated the city’s homeless population to be 246,000.
Whatever the number, those who find themselves in homeless shelters often sleep in cramped quarters. Advocate Sugriv Dubey on Tuesday filed a petition in the Delhi high court in which he argued that the government should be asked to provide separate shelters for males and females to protect girls from sexual violence. “My submission is that if the number of these places is not increased, and boys and girls are not separated, then what will happen? People will sleep on the footpath,” Dubey said.
In fact, many prefer streets to the shelters, where thefts and rapes are not uncommon, as reported by HT in its Roofless in Delhi series. “In the summer, they will die with the heat. In winter, they will die with the cold. So at least let them reside peacefully. Give them some space,” Dubey said.