FIR Against Rahul Gandhi On Complaint Filed by BJP MPs; India’s Pragmatic Policy Towards Trade and Investment From China; Long-Used Urdu Words by Police in Rajasthan May Be Removed
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Snapshot of the day
December 20, 2024
Sidharth Bhatia
Both houses of parliament were adjourned for the winter session today. During the final hours of today’s proceedings the Lok Sabha adopted a resolution recommending the ‘one nation, one election’ constitution amendment Bills to a joint parliamentary committee, which will have 27 Lok Sabha MPs and 12 Rajya Sabha MPs.
Yesterday the Delhi police registered an FIR against Rahul Gandhi in connection with the scuffle between NDA and INDIA MPs outside parliament. The Hindu reports that the police, acting on a complaint by BJP legislators, invoked provisions relating to voluntarily causing grievous hurt, endangering the life and personal safety of others and using criminal force. Congress MPs had also filed a counter-complaint against BJP MPs, accusing them of using “criminal force, assault and battery” against party president Mallikarjun Kharge, as per the newspaper.
After yesterday’s scuffle – which took place amid protests by NDA and INDIA MPs against each other for their alleged insults of BR Ambedkar – Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla prohibited demonstrations by MPs and political parties outside any of parliament’s gates, PTI cites sources as saying.
Another take on the BJP MPs claiming they were badly hurt:
(Credit: Manjul.)
Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair was granted protection from arrest until January 6 by an Allahabad high court bench, which orally remarked that he was not a ‘dreaded criminal’, LiveLaw reports. While the police have accused him of endangering India’s sovereignty, promoting enmity, fabricating evidence and outraging religious feelings (among other things) by posting about extremist Hindu leader Yati Narsinghanand’s alleged hate speech, today the Uttar Pradesh government’s counsel argued that Zubair’s post promoted “feeling separatist activity”, LiveLaw’s report says.
Speaking of Narsinghanand, he said yesterday that the World Dharma Sansad he was to convene at the Sripanchdashnam Juna Akhara in Haridwar stood cancelled after the police took down tents erected for it, scattered cooks were who working there and prohibited the gathering from taking place. PTI says that Narsinghanand called the police action “goondaism” in the Supreme Court’s name and vowed to march to the apex court in protest. He also wrote a letter to Uttarakhand chief minister Pushkar Dhami saying Hindus have become second-class citizens in India.
Former five-time Haryana chief minister Om Prakash Chautala died of cardiac arrest today at 89. Hugely popular among the state’s Jat community, Chautala “learnt the nitty-gritty of politics from his father Chaudhary Devi Lal”, who is considered a key player in Haryana’s creation out of Punjab and in forming India’s first non-Congress government under the Janata Dal in 1989, Vivek Gupta recalls.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “annus horribilis” this year “leaves him on shakier ground going into 2025”, write Dan Strumpf and Sudhi Ranjan Sen of the various setbacks he has has faced since the general election, including a Trump victory (whose government could target India in light of its protectionism), a slowing economy, regime changes in South Asia and the allegations against Gautam Adani and his conglomerate. But Strumpf and Sen also note that not all is grim for Modi: some expect that New Delhi could benefit from a ‘transactional’ Trump government, his government has won key state elections and made progress on the China border front, and the economy is still among the world’s fastest growing.
The Economist explains why it chose Bangladesh from a roster of five countries – also comprising Poland, South Africa, Argentina and Syria – as ‘country of the year’.
While declaring Bangladesh country of the year, the magazine does note that Muhammad Yunus’s interim government needs to fix its strained relations with India. Reporting from Kolkata, Joydeep Sarkar finds that this chill in bilateral ties is causing hospitals, pharmacies, bus services and hotels in the area of the city nicknamed ‘Mini Bangladesh’ to see money go bye-bye because of reduced traffic from across the border. Business in the not-so-far away Darjeeling, Sikkim and Siliguri, which were also frequented by Bangladeshi tourists, stands affected as well, Sarkar learns.
But the movement of people – specifically, of militants – along another border, the one between Manipur and Myanmar, is worsening the ethnic violence in the northeastern state, Shivam Patel is told by security officials. Patel cites them as also saying that while Meitei and Kuki groups looted state armouries to arm themselves amid the conflict, the more sophisticated weapons that have been used in Manipur were mostly brought there from Myanmar this year.
Sixteen workers from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar working at a cement plant in Libya’s Benghazi are enduring confinement and haven’t been fully paid for their work, Kunal Shankar reports, having spoken to two of them. One of them, 26-year-old Mithilesh Vishwakarma from Gorakhpur, said that the men had their passports taken away after their arrival in Libya, and are now living ‘cooped up’ in the factory premises ever since September, when they were punished for protesting irregular payments and long work hours. Shankar also learns that the workers are being helped in contacting the outside world by an Indian social worker named Tabassum Mansoor, who was asked by the Indian mission in Tunisia to assist them.
Journalists covering the Punjab and Haryana high court have been asked by its registrar general “not to publish” the names of judges while reporting on court proceedings “in the interest of [their] security”, Sofi Ahsan reports citing sources. The request was made especially in case of “sensitive matters”, Ahsan adds. It is not known what prompted the court’s decision but Ahsan recalls that three months ago, a man stole a gun from a high court judge’s security detail and took his own life with it at the Golden Temple.
Urdu words such as mukadma (case), ilzam (allegation) or mulzim (accused) are used in police procedure in Rajasthan, but it is unclear whether they will continue to do so in the future, PTI writes – it reports that directives from the state’s police chief to a training official last month asked him to delete Urdu terms from training material and sensitise trainees to their corresponding Hindi words. His orders in turn come after the state’s junior home minister sought information about Urdu words in police usage and their Hindi alternatives, the news agency says.
There has been a “significant and sustained escalation in military infrastructure” by China to “support a long-term presence” at the Line of Actual Control over the last few years, a US defence department report to Congress on “military and security developments involving” China has noted.
AFP has a moving report on how people in Tamil Nadu’s Nagapattinam district scarred by losses they suffered during the 2004 tsunami become worried every time a weather warning for cyclones or heavy rains is issued. Their worries are not misplaced, though – the report notes that while “better forecasting and more effective evacuation planning have dramatically reduced death tolls”, experts have said that “human-driven climate change is intensifying their [cyclones’] power”.
Independent analysis of Hmar ‘militants'’ post-mortems indicate beatings, torture
Three Hmar men in Assam’s Cachar district were killed, police have said, in an operation against their militant counterparts, in which they led a team of security personnel and were shot by the suspected militants. But their families say they were farmers and allege they were killed by the police themselves. Seemi Pasha reports that an independent analysis they had conducted of the deceased’s post-mortems indicate they were shot at close range, beaten, tortured and perhaps sexually assaulted. The families have also noted that while the cops said three of their own were injured during the operation, the state has not shared any medical records attesting to this.
Justice Chandrachud recommended against making SK Yadav a high court judge
His “inadequate” work experience, membership in the RSS and closeness to a then-BJP Rajya Sabha MP are among the reasons why former Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud recommended against elevating then-assistant government advocate Shekhar Kumar Yadav to a judge of the Allahabad high court, Maneesh Chhibber learns. However, six months later, a Supreme Court collegium recommended his name for elevation anyway. Chhibber quotes Justice Chandrachud as also having noted that Yadav had been “recommended … because of his political affiliations”. Justice Yadav was most recently in the spotlight for making communal and Hindu-majoritarian statements at a Vishva Hindu Parishad event.
Karnataka probe finds discrimination against Dalit IIMB professor
An investigation by Karnataka’s civil rights enforcement department has found that the director and the dean of the city’s IIM denied equal opportunities in professional activities to a Dalit marketing professor; that the professor, Gopal Das, faced public humiliation and exclusion there; and that the institute did not comply with statutory obligations requiring it to create a mechanism using which Dalit and Adivasi staff can lodge grievances, Shivani Kava reports. IIMB in the meanwhile has alleged that Das’s complaints appeared only after his promotion was put on hold following harassment complaints from doctoral students. The state’s social welfare department has called for action against six IIMB officials, including its director, in light of the civil rights enforcement department’s probe.
The Long Cable
India’s Pragmatic Approach Towards Economic Ties With China
Manoj Joshi
The recently concluded talks between Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and his Chinese counterpart Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who are the Special Representatives for the China-India Boundary Question, is a confirmation of the reset in relations between the two countries.
The talks—the 23rd in the series-- were held after a gap of five years because of the Sino-Indian confrontation in eastern Ladakh leading to the clash at Galwan. This followed a sudden Chinese blockade of Indian patrols at five disputed points on the LAC and the massing of substantial forces there.
While the Indian readout of the talks was fairly anodyne, the Chinese issued two notes detailing the outcome of the talks. Both sides agreed that the issues of the past five years had been “properly resolved” (China) and they “positively affirmed”(India) the implementation of the disengagement agreement of October. There was common agreement, too, that their task ahead was the need to work on “a fair, reasonable and mutually acceptable framework for settlement of the boundary question.”
There was a difference, however, on the issue of the centrality of the border issue to the state of their relations. The Chinese felt that India should “put the border issue in an appropriate position in bilateral relations,” while India said a peaceful border was necessary for the “normal development of bilateral relations.” In the last five years, China had been trying to persuade India that the border issue should be separated from their wider relations in other areas. India, however, made it clear that the developments on the border in 2020 were central to their relationship and unless the status quo ante April 2020 was achieved there would be no normal ties.
As a further sign of normalisation of ties, China has agreed to resume the Kailash-Manasarovar yatra and resume providing data on river water flows relating to the Brahmaputra and the Sutlej. In addition both sides will resume cross-border trade at Nathu La in Sikkim.
The obvious question that comes to mind is just why this change has taken place ? Till early this year it appeared that Indian and Chinese positions had hardened. After agreeing to resolve issues in four of the blockade points, the Chinese had refused to move on Depsang and Charding Nala. For its part, India tightened the web of measures it had taken to restrict Chinese trade and investment in India in the wake of the 2020 developments. Yet, it found that goods imports from China surged 63 per cent and India’s trade deficit nearly doubled to $85 billion since 2020.
We do not know much about Chinese decision-making, but it would appear that the state of the Chinese economy and the COVID disruptions the country suffered in 2022-23 played a role. The Chinese could not but have noticed that the Indian response had not been aggressive and had focused on dealing with the issue through diplomacy and negotiations. In an environment, where the Biden Administration was tightening the screws on China and taking along allies in the EU and Japan in the process, India could be a stable and vast market for Chinese goods and investments.
The Indian calculation was at two levels. In countering China, India came closer to the US. It participated in the steady evolution of the Quad into a strategic grouping of nations to counter China’s rise in the Indo-Pacific. It also signed far-reaching technology sharing agreements in the area of defence with the US. Yet, India’s strategic goal has been to become a pole in a multipolar global order, something that could be negatively affected by too close ties with the US.
At the second level India had its own economic issues. First and foremost was its dependence on Chinese imports and the massive trade deficits they engendered. Efforts to promote manufacturing in India through the Production Linked Incentives (PLI) have not quite worked as India realised that to grow its manufacturing it needed China more, not less. China may have major problems, but it remains a global leader in EVs, high speed trains, batteries, solar technology and UAVs. By 2030, they could be accounting for 45 per cent of global manufacturing.
Pressure also built up from the business community which felt that restrictions placed by the government on investments, imports and travel in relation to China were hurting them. They said goods and specialiSed manpower from China was needed in the current phase of India’s efforts to emerge as a manufacturing power.
The government’s approach became apparent with the Economic Survey 2023-24 issued in July which wanted India to encourage investments from China, even while discouraging the import of finished goods. Last month, Niti Ayog CEO B.V.R.Subrahmanyam called for India to join the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). This is notwithstanding New Delhi’s precipitate decision to not join the RCEP on account of concerns that India would get swamped by China.
There will be no status quo ante on the measures that India has taken on the economic front with China. But there will be a major tweak that will ensure that India can take advantage of what China has to offer, in the manner other countries have been doing so. Pragmatism is the name of the new game.
(The writer is a distinguished fellow at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi.)
Reportedly
CCTV footage has increasingly served as evidence of crowd behavior in riot-like situations in Delhi. For instance HM Amit Shah has particularly instructed Delhi police to pore over CCTV footage to identify violent behavior during the North East Delhi riots which were a huge embarrassment for Modi during Trump's visit to the capital then.
An opposition member of Lok Sabha said the same Delhi Police seems a bit reluctant to study the CCTV footage in detail to ascertain claims and counterclaims of BJP and opposition parties with regard to the physical, push & shove brawl at the Parliament entrance which BJP is making much of and trying to blame Rahul Gandhi for it. It remains to be seen whether the Delhi police, which has almost totally squandered its reputation for objective investigation in the last 6 to 8 years, conducts a fair probe. The grapevine has it that this time BJP will try to use this incident to challenge RG's status as LoP.
Deep dive
Amit Shah’s controversial remarks about BR Ambedkar in parliament did not just insult the man but propagated falsehoods about him, argues Ajoy Ashirwad Mahaprashasta. He makes the case that what went “unnoticed in the outrage is that Shah misconstrued, and also lied about, Ambedkar and his opinions on two vital counts that shouldered his entire argument against the Congress”.
Prime number: ~1 in 3 applicants for Indian executive rolesA KPMG study has found that 30% of candidates for senior management and CXO posts in India “misrepresented themselves during the recruitment process”, Veena Venugopal reports. She adds:
“At the senior executive level, they [KPMG] found candidates misstating the actual reason for leaving a job, not mentioning legal disputes, as well as interpersonnel [sic] issues around how senior managers were treating their staff members”.
Opeds you don’t want to miss
Dr Ambedkar was insulted, but was it only by the Congress, as prime minister Narendra Modi said? No, in fact while it is true that the ultra-orthodox Brahmins sections opposed Ambedkar, it was the Hindutvawadis of the Jan Sangh-RSS who insulted him the most, writes Prasenjit Bose.
The painting of the surrender of Pakistani troops in December 1971 after the liberation of Bangladesh was an iconic image that celebrated victory. Lt Gen H S Panag writes that the painting that has replaced it – showing an image of Chanakya with tanks and soldiers – which will now hang in the Army chief’s office is all about religiosity, mythology and displays a feudal past.
Ananth Krishnan has annotated India and China’s separate statements issued after the special representative-level talks held on Wednesday – the first in close to five years – to highlight important sections and add his comments.
An alliance between the Bangladesh Nationalist Party and the country’s Jamaat-i-Islami will trigger a “full-blown” foreign policy realignment in New Delhi, Sumit Ganguly notes, adding that India in any case cannot do much to prevent this alliance. India’s “inordinate reliance on Hasina and the Awami League to the exclusion of other parties and Bangladeshi civil society has put it in this untenable position,” Ganguly says.
Abhinav Mukund, a childhood friend of R Ashwin recalls growing up with a player who gave no indication that he would become the superstar he has. He was an ordinary middle-class boy who was smart enough to become a doctor or an accountant and did become an engineer.
Listen up
In light of one of the ‘one nation, one election’ Bills mandating a fixed five-year term for the Lok Sabha and the state legislatures, The Hindu’s Aaratrika Bhaumik discusses the question of whether Indian legislatures should have fixed terms with former Lok Sabha secretary general PDT Achary and PRS Legislative Research founder-president MR Madhavan.
Watch out
Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra switches places with Karan Thapar in this year-end special edition of the latter’s show that he likes to call ‘The Revenge Interview’. Watch here.
Over and out
Earlier this week, India radio-tagged a Ganges river dolphin for the first time ever as part of the Union environment ministry’s ‘Project Dolphin’ and in collaboration with the state-run Wildlife Institute of India, Assam’s forest department and the Aaranyak NGO. Aathira Perinchery explains how exactly radio-tagging these dolphins will help conserve the species, which faces many threats and is considered ‘endangered’ by the IUCN.
That’s it for today. We’ll be back with you on Monday, on a device near you. If The India Cable was forwarded to you by a friend (perhaps a common friend!) book your own copy by SUBSCRIBING HERE.