News Analysis India

Tag: Lucknow

  • Uttar Pradesh government swearing-in: Seating arrangements for 75,000 people being made at Lucknow stadium

    By PTI

    LUCKNOW: Seating arrangements for 75,000 people are being made at the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Stadium here for the swearing-in ceremony of the newly elected BJP government on March 25, an official said on Saturday.

    Chief minister-designate Yogi Adityanath and his cabinet ministers will take the oath of office at the ceremony that will take place at 4 pm on Friday.

    Additional Chief Secretary (information) Navneet Sehgal, who on Saturday visited the stadium, said the preparations for the swearing-in ceremony are being done under Chief Secretary D S Mishra.

    “Seating arrangements for 75,000 people are being made at the swearing-in ceremony. The programme will be a grand and splendid one, and preparations are already underway,” he said.

    On Friday, BJP sources had said that senior party leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, BJP national president J P Nadda and other central ministers will attend the event.

    Besides, chief ministers of other BJP-ruled states, RSS leaders and BJP office-bearers are expected to attend the function.

    Top leaders of opposition parties will also be invited, they had said.

    Before the ceremony, Adityanath will be elected as the leader of the legislature party, the sources had said.

    This will be the second consecutive term for Adityanath.

    The BJP won 255 seats in the 403-member assembly and its allies won 18 seats.

  • West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee arrives at Lucknow, Akhilesh Yadav receives her at airport

    By PTI

    LUCKNOW: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday reached Lucknow, where she will address an election rally and hold a joint press conference with Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav during her two-day visit ahead of the state Assembly polls.

    Yadav welcomed her at the Amausi airport here and shared this information on Twitter.

    “We defeated together in Bengal, now we will defeat in UP. This is a promise to Didi, we will emerge winners. Warm welcome and greetings to Didi in UP,” the SP chief tweeted sharing a picture with Banerjee.

    Mamata Banerjee, who came out of the airport with the SP chief, was also welcomed by her party workers.

    On Tuesday, Banerjee is scheduled to reach the SP office where she will address a joint press conference with Akhilesh Yadav.

    Apart from this, she will address a virtual rally.

    Before leaving for Lucknow, Banerjee in Kolkata gave a call to defeat the BJP in the coming elections.

    She said Yadav has invited her to campaign for the BJP.

    “We (TMC) want BJP to be defeated and Akhilesh to win Uttar Pradesh. All of us should support him in the fight against the BJP. That is the reason we have decided not to contest in Uttar Pradesh this time,” Banerjee, who is the Trinamool Congress chief, told reporters in Kolkata.

    Banerjee said she will visit Varanasi later in February but the date is yet to be fixed.

  • Nine dead after consuming spurious liquor in Raebareli

    Express News Service

    LUCKNOW: Nine persons lost their lives and 29 others have falled ill after consuming spurious liquor in Pure Chatta Singh village under Paharpur Majra in Maharajganj police station area of Rae Bareli district, 80 km from the state capital.

    The tragedy occurred on Tuesday night when four persons had died after consuming spurious liquor at a function. However, the toll went up to nine on Wednesday.

    According to Rae Bareli District Magistrate Vaibhav Srivastava, the body of the deceased was sent for an autopsy and a probe was ordered into the incident. An FIR has also been lodged against the licensed shop which had supplied the liquor to the villagers.

    As per the police sources, those who lost life were identified as Chandra Gopal, 45, Raj Babu, 30, Qasim, 35, Saroj, 40, Pankaj, 38, Ram Sumer, 46, Sukhrani, 60, Bansi Lal, 50 and Kallu, 53. Two of the deceased Raj Babu and Qasim had come to the village from Chhatarpur, MP and Hamirpur respectively. The rest of the victims belonged to Raebareli.

    According to district police officials, around 40 persons had consumed the liquor in the function. Seven persons including an elderly woman had died in the wee hours while two others lost life at the local Community Health Centre.

    According to Raebarli police chief Shlok Kumar, the FIR was lodged against Dhirendra Pal Singh, the local liquor shop owner and his executive under charges of murder, food adulteration, mixing and selling noxious substances with intoxicants. The shop owner along with his salesman is absconding and police teams are out to nab them, said the SP.

    Meanwhile taking cognisance of the issue, UP DGP Mukul Goel directed IG Lucknow range Lakshmi Singh to visit the spot and conduct a thorough probe into the incident. On the other, Additional Chief Secretary, Excise, Sanjay Bhoosreddy said that action would be taken against district excise officers including Rajeshwar Maurya who would be charge-sheeted while Excise Inspector Ajay Kumar and constable Dhirendra Srivastava were suspended in connection with the incident.

  • Priyanka picks up broom in Dalit hamlet as Yogi says people have made Congress worth doing that only

    By PTI

    LUCKNOW: Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Friday made a surprise visit to a Dalit hamlet here and picked up a broom to clean it, reacting to Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s dig at her act of sweeping of floor at a Sitapur guest house during her detention.

    In reply to a query over Gandhi’s act of mopping during her detention, Adityanath earlier during the day had said “the people wanted to make them (the Congress leaders) worth doing that and that is what they have made them”.

    “These people have no work except spreading nuisance and negativity,” he had said.

    The chief minister had made the remark earlier in the day during a programme at a private TV news channel.

    In response to the chief minister’s remark, Gandhi descended upon the Dalit colony and picked up the broom, saying it is a symbol of simplicity and self-respect.

    While mingling with the inhabitants at Luv Kush Nagar, the Congress general secretary cleaned the area, saying crores of women and sanitation workers in the country use brooms daily for cleaning, a Congress spokesman said.

    At the TV news channel programme, the chief minister had further said, “These people have nothing but a negative attitude. They were not seen during the corona times. “When people were suffering from the infection, it was the BJP workers and government which were with people amid a nil presence of these people,” he had added.

    “But now they have got up from their slumber and took up the Lakhimpur incident as an opportunity,” Adityanath said.

    “He has not humiliated me by saying so he has humiliated you all as crores of Dalit brothers and sisters are safai karamcharis and they do this work,” Priyanka told residents of Luv Kush Nagar, taking exception to the Chief Ministers comments.

    “I have come here for doing the cleaning work along with you all and let Yogi Ji know that cleaning and using a broom is a self-respecting task,” she said.

  • Rahul Gandhi leaves for Lakhimpur Kheri from Lucknow airport in own vehicle after brief dharna

    By PTI

    LUCKNOW: Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi left for Lakhimpur Kheri from the Lucknow airport in his own vehicle after staging a brief ‘dharna’ on initially being asked to travel in a police vehicle, a party spokesperson said.

    “Rahul Gandhiji along with Punjab Chief Minister Charanjeet Singh Channi and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel have left for Lakhimpur Kheri from the Lucknow airport,” UP Congress spokesperson Ashok Singh told PTI.

    Gandhi had reached the Lucknow airport from Delhi along with Channi and Baghel.

    Television footage from the airport showed officials telling Gandhi to take the police vehicle, which Gandhi did not agree to and sat on a ‘dharna’ there.

    “We want to go in our own vehicles, but they want that we should go in their vehicle. I want to know that why are you not allowing me to go? First, I was told that I can go in my own vehicle, now you are saying that you will go in police vehicle. They are doing some mischief,” Gandhi told reporters.

    To a question, he said, “You can put me or Priyanka in a jail. It does not have any meaning. The question is that six people were crushed by criminals. Those who should have been in a jail, are not being put in a jail. We are being stopped from meeting the aggrieved families of the farmers.” 

    ALSO WATCH:

  • On way to Lakhimpur Kheri, Rahul reaches Sitapur guest house where Priyanka is detained

    By PTI

    LUCKNOW: Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi has reached the PAC guest house at Sitapur where Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has been kept in detention on his way to Lakhimpur Kheri, which witnessed eight deaths in violence during a farmers’ protest on Sunday.

    Gandhi left for Lakhimpur Kheri from the Lucknow airport in his own vehicle after staging a brief dharna on initially being asked to travel in a police car.

    He had reached the airport this afternoon from Delhi along with Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi, his Chhattisgarh counterpart Bhupesh Baghel and Congress general secretaries K C Venugopal and Randeep Surjewala.

    “Rahul Gandhiji along with Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel have left for Lakhimpur Kheri from the Lucknow airport,’ UP Congress spokesperson Ashok Singh told PTI in the afternoon.

    Venugopal and Surjewala are also accompanying Gandhi on his visit to Lakhimpur Kheri.

    Television footage from the airport showed officials telling Gandhi to take the police vehicle, which he did not agree to and sat on a dharna there.

    “We want to go in our own vehicles, but they want that we should go in their vehicle. I want to know why are you not allowing me to go? First, I was told that I can go in my own vehicle, now you are saying that you will go in a police vehicle. They are doing some mischief,” Gandhi told reporters.

    Responding to a question, he said, “You can put me or Priyanka in a jail. It does not have any meaning. The question is that six people were crushed by criminals. Those who should have been in a jail, are not being put in a jail. We are being stopped from meeting the aggrieved families of the farmers.”

    It took Gandhi a couple of hours to reach the Provincial Armed Constabulary guest house in Sitapur, around 88 km from Lucknow, where Priyanka Gandhi is in detention since Monday morning.

    She was on her way to meet the families of farmers killed in Sunday’s violence in Lakhimpur Kheri when she was stopped.

    Earlier in the day, the state government had denied permission to Rahul Gandhi for the visit, with an official spokesperson saying no one would be allowed to visit the violence-hit district to vitiate its atmosphere.

    However, it later allowed Rahul, Priyanka Gandhi and three others to visit Lakhimpur.

    “Permission has been given to five leaders of Congress, including Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, to visit Lakhimpur,” Additional Chief Secretary, Information, Navneet Sehgal told PTI.

    ALSO WATCH:

  • WATCH | Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel stopped at Lucknow airport, disallowed to visit Congress office

    By PTI

    LUCKNOW: Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel was prevented from coming out of Lucknow’s Chaudhary Charan Singh Airport Tuesday when he arrived to visit the state Congress office and meet party leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.

    Baghel sat on a dharna at the airport after being disallowed to go to the Uttar Pradesh Congress office amid widespread protest over the Lakhimpur Kheri violence.

    “I am being stopped from going out of Lucknow airport without any orders,” he wrote in tweet with a photo of him sitting on the floor at the airport.

    pic.twitter.com/xoZpzNswwC
    — Bhupesh Baghel (@bhupeshbaghel) October 5, 2021
    The Chhattisgarh chef minister reasoned with the police on duty as to why he was being stopped but to no avail, a Congress spokesman said.

    “Why am I being stopped? I am not going to Lakhimpur where there are prohibitory orders in place.

    I am only going to PCC (Congress office),” he asked the police personnel.

    Talking to mediapersons at the airport, Baghel said he does not plan to go to Lakhimpur Kheri but to the Congress office where he was scheduled to address a press conference later in the day.

    Baghel also said he has come to meet party national general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra who is currently in custody at Sitapur.

    The Uttar Pradesh government had Monday asked the Lucknow airport authority not to allow Chhattisgarh chief minister and the Punjab deputy chief minister who had to visit Lakhimpur Kheri in view of the violence that erupted there.

    Eight people were killed Sunday as violence erupted during a farmers’ protest claiming the lives of both farmers and BJP workers ahead of a visit to Lakhimpur by Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya.

    “After the incident in Lakhimpur, the district magistrate has imposed prohibitory orders there to maintain law and order.

    It is requested that you should not allow Chhattisgarh CM and Punjab deputy CM at the CCS Airport in Lucknow,’ Additional Chief Secretary, Home, Awanish Kumar Awasthi had said in a letter dated October 3 to the Airport Authority of India (AAI).

    ALSO WATCH:

    Lakhimpur Kheri Violence: What all happened in 24 hours at the farmers’ protest:

  • Video clip of girl dancing inside Lucknow’s Bada Imambara kicks up row, Shia Muslim bodies demand action

    Express News Service

    LUCKNOW: The prominent Shia clerics and Shia Muslim bodies including All India Shia Muslim Personal Law Board (AISMPLB) were left miffed and lodged a strong protest after a 30-second video clip of a girl dancing inside the Bada Imambara here on Friday went viral.

    The prominent members of Shia community called the act ‘un-Islamic’ and ‘breach of sanctity’ of the religious structure. Protesting against such an act, Shias demanded a ban on the entry of the tourists at Bada Imambara and the youth wing of the community said they were going to lodge FIR in the matter.

    Earlier, the Shia Muslims had demanded a ban on wedding shoots inside Bada Imambara and also opposed the shooting of ‘tik-tok’ videos in and around the premises.

    In fact, an Imambara is a place or a building with a hall where people assemble for “Majlis” of Imam Husain and Martyrs of Karbala. It is mainly associated with Shia Muslims.

    “We strongly oppose the act as it is a breach of the sacredness of the religious structure. We demand the immediate intervention of the district administration, the chairman of the Hussainabad and Allied Trust (HAT) that owns the structure, and demand a ban on the entry of tourists in the Bada Imambara,” said Maulana Yasoob Abbas, the senior Shia cleric and general secretary of AISMPLB.

    Mortal Kombat tiktok inside Bara Imambara, Lucknow.PS: Imambara is a sacred place.#ImambarasOfLucknow pic.twitter.com/F9mcEfUp46
    — Guzashta Lakhnau گزشتہ لکھنؤ (@GuzashtaLakhnau) October 1, 2021
    The miffed Maulana reminded that Imambara was not a tourist destination “It is a religious structure and such acts hurts our religious sentiments,” said Maulana Yasoob Abbas.

    However, Shia Muslim youths said an FIR should be lodged against the girl. “Such acts should be banned immediately. We are going to lodge FIR into the matter against the girl and the person who was shooting the video,” said Shamil Shamsi, convener ‘Hussaini Tigers’ — a group of Shia Muslim youths.

    Besides, he said that they have also written to the ASI and HAT to make all possible arrangements and install CCTV cameras in order to keep a check on such activities.

    In the 30 second video, a girl in black attire and wearing a mask was seen dancing inside Bada Imambada that is also known as Asafi Imambara.

    Since Asifi Imambara is an architectural marvel of Awadh, it is frequented by not only the tourists who visit Lucknow but also couples use it for the wedding shoot sessions. In 2019, the ban on pre- and post-wedding shoots inside the structure was imposed following objections raised by Shia Muslims, including cleric Maulana Kalbe Jawad.

  • Lucknow Diary: All that is happening in the ‘City of Nawabs’

    Express News Service

    Teen’s feat in racing

    Uttar Pradesh teen formula car driver Shahan Ali Mohsin won two races of round one in the MRF Formula1600 category at MMSC FMSCI National Car Racing Championship in Chennai this week. A student of Class 12, the Agra-based champion took pole position even after he lost the first race due to overheating of the clutch. He won the next two races beating 11 drivers.

    The championship has four rounds. Second will be organised in December and the remaining two in first quarter of 2022. There are three races in each round and the driver with highest points will be declared champion at the end of round four. 

    Recognition for three scientists

    Three young scientists bagged the annual CDRI Award 2021 conferred by the CSIR-Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI). In the category of chemical sciences, Vishal Rai from Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Bhopal, bagged the award for his work on precision engineering of proteins for enabling biology and medicine.

    Sidhesh S Kamat from Pune’s IISER bagged the award for contribution towards understanding human neurological disorder using the chemical biology approach. Chandrima Das from Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata, bagged an award in the life sciences category for her work on decoding the epigenetic landscape – a concept representing embryonic development. The CDRI award was instituted in 2004 to promote drug discovery and development research in India.

    Tourism carnival concludes

    A carnival organised at Gomti riverfront to mark World Tourism Day and the completion of 50 years of the Uttar Pradesh government’s tourism department concluded on Wednesday. The three-day extravaganza witnessed a variety of cultural events, including folk and Sufi performance by the Anhad Band. Many other events like magic show, puppet dance and folk dance of Uttar Pradesh besides the food festival of Lucknowi cuisine were a big draw.

    CPR training for cops

    In a first-of-its kind effort, the Uttar Pradesh Police personnel will be trained in Cardio-Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) to save lives on time.

    The decision was taken by Uttar Pradesh DGP Mukul Goel, after attending a workshop with Dr Aditya Kapoor, head of the department of cardiology, Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences, and head of cardiology department at KGMU, Dr Sudhnashu Dwievdi.

    The workshop was organized by iCARE, Mumbai. The DGP feels that as first responders, policemen should be well-versed with the perils of cardiac arrest and should receive training in CPR.

  • Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi meets health workers in Lucknow

    By PTI

    LUCKNOW: Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra met various people, including doctors and health workers here on Wednesday, and praised them from their efforts during the pandemic. Ahead of the upcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, Priyanka Gandhi is on a five-day visit in Lucknow to review and discuss the party’s preparedness for the polls.

    On the third day of her visit Wednesday, she continued her meetings with senior party leaders to discuss the strategy for the polls, Pankaj Srivastava, vice chairman of the Media and Communication Department of the UP Congress Committee, told media. She will continue meetings at Kaul house with party office bearers.

    During meetings on Tuesday, the party’s general secretary had discussions relating to setting up of “war rooms” at district levels to receive feedback from the ground so as to take prompt decisions on emergent issues as part of the election strategy.

    She also discussed the route for the party’s proposed ‘Pratigya Yatra’. The party leaders also discussed the booth management strategy considered important for the polls, party officials said. This is her second visit this month after September 13, when she stayed in the state for five days.

    The Congress party had fought the 2017 UP polls in alliance with the Samajwadi Party. The grand old party had managed to win just seven of the 114 contested seats with a vote share of 6.25 per cent. This time, the Congress party has announced that it would fight the 2022 polls without aligning with any big political party.