News Analysis India

Tag: Uttar Pradesh government

  • Uttar Pradesh STF arrests man for duping people with promise of benefits from government schemes

    By PTI
    LUCKNOW: The Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force on Sunday arrested the mastermind of a gang, which used to dupe people by claiming to install mobile phone towers, getting loans and also in the name of various government schemes.

    In a statement issued here on Sunday, the STF said the arrested accused has been identified as Naveen Giri, a resident of Bihar’s Nalanda district, and he was arrested from Kanpur’s Bidhnoo police station area.

    He was living in Vineet Khand of Gomti Nagar in Lucknow.

    Giri used to dupe people in the name of installing mobile phone towers, getting loans and also in the name of various government schemes like Balika Smriti Yojana, Fasal Bima Yojana and Rashtriya Krishi Grameen Vikas Yojana by demanding cheques from them.

    During interrogation, Giri said he used to work with people as an organised gang in different states, and garnered wealth by duping people, the STF said.

    In the past five years, the gang had duped hundreds of people worth lakhs.

    A case has been registered in this connection, the STF further said.

  • Opposition misleading farmers to regain lost ground: Uttar Pradesh minister Sidharth Nath Singh

    By PTI
    LUCKNOW: Uttar Pradesh minister Sidharth Nath Singh on Saturday charged the Opposition with misleading farmers and using them to regain their lost political ground. In a statement, Singh alleged that the parties pretending to be championing the farmers’ cause have actually been responsible for their plight since the Independence.

    When the Modi government took over for the first time in 2014, farmers’ interests were given a priority, he claimed, adding that the government expedited the implementation of projects that were pending for several decades.

    “It was Prime Minister Narendra Modi who implemented the recommendations of the Swaminathan commission and not the Congress that sat over it for years,” Singh said.

    Farmers are getting one and a half times of their crops’ price today while procurement of seeds and fertilisers has also been made much easier for them unlike in the past when there were long queues for it and they were canecharged, Singh claimed.

    The minister said the PM and Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath are committed to doubling the income of farmers and efforts are on to achieve this goal. He alleged that farmers are much better off than they were in the past and this is what upsets the Opposition, which has been exploiting them as a mere vote bank.

    He said that in the Union Budget also, special attention has been given to improving the condition of villages and farmers. “During the Chauri Chaura Centenary celebrations on Thursday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said the earlier governments used farmers only as a vote bank and made announcements of plans which never saw the light of day whereas now plans were being implemented,” the UP minister added.

    Singh said that the PM had also appealed to farmers to identify their true well-wishers and said it pained the Opposition to see positive changes taking place under the present government.

  • SC dismisses Uttar Pradesh government’s plea against bail to SP leader Azam Khan’s wife and son

    By PTI
    NEW DLH: The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed an appeal of Uttar Pradesh government against the Allahabad High Court order granting bail to the wife and son of senior Samajwadi Party leader and Lok Sabha MP Mohammad Azam Khan, in a case pertaining to fraudulent allotment of the government land.

    A bench of Chief Justice SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian told Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the State government, “It is a good order. What is wrong with it? In this case the judgement is correct. We are dismissing the Special Leave Petition.”

    The High Court on October 13 last year had granted bail to Azam Khan’s wife, Tazeen Fatma, an Uttar Pradesh assembly member from Rampur and their son Abdullah Azam Khan, a former MLA. Mehta said that there are several cases lodged against his father (Azam Khan)for land grabbing and other offences.

    The bench said that maybe his father (Azam Khan) has done some wrongs but his son (Abdullah Khan) cannot be blamed for it. Mehta added that they (son and wife) are beneficiaries. “We have said that the judgement is good. Nothing else. The SLP is dismissed,” the bench said.

    The Solicitor General then urged the court that the observation made in the order should not affect the trial against the accused. The High Court had said that the trial court shall expeditiously conclude the trial of the case against them, possibly within a year.

    The two were booked by the Uttar Pradesh police for the allegedly fraudulent allotment of a plot of land for Hotel Quality Bar in 2014. The plot was allotted to the mother-son duo after their bid of Rs 1,200 rent per month was found to be the highest.

    Tazeen Fatma had argued in the high court that she took the property on rent in a bonafide belief that it belonged to the Zila Sahkari Vikas Sangh, Rampur and was not aware that it actually belonged to the district administration.

    She had contended that they were falsely implicated in this case due to political rivalry.

    State government has contended that Azam Khan, who was then a minister in the Uttar Pradesh government, had misused the official machinery to create forged documents for extending undue gains to his wife and son, who had colluded with him.

  • Will look into allowing video-conferencing for jailed Kerala scribe: Uttar Pradesh government to SC

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: The Uttar Pradesh government told the Supreme Court on Friday that it would look into the possibility of facilitating the video-conferencing between jailed scribe Siddique Kappan, arrested on his way to Hathras where a young Dalit woman had died after allegedly being gang-raped, and his mother living in Kerala.

    Meanwhile, the top court fixed the plea of Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ) questioning the arrest of scribe Kappan for hearing on a non-miscellaneous day.

    A bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde took note of the submissions of senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the journalists’ body, that the mother of Kappan was unconscious and was wanting to see her son.

    “Please allow her the video conferencing option so that she can see her son while she lives. We have filed an application. Please allow us,” Sibal told the bench during the hearing conducted through video conferencing. “We will allow,” said the bench which also comprised justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian.

    Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the state government, told the bench that the issue be left to him and the authorities and they would look into the possibility of granting the video-conferencing facility. Earlier, the Uttar Pradesh government had opposed the bail plea of Kappan saying he has been “associated” with PFI, responsible for disrupting public peace by provoking “the class and caste conflicts”.

    The UP government in its additional affidavit has said that Kappan has been associated with the Popular Front of India (PFI) which has been responsible for disrupting the public peace by provoking class and caste conflicts to destroy public order and tarnish the image of the state government.

    Prior to this, the KUWJ had said that the accused is innocent and even urged the top court to order an independent inquiry by a retired top court judge to determine the facts of the “illegal arrest and detention” of Kappan.

    Kappan was arrested on October 5 while he was on his way to Hathras, home to the young Dalit woman who died after being allegedly gang-raped by four upper-caste men. The FIR has been filed under various provisions of the IPC and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) against four people having alleged links with PFI.

    PFI had been accused in the past of funding protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act across the country earlier this year. Hathras has been in the news following the death of a 19-year-old Dalit woman who was allegedly gang-raped on September 14, 2020, in a village in the district.

    Her cremation at night by the authorities, allegedly without the parents’ consent, has triggered widespread outrage.

  • Priyanka slams UP govt over Budaun gang rape, murder

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra hit out at the Adityanath government on Wednesday over the gang rape and murder in Budaun district, alleging that there was something wrong in the intentions of the Uttar Pradesh administration on the issue of women”s security.

    The 50-year-old woman was gang-raped and brutally murdered allegedly by a priest and two others on Sunday when she had gone to a temple. The three suspects have been booked and two of them arrested on Tuesday, police said.

    Tagging a media report, Priyanka Gandhi tweeted: “In Hathras, the government administration did not listen to the voice of those pleading. The government saved officials and suppressed the victim”s voice.”

    “In Budaun, the police station officer did not listen to the one pleading and did not even examine the place of the incident. There is something wrong in the UP government”s intentions on women’s security,” she added.

    Priyanka Gandhi, who is the Congress” general secretary incharge of Uttar Pradesh, and party leaders has been attacking the Adityanath government over law and order, alleging that criminal activities were rampant, a claim denied by the state government.

    The Budaun incident comes months after a Dalit woman from Hathras was allegedly raped by four men on September 14 and died on September 29 at Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital.