COIMBATORE l saturday l may 04, 2024 l `9.00 l PAGES 12 l LATE CITY EDITION May consider granting interim bail to Kejriwal due to polls: SC The Supreme Court on Friday indicated that it may grant interim bail to AAP leader and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal in view of Lok Sabha polls Apex court to hear Arguments on May 7 Sec 70 of pmla covers political parties A bench of justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta told Additional Solicitor General S V Raju, appearing for ED, that the hearing on Kejriwal’s plea against arrest is likely to take time and therefore, the court was considering hearing arguments on interim bail on May 7. Kejriwal was arrested on March 21 in the excise policy-linked money laundering case ■ “We are just saying we will hear on interim bail and not saying we will grant bail. We may or may not grant interim bail,” the bench clarified ■ The court rejected the argument of Kejriwal’s counsel A M Singhvi that Section 70 of PMLA (which deals with companies) would not cover political parties and hence the AAP convenor should not have been arrested Sec 19 of pmla Empowers ED to arrest persons based on the material in its possession CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOgGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI Amethi ticket to little-known Congman N a m i ta B a j pa i @ Lucknow Congress leader Rahul Gandhi files his nomination papers for the Lok Sabha election in Rae Bareli on Friday, as mother Sonia and sister Priyanka look on | PTI Closure report on Vemula puts T’gana in a spot Court nod to be sought to reopen case after closure report said he was not a Dalit: DGP “The deceased himself was aware that he does not belong to Scheduled Caste (SC) ... This Hours after a police closure could be one of the constant report in the Rohith Vemula fears as the exposure of the suicide case filed in the Telan- same would put him to loss of gana High Court on Friday his academic degrees that he claimed he was not a Dalit, the earned over the years and be Telangana police tried to con- compelled to face prosecutrol the damage by announc- tion,” the report said. ing it wanted to reSeveral individuopen the probe. als were accused in DGP Ravi Gupta the case, including said the police will the then Union file a petition in the HRD Minister Smcourt concer ned riti Irani and the seeking per misthen vice-chancelsion for further lor P Appa Rao. investigation. The closure reEarlier in the day Vemula’s mother , port was first filed the Gachibowli po- questions probe in March before the lice filed a closure jurisdictional report before the “As some doubts have court, four months high court citing been expressed by the after the Congress lack of evidence in mother and others of came to power in the 2016 suicide of the deceased Rohit the state in Decemthe University of Vemula... a petition ber 2023. After RoHyderabad PhD will be filed in the hith died by suischolar. It went on court concerned...to c i d e, C o n g r e s s to state that he did permit further leader Rahul Gannot belong to a investigation into the dhi too had visited Scheduled Caste case,” the DGP said the university hoscommunity. The tel, when the stuHigh Court then disposed of dents protests were at the peak. petitions related to the case. In 2023, in a resolution passed More than eight years after at its 85th plenary session, the Ro h i t h ’s s u i c i d e, wh i ch Congress said it would bring in sparked widespread protests a legislation called the ‘Rohith across the nation, the police, in Vemula Act’ to redress distheir closure report stated that crimination faced by SC, ST, the reasons for suicide are per- OBC and minority students in sonal and no one abetted it. educational institutions. Express News Service @ Hyderabad Ending weeks of speculation, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi filed his nomination papers for the generl elections from his family’s bastion Rae Bareli in the presence of his mother and former Rae Bareli MP Sonia Gandhi, sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and party chief Mallikarjun Kharge on Friday . This newspaper was the first to report on the buzz about Rahul entering the fray from Rae Bareli (April 30 edition). With Rahul opting for Rae Bareli, the party gave the Am- ethi ticket to family faithful Kishori Lal Sharma, 63. Little is known about him except that he is a low profile operative and an errand boy of the Gandhi family in Rae Bareli. He, too, filed his papers. Priyanka recalled her family’s long association with Sharma, adding, “he has been handling Amethi for a long time. When I had managed election for the first time in 1999, we had done it together. He knows every village and street of Amethi.” Rahul said, “I am happy that Kishori Lalji, who has been serving in the area for the In Fresh trouble for Revanna, police file FIR on kidnap plaint e x p r e s s n e w s s e r v i c e @ Mysuru IN fresh trouble for Hassan NDA candidate Prajwal Revanna and his father H D Revanna, police on Friday filed a fresh FIR against H D Revanna based on a complaint filed in Mysuru. The father-son duo is facing criminal charges for sexually assaulting several women. The latest complaint was filed by the son of a victim. The complainant alleged that his mother, who had worked as a domestic help at H D Revanna’s house and farm house for six years, was kidnapped by the politician and his aide Sathish Babanna. He said Sathish Babanna visited his house on April 26, saying Revanna’s wife Bhavani had invited his mother to her house. His mother was then taken to Revanna’s house and sent back. However, on April 29, Babanna visited again saying Revanna had asked for his mother. She was then allegedly forcibly taken on a bike. On May 1, some villagers told the son TN man without hands gets licence to drive car with legs S i n d u j a J a n e @ Chennai In a possible first in Tamil Nadu, a 31-year-old Chennai man who had lost both his arms from below the elbow in an electric accident during childhood, has been given a special driving licence by the North Chennai regional transport office. K Thansean of Vyasarpadi was given the licence based on a fitness certificate issued by government doctors. A visibly happy Thansean, who is pursuing Master of Laws at Dr Ambedkar Government Law College, said disabled people like him who love driving should be encouraged and given licence without much hassle. “Immediately after getting the licence last week, I drove my family in a car to a temple in Perambur. Of course, people on the road were surprised. Many came and appreciated me for driving the car with legs without any difficulty,” Thansean said. His longest drive so far was to a temple in Tiruttani. “The vehicles are modified to my convenience. Horn, indicator, wiper, and light switches are placed near the hand brake,” he said. P5 Scindia’s fight to reclaim lost Guna glory A n u r a a g s i n g h @ Bhopal WHEN Jyotiraditya Scindia lost the royal family bastion Guna in Madhya Pradesh to his protégé-turnedrival KP Yadav in 2019, it was largely attributed to his arrogance. Then, Scindia was an influential Congress leader and Yadav had just switched sides to join the BJP to emerge as a giant killer. Cut to 2024, Scindia is fighting to reclaim his lost glory on a BJP ticket while the Congress has taken a leaf out of the BJP’s book by fielding Rao Yadvendra Singh Yadav, a former leader of the saffron party . Guna has been synonymous with Gwalior’s erstwhile royal Scindia family and Scindia has won four times – in 2002, 2004, 2009 and 2014 – on Congress ticket. According to party insiders, when Scindia’s candidature was announced on March 2, there was considerable unease among party workers as well as the dominant Yadav voters over the denial of ticket to sitting MP K P Yadav. “The Yadavs are clearly siding last 40 years, will represent Amethi this time.” Apparently, Rahul opted out of Amethi because he did not want the polls to be framed as a rematch between him and the BJP’s feisty Smriti Irani, who had defeated him in 2019. But by fielding the foot-soldier, the party appears to have thrown in the towel. When the SP allotted Amethi and Rae Bareli to the Congress, the understanding was the Gandhi siblings would enter the fray from there. Sonia had represented Rae Bareli in the Lok Sabha since 2004 before she vacated it. with Rao Yadvendra Singh Yadav. To complicate matters, Yadav is the son of former BJP MLA Rao Deshraj Singh Yadav, a sworn adversary of the Scindia family This makes Yadav . acceptable even to non-Yadav BJP voters,” said a senior BJP worker. While Yadav voters are still opposed to Scindia, the other castes, Jyotiraditya Scindia Yadvendra Singh Yadav Illustration: Mandar Pardikar including Lodhis, Kirars, Raghuvanshis, Vaishya, Brahmin, Kshatriyas, and tribals are said to be backing the Union minister. Scindia has his work cut out. The scarcity of drinking water in many parts of the constituency, particularly in tribal-dominated areas, also remains a concern for the Scindia camp. Recently, a video went viral which showed Scindia’s wife being confronted by women raising their water woes. Since his humiliating defeat in 2019, Scindia has been frequently crisscrossing the 18.83 lakh votersstrong constituency. He visited Guna many times after joining the BJP in March 2020 and also after becoming Union minister in the Narendra Modi government. According to political watchers, the unique combination of Modi’s image and the royal family’s goodmay work in favour of Scindia. Scindia has also got former BJP chief ministers Uma Bharti and Shivraj Singh Chouhan to campaign for him to ensure the support of Lodhi-Kirar castes to counter the opposition of Yadavs. about a video of alleged sexual abuse of his mother by Prajwal. Disturbed by this, he immediately contacted Babanna and asked him to bring his mother back. However, Babanna claimed the woman was involved in a case and she could not be sent back till she secured bail. The son then filed a complaint of kidnapping. The FIR names Revanna as accused No 1 and Babanna as No 2 under Sections 364(a), 365, and 34. Both seats are family: rahul “My mother has handed over the karmabhoomi of our family with great trust giving me an opportunity to serve it. Amethi and Rae Bareli are not different for me. Both are my family,” Rahul said. The seat was earlier held by his grand mother and former prime minister Indira Gandhi thrice (1967, 1971, 1980) and grandad Feroze Gandhi in 1952 and 1957 HC Quashes the appointment of 18 DEOs in TN Justice RN Manjula quashed the appointment of 18 district education officers over failure to adhere to reservation rules, and asked the school education dept to prepare new selection list | P2 ‘Stop-chain failure’ Pregnant woman falls to death from train, kin fault rlys E x p r e s s N e w s S e r v i c e @ Cuddalore A 21-year-old pregnant woman, who was travelling on a train with her family members for her baby shower function, accidentally fell from the train on Thursday night between Ulundurpet and Vriddachalam and died. Efforts to save her by the family members failed as the emergency chain in the train compartment allegedly failed to work and they had to rush to the adjacent compartment to pull the chain to stop the train. But the express train had travelled for a distance of eight km by then and the woman could not be saved on time. The victim, Kasthuri (22) of Tirusulam in Chennai, was travelling on Kollam Express with husband Suresh Kumar and other relatives for the function to be held in Tenkasi. Speaking to reporters, family members alleged that Kasthuri, who was seven months pregnant, could not be saved because of the failure of the train’s emergency brake. “Immediately after she fell off the train, we attempted to stop the train by pulling the chain in S9 coach. As the train didn’t stop, we rushed to S8 coach and pulled the chain. But by the time the train halted, it had crossed several kilometres from the spot where she fell,” they said. P5
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