Feet washing as a comedy
Prime minister Modi is doing exactly the same work that people when they sleep through their tenure and do not implement a single pro-people welfare programmes and spend time making massive speeches while forgetting his constitutional responsibility, and busy filling the coffers of rich friends. Making people forget the real problem and turn them into caste, community and other smaller stuff is the real character of communal politicians. Apart from doing this, Modi is also playing a new role of washing the feet of Pourakarmikas.
Modi had defended the work of manual scavengers by saying getting into the manhole must be a spiritual experience for the Pourakarmikas, and had even provided indirect approval to scavenging and Pourakarmikas carrying human excreta on their heads. Now all of a sudden on Sunday, he has met some of them at Prayagraj and washed their feet in the presence of cameras, praised them to heavens. The people are laughing at this, stating this is a comedy show made as part of the Lok Sabha preparations.
When people give an opportunity to provide better administration, such shows and gimmicks turn necessary when one whiles away time and the golden opportunity given by the people. If a politician serves people in real sense, such shows won’t be necessary when the elections draw close. Politicians who actually do some work, do not hesitate to face the people of their constituency. The best example for this is our former CM Siddaramaiah. He made schemes and plans to fill the stomachs of the poor through Anna Bhagya and others. This scheme satiated the hunger of poorest of the poor in many cities. Indira canteen has provided food at highly economical rates to poor immigrant labourers, poor students, auto drivers etc. Hence he didn’t have to wash the feet of someone owing to this confidence. A politician who does not do any work and spends time managing gimmicks is the one who needs such optics when elections draw close.
Without contributing to changing their lifestyle, or providing them with any incentives or increased salaries, just washing their feet is just an election time optics and nothing else. This is much like cheating people. Having danced to the tunes of extra constitutional bodies sitting in Nagpur, and like the string puppet of Ambani, Adani etc, Modi has suddenly remembered Pourakarmikas during the fag end of his term.
In the last four and half years, he could not fulfil any promise he had issued to the people of this country. No black money was recovered from abroad and never landed in anybody’s bank account. The promise of creating 2cr jobs wasn’t fulfilled. Forget fulfilling the manifesto promises, he didn’t allow anybody to live in peace. This party has encouraged lynching in the name of cow safety. Poor went through hell during demonetisation. GST left the traders on the edge. Thinkers and writers who spoke against this have been sent to jail in the name of ‘urban naxals’. Killers of Dabholkar, Pansare, Kalburgo, Gauri Lankesh and others have not been penalised yet.
If the PM Modi is really interested in the lives of Pourakarmikas, he should stop making a comedy out of all this and strive to improve their life conditions. Every five days since the last year-and-half, we are losing a sanitation worker to his trip down the manhole. The family of the dead aren’t even receiving compensation for their loss. The family members lost about what needs doing next. This act of washing feet won’t give them life. If you have any self-respect, Modi should offer martyr status to those who died getting down the manholes, and accord the status much better. If a dead Paurakarmika should be covered with national flag and the family should be rehabilitated.
This act of washing feet may not even last longer with polls fast approaching. Go to people with the list of your achievements. If you have failed, seek their excuse. Stop such dramas. This is democracy and citizens are the last word here. People choose their leaders and reprsentatives every once in five years. They are the supreme power. Those who are elected need to work according to the objectives of the constitution. They would have sworn to this. Have you acted accordingly Modiji? Question yourself. You have compromised upon RBI, CBI and UGC which were perfectly autonomous institutions till now. You tried arm twisting the high court. Your ministers speak about changing the constitution. Should one elect you who has kicked the very ladder he has climbed on, and does he have any moral right to oppose this?
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US vetoes Palestinian bid to gain statehood at the United Nations
United Nations, Apr 19: The US has vetoed a resolution in the UN Security Council on the latest Palestinian bid to be granted full membership of the United Nations, an outcome lauded by Israel but criticised by Palestine as “unfair, immoral, and unjustified".
The 15-nation Council voted on a draft resolution Thursday that would have recommended to the 193-member UN General Assembly “that the State of Palestine be admitted to membership in the United Nations.”
The resolution got 12 votes in its favour, with Switzerland and the UK abstaining and the US casting its veto.
To be adopted, the draft resolution required at least nine Council members voting in its favour, with no vetoes by any of its five permanent members - China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Palestinian attempts for recognition as a full member state began in 2011. Palestine is currently a non-member observer state, a status that was granted in November 2012 by the UN General Assembly.
This status allows Palestine to participate in proceedings of the world body but it cannot vote on resolutions. The only other non-member Observer State at the UN is the Holy See, representing the Vatican.
Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz praised the US for vetoing what he called a “shameful proposal.”
“The proposal to recognise a Palestinian state, more than 6 months after the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust and after the sexual crimes and other atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists was a reward for terrorism”, Katz wrote on X, after the US veto.
US Ambassador Robert Wood, Alternative Representative for Special Political Affairs, said in the explanation of the vote at the Security Council meeting on Palestinian membership that Washington continues to strongly support a two-state solution.
“It remains the US view that the most expeditious path toward statehood for the Palestinian people is through direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority with the support of the United States and other partners,” he said.
“This vote does not reflect opposition to Palestinian statehood, but instead is an acknowledgement that it will only come from direct negotiations between the parties.”
Wood said there are “unresolved questions” as to whether Palestine meets the criteria to be considered a State.
“We have long called on the Palestinian Authority to undertake necessary reforms to help establish the attributes of readiness for statehood and note that Hamas - a terrorist organisation - is currently exerting power and influence in Gaza, an integral part of the state envisioned in this resolution,” he said, adding that “For these reasons, the United States voted “no” on this Security Council resolution.”
Wood noted that since the October 7 attacks last year against Israel by Hamas, US President Joe Biden has been clear that sustainable peace in the region can only be achieved through a two-state solution, with Israel’s security guaranteed.
"There is no other path that guarantees Israel’s security and future as a democratic Jewish state. There is no other path that guarantees Palestinians can live in peace and with dignity in a state of their own. And there is no other path that leads to regional integration between Israel and all its Arab neighbours, including Saudi Arabia,” he said.
The Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas, sharply criticised the US veto, saying that it was “unfair, immoral, and unjustified, and defies the will of the international community, which strongly supports the State of Palestine obtaining full membership in the United Nations.”
Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine, said that “our right to self-determination has never once been subject to bargaining or negotiation.
“Our right to self-determination is a natural right, a historic right, a legal right. A right to live in our homeland Palestine as an independent state that is free and that is sovereign. Our right to self-determination is inalienable...,” he said.
Getting emotional and choking up as he made the remarks, Mansour said that a majority of the Council members “have risen to the level of this historic moment” and have stood “on the side of justice, freedom and hope.”
He asserted that Palestine’s admission as a full member of the UN is an “investment in peace.”
On April 2, 2024, Palestine again sent a letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres requesting that its application for full UN membership be considered again.
For a State to be granted full UN membership, its application must be approved both by the Security Council and the General Assembly, where a two-thirds majority of the members present and voting is required for the State to be admitted as a full member.
Earlier in the day, Guterres, in his remarks to a Council meeting on the Middle East, warned that the region is on a “knife edge”.
“Recent escalations make it even more important to support good-faith efforts to find lasting peace between Israel and a fully independent, viable and sovereign Palestinian state,” Guterres said.
“Failure to make progress towards a two-state solution will only increase volatility and risk for hundreds of millions of people across the region, who will continue to live under the constant threat of violence,” he said.
The UN, citing the Ministry of Health in Gaza, said that between October 7 last year and April 17, at least 33,899 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza and 76,664 Palestinians injured. Over 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals, including 33 children, have been killed in Israel, the vast majority on October 7.
As of April 17, Israeli authorities estimate that 133 Israelis and foreign nationals remain captive in Gaza, including fatalities whose bodies are withheld.
