A day after Assembly dissolution, KCR kicks off poll campaign
Hyderabad, Sep 7 : A day after dissolving Telangana Assembly, caretaker Chief Minister and TRS chief K. Chandrashekhar Rao on Friday launched his party's election campaign, seeking fresh mandate and targeting Congress party.
Addressing a public meeting in Husnabad constituency in his home district Siddipet, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) sounded the poll bugle and sought people's blessings for another term to make "golden Telangana' a reality.
Listing out the major welfare schemes and development works undertaken by his government during the last four years, Rao assured people that any additional wealth generated by the state will be spent on their welfare.
KCR, as Rao is popularly known, considers Husnabad a lucky place. It was from here that he had launched 2014 poll campaign. Husnabad is among 105 constituencies for which KCR announced the candidates on Thursday.
Titled "Praja Ashirwada Sabha", this was the first of 100 meetings to be addressed by KCR covering 100 constituencies over the next 50 days.
The TRS chief expects Assembly polls in November. The Election Commission on Friday decided to send a team to Hyderabad on September 11 to make an assessment of the poll preparedness in the state.
KCR wondered why the opposition parties, who were so far claiming to be ready for elections anytime, are now afraid of facing polls.
He launched a bitter attack on the Congress party blaming it for all the problems faced by Telangana in undivided Andhra Pradesh. He said the Congress leaders of Telangana were only working as slaves to their high command in Delhi.
KCR told people that he dissolved the Assembly and going for early polls in the interest of the state.
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36 ex-judges slam Opposition move to impeach Justice Swaminathan
New Delhi (PTI): Thirty-six former judges on Saturday gave a call to people, including parliamentarians, to denounce opposition leaders' move to impeach Madras High Court judge Justice G R Swaminathan, saying such an attempt, if allowed to proceed, would cut at the very roots of democracy and independence of the judiciary.
On December 1, Justice Swaminathan held that the Arulmighu Subramania Swamy Temple was duty-bound to light the lamp at the Deepathoon, in addition to the customary lighting near the Uchi Pillaiyar Mandapam.
The single-judge bench said that doing so would not encroach upon the rights of the adjacent dargah or the Muslim community.
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The order sparked a row, and on December 9, several opposition MPs, led by the DMK, submitted a notice to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla to move a motion for the removal of the judge.
Taking serious exception to the move, the former judges in a joint statement said this is a "brazen attempt to browbeat judges who do not fall in line with the ideological and political expectations of a particular section of society".
"If such an attempt is permitted to proceed, it would cut at the very roots of our democracy and the independence of the judiciary," they said.
"We therefore call upon all stakeholders -- Members of Parliament across party lines, members of the Bar, civil society, and citizens at large -- to unequivocally denounce this move and ensure that it is nipped in the bud at the very inception," they added.
The statement emphasised that the judges must remain answerable to their oath and to the Constitution of India, not to "partisan political pressures or ideological intimidation".
"The message from all constitutional stakeholders must be clear and firm: in a republic governed by the rule of law, judgments are tested by appeals and legal critique, and not by threats of impeachment for political nonconformity," it said.
The statement was signed by former Supreme Court judge Krishn Murari J as well as ex-chief justices and former judges of different high courts.
The statement said the opposition party's move is not an "isolated aberration". It fits into a "clear and deeply troubling pattern" in India's recent constitutional history, where sections of the political class have sought to discredit and intimidate the higher judiciary whenever outcomes do not align with their interests, it added.
"The unprecedented bid in 2018 to initiate impeachment proceedings against then Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, the sustained campaigns of vilification directed at Chief Justices Ranjan Gogoi, S A Bobde and D Y Chandrachud while they were in office," the statement noted.
"The targeted attacks now being mounted against the incumbent CJI, Justice Surya Kant, whenever a judgment/remark displeases a political constituency, are all manifestations of the same trend," it said.
"This is not principled, reasoned criticism of judicial decisions; it is an attempt to weaponise impeachment and public calumny as instruments of pressure -- a practice that strikes at the heart of judicial independence and the basic norms of constitutional democracy," the statement added.
