'Fake letter' on home minister's name: BJP spokesman Hemanth Kumar arrested
Bengaluru, Apr 27: A journalist was arrested here Saturday for allegedly circulating a "fake letter,"purportedly written by home minister M B Patil to Congress supremo Sonia Gandhi in 2017 on religion tag to the Lingayat sect.
Patil had termed the letter fake and alleged that it was a conspiracy against him by his rivals.
Inspector General of Police CID, economic offence wing and cyber crime Hemant Nimbalkar told PTI that Hemant Kumar was arrested here Saturday.
Kumar is special correspondent of a Delhi based English and Hindi magazine.
Police in a release said Hemanth Kumar was arrested, "based on credible evidence corroborated by oral statement."
He was produced before a court, which granted police custody of Kumar till April 30, it said.
The 'letter' had first emerged during the Karnataka assembly elections in 2018.
It resurfaced during the current Lok Sabha election with BJP first publishing it on its Twitter handle on April 15.
Condemning the arrest, a delegation of BJP leaders, led by MLAs Arvind Limbavali and Suresh Kumar submitted a memorandum to the Director General of Police Neelamani M Raju.
Later, speaking to reporters, Limbavali alleged that all those supporting the BJP and working for the party during the election are being targeted at the instance of home minister.
Police barged into the office and arrested Hemanth Kumar, who is a BJPsympathiser, he said.
Patil has repeatedly termed it a fake letter, but it kept resurfacing time and again.
When it came up again,Patil, as home minister, took serious note of it.
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Trump says he ‘hasn’t even thought about’ continuing Iran ceasefire
Washington: US President Donald Trump has said he has not yet considered whether he would continue the ceasefire involving Iran, while also claiming the United States holds the advantage in negotiations.
Speaking to reporters, Trump said he was prepared to make a deal with “whoever is running the show” in Iran.
“They are fighting with each other, there’s tremendous infighting. They’re probably fighting for leadership in many cases. I think they’re fighting not to be leader because we knocked out two levels of leaders,” he said.
Trump added, “When they want they can call me. We have all the cards, we’ve won everything.”
Referring to ongoing negotiations, he said, “They gave us a paper that should’ve been better. And, interestingly, immediately when I cancelled it [envoy trip to Pakistan], within 10 minutes we got a new paper that was much better.”
“We talked about they will not have a nuclear weapon, very simple … They offered a lot, but not enough,” he added.
When asked whether he would continue the ceasefire, Trump replied, “I haven’t even thought about it.”
The remarks come as uncertainty remains over the future of the temporary truce and broader negotiations between Washington and Tehran.
