Siddaramaiah's repeated "chest-thumping" on completing term direct snub to Cong high command: Ashoka
Bengaluru (PTI): BJP leader R Ashoka on Thursday said Chief Minister CM Siddaramaiah's "repeated chest-thumping" about completing a full term, despite the supposed "power-sharing agreement", was nothing short of a direct snub to the Congress high command.
When a sitting CM keeps reiterating his own permanence while conveniently ignoring the party's internal commitments, "it's not confidence, it's defiance," the Leader of Opposition in Karnataka Assembly said.
Siddaramaiah had on Wednesday asserted that he will be in office for a full five-year term, amid speculations about leadership change in the ruling Congress later this year.
"What happened to the (Congress) "high command's will"? Has it been reduced to a rubber stamp in Karnataka? Or has Siddaramaiah already declared independence from party discipline?" Ashoka asked in a post on 'X'.
"By brushing aside the power-sharing pact and daringly stating "why should there be a doubt", he's not just undermining Karnataka Congress Chief and Deputy CM D K Shivakumar, he's publicly diminishing the authority of Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, and Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge," Ashoka said.
Kharge had on Monday asserted that it is up to the party high command to decide on matters such as change of guard.
If the Congress high command had any real control, they would not allow their own CM to so brazenly contradict internal arrangements, Ashoka further said.
But then again, maybe the CM's chair in Karnataka is decided by "lottery" and "luck", not leadership and loyalty, he added.
The question now is not whether Siddaramaiah will complete his term, it's whether the Congress high command has the spine to assert itself, Ashoka said.
There was stiff competition between Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar for the chief minister's post after the declaration of Assembly election results in May 2023, and the Congress had managed to convince the latter and made him the deputy CM.
There were some reports at the time that a compromise had been reached based on a "rotational chief minister formula," according to which Shivakumar will become CM after two-and-half years, but they have not been officially confirmed by the party.
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SC slams WhatsApp, Meta over privacy policy, says will pass interim order on Feb 9
New Delhi (PTI): The Supreme Court on Tuesday came down heavily on Meta Platforms Inc and WhatsApp while hearing their appeals against a Competition Commission of India order imposing a penalty of Rs 213.14 crore over the privacy policy, saying tech giants cannot “play with the right to privacy of citizens in the name of data sharing”.
A bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi said that it will pass an interim order on February 9. The top court ordered that the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology be made a party to the petitions.
It was hearing appeals filed by Meta and WhatsApp against a National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) judgment that upheld the CCI’s findings of abuse of dominance, while granting limited relief on advertising-related data sharing.
"You can't play with the right of privacy of this country in the name of data sharing. We will not allow you to share a single word of the data, either you give an undertaking...you cannot violate the right of privacy of citizens,” the CJI said.
The bench said the right to privacy is zealously guarded in the country and noted that the privacy terms are “so cleverly crafted” that a common person cannot understand them.
“This is a decent way of committing theft of private information, we will not allow you to do that... You have to give an undertaking otherwise, we have to pass an order,” the CJI said.
