Israel on cusp of fourth national elections in two years, after budget vote fails
Jerusalem, Dec 22: Israel appeared headed to its fourth election in two years on Tuesday after a last-ditch effort to keep the government afloat and push off the automatic dissolution of parliament failed.
Negotiations meant to bring about a budget compromise between the government's two main parties broke down early Tuesday and in a late-night Knesset session, members of the Likud and Blue and White parties voted against a proposal to postpone Tuesday's budget deadline for another two weeks. The measure failed by 49 votes to 47.
If the government does not pass a budget by midnight Tuesday, Israeli law stipulates that the Knesset dissolve and triggers snap elections in 90 days. Most avenues to evade that deadline have been closed off.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud and Defense Minister Benny Gantz's Blue and White party have been at loggerheads over the national budget issue since forming a unity government in May.
Netanyahu and Gantz had proposed pushing off Tuesday's deadline by two more weeks in an effort to reach a compromise on the 2020 budget. But members of their own parties voted against the motion in a late-night, 11th hour break from party ranks.
We do not want elections and we voted against them this evening, but we are not afraid of elections because we will win! the prime minister wrote on Twitter.
Once parliament dissolves, Israelis will head to the polls in March for a fourth time since early 2019, this time in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, a major economic recession, and while Netanyahu is on trial for a series of corruption charges.
Netanyahu also faces a challenger from within his own camp, Gideon Saar, who broke from the Likud party earlier this month and has called for the long-ruling prime minister's ouster. Several members of Netanyahu's party who shot down Tuesday's proposal are expected to join ranks with Saar.
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Delhi court sentences Haryana gangster Vikas Gulia, associate to life imprisonment
New Delhi (PTI): A Delhi court has sentenced Haryana gangster Vikas Gulia and his associate to life imprisonment under MCOCA provisions, but refused the death penalty saying the offences did not fall under the category of 'rarest of the rare cases'.
Additional Sessions Judge Vandana Jain sentenced Gulia and Dhirpal alias Kana to rigorous imprisonment for life under Section 3 (punishment for organised crime) of the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA).
In an order dated December 13, the judge said, "Death sentence can only be awarded in 'rarest of the rare cases' wherein the murder is committed in an extremely inhumane, barbarous, grotesque or dastardly manner as to arouse umbrage of the community at large."
The judge said that on weighing the aggravating and mitigating circumstances, it could be concluded that the present case did not fall under the category, and so, the death penalty could not be imposed upon the convicts.
"Thus, both the convicts are sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life and to pay a fine of Rs 3 lakh each, for committing the offence under Section 3 of MCOCA," she said.
The public prosecutor, seeking the death penalty for both the accused, submitted that they were involved in several unlawful activities while they were on bail in other cases.
He argued that the accused had shown no respect for the law and acted without any fear of legal consequences, and therefore did not deserve any leniency from the court.
The court noted that both convicts were involved in offences of murder, attempt to murder, extortion, robbery, house trespass, and criminal intimidation. Besides, they had misused the liberty of interim bail granted to them by absconding.
It said, "The terror of the convicts was such that it created fear psychosis in the mind of the general public, and they lost complete faith in the law enforcement agencies and chose to accede to the illegal demands of convicts. Despite suffering losses, they could not gather the courage to depose against them."
The court noted that Gulia was involved in at least 18 criminal cases, while Dhirpal had links to 10 serious offences.
It underlined that MCOCA had been enacted "keeping in view the fact that organised crime had come up as a serious threat to society, as it knew no territorial boundaries and is fuelled by illegal wealth generated by committing the offence of extortion, contract killings, kidnapping for ransom, collection of protection money, murder, etc."
Both accused persons had been convicted on December 10 in a case registered at Najafgarh police station. The police filed a chargesheet under Section 3 (punishment for organised crime) and 4 (punishment for possessing unaccountable wealth on behalf of member of organised crime syndicate) of MCOCA.
