Congress bags Allahabad seat 40 years after Amitabh Bachchan's feat
Prayagraj (UP), Jun 4: Congress candidate Ujjwal Raman Singh on Tuesday secured a win on the Allahabad Lok Sabha seat ending the party's 40 years long dry patch when actor Amitabh Bachchan was elected.
According to the Election Commission, Singh won the seat by a margin of 58,795 votes against Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Neeraj Tripathi. Singh got a total of 4,62,145 votes, while Tripathi received 4,03,350 votes.
Senior Congress leader from Allahabad Baba Abhay Awasthi said that after Bachchan, who was elected from the seat in 1984, the Congress has won the seat after 40 years.
He said before 1984, former prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri won the election from the Allahabad parliamentary constituency in 1957 and 1962. "After Shastri's death in 1966, his son Harikishan Shastri won the 1967 election from here," Awasthi said.
The Congress leader added that after 1984, many big leaders like Anil Shastri, Kamla Bahuguna, Satya Prakash Malviya contested elections from this seat on Congress ticket, but lost.
Since 2014, the seat has remained with the BJP with Shyam Charan Gupta winning the constituency in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections and Rita Bahuguna Joshi in the 2019 polls.
Singh (51), son of Samajwadi Party's stalwart leader and two-time MP from the Allahabad seat Rewati Raman Singh, has been an MLA from the Karchana seat of Prayagraj district.
After the Allahabad seat was given to the Congress under the INDIA bloc, Singh left the SP and joined the Congress, which announced him as its candidate from this constituency.
Tripathi (57), son of BJP leader and former West Bengal Governor late Kesari Nath Tripathi, was named as the BJP's Allahabad candidate in April, replacing outgoing MP Joshi.
Earlier, Tripathi served as the additional advocate general for the Uttar Pradesh government.
The Allahabad constituency falls in Prayagraj district and went to polls on May 25. The seat has over 18 lakh registered voters.
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41 lakh illicit liquor seized, 1.84 lakh arrested in major drive: K'taka Minister tells Assembly
Belagavi (Karnataka) (PTI): The Karnataka Excise Department has conducted a statewide crackdown on illegal liquor trade over the last two years, resulting in arrests and seizures of alcohol, Karnataka Excise Minister R B Timmapur said on Tuesday.
As many as 1,09,017 people were arrested, and seizures included 13.66 lakh litres of liquor and 27.19 lakh litres of beer, he said in a written reply to a starred question by Harihar BJP MLA B P Harish in the Karnataka Assembly.
The Minister said the enforcement drive covered the financial year 2023–24, 2024–25 up to June, and 2025–26 from July to October, targeting unauthorised liquor manufacture, storage, sale and transportation across the State.
"During this period, statewide enforcement drives resulted in a total of 1,84,570 raids against illegal liquor sales,” Timmapur said.
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He noted that 9,179 non-bailable cases and 91,968 bailable and compoundable cases under Section 15(A) of the Karnataka Excise Act, 1965, were registered during the same period.
According to him, there have been no reports indicating that students have become addicted to alcohol due to illegal liquor sales.
The sale of alcohol to minors is strictly prohibited under the Karnataka Excise Act, 1965, and the department has issued periodic instructions to initiate legal action against violators, with strict enforcement and investigation measures in place, the Minister said.
Excise officials are carrying out regular road and night patrols, collecting intelligence, monitoring habitual offenders and conducting raids to identify illicit distillation units, unauthorised liquor outlets and spurious liquor manufacturing centres, he said, adding the department is also enforcing the law to prevent the production, storage, sale and transport of spurious, non-duty-paid and unauthorised liquor.
Regular patrols are being conducted on national and state highways, with suspicious vehicles being subjected to checks.
At the district level, standing committee meetings are held under the chairmanship of Deputy Commissioners, and joint operations are carried out with the police and forest departments to curb excise-related offences.
The department is also conducting awareness programmes through Gram Sabhas and in schools and colleges to educate the public and students about the physical, mental and social health hazards associated with alcohol addiction and substance abuse, Timmapur added.
