Modi to face farmers' anger in 2019: Yogendra Yadav
New Delhi, May 29: Swaraj India leader Yogendra Yadav on Tuesday warned that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will face the anger of the farmers in the 2019 general elections.
He made the remarks at a meeting arranged by the All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee which marked June 5 as 'Mandsaur Shaheed Kisan Smriti Diwas' as six farmers were killed in the police firing in Madhya Pradesh's Mandsaur in 2017.
Criticising the inaction of the Madhya Pradesh government, he said that six farmers and a child named Abhishek were killed by police, but "to this day no concrete action was taken against the police officers responsible for this heinous murder".
Last year farmers demanding the better price for the crops triggered the widespread protest in Mandsaur, in which six people killed in police firing. Initially the Madhya Pradesh government denied police firing but finally Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan confirmed it.
The committee members demanded the immediate arrest of the of police personnel responsible for the killing of the six farmers.
The committee also met President Ram Nath Kovind on Monday and urged him to immediately pass the two bills prepared by the farmers of the country and asked him to arrange a parliament session to resolve the agrarian crisis.
Briefing the media about the interaction with the President, AIKS leaders said 21 political parties have signed their support for the bills and expressed confidence in passing both the bills.
Describing the four years regime of the prime minister as anti-farmer, V.M. Singh, the national President of Rashtriya Kisan Mazdoor Sangathan said: "Modi should immediately waive the crop loans of the farmers unconditionally in one go."
Expressing disappointment at the rising fuel prices, he said that this has terribly hit the farmers, most of whom use diesel generators as there is absence of electricity in most of the villages.
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Bombay High Court strikes down Centre's plan to set up Fact-Check Unit
Mumbai: The Bombay High Court has struck down the central government's plan to establish a fact-checking unit (FCU) under the Information Technology Amendment Rules, 2023. The decision comes in response to a petition filed by standup comedian Kunal Kamra, challenging the constitutional validity of the Centre's move.
Justice A.S. Chandurkar, delivering the final verdict, declared that the proposed IT Amendment Rules violated key provisions of the Indian Constitution, namely Articles 14 (right to equality), 19 (freedom of speech and expression), and 19(1)(g) (right to profession).
“I have considered the matter extensively. The impugned rules are violative of Articles 14, 19, and 19(1)(g) of the Constitution of India,” Justice Chandurkar said in his judgment. He further remarked that terms like "fake, false, and misleading" in the IT Rules were "vague" and lacked a clear definition, making them unconstitutional.
This judgment followed a split verdict issued by a division bench of the Bombay High Court in January. The bench, consisting of Justices Gautam Patel and Neela Gokhale, was divided in their opinions. While Justice Patel ruled that the IT Rules amounted to censorship and struck them down, Justice Gokhale upheld the rules, arguing that they did not pose a "chilling effect" on free speech, as the petitioners had claimed.
The matter was then referred to a third judge, leading to today's decision. The Supreme Court had previously stayed the Centre's notification that would have made the fact-checking unit operational, stating that the government could not proceed until the Bombay High Court ruled on the case.
Kunal Kamra and other petitioners had argued that the amendments posed unreasonable restrictions on freedom of speech and expression. They contended that the provisions would lead to government-led censorship, effectively granting the government unchecked powers to determine what constitutes 'truth' online. The petitioners further claimed that such powers would turn the government into "prosecutor, judge, and executioner" in matters of online content.
With the Bombay High Court’s ruling, the Centre's move to create fact-checking units has been effectively halted, reaffirming the importance of protecting freedom of speech and expression in the digital space.
