Pahalgam attack 'barbaric', Modi a fighter who will bring peace to J-K: Rajinikanth
Mumbai, May 1 (PTI): Veteran star Rajinikanth on Thursday termed the Pahalgam terror attack "barbaric and merciless" and said Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a fighter who would bring peace to Jammu and Kashmir.
Addressing the inaugural WAVES Summit, the pan-India actor said many people had told him the government might postpone the four-day event because of "unnecessary criticism" as it focused on entertainment.
"But I was confident that this event will definitely happen because of my confidence in Prime Minister Narendra Modiji," he said.
The World Audio Visual & Entertainment Summit (WAVES) brings together top Bollywood and southern stars as well as industry leaders and political personalities.
"PM Modi is a fighter. He will meet any challenge. He has proven it and we have been seeing it in the last one decade," Rajinikanth said.
The 74-year-old actor added that the prime minister will handle the Kashmir situation "bravely and gracefully".
"(He will) bring peace in Kashmir and glory to our country. I'm extremely happy to be here and it is my privilege to be a part of WAVES moment. and my heartiest congratulations to central government," Rajinikanth said.
WAVES will integrate films, OTT, gaming, comics, digital media, AI, AVGC-XR, broadcasting, and emerging tech, and seek to present itself as a comprehensive showcase of India's media and entertainment prowess.
The summit, which aims to unlock a USD 50 billion market by 2029, expanding India's footprint in the global entertainment economy, comes shortly after a terror attack in the upper reaches of Pahalgam in Kashmir killed 26 people, mostly tourists.
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When a woman says no, it means no: HC upholds conviction of three men for gang rape
Mumbai (PTI): The Bombay High Court has upheld the conviction of three men for raping one of their partners, ruling that when a woman says no, it means no, and there can be no presumption of consent based on her past sexual activities.
“No means no”, the bench of Justices Nitin Suryawanshi and M W Chandwani said in its May 6 judgment refusing to accept the attempt made by the convicts to question the morals of the survivor.
Sexual intercourse when done without the consent of a woman is an assault on her body, mind and privacy, said the court, terming rape the most morally and physically reprehensible crime in society.
“A woman who says ‘NO’ means ‘NO’. There exists no further ambiguity and there could be no presumption of consent based on a woman's so-called immoral activities,” HC said.
The court refused to quash the conviction of the three persons but reduced their sentence from life imprisonment to 20 years in jail.
In their appeal, the trio had claimed that the woman was initially involved with one of them but later got into a live-in relationship with another man.
In November 2014, the three barged into the survivor’s house, assaulted her live-in partner and forcibly took her to a nearby deserted spot where they raped her.
The bench in its judgment said that even if a woman was an estranged wife and lived with another man without getting divorced from her husband, a person cannot force the woman to have intercourse with him without her consent.
The bench said even though the survivor and one of the convicts were in a relationship in the past, any sexual act without her consent would amount to rape if she was not willing to have intercourse with him and the other accused.
“A woman who consents to sexual activities with a man at a particular instance does not ipso facto (by the fact itself) give consent to sexual activity with the same man at all other instances. A woman’s character or morals are not related to the number of sexual partners she has had,” the court said.
The court said sexual violence diminishes the law and unlawfully encroaches on the privacy of a woman.
“Rape cannot be treated only as a sexual crime but it should be viewed as a crime involving aggression. It is a violation of her right to privacy. Rape is the most morally and physically reprehensible crime in society, as it is an assault on the body, mind and privacy of the victim,” HC said.
The court also upheld the trio’s conviction for the assault of the survivor’s live-in partner.
