PM Modi should nationalise all assets of Adani Group and then auction it for sale: Subramanian Swamy
Chennai (PTI): Former Union minister and senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy has said he wants the Centre to nationalise the assets of Adani Group, which has faced scrutiny after its stocks tumbled following a report over its financial deals and a ruckus was created in Parliament by opposition parties over it.
In an interview with PTI here, Swamy spoke about how his recent tweet on being "sorrowful" regarding the demise of former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf which has received a lot of criticism online.
He also spoke about how Union Budget 2023-24 presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman alleging it lacked either objectives or strategies and said the allocation for defence is low at a time when China is aggressive on the border issue.
Excerpts from the interview --
Question: How do you think the BJP government has handled the Adani Group issue, while opposition parties are demanding action against the beleaguered conglomerate?
Answer: I would like to see the Prime Minister nationalise all the assets of Adani Group and then auction it for sale and out of that money, help people who have lost this way. As if Congress didn't have deals with Adani. I know many of them who had lots of deals with Adani but I don't care for the Congress. I want the purity of the BJP to be established. The general public opinion is that (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi has something to hide and now it is the job of the government to punish it.
Q: Your recent tweet on being "sorrowful" about ex-Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has been widely criticised on social media even by members of BJP. What do you have to say about it?
A: A lot of criticism on me, saying that Pervez Musharraf was a butcher who killed Indians in the Kargil war. But in the Kargil war, Pervez Musharraf was commander-in-chief for the Pakistan Army. I mean, he didn't go around shooting people. He asked the army to shoot. Now, how can you be called a butcher and so on when the Prime Minister of Pakistan was Nawaz Sharif during the war (in 1999).
Now, I believe PM Modi is the one who broke all protocol, went to Pakistan and had lunch with him... Why didn't they talk about the real man who was behind the attack on Kargil, that is Nawaz Sharif. I know Musharraf because I have met him several times. I met him in Pakistan, and in India. He had at that time become president by a coup. When he started wearing civilian clothes, he gave up the commander-in-chief position. He said, I would like to work with India. And he was also the person who helped the United States to finish the Taliban, at least temporarily.
So, these (netizens) are funny people. If they want to question me on that, the first question I have is why did Modi go to Nawaz Sharif's place, who is the real architect of Kargil war? They won't do that...
Q. The appointment of Justice Victoria Gowri as an additional judge of Madras High Court has received criticism and outcry by a section of lawyers. Senior advocates say the decision by the Supreme Court on dismissal of the petitions will be challenged. Your comments?
A: In a democracy, anyone can challenge anyone. What she said, as an individual, as a member of RSS, as a member of BJP cannot be assessed unless she became a judge and then behaved the same way. Secondly, as the Chief Justice has correctly noted, she is an additional judge at the moment. And after two years, there'll be a review... So she has to act according to the law.
We have other judges which I don't want to name, we have made them judges and they have been "fanatic Muslims" before becoming a judge. So, I think this hounding and hunting people just like that, because they held some views. Why didn't you prosecute her at that time? When she expressed those views. You could have easily done it. One could have filed a PIL like I do all the time. Go and file a case against her if you want. This is the selection made by the Government of India and supported by the judges of the Supreme Court. So, I think it's a bogus campaign against her.
Q. You have been a critic of Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman from the time she has taken up the portfolio. What is your view on this year's budget?
A: It is a bogus budget. Budget must have four pillars. What is your (government) objective? No objective was seen in this budget. She said India will grow at six and a half percent next year. What about last year? What happened from 2019 to today, we have only grown at 3 per cent or 4 per cent per year. How is it going to work at 6 per cent?
Regarding the priorities, is agriculture a priority? or is industries a priority or services a priority? Nothing about that. On the question of strategy. What is your (government) strategy? Do you have a strategy for government control? or do you have a strategy for encouraging people to save more? What is the strategy? Nothing. Finally, where are we going to get the resources from? They have cut down the resources for defence, a minuscule amount when China is threatening you. We are cutting our defence allocation. We have got so many essential sectors. So, what she should do is tell us what happened.
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Malian defence minister killed in attack that saw jihadis and rebels seize towns, military bases
Dakar (AP): Malian Minister of Defence Gen. Sadio Camara was killed in an attack as jihadi and rebel forces seized towns and military bases across the country, according to a military officer and two other sources on Sunday.
There was no immediate comment from the Malian government.
“Unfortunately, the Ministry of Defence, Gen. Sadio Camara, has been killed during the attack which targeted his house yesterday,” said a military official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he did not have permission to speak to the media.
Two other people, a civil society leader and a security member, confirmed the information.
Separatist fighters on Saturday joined Islamic militants in launching one of the biggest coordinated attacks on the Malian army in the capital and several other cities that left at least 16 wounded.
The separatists have been fighting for years to create an independent state in northern Mali, while al-Qaida and Islamic State group-aligned militants have been fighting the government for over a decade.
Malian troops and Russian mercenaries withdrew from the northern city of Kidal after the attacks, the rebels said Sunday.
A spokesperson for the Tuareg-led Azawad Liberation Front, or FLA, a separatist group, said the Russian Africa Corps troops and the Malian military withdrew from the city after an agreement was reached for their peaceful exit.
“Kidal is declared free,” said FLA spokesperson Mohamed El Maouloud Ramadan.
The Malian army did not respond to requests for comment but in an earlier statement said they were “tracking down terrorist armed groups in Kidal.”
The separatists have been fighting for years to create an independent state in northern Mali. Kidal had long served as a stronghold of the rebellion before being taken by Malian government forces and Russian mercenaries in 2023. Its capture marked a significant symbolic victory for the junta and its Russian allies.
It was the first time the separatists worked alongside the al-Qaida-linked militant group JNIM, which also claimed responsibility for Saturday's attacks on Bamako's international airport and four other cities, including Kidal, in central and northern Mali.
“This operation is being carried out in partnership with the JNIM, which is also committed to defending the people against the military regime in Bamako,” Ramadan said.
Wassim Nasr, a Sahel specialist and senior research fellow at the Soufan Center security think tank, said that the coordination between the two groups, as well as the explicit call for the Russian military to leave, is new.
“The coordination, conducting attacks all over the country at the same time, real coordination on the military level but also on the political level because both claims of both groups they acknowledged that they worked together, this is a first,” said Nasr.
Mali government spokesperson Gen. Issa Ousmane Coulibaly said on state television late Saturday that 16 people were wounded, including civilians and military personnel, and that several militants were killed. He did not provide a death toll.
The governor of Bamako's district, Abdoulaye Coulibaly, announced a three-day overnight curfew, from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m.
The Economic Community of West African States has condemned the attacks and called on “all states, security forces, regional mechanisms and populations of West Africa to unite and mobilize in a coordinated effort to combat this scourge.”
The separatists called on Russia to “reconsider its support for the military junta in Bamako, whose actions have contributed to the suffering of the civilian population.”
Following military coups, the juntas in Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso turned from Western allies to Russia for help in combating Islamic militants. But the security situation has worsened in recent times, with a record number of attacks by militants. Government forces have also been accused of killing civilians they suspect of collaborating with militants.
In 2024, an al-Qaida-linked group claimed an attack on Bamako's airport and a military training camp in the capital, killing scores of people.
Ulf Laessing, head of the Sahel program at the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, said that while the attacks were a major blow to the credibility of Mali's Russian partners, JNIM is unlikely to take control of Bamako in the near term due to opposition from the local population.
“The attacks are a major blow to Russia as the mercenaries had no intelligence about the attacks and were unable to protect major cities. They have unnecessarily worsened the conflict by not distinguishing between civilians and combatants,” Laessing said.
