Protests against CAA should continue: Singer Zubeen Garg
Guwahati (PTI): Popular singer Zubeen Garg said the people of Assam would never accept the Citizenship (Amendment) Act or CAA, and protests against it should continue but without any bloodshed.
He said he will continue opposing it on various forums, and also urged for concerted efforts in winning the legal battle to get the Act scrapped.
In a Facebook post on Tuesday, Garg said he has been opposing the Act right from 2017, when it was a bill, and he remains firm on his stand.
He said that while protesting against CAA was necessary, there were various ways to do so.
Noting that the state has seen many deaths during many such movements, be it the Assam Agitation or the 2019 anti-CAA demonstrations when five youths died, he said that no more deaths should be allowed to happen due to protests.
"I will continue protesting against CAA in my own ways. On stage or on social media -- wherever, however I can," Garg, considered a youth icon in the state, said.
He claimed that the government was trying to "impose" the CAA, but the people of the state would never accept it.
He asserted that there was no room for any Hindu-Muslim divide in Assam, and only the people of Assam and India would stay here, not from anywhere else.
Mentioning the petition in the Supreme Court, he said all should come together to fight the legal battle and repose faith in the judiciary.
Besides Garg, noted personalities in different fields had come out against the law during the peak of the anti-CAA movement in 2019. They had shared the stage with leaders of different social organisations, penning songs and poems to register their opposition.
Later, many of them joined different political parties, including the BJP and the Congress.
The CAA seeks to provide Indian citizenship to Hindus, Jains, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsis who entered India on or before December 31, 2014 from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan after five years of residence here.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Rupee settles 1 paisa higher to close at 94.15 against US dollar
Mumbai (PTI): The rupee settled with gains of just one paisa to close at 94.15 against the US dollar on Monday, as rising global uncertainty, escalating tensions in West Asia and soaring crude oil prices weighed on investor sentiments.
Forex traders said the INR/USD pair pared its initial losses, but the overall bias remains negative as FII sell-off and elevated crude oil prices restricted the gains for the local unit.
At the interbank foreign exchange market, the rupee opened at 94.25 against the US dollar, and touched an intraday high of 94.11 and a low of 94.28 against the greenback during the day.
At the end of Monday's trading session, the rupee was quoted at 94.15, registering a gain of just 1 paisa over its previous close.
On Friday, the rupee extended its losing streak for the fifth day in a row, depreciating 15 paise to close at 94.16 against the US dollar.
"The rupee snapped a five-session losing streak, rebounding in tandem with a rally across regional currencies. However, the mood remains apprehensive as the market braces for a potential RBI intervention around 94.30 and higher crude oil prices," said Dilip Parmar – Senior Research Analyst, HDFC Securities.
On the charts, the USDINR pair has reclaimed its upward momentum, carving out a classic bullish structure of higher highs and lows on the daily time frame, he said, adding that for the coming sessions, 93.80 serves as a support, with 94.40 acting as the primary hurdle.
Meanwhile, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback's strength against a basket of six currencies, was down 0.21 per cent at 98.32.
Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, was trading higher by 2.36 per cent at USD 107.82 per barrel in futures trade.
On the domestic equity market front, Sensex jumped 639.42 points to settle at 77,303.63, while the Nifty surged 194.75 points to 24,092.70.
Foreign Institutional Investors offloaded equities worth Rs 1,151.48 crore on Monday, according to exchange data.
Meanwhile, India's forex reserves jumped by USD 2.362 billion to USD 703.308 billion during the week ended April 17, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said on Friday.
In the previous reporting week, the forex kitty had increased by USD 3.825 billion to USD 700.946 billion.
