Woman dies after stepping on live electric wire laid to hunt wild boars
Three accused held for trying to cover-up incident
Karkala, September 18: Karkala rural police arrested three persons on charges of trying to cover-up the incident of death of a woman who was electrocuted after she came in contact with live electric wire put up for hunting wild boars, by disposing the body in the forest, here on Monday.
The woman is identified as Girija Poojarthi (50), wife of Kantappa Poojary of Sacheripete Posral in Mundkur village. The arrested are identified as John (57) of Kadandale, Sunil (30) of Sachcharipete and Padmanabha (42) of Mundkur.
Girija Poojarthi was working as a helper at Ram Restaurant at Mundkur. On September 8 at 7.30 pm, she has gone to her neighbor’s house and later, she has been to her brother’s house nearby. But on the way, she touched the live electric wire laid for hunting the wild boars and died. But the three accused dumped the body into a well near the house of John in order to destroy the evidences. Later, after two days, they lifted the body from the well and wrapped in plastic and dumped beside a road leading to the forest at Kandiga near Kanthavara and fled the scene.
As his wife did not come home, Kantappa Poojary has lodged a complaint on September 14 at rural police station. When a two-wheeler rider Sudhir smelt foul smell while going on the road, he checked it and found the body of Girija Poojarthi in a mutilated condition. Knowing the information, the police who rushed to the spot arrested the accused. It is said that the police have suspected that another two persons might have involved in the incident and the police were looking for them also. The police will produce the accused before the court on September 19, sources said.
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Supreme Court rejects plea for reverting to ballots in elections
New Delhi (PTI): The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed a petition seeking to revert to ballot paper voting in elections in the country.
"What happens is, when you win the election, EVMs (electronic voting machine) are not tampered. When you lose the election, EVMs are tampered (with)," remarked a bench of Justices Vikram Nath and P B Varale.
Apart from ballot paper voting, the plea sought several directions including a directive to the Election Commission to disqualify candidates for a minimum of five years if found guilty of distributing money, liquor or other material inducement to the voters during polls.
When petitioner-in-person K A Paul said he filed the PIL, the bench said, "You have interesting PILs. How do you get these brilliant ideas?".
The petitioner said he is the president of an organisation which has rescued over three lakh orphans and 40 lakh widows.
"Why are you getting into this political arena? Your area of work is very different," the bench retorted.
After Paul revealed he had been to over 150 countries, the bench asked him whether each of the nations had ballot paper voting or used electronic voting.
The petitioner said foreign countries had adopted ballot paper voting and India should follow suit.
"Why you don't want to be different from the rest of the world?" asked the bench.
There was corruption and this year (2024) in June, the Election Commission announced they had seized Rs 9,000 crore, Paul responded.
"But how does that make your relief which you are claiming here relevant?" asked the bench, adding "if you shift back to physical ballot, will there be no corruption?".
Paul claimed CEO and co-founder of Tesla, Elon Musk, stated that EVMs could be tampered with and added TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu, the current chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, and former state chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy had claimed EVMs could be tampered with.
"When Chandrababu Naidu lost, he said EVMs can be tampered with. Now this time, Jagan Mohan Reddy lost, he said EVMs can be tampered with," noted the bench.
When the petitioner said everybody knew money was distributed in elections, the bench remarked, "We never received any money for any elections."
The petitioner said another prayer in his plea was the formulation of a comprehensive framework to regulate the use of money and liquor during election campaigns and ensuring such practices were prohibited and punishable under the law.
The plea further sought a direction to mandate an extensive voter education campaign to raise awareness and importance of informed decision making.
"Today, 32 per cent educated people are not casting their votes. What a tragedy. If democracy will be dying like this and we will not be able to do anything then what will happen in the years to come in future," the petitioner said.
