Coalition government is not alive: Jagadish Shettar
Bengaluru, November 23: “As the coalition government is economically bankrupt, the administration has completely collapsed. Even after six months of coming to power, this government is not existed. It is dead”, said former chief minister Jagadish Shettar.
Speaking to reporters at the office of the Opposition Leader at Vidhana Soudha here on Friday, he said that the government has no money to give pension to the employees. The bills worth Rs 6,000 crore were pending. It has not waived off Rs 46,000 crore farm loan as the state exchequer was empty, he said.
MLA Fund of Rs 2 crore should be released annually. But till date, the government has released just Rs 50 lakh. The development works were suspended. The government has no concerns towards the people, he alleged.
Not in a position to receive criticism
The Chief Minister was not in a position to receive the criticism in a sportive spirit. Opposition parties and media were not there to praise the Chief Minister. The Cooperative Minister has said that the government would collect the data of farm loan waiver beneficiaries. How long the government would take to do that work, he asked.
The state government has created a situation that sugarcane farmers have come to the streets. It was not fair to speak lightly on farmers who broke the lock of the gate during the protest. The government should solve the farmers problems first, he demanded.
Development is victim for prestige
For the individual prestige of Hassan, the government has been misusing the public tax money. The compromise politics of the coalition partners has been killing the development of the state, former minister CT Ravi blasted Minister HD Revanna.
The best example for such development was the government has released Rs 58 crore for establishing an engineering college at Mosale Hosahalli in Hassan. Though there were five engineering colleges including a government engineering college, even there was a shortage of students. When the situation was like that, what was the need to sanction another college for the district, he asked.
Publish White Paper
The government should publish a White Paper for the assurances it has made and the development works implemented. The government has not given priority to the drought and flood affected people, he said.
“I have no intention of contesting the forthcoming Lok Sabha election. But if the party asks me to contest for strengthening the party, I am ready to contest against former prime minister HD Deve Gowda from Hassan Lok Sabha constituency”.
- CT Ravi, BJP Leader
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.
2018 Kathua rape-murder: HC dismisses mastermind's plea seeking suspension of life sentence
Chandigarh, Mar 18 (PTI): The mastermind behind the 2018 rape and murder of an eight-year-old in Kathua does not deserve the "concession of suspension of sentence at this stage", the Punjab and Haryana High Court has said while dismissing a plea from former temple caretaker Sanji Ram.
Ram, who was caretaker of the 'devasthanam' (temple) where the crime took place in January 2018, was sentenced to life by a sessions court in Pathankot the following year. His nephew Parvesh Kumar and special police officer Deepak Khajuria were also given life terms.
A division bench of Justices Gurvinder Singh Gill and Ramesh Kumari passed the order on Ram's plea on March 6. The three-page order was made available earlier this week.
Without commenting on the merits of the case, the court said it was of the opinion "that it is not a case where the applicant/appellant deserves the concession of suspension of sentence at this stage".
ALSO READ: Pregnant youtuber killed in Telangana, husband held
"The application, as such, is dismissed," it said.
The court, however, directed the registry to list Ram's main appeal against conviction for final hearing in September this year given the fact that he has already spent a substantial amount of time in custody.
According to the 15-page chargesheet filed by the Jammu and Kashmir crime branch in April 2018, the nomadic girl was abducted on January 10 that year and raped in captivity in the small village temple in Jammu's Kathua region that was exclusively manned by Ram. She was kept sedated for four days and later bludgeoned to death, it said.
Arguing for suspension of Ram's life sentence, senior advocate Vinod Ghai said before the high court that the prosecution examined as many as 114 prosecution witnesses but no concrete evidence was brought on record to establish his involvement.
ALSO READ: Sri Rama Sene’s Ugadi wishes banner featuring PM Modi, Netanyahu in Belagavi goes viral, sparks row
He also said Ram had already undergone a substantial period of more than eight years and deserves the concession of suspension of sentence.
The state of Jammu and Kashmir was represented by senior advocate R S Cheema. Advocates Mandeep Singh Basra and Anupinder Brar represented the victim's family.
Cheema recalled the manner in which heinous crime was committed and said based on the testimonies of the prosecution witnesses and the circumstances brought on record, the accused's complicity is "clearly evident".
"It has been submitted that since upon findings of guilt having been recorded by the trial court, the presumption of innocence of the applicant is no longer available to him, the applicant does not deserve to be released on bail," he said.
ALSO READ: Ali Larijani, believed to be running Iran since the beginning of the war, is killed in a strike
The Pathankot sessions court had also sentenced three policemen to five years imprisonment for cover up and destruction of evidence while Ram's son Vishal was acquitted.
In June 2019, then sessions judge Tejwinder Singh said, “In the present case, facts are many but truth is one that under a criminal conspiracy, an innocent eight-year-old minor girl has been kidnapped, wrongfully confined, drugged, raped and ultimately murdered. The perpetrators of this crime have acted in such a manner as if there is a 'law of jungle' prevalent in the society."
The judge summed up the enormity of the crime with a couplet by Mirza Ghalib: "Pinha tha daam-e-sakht qareeb ashiyaan ke, udhne hi nahi paye the ki girftar hum hue" (hunters had placed the net near a nest and the young one was caught before it could take its first flight).
In his 432-page judgment, the judge described the crime as a "devilish and monstrous" one committed in the most "shameful, inhumane and barbaric manner" for which poetic justice needs to be done to its perpetrators.
After initial hiccups, the case, which triggered nationwide outrage, was handed over to the crime branch, which unravelled the conspiracy.
In 2018, the Supreme Court directed the case to be shifted out of Jammu and Kashmir and directed the sessions court in Pathankot to hear it on a daily basis.
