Islamabad, Aug 30: Pakistan Railway Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed suffered an electric shock on Friday while speaking against Prime Minister Narendra Modi at a rally during the "Kashmir Hour".
Pakistan on Friday observed the "Kashmir Hour" to express "solidarity" with the Kashmiri people after India revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir.
In a video, Rashid, a known motormouth, says while addressing the rally, "Hum tumhari Modi niyaton se waqif hain (we are aware of your intentions, Narendra Modi)".
The video, which has gone viral on social media, shows that the moment Rashid utters the sentence, he gets an electric shock in his hand, forcing him to discontinue his speech momentarily.
"Current lag gaya. Khair, koi baat nahi. Mera khayal hai, current aa gaya. Yeh Modi is jalse ko nakam nahi kr sakta (I think it was electric current. Never mind. Modi cannot ruin this rally)," he said while resuming his speech.
Rashid claimed on Thursday that US President Donald Trump was "deceiving" both India and Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir.
Talking to reporters in Rawalpindi, he said the Kashmir issue would be resolved during the tenures of Prime Minister Khan and Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa.
Rashid said both Samjhauta Express and Thar Express trains were shut down to express solidarity with the Kashmiri people.
Tensions between India and Pakistan have escalated after New Delhi on August 5 revoked Jammu and Kashmir's special status and bifurcated it into two union territories.
Reacting to India's move on Kashmir, Pakistan downgraded its diplomatic ties with New Delhi and expelled the Indian High Commissioner.
India has categorically told the international community that the scrapping of Article 370 was an internal matter and also advised Pakistan to accept the reality.
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New Delhi (PTI): In a stinging attack, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Thursday said the government began finishing off democracy by putting pressure on institutions, such as the Election Commission (EC) and the judiciary, but now, an "open attack" has been launched on democracy with the Constitution amendment bill.
Participating in a debate in the Lok Sabha on three bills introduced for amendments in the women's-quota law and setting up a delimitation commission, Priyanka Gandhi asked why can't the government give 33 per cent reservation to women on the current 543 seats of the Lok Sabha.
She said the bill talks of increasing the number of Lok Sabha seats to up to 850 -- to be done by a delimitation commission on the basis of the 2011 Census data.
"This seems fine on the surface but the real meaning comes to the fore when one carefully reads it. It smells of politics," the Congress leader said.
She said on reading the fine print, it shows that the three members of the delimitation commission will decide the fate of the states and their representation in Parliament.
"The government began finishing off democracy by putting pressure on institutions, such as the Election Commission, the judiciary, the media etc., but now, an open attack on democracy is being launched," Priyanka Gandhi said.
If this Constitution amendment bill is passed in Parliament, democracy will be finished in India, she added.
The Congress MP also narrated a background to the issue of women's reservation in legislative bodies.
"This issue is close to the heart of every woman. There is a background to this issue. The prime minister said this issue was blocked for 30 years. This was started by a person called Nehru. Not the Nehru they avoid so much but Motilal Nehru, who as the president of a committee prepared a list of 19 rights which were then passed as a resolution at the Karachi session of the Congress and formed the basis of giving women equal rights in Indian politics," she said.
She said it was Rajiv Gandhi who, as the prime minister, brought a bill for women's reservation in panchayats and nagarpalikas and finally, the bill for it was passed during the P V Narasimha Rao government of the Congress.
"Under the UPA, this was passed in the Rajya Sabha but a consensus could not be reached in the Lok Sabha. In 2018, Rahul Gandhi wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, calling for women's reservation," Priyanka Gandhi said.
Taking a swipe at Modi, she said it seems from the prime minister's address that the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is a champion of women's reservation.
"Any woman would tell you that women easily recognise those who try to mislead them," she said and urged the BJP to be careful.
"In 2023, when this law was passed, the Congress supported it and today also, the Congress is strongly in support of women's reservation. But the truth is that the debate is not on women's reservation. The bill that the government has brought has changed the direction of the debate," Priyanka Gandhi said and hit out at the BJP over the delimitation provisions in the bill.
The Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill to tweak the women's-quota law was introduced in the Lok Sabha on Thursday after a division of votes.
Two ordinary bills -- the Delimitation Bill and the Union Territories Laws (Amendment) Bill to implement the proposed amended women's-quota law in the Union territories of Delhi, Puducherry and Jammu and Kashmir -- were also introduced in the House.
