CURRENT AFFAIRS
11 March 2021
NATIONAL NEWS:
A) Tirath Singh Rawat sworn in as Uttarakhand CM.
Lok Sabha MP from Garhwal, Tirath Singh Rawat was sworn in as Chief Minister of Uttarakhand today. The oath of office was administered to him by Uttarakhand Governor Baby Rani Maurya at the Raj Bhawan. Earlier in the day, Rawat was elected the new Chief Minister of Uttarakhand by the BJP legislative party in Dehradun after the resignation of Trivendra Singh Rawat on March 9. Tirath Singh Rawat, 57, was the Uttarakhand BJP chief in 2013-2015 and was a member of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council before the creation of Uttarakhand during 1997-2002. He has been MLA in Uttarakhand in 2012-2017, and previously held the post of Education Minister in the State in 2000-2002. A long-time member of the BJP, Tirath Singh Rawat was the dark horse in the race for Chief Ministership where the only thing clear was that the choice would devolve on a person from the Rajput community. Tirath Singh Rawat is considered very close to Union Home Minister Amit Shah and was his close aide during the latter’s vistarak programme of organisational strengthening in 2016-2017 held over a period of 120 days.
B) Ambani bomb scare case: Top cop removed from Crime Branch.
Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukh on Wednesday announced the removal of Mumbai police officer Sachin Vaze from the crime intelligence unit until the inquiry into the mysterious death of automobile parts dealer Mansukh Hiran is completed, PTI reported. While making the announcement in the Maharashtra Legislative Council, Deshmukh said the state government will conduct an impartial probe into the death of Hiran. Police officer Sachin Vaze will be removed from his current posting in the crime branch till the investigation is not completed. I am taking this decision in view of the rising demand from the opposition, the minister said. Mansukh Hiran was in possession of the SUV which was found with explosives outside industrialist Mukesh Ambani’s house in south Mumbai on February 25, 2021. Police said the vehicle was stolen from Hiran’s possession on February 18, 2021. The mystery deepened after Hiran’s body was found in a creek last Friday in neighbouring Thane. Leader of opposition in the state assembly Devendra Fadnavis on Tuesday demanded action against API Sachin Vaze in connection with the death of Hiran. Fadnavis demanded that the government shift Vaze from his present posting. Vaze is in some way involved in the death of Mansukh Hiran. He should face legal action and should be suspended at once, leader of Opposition in the legislative Council Pravin Darekar said.
C) Haryana government defeats no confidence motion.
The no-confidence motion moved by the Congress against the BJP-Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) coalition government in Haryana on Wednesday was defeated by 55 votes to 32. The legislators voted along party lines with two Independents Meham MLA Balraj Kundu and Dadri MLA Sombir Sangwan supporting the vote of no-confidence. In the 90-member assembly, the BJP and JJP have 40 and 10 MLAs respectively, besides the support of five Independents. Lone Haryana Janhit Party MLA Gopal Kanda, representing Sirsa, also voted in favour of the government. The Congress has 30 MLAs. Two Assembly seats of Ellenabad and Kalka had fallen vacant earlier this year. Moving the no-confidence motion against the Manohar Lal Khattar-led government, leader of the Opposition Bhupinder Singh Hooda said the coalition government had completely lost the confidence of the people and its representatives could not even go to their own constituencies and the villages. He accused the government of snapping the power connection of the farmers agitating at the Delhi border and denying them access to toilets. Hooda said both the parties in the government had promised Minimum Support Price to farmers in their manifestos, but forgot about it after coming to power. He also raised the issue of unemployment, deteriorating law and order situation, and increasing cases of drug abuse in the State. Opposing the motion, JJP leader and Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala said the BJP was his party’s natural ally.
D) P.C. Chacko quits Congress in Kerala.
Senior Congress leader P.C. Chacko has quit the party ahead of the Kerala Assembly elections on April 6, blaming factionalism in the party’s State unit and lack of proper leadership at the national level. Speaking to reporters at his Delhi residence, Chacko said that he had been mulling over the decision for a while and sent in his resignation to party president Sonia Gandhi out of frustration. Chacko expressed despair over alleged factionalism in the party’s State unit. In Kerala, there is no Congress party. There are two parties Congress (I) led by Ramesh Chennithala and Congress (A) led by Oommen Chandy, he said. He had flagged this issue many times to the central leadership but to no avail. The Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) was a powerless entity while it was these two factions that decided the working of the party. No names came up before the State election committee of the KPCC. Only Chandy and Chennithala decide who will contest from their respective factions. This is disturbing and disappointing. Today in Kerala, one cannot be a Congressman, you can only be faction I or faction A member. So I decided to call it a day after 50 years of being in active politics, he said. The G-23 had contacted him at the time of writing the first letter seeking internal reforms. But he had refused to sign the letter. As of now, he had not thought about his future plans, he stated. He ruled out joining the BJP who, he said, had failed to move the Kerala voters despite spending huge amounts of money.
E) Kerala HC seeks Centre’s response on petition challenging validity of new IT Rules.
The Kerala High Court on Wednesday sought the Centre’s response on a plea challenging the constitutional validity of the new Information Technology (Guidelines For Intermediaries And Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, PTI reported. Considering the plea filed by digital media outlet ‘LiveLaw’, Justice P V Asha directed the government not to take any coercive action against the petitioner for non-compliance of the provisions under Part III of the new rules, which deal with digital media regulation. The Delhi High Court had issued a notice to the Centre on the same matter Tuesday in response to another petition. According to the petition by Livelaw, the Rules notified on February 25 impose an unconstitutional three-tiered complaints-and-adjudication structure upon publishers, which makes the executive both the complainant and the judge on vital free speech questions involving blocking and take down of online material. As per the petition, the mechanism is both arbitrary and violates the rule of law and separation of powers, especially since there is no provision for the aggrieved publishers to appeal against the decision of the Inter-Departmental Committee consisting only of members of the executive.
F) Mamata Banerjee suffers leg injury while campaigning in Nandigram, alleges conspiracy.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday suffered injuries in her leg while campaigning in Nandigram. Banerjee alleged that when she was greeting people, four to five people surrounded her and pushed her. There were no local police personnel. Even the Superintendent of Police was not there. There is lot of swelling. She was in pain and have to return to Kolkata, Banerjee told journalists. Asked whether there was some conspiracy, Banerjee said, It is a conspiracy. They did it purposefully, she said. According to reports, Banerjee suffered injuries in her left feet. She was returning from a religious event at Ranichak area of Nandigram when the incident occurred. Banerjee has been staying in Nandigram for the past two days. Earlier in the day, she filed nomination papers at Haldia Sub Divisional Office to contest from Nandigram. The Trinamool Congress leadership condemned the development and called it most unfortunate.
G) Parliament proceedings: LS, RS manage to pass one Bill each amidst din.
For the third day in a row, both Houses of Parliament could barely do any business, with the government refusing to concede the Opposition’s demand of holding a debate on the farmers’ agitation. Each House managed to pass one bill each amidst din. The Lok Sabha passed the National Capital Territory of Delhi Laws (Special Provisions) Second (Amendment) Bill and the Rajya Sabha cleared the Arbitration and Conciliation (Amendment) Bill, 2021. In the Rajya Sabha, commotion began early on, with the first adjournment coming in just 17 minutes after the session began for the day. Chairman Venkaiah Naidu rejected the notices moved by Congress members Deepender Hooda, Pratap Bajwa and Rajiv Satav, along with DMK’s Tiruchi Siva, and RJD’s Manoj K Jha asking for the suspension of business to discuss the farmers’ agitation.
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
A) Sri Lanka invites Myanmar junta’s Minister.
Sri Lanka has invited Myanmar’s junta’s appointed Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin for a virtual meeting of members of regional body BIMSTEC, which Sri Lanka currently chairs. Pro-democracy activists in Myanmar slammed the move on social media. as Colombo’s outreach comes just over a month after Myanmar’s military seized power in Yangon. Sri Lanka has not commented on the development so far. In a March 2 letter addressed to Mr. Wunna Maung Lwin, Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Dinesh Gutb wardena said a ministerial meeting of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation would be held on April 1. The 17th ministerial meeting will greatly benefit from your Excellency’s valued participation, and he look forward to our close engagement over the of the meeting, the letter said. Meanwhile, nearly 40 Sri tankan activists staged a demonstration outside the Myanmar Embassy in Colombo on Wednesday, in solidarity with Myanmar’s protesting civilians.
B) U.K. variant 64% deadlier than earlier strains: study.
The coronavirus strain that first emerged in Britain and is now spreading internationally is 64% more deadly than pre-existing strains, according to a study published on Wednesday that confirms earlier advice to the British government. The variant, detected late last year, is one of several to have emerged in recent months from countries with large epidemics, raising the stakes in the race to rein in the pandemic. Findings from one of those studies, led by the University of Exeter, were published in the BMJ on Wednesday. Researchers compared data for nearly 55,000 pairs of participants who tested positive in the community rather than in hospitals between October and January and followed them for 28 days. Participants were matched on a range of factors like age, sex and ethnicity. They found that those infected with the new variant, known as B.1.1.7, were 64% more likely to die, representing an increase in deaths from 2.5 to 4.1 in every 1,000 detected cases. Simon Clarke, Associate Professor at the University of Reading, said the increased lethality added to its faster spread meant that this virus version poses a substantial challenge. It also makes it even more important people get vaccinated when called, he added.
