Chandigarh, July 11 (IANS) Haryana’s Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) on Thursday stitched a pre-poll alliance for the state Assembly elections likely to be held in October.

INLD Secretary General Abhay Chautala and BSP national coordinator Akash Anand said the alliance would explore options to join hands with other like-minded social and political outfits.

The alliance’s Chief Minister face would be Abhay Chautala, the grandson of former Deputy Prime Minister and state’s tallest Jat leader, Chaudhary Devi Lal.

While the INLD would contest on 53 out of 90 seats, the BSP would fight on the remaining 37 seats.

As per the manifesto, both parties promised to do away with contractual employment by offering permanent jobs, setting up solar plants to minimise the electricity bill of each household to Rs 500, besides free water, old-age pension of Rs 7,500 per month, Rs 21,000 unemployment allowance and one employed person in every house.

For the Scheduled Castes, there would be a 100-yard plot for each family, free coaching for competitive exams, free education up to Class 10, etc.

After the feud within the INLD, five-time Chief Minister O.P. Chautala’s grandson Dushyant split the party vertically in 2018 and formed the Jannayak Janta Party (JJP). In 2019, the JJP extended support to the BJP to form the government in the state. In March, it withdrew its support.

–IANS

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Mysuru (Karnataka), July 11 (IANS) Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Thursday said that he was being targeted as he belongs to a backward class and yet became the CM a second time in Karnataka.

He said this in Mysuru to the media while reacting to his alleged involvement in the Mysuru Urban Development Authority (MUDA) land scam.

“Everyone is upset because, despite being from a backward class, I became Chief Minister for the second term…they are burning and hatching a conspiracy,” said CM Siddaramaiah, who described the allegations against him as political.

When asked about the protest organised by the BJP against the MUDA land scam in his native Mysuru, CM Siddaramaiah said, “We have ordered a probe. The BJP is taking the issue politically. We will also deal with it politically.”

Answering a question on BJP’s state chief B.Y. Vijayendra’s protest in Mysuru, the CM said, “Let the BJP National President J.P. Nadda also do it. If they do it, we will also certainly deal with it politically. We also know how to counter it politically.”

CM Siddaramaiah further said that those who make charges should explain where illegal activities have occurred. “I am claiming it as legal when they claim it as illegal. They have to show and prove it. Before conversion, it was agricultural land. Conversion happened in 2005, the DC converted it, and I have no connection. Mallikarjunaswamy is my brother-in-law, and he has legally gifted it. Where is the illegality?”

“Suppose it is mentioned as agricultural land, though it is developed into a layout, is it a great offence?” CM Siddaramaiah said.

“Until 2010, after conversion, it was a farmland until it was gifted. Afterwards, in 2014, MUDA illegally acquired it, and sites were formed and distributed. Should I just let it go? Compensation has been sought. They have not sought it in a particular locality. BJP was in power in 2021. The allotment was made during the BJP rule, and they are making an issue now,” CM Siddaramaiah claimed.

“In a similar case, one Sundaramma approached the high court on this matter. The court fined MUDA Rs 1 lakh and directed authorities to grant land. If the mistake was committed during the BJP rule, who is responsible for this? We had not asked for it. When their government was in place, how was Siddaramaiah responsible then?” he said.

“They are highlighting my claim of getting Rs 62 crore compensation. As per rules, the compensation amount has to be three times more now,” he stated.

Replying to a question on social activist T.J. Abraham’s complaint to the Election Commission of India (ECI) in this regard, CM Siddaramaiah said that whenever the Commission seeks clarification, he is ready to provide answers.

T.J. Abraham, President of Karnataka Anti-Graft and Environmental Forum, has appealed to the ECI to initiate proceedings against the Chief Minister by filing a criminal complaint and also to take necessary action under Section 125 A and Section 8 of the Representation of People’s Act and under sections 227, 229, 231, and 236 of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita for filing a false affidavit, along with nomination papers during the 2013 Assembly election, to uphold the law.

The Chief Minister is facing allegations of fabricating documents regarding a piece of 3.16 acres of land in his wife’s name and fraudulently getting 14 sites worth Rs 2 crore each allotted by the Mysuru Urban Development Authority (MUDA). The state BJP is demanding his resignation and will organise a large-scale protest in Mysuru on Friday.

–IANS

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Sambhal (UP), July 11 (IANS) Addiction to the mobile game Candy Crush cost a teacher in a government school his job.

The teacher has been suspended for playing Candy Crush on his phone and talking on the device during duty hours.

The incident came to light when District Magistrate Rajendra Pansiya went to the school for a random check, and found scores of mistakes in students’ copies starting from the first page to the last.

Later, a feature on the teacher’s phone, which tracked hours dedicated to applications, revealed that he spent nearly two hours playing Candy Crush during school hours.

“Teachers should focus on checking the classwork and homework of students, and ensure that they get quality education. Also, using mobile phones is not a problem, but using them for personal reasons during school hours is not right,” the District Magistrate told reporters.

Pansiya checked six pages of six students’ copies, and spotted 95 mistakes, with nine being on the first page itself.

He expressed displeasure about this and checked assistant teacher Priyam Goyal’s phone.

The Digital Wellbeing feature on the teacher’s phone then revealed that of the five-and-half hours of school hours, Priyam Goyal spent nearly two hours playing Candy Crush, talked on the phone for 26 minutes, and used social media apps for almost 30 minutes.

The District Magistrate apprised the state education department of the matter, who took cognisance of the same and suspended the assistant teacher.

–IANS

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New Delhi, July 11 (IANS) The Supreme Court on Thursday fixed July 18 for hearing on a batch of petitions alleging irregularities in the conduct of NEET-UG examination.

Rising early for the day, a Bench presided over by CJI, DY Chandrachud, suggested taking up the issue for hearing on Friday at the top of the list.

The petitioner’s side suggested listing the matter for coming Monday as they were served affidavits filed by the Centre and National Testing Agency (NTA) late on Wednesday night.

However, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, the second-highest law officer of the Centre, expressed personal difficulty to appear on coming Monday and Tuesday.

Ultimately, the Bench, also comprising Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, decided to list the batch of petitions, including pleas seeking cancellation of NEET exam, on July 18 on the joint request of the parties, noting that the CBI has put on record the status report in relation to paper leak allegations.

In its latest affidavit, the Centre told the top court that the data analysis conducted by IIT-Madras shows that there is neither any indication of mass malpractice nor a localised set of candidates being benefitted, leading to abnormal scores in NEET-UG examination held on May 5 this year.

“There is an overall increase in the marks obtained by students, specifically in the range of 550 to 720. This increase is seen across the cities and centres. This is attributed to 25 per cent reduction in syllabus,” said the Centre, adding that candidates obtaining such high marks were spread across multiple cities and multiple centres, indicating very “less likelihood of malpractice.”

After a comprehensive data analysis using the parameters like marks distribution, city-wise and centre-wise rank distribution and candidates spread over marks-range, experts of IIT-Madras opined “no abnormality”, the affidavit said.

In an earlier hearing held on Monday, a Bench presided over by CJI Chandrachud, to decide if re-test should be ordered in entirety, directed the NTA to make full disclosure before the apex court regarding the nature of paper leak, the places where leaks took place, and lag of time between the occurrence of leak and conduct of examination.

It also asked the CBI to file a status report indicating the status of investigation and the material collected during the course of the probe.

–IANS

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Kolkata, July 11 (IANS) The CBI officials investigating the cash-for-school job case in West Bengal have seized two servers from the office of S. Basu Roy & Company, the outsourced agency responsible for providing optical mark recognition (OMR) sheets for written examination for primary teachers’ recruitment in state-run schools, sources said on Thursday.

Since Thursday morning a team of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officials, accompanied by cyber and software experts, were conducting a fresh round of raid and search operation at that office. Earlier, a similar raid and search operation was conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The central agency officials are taking the help of the cyber and software experts following a directive from Calcutta High Court’s single-judge bench of Justice Rajasekhar Mantha, who advised CBI to take the help of any specialised agency to recover the data regarding the OMR sheets.

However, the CBI sleuths are tight-lipped on whether the latest raid and search operation have led to any significant recovery in the matter.

As per the directive of Justice Mantha, the entire cost for bearing the assistance of expert agencies is supposed to be borne by the West Bengal Board of Primary Education (WBBPE).

Significantly, on July 9, the WBBPE counsel made an explosive revelation at Justice Mantha’s bench claiming that the OMR sheets used in the written examination in 2017 for recruitment of primary teachers in state-run schools of West Bengal were destroyed. This was done following the instructions of the Trinamool Congress legislator and former WBBPE chairman Manik Bhattacharya, said the counsel.

The WBBPE counsel also informed the court that the decision to destroy the OMR sheets was taken independently by Bhattacharya without any resolution adopted by other members of the board in the matter.

–IANS

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