B8BuVtyZKih68ivpJfKJ8LBVad2ZRNzZ1iie4qXB6Na9LYLGeOjUh8lgdJnOEOjTr ... TOI Chennai.pdf · 2021. 2....

Murshidabad/Burdwan:Bengal chief minister Mama-ta Banerjee on Tuesday li-kened herself to a Royal Ben-gal Tiger, saying she is not aweak person who can be in-timidated by BJP.

Addressing a rally in Bah-arampur, she said: “There isno reason to think I am weak, Iam not a person to be afraid ofanything. I am a strong personand will keep my head high aslong as I live and till then I willlive like a Royal Bengal Tiger.”

At another rally in Mur-shidabad — home to NawabSiraj-ud-Daulah who lost tothe British after his man MirJafar joined the enemy camp— she hit out at Trinamoolleaders who dumped the partyto join BJP.

“A few naughty cows leftthe party to join BJP like MirJafar did in the Battle of Plas-sey. They are now making a lotof noise — hamba hamba,

ramba ramba, kamba kamba,dumba dumba… There aresome others too. The soonerthey leave the party, the better.An empty cowshed is betterthan having bad cows. Goodriddance. I do not sell the par-ty for money,” she said.

“Those who are corruptbow their heads to corrup-tion. They have amassed hugewealth and are now afraid ofgetting caught in the cattlesmuggling case or the coalscandal,” she said, referringto some TMC leaders whosenames have cropped up inthese cases without taking

any names. Taking a dig atBJP, she said: “These peoplewith muck all over are clean-ing themselves up in the BJPwashing machine. They haveall flocked together to BJP.”

The TMC chief asked par-ty workers to respect womento consolidate her supportamong rural women, many ofwhom are beneficiaries ofgovernment schemes. . Shespoke at length on “Ma, bone-ra (mother and sisters)” whorun households, cook food forthe family and also during fes-tivals — Durga Puja and Eid— and attend to family mem-

bers when they fall sick. Sheharped on the women forcesoon after BJP president JPNadda ticked off the state gov-ernment saying that Bengalhad the highest number of hu-man trafficking and domesticviolence cases.

“My mothers and sisters,tell me if you can go out on thestreets on your own. Do youtake somebody along?” shesaid, adding that women inBengal enjoy respect, freedomand peace better than BJP-ruled states of Uttar Pradesh,Rajasthan and Haryana.

Full report on www.toi.in

‘People With Muck Cleaning Themselves Up In BJP Washing Machine’

I am not afraid, will live like aRoyal Bengal Tiger: Mamata

Sukumar Mahato & Mohammad Asif TNN

New Delhi: The SupremeCourt on Tuesday shieldedCongress leader Shashi Tha-roor and six journalists, in-cluding Rajdeep Sardesai,from arrest in any of the 11 FIRslodged against them in Delhi,Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Mad-hya Pradesh and Karnatakafor allegedly stoking violenceduring the farmers’ tractor ral-ly on Republic Day through“fake news and views”.

A bench of Chief Justice SA Bobde and Justices A S Bo-panna and V Ramasubrama-nian asked senior advocate Ka-pil Sibal, who appeared forTharoor, “where is the danger

of getting arrested” as solicitorgeneral Tushar Mehta, appear-ing for Delhi and UP police, toldthe bench that there would notbe any rush to arrest but a con-sidered view would be takenwhile investigating the FIRs.

Sibal said police from otherstates were in Delhi and arrestof the seven people named inthe FIRs appeared imminent.

“Sedition charges are add-ed to the FIRs for mere tweets.Police from any of the stateswhere FIRs are lodged cancome and arrest,” he said. The

bench said the petitions of Tha-roor, Sardesai and others weresimilar to an earlier case (filedby Arnab Goswami who faced14 FIRs in Maharashtra, Chhat-tisgarh and Rajasthan for hisalleged comments against So-nia Gandhi in the Palgharlynching case).

The bench said Mehtacould assure only about non-ar-rest of the accused by the policefrom Delhi and UP and not forother states. The SG attemptedto pre-empt a protective orderby assuring that he would

speak with all other states, forwhom he might appear in thenext hearing, for not arrestingthe petitioners.

When the bench appearedinclined to take the path laid inits judgment in the Goswamicase that included protectionfrom arrest, Mehta said, “Thetweets were not innocent as isbeing made out in these pet-itions. We will show what hor-rendous effect these had on theviolence that was unleashed inDelhi during the tractor rally. ”

Full report on www.toi.in

SC relief for Tharoor, Sardesai and five journalistsDhananjay.Mahapatra

@timesgroup.com

New Delhi: Facing the possi-ble arrest of its top executivesand a financial penalty, Twitterfinally started blocking ac-counts flagged by the govern-ment for “carrying inflamma-tory and divisive comments”.

Top sources told TOI thatthe American microblogginggiant, which has been underpressure over the past few daysover comments made by usersusing the hashtag #ModiPlan-ningFarmerGenocide, has as-sured the government that it islooking into its concerns, andtaking stock of the content onthe handles mentioned in thenotice sent by the IT Ministryunder Section 69A of the ITAct.

Sources said that of the 257handles that had originallytweeted with the hashtag, 126have been deactivated. Just afew days ago, Twitter hadblocked them, before activa-ting them almost immediately

citing “free speech” and be-cause it found the content“newsworthy”. It has nowblocked many of them again.

Similarly, of the 1,178 han-dles that the government sus-pected to have links with Khal-istani and Pakistani elementsto spread misinformation andprovocative content, 583 havebeen deactivated.

A spokesperson for Twitter

in India refused to respond. Af-ter American pop star Rihanna— who has a mammoth 101.6million followers on the plat-form — and teen activist GretaThunberg expressed solidaritywith the farmers agitation, theonline chatter around the issuegrew in leaps and bounds.

The IT ministry told Twit-ter that it was obliged to complywith its instructions as theywere being given keeping pub-lic order in mind and in order to

defuse tensions and hatred.“Twitter is an intermedi-

ary and they are obliged to obeythe directions of the govern-ment. Refusal to do so will in-vite penal action,” the IT minis-try said in a terse message, add-ing the “motivated campaigns”on the platform and the contro-versial hashtag around PrimeMinister Narendra Modi werebeing run to “abuse, inflameand create tension in society onunsubstantiated grounds”.

Twitter was told that if itdid not comply with the de-mands of the government,then action would be takenagainst the company underSection 69A [3] of the IT Act,which talks about a jail term ofup to seven years for seniorcompany officials, and a finan-cial penalty.

Twitter, which has its owncontent-moderation policy be-fore taking down any account,for now has decided to block thehandles that were sought to becensured by the government.

Under pressure, Twitter startsblocking handles flagged by govtPankaj.Doval@timesgroup.com

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursdayrelaxed the ‘complete’ gag order passed againstcontroversial activist Rehana Fathima by theKerala high court but allowed continuation ofthe restraint order for her not to make,share, or forward any comment, whichmay affect religious sentiments of anycommunity.

Agreeing to hear her plea against theHC’s gag order, a bench headed by JusticeR F Nariman issued notice on her appealand stayed one of the conditions of theHC as per which she was restrained to expressher views in any form through any media. Thecourt said the condition amounted to a completegag order and stayed it.

The HC while imposing bail conditions in a

case lodged against her for hurting religioussentiments, had on November 23 said, “Till thetrial is over, the accused shall not directly, indi-rectly or through any other person publish,transmit, share, upload or disseminate or pub-lish any material or any of her comments

through any visual and electronic media,open to public.” The apex court stayed thiscondition.

The Supreme Court, however, said oth-er condition imposed by the HC will con-tinue. The other condition, imposed by HCsaid, “She shall not directly or indirectlyor through any other person, through

print, visual or other electronic media make,share, forward, disseminate or propagate anycomment, which may affect or has the propensi-ty to affect the religious feelings or sentiments ofany community or group of society.”

Top court relaxes ‘complete’ gagorder on activist Rehana Fathima

New Delhi: The governmentwill soon issue guidelines forregulation of OTT (over-the-

top) plat-forms likeNetflix andAmazonPrime to ad-dress issuesof sensitiveand vulgar

content.Replying to a Zero Hour

mention in Rajya Sabha, in-formation and broadcastingminister Prakash Javade-kar said, “We are getting a lotof suggestions and com-plaints (about OTT plat-forms). Guidelines and direc-tions are ready. They willsoon be implemented.”

Earlier while raising theissue, Mahesh Poddar of BJPsaid some content and lan-guage on OTT platforms,which have grown in viewer-ship, was highly objectiona-ble and sexually discrimina-tory in nature. “Crude lan-guage against women isshown. The governmentshould, without delay, con-trol them,” he said. TNN

Guidelines forOTT platforms

soon, saysJavadekar

SHIELDED FOR NOW: ShashiTharoor (L) & Rajdeep Sardesai

Kolkata/Berhampore: Calcutta High Court on Tuesday said itwould hear on Thursday a PIL seeking a stop to BJP’s ‘parivartanyatra’ across Bengal, report Subrata Chattoraj & SukumarMahato. The petitioners urged for an interim order stalling therallies till February 11, but a division bench said the matter wouldbe heard first. In Berhampore, BJP’s yatra organisers tried totake the ‘rath (chariot)’ to Madhupur party office on Tuesday,triggering a stand-off with police. Earlier, police had halted therally for a day and altered route in the wake of securityarrangements for chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s visit.

Cal HC to hear PIL against BJP yatra tomorrow

HEAR HER ROAR: MamataBanerjee

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