DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PUNE, VADODARA JOURNALISM OF COURAGE WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2024, AHMEDABAD, LATE CITY, 18 PAGES `5.00 WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM SINCE 1932 BJP CANDIDATE WINS LOK SABHA SEAT UNOPPOSED How Surat was won: BJP member says attested affidavits disowning signatures on Cong form KAMAAL SAIYED WHY I WILL VOTE &YOUSHOULDTOO DROUPADI MURMU, President of India Shape the Future D emocracy, I believe, is the most outstanding idea humankind has come up with. That it was born in India is a matter of pride for us. These days, we are celebrating the Festival of Democracy. Elections to the Lok Sabha and four State Assemblies, apart from a number of bye-elections, are taking place from April to June, 2024. This is the largest exercise of its kind in history, with 96.88 crore registered voters. Needless to say, the idea of democracy can be only as strong as we make it to be. It is our participation in the election that deepens the roots of democracy — not only in India, but also around the world. I, therefore, urge every eligible voter to vote and experience the joy of participating in our collective endeavour to shape the future. THE EXPRESS INTERVIEW ●Mother’smangalsutra sacrificedforcountry: PriyankahitsbackatPM AKASH ANAND, BSP NATIONAL COORDINATOR ●Congwantstoimplement Sharialaw,redistribute wealth,saysYogi PAGE 10 PAGE 12 HC: Public sector banks cannot request LOCs against defaulters BUSINESS AS USUAL SURAT, APRIL 23 THE AFFIDAVITS in which three proposers of Surat Lok Sabha Congress nominee Nilesh Kumbhani and another of the party’sdummycandidateSuresh Padsaladisownedthesignatures on the nomination papers were notarised (attested) by a memberof theSuratCityBJPlegalcell. OnMonday,followingtherejection of the Congress nomination Sunday and the withdrawal of eight others includingthe BSP BY UNNY BJP’s Mukesh Dalal; Cong’s Nilesh Kumbhani (right) nominee,BJP candidate Mukesh Dalalwasdeclaredaselectedunopposed from the Surat Lok Sabha constituency. Kiran Ghoghari, member of As citizenship issue roils Barak Valley, border seat is Opp candidate’s hope LIZ MATHEW SUKRITA BARUAH CALLING FOR strengthening of the anti-defection law, former Vice President M Venkaiah NaiduTuesdayspokeoutagainst the “disturbing trend” of partyhopping for election tickets, and criticised those who praise their “newleader”and“abusethefirst leader”. Healsotookstrongexception totheannouncementof freebies by parties and said “only education and health should be free”. Speakingtomediapersonsat a function in New Delhi a day after he was conferred the Padma Vibhushan by the President, Naidu said, “In the morning you are in one party, in the afternoon you join the other one. The next day you get a ticket to fight the THE DAYS running up to polling day in Karimganjlooka little different DECISION this time, says 2024 Shahuddin, 35, who runs a tea shop in Bhanga, halfway between Karimganj town and Silchar. Every evening, he has people gathering at his small tea shop for vigorous discussion on the elections and whom they shouldvotefor–unusualforparliamentary elections, he says. Habibur Rahaman Choudhury, the editor of the only daily newspaper published from Karimganj, Dainik Nababarta Prasanga, agrees. As NEW DELHI, APRIL 23 KARIMGANJ, APRIL 23 M Venkaiah Naidu, who received Padma Vibhushan Monday, with L K Advani. X@MVenkaiahNaidu election. First you are praising your new leader and then you abuse the first leader. This is a new trend. You were adoring someone today, you joined the other party and abused the first leader… It’s a disturbing trend.” CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 MOVE TO MAKE TECHNICAL EDUCATION INCLUSIVE Engineering in local language? Slow start but uptick in students in UP, TN, Andhra In Noida, it’s a hit — with some help from ‘Hinglish’ MUMBAI, APRIL 23 CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Party-hopping for poll tickets is a disturbing trend, says Venkaiah OMKAR GOKHALE THE BOMBAY High Court Tuesday ruled that public sector banks do not have the power to request issuance of Look Out Circulars (LOCs) against loan defaulters under the central government's office memoranda or circulars which give special powers. Issued by the Bureau of Immigration of the Ministry of Home Affairs, LOCs allow authoritiesatanyportof departure to prevent a person from travelling abroad. While the central government's office memoranda were not ultra vires or “per se arbitrary”, the subsequent empowerment of managers of public sectorbankstoissuerequestsfor LOCs was arbitrary, the court said. “We do not expect public sector banks to do this (issue the request for LOCs),” it said. A division bench of Justices Gautam S Patel and Madhav J Jamdar passed the judgment on a batch of petitions and quashed the LOCs issued to restrain people indebted to public sector banks from travelling abroad. The High Court said that the Bureau of Immigration will not act on those LOCs. R RADHIKA & VIDHEESHA KUNTAMALLA NEW DELHI, APRIL 23 At an introductory class for computer science in Hindi at the G L Bajaj Institute of Technology and Management in Noida. Gajendra Yadav R RADHIKA NEW DELHI, APRIL 23 THREE YEARS ago, the Government launched engineering degree courses in regionallanguagesaspartof anew national plan to make technical education more inclusive and not allow lack of English to be a hurdle. Since then, 2,580 seats have been volunteered in local languagesby22engineeringcolleges across the country — 18 private, the rest public. Of the total 25-lakh bank of engineering seats, this is a small fraction but its experience holds the Surat City BJP legal cell, told The Indian Express Tuesday that the proposers came to the Collector’sofficewhenhewassitting there “after having finished theformalitiesfortheBJPonApril 20andIextendedhelptothemas aprofessional,andnotarisedtheir affidavits disowning the signaturesonKumbhaniandPadsala’s nomination forms”. Ghoghari saidhetookafeeof Rs 2,500 for each affidavit though his regular fee is Rs 500. Kumbhani,theCongresscandidate, had submitted larger lessons for the road ahead — indeed, the progress card shows a distinct uptick in locallanguage programmes in the statesof TamilNadu,Andhraand Uttar Pradesh. Data from the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE ) shows that enrollment in these courses has improved overall — from 80 per cent seat vacancy in the 2021-22 academic year to 53 per cent in 2022-23. The Indian Express spoke to officials, teachers, students and recruiters across four states to find what’s behind the uptick and where the challenges lie: from availability of non-English textbooks and language teachers to questions over job prospects. In some colleges, these vernacular programmes have become a popular draw for students from English-medium schools, too, given that it’s easier to get a more “coveted” department. The Big Picture: Opening the door In line with the new National EducationPolicy(NEP2020),the AICTE approved 1,140 seats for BTech programmes in 11 regional languages — Hindi, CONTINUED ON PAGE 9 “EK USER aur hardware ke beech hone-wale interface ko operating system bola ja sakta hai (The interface between a user and the hardware can be called an operatingsystem),”LaxmiKantSagar, assistantprofessor,tellsstudents gatheredinaclassroomattheGL BajajInstituteof Technologyand Management in Noida. Welcome to an introductory session on operating systems for the college’s computer science programme — in Hindi. Actually, it’s “Hinglish”, a mix of Hindi and English, and technical terms like “throughput”,“memorymanagement” and “common interpreter system” are rarely translated. “Almost all my students are from English-medium schools sotheyarecomfortablewith the language. Nevertheless, I hold the lectures in Hindi with a mix of English to explain concepts CONTINUED ON PAGE 9 Cong’s Hafiz Rashid Ahmed Choudhury. Express Karimganjheadsforelectionson April 26, one of the five seats in Assam voting in the second phase, Choudhury says: “In all my 65 years, this is the greatest enthusiasm I’m seeing for Lok Sabha elections here.” Onekeyfactorthistimeisthe CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 After her Nijjar report blocked, journalist exits India, cites visa extension issue Avani Dias, Australia’s ABC News South Asia bureau chief ‘TOYED WITH CONSTITUTION’ Congtriedtogive Muslimquotaby cuttingSC/ST reservation:PM Says party tried it first in Andhra, then sought to implement across country HAMZA KHAN JAIPUR, APRIL 23 PRIME MINISTER Narendra Modi Tuesday said the Congress has often tried to give reservation to Muslims by reducing the reservation for SCs, STs and OBCs, and that it “did not care” about the Constitution. Speaking in Rajasthan’s Tonk-Sawai Madhopur Lok Sabhaconstituency,whichvotes on April 26, the PM said, “The truth is that when Congress and INDIalliancewasinpower,these people broke into the reservation of Dalits and the backward for vote bank politics and wanted to give reservation to their specific people (khaas jamaat) separately. While the Constitution is absolutely against this.” “Therighttoreservationprovided by Babasaheb Ambedkar toDalits,backwardsandAdivasis PM Narendra Modi in Tonk, Rajasthan, Tuesday. PTI — Congress and INDI alliance wanted to give it to Muslims on the basis of religion,” he said. “Congress party has toyed with Babasaheb Ambedkar’s CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 @AvaniDias DIVYA A NEW DELHI, APRIL 23 DAYS AFTER her news report on the killing of Sikh separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Canada wasblockedonYouTubeinIndia, Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s(ABCNews)South Asia bureau chief Avani Dias has left India. She claimed Tuesday she was told by Indian authoritiesthathervisaextensionwould not come through. The Ministry of HomeAffairs—theForeigners Registration Office dealing with the visa process of foreign journalists operates under the MHA — did not comment. Dias, who had been living and working in India for the last two-and-a-half years, also said that she found it difficult to do her job in the country. Sheisthesecondforeigncorrespondent to have left India in the last three months. In February, Vanessa Dougnac, a Delhi-based French journalist, was accused of “malicious” CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 What lies beneath PM’s ‘Muslim quota’ attack on Congress? quota, “which was created by snatchingitfromSTs/SCs”.What was the PM referring to? MANOJ C G & SREENIVAS JANYALA NEW DELHI, HYDERABAD, APRIL 23 Andhra Pradesh PRIMEMINISTERNarendraModi Tuesday said the Congress tried to extend reservation on the basisof religionandgiveitto Muslims. Addressing an election rally in Tonk, he said that as soon as the Congressformedthegovernment at the Centre in 2004, one of its first tasks was “reducing the SC/ST reservation in Andhra Pradesh” and giving it to Muslims. Modi also said that when the BJPgovernmentinKarnatakagot an opportunity, the first thing it did was to abolish the Muslim Reservation to Muslims in undivided Andhra Pradesh (includingTelangana)wasfirstproposed in 1993-1994 when the Kotla Vijayabhaskar Reddy-Congressled government set up a Minorities Welfare ● Ministry. In August 1994, a government order was issued providing a 5% quota to Muslims and 14 other castes in educational institutions and government jobs. It could not be implemented as the Congress lost in 1994 and 1999. In 2004, the Congress made E EXPLAINED DECISION 2024 CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 On Arun ‘Ram’ Govil’s lips, Modi and Yogi: ‘They must have a plan’ PAGE 1 ANCHOR AMIT SHARMA MEERUT, APRIL 23 THE BJP may be banking big on the consecration of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya under the Modi government for the coming Lok Sabha elections, raising it at poll meetings. But Arun Govil, the ‘Ram’ in the race, appears to believe that God alone won’t see him through in Meerut; he is also counting on Narendra Modi and Yogi Adityanath. As Govil, who played Ram in the hit Ramayan TV series of the 1980s, travels through the constituency in an open vehicle, flankedbytheactorswhoplayed Sita (Deepika Chikhalia) and Laxman (Sunil Lahiri), people line up to watch them and shower petals — the adulation reminiscent of what the three received 40 years ago. Slogans of “Jo Ram ko laye hain, hum unko layenge (We will welcome those who have broughtRam)”and“JaiShriRam” filltheair.Thevehiclesinthecavalcade, including auto-rickshaws, carry posters saying “Iss VOTE SHARE (%) IN MEERUT LS SEAT ■ BJP Rajendra Agarwal 47.86 ■ BSP ■ Others Mohd.Shahid Akhlak 27 2014 par sawar, Modi ka Parivar (On thisvehicleridesModi’sfamily)”. Clearly overwhelmed, Govil tells The Indian Express: “The Prime Minister and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister must Rajendra Agarwal 48.17 Haji Mohammad Yaqoob 47.78 2019 have a strategy, putting their faith in me for not only Meerut but also the major seats of west UP... That strategy is known only to Ramji or the two leaders. I am just working hard to make my BJP candidate Arun Govil, Deepika Chikhalia and Sunil Lahiri from the cast of Ramayan during a roadshow in Meerut. Azad janmabhoomi Meerut, my karmabhoomi.” Both Modi and Adityanath have campaigned in Meerut, whichvotesonApril26.Modi,in fact, officially kicked off his poll campaign from Meerut on March 31, where he appealed to people to vote for Govil, apart fromtheNDA’sothercandidates in west UP. Addressing a meeting in Meerut’s Kithaur town on April 18, Yogi said that when Govil played Ram, he could have already imagined that one day he would be seeking votes for himself the same year as the Ayodhya Ram Temple came up. Gesturing to the crowds, Govil says: “The electorate has already decided the outcome in myfavour.This electionisfor the nation, and the people in the country have already decided that for the sake of the country and development, Modi ji must become PM for the third time.” With the BJP having won the Meerut Lok Sabha seat the last three times, Govil clarifies that it is not that the area hasn't seen work. “There has been development on a large scale. But still many things are left undone.” Chikhalia, who incidentally was fielded by the BJP for a Lok Sabhaseatbackin1991andwon CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Ahmedabad