New Delhi: Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta on Monday hit out at “TMC goons” in West Bengal and accused them of switching off street lights during her road show in Kolkata and attempting to disrupt the event and create a security risk.Speaking to reporters, the Delhi CM said that the fear felt by the public under the Trinamool Congress government has now shifted to its supporters. He alleged that the lights were switched off to disrupt his rally, but claimed that the crowd responded by illuminating the area with mobile flashlights.“It is a good thing that the fear and terror that the public once felt because of the TMC government has now been transferred to TMC’s own goons because of the public. Fearing our rally and this election campaign, they switched off lights in the entire area to stop the road show,” she said.She said, “But the public responded – they switched on their mobile lights and gave their blessings and love. I thank them wholeheartedly. Now the people of Bengal are ready to extend their support. This darkness will not last. The darkness that the TMC government wants in people’s lives will end. The sun will rise and the lotus will bloom.”Rekha Gupta was campaigning for the Bharatiya Janata Party ahead of the West Bengal Assembly elections, which are scheduled to be held in two phases on April 23 and 29, with the results scheduled to be declared on May 4.He expressed confidence that BJP will come to power in the state. In the 2021 assembly elections, TMC won 213 seats, while BJP won 77 seats.

New Delhi: Enforcement Directorate Ahead of the assembly elections in Bengal, intensified action has been taken since April 1 in at least 19 cases of money laundering in the state, involving ministers, police officers and alleged key political henchmen.The agency on Monday summoned Rishi Raj, one of the directors of political consultancy company I-PAC TMCWhile former Principal Secretary of the State Education Department, senior IAS officer Manish Jain has also been summoned for questioning in connection with the SSC recruitment scam.Another director of I-PAC, Pratik Jain, has already been summoned several times, increasing the scrutiny on high-profile political consulting cases. Vinesh Chandel, the other director of I-PAC, is currently in ED custody.The intense scrutiny of I-PAC led to speculation that the company crucial to TMC’s election campaign had suspended its operations, prompting CM Mamata Banerjee to deny it. TMC said the “baseless speculations” were meant to create confusion.The ED on Sunday searched the residence of Kolkata Police Special Branch DCP Shantanu Sinha Biswas, who is being investigated in the alleged fake NRI quota admission case in private medical colleges in West Bengal.IAS officer Manish Jain was questioned soon after the raids on the premises of former minister and Banerjee’s close aide Partha Chatterjee. Biswas, along with former Jhargram collector Sunil Agarwal, is already under investigation in a sand mining money laundering case and a coal mining “scam”. His close aide Jai S Kamdar was arrested on Sunday after the ED accused him of having links with gangster Sona Pappu and involvement in “cross-border and domestic hawala transactions”.

CHENNAI: Madras HC on Monday directed actor-TVK founder Vijay, the IT department and the EC to respond to a plea alleging discrepancies, saying “there appear to be some irregularities as nearly Rs 100 crore was not disclosed in the election affidavits.”Vijay had reportedly declared assets worth Rs 115.13 crore in Perambur constituency and Rs 220.15 crore in Trichy (East) constituency.Admitting the petition filed by V Vignesh, a voter from Perambur, the court adjourned the hearing for a week for the authorities and Vijay to file their reply.Vignesh said the petition has been filed in extraordinary circumstances wherein the disclosures made by Vijay in his statutory affidavit under mandatory Form 26 under Rule 4A of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961, are not only incomplete but are prima facie false, inconsistent with the statutory record and indicate deliberate and systematic suppression of material financial information.

Coimbatore: A protest in Tamil Nadu left a strange truth for the election season – this time the outrage was not over bribery, but over who didn’t get it. Anger over being excluded from cash-for-vote payments spilled over onto a major road in Kottoor, a rural area about 40 km south of Coimbatore and about 500 km southwest of Chennai, as residents blocked traffic towards nearby Pollachi on Monday.Protesters said that families in nearby areas had received money from a political party ahead of voting on April 23, while their area was spared. He demanded “equal treatment, turning a routine election malpractice into a public standoff.”Local police warned that both soliciting and accepting money for votes is a criminal offense and told the crowd that cases could be filed for unlawful assembly and blocking a public road. The protesters dispersed soon after.District officials said complaints about cash distribution had surfaced, but this appeared to be the first protest prompted by being excluded from such distribution. Flying squads and static surveillance teams have been asked to intensify patrolling in the Kottoor area to trace the source of the alleged cash distribution.A social activist said the episode underlines how entrenched the practice has become. “People now see cash in exchange for votes as a right,” he said. news network