New Delhi: East Trinamool Congress MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar on Thursday lodged a formal complaint with Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla against party MP and current Chief Whip Kalyan Banerjee, alleging that he had ‘repeatedly verbally abused’ her inside Parliament.“I seek your permission to file a formal complaint for redressal against AITC Lok Sabha member Kalyan Banerjee, who has repeatedly verbally abused me inside the Lok Sabha. This misogyny is against many women members and needs to be punished,” Dastidar said in his letter to the Speaker.The complaint comes amid rising tension within the Trinamool Congress following Dastidar’s recent resignation from key organizational posts and public criticism of some sections of the party leadership following the party’s poor performance in the 2026 assembly elections.The four-time MP from Barasat resigned from all organizational responsibilities in TMC on Wednesday, a day after attending the former chief minister’s event. Mamata BanerjeeAsked not to attend the administrative review meeting in Kalyani despite alleged instructions from the party.Dastidar, who earlier served as the national president of the TMC women’s wing and was associated with the party’s ‘Banga Janani’ programme, informed state party president Subrata Bakshi that she would no longer hold organizational roles. The party is yet to officially comment on his latest move.Taking ‘moral responsibility’ for TMC’s defeat in Barasat, he resigned from the post of president of the party’s Barasat organizational district unit. The resignation was accepted by the party, which later appointed Tapas Chatterjee as the new district chief.Dastidar had also publicly attacked political consultancy firm I-PAC and accused it of pressurizing party leaders and workers and contributing to the party’s electoral decline.He had said, “The way this organization has operated and mistreated us, the way they have pressured us, this is not the way to operate. Wherever they go, I think they will deliver dangerous results in the elections.”Veteran TMC leader Dastidar, considered close to Mamata Banerjee for a long time, was removed from the post of party chief whip in the Lok Sabha after the defeat in the assembly elections and Kalyan Banerjee was appointed in his place.He had alleged increasing ‘criminalisation’ within the party and urged the leadership to once again rely on ‘honest, experienced and dedicated’ workers to rebuild the TMC’s image after the electoral setback.

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday greeted the nation on the occasion of Eid ul-Adha, as India celebrated Bakrid with special prayers and charitable festivities.“Happy Eid-ul-Azha! May this occasion deepen the spirit of brotherhood and happiness in our society. Praying for everyone’s success and good health,” Modi posted on Twitter.Rahul Gandhi also shared his wishes on social media regarding this auspicious occasion. He wrote, “Wishing you and your family a very happy Bakrid. May your home be filled with warmth and togetherness today. Eid Mubarak.”

Celebration and preparations all over India

Special prayers were offered at Fatehpuri Masjid in Old Delhi, while large crowds gathered at Jama Masjid in New Delhi and various Eidgahs to offer prayers.Joint Commissioner of Police Madhur Verma, during routine security patrolling, said that the celebrations have been completely incident-free so far and hoped that the trend would continue.Eid-ul-Azha prayers were conducted peacefully under police surveillance in Sambhal district of Uttar Pradesh. Temple attendant Om Prakash said the Hindu and Muslim communities have co-existed harmoniously for generations, with the temple and the Eidgah sharing a common wall.Jannati Darwaza was opened early in the morning at the Dargah of Khwaja Garib Nawaz in Rajasthan, where a huge crowd gathered to offer namaz.The festival is also being celebrated peacefully in other states including Maharashtra, West Bengal, Bihar and Rajasthan.In Uttar Pradesh, Joint Commissioner of Police Bablu Kumar said 46 officers of additional SP rank and about 14 officers of deputy SP rank have been deployed with the police force of about 1,500 personnel. Meetings were held with peace committees by all SHOs and ACPs of all zones.Chandannagar Police Commissioner in West Bengal Sunil Kumar Yadav said 12 companies of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) along with Rapid Action Force (RAF) and Emergency First Response (EFR) teams would be deployed. About 22 coordination meetings were held with community leaders.“All qurbani (sacrifices) will be done only in closed areas. Meat distribution will also be done in strictly closed areas only. Traffic flow will be normal,” Yadav said.

New Delhi: Ten days after the President issued an ordinance to increase the number of judges in the Supreme Court to 38, the SC collegium led by CJI Surya Kant on Wednesday recommended the Central government to appoint four HC chief justices – Sheel Nagu, Shri Chandrashekhar, Sanjeev Sachdeva, Arun Palli – and senior lawyer V Mohana as SC judges.With the appointment, Mohana will become the second woman after Justice Indu Malhotra to be appointed as an SC judge directly from the bar. The recommendations were finalized after a stormy preliminary discussion that lasted till after midnight at the CJI’s residence on May 22.However, the names were finalized on Wednesday by the collegium comprising CJI Kant and Justices Vikram Nath, JK Maheshwari, BV Nagarathna and MM Sundaresh after removing those names on which there were major differences of opinion. Upon appointment of these five as judges, the strength of the Supreme Court will increase from the present 32 to 37, leaving only one vacancy.Punjab and Haryana HC Chief Justice Nagu was part of the three-member in-house investigation committee constituted by then CJI Sanjiv Khanna for the discovery of a huge amount of cash in a half-burnt state at the residence of then Delhi HC judge Yashwant Verma in March last year. Justice Verma has resigned from the post of judge of Allahabad HC.Justice Nagu was appointed as a judge of MP HC in May 2011 and then as CJ of Punjab and Haryana HC on July 9, 2024. As an SC judge, his tenure will be three and a half years and he is scheduled to retire on December 31, 2029.Mohana is a first generation lawyer and became an advocate on record in 1996. He was designated as senior counsel by the SC in April 2015. Hailing from Coimbatore, she practiced law for over 37 years after obtaining her law degree in 1988.Bombay HC Chief Justice Chandrashekhar will have less than four years’ tenure in the SC and will retire on May 24, 2030. He was part of the Judges Inquiry Committee appointed by the Speaker of the Lok Sabha which was probing the alleged misconduct of Justice Yashwant Verma. MP HC Chief Justice Sachdeva’s tenure on appointment to the SC will be three and a half years. Chief Justice Palli of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh HC will have a tenure of three years and four months upon his appointment as an SC judge.

New Delhi: The Election Commission As directed by the Supreme Court, the list of deleted voters will be forwarded as part of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in 13 states – primarily those classified as ‘Others’, as distinct from Absent, Transferred, Dead, Duplicate (ASDD) voters and thus, excluded from the rolls on the basis of ‘doubtful’ citizenship as well as the decision, during which they are in their mapping with the rolls from the previous SIR. Could not explain the logical inconsistencies – to the competent authority under the Citizenship Act, 1955, to investigate his citizenship.Election Commission officials welcomed the decision, saying that the SIR and all its processes, including seeking further clarification from voters on the basis of logical anomalies – mismatch with father’s name, gender mismatch, being above 45 years of age but never enrolled, being one of more than six children of the same parent, age difference of less than 15 years or more than 50 years with the mapped parent and those of the mapped grandparents. including a difference of less than 40 years – and eliminating those who fail to explain the discrepancies. Validated by SC. Those challenging the SIR had previously called these logical inconsistencies an exercise in disenfranchisement.Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar said, “The Election Commission was, is and will always be with the voters.”According to EC data from a dozen states covered in the second round of SIR, around 6.5 crore ASDD voters were removed. More than 12.7 lakh people were excluded from the list and classified as ‘others’, who sources said are basically “suspected illegal immigrants”. Another 63.2 lakh were removed through Form 7 and decision; These include more than 27 lakh people who were removed from the Bengal list after their appeals were rejected by the authorities.The SC’s direction to the EC to hand over ‘doubtful’ citizenship cases under the Citizenship Act to the competent authority was already in the SIR order. The order directed Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and Assistant EROs to “forward cases of suspected foreign nationals to the ‘competent authority’ under the Citizenship Act, 1955”. Sources said the competent authority is the Foreigner Registration Office (FRO) or Foreigner Regional Registration Office (FRRO), and the ERO/SDM can refer ‘suspicious’ cases to them for verification. If the citizenship is verified, the FRO/FRRO can refer the case back to the EC authorities who will include the person in the list. Otherwise, the FRO/FRRO may order the suspect to be sent to a custody or holding centre.

New Delhi: Supreme Court Validated on Wednesday Election CommissionThe decision to conduct Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of Bihar voter lists rejected the opposition’s stand that it was an arbitrary and exclusionary exercise and said the SIR was carried out in accordance with the constitutional mandate of the Election Commission to ensure free and fair elections, which are based on the integrity, accuracy and correctness of the voter lists.A bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi also said that while preparing the voter list, the election panel is empowered to make a preliminary inquiry into the citizenship of a person wishing to be included as a voter as only an Indian can exercise the franchise.Writing a 124-page judgment disposing of a dozen petitions filed by NGO Association for Democratic Reforms, social activist Yogendra Yadav, TMC’s Mahua Moitra, RJD’s Manoj Kumar Jha and Congress’s KC Venugopal, among others, CJI Kant said, “The Election Commission has the power to conduct a limited inquiry of citizenship in the exercise of its constitutional mandate for the purpose of satisfying itself about the eligibility for inclusion in the electoral list. Is.“This rejects the petitioners’ stand that the Election Commission has no power to inquire into the citizenship status of voters for the purpose of inclusion or deletion from the electoral roll, although the Supreme Court clarified that such inquiry does not determine citizenship in the true sense of the term, and any subsequent action is limited to the electoral results only.Send list of removed voters to Home Ministry: Supreme Court tells Election CommissionUpholding the special intensive revision (SIR) of Bihar voter list, the Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the Election Commission to send the list of names of people removed from the voter list due to ‘doubtful citizenship’ to the competent authority (Home Ministry) within four weeks for decision on their citizenship under the Citizenship Act, 1955.The order comes amid heightened scrutiny of citizenship claims of many people and tightening of borders, and details collected by the Election Commission could potentially help the Home Ministry trace and deport foreigners who have crossed from Bangladesh illegally.“The competent authority shall, after giving notice to the removed persons and giving them an opportunity of being heard, preferably before the next Parliamentary, Assembly, local body elections, whichever is earlier, take necessary decision in accordance with law,” the bench said. If they are found to be Indian citizens, their names will be included in the voter list, the bench said.On the need for conducting the SIR exercise in Bihar, which was raised by the petitioners, the bench said that since it is being conducted after a gap of 23 years and considering the nature of the problems and the procedural safeguards as well as the scale of the exercise, the EC cannot be held arbitrarily to carry out the mandate.The challenge to the number of documents required to be produced by voters during the SIR probe was also rejected by the CJI-led bench, which said, “The classification of documents, including the exclusion of certain categories (other than Aadhaar card, which was directed to be included by the SC on September 8 last year), is based on sensible norms having direct bearing on the objective of ensuring the integrity of the electoral roll.“