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Disruption of the ability of the opposition to run political campaigns has been well pronounced since January 1, 2024 to March 22, which can even be seen in the political advertising through Google. No national political party other than the BJP is among the top 10 political campaigners online. PM Narendra Modi is thus seen everywhere giving the wrong impression of his so-called charisma, while it was in reality the effect of the advertising campaigns worth billions of rupees, spent not only by the BJP but also through Central Ministries and departments.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday took back from the Supreme Court his appeal against his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate. The top court was poised to hear the plea when Kejriwal’s lawyer Abhishek Manu Singhvi declared the decision, which Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta said was used by Kejriwal’s counsel to “mislead the court”.

The other day the chief executive officer of NITI Aayog made a fantastic claim, that the poverty ratio in India had fallen below 5 per cent according to the 2022-23 consumption expenditure survey data. His claim was based on the fact that the per capita consumption expenditures of only 5 per cent of the population in 2022-23 fell below the poverty lines for that year for rural and urban India, arrived at by updating, on the basis of consumer price indices, the poverty-lines suggested for 2011-12 by a committee headed by Suresh Tendulkar.

BHOPAL: Unexpected and dramatic developments marked the politics of Madhya Pradesh in the past few days. They included minor rift in the state cabinet. difference in the Congress over the selection of candidate for Lok Sabha poll and continued defection from the Congress, According to one estimate, over 16 thousand Congressmen left the party to join the BJP.

According to official sources, India’s unemployment rate in the past five years turned out to be one of the highest in the post-independence period. For decades before the current regime the average open unemployment rate used to be within the range of 2-3 per cent. In developing countries where labour resources are mostly unused, people can hardly afford to wait and remain unemployed in absence of unemployment supports and tend to accept low wages and poor working conditions as they have no alternative source of earnings. In such a scenario when average unemployment rate for the past five years reaches 4.7 per cent and for the young people of age group 14-29 records an average unemployment rate as high as 14.23 per cent, it simply reflects dearth of jobs available for the working population.

On the eve of Lok Sabha general election 2024, we have two important news this week – first, Indians are one of the most unhappy people of the world; and secondly, the promised “good days” came only for the top 10 per cent people of the country who were enabled to earn 57.7 per cent of the national income in 2022-23 with average income of about Rs 3,758 per day, but not for the bottom 50 per cent of the people who could earn only 15 per cent with average income of less than Rs 198 per day.

The observations by the Supreme Court the on Wednesday , disapproving of enforcement agencies' practice of delaying proceedings in Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) cases to keep the accused incarcerated for indefinite periods resonate deeply with the court's commitment to safeguarding personal liberty, which has found expression increasingly in recent times. This stance assumes even greater significance in light of the pending review of the earlier PMLA judgment upholding the broad arrest powers of these agencies.

The details of the electoral bonds scheme released so far have strikingly confirmed the existence of the communal-corporate, or more specifically, the Hindutva-corporate nexus in the country.

As the elections are getting closer, both for the Parliament and a few assemblies, there are challenges too haunting our secular, democratic fabric. One was declared in a 18,000- page report prepared by a committee led by former President Ram Nath Kovind and submitted to Droupadi Murmu, our country’s present President, that asked for simultaneous elections. Though the recommendation is meant to be taken after the completion of the present round of general election, it needs a proper scrutiny. The plea given was for reducing the election cost. It has also asked for synchronized local body polls within hundred days of general elections.

Why does not the Enforcement Directorate arrest Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in the Delhi Excise Policy Case and be done with it? What is stopping the Enforcement Directorate from drawing a line on summons and follow-up with real action? On March 21, Kejriwal petitioned the Delhi High Court, asking that no “coercive action” be taken against him. While that is something to think about, maybe the Modi government does not want to arrest Kejriwal, perhaps, because of the martyrdom that Kejriwal will wear as a crown post his arrest. It has been told, again and again, that Kejriwal is a wily fox and the only politician "Modi fears".