After Surjewala review, Siddaramaiah to hold four-day meetings with Congress MLAs
On Day 1, Siddaramaiah will meet MLAs from six districts, Mysuru, Chamarajanagar, Tumakuru, Kodagu, Hassan, and Dakshina Kannada, along with their respective district in-charge ministers.The meetings kick off at 5.00 pm with MLAs from Siddaramaiah's home district of Mysuru. Attending the session will be Mysuru District In-charge Minister HC Mahadevappa, Animal Husbandry and Sericulture Minister K Venkatesh, and MLAs Ravishankar D, Anil Chikkamadu, Darshan Dhruvanarayan, K Harish Gowda, and Tanveer Sait.Next, from 5.00 pm to 5.30 pm, the Chief Minister will engage with MLAs from Chamarajanagar, including AR Krishnamurthy, C Puttarangashetty, and HM Ganesh Prasad, along with District In-charge Minister K Venkatesh.The Tumakuru session is scheduled from 5.30 pm to 6.45 pm. It will be attended by Home Minister and Tumakuru District In-charge Minister G Parameshwara, Cooperation Minister K N Rajanna, and MLAs T B Jayachandra, K Shadakshari, H D Ranganath, S R Srinivas (Vasu), and H V Venkatesh.The final session for the day, from 6.45 pm to 7.45 pm, will cover Kodagu, Hassan, and Dakshina Kannada districts. Kodagu will be represented by District In-charge Minister NS Boseraju and Chief Minister's Legal Advisor AS Ponnanna, along with Dr. Manthar Gowda.From Hassan, K M Shivalingegowda and others will attend, with K N Rajanna serving as district in-charge. The Dakshina Kannada delegation includes Dinesh Gundu Rao, Speaker U T Khader Fareed, and Ashok Kumar Rai.These meetings are seen as a crucial trust-building exercise following the party high command's recent intervention. Sources say Siddaramaiah is keen on resolving local issues and speeding up stalled development initiatives. The Chief Minister has already released Rs 50 crore in grants recently, signalling intent to back words with action.- EndsTune InMust Watch
IN THIS STORY#Karnataka
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Hans India
15 minutes ago
- Hans India
Hindu seers welcome Malegaon blast case verdict, demand apology from Congress
New Delhi: Hindu religious leaders on Thursday welcomed the verdict of the special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court acquitting all seven accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast case, calling it a moment of justice and demanding an apology from the Congress leadership and the Gandhi family for what they termed a conspiracy to malign Hindus. The court acquitted the accused, including former BJP MP Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur and Lt Colonel Prasad Shrikant Purohit, citing a lack of sufficient evidence under charges filed under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), Arms Act, and various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). Seers alleged that the case was part of a political plot during the tenure of the UPA government to vilify Hindus using terms like "Hindu terrorism (Bhagwa atankwad)". Swami Jitendranand Saraswati, General Secretary of the Akhil Bharatiya Sant Samiti, told IANS, "Where there is righteousness, victory is bound to happen. The Malegaon blast case was extremely complex. During the UPA tenure, under Sonia and Rahul Gandhi's leadership, several honourable saints of the Hindu community were jailed for years." "They suffered for 17 long years. This was a conspiracy hatched by the Congress against the Hindus of the nation. Congress should apologise. Hindus can never be terrorists," he added. Mahant Raju Das, priest of Shri Hanuman Garhi temple in Ayodhya, said, "This incident deeply hurt Hindu sentiments because the term 'Bhagwa atankwad' was used to defame us. With today's court verdict, all seven have been acquitted. Congress has been disgraced. Will Sonia Gandhi and other Congress leaders apologise for defaming seers and using such terminology?" "Will they apologise for the 17 years these innocent people lost, for the torture they endured? We demand an apology from the Congress to all Hindus," he added. Speaking to IANS, former Union Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti said, "This was bound to happen because truth always triumphs. But the Congress, in its attempt to shield terrorists and shed tears over their deaths, dared to label a sacred part of Indian culture -- saffron -- as terrorism. In a way, the court's verdict is a self-inflicted slap on Congress." Saints in Haridwar also welcomed the judgment and expressed gratitude towards the judiciary. A saint said, "The verdict delivered by the NIA court is very good and impartial. We thank the NIA court. Today, on Tulsidas Jayanti, all seven innocent people, including our Sadhvi Pragya, have attained freedom after years of hardship. Hindus can never be terrorists and can never act against the country." Another seer remarked, "This verdict is appropriate. It has exposed a long-running conspiracy against Hindus. We appreciate the court's judgment." The verdict was announced in a packed courtroom, with all accused present as directed earlier by the court. The court also ordered compensation of Rs 2 lakh to the families of each of the six deceased and Rs 50,000 to every injured victim.
India Today
15 minutes ago
- India Today
When Congress leaders raised Hindu-terror bogey after Malegaon blasts
Seventeen years after an explosion ripped through Bhikku Chowk in Malegaon, killing six people and injuring over a hundred, a special NIA court in Mumbai has acquitted all seven accused. On July 31, 2025, the court declared that the prosecution had failed to establish its case beyond reasonable doubt, closing one of India's longest-running terror cases. The Malegaon blasts of 2008 resulted in the first accusations of "Hindu terror" and "saffron terror" in others, BJP MP Pragya Singh Thakur and Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Shrikant Purohit, who had become the faces of the so-called "Hindu terror", were cleared of charges by the NIA court ruled that mere suspicion could not carry the weight of a conviction, noting that there was no evidence to prove Purohit procured RDX or assembled the bomb, nor that Thakur was the owner of the motorcycle used in the blast. After the verdict, Congress leaders, including former Madhya Pradesh CM and MP Digvijaya Singh, tried to distance the party and its members from having coined the "Hindu terror" was Digvijaya Singh who was one of the first proponents of the "RSS bomb-making factory" theory, linking the outfit to not just Malegaon but several other terror verdict has reopened memories of how the Malegaon case became the springboard for a political narrative that sought to redefine terrorism in BLAST: SPRINGBOARD FOR HINDU TERROR BOGEYIn 2008, it was a Congress-NCP coalition that was in power in the state. The Congress-led UPA was in power at the explosion on September 29, 2008, came during the month of Ramzan, striking a Muslim-majority Maharashtra ATS, led by Hemant Karkare, traced the motorcycle used in the attack to Pragya Singh bike's registration number was fake, its chassis and engine numbers filed off, but forensic labs restored the erased identity and linked it back to Pragya, Lieutenant Colonel Purohit, and several others tied to the obscure organisation Abhinav Bharat were ATS claimed the group conspired to target Muslims, charging them under the IPC, UAPA, and the stringent its massive 4,000-page chargesheet, the ATS portrayed Abhinav Bharat as an organised crime syndicate, and in the process, shifted the language of terror the first time, investigators spoke of right-wing Hindu actors as perpetrators of terror, a sharp departure from the prevailing focus on Islamist was the moment when the phrase "Hindu terror" entered the political lexicon in FIRESTORM ABOUT 'HINDU TERROR' BOGEYadvertisementCongress leader Digvijaya Singh was the first to seize upon the 2008 and 2011, he repeatedly warned of "Hindu terrorism" or "saffron terror," accusing the RSS of running 'bomb-making factories' and linking Hindutva outfits to Malegaon, Ajmer Sharif, and even the Samjhauta Express blasts, according to the New Indian statements provoked outrage, especially when he went so far as to cast doubt on the Batla House encounter and to hint that Hindutva forces had a role in the 26/11 Mumbai 2010, the term had official sanction August that year, Home Minister P Chidambaram told intelligence officers in New Delhi that "saffron terror" was a phenomenon that had been implicated in several bombings, according to The years later, his successor Sushilkumar Shinde sharpened the charge at a Congress conclave in Jaipur, according to declared that the "RSS and BJP are running terror training camps" and accused Hindu organisations of spreading terrorism — a statement that sparked a political US CABLE ON RAHUL GANDHI AND 'HINDU TERROR'Not just in India, the idea of terrorism with Hindutva imprint was discussed by Congress even with top foreign 2010, WikiLeaks made public a secret communication to Washington by then US Ambassador to India Timothy Roemer on his July 20, 2009, conversation with Congress MP Rahul Roemer detailed how Rahul Gandhi told him that "radicalised Hindu groups" were a bigger danger than Islamist terrorist groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).In fact, even UPA-era government officials discussed the issue of "Hindutva terror" with top American months before Rahul's discussion with Roemer, India's then National Security Adviser (NSA), MK Narayanan, on March 3, 2009, spoke about "Hindu extremist groups" with FBI director Robert was revealed by Wikileaks from a leaked US cable filed by US charge d' affairs Steven White on the Narayanan-Mueller matter was raised shortly after the Maharashtra ATS arrested several persons with saffron links for their role in the 2008 Malegaon blast, WikiLeaks revealed."India is also seeing the beginnings of Hindu extremist groups that use violence, Narayanan said, agreeing with the director's point that terrorists came from more than just Muslim backgrounds," according to the leaked US cable from MALEGAON BLAST CASE PROGRESSED?In 2011, the probe was transferred from the ATS to the NIA, which quickly found serious "lacunae" in the earlier 2016, the NIA dropped charges under MCOCA, declaring confessions recorded under the law inadmissible. It also noted that the motorcycle registered in Pragya's name had been with another accused well before the blast, according to The tide began to turn in court. The Bombay High Court granted Pragya bail in 2017, citing lack of evidence, and Lt Col Purohit was released the same year by the Supreme 2018, the NIA court framed charges afresh, but as the trial unfolded, over 300 witnesses were examined and many turned hostile, crippling the prosecution's 2019, even as the trial continued, Pragya contested the Lok Sabha elections from Bhopal on a BJP ticket and won. Her candidature was defended by BJP leaders as a rebuke to what they called the Congress's manufactured 'Hindu terror' years of testimony, the NIA court reserved its verdict in April 2025, and on July 31 delivered its judgment, acquitting all seven July 30, the Union Home Minister Amit Shah addressed the Rajya Sabha and directly took on the "Hindu terror" narrative. Here, he was referring to the same Hindutva narrative that had begun after the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. It was the arrest of Ajmal Kasab which blew those charges to smithereens and proved Pakistani links to the terror attack in I proudly declare to the world and the people of the country that a Hindu can never be a terrorist. Hindus can never be terrorists," said Congress bogey of "Hindu terror" and "saffron terror" has finally been called by the NIA court.- EndsMust Watch
Indian Express
15 minutes ago
- Indian Express
‘Congress used the phrase ‘Hindu terror' to serve its vote-bank politics': Maharashtra Deputy CM Eknath Shinde after Malegaon verdict
Following the acquittal of all accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast case by a special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde Thursday launched a sharp attack on the Congress. He accused the party of pushing a political narrative of 'saffron terror' and demanding a public apology for what he termed a '17-year-long injustice' against Hindus. 'The NIA court's verdict has finally cleared the stain unfairly placed on the Hindu community. Those who labelled it as 'saffron terrorism' must now apologise publicly,' Shinde said, addressing reporters in Mumbai. 'The slogan 'Garv se kaho hum Hindu hain (Say proudly that we are Hindus)' will now echo louder across the nation,' he added. Shinde referred specifically to Lieutenant Colonel (retd) Prasad Purohit and former BJP MP Pragya Singh Thakur (Sadhvi Pragya), who were acquitted along with five others after a prolonged legal battle. All seven had been accused in connection with the 2008 blasts in Malegaon, which killed six people and injured over 100. 'The accused were falsely implicated and subjected to immense physical and mental trauma. Despite this, Congress used the phrase 'Hindu terror' to serve its vote-bank politics,' Shinde alleged. 'This was not just a legal matter but an assault on the identity and patriotism of Hindus,' he added. While the Shiv Sena leader hailed the verdict as 'a long-overdue vindication,' he criticised the Congress for what he described as 'an orchestrated attempt to malign an entire community'. He also asserted that his party had stood by the accused throughout the legal process, 'because our fight was based on truth and justice.' 'The Hindu community will never forget this injustice. For Hindus, patriotism is not just a sentiment; it is a religious duty,' Shinde said. 'Congress leaders now need to answer – what was the basis of this fabricated 'Hindu terrorism' narrative? What do they have to say now?'
