July 22, 1985, Forty Years Ago: Plane Broke Apart
Police Firing
Eleven persons were killed in Ahmedabad — nine of them in police firing in the Dariapur area — as violence continued to rock communally sensitive localities of the walled city for the fifth successive day. After a relatively peaceful night, trouble erupted when bombs were hurled and shots fired at a passing police vehicle. The police returned fire and nine persons were killed in the incident ,while four were admitted to hospitals with bullet injuries.
Flash Floods Toll
The death toll in flash floods and unprecedented rains in Punjab and Himachal Pradesh rose to 55 while major rivers in Bihar, fed by overnight heavy rains, are likely to worsen the flood situation in the state. In Uttar Pradesh, all major rivers were rising at different places but were still under the danger mark.
BJP Bats For Bomb
The Bharatiya Janata Party wants the government to develop 'our own'' nuclear bomb because it feels that the threat of a Pakistan N-bomb is 'real'. The party said the country could no longer afford to adopt a policy of drift and escapism in this 'serious matter'.
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Mint
16 minutes ago
- Mint
Who will be next Vice President? Harivansh, Nitish, Arif among in race to succeed Jagdeep Dhankhar
The Election Commission of India said on Wednesday that it has already begun the process of electing a new Vice President. The announcement comes two days after Jagdeep Dhankhar resigned from the post, opening the contest for his successor. Dhankhar, 74, assumed office in August 2022. His five-year term would end in August 2027. Dhankhar's abrupt resignation means a new Vice President has not been elected within the next two months. While the Election Commission has yet to announce the poll schedule, sources say the country will likely have a new Vice President by the end of August. Dhankhar's resignation has set off a wave of speculation about his potential successor. One of the past governors, as Dhankhar was of West Bengal before taking the vice president's office, or a seasoned organisational leader or one of the Union ministers – the BJP has a large pool of leaders to choose from for the position. Dhankhar's resignation comes as the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is in the process of electing its new national president, replacing JP Nadda. According to some reports, the saffron party may get a new president after August 15. Whenever the election happens, the ruling National Democratic Alliance and the opposition INDIA bloc will field their candidates for the top post. The electorate for the Vice Presidential election comprises all members of both Houses of Parliament, using a proportional representation system via single transferable vote. The MPs will cast a single transferable vote with a secret ballot. The electoral college currently has 788 MPs- 588 in Lok Sabha and 245 in Rajya Sabha. The ruling BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has a majority in the electorate, which means the NDA candidate will be the next Vice President of India At present, the effective strength of both Houses is 786, and the winning candidate will require 394 votes, considering that all eligible voters exercise their franchise. In the Lok Sabha, the BJP-led NDA enjoys the support of 293 of the 542 members. The ruling alliance has the support of 129 members in the Rajya Sabha, assuming that the nominated members vote in support of the NDA nominee, which has an adequate strength of 240. So, overall, the ruling alliance has the support of 422 members in both the houses as against the requirement of 394. Among the frontrunners from the NDA camp is Harivansh Narayan Singh, a Janata Dal (United) MP who has been the Rajya Sabha deputy chairman since 2020. Harivansh has been temporarily filling the role of Rajya Sabha chair until the election of the next Vice President of India. In the 2020 Deputy Speaker Elections, Harivansh defeated Opposition candidate and RJD leader Manoj Jha. Nitish Kumar's name has also been floating around for the post. However, the JD-U chief will have to leave the CM chair, months before the elections, so Kumar seems an unlikely candidate. Yet, NDA ally Upendra Kushwaha suggested that Nitish Kumar step down as CM to make way for the next generation. Manoj Sinha will complete five years as the Lieutenant Governor (LG) of Jammu and Kashmir this August, fuelling speculation about his candidature as Vice President. Sinha is a former MP, Union minister and an old BJP hand from Uttar Pradesh's Purvanchal region. Two Union Ministers — Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Health Minister JP Nadda — have also been suggested as contenders. Congress leader Shashi Tharoor has also emerged as a contender for some. To be a VP, Tharoor, who has an uneasy relationship with the Congress party, will have to leave his Lok Sabha MP seat. Dhankhar's abrupt resignation has set off a wave of speculation about his potential successor. Bihar Governor Arif Mohammad Khan is also counted in the list. A former Congress and Janata Dal MP, Khan left the Congress in 1986 over the Shah Bano case. Before Bihar, he was Governor of Kerala. Well, all these are speculations. Who knows, like in the past, the BJP will come up with a surprise pick. Until then, more names will be added to the list of frontrunners for Vice President of India.
The Wire
16 minutes ago
- The Wire
Indian Govt Sent British Families of Air India Crash Victims 'Wrong Bodies'; MEA Responds to Reports
British prime minister Keir Starmer is expected to discuss the case with prime minister Narendra Modi when the latter makes a state visit to Britain this week. Representative image. Members of the Indian Medical Association and Ahmedabad Medical Association pay tribute to the victims of the Air India plane crash, in Ahmedabad, Tuesday, June 17, 2025. Photo: PTI New Delhi: British news outlets have reported that grieving families of those killed in the Air India plane crash in Gujarat in June have been sent by wrong bodies by the Indian government – a claim that the Indian Ministry of External Affairs has not denied in its official response. Reports on the Daily Mail and The Times noted that British prime minister Keir Starmer is expected to discuss the case with prime minister Narendra Modi when the latter makes a state visit to Britain this week. The former also reported that a "top-level inquiry into the scandal" is underway in India and England. Fifty two of the 241 people killed in the 242-passenger Air India flight bound for London's Gatwick on June 12 were British citizens. Nineteen others, who were in and around the building into which the plane crashed, were also killed. The reports, including on the British Telegraph, noted that the remains of a number of British victims were "wrongly identified before they were flown home." The relatives of a victim abandoned funeral plans after allegedly being told that the coffin contained a different – and unidentified – passenger's body, the Daily Mail reported. Daily Mail further reported that the remains of more than one person killed in the crash were "commingled in a single coffin" and "had to be separated before the funeral could go ahead." The errors were reportedly identified by Fiona Wilcox, the Inner West London coroner, who had to compare DNA from the bodies with samples given by the victims' families. "Though two instances of mistaken identity have so far come to light, there are fears that more such errors could have been made, leaving families under a shadow of uncertainty," the Daily Mail report said. The victims' families are represented by a lawyer, James Healy-Pratt, who told the news outlets that the mistakes had left the families 'distraught'. Healy-Pratt said that this confusion has been prevailing for the last two weeks. To The Telegraph, he said that the question also is that if it "isn't their is it in that coffin?" Most crash victims whose families are in India have been cremated or buried soon after their bodies were recovered, in accordance with religious customs. MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal, in his response to the reports today, said that India is working with UK authorities to address concerns on this. Jaiswal also claimed that the authorities had carried out identification of victims "as per established protocols and technical requirements." His statement said: "We have seen the report and have been working closely with the UK side from the moment these concerns and issues were brought to our attention. In the wake of the tragic crash, the concerned authorities had carried out identification of victims as per established protocols and technical requirements . All mortal remains were handled with utmost professionalism and with due regard for the dignity of the deceased. We are continuing to work with the UK authorities on addressing any concerns related to this issue." Lawyer Healy-Pratt also told Telegraph that the family who received the wrong body had been left 'in limbo' and that the coroner also "has a problem because she has an unidentified person in her jurisdiction.' The Times reported that Healy-Pratt is seeking formal responses from Air India and its emergency response contractor, Kenyon International Emergency Services. The families are in contact with their respective MPs and the UK's Foreign Office. One of the family members of three victims is quoted by Telegraph as having said that they were not "allowed to" look at the remains. "They just said, 'This is your mother or father,' and gave us a paper label with an ID number on it. We had to take their word for it," said Blackburn-resident Altaf Taju who lost his parents and brother-in-law. Taju's family members were buried in India, so he was not affected by the mix-up. The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.
The Wire
20 minutes ago
- The Wire
The Gujarat Model: At a Dangerous Crossing
'He is incorruptible'; the middle-aged founder of a well-known chartered accountancy firm in Mumbai looked palpably thrilled. It was another of Mumbai's social get togethers following a business conference where India's supposedly best minds exchanged political gossip and fulminated on the state of the nation, including its celebrated potholes. 'He is ushering in changes. He looks like a man on a mission.', the exuberant gentleman continued, like a rollercoaster on steroids. I saw a Narendra Modi 'bhakt' long before that dodgy sobriquet became a national meme. The year was 2004. The Gujarat chief minister had already assiduously created a political narrative about himself, even as an ageing PM Atal Behari Vajpayee was selling the chimera of India Shining. But I am not easy pickings; we are not an argumentative nation for nothing. 'These things don't matter. They happen all the time' 'Do you endorse what happened in Gujarat in 2002? Is that okay? Does that not alone disqualify Modi from holding such an august office?'. The gentleman was unperturbed. If at all, he seemed stunned at my apparent naivete. He looked at me with a bemused expression of a laboratory scientist who was about to do a surgery on a trapped cockroach: "These things don't matter. They happen all the time'. Whataboutery would go on to become India's favorite sport on prime-time TV to rationalise the worst of shenanigans, corruption, violence, sectarianism and riots. Fast forward to 2014: Modi was the presumptive prime ministerial candidate of the BJP. He had graduated from being a regional satrap ( as TV anchors brand ambitious provincial leaders) into a national alternative. By that time, I had morphed from being a part-time, quasi-back-office analyst for the Congress to becoming its ubiquitous face on television networks. Modi willy-nilly would become the surname I encountered at every nook and corner. And on every show. 'Mr Jha, Modi stands for development', the popular bespectacled face who had mesmerised the nation with his trademark theatrics, was implacable. 'India needs his Gujarat model'. He sounded like the saffron party's campaigner-in-chief himself. ' Seriously? ', I pushed back. 'Are we saying that we have become a $ 2 trillion economy without development? Are you aware that India has grown at nearly 7.8% average GDP during 2004-14 and lifted over 140 million people out of poverty ? Yes, there are problems, but we are the global sweet spot after China. So what new 'development' are we talking about?'. It was my early discovery that facts, data, statistics and evidence mattered little in the noisy public discourse. Modi's Acche Din ( Happy days) was a precursor to what would be Donald Trump's astonishingly successful Make America Great Again ( MAGA) shibboleth that would transmogrify into a movement, a neo-Republican vote bloc. On every parameter, America was the dominant superpower in 2016, but Trump had altered the political conversation. Both Modi and Trump would go on to annihilate their beleaguered and stunned opponents. On July 11, 2025 , a bridge in Vadodara district of Gujarat collapsed. It killed 20 innocent people for no fault of theirs. Barring a tiny fleeting mention, the news cycle cursorily buried it. They cannot be blamed. When the Morbi bridge fell in October 2022, its death toll of 135 people did not affect the electorate whatsoever. The BJP returned to power in the assembly elections that were held just a few months later with a massive mandate. In Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur-Kheri, the son of the local Member of Parliament was arrested for driving his jeep mercilessly into protesting farmers in October 2021. In the assembly elections just five months later, the BJP won all 8 assembly seats in the Lok Sabha constituency with handsome margins. I was reminded of my unforgettable confabulation with the suited-booted corporate schmoozer in 2004: 'These things don't matter. They happen all the time'. But do they? And just because they happened in the past, true or exaggerated, must we silently condone the brazen dismantling of what was once a democratic and secular role model to the world? We were once a newly independent country that had boldly resurrected itself from a pulverised economy and a harrowing bloody partition, to embrace religious diversity and inclusive growth, and become a lighthouse to new societies battling seemingly irreconcilable contradictions. Societies pay a huge price for not just bad choices but even for temporary blind-sidedness. The Congress's underwhelming defense of itself led to an unprecedented wave of support for Modi, enough for its people to shockingly ignore the deadly pogrom of 2002, fake encounter killings, rise of crony capitalism, the ruthless decimation of dissenting voices, the unrelenting intimidation of brutalised minorities. A manufactured cult A cult was born, or more appropriately, manufactured. The Gujarat model is now trumpeted as Modi's India by his acolytes. In his model, all you do is build highways, expressways, metro lines, trains, ports and highways. And even have an eponymous cricket stadium. In her Pulitzer Prize winning book Autocracy Inc, author Anne Applebaum talks of disinformation, surveillance and propaganda as the trifecta of modern-day autocracies, democratically elected leaders who surreptitiously through regulatory and media capture change the destinies of nations. As I write, the Supreme Court calling out India's police state (Why are you fighting political battles, ED?) , and the alleged attempt by the Election Commission to disenfranchise voters in Bihar are a warning; Politicians may love power, but despots will never give it up. Even as Modi continues to boast about his infrastructure push, he has not yet understood the core principle of political leadership; societies need a bridge between communities before they pay their toll-tax for a shimmering patch of concrete. And tragically for Modi, even they are crumbling. And broken. Sanjay Jha is an author and former national spokesperson for the Congress. The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.
