
Owaisi slams Hyderabad Corporation for ‘meat ban' on Independence Day
Mr. Owaisi, who is the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen president, stated that a vast majority of the public in Telangana is non-vegetarian. Using this to buttress his point, he sought to know the 'connection' between meat-eating and Independence Day. 'These meat bans violate people's right to liberty, privacy, livelihood, culture, nutrition & religion,' he stated on X, formerly Twitter.
'Many municipal corporations across India seemed to have ordered that slaughterhouses and meat shops should be closed on 15th August. Unfortunately, @GHMCOnline has also made a similar order. This is callous and unconstitutional,' he posted.
The GHMC had issued orders for the closure of cattle slaughterhouses and retail beef shops on August 15 and August 16 on account of Independence Day and Janmastami, respectively. The Municipal Corporation said it issued the order under Section 533 (b) of the GHMC Act, 1955.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Mint
19 minutes ago
- Mint
S&P Global upgrades India' rating to BBB amid Trump's 50% tariffs, says outlook stable
Ratings agency S&P Global has today upgraded India's sovereign rating to BBB from its earlier rating of BBB-, while maintaining the economic outlook as 'stable'. This comes just ahead of Independence Day tomorrow and amid United States President Donald Trump's imposition of 50 per cent tariffs. Further, S&P Global has also revised India's short-term rating to A-2 from A-3, and improved the transfer and convertibility assessment to A- from BBB+. In its report, S&P Global said their 'stable' assessment reflects confidence in continued policy stability and that high infrastructure investment will support India's long-term growth prospects. 'That, along with cautious fiscal and monetary policy that moderates that government's elevated debt and interest burden will underpin the rating over the next 24 months,' it added. (This is a breaking story, more updates coming…)


The Hindu
19 minutes ago
- The Hindu
Forgotten witness
I always thought Independence Day belonged to the likes of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Patel. My father was a young man when India gained Independence. I heard my great-aunt had tasted the police lathi and then become a politician. Our neighbour had been to jail as a freedom-fighter. But I never asked any of them, 'What did you do on August 15?' In retrospect, that seems like such an obvious question. But it ended up being a missed opportunity. That remains a lifelong regret. Some years ago, I asked my mother what she had done on August 15, 1947. But she didn't have clear memories of doing anything special that day. She didn't remember any feasts being cooked at home, or the family huddled around the radio set listening to Nehru's famous speech at midnight. Instead, she remembered drawing the curtains and huddling around the radio to listen to Subhas Chandra Bose's Aami Subhas Bolchi broadcasts from Singapore in years earlier. It puzzled me. Independence was such a seminal moment in the history of the country. I would have thought it would be engraved in her memory. But Kolkata was in a state of violent unrest in those days with Hindu-Muslim killings. It's likely that as a young girl, my mother was not allowed to go anywhere. Independence probably felt very different to her than it did to her brother. I can imagine my uncle and his friends running down the streets on Independence Day. But I never asked him. Our generation took independence for granted. And then one day it was too late to ask those who had witnessed it about it. An incredible spectrum The problem I realise is the way we are taught history. It's about very important men (and a few women) taking very important decisions around round tables. There are Wavell Plans and Cripps Missions and Dandi Marches. But the ordinary people are always the extras. Never at school did someone tell us, 'Go interview your grandparents about living through this period in history'. Their stories somehow never mattered. But what stories they had. Flower Silliman, who passed away last year, was one of the last members of the dwindling Jewish community in Kolkata. She once told me about how she had come upon a mob killing a man in the heart of Kolkata. When she tried to intervene, the mob politely told her this was not her fight. As a memsahib (white woman), she needed to stay out of it. Suddenly she realised that though she thought of herself as an Indian Jew, to many in the new India, she wasn't Indian at all. Jatra artist Chapal Bhaduri remembers peering out of the window of his home in North Kolkata and seeing someone hold another person by the throat and hack his head off with a chopper. In his book The Last Heroes, veteran journalist P. Sainath collects many such stories. The woman who cooked food for revolutionaries hiding in the forests of Purulia in West Bengal. The woman who at 13 was taking on the Razakars of Hyderabad with a slingshot. The student activist who could not give his final exam because he was in jail. 'Freedom was not brought to you by a bunch of Oxbridge Brahmin baniyas,' says Sainath. 'But by an incredible spectrum of diverse peoples — Dalits, Adivasis, women, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, OBCs, Brahmins, you name it. They participated.' The woman who cooked for Bose's INA thought she was just a cook, not a freedom fighter. Years later, when she was invited to hoist the flag, she was embarrassed. She worked as a domestic help and didn't have a decent sari. These people didn't get roads named after them. There are no statues to them. Memories on postcards It took Aanchal Malhotra finding objects like a peacock-shaped bracelet, a maang tika, a pocket knife, to realise they carried in them stories about her ancestors as they fled across the new border that separated India and Pakistan. That led to her book Remnants of Separation, an alternative history of Partition told through material memory. These stories were not really deemed worth of history books. But history needs to be freed from textbooks. DAG once organised an exhibit called March to Freedom at the Indian Museum in Kolkata. In it were dozens of handwritten postcards with people's memories of Independence. 'My grandmother's father was in the police but he still took part in the Swadeshi movement,' said one. Another said, 'My late grandfather's account of 15th August is rather funny. A bunch of village kids with no money or resources stole gamchas [cotton towels] and hoisted them on a bunch of sticks and ran through the rice fields overjoyed about a free India.' The letter writers (or their grandparents) had never met Gandhi or Nehru. But they too were part of the story of Indian Independence. The people's history of Independence needs to be preserved before it's too late. Sandip Roy, the author of Don't Let Him Know, likes to let everyone know about his opinions, whether asked or not.


News18
29 minutes ago
- News18
Trump-Putin Summit, The Nobel Peace Prize And Other Imponderables
President Trump is pushing for a Ukraine-Russia ceasefire, but deep differences between both sides make ending the three-year conflict extremely difficult. The Russia-Ukraine war faces significant obstacles to ending, primarily due to the conflicting territorial and political demands of both sides. Ukraine insists on reclaiming all its lost territories, including Crimea, and will not renounce its intention of becoming a NATO member. Russia, on the other hand, seeks sweeping political changes in Kyiv and aims to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO. These fundamental disagreements create a deadlock that makes a negotiated settlement extremely difficult. Neither side is willing to end the war on terms that are acceptable to the other side. Against this background, President Donald Trump said he'll be meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday, 15th August, in Alaska, to work out a potential peace deal to end the war in Ukraine that could include 'some swapping of territories." Trump's announcement came on the day which he had set as the deadline for Putin to make peace or face severe economic punishment. Trump posted on Truth Social: 'The highly anticipated meeting between myself, as President of the United States of America, and President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, will take place next Friday, August 15, 2025, in the Great State of Alaska. Further details to follow". India has said that it 'welcomes the understanding reached between the United States and the Russian Federation for a meeting in Alaska on 15th August 2025", and that 'this meeting holds the promise of bringing to an end the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and opening up the prospects for peace." Being India's Independence Day, 15th August is a very auspicious day for all Indians, and one cannot but hope that it proves auspicious for the Ukrainians and Russians also. China's President Xi Jinping has also said he is pleased to see Moscow maintain contact with the United States to advance a political resolution of the Ukraine crisis. However, while President Trump is pushing for a potential ceasefire agreement that could end Russia's three-year war against Ukraine, the huge divergence between the Russian and Ukrainian positions will make it extremely difficult to bring the conflict to an end. Trump and Putin had last met in 2019 on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Osaka and have not met since then. Moreover, Putin has not visited the US since 2015 when he attended the UN General Assembly meeting. Interestingly, in his address to the General Assembly, Putin had stressed 'the vital importance of respecting State sovereignty" and had said that 'many of the crises facing the world have been exacerbated by countries acting against sovereign States outside the UN Charter!" Ironically, Putin is now widely accused of undermining Ukraine's sovereignty, and this has been a central accusation throughout the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian conflict which escalated into a full-scale invasion in February 2022. Trump said he would hold a meeting with Putin regardless of whether the Russian leader agrees to meet his Ukrainian counterpart Zelensky. A White House press official had earlier said that a meeting between Putin and Zelensky was a precondition to a meeting between Putin and Trump, but Putin had rejected the idea of meeting Zelensky. In May 2025, Putin had similarly declined to meet with Zelenskyy during talks in Turkey and instead sent a lower-level delegation led by Presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky. Ahead of the planned Trump-Putin summit, Putin reiterated that the conditions were not yet in place for a meeting with Zelensky, although Trump had suggested a trilateral summit earlier. Russian officials have stated that high-level talks require meticulous preparation and that Putin would only consider a meeting during the final stages of peace negotiations or after a draft agreement has been reached. Russian media and officials have frequently sought to undermine Zelensky's legitimacy, viewing him as a 'loser" and a 'clown," and claiming he is not a valid negotiating partner. Some analysts suggest that Putin doesn't want to appear pressured into a meeting on Zelensky's terms, as it could be seen as backing down, especially after Zelensky's ultimatums. In essence, while Zelensky has expressed willingness to meet with Putin, Putin has consistently resisted the idea, citing the lack of necessary preconditions and portraying Zelensky as an illegitimate negotiating partner. US officials have reportedly briefed their Ukrainian counterparts on a plan offered by Putin to halt the war in Ukraine in exchange for significant territorial concessions by Kyiv. This plan would require Ukraine to cede the eastern Donbas region — the majority of which is currently occupied by Russia — as well as Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014. Putin reportedly presented this plan to Trump's foreign envoy Steve Witkoff in a meeting in Moscow on Wednesday. It wasn't clear what the plan would mean for two other regions in Ukraine —Zaporizhzhya and Kherson — where Russia controls some territory, beyond Russia stopping its offensive there. Ukraine's President Zelensky has totally rejected the idea of making any territorial concessions and ceding any territory. In a video address after Trump's announcement about the forthcoming meeting with Putin, Zelensky said that Ukraine is 'also ready to work together with President Trump," but vowed that his people 'will not give their land to the occupier." Zelensky said: 'Any decisions that are against us, any decisions that are without Ukraine, are also decisions against peace. These are dead decisions. They will never work. And we all need a real, living peace that people will respect." In a video shared on social media, Zelenskyy said Ukraine was ready for 'real decisions" that could bring a 'dignified peace" but stressed there could be no violation of the constitution on territorial issues. He also said, 'The answer to the Ukrainian territorial issue is already in the Constitution of Ukraine. No one will and cannot deviate from this. Ukrainians will not give their land to the occupier." Therefore, Ukraine's government and people are unlikely to accept ceding any territory to Russia, especially given the high political and human costs of such a concession. They also prioritize NATO membership as a security guarantee. On the other hand, Russia insists on maintaining control over territories it currently occupies and demands significant political concessions from Ukraine, including a neutral status that effectively excludes NATO membership. Putin's vision for the war also includes subjugating Ukraine and preventing it from having the right to join NATO, making even a temporary ceasefire difficult. It seems that Putin has framed the war as an existential struggle for his legacy, making it difficult for him to concede without appearing defeated. He has even made it clear that his intentions in this war are to subjugate Ukraine, deprive it of sovereignty and prevent it from having the right to join NATO. Despite the economic and human costs of the war, Putin's popularity remains relatively high, potentially encouraging him to maintain the conflict rather than seek a negotiated settlement. Moreover, deep-seated mistrust between Russia and Ukraine, as well as between Russia and the West, makes it challenging to build confidence for negotiations. A 'frozen conflict" scenario could be on the cards, where fighting ceases but the underlying issues remain unresolved. It would require Ukraine to dedicate significant resources to defense and rebuilding. Ukraine faces significant economic and demographic challenges, including a heavily indebted economy and a rapidly ageing population, which will impact its ability to recover from the war. Trump's desire to bring the Russia-Ukraine war to an end is also linked to his desire to win the Nobel Peace Prize. In his inaugural address on January 20 this year, Trump had said 'My proudest legacy will be that of a peacemaker and unifier. That's what I want to be: a peacemaker and a unifier". He has repeatedly said that this was the reputation he wanted recorded in the history books. It is no secret that he covets the Nobel Peace Prize. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Jul 31: 'It's well past time that President Trump was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize." However, India declined to officially comment on the US's pitch for Donald Trump to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, suggesting that the question be directed to the White House. Trump has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize multiple times since 2018 but is yet to win it. Pakistan said in June that it would nominate him for the award for his role in helping to end its conflict with India. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last month he had nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. Cambodia's prime minister also said that he has nominated US President Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize, lauding his 'extraordinary statesmanship" in halting a border conflict between Cambodia and Thailand. Now, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on Saturday also jointly threw their weight behind US president Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize, following a landmark peace agreement between the two longtime rivals. Both these leaders credited Trump's mediation for ending decades of conflict and called on the Nobel committee to recognise his efforts. Aliyev asked, 'Who, if not President Trump, deserves a Nobel Peace Prize" while Pashinyan described Trump as the 'peacemaker" behind the 'breakthrough" and said that the US President 'deserved the Nobel." There are many who may dispute Trump's claim to the Nobel Peace prize, but the Nobel Peace Prize is no stranger to controversy. Criticisms that have been leveled against some of the awards include allegations that they were politically motivated, premature, or guided by a faulty definition of what constitutes work for peace. As the New York Times stated in an article on May 4, 2018, the Nobel Committee 'began choosing winners in 1901, and for almost as long, some of its choices have been assailed as politicised, parochial or just misguided." Donald Trump has an obsession with the Nobel Peace Prize for several reasons such as a craving for international prestige and a decade-long rivalry with former US president Barack Obama who won this prize in 2009. In fact, Obama's Nobel Peace Prize also faced a wave of criticism. He received the prize in the first year of his presidency, which some considered too early. Critics pointed out that Obama's presidency was still in its early stages and that he hadn't yet demonstrated the concrete achievements in peace and diplomacy that typically accompany a Nobel Peace Prize. Moreover, it raised questions about the selection due to the Obama administration's involvement in wars in Libya, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq and Yemen. The 1994 prize went to Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzak Rabin 'for their efforts to create peace in the Middle East". Kåre Kristiansen, a member of the Nobel Committee, resigned in protest at Arafat's award, citing his sponsorship of terrorism through the PLO and calling him the 'world's most prominent terrorist". The 2012 prize went to the European Union for having 'over six decades contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe". Some former laureates disputed the award, claiming that the EU is 'clearly not a champion of peace"! If Trump won the prize, he would be the fifth US President to do so, after Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Jimmy Carter, and Barack Obama. Interestingly, Trump had this to say: 'No, I won't get a Nobel Peace Prize no matter what I do, including Russia/Ukraine, and Israel/Iran, whatever those outcomes may be, but the people know, and that's all that matters to me." The Washington Post had commented on July 15 this year that " The road to President Donald Trump's highly coveted Nobel Peace Prize might ultimately run through Ukraine". It had also said that 'Trump's approach to the Ukraine conflict has lacked a coherent strategy." In any case, the Russia-Ukraine war's complexity and the deeply entrenched positions of both sides, combined with the potential for shifts in the global political landscape, make ending the conflict a formidable challenge. Zelensky has already said that the Trump-Putin meeting in Alaska will achieve nothing, that Ukraine will not cede any territory and that any peace deal excluding Kiev would lead to 'dead solutions." Thus, despite Trump's Summit meeting with Putin next week, ending the Russia-Ukraine conflict is going to be extremely difficult due to the significant disagreements on key issues and a lack of trust between the two sides. Neither side is willing to compromise on their core demands, making a peaceful resolution a highly complex challenge. top videos View all However, good luck President Trump! The writer is a retired Indian diplomat and had previously served as Consul General in New York. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18's views. Click here to add News18 as your preferred news source on Google. tags : donald trump russia-ukraine conflict Vladimir Putin view comments Location : New Delhi, India, India First Published: August 14, 2025, 15:07 IST News opinion Opinion | Trump-Putin Summit, The Nobel Peace Prize And Other Imponderables Disclaimer: Comments reflect users' views, not News18's. Please keep discussions respectful and constructive. Abusive, defamatory, or illegal comments will be removed. News18 may disable any comment at its discretion. By posting, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.