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Indian Express
03-08-2025
- Politics
- Indian Express
Farmers' legal crusader Joginder Toor dies in Toronto at 88
Advocate Joginder Singh Toor, a senior member of the Punjab and Haryana High Court Bar, passed away on Sunday evening at the age of 88. Renowned for his unwavering dedication to justice, Toor was a prominent legal voice during the farmers' agitation, especially in matters concerning the minimum support price (MSP) of crops. The High Court Bar Association expressed deep sorrow over his passing. Association president Sartej Singh Narula said that Toor had been residing in Toronto with his family in the recent months. Swaraj India leader Rajeev Godara paid tribute to Toor's contributions, noting his representation of farmers in legal cases related to MSP and crop insurance. Toor also authored a book analysing the three contentious farm laws, which were repealed in 2021 following a year-long nationwide protest. The book aimed to educate and empower the agitating farmers with legal insights. 'Toor's legacy as a defender of farmers' rights and a steadfast advocate for justice will be remembered with deep respect and admiration,' Godara added.
Hindustan Times
28-07-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
FIR filed against computer operator for domicile certificate to dog: Patna DM
PATNA: A first information report (FIR) has been registered in connection with a widely circulated domicile certificate issued to a dog in Bihar's Patna on July 24, a Bihar government official said on Monday. A residence certificate in the name of Dog Babu has led to embarrassment for the Bihar government Patna district magistrate Thiyagarajan SM said the FIR has been registered at the police station concerned against the applicant, the computer operator, and the officer who issued the certificate. 'The Masaurhi sub-divisional officer has been directed to conduct a detailed investigation of the entire matter and submit a report within 24 hours,' Thiyagarajan said. 'Departmental and disciplinary action will be taken against the guilty employees and officers'. 'The certificate was applied on July 15 and issued on July 24 at 3.56 pm and was immediately cancelled within two minutes at 3.58 pm,' the district magistrate said. Under the Bihar Right to Public Service (RTPS) Act, citizens can apply for a certificate of residence online, which is issued after due verification. This domicile certificate is one of the documents accepted for inclusion of names of people in the electoral rolls under the Election Commission of India (ECI) But the document generated through the RTPS portal in this case, was issued to 'Dog Babu', son of 'Kutta Babu' and 'Kutiya Devi', and that lived at Mohalla Kaulichak, Ward No 15, Nagar Parishad Masaurhi, Patna. Revenue officer Murari Chauhan had digitally signed the certificate. Officials said preliminary inquiries indicated that the supporting documents uploaded with the application form belonged to a woman from Delhi. 'This is not a joke but a serious case of tampering with the government's system and documents. It will be probed as to how the dongle of the revenue officer was misused,' said Prabhat Ranjan, circle officer at Masaurhi, adding that stringent action would be taken by whoever was involved in this 'forgery'. To be sure, a residence certificate has been issued earlier to a 'Sonalika tractor' in Munger. Swaraj India member Yogendra Yadav took a swipe at the state government for issuing a domicile certificate to a dog in Patna and underlined that this was the same certificate that was being considered for the special intensive revision (SIR) exercise undertaken by ECI in Bihar. Thiyagarajan said the authorities, in coordination with the cyber police station, were tracking the suspects, adding that necessary action is being taken against officials involved in the negligence. 'The process to suspend them is underway. Through the cyber police station, we are also trying to find out who did this and why such an application was filed. We will investigate and take action against all those who are behind this,' he added.
Indian Express
26-04-2025
- Politics
- Indian Express
Yogendra Yadav
YOGENDRA YADAV NEWS Yogendra Yadav: 'The North and South should make a deal on population vs revenue over delimitation' April 26, 2025 6:21 am Yogendra Yadav, member, Swaraj India, and national convenor of Bharat Jodo Abhiyaan, discusses the challenges of delimitation, freeing up the process from bias and streamlining voters' lists. The session was moderated by Amitabh Sinha, Science and Climate Editor Yogendra Yadav guest at event today March 28, 2025 4:58 am The DMK has taken the lead in opposing the exercise and is trying to get other Opposition parties on its side to demand that the exercise be put on hold for another 25 years. By turning against our past, we handed democracy over to 'manipulators': Yogendra Yadav January 06, 2025 11:33 am Yadav was delivering the Kappen Centenary Public Lecture, titled 'Re-enchanting Democracy, Reclaiming the Republic', in Bengaluru on Saturday evening. He was "exploring ways to reclaim democracy". Yogendra Yadav writes: 2024, the books read and the hope they inspire December 31, 2024 4:26 pm From Rahul Bhatia's story of the dismantling of Indian democracy to Neha Dixit's tale of empathy, a snapshot into the life of a fictional character who experiences the non-fictional events that plagued the nation, in 2024 truth found temporary shelter under the covers of some books Yogendra Yadav writes: What kind of India do we seek? December 03, 2024 9:49 pm In Kachchh, a gathering of organisations opens up space to ask this and other big questions, and a daring to imagine alternatives to modern 'development' Palshikar, Yogendra write to NCERT chief: We'll sue if you don't remove our names from textbook June 18, 2024 7:46 am Their letter comes against backdrop of revisions in the class 12 political science textbook, including pruning of the section on the Ayodhya dispute Civil society groups pledge support to INDIA bloc in elections September 30, 2023 1:14 am The Convention also pointwed to the economic recession and increase in unemployment and inflation, alleging that the BJP has in the meantime favoured its corporate 'cronies'' as like Adani. NCERT textbook modification row: No merit in hue and cry, says UGC chief June 17, 2023 9:08 am Kumar's and other academicians' statement comes a day after 33 academicians wrote to NCERT to remove their names from the revised political science textbooks, released by the Council. 'No thank you, we decline your generosity': Yadav, Palshikar clap back at NCERT June 12, 2023 9:31 am In a continuing war of words between the NCERT and its two former chief advisors, Yogendra Yadav and Suhas Palshikar issued another statement Saturday reacting to the Council's rejection of their demand to have their names removed from political science textbooks. "If the name of the Textbook Development Committee is there to acknowledge our contribution, as the NCERT claims, then we must be free to decline this generosity," their statement reads. Arc of Yogendra Yadav's journey: 'Congress must die' to 'Bharat Jodo Yatra', AAP to Swaraj India September 10, 2022 8:48 pm Days before joining the Yatra, Yadav stepped down from the coordination panel of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha, which led the year-long farmer protests against the three controversial central agricultural laws. Load More YOGENDRA YADAV PHOTOS Bharat Jodo Yatra: Congress Party's 'long battle' to unite the country September 09, 2022 8:55 pm The 'Bharat Jodo Yatra' by Rahul Gandhi is being billed by the party as the longest rally mounted in the country over the last century. Today in pics: March 24, 2014 March 24, 2014 10:22 am India will hold national elections from April 7 to May 12. Yogendra Yadav launches AAP campaign in Maharashtra, hits out at Rahul, Modi February 20, 2014 9:50 am Launching his party's Lok Sabha campaign in Maharashtra, Aam Aadmi Party leader Yogendra Yadav lambasted Congress and BJP, saying that they were neck deep in corruption. AAP MLA Binny launches fresh attack against Kejriwal January 21, 2014 6:47 pm
Indian Express
25-04-2025
- Politics
- Indian Express
Yogendra Yadav: ‘The North and South should make a deal on population vs revenue over delimitation'
Yogendra Yadav, member, Swaraj India, and national convenor of Bharat Jodo Abhiyaan, discusses the challenges of delimitation, freeing up the process from bias and streamlining voters' lists. The session was moderated by Amitabh Sinha, Science and Climate Editor On the impact of delimitation Delimitation, as it is called in India, or redistricting as it is called in the US, is a standard procedure or requirement for any electoral democracy to readjust the number of seats to reflect the changes in population. These changes in numbers and patterns mean the system has to ensure that the equality in representation is maintained. It has to address the need to change the nature of seats, the number of seats or their boundaries and so on. That's broadly what is called delimitation. In the Indian context, it has three different components. The first is reallocation. Since population changes, some states have more population than others. Within a state, some areas, typically urban areas, have more population than earlier. Therefore, they should get more seats. The second component is the redrawing of boundaries. You have decided Haryana should have 10 constituencies. What exactly should be their boundaries? If you have decided that Gurugram should have four Assembly constituencies, should it continue to be in one city or be split? There is a special third component, which is deciding upon reservations. Let's say among the 10 parliamentary seats of Haryana, which ones should be reserved for Scheduled Castes? In Jharkhand, how many seats should be reserved for Scheduled Tribes, and which seats should be reserved? Our constitutional provision (regarding delimitation) was fairly straightforward and followed a fundamental democratic principle of parity. The Constitution says, as far as possible, every Lok Sabha constituency should have the same population. The basic principle is one person, one vote. That's the parity principle. The Constitution says that after every census, which was assumed to be every 10 years, you could look at the population, re-allocate the number of seats for each state, re-allocate within the state, redraw boundaries and re-fix which constituency should be reserved. That is the constitutional position of the original constitutional state. On the history of delimitation There was a delimitation between 1952 and 1956 and then after the 1961 and 1971 census. But by then, the growth of the population was very uneven. Some states were beginning to lose systematically, others were beginning to gain systematically. So, in the 42nd Amendment, the constitutional provision was changed which froze delimitation or the allocation of seats for Parliament and Assembly constituencies. It froze reserved seats and even the boundaries. Everything was frozen for 25 years. The argument was that since the country was going through family planning, it wasn't fair to punish states doing well in family planning. So if their population went down, their representation in Lok Sabha must not be allowed to go down. Cut to 2001 when that was frozen once again. The then Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, after intense discussions and negotiations, decided to freeze delimitation for another 25 years. But with a change. It said while seat allocation for different states would remain as it was, it would unfreeze the allocation within a state because that would not change the federal balance. Also, it unfroze state boundaries and they were redrawn. So, for example, Haryana continued to have 10 seats but the boundaries were redrawn and a new constituency called Gurugram was created. It also allowed the number and the exact nature of reservations for constituencies to be changed. So, it was a partial unfreeze. On dealing with concerns and challenges around delimitation We have three options. One is to do what was done in 1976, which is to completely freeze all three elements, and continue for another 25 years or forever. At the moment, no one is quite advocating that. The second option is to re-do a partial freeze, which was done in 2001. To allow everything else to take place but not allow the number of seats for each state, or at least in percentage terms, the quota of each state, to change. The third option is to unfreeze fully and to go back to the original constitutional position. That could have drastic effects. My suggestion is let's permanently freeze this (present ratio of Parliament and Assembly constituencies), and go for option number two, which is partial freeze. We already have three fault lines in the country. First is a cultural fault line, the linguistic one, broadly Hindi versus non-Hindi. It's a distinction, not a division yet. Second is the economic fault line, which has intensified over the last three decades. I am not saying that the South and West have become rich but compared to them, the rest of the country is starkly poor. The third fault line is an electoral political fault line between areas where BJP dominates, and areas where the BJP's dominance is being challenged. BJP is not absent in the remaining part but it's being challenged. These three fault lines do not coincide perfectly and we are lucky that they don't perfectly coincide. But if you do reallocation as would indeed be required by the Constitution, then what you are doing is creating a fourth fault line which happens to coincide with the first, second and third fault lines broadly. That's why we need to make a deal. North Indians should stop demanding more political representation because they have a greater population. South and West Indians should stop demanding a greater share in federal revenue because they have a better GDP. Once you do so, that, to my mind, consolidates the foundations of Indian federalism and the Indian Union. On less highlighted concerns over delimitation In our country, the process by which delimitation should be done is not provided for in the Constitution. Every time delimitation takes place, a new law is enacted by Parliament. So far, delimitation has been done in a judicial manner. Usually, there is a delimitation commission. The head is a former judge of the Supreme Court, helped by the Election Commission. At a moment when institutions are under serious stress, my first concern is, will the non-partisan character of the delimitation exercise be maintained in India? Related is the concern about gerrymandering. In America, the boundaries of constituencies are decided by the outgoing representatives. So, they actually tweak and tailor the boundaries to suit their own interests. You have all kinds of weird shapes to ensure that you get people who are likely to vote for you inside your constituency and shove those who are unlikely to do so to the next constituency. This is called gerrymandering. India has generally been free of this challenge but unfortunately, in the last two instances, which took place in Jammu and Kashmir and Assam, delimitation was not done under judicial supervision. The manner in which the Election Commission carried out the delimitation in Assam was straightforward gerrymandering. It is communal gerrymandering intended to suit one party, namely the BJP. My third concern is that our constituencies are just too large. Can we find a way of increasing the numbers without shifting the federal balance? Fourth is which constituency should be reserved. It has been done by a certain lottery principle. It has not been so unfair, although you would find many Muslims complaining that wherever we have a population, things are reserved. So far, that has actually not been the case. But we don't have written rules about it. I would like this to be inscribed in the law itself. And finally, the concern is that in India, we have two election systems. The election system for Lok Sabha is done by the Election Commission of India. But the local bodies' elections — such as that of panchayat and municipality — are done by a separate body. The constituency boundaries are not done by the central Election Commission and most interestingly, the voter list is different from that of the Election Commission. So you could be a voter in one list, and not a voter in the other. The one thing that is desperately needed before we get into one nation, one election, is to have one nation, one voters' list.
