Cows come home to haunt India's Modi

[Swordsmyth]

One of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's signature policies has been protecting cows, but for Raghuvir Singh Meena -- a Hindu farmer struggling to protect his crop of chickpeas from roaming cattle -- it has gone too far.
Farmers overwhelmingly supported Modi's nationalist party when he swept to power in 2014 but the strict measures on cows, which are sacred to Hindus, have caused major headaches for rural communities.
"We have tried everything -- scarecrows and barbed wire -- but the stray animals never miss a chance to eat away our crop," Meena told AFP, looking askance at his lush fields in the Pilani district of Rajasthan in western India.
"They (the government) are playing their politics, they don't care about poor farmers," he said ahead of elections beginning on April 11, when Modi will run for a second term.
Even before Modi came to power, cow slaughter and the consumption of beef was banned in Rajasthan and many other states in officially secular India, which also has substantial Muslim and Christian populations.
But laws are now applied more strictly and punishments have increased. In 2017 the government tried to ban the cattle trade for slaughter nationwide, only for it to be rejected by the Supreme Court.
Critics say Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is on a mission to impose "Hindutva", the hegemony of Hindus, on 1.25-billion-strong India.
They also warn that the BJP has emboldened fringe Hindu vigilante groups to attack minority Muslims and low-caste Dalits with impunity for eating beef, slaughtering and trading in cattle.
Incidents of mob lynchings have spiked, with 44 people -- including one in Rajasthan -- killed in cow-related attacks between May 2015 and December last year, says Human Rights Watch.
The BJP says it opposes all violence, but even the fear of attack and tougher laws have badly disrupted the cattle trade.
This has led to farmers abandoning old and infirm cows instead of selling them for slaughter, resulting in more bovines on the loose -- causing road accidents and wreaking havoc in rural areas, where 70 percent of Indians live.
The number of strays was put at 5.2 million in a 2012 livestock census --- which is carried out every 10 years, just as for people -- but the numbers are believed to have shot up since.
Wandering cattle, often eating plastic rubbish or ruminating at busy traffic intersections, have become a much more common sight in India's towns, villages and cities since Modi came to power.
In 2015, the last year for which government figures are available, more than 550 people were killed in accidents involving stray cattle.
- 'No one dares' -
"Because of these cow protectors no one dares touch the cow now," said Sumer Singh Punia, a former village head in Churu district.
"There are not enough cow shelters and the ones that are there they are so overcrowded that each day one animal dies," he told AFP.
"We are Hindus, we don't want to hurt the cow but we can't afford to keep and feed so many strays when we are struggling ourselves to make ends meet."
Voter unhappiness was already evident when the BJP lost state elections in the largely agricultural states of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh in December to the opposition Congress.
The country's only dedicated "cow minister" in Rajasthan was also booted out.
It was a major turnaround from 2014 when the country's 262 million farmers largely backed the BJP, which has promised to double farm income by 2022.
Some villagers are now pooling money from their modest savings to herd the strays into makeshift shelters, at least through the harvest season.

More at: https://news.yahoo.com/cows-come-home-haunt-indias-modi-000449716.html

 

[oyarde]

I do not believe Cows were always forbidden to Hindus so maybe one day they will evolve back and use the resource . Or maybe not .

 

[goldenequity]

nominee for 'best title of the year' award.

------

in other news...
Jharkhand: Man lynched to death, three others injured on suspicion of cutting flesh of dead bull in Gumla
by Newsd Published on Friday 12th April 2019, 11:54 AM
https://newsd.in/jharkhand-man-lync...icion-of-cutting-flesh-of-dead-bull-in-gumla/

 

[Swordsmyth]

Millions of voters across swathes of southern India cast ballots on Thursday in the second phase of a mammoth, staggered general election, as sporadic violence flared in the east and the insurgency-wracked state of Jammu and Kashmir.The Election Commission said 66 percent of more than 155 million eligible Indians had voted, as per provisional data, in 95 constituencies in 12 states. Results of the election to India's 545-member parliament are expected on May 23.
In focus are the southern states of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, where the main opposition Congress party and its allies need to win big if they hope to stop Prime Minister Narendra Modi from securing a second straight term.
Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have run an aggressive campaign, playing to their nationalist, Hindu-first base and attacking rivals they accuse of appeasing minorities.
Critics say such divisive rhetoric threatens India's secular foundations.
"Communal polarization is the biggest issue for me," said Rakesh Mehar, who voted in the technology hub of Bengaluru, capital of Karnataka. "And the growing intolerance in the country is what worries me the most."
Sporadic violence was reported in the northern state of Jammu and Kashmir, where separatists have called for an election boycott, and the eastern state of West Bengal, which has a history of election clashes.
Police fired teargas to disperse stone-throwers in Srinagar, the Himalayan region's main city, where thousands of troops had been deployed to guard the vote, although turnout was less than 8 percent, according to provisional election commission data.
"There has been stone pelting by protesters in at least 40 places," said a senior police officer who sought anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media.
Police in the West Bengal constituency of Darjeeling also fired tear gas at protesters who complained they had not been allowed to vote, said top district official Arvind Kumar Mina.
"They had blocked a highway and had to be dispersed," he added.


About 900 million people are eligible to vote in the election that began last week and ends next month.
On Thursday morning, the body of a 20-year-old worker for the BJP's youth wing was found hanging from a tree in West Bengal's Purulia district, party officials and local police said.
"The night before he died he was seen writing graffiti for BJP for the elections. In the night he was reported missing. His body was found today," said local BJP leader Vidyasagar Chakrabarty.
Tensions between the BJP and the regional Trinamool Congressthat governs the state have been rising in the lead-up to the poll, with each accusing the other of killings, beatings, vandalism and making false allegations to the police.
Trinamool Congress local leader Shantiram Mahato said the party had asked the police to conduct an impartial investigation into the death of the BJP worker.

More at: https://news.yahoo.com/indians-begin-voting-second-phase-mammoth-general-election-021812088.html

 

[Swordsmyth]

Suspected militants shot dead a local leader of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ruling party in disputed Kashmir ahead of the latest round of polling, highlighting bloodshed that has marred India's mega-election.
The killing in Anantnag district of India's only Muslim-majority state is the latest in a string of attacks to have marred the election which began last month.
The militants opened fire on Gul Mohammad Mir, who belonged to a local unit of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), at his house in south Kashmir on Saturday night.
Police called it a "terror crime" and Modi condemned Mir's killing in a Twitter post Sunday, saying "there is no place for such violence in our country."
Police said a polling station to be used in Monday's voting was set ablaze in the nearby Shopian area.
Voter turnout in Indian Kashmir has barely crossed 10 percent in the previous rounds, and Anantnag is expected to suffer on Monday -- the fifth round of voting in the six-week long election which ends May 19. Results are to be released four days later.
Political killings are common in India's bitterly-fought elections with party and regional rivalries often boiling over.
The National Crime Records Bureau says there were more than 100 political murders in 2016.
Kerala state in the south and Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in the north are the worst for political murders.
The world's biggest election has been mostly targeted by far-left Maoist rebels.
Last week guerrillas killed 15 police commandos and their driver in western Maharashtra state.
The Maoists, who have traditionally boycotted elections as part of their campaign against the Indian state, killed two police in Chhattisgarh state last month.
And on April 9, they attacked a political convoy in the same state, killing five people including a BJP lawmaker.


More at: https://news.yahoo.com/militants-kill-politician-ahead-round-india-vote-075324715.html

 

[Swordsmyth]

Scattered bomb explosions and clashes between rival political groups marred voting Monday in the crucial fifth phase of India's marathon elections, which also saw Congress party President Rahul Gandhi and his mother, Sonia Gandhi, trying to keep their seats.More than 25 million people were registered to vote for 14 members of India's Parliament in Uttar Pradesh state in northern India, where temperatures were scorching and security was tight.
The Election Commission said turnout was 57.1% in Uttar Pradesh and averaged of 62.5% in the 51 constituencies in seven states where the polling was held. More voting rounds happen on May 12 and May 19 and voting from all rounds will be counted on May 23.


Police said suspected insurgents attacked two polling stations with bombs in the Pulwama area of Indian-controlled Kashmir. One exploded without causing injuries and the second did not explode and was defused by security forces, police said.
In West Bengal state, members of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party and party workers with the powerful regional Trinamool Congress party hurled crude bombs at each other, the Press Trust of India news agency said.
Government forces used canes to disperse them, injuring some people in the constituencies of Bangaon, Barrackpore, Hooghly and Howrah, Press Trust reported.


Voting for one parliamentary seat in Indian-controlled Kashmir is being spread over three days because of security threats posed by almost daily clashes, government crackdowns and anti-India protests.
Muslim separatists have said the vote is an illegitimate exercise under India's military occupation and Kashmir turnout was extremely low. As the voting ended, anti-India protesters clashed with security forces in several places, leaving some people injured, police said.
Kashmiri youths hurled stones at election staff and their security guards as they moved into schools and government buildings Sunday night to set up polling stations in the area. Troops fired shotguns and tear gas to quell the anti-India protests that injured people, police said.

More at: https://news.yahoo.com/gandhis-hope-keep-seats-5th-phase-indias-elections-042826733.html

 

[Swordsmyth]

Modi beats the cows?



Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to return to power with an even bigger majority in parliament after a mammoth general election that ended on Sunday, exit polls showed, a far better showing than expected in recent weeks.

Modi's National Democratic Alliance (NDA) is projected to win anything between 339-365 seats in the 545-member lower house of parliament with the Congress party-led opposition alliance at a distant 77 to 108, India Today Axis exit poll showed.
To rule, a party needs to win 272 seats. Modi's alliance won 336 seats in the 2014 election. The exit polls showed that he not only held to this base in the northern Hindi belt but also breached the east where regional groups traditionally held sway.
Only the south largely resisted the Hindu nationalist surge, except for Karnataka, home to software capital Bengaluru.
Counting of votes recorded in hundreds of thousands of computerised machines will begin early on Thursday and results are expected by noon.
According to another poll released by Today's Chanakya, Modi's alliance is likely to get around 350 seats. One poll by Neta Newsx, though, forecast Modi's group falling 30 seats short.
Exit polls, though, have a mixed record in a country with an electorate of 900 million people - around two-thirds of whom voted in the seven-phase election. They have often gotten the number of seats wrong, but the broad direction has generally been correct, analysts say.


But a big win for Modi would fan fears that Hindu hardliner groups would be further emboldened to pursue partisan programmes such as punishing Muslims for the slaughter of cows, considered sacred by Hindus, rewriting school textbooks to reduce India's Muslim history, and attacking liberals.
Critics say Modi sought to win votes by stoking fear among the Hindu majority of the potential dangers posed by the country's Muslims and Pakistan, and promoted a Hindu-first India.


The Congress party led by Rahul Gandhi, the fourth generation scion of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty that ruled India for decades following independence, focused on Modi's failure to deliver on the promises he made to transform the economy and turn India into a manufacturing hub.
Congress spokesman Sanjay Jha dismissed the poll projections, saying that an alliance led by his party would defeat the BJP when votes are counted on May 23.
"Many of the pollsters, if not all of the pollsters, have got it wrong," he said, adding that a polarised atmosphere and fear had kept voters from telling pollsters about their actual allegiance.
Mamata Banerjee, the chief minister of West Bengal and a bitter opponent of Modi, said the fight was not over.
"I don't trust exit poll gossip," she said on Twitter. "I appeal to all opposition parties to be united, strong and bold. We will fight this battle together."

More at: https://news.yahoo.com/modi-led-coalition-likely-win-majority-exit-polls-131854694--finance.html

 

[Swordsmyth]

India's Election Commission rejected opposition fears of possible tampering of electronic voting machines ahead of the counting of votes Thursday that will determine the outcome of the country's mammoth national elections.Authorities on Wednesday tightened security at counting centers where the electronic voting machines have been kept in strong rooms across the country. The winners of most of the 542 seats up for grabs in India's lower house of Parliament are expected to be known by Thursday evening.
The Congress and other opposition parties were stunned by mainstream TV channels' exit poll projections on Sunday of a decisive victory for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies.
Top opposition leaders met with Election Commission officials on Tuesday after videos appeared on social media showing some electronic voting machines being moved in north Indian states. They alleged that an attempt was being made to tamper with the verdict in favor of the BJP by replacing electronic voting machines, or EVMs, in some areas.
The Election Commission rejected the allegations in a statement Tuesday.
"The visuals seen viral on media do not pertain to any EVMs used during the polls," it said, explaining that the footage showed reserve, unused machines being put into storage.
The three-person body said that after the close of polls on Sunday, all voting machines used in the election were brought under security cover to designated strong rooms, which were sealed with double locks.
Since India first introduced electronic voting machines in 1998, rolling them out as the exclusive form of polling in all national and state assembly elections in 2004, glitches have been reported, but challengers' tampering claims have never been proven.

More at: https://news.yahoo.com/indias-election-commission-rejects-ballot-tampering-claims-065124220.html

 

[Swordsmyth]

Official data from the Election Commission showed Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party ahead in 302 of the 542 seats up for grabs, up from the 282 it won in 2014 and more than the 272 seats needed for a majority in the lower house of parliament.
That would give his party the first back-to-back majority for a single party since 1984. Votes will be fully counted by Friday morning.

More at: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...position-with-huge-election-win-idUSKCN1SS2YR

 

[Swordsmyth]

The Indian National Congress Party went from understated optimism to shellshocked defeat within the space of a few hours on Thursday as Narendra Modi and his party celebrated another landslide victory.
For the Congress leader, Rahul Gandhi, the performance by his party was nothing short of a humiliation, with several members of his own party demanding he step down and lay the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty to rest for good.
Mr Gandhi suffered the sting of losing the iconic seat of his family homestead in Amethi, Uttar Pradesh, which he had held since 2004 and was controlled by his father before him.
He won in his second constituency – candidates can run from two in India – but the symbolism of the defeat was one from which he may never recover.


At a brief press conference as the results were still coming in, Mr Gandhi congratulated Mr Modi and said “the people are king and they have directed that the BJP and Modi have won this election”.
He added: “I don't want to get into what went wrong today, this is not the time for that. I fully respect the Indian people's decision.”
During the briefing he also conceded defeat in the Amethi election and congratulated his opponent Smriti Irani, of the BJP, who was more than 28,000 votes ahead at the time.
Congress party officials did not return calls by The Telegraph but there were widespread reports in Indian media that the party had wildly miscalculated the margin of any potential loss with its internal polling, and now all that was left was to call for its talisman's head.
“If they want to change anything, change the leadership,” a Congress official in Rajasthan told Reuters, referring to Mr Gandhi and the party's high command. “You need to give young people a chance.”
However Mr Gandhi, 48, will probably not face an immediate leadership challenge as India's establishment party does some soul searching after an inglorious defeat.
Some reports claimed Mr Gandhi had offered to resign.
“According to sources, Sonia Gandhi and senior Congress leaders advised him to bring up the matter before the party forum,” reported India Today TV. “The CWC (Congress Working Committee) will meet in a week in which the proposal will be discussed,” it added.
Ironically the youthful pretender had grown into his role as leader in the past 18 months after previously being seen as a reluctant heir to his political lineage which stretched back to India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru.
He campaigned vigorously and was not shy on calling out Mr Modi on the economy, national security, Hindu nationalism and women's rights. After a while the media started to take notice.
However behind the scenes his inability to foster good relations with a host of regional party leaders that could have generated a tenable anti-Modi alliance may have damaged his chances.
"The BJP fought these elections on the basis of social and religious divisive policies and the agenda was set by them on this basis," said Atul Kumar Anjaan, national secretary of the Communist Party of India, a potential ally.
"But more significant is the fact that the unity of the opposition has been damaged by the Congress. The policies and decisions of Rahul Gandhi has weakened opposition unity, led to divisions and opened the doors for Modi's victory.”
Congress has ruled India for most of its history since independence from Britain in 1947, and boasts three prime ministers from the Nehru-Gandhi clan. But its weak performance in the last two elections seems to suggest it needs a drastic change of direction to take on someone with Mr Modi's political savvy.

https://news.yahoo.com/congress-leader-rahul-gandhi-loses-164602011.html