The Evening Wrap: Hunger strikes and dharnas on 19th day of protests; Convenor ready for separate talks evicted from post

The Hindu Newsletter - Here are the biggest news stories of the day [The Hindu Logo]( [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Youtube]( [Linkedin]( [Instagram]( Monday 14, December 2020 [alt_text]( The Evening Wrap Here are the biggest news stories of the day [alt_text]( Welcome to the Evening Wrap newsletter, your guide to the day’s biggest stories with concise analysis from The Hindu. We hope you are staying safe. Hunger strikes and dharnas on 19th day of protests; Convenor ready for separate talks evicted from post On a day when farmers held hunger strikes and dharnas at the Delhi border and across the country, the [Centre continued to engage with individual elements in the farmers’ movement in an effort to restart negotiations](. The national convenor of one of the farmer groups leading the protest was evicted from his position after he said he was willing to engage in separate talks with the government and discuss a minimum support price (MSP) law rather than demand repeal of the three contentious laws. Tens of thousands of farmers, mostly from Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, have been protesting on the borders of Delhi for 19 straight days, demanding a repeal of the three laws. Leaders of the movement held a day-long hunger strike from 8 am to 5 pm on Monday. When Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal joined the fast in solidarity with the farmers, Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh accused him of trying to fool farmers through “dramatics”. Taking to social media, Singh tweeted, “Just as every Punjabi knows, I am not one to be cowed down by ED or other cases, you Mr [@ArvindKejriwal]( will even sell your soul if it serves your political purposes. If you think farmers are going to be taken in by your dramatics then you are totally mistaken,” and added, “Farmers of India and particularly Punjab know that you Mr [@ArvindKejriwal]( have sold off the interest of farmers by notifying one of the draconian farm bills in Delhi on 23rd November. What pressure did the Centre have on you?” The Delhi government had notified the Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Ordinance, 2020 – one of the three farm laws -- on November 23, a fact pointed out by rival parties who have questioned the sincerity of Kejriwal’s support to farmer protests. Meanwhile, on the Uttar Pradesh border, protestors aligned with the Bharatiya Kisan Union-Tikait temporarily blocked the highway at Ghazipur. However, a farmer leader from U.P., V.M. Singh, seemed ready to engage with the Centre. Singh was evicted from his postition as The [All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee (AIKSSC) national convenor]( on Sunday night. He had said he was willing to leave aside the demand for repeal of the laws, if the Centre would bring in a law to guarantee MSP rates for all farm produce, from both public and private buyers. “These three laws will automatically become infructuous if the MSP guarantee law is passed. That was always our original demand. [Other organisations] are now changing the goalposts,” he told The Hindu. The Centre has offered a written assurance that MSP will continue, but has so far refused to consider a legal guarantee. Over the last month, Singh has repeatedly broken ranks with other leaders in the AIKSCC, which is an umbrella platform for 250 plus farm groups across the country, created in the wake of the Mandsaur protests of 2017. For instance, when the farmers first reached the Delhi border, he had urged acceptance of the government’s designated protest site in Burari, to the anger of many of the Punjab unions. His willingness to negotiate separately with the Centre seemed to be the last straw. Telcos spar again, this time over farmer protests India’s telecom majors have gotten into a sparring match over the farmer protests. Reliance Jio has written to telecom regulator TRAI seeking action against Airtel and Vi (Vodafone-Idea Ltd) for allegedly encouraging the public to show support for farmers by migrating from Jio. It has claimed that Airtel and Vi have been spreading “frivolous rumours” toward that end. Airtel has responded by asking the regulator to throw the complaint out “with the contempt that it deserves”. Vi, too, in a statement, described Jio’s complaint as “baseless allegations…to malign our reputation.” In a letter dated December 10, Reliance Jio alleged that the two companies are directly or indirectly involved in “supporting and furthering the insinuations and false and frivolous rumours of Reliance being an undue beneficiary of the farm bills”. The company added that this has resulted in it receiving “large number of port out” requests from customers citing “this as the sole reason for porting out of Jio without having any complaints or other issues related to Jio services”. Meanwhile, strongly refuting the “baseless charges” made by Reliance Jio, Airtel on Monday shot off a letter to the regulator stating that, “Despite being provoked by some competitors who we know will go to any length to make baseless allegations, adopt bullying tactics, and use intimidatory behaviour, we have always conducted our business with character and transparency, something that we are deeply proud of and known for.” Gmail, YouTube, other Google services hit by widespread outage [Photo for representational purpose. ]Photo for representational purpose. A [widespread outage of Gmail, YouTube, Google Docs and other Google services was reported globally on Monday](. However, Google.com and Chrome appear to be working. Several users of YouTube, Gmail and other services posted their complaint about the issue on the social media. Google Docs users were welcomed with the message that the service has encountered an error, and that they should try reloading the page or try coming back in a few minutes. YouTube’s error page showed a monkey with the message, “Something went wrong”. More than 100,000 users have reported problems with YouTube on downdetector from around the world. However, YouTube seemed to be working in an incognito browser without signing in. As per downdetector website, almost all of Google’s services, including Hangouts, Meet, Play and Duo, were affected. In addition to this, users reported issues with smart home gadgets that are integrated with Google Assistant. Third party-apps that rely on Google’s back-end services were also affected. At the time of writing, it was not known what caused the outage. “We are aware that many of you are having issues accessing YouTube right now – our team is aware and looking into it. We’ll update you here as soon as we have more news,” Youtube’s official handle tweeted. An hour later, it further updated: “We’re back up and running! You should be able to access YouTube again and enjoy videos as normal.” Tata Sons among multiple bidders in race to buy Air India [ File photo for representation. ] File photo for representation. The [Tata Group was among “multiple” entities that on Monday put in preliminary bids for buying the government’s stake]( in loss-making carrier Air India, PTI reported. “Multiple expressions of interest have been received for strategic disinvestment of Air India. The Transaction will now move to the second stage,” the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) Secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey tweeted. He, however, did not reveal either the identity of the bidders or the number of bids received for buying the national carrier. Sources said Tata Sons, the holding company of the Tata Group, had put in an Expression of Interest (EoI) at the close of the deadline on Monday. It was not, however, immediately clear if the Tatas have bid alone or as part of a consortium. An official said the transaction advisor will inform bidders before January 6 if their bids have been qualified. Qualified bidders will then be asked to submit financial bids. SC issues notice to govt. on plea seeking declaration of Emergency as ‘unconstitutional’ [ A view of the Supreme Court of India. ] A view of the Supreme Court of India. The [Supreme Court on Monday agreed to examine whether a “simplictor declaration” that the Emergency of 1975]( was unconstitutional will be feasible or desirable after the passage of 45 years. A Bench led by Justice S.K. Kaul reluctantly, and after much persuasion from senior advocate Harish Salve, agreed to consider the limited question on a request made by 94-year-old Veera Sarin, who said the “errors of history should be corrected and never happen again”. “Something wrong may have happened at a particular point of history... But it has been 45 years now. Many of the persons are no longer with us...”, Justice Kaul, leading a three-judge Bench, expressed his doubts. But Salve, for Sarin, replied that “this may perhaps be the right time to do it”. “There was abuse of powers... If we do not tend to correct the errors of history, it will go on. For 19 months, the fundamental rights of this country were under the jackboots. We have to revisit this error. She [Sarin] wants a declaration that the Emergency was unconstitutional. For that, she cannot go to any other court,” Salve submitted. The court then issued notice to the government. During the hearing, Justice Kaul, amidst discussion with his Bench mates, tried to dissuade Salve, saying “digging up the Emergency” now would be odd as the people involved were no more. “Hitler is dead and gone, but even now people in their eighties and nineties are pulled for their crimes against humanity,” Salve replied. “One cannot compare this with the Holocaust and its consequences,” said Justice Kaul in response. Delhi High Court slams CBSE for ‘anti-student attitude’, treating ‘students as enemies’ [ The Shiksha Sadan which houses the CBSE at Rouse Avenue in New Delhi. File ] The Shiksha Sadan which houses the CBSE at Rouse Avenue in New Delhi. File The [Delhi High Court on Monday rapped the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE)]( for its “anti-student attitude”, saying it was “treating students as enemies” by dragging them all the way to the Supreme Court in certain matters. A bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice Prateek Jalan made the observation while hearing a plea moved by the Board challenging a single judge order, which said the CBSE’s reassessment scheme for students whose board exams got cancelled due to Covid-19 would apply to improvement candidates also. “We don’t like this anti-student attitude of the CBSE. You are dragging students all the way to the Supreme Court. Should they be studying or going to court? We should start imposing costs on the CBSE. They are treating students as enemies,” the Bench said. The Bench further said that if the scheme applies to all improvement students, “what is the harm in it?” The single-judge Bench had held on August 14 that the scheme approved by the Supreme Court for assessing students affected by the Covid-19-induced cancellation of CBSE exams will also apply to students who appeared for improvement examinations as they are equal victims of the pandemic. Covid Watch: Numbers and Developments The [number of coronavirus cases reported from India]( stood at 98,96,061 at the time of writing this newsletter, with the death toll at 1,43,609. The Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M) has shut down all departments after the campus turned into a Covid-19 cluster with 71 persons, including 66 students, testing positive since December 1. In a circular on Sunday, the institute said it decided to close all departments, centres and the library immediately until further notice. All faculty members, project staff members, and research scholars would work from home, while students, scholars and project staff members staying on the campus were advised to confine themselves to their hostel rooms. In Brief: Retail inflation declined to 6.93% in November on softer food prices, though it remained above the comfort level of the RBI. Retail inflation based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI) stood at 7.61% in October. According to the CPI data released by the government on Monday, inflation in the food basket was 9.43% in November, down from 11% in the previous month. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. Today's Top Picks [alt_text]( [Gmail, YouTube, other Google services hit by widespread outage]( [alt_text]( [Watch | Mount Everest is now officially a little higher]( [alt_text]( [Watch | Robots on poll duty in Kerala]( [alt_text]( [Xbox Family Settings app’s new features gives more control to parents]( You are receiving this email because you are a user of [thehindu.com]( If you do not wish to receive any such emails, [unsubscribe here.](mailto:rm-0b42kh1sbf2f90kauhrxfebysa8hk47@newsalert.thehindu.com?subject=Unsubscribe&body=You will be unsubscribed from our mailing list.) To ensure you continue to receive emails from The Hindu in your inbox, please add newsletters.th@newsalert.thehindu.com to your contact. 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