The Evening Wrap: AAP’s Sanjay Singh says 3,000 Opposition members raided by central agencies

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) member Sanjay Singh’s claim in Rajya Sabha about the misuse of central agencies such as the Enforcement Directorate (ED) created a flutter, with Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar interjecting that only legally permissible documents should be mentioned else it amounts to serious breach of privilege. Singh, while speaking during the Zero Hour in the Rajya Sabha on Monday said that the ED has raided around 3,000 Opposition members in the past eight years and conviction has been achieved only in 23 cases so far, a mere 0.5%. The treasury benches protested the member’s claims. Following this, Dhankhar said that members cannot be allowed to give any fact if it is not substantiated and it amounts to serious breach of privilege “Any statement made here has to be indicated with precision, sanctity and with ownership. The member must focus on actual figures and put the relevant record on the table of the House….this House has to be a platform for putting across everything that concerns the public at large … a newspaper report, an opinion given by someone is of absolutely no consequence, only legally admissible documents must be the premise of making an allegation,” Dhankhar said. Responding to this, Leader of Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge said that the members who speak here either quote from starred or unstarred questions tabled in the Parliament and the Chairman could be dismissive of the media reports but sometimes they have to cite from newspaper reports too, other than the statements made by the prime minister outside the House. “The prime minister has mentioned about 2 crore jobs per year, (to deposit) ₹15 lakhs (in every person’s account once black money was brought back), you may ask what is the authenticity of it? We believe whatever the PM says is authentic,” Kharge said. Dhankhar said he will have a special meeting with the members on the way forward. Union Minister Piyush Goyal and the Leader of the House replied that this was a regular practice of scoot and shoot. “There are a number of websites, social media platforms, where people make all sorts of claims which are not backed by facts or RTI...factcheckers come out with fake claims, he made a claim that 3,000 political persons were raided, it unsubstantiated. There is a special directive of the court that action should be taken against members of parliament and legislators, we are doing public service that high standards should be maintained and the country’s law should not give any immunity to politicians,” Goyal said. Singh said that the central agencies do not take any action against fugitives such as Nirav Modi, Vijay Mallya, Lalit Modi but instead raided the house of Delhi’s deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia for 14 hours, kept minister Satyendra Jain in jail. “Why don’t you put everyone in jail. Sanjay Raut (Shiv Sena) stayed in jail for 100 days,” Singh said. Several Indian soldiers injured in clashes with Chinese PLA on December 9 in first such incident since Galwan Several Indian soldiers were injured in a clash with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) at Yangtse, Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh on December 9, multiple sources told The Hindu. Confirming that the incident has occurred, a defence official with knowledge of the matter, without giving the specifics, said that the injuries on the “Chinese side were much higher than on the Indian side.” This is the first incident of its kind after the June 15, 2020 incident when 20 Indian soldiers were killed and several others were injured in violent clashes with the PLA troops in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley. Several senior officials while confirming that the incident took place declined to comment on the specifics of the incident. There was no response from the Army to questions sent till the time of going to print. According to another source, few soldiers sustained fractured limbs during the skirmish and are said to be recuperating at a hospital in Guwahati. Around 600 PLA soldiers were present when the clashes took place, the source said. This is not the first time the area in Arunachal Pradesh has seen a face-off between the Indian and Chinese troops. Since the boundary is undefined, Indian and Chinese troops often face-off while patrolling the area. In October 2021, a similar incident had taken place when some Chinese soldiers of a large patrol team were detained for few hours by the Indian Army they engaged in a minor face-off and clashed near Yangtse. In the last few years, the Army has significantly upgrading firepower and infrastructure along the LAC in the Tawang sector and a similar effort is underway in the Rest of Arunachal Pradesh (RALP). This includes road infrastructure, bridges, tunnels, habitat and other storage facilities, aviation facilities and upgradation of communications and surveillance especially in the Upper Dibang Valley region. Retail inflation falls below 6% mark for first time in 2022 India’s retail inflation fell below the 6% mark for the first time this calendar year in November, cooling to 5.88% from 6.77% in October, with food price inflation faced by consumers easing to 4.67% from over 7% in October. Rural retail inflation, however, stayed high at 6.09%. India’s industrial output contracted by a sharp 4% in October, the second time in three months that production levels have contracted year-on-year, led by a significant 5.6% drop in manufacturing output and minimal growth recorded in electricity generation. Industrial output had grown nearly 3.5% in September, as per revised numbers. The Index of Industrial Production (IIP) stood at 129.6 in October, its lowest level since September 2021, with manufacturing output slipping to its lowest mark since June 2021. Mining output grew 2.5%, while electricity generation rose just 1.2%. As many as 17 of 32 manufacturing sectors tracked in the IIP recorded negative growth, led by apparel (-37%), electrical equipment (-33.2%), leather products (-24.3%), pharmaceuticals (-21.4%) and textiles (-18.6%). Classified on the basis of their use, production declined in four of six sub-sectors, led by consumer durables as well as consumer non-durables that shrank a sharp 15.3% and 13.4% respectively from October 2021 levels. This is the fourth successive month that consumer non-durables output has shrunk and the third month in a row that durables production dropped. Intermediate goods and capital goods production also contracted year-on-year, by 2.8% and 2.3%, respectively, while primary goods grew 2%. Infrastructure/construction goods output rose a mere 1% in October, but was 0.7% below September 2022 levels. Terming the October IIP print a surprise, Bank of Baroda chief economist Madan Sabnavis said the negative growth in capital goods over a 1.6% contraction recorded last October is disappointing and suggests private sector investment has not picked up. Moreover, the continued decline in consumer durables and non-durables is a let-down as one would have expected them to be buoyant during the festival month of October, he noted. “Quite clearly, high nominal consumption has been due to higher inflation… Future prospects do not look so positive as we move to the end of the festival months,” Sabnavis reckoned. “The IIP posted a deeper-than-expected contraction, mirroring the anaemic performance of exports, but chiefly reflects holidays during the festive period,” said Aditi Nayar, chief economist at ICRA, adding that growth of most available high-frequency indicators improved in November relative to October. Umar Khalid allowed interim bail for sister’s wedding Student leader Umar Khalid was allowed interim bail of one week by a Delhi court on December 12, 2022. Khalid, who is in jail since September 2020, is facing trial in the larger conspiracy case of 2020 Northeast Delhi riots. He had sought bail for his sister’s wedding scheduled at the end of this month. Khalid was granted bail for one week by Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat. The bail period is from December 23 to 30th. Khalid will have to surrender on December 30. Khalid had applied for interim bail in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) case against him and further to attend his sister’s wedding. The bail was initially sought for two weeks. Khalid, represented by advocate Trideep Pais, told the court that he is ready to abide by any conditions for the bail. The same includes sharing his live location and not interacting with the media. Earlier, responding to court’s notice on Khalid’s release, Delhi police, last month, has said that his release is likely to cause ‘unrest’ in the society and hence the bail should be denied. The police’s response also mentioned that Khalid may spread fake information, once given bail. The police also maintained that Khalid’s parents are capable of making all necessary arrangements for his sister’s wedding because both his parents are working. The Delhi High Court on October 18th this year had rejected the bail plea of Umar Khalid, arrested in connection with the 2020 north-east Delhi riots case. “We don’t find any merit in the bail plea,” the High Court said while dismissing the plea of Khalid who has been charged under the anti-terror law Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) for allegedly being one of the ‘masterminds’ and instigator behind the 2020 riots. SC takes serious note of ‘scurrilous’ allegations made by petitioner-advocate in forcible religious conversions case The Supreme Court on December 12 took serious note of a Christian organisation’s objections to “scurrilous, vexatious and scandalous” allegations made against minority religions by petitioner-advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay in his case alleging “massive” forcible religious conversions. Appearing before a Bench of Justices M.R. Shah and S. Ravindra Bhat, senior advocate Dushyant Dave, for the organisation referred to allegations made in the additional submissions filed by Upadhyay in the apex court on December 8. “These allegations include that certain religions are perpetuating rapes and murders… These averments should not be even on the files of Your Lordships. It gives a wrong signal to the minority community that the Supreme Court is allowing this to go uncontested,” Dave submitted. Justice Bhat intervened to address senior advocate Arvind Datar, who is appearing for Upadhyay, to go through his client’s written submissions and remove the offending allegations. “Mr. Datar, please consider what these allegations are and moderate them… You should not have all this on record,” Justice Bhat told Datar. “You should personally look into this,” Justice Shah told the senior lawyer. “If it is scurrilous, it will be removed,” Datar assured. The 28-page written submissions filed by Upadhyay includes statements like “history is evident that forceful and fraudulent conversions are a global phenomenon in human history. In their zeal of converting people to their own religion both Muslims and Christians killed billions of people, raped millions of women and destroyed millions of temples and other worship centres. They have completely destroyed many ancient cultures like Maya, Mesopotamia, Roman, Egypt, etc”. On Monday, Dave urged the court to allow organisations and individuals representing minority communities to implead themselves in the case and contest Upadhyay’s petition claiming large-scale religious conversions across the country. Justice Shah reacted that the court would consider their applications for impleadment in the next hearing on January 9. It said it wanted to first know if the Centre, represented by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who was not present in the hearing, would be filing an affidavit in the case. “The Solicitor is not here today. Meanwhile, what is the harm in allowing us to get impleaded? Give us an opportunity to oppose this petition which cannot be allowed to go uncontested,” Dave submitted to the Bench. In the previous hearing on December 5, the court had orally observed that conversion should not be the hidden intention behind charity and good work. “Everybody has a right to choose their faith but that does not mean luring somebody by giving something. If you believe that a particular community needs help, you help it. It is a charity. But the purpose of charity should not be conversion. Every charity or good work is welcome, but what requires to be considered is the intention,” Justice Shah had said on December 5. In Brief: A Bill seeking to mandate the use of non-fossil energy sources such as biomass, ethanol and green hydrogen was passed by Parliament on Monday. The Energy Conservation (Amendment) Bill, 2022, was cleared in the Rajya Sabha by a voice vote on Monday. Lok Sabha passed the legislation in the previous session in August this year. The Bill provides for penalties for violations by industrial units or vessels, and on manufacturers if a vehicle fails to comply with fuel consumption norms. The amendments also seek to promote renewable energy and the development of a domestic carbon market to battle climate change. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. [logo] The Evening Wrap 12 DECEMBER 2022 [The Hindu logo] Welcome to the Evening Wrap newsletter, your guide to the day’s biggest stories with concise analysis from The Hindu. [[Arrow]Open in browser]( [[Mail icon]More newsletters]( Dear reader, We have now made it easier for you to manage your The Hindu newsletter subscriptions in one place! 1. Visit [The Hindu newsletters page]( 2. Click MANAGE tab and then click LOGIN / SIGN UP 3. If you don’t have an account with The Hindu, please click SIGN UP OR If you already have an account with The Hindu with this email ID, please login using the email ID AAP’s Sanjay Singh says 3,000 Opposition members raided by central agencies in eight years Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) member Sanjay Singh’s claim in Rajya Sabha about the[misuse of central agencies such as the Enforcement Directorate]( (ED) created a flutter, with Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar interjecting that only legally permissible documents should be mentioned else it amounts to serious breach of privilege. Singh, while speaking during the Zero Hour in the Rajya Sabha on Monday said that the ED has raided around 3,000 Opposition members in the past eight years and conviction has been achieved only in 23 cases so far, a mere 0.5%. [AAP MP Sanjay Singh speaking in the Rajya Sabha.] The treasury benches protested the member’s claims. Following this, Dhankhar said that members cannot be allowed to give any fact if it is not substantiated and it amounts to serious breach of privilege “Any statement made here has to be indicated with precision, sanctity and with ownership. The member must focus on actual figures and put the relevant record on the table of the House….this House has to be a platform for putting across everything that concerns the public at large … a newspaper report, an opinion given by someone is of absolutely no consequence, only legally admissible documents must be the premise of making an allegation,” Dhankhar said. Responding to this, Leader of Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge said that the members who speak here either quote from starred or unstarred questions tabled in the Parliament and the Chairman could be dismissive of the media reports but sometimes they have to cite from newspaper reports too, other than the statements made by the prime minister outside the House. “The prime minister has mentioned about 2 crore jobs per year, (to deposit) ₹15 lakhs (in every person’s account once black money was brought back), you may ask what is the authenticity of it? We believe whatever the PM says is authentic,” Kharge said. Dhankhar said he will have a special meeting with the members on the way forward. Union Minister Piyush Goyal and the Leader of the House replied that this was a regular practice of scoot and shoot. “There are a number of websites, social media platforms, where people make all sorts of claims which are not backed by facts or RTI...factcheckers come out with fake claims, he made a claim that 3,000 political persons were raided, it unsubstantiated. There is a special directive of the court that action should be taken against members of parliament and legislators, we are doing public service that high standards should be maintained and the country’s law should not give any immunity to politicians,” Goyal said. Singh said that the central agencies do not take any action against fugitives such as Nirav Modi, Vijay Mallya, Lalit Modi but instead raided the house of Delhi’s deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia for 14 hours, kept minister Satyendra Jain in jail. “Why don’t you put everyone in jail. Sanjay Raut (Shiv Sena) stayed in jail for 100 days,” Singh said. Several Indian soldiers injured in clashes with Chinese PLA on December 9 in first such incident since Galwan Several Indian soldiers were injured in a [clash with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army]( (PLA) at Yangtse, Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh on December 9, multiple sources told The Hindu. Confirming that the incident has occurred, a defence official with knowledge of the matter, without giving the specifics, said that the injuries on the “Chinese side were much higher than on the Indian side.” This is the first incident of its kind after the June 15, 2020 incident when 20 Indian soldiers were killed and several others were injured in violent clashes with the PLA troops in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley. Several senior officials while confirming that the incident took place declined to comment on the specifics of the incident. There was no response from the Army to questions sent till the time of going to print. According to another source, few soldiers sustained fractured limbs during the skirmish and are said to be recuperating at a hospital in Guwahati. Around 600 PLA soldiers were present when the clashes took place, the source said. This is not the first time the area in Arunachal Pradesh has seen a face-off between the Indian and Chinese troops. Since the boundary is undefined, Indian and Chinese troops often face-off while patrolling the area. In October 2021, a similar incident had taken place when some Chinese soldiers of a large patrol team were detained for few hours by the Indian Army they engaged in a minor face-off and clashed near Yangtse. In the last few years, the Army has significantly upgrading firepower and infrastructure along the LAC in the Tawang sector and a similar effort is underway in the Rest of Arunachal Pradesh (RALP). This includes road infrastructure, bridges, tunnels, habitat and other storage facilities, aviation facilities and upgradation of communications and surveillance especially in the Upper Dibang Valley region. Retail inflation falls below 6% mark for first time in 2022 India’s [retail inflation fell below the 6% mark for the first time this calendar year]( in November, cooling to 5.88% from 6.77% in October, with food price inflation faced by consumers easing to 4.67% from over 7% in October. Rural retail inflation, however, stayed high at 6.09%. India’s industrial output contracted by a sharp 4% in October, the second time in three months that production levels have contracted year-on-year, led by a significant 5.6% drop in manufacturing output and minimal growth recorded in electricity generation. Industrial output had grown nearly 3.5% in September, as per revised numbers. The Index of Industrial Production (IIP) stood at 129.6 in October, its lowest level since September 2021, with manufacturing output slipping to its lowest mark since June 2021. Mining output grew 2.5%, while electricity generation rose just 1.2%. As many as 17 of 32 manufacturing sectors tracked in the IIP recorded negative growth, led by apparel (-37%), electrical equipment (-33.2%), leather products (-24.3%), pharmaceuticals (-21.4%) and textiles (-18.6%). Classified on the basis of their use, production declined in four of six sub-sectors, led by consumer durables as well as consumer non-durables that shrank a sharp 15.3% and 13.4% respectively from October 2021 levels. This is the fourth successive month that consumer non-durables output has shrunk and the third month in a row that durables production dropped. Intermediate goods and capital goods production also contracted year-on-year, by 2.8% and 2.3%, respectively, while primary goods grew 2%. Infrastructure/construction goods output rose a mere 1% in October, but was 0.7% below September 2022 levels. Terming the October IIP print a surprise, Bank of Baroda chief economist Madan Sabnavis said the negative growth in capital goods over a 1.6% contraction recorded last October is disappointing and suggests private sector investment has not picked up. Moreover, the continued decline in consumer durables and non-durables is a let-down as one would have expected them to be buoyant during the festival month of October, he noted. “Quite clearly, high nominal consumption has been due to higher inflation… Future prospects do not look so positive as we move to the end of the festival months,” Sabnavis reckoned. “The IIP posted a deeper-than-expected contraction, mirroring the anaemic performance of exports, but chiefly reflects holidays during the festive period,” said Aditi Nayar, chief economist at ICRA, adding that growth of most available high-frequency indicators improved in November relative to October. Umar Khalid allowed interim bail for sister’s wedding Student leader [Umar Khalid was allowed interim bail of one week]( by a Delhi court on December 12, 2022. Khalid, who is in jail since September 2020, is facing trial in the larger conspiracy case of 2020 Northeast Delhi riots. He had sought bail for his sister’s wedding scheduled at the end of this month. Khalid was granted bail for one week by Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat. The bail period is from December 23 to 30th. Khalid will have to surrender on December 30. Khalid had applied for interim bail in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) case against him and further to attend his sister’s wedding. The bail was initially sought for two weeks. Khalid, represented by advocate Trideep Pais, told the court that he is ready to abide by any conditions for the bail. The same includes sharing his live location and not interacting with the media. Earlier, responding to court’s notice on Khalid’s release, Delhi police, last month, has said that his release is likely to cause ‘unrest’ in the society and hence the bail should be denied. The police’s response also mentioned that Khalid may spread fake information, once given bail. The police also maintained that Khalid’s parents are capable of making all necessary arrangements for his sister’s wedding because both his parents are working. The Delhi High Court on October 18th this year had rejected the bail plea of Umar Khalid, arrested in connection with the 2020 north-east Delhi riots case. “We don’t find any merit in the bail plea,” the High Court said while dismissing the plea of Khalid who has been charged under the anti-terror law Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) for allegedly being one of the ‘masterminds’ and instigator behind the 2020 riots. SC takes serious note of ‘scurrilous’ allegations made by petitioner-advocate in forcible religious conversions case The Supreme Court on December 12 took serious note of a Christian organisation’s objections to [“scurrilous, vexatious and scandalous” allegations]( made against minority religions by petitioner-advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay in his case alleging “massive” forcible religious conversions. Appearing before a Bench of Justices M.R. Shah and S. Ravindra Bhat, senior advocate Dushyant Dave, for the organisation referred to allegations made in the additional submissions filed by Upadhyay in the apex court on December 8. “These allegations include that certain religions are perpetuating rapes and murders… These averments should not be even on the files of Your Lordships. It gives a wrong signal to the minority community that the Supreme Court is allowing this to go uncontested,” Dave submitted. Justice Bhat intervened to address senior advocate Arvind Datar, who is appearing for Upadhyay, to go through his client’s written submissions and remove the offending allegations. “Mr. Datar, please consider what these allegations are and moderate them… You should not have all this on record,” Justice Bhat told Datar. “You should personally look into this,” Justice Shah told the senior lawyer. “If it is scurrilous, it will be removed,” Datar assured. The 28-page written submissions filed by Upadhyay includes statements like “history is evident that forceful and fraudulent conversions are a global phenomenon in human history. In their zeal of converting people to their own religion both Muslims and Christians killed billions of people, raped millions of women and destroyed millions of temples and other worship centres. They have completely destroyed many ancient cultures like Maya, Mesopotamia, Roman, Egypt, etc”. On Monday, Dave urged the court to allow organisations and individuals representing minority communities to implead themselves in the case and contest Upadhyay’s petition claiming large-scale religious conversions across the country. Justice Shah reacted that the court would consider their applications for impleadment in the next hearing on January 9. It said it wanted to first know if the Centre, represented by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who was not present in the hearing, would be filing an affidavit in the case. “The Solicitor is not here today. Meanwhile, what is the harm in allowing us to get impleaded? Give us an opportunity to oppose this petition which cannot be allowed to go uncontested,” Dave submitted to the Bench. In the previous hearing on December 5, the court had orally observed that conversion should not be the hidden intention behind charity and good work. “Everybody has a right to choose their faith but that does not mean luring somebody by giving something. If you believe that a particular community needs help, you help it. It is a charity. But the purpose of charity should not be conversion. Every charity or good work is welcome, but what requires to be considered is the intention,” Justice Shah had said on December 5. In Brief: A Bill seeking to mandate the use of non-fossil energy sources such as biomass, ethanol and green hydrogen was passed by Parliament on Monday. [The Energy Conservation (Amendment) Bill, 2022]( was cleared in the Rajya Sabha by a voice vote on Monday. Lok Sabha passed the legislation in the previous session in August this year. The Bill provides for penalties for violations by industrial units or vessels, and on manufacturers if a vehicle fails to comply with fuel consumption norms. The amendments also seek to promote renewable energy and the development of a domestic carbon market to battle climate change. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. Interested in daily updates from Tamil Nadu? 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