HYDERABAD  WEDNESDAY  NOVEMBER 06, 2024  `9.00  PAGES 16  LATE CITY EDITION PAWAR, 83, HINTS AT RETIREMENT FROM PARLIAMENTARY POLITICS The NCP (SP) chief on Tuesday said that he was contemplating whether to seek another Rajya Sabha term after his current tenure ends in 2026 ‘ONE HAS TO STOP, STEP ASIDE AT SOME POINT’ WILL CONTINUE TO WORK FOR THE PEOPLE Speaking at a campaign rally for grand-nephew Yugendra Pawar at Supa in Maharashtra’s Baramati assembly constituency, Sharad Pawar said that he has to stop at some point for the new leadership to take over. The veteran leader, who has won 14 elections in his political career, entered the Maharashtra assembly in 1967 and became the chief minister in 1978 ■ ■ The decision not to seek Parliamentary position does not mean a complete retirement from the social sphere, Pawar clarified | P8 “I will not be in power, but will continue to work for the people, work for the drought-affected regions, marginalised segments of society,” he said, adding that he will now focus on installing a new leadership SEVEN TIMES PAWAR WON THE LOK SABHA POLLS; HE ENTERED RAJYA SABHA IN 2014 CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOGGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI Cong govt will demolish 50% quota cap: Rahul HC: Include ‘No Caste, No Religion’ column in survey B K A R T H E E K @ Hyderabad Deputy CM Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka greets AICC leader Rahul Gandhi as Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy looks on, at the Gandhi Ideology Centre in Hyderabad on Tuesday Telangana is the model for the nationwide caste census. I would like to thank the leadership of Telangana because they have done a truly beautiful thing in this process DISQUALIFICATION PLEAS Single judge’s order erroneous, HC bench told EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Hyderabad A division bench of the Telangana High Court on Tuesday was told by the Advocate-General that the orders of a single judge directing the Assembly Secretary to place disqualification petitions pertaining to three BRS MLAs before the Speaker for scheduling a hearing at the pre-decisional stage was erroneous. The bench of Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice J Sreenivas Rao was hearing writ appeals seeking setting aside of the orders passed by Justice B Vijaysen Reddy on September 9 directing the Assembly Secretary to place the disqualification petitions of Danam Nagender, Kadiyam Srihari and Tellam Venkat Rao before the Speaker for scheduling a hearing. The single judge had also instructed the Assembly Secretary to inform the court of the schedule within four weeks, and had made it clear that failure to comply would lead to the suo motu action. On Tuesday, Advocate General A Sudarshan Reddy repre, senting the Assembly Secretary, and senior counsel Ravi Shankar Jandhyala, appearing for Nagender, argued that the disqualification petitions were filed prematurely, as the petitioners moved court within 10 days of filing them. This was against established rules, the A-G and senior counsel said. According to the rules, once a disqualification petition is filed in the Speaker’s office, the Speaker has three months to take action, they said. They cited a five-judge bench judgment of the Supreme Court, which ruled that the courts cannot issue directions to the Speaker of a state Assembly to take action on disqualification CONTINUED ON P4 petitions. –Rahul Gandhi, Congress MP ASSERTING that the Congress would demolish the “artificial barrier” of 50% cap on reservations after coming to power at the Centre, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday said that he remains committed to caste census and the Telangana model would be adopted for such an exercise nationwide. Terming the caste census slated to commence across Telangana from Wednesday as a solution to discrimination and a political instrument that would essentially define the future of the country, Rahul demanded to know why Prime Minister Narendra Modi was not publicly challenging caste discrimination. Modi was accusing him of dividing the people for making this discrimination transparent, Rahul alleged. “We will demolish the artificial barrier of 50% cap on reservations. For me, Telangana is the model for the nationwide caste census. I would like to thank the leadership of Telangana because they have done a truly beautiful thing in this process,” Rahul said. He was addressing a consultation meeting with student outfits, caste-based rights organisations and party ideologues at Gandhian Ideology Centre here. The meeting was also attended by Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy, Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka and their Cabinet colleagues, and legislators. Stating that discrimination in the name of caste has been an indisputable fact prevalent in the country for thousands of years and only a tip of iceberg is visible, Rahul said that this malaise was present in boardrooms, behind examinations, in interviews and conversations and inside people’s minds. “Caste is in the legal system, political system, and every single place. It destroys lives, careers, and confidence, destroying belief in the system. And if you want to talk about a powerful country progress and happi, ness among our people, the absolute first thing we need to do is identify the amount of discrimination and the nature of discrimination taking place,” CONTINUED ON P4 he said. T G N A I D U @ Hyderabad THE Telangana High Court on Tuesday directed the state government to include “No Religion” and “No Caste” columns in the comprehensive household survey set to begin on Wednesday . Justice Surepalli Nanda was dealing with representations submitted by Md Waheed and DL Krishna Chand seeking the inclusion of such a column in the “Samagra Intinti Kutumba Survey” (comprehensive social, economic, educational, employment, political and caste survey) to begin on November 6. The petitioners contended that the failure to include such a column would violate their Right to take over pvt property not total: SC Not all pvt property can be taken over for common good: 7:2 verdict S U C H I T R A K A LYA N M O H A N T Y @ New Delhi POSTULATING RIGID ECONOMIC THEORY THE Supreme Court in a 7:2 ruling on Tuesday held that states were not empowered under the Constitution to take over all privately-owned resources for distribution to serve the “common good”. A nine-judge bench of headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud, however, said states can stake claim over private properties in certain cases. With this, the court settled the Property Owners Association vs State of Maharashtra case, which is one of the oldest pending before the court. While Justice B V Nagarathna partially concurred with the majority, Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia wrote a dissenting verdict. The question before the court was whether “material resources of the community” in Article 39(b) could include privately owned property . The case also involved chal- “In Bhim Singhji, Justice Krishna Iyer cited Karl Marx to observe that taking over large conglomerations of land is necessary to make Article 39 a ‘constitutional reality’... (It) amounts to endorsing a particular economic ideology for our economy,” the CJI said lenges to Chapter VIIIA of the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Act, 1976 introduced in 1986. The chapter allowed the Mumbai Building Repair and Reconstruction Board to acquire certain “cessed properties” for restoration with the consent of 70% of the residents. The majority verdict authored by the CJI criticised the opinion of Justice Krishna Iyer in a 1978 case, where the latter ruled that all privately owned resources can be acquired by the state for distribution under Article 39(b). “The doctrinal error in the Krishna Iyer approach was, postulating a rigid economic theory, which advocates for greater state control over private resources, as the exclusive basis for constitutional governance,” the verdict said. However, Justice Nagarathna found the observations against Justice Krishna Iyer harsh and unwarranted. The bench said the vision of the framers of the Constitution to establish economic democracy and trust the wisdom of the elected governments was the “backbone of the high growth rate of India’s economy... To scuttle the constitutional vision by imposing a single economic dogma which views the acquisition of private property by the state as the ultimate goal would undermine the values and principles of our Constitutional framework,” the verdict said. constitutional rights under Articles 14 (equality before law), 19 (freedom of speech and expression), 21 (protection of life and personal liberty), and 25 (freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion). They said that the current structure of the survey, which recognises only traditional religions and castes, is inadequate to account for those who do not wish to identify with any caste or religion. In response to the petition, the judge directed the state government to amend the survey’s existing framework to ensure that citizens opting for “No Religion” and “No Caste” are recCONTINUED ON P4 ognised. Govt to sell 2.5% in HZL to raise `5K cr M O N I K A YA D A V @ New Delhi SC UPHOLDS U.P. BOARD OF MADARSA EDU ACT, NULLIFIES HC ORDER WRONG CALL The court said the HC had ended up throwing the baby out with the bathwater by striking down the entire law on the ground that conferment of higher edu degrees were not constitutional S U C H I T R A K A LYA N M O H A N T Y @ New Delhi IN a landmark judgment, the Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the constitutional validity of the Uttar Pradesh Board of Madarsa Education Act 2004, and set aside the Allahabad High Court’s order declaring the Act unconstitutional. “We have upheld the constitutional validity except for a small extent. , The HC erred in holding that the statute is bound to be struck down if it violates secularism,” a threejudge bench led by the Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud said. The court, however, held that the Madarsa Act, to the extent it regulates higher education, including the degrees of Fazil and Kamil (bachelor and postgraduate level degrees given by madrasas), is in conflict with the UGC Act and hence unconstitutional. The court said a statute could be declared ultra vires only on two grounds — being beyond the legislative competence or violating fundamental rights or any other Constitutional provision. As for regulations relating to the quality of the education, the state is empowered to enforce them. The Act does not directly interfere with the day-today administration, the bench pointed out. THE Centre on Tuesday announced its plan to divest up to 2.5% of its stake in Hindustan Zinc through an offer for sale (OFS) set to commence on November 6. The floor price for this offering has been set at `505 per share. The government is likely to raise `5,000 crore through the OFS. The government plans to sell approximately 5.28 crore shares amounting to 1.25% of the equity, with an option to add another 1.25% of equity The offer . will be available for non-retail investors starting November 6. These investors will have the opportunity to express their interest in carrying forward any unallocated bids to the following day November 7. , Retail investors will have the opportunity to submit their bids on November 7. According to OFS regulations, only retail investors and employees will be permitted to place their bids on Thursday Non-retail investors . who place their bids on Wednesday and opt to carry forward any unallocated bids to the following day will also have the option to revise their bids. US votes to elect its 47th President AGENCIES Republican vice presidential nominee J D Vance and his wife Usha Vance arrive to vote at the St Anthony of Padua Maronite Catholic Church on Tuesday | AP/PTI MILLIONS of Americans on Tuesday headed towards polling stations across the United States to elect the 47th President between Republican leader Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris in an election billed as one of the most consequential contests for the White House in decades. Voting across the country began at 6 am local time. New Hampshire was the first state where polling started. According to US media reports, the early hours of voting were smooth with scattered reports of extreme weather, ballot printing errors, and technical problems causing delays. The early votes included record numbers in Georgia, North Carolina and other battleground states that could decide the winner. Over 82 million voters across the US had already voted before the main election day. These votes were sent in either by mail or by visiting the polling station in person. According to an Associated Press report, Republican voters were casting early ballots at a higher rate than in recent previous elections. Both Harris and Trump are fighting for every vote, especially in the seven key battleground states of Arizona, Ne- RESULTS COULD TAKE SEVERAL DAYS Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign chief Jen O’Malley Dillon said results may take several days, as vote tallies will come in at different times across states, and close results could delay a final call. “We may not know the results of this election for several days,” she said vada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia. The race remained stubbornly deadlocked for weeks, with some of the election forecasters giving 60-year-old Vice President Harris an edge over former President Trump, 78, in some of the key battleground states like Pennsylvania. After casting his vote in Florida, Trump said said if he lost the elections, he would be the first one to acknowledge it if it’s a “fair election”. This is the first presidential vote since Trump lost to Joe Biden four years ago. HARD TALK Yechury gone, CPM moves towards Karat line to keep off Congress on core issues A N I L S @ T’Puram WITHDRAWING from the line proffered by former CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury , the Left party’s current leadership feels it should distance itself from the Congress on core issues such as neo-liberal policies and stance against communal politics. The draft of the Political Review report, presented before the three-day central committee meet that concluded on Monday, is also highly critical of the CPI for promoting the INDIA bloc at the cost of the Left parties. The draft says the INDIA bloc can continue as an Opposition platform but the CPM should protect its electoral interests in its traditional strongholds such as Kerala and West Bengal, adding that the party must work out its tactics and adopt a statespecific approach. Post-Yechury, the CPM has been taking a guarded approach towards furthering any ties with the Congress. The draft leans more towards the Kerala CPM-backed Prakash Karat line that insists on keeping the Congress at bay With Karat be. ing the Politburo coordinator, the draft has chosen to toe a more hardline approach. “The INDIA bloc, as a loose platform that seeks to gather secular Opposition parties, mainly for uniting and pooling anti-BJP votes, should continue. Its main focus of work will be Parliament and periodical elections,” says the report, add- ing that the CPM cannot be part of any broad alliance with the Congress especially in Kerala and West Bengal. The draft report also flags the dangers of the INDIA bloc occupying the Left’s political space. “We should counter any tendency to substitute the independent role and activities of the Party with the INDIA bloc. We must also be clear about the class character of the main party in the INDIA bloc - the Congress,” says the draft. According to the draft, any blurring of the CPM’s distinctive policies and identity will be detrimental to its growth in the country. It also notes that the BJP has made headway in Kerala, at the CPM’s expense.