29052024-TTB-01.qxd 5/29/2024 12:13 AM Page 1 13 CHANDIGARH | GURUGRAM | JALANDHAR | BATHINDA | VOL. 144 NO. 148 | 14 PAGES | ~5.00 | REGD. NO. CHD/0006/2024-2026 ESTABLISHED IN 1881  HARYANA BADALS WALKING EXTRA MILE TO GET LEAD FROM LAMBI INDIA VOTES /thetribunechd HEATWAVE TO PERSIST IN JAMMU FOR NEXT 7 DAYS J&K LINK PAN WITH AADHAAR BY MAY 31, IT DEPT TELLS TAXPAYERS BUSINESS 21 KILLED AS ISRAELI TANKS HIT EVACUATION ZONE IN RAFAH WORLD wednesday | 29 may 2024 /thetribunechd www.tribuneindia.com PILES TREATMENT German/American Italian Techniques RANA HOSPITAL SAME DAY DISCHARGE 98141-28667 BDO Office Road, Sirhind (PUNJAB) Shahjahan brain behind ED attack: CBI chargesheet Shubhadeep Choudhury & Animesh Singh Tribune News Service New Delhi, May 28 Giving fresh ammunition to anti-Trinamool parties to target it on the Sandeshkhali issue ahead of the last phase of the Lok Sabha elections, party’s West Bengal strongman Shahjahan Sheikh has RIVALS GET FRESH AMMO TO ATTACK TMC ON LS POLL EVE been named by the CBI as the main conspirator in a case related to an alleged attack on an Enforcement Directorate team in January. Tasked with the probe by the Calcutta High Court, the CBI filed a chargesheet in the case in a Basirhat court on May 27. Shahjahan and his brother Sekh Alomgir are continued on page 9 TMC tricked OBCs for ‘vote jihad’: PM Asks if WB Govt will target judges who ‘exposed’ it Aditi Tandon Tribune News Service New Delhi, May 28 Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday accused the Trinamool Congress in West Bengal of snatching the rights of Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and giving these away for “appeasement politics and vote jihad”, asking if the ruling party would now let loose its goons on judges “who had exposed its treachery”. The PM was speaking in Barasat and Baruipur in Bengal ahead of the final phase of voting on June 1 in nine parliamentary segments of the state. His reference was to the recent Calcutta High Court judgment declaring as illegal OBC certificates granted to nearly 77 communities, of which, the majority, he said, were Muslims. He claimed the BJP would be the top gainer in Bengal elections this time and the TMC “was fighting for existence”. In 2019, the BJP had won 18 of the state’s 42 parliamentary segments. The TMC got Sketchy probe: HC acquits Ram Rahim in aide’s murder case Saurabh Malik Tribune News Service Chandigarh, May 28 More than two years after the CBI Special Judge convicted and sentenced Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh to life imprisonment in Ranjit Singh murder case, the Punjab and Haryana High Court today acquitted him and four others after observing that the investigation officers carried out a “tainted and sketchy probe” following the media glare surrounding the event. The Bench of Justice Sureshwar Thakur and Justice Lalit Batra also asserted that the investigation officers collected evidence unworthy of credence. It observed that the case starkly portrayed the necessity of the courts to make an incisive and objective analysis of the evidence existing on PM Narendra Modi during a roadshow in Kolkata on Tuesday. REUTERS KEDARNATH TO KANYAKUMARI FOR MEDITATION 22 seats and the Congress two. At Barasat, Modi, in a veiled attack on Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, castigated her for questioning the HC order and said, “The court has exposed the treachery of the Trinamool with OBCs. The party snatched the rights of OBC youths to support its appeasement politics and vote jihad.” The PM also questioned Mamata’s “we will not accept the court order” remarks and continued on page 9 23 die in Mizoram landslips, quarry collapse THE 2002 CASE ■ A case for murder was registered on July 10, 2002, after dera manager Ranjit Singh was shot in Kurukshetra ■ Ranjit’s father had alleged that dera followers killed his son for flagging sexual exploitation of sadhvis by Ram Rahim MULTIPLE LAPSES ■ In its 163-page verdict, HC cited Rescuers look for survivors amid the debris next to a stone quarry that collapsed following torrential rain at Aizawl in Mizoram. As many as 23 persons were killed in rain-related incidents. REUTERS BJP president JP Nadda at an election rally in Kinnaur district on Tuesday. TRIBUNE PHOTO INDIA bloc wants to give quota to Muslims: Nadda Calls it a coalition of ‘corrupt’ leaders either in jail or on bail Pratibha Chauhan Tribune News Service HIMACHAL GOT MEGA PROJECTS Over the past 10 years, 17,000 km of roads have been built in HP. Mega projects such as AIIMS-Bilaspur and IIITUna were sanctioned by the Centre. JP Nadda, BJP CHIEF are either out on bail or in jail,” he remarked. Nadda said in 2014 when Modi came to power, he gave one rank-one pension (OROP) benefit to Army personnel and transferred Rs 1.25 lakh crore into their accounts. “Under PM Modi, the Army gave a befitting reply to Pakistan by way of surgical strikes. He also ensured the production of bulletproof jackets and fighter planes in India itself,” he said. The BJP urged voters to rise above petty considerations of caste, region and religion and vote for PM Modi against as he had “changed the political narrative in the country and laid the foundation for a ‘Viksit Bharat’”. Shimla, May 28 BJP national president JP Nadda today said the INDIA bloc was a “coalition of corrupt parties” that allegedly wanted to provide religion-based reservation to Muslims by snatching it from those allowed under the Constitution. Addressing rallies at Nankhari (Rampur) and Kinnaur in support of BJP’s Mandi candidate Kangana Ranaut, Nadda asserted that the tribal reservation was given on geographical considerations, but the “Congress wanted to divert it to the Muslims”. “The leaders of all parties that form the INDIA bloc, be it the Con- gress, AAP or Trinamool, have been involved in scams related to liquor, 2G, coal, sugar, rice, Rafael, helicopter, fodder and recruitment. Most of their top leaders, including Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Arvind Kejriwal, P Chidambaram, Lalu Prasad and Manish Sisodia, Major Radhika Sen of HP earns UN honour new delhi: A Varanasi-bound IndiGo flight received a bomb threat at the IGI Airport here on Tuesday morning, but nothing suspicious was found during inspection. Dramatic scenes were witnessed at the airport as the 176 passengers onboard the flight were evacuated via the emergency exits. — TNS new delhi: Major Radhika Sen, who hails from Himachal Pradesh, has won the United Nations Military Gender Advocate of the Year Award. A UN statement said she was working at the United Nations Stabilisation Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO). Born in ❝ Himachal in 1993, Major Sen joined the Army eight years ago. She graduated as a biotech engineer and was pursuing her post-graduation from the IIT-Bombay, when she decided to join the armed forces. She will receive the award from UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on May 30. BACK PAGE multiple lapses in the CBI probe ■ The car allegedly used in the crime could never be seized ■ Prosecution witnesses stated four assailants were armed, but none of the weapons was seized CJI to take call on Kejri’s bail Satya Prakash Tribune News Service record, rather than allowing it to become stultified through a proactive media trial of the purported incriminatory role of the continued on page 9 New Delhi, May 28 Refusing to urgently list Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s plea seeking oneweek extension of his interim bail in a money launder- Seeks commitment on raising these in Parl Tribune News Service Mansa/Chandigarh, May 28 When a Congress candidate for the Lok Sabha elections sought support from the family of slain Punjabi singer Sidhu Moosewala, he was handed over a two-page letter containing nine unanswered questions about the murder. In the letter, Balkaur Singh, father of Moosewala, also sought a commitment from the Congress leader to raise these in Parliament. This is the ritual Balkaur has been following since the campaign for June 1 election in Punjab started. As the family prepares to observe the second death anniversary of Moosewala (May 29), Lahore, May 28 Former Pakistan premier Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday admitted that Islamabad had “violated” an agreement with India signed by him and former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 1999, in an apparent reference to the Kargil misadventure by Gen Pervez Musharraf. “On May 28, 1998, Pakistan carried out five nuclear tests. After that Vajpayee saheb came here and made an agreement with us. But we violated that agreement... it was our fault,” Sharif told a meeting of the PML-N general council that elected him president of the ruling party six years after he was disqualified by the Supreme Court. Sharif and Vajpayee signed the Lahore Declaration on February 21, 1999. The agreement that talked about a vision of peace and stability between the two countries signalled a major breakthrough, but a few months later Pakistani intrusion in the Kargil district in J&K led to the Kargil War. “President Bill Clinton had offered Pakistan USD 5 billion to stop it from carrying out nuclear tests but I refused. Had (former PM) Imran Khan like a person been on my seat he would have accepted Clinton's offer,” Sharif said. — PTI Bomb scare on Varanasi flight at Delhi airport PM Modi will end his LS poll campaign with a 48-hour meditation break in Tamil Nadu’s Kanyakumari, in keeping with the past practice of undertaking spiritual journeys at the end of national poll cycles. In 2019, he medidated at Kedarnath. DELHI CM HAD SOUGHT EXTENSION FOR CHECK-UP ing case linked to the excise scam on medical grounds, the Supreme Court on Tuesday referred it to CJI DY continued on page 9 No justice, Moosewala’s dad lists 9 posers to netas Jupinderjit Singh & Sukhmeet Singh ‘It was our fault’: Nawaz admits to Pak violating ’99 pact with India Balkaur Singh, father of Sidhu Moosewala, in Mansa. PAWAN SHARMA his father has one demand from his fans in Punjab – “through your votes on June 1, defeat those responsible for the death of my son”. “My whole focus in this election has been to raise the issue of Sidhu Moosewala’s murder. No political party has made the murder a poll issue. I want to make the candidates commit on what they will do about my son’s murder if they win the election,” Balkaur told The Tribune. He said he had requested the fans through social media to observe a quiet death anniversary. As Balkaur tours the state, his wife Charan Kaur takes care of their second son, who was born in March this year. “She mostly listens to ‘Dear Mama’ song of Moosewala, who likened his face and nature to his mother,” said a source close to the family. Meanwhile, as many as 34 persons have been chargesheeted and 29 accused have been arrested in the case so far. The investigation into the case still ends at gangster Lawrence Bishnoi continued on page 9 Unemployment, inflation pressing issues, being pushed under the carpet: Priyanka Rajesh Sharma Una, May 28 Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi today said the BJP sought votes in the name of religion, but its acts were against the preachings of all religions. Addressing an Says ‘arrogant’ PM Modi equating himself with God election rally in the Gagret Assembly segment, she claimed that 600 farmers had sacrificed their lives while demanding the MSP for their agriculture produce, but the PM had “ignored the growers”, while Adani was getting full support for his apple cold storage chains in the country. Priyanka said the Himachal Government gave the benefit of the old pension scheme to 1.4 lakh employees, but the Centre was withholding the state’s share in the scheme. She alleged that the BJP indulged in horsetrading and spent hundreds c m y b Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi at a roadshow in Hamirpur on Tuesday. PTI of crores of rupees to destabilise a democratically elected government. She said Himachal witnessed one of the worst natural disasters last year, but the BJP government at the Centre neither declared it a disaster nor gave a single penny to the state. Priyanka alleged that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was arrogant and was behaving “as if he was God”. “He has been fooling the peo- ple of the country for the past 10 years and some television channels close to him are portraying a rosy picture of the country,” she said, adding that the real issues of unemployment, poverty and inflation were being pushed under the carpet. The Congress leader said a person of the stature of the Prime Minister should refrain from making “cheap remarks” such as that if the Congress came to power, it would snatch away the ‘mangalsutras’ of women. She said Indira Gandhi donated her jewellery to the nation and Sonia Gandhi sacrificed her “mangalsutra” (Rajiv Gandhi) for the cause of the nation. The Congress leader said her party ruled the country for 55 years, but the Narendra Modiled BJP which had ruled for , just 10 years, was today the richest party in the world. continued on page 9