The government appointed former Eastern Army Commander Lt. General Anil Chauhan (Retd) as the next Chief of Defence Staff (CDS). The post has been vacant since the death of the country’s first CDS Gen. Bipin Rawat in a helicopter crash in December 2021.
“The Government has decided to appoint Lt. Gen. Anil Chauhan (retired) as the next Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) who shall also function as Secretary to Government of India, Department of Military Affairs with effect from the date of his assumption of charge and until further orders,” the Defence Ministry said in a statement.
In a career spanning over nearly 40 years, Lt. Gen. Chauhan had held several command, staff and instrumental appointments and had extensive experience in counter-insurgency operations in Jammu and Kashmir and North-East India, the statement said.
Post retirement, Lt. Gen. Chauhan took over as the Military Advisor in the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS) from Lt. Gen. Vinod G. Khandare who stepped down from the post in October 2021.
General Rawat was pushing forward the ambitious plan for reorganisation of the armed forces into integrated theatre commands among other measures to bring in synergy and efficiency.
The broad mandate of the CDS includes bringing about “jointness” in “operations, logistics, transport, training, support services, communications, repairs and maintenance of the three Services, within three years of the first CDS assuming office”.
This task now falls on the new CDS to build consensus and take the reorganisation process forward, which has been delayed due to lack of complete consensus and objections on certain aspects from the Air Force. Detailed studies have already been carried out, and table top exercises executed in the recent past to fine tune the modalities. Additional studies have also been carried out in this direction.
In addition, the war in Ukraine has added urgency on the need to indigenise critical military technologies and systems and reduce dependence on imports.
Congress president election | All eyes on Gehlot-Gandhi meeting; Digvijaya to join the fray
Congress president Sonia Gandhi is likely to meet Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Thursday in an attempt to resolve the ongoing crisis in the State. Even as all eyes are on this anticipated meeting, sources said that Rajya Sabha MP and former Madhya Pradesh CM Digvijaya Singh could enter the race for Congress president. He is expected to be in Delhi on Thursday.
Singh has already sounded out the top leadership about his decision but may wait for the outcome of the Gandhi-Gehlot meeting before taking a final call, said the source.
The process for filing nominations for the elections began on September 24th and in the last four days, none have been filed. Gehlot was slated to file his nomination on Wednesday and with his expected elevation, a meeting of the party’s legislators was called in Jaipur to pick his successor. The party was thrown into a turmoil when a large section of the MLAs boycotted the meeting saying that they will not allow the CM to be picked from those who put the government at risk in July 2020.
Meanwhile, reports about Singh’s decision to join the fray, has met with stiff opposition from some quarters in the party.
“He has made several outrageous and dangerous comments in the past including belittling Delhi Police officer Mohan Chand Sharma’s supreme sacrifice in the Batla House encounter. All his past statements will come to haunt us,” a senior party leader said.
PFI, eight front organisations, including Campus Front of India, banned for five years
The Ministry of Home Affairs on Wednesday declared the Popular Front of India and its front organisations including its student wing — the Campus Front of India — as an “unlawful association” under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
The Muslim organisation has been banned for five years along with eight associates or front organisations.
Security person sits outside the sealed office of the Popular Front of India in Bhopal on September 28, 2022. | Photo Credit: PTI
The MHA has also issued another order empowering States to notify places associated with PFI and its front organisations where unlawful activity is taking place. According to the order, District Magistrate will make a list of immovable properties of the organisation and make an order that no person who at the date of the notification was not a resident in the notified place shall, without the permission of the District Magistrate, enter, or be on or in, the notified place.
The Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka and Gujarat governments have recommended a ban on PFI, the MHA said. It added that if there is no immediate ban, the group will continue its subversive activities, disturbing public order and undermining the constitutional setup of the country; encourage and enforce a terror-based regressive regime; continue to propagate anti-national sentiments and radicalise a particular section of society with the intention to create disaffection against the country and aggravate activities which are detrimental to the integrity, security and sovereignty of the country.
The ban comes close on the heels of a countrywide raid on September 22 when 109 members of the groups were arrested by the National Investigation Agency and other agencies. MHA will now set up a tribunal under UAPA to try the case where PFI could defend its case against the ban.
In a notification, MHA said some of the PFI’s founding members are the leaders of the Students Islamic Movement of India and have linkages with Jamat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh, both of which are proscribed organisations.
It said that the group also has linkages to global terrorist organisations such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and participated in terror activities in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan. It said the PFI cadres linked to ISIS have been killed in these conflict theatres and some have been arrested by State Police and Central Agencies.
PFI and its associates “operate openly as a socio-economic, educational and political organisation but, they have been pursuing a secret agenda to radicalise a particular section of the society working towards undermining the concept of democracy and show sheer disrespect towards the constitutional authority and constitutional set up of the country.”
The Ministry said the PFI cadres have been involved in several terrorist acts and the murder of several persons including Sanjith (Kerala, November 2021), V. Ramalingam, (Tamil Nadu, 2019), Nandu, (Kerala, 2021), Abhimanyu (Kerala, 2018), Bibin (Kerala, 2017), Sharath (Karnataka, 2017), R. Rudresh (Karnataka, 2016), Praveen Poojary (Karnataka, 2016), Sasi Kumar (Tamil Nadu, 2016) and Praveen Nettaru (Karnataka, 2022).
Most murder victims cited in the notification were members of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, Bharatiya Janta Party or other Hindu organisations.
The office-bearers and cadres of the PFI along with others are conspiring and raising funds from within India and abroad through the banking channels, and the hawala, donations, etc. as part of a well-crafted criminal conspiracy, and then transferring, layering and integrating these funds through multiple accounts to project them as legitimate and eventually using these funds to carry out various criminal, unlawful and terrorist activities in India, the MHA said.
The Ministry said the PFI has created the front organisations with the objective of enhancing its reach among different sections of the society such as youth, students, women, Imams, lawyers or weaker sections of the society with the sole objective of expanding its membership, influence and fundraising capacity.
Supreme Court Constitution Bench to examine if greater restrictions can be imposed on freedom of speech of Ministers
To frame general guidelines in “thin air” to restrict government Ministers, MPs, MLA or public leaders, including political party presidents, from making unguarded, derogatory and hurtful statements in public may prove “difficult”, a Constitution Bench prima facie said.
The oral observation came from a Constitution Bench led by Justice S. Abdul Nazeer while hearing a reference on the question whether the right to free speech and expression of high public functionaries require “greater restrictions”.
“Can we lay down some central guidelines without examining the factual background? We cannot decide this question in thin air. We need to decide this on a case-to-case basis,” Justice Nazeer said.
Justice B.V. Nagarathna said “reasonable restrictions” on the right to free speech under Article 19(1)(a) were already there under Article 19(2) of the Constitution. The judge asked whether it was right on the part of the court to impose a further law on free speech over and above the restrictions already imposed under Article 19(2). There are other remedies already available like civil/criminal injunctions, torts, general laws, etc.
Advocate Kaleeswaram Raj, for petitioner Joseph Shine, who has moved against comments made by Kerala minister M.M. Mani, agreed that such a judicially-imposed restriction over and above Article 19(2) may not be impermissible.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta accepted that a public functionary should be more guarded in speech than an ordinary person. “But judicially demarcating the threshold may likely prove difficult,” he said.
Justice B.R. Gavai, on the Bench, agreed, saying that such restrictions should be considered only on the individual facts of each case. The court decided to examine the question on November 15.
The reference to a Constitution Bench was made two years ago in April 2017. It sprouted from a petition filed by the family members of the Bulandshahr rape case victim against a former Minister’s public statements that the rape case was part of a political conspiracy against the then Akhilesh Yadav government.
The Minister subsequently apologised unconditionally in the apex court. But the court had decided to examine the question of imposing curbs on the free speech of public functionaries in sensitive matters.
Attorney General K.K. Venugopal had at the time flagged issues which the Constitution Bench ought to consider, including whether reasonable restrictions under Article19(2) should be expanded or not.
The Attorney General had said the Bench should further answer whether private persons and corporations could be held liable for violating Article 21.
The case had initially been taken up by another Constitution Bench, but the hearing was left incomplete. Justice Arun Mishra (now retired), who had led the earlier Constitution Bench, had, in a hearing in 2019, said both free speech and right to life were equally important.
In Brief:
Nearly six years after the government’s banknote demonetisation saw long queues, reported deaths and cash shortage, a Constitution Bench, charged with examining the validity of an Ordinance promulgated to legalise the exercise retrospectively and look into human problems, which accompanied the implementation of withdrawal of ₹500 and ₹1,000 currency notes from legal tender, turned around on Wednesday to ask if “anything survives at all” in the issue in 2022. “Does this survive at this stage? In those days, it was relevant. Does it survive now?” Justice S. Abdul Nazeer, who headed the five-judge Bench, asked as soon as the hearing in the case commenced.
Evening Wrap will return tomorrow.
