New Delhi: BJP president Rajnath Singh on Sunday hit out at Congress for doing "nothing for Dalits" in the country and "using" them as mere "vote bank". "Congress ruled the country for 54 years out of the 65 years since independence. This is not little time, but it made no effort to lift your status," Singh said while addressing a gathering on the occasion of BR Ambedkar's 122nd birth anniversary.
The BJP president said the Congress used Dalits as vote bank and came to power with their votes but took no steps to solve their problems. "I wanted to tell Dalit brothers that Congress always used you as a vote bank and never tried to take any steps to solve your problems," he said.
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03:58 AM, Apr 15, 2013
A statue of BR Ambedkar is costing the Namma Metro in Bangalore nearly Rs 100 crore. Plans are on to make an alternative design and a wider pathway will be constructed around the statue. This because the Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation has been forced to stop work after Dalit organisations objected against the removal of the statue. While the statues of Subhash Chandra Bose and Jawaharlal Nehru have been moved,...
09:58 AM, Feb 12, 2013
On Dalit icon BR Ambedkar's 55th death anniversary on Thursday, lakhs of people are expected to converge at the Indu Mills in Mumbai to celebrate the Centre's move to install an Ambedkar memorial there. This land faces the sea and is right next to Chaitya Bhoomi, where Ambedkar's ashes have been interred. ...
10:07 AM, Dec 06, 2012
Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley on Wednesday claimed that the disruption in the House is a tactic adopted by the UPA government and its allies in order to stay way from the FDI debate. Jaitley accused the government of diversionary tactics in the Rajya Sabha and said that the UPA constituents have been deliberately disrupting proceedings to avoid the vote. ...
01:10 PM, Dec 05, 2012
Arvind Kejriwal on Monday formally launched the Aam Aadmi Party amidst loud cheers from the people who had gathered at Jantar Mantar to participate in the inauguration ceremony. Introducing the party, Kejriwal said that it will seek to eradicate corruption at all levels in the country. ...
03:27 PM, Nov 26, 2012
Lucknow: Does Mahatma Gandhi belong to the Congress? In Uttar Pradesh, it would seem so as a Right to Information (RTI) poser has revealed that the state government "does not allocate any funds for celebrating the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi." In response to a query by RTI activist Gaurav Agarwal, the National Integration Department has said that though funds are available for other leaders like Bhimrao Ambedkar and Sardar...
03:45 PM, Nov 08, 2012
Bangalore: The Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL) has decided to continue the underground Metro station in front of Vidhana Soudha as the state government is delaying a decision on its request to remove a statue of B R Ambedkar from there. Dalit organisations have strongly opposed the removal of the statue and this has led the government to delay the decision on it. The cost of such a delay...
12:54 PM, Sep 17, 2012
New Delhi: The latest batch of the NCERT textbooks is out, but this time, without six cartoons from four political textbooks. This comes after the Thorat committee's recommendation that 22 cartoons be removed from the textbooks. The cartoon of Ambedkar that sparked off protests in Parliament has been replaced with his photograph. RK Laxman's cartoon depicting the anti-Hindi agitation and four other cartoons that represented political developments have also been...
01:59 PM, Sep 11, 2012
Mumbai: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Saturday said in Mumbai that Babasaheb Ambedkar is the Father of the Constitution and his government will ensure a befitting memorial for him. The Prime Minister told this to an all-party delegation led by Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, who called on him at Raj Bhavan in Mumbai on Saturday morning to request him for expediting the handing over process of Indu Mill Land for...
12:52 PM, Aug 18, 2012
Madurai: Security has been stepped up in Madurai and parts of south Tamil Nadu following escalating tension sparked by the desecration of two statues of the Father of Indian Constitution B R Ambedkar and a statue of local Dalit hero Immanuel Sekaran in the temple town. Miscreants had vandalised the statue of Ambedkar placed near Madurai airport at Perungudi and statues of Immanuel Sekaran and Ambedkar statue at Chinna Udaippu...
12:24 PM, Aug 08, 2012
New Delhi: The controversy over cartoons in text books threatens to escalate. After a committee set up by the HRD Ministry recommended the removal of 43 cartoons, which included those of Indira Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, from the NCERT textbooks of classes 9-12, the chief of the national council has said that there is no logic behind axing them. The NCERT chief says that it is illogical to remove the...
07:33 AM, Jul 07, 2012
New Delhi: The Government-appointed committee looking into the controversy surrounding political caricatures in the school textbooks has submitted its recommendations. The NCERT panel said that cartoons with negative references to politicians and bureaucrats should be removed from the textbooks. It found that current textbooks carry too many cartoons of the Nehru-Gandhi family. It says these must be removed as well. It has recommended the removal or modification of 36 of...
08:13 AM, Jul 03, 2012
New Delhi: The government has set up a panel headed by former UGC chairman SK Thorat in the wake of the cartoon row to review NCERT's political science textbooks for schools. The committee, which has five members from the social science background, will review class IX to XII social science/political science textbooks of NCERT from the point of view of identifying educationally inappropriate material in them, said a NCERT notification....
09:39 PM, May 16, 2012
New Delhi: The members of Parliament across party lines said not just Ambedkar cartoons but no political cartoons at all should be allowed in school textbooks. The BJP said HRD Minister Kapil Sibal must resign on this issue. The question is whether cartoon and politician satire should be censored. CNN-IBN Deputy Editor Sagarika Ghose discussed the issue with a distinguished panel on her show Face The Nation. Following is the...
12:17 PM, May 15, 2012
New Delhi: Under attack over the cartoon row, HRD Minister Kapil Sibal on Monday acknowledged that cartoons on the political class should not find a place in textbooks as they influence the impressionable minds of students. Holding that the issue is not about the content of the cartoons but about their inclusion in textbooks, he said the impression should not go to the world that the political class is corrupt...
02:04 AM, May 15, 2012
New Delhi: Union Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal on Monday said that freedom of expression is "contextual". His statement came even as members in the Lok Sabha once again united in criticising cartoons in NCERT textbooks, stating that these allegedly denigrated political leaders, especially the ones on BR Ambedkar. Sibal promised the Lok Sabha that all objectionable material would be removed and the role of advisors of NCERT (National...
07:30 PM, May 14, 2012
New Delhi: Following the controversy over a 63-year-old BR Ambedkar cartoon by K Shankar Pillai the government assured Parliament that no political cartoons would be allowed in school textbooks. Finance Minister Pranab Mukerjee also announced that all the objectionable material would be withdrawn. But the National Council for Educational Research and Training (NCERT) book at the centre of the storm - India Constitution at Work, a part of the Class...
06:58 PM, May 14, 2012
New Delhi: Cartoons are not a laughing matter for politicians after a 63-year-old cartoon of DR BR Ambedkar led to uproarious scenes in Parliament, forcing the Union Government to apologise. Finance Minister Pranab Mukerjee assured Parliament on Monday that no political cartoons would be allowed in school textbooks and all objectionable material would be withdrawn after there was a ruckus over a cartoon of BR Ambedkar in NCERT class XI...
12:06 PM, May 14, 2012
New Delhi: After fighting for removal of BR Ambedkar's cartoon from NCERT books, some MPs are demanding the removal of all political satires from school textbooks. In fact that's what a Parliamentary forum headed by Meira Kumar has told the NCERT. CNN-IBN has now learnt that the Members of Parliamentary forum having members from all major parties in a meeting last week raised expressed strong displeasure on cartoons in NCERT...
10:14 PM, May 13, 2012
New Delhi: Not just BR Ambedkar, there should be no political satire in school textbooks, that's what a Parliamentary forum headed by Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar has told the NCERT. Sources told CNN-IBN that at a meeting on May 8, the Parliamentary Forum on Children strongly objected to cartoons in Political Science textbooks of Class IX, X, XI and XII. Sources say the MPs want cartoons of all politicians...
01:06 PM, May 13, 2012
