The Delhi High Court on Friday dismissed an appeal filed by the police challenging the bail granted to former Congress councillor Ishrat Jahan in the larger conspiracy case linked to the 2020 riots in the capital, Bar and Bench reported.

Jahan was granted bail in the case in 2022.

While hearing the appeal against her bail, a bench of Justices Navin Chawla and Ravinder Dudeja said that over four years had passed since the former councillor was granted bail by a special court.

There was nothing to show that she had violated any of the bail conditions, it added.

The case pertains to clashes that had broken out in North East Delhi from February 23 to February 26, 2020, between supporters of the Citizenship Amendment Act and those opposing it, leaving 53 dead and hundreds injured. Most of those killed were Muslims.

Several activists were arrested between January 2020 and September 2020 in connection with the violence. The accused were charged under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, the Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act, the Arms Act and sections of the Indian Penal Code.

The Delhi Police have claimed that the violence was part of a larger conspiracy to defame the Narendra Modi government and was planned by those who organised the protests against the amended Citizenship Act.

Jahan was arrested in February 2020. The special court in March 2022 granted bail to the former councillor after noting that there were no allegations in the chargesheet that she was physically present during the riots.

It also said that Jahan was not part of the any WhatsApp groups that played a large role in the alleged conspiracy.

In its appeal in the High Court, the Delhi Police alleged that the lower court ignored the evidence and statements that were produced before it, Bar and Bench reported.

It added that the order granting Jahan bail was passed “discarding the evidences which clearly made out a sinister plot of engineering mass-scale violent riots" in the national capital.

The timing of the riots was meticulously chosen by Jahan and other co-conspirators with the visit of the United States president in order to garner the attention of the international media, the police added.

The Delhi Police said that the order issued by the lower court was not only in the teeth of the settled of law, but suffered from infirmities that go to the root of the matter, the legal news portal reported.

Meanwhile, the trial court January 24 framed charges of attempt to murder and rioting against Jahan.

Also read: How Delhi riots accused Ishrat Jahan survived two years in jail by writing a diary

Twenty-three percent of the candidates contesting the ongoing Assembly elections in West Bengal have declared criminal cases in their affidavits, a report released by the Association for Democratic Reforms has shown.

The report released on Tuesday analysed the self-sworn affidavits of 2,920 out of the 2,926 candidates contesting the elections.

Out of the candidates analysed, 683 had criminal cases filed against them. Additionally, 20% of these candidates, or 589 of them, declared serious criminal cases against themselves, the report showed.

A serious criminal case includes offences with a maximum punishment of five years or more, non-bailable offences, electoral offences, or charges related to assault, murder, kidnapping, rape, and crimes against women and children.

Polling in 152 of West Bengal’s 294 constituencies was held on Thursday. Voting in the remaining seats in West Bengal will be held on April 29 and the results will be announced on May 4.

In the first phase of polling, 23% of the candidates, which is 345 out of the 1,475 analysed, have said that they face criminal cases, as per the report. Of these, 294 candidates, or 20% have serious criminal charges filed against them.

In the second phase too, 23% of the candidates, which is 338 out of the 1,445 analysed, have criminal cases against them, the Association for Democratic Reforms said. About 20%, or 295 of them, have serious criminal cases against them.

The Bharatiya Janata Party has the highest number of candidates with criminal cases filed against them, the report said. As many as 208 out of its 293 candidates analysed in the report, or 71%, face criminal charges.

From the Congress, 76 (26%) out of 293 candidates analysed from had criminal cases, while 112 (39%) out of 290 candidates from the Trinamool Congress had such charges. Ninety-four, or about 47%, of the 198 candidates from the Communist Party of India (Marxist) also had criminal cases.

The BJP also topped the list of candidates with serious criminal cases. At least 188 (64%) out of the 293 candidates from the Hindutva party had such charges.

Overall, 192 candidates of the the 2,920 candidates looked into have declared cases related to crimes against women, the report said. Out of them, eight candidates declared cases related to rape. Thirty-five candidates also declared cases related to murder, while 185 declared cases of attempt to murder.

The Association for Democratic Reforms added that 129, or 44%, out of 294 constituencies are red alert constituencies. Such seats are those where three or more contesting candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves.

The report further noted that 629 (22%) of the total candidates have assets worth over Rs 1 crore.

Among the major parties, 209 (72%) out of 290 candidates from Trinamool Congress, 143 (49%) of 293 candidates from the BJP and 86 (29%) of 293 candidates from the Congress have declared assets valued more than Rs 1 crore.

Three persons were killed and several others were injured in Manipur’s Ukhrul district on Friday after violence broke out between Kuki and Naga communities, The Hindu reported.

Two of those killed were Kukis, while the third was a Tangkhul Naga. The Tangkhuls are the dominant community in the district.

The Kuki Organisation for Human Rights alleged that around 5.30 am on Friday, armed Tangkhul Naga men attacked Kuki villages Mullam and Shongphal when the residents were asleep in their homes, according to The Hindu. The assailants fatally shot two “village volunteers”, injured several others, including women and children and burned over a dozen homes, the organisation alleged.

The term “village volunteers” has been used for armed civilians guarding villages since ethnic clashes broke out in the state in May 2023.

The two persons killed, L Sitlhou and P Haolai, were found in camouflage outfits with bullet wounds, PTI quoted unidentified officials as saying.

The Kuki Organisation for Human Rights said that the villagers exercised “their lawful right to self-defence with licenced hunting arms”, repulsed the attack, and “neutralised” one of the alleged assailants, The Hindu reported.

However, the central command of the Naga Village Guard claimed that armed Kuki extremists opened fire at its members on patrol duty between Sirakhong and Sinakeithei villages. It said that Naga villagers had been patrolling the area because of “repeated attacks on Sinakeithei village and reports of constant tactical movement in the peripheries by the Kuki armed cadres under the Suspension of Operations [SoO] agreement”, according to The Hindu.

The Suspension of Operations agreement was signed between the Centre, the Manipur government and two conglomerates of Kuki militant outfits – the Kuki National Organisation and United Peoples Front – in 2008.

The Naga Village Guard on Friday identified the third person killed as Horshokmi Jamang, and claimed that he was also a “village volunteer”.

Tensions between Kukis and Nagas in Ukhrul erupted on February 7, when an alleged assault involving members of the Tangkhul Naga and the Kuki-Zo communities escalated into clashes.

The incident, in which a Tangkhul Naga man was injured following an altercation, triggered days of arson and firing in Litan and nearby villages. Subsequent efforts by civil society groups from both communities to resolve the dispute failed and intermittent violence continued.

This violence signalled a shift in clashes in Manipur from the Meitei-dominated plains to the hills.

Ethnic clashes broke out between the Meitei and Kuki-Zo-Hmar communities in May 2023, leaving at least 260 persons dead and more than 59,000 persons displaced . There were periodic upticks in violence in 2024 and 2025.

The Indian federation under Narendra Modi today is vastly different from the “union of states” imagined by the constituent assembly.

There are many aspects to this. Take the growing marginalisation of Parliament and the defiant refusal of the union government to consult with opposition leaders and chief ministers on important matters. The latest blow was the aborted attempt to thrust on the country a constitutional amendment enabling a countrywide delimitation of parliamentary constituencies and the possible reduction of seats in southern states.

Take the weak and uncertain defence of constitutional rights by the judiciary. Take the deployment of every institution including most recently the Election Commission to interrogate their citizenship. Take the conversion of the Mahatma Gandhi NREGA from a guarantee of the right to work guaranteed by the centre to a discretionary grant from the centre with major budgetary burdens on the states; and the repackaging of welfare schemes such as of food and housing from rights to the largesse of the prime minister. Take the questionable tactics of coming to power in the majority of states at all costs. Take the surge of crony capitalism. Take the criminalising of dissent. All of these have profoundly shaken democracy and India's federal character.

Federal institutions like the Inter-State Council and the Finance Commission charged with equitable financial devolution principles have given way to the reshaping of taxation and resource distribution in favour of the Centre, and the overriding of state policies through centrally sponsored schemes. We see the naked use of Governors to control opposition-ruled States in ways that violate both the letter and spirit of the constitution. And the conflicts in sensitive border areas of Kashmir and Manipur have again been handled in ways that weaken state authority and exacerbate local community anxieties.

At a time when the Indian constitution is under grave assault, the Centre for Equity Studies planned with the publishers Speaking Tiger a series of short monographs that attempt to identify, unpack and explain the basic ideas of the Constitution.

We identified many of the key ideas for this series, from a reading of the text of the preamble of the Constitution. These were: Secularism, Socialism, Democracy, Justice, Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.

However, we felt that there were at least two other essential ideas of the Constitution that needed to be added to our literal reading of the words in the preamble. One of these was Scientific Temper. The other was Federalism.

Shortly to be released is Federalism: Making and Unmaking of a Union of States. It sets out how the idea of federalism was imagined, debated, pledged and implemented after freedom and the grave dangers it faces in Modi’s India.

The tilt to the centre

What the author Avinash Kumar accomplishes is to admirably capture crucial elements of the reverberant sweep of the thinking of the makers of independent India. How they sought to weave a democracy from this boundlessly diverse land with followers of every major religion in the world, more than 500 often restive princely states, and – according to a recent survey – 780 languages and 66 scripts.

The word federalism is never mentioned in the constitution. Yet when BR Ambedkar introduced the draft constitution, he described it as a “federal constitution”. He argued that India’s Constitution really is federal at its core.

Federal ‘middle-path’

Gandhi was firmly opposed to centralised states. His influential Hind Swaraj published in 1909 was not just a landmark critique of modernity and Western civilisation. It contained a blueprint for free India as a true federation of self-sufficient village republics founded on the principles of non-violence and truth. But Ambedkar passionately rejected Gandhi’s idealisation of the village republic. Villages, he said, were cesspools of caste inequity and oppression.

The federalism voted for by the constituent assembly was very distant from Gandhi’s swaraj. Ambedkar clarified that India was not a classic federation, like the United States. It was a “Union of States,” not a federation born of agreement among sovereign units. In this way, India became a federation but one that tilts to the centre, balancing unity with regional autonomy.

As the decades passed, the Gandhian moral beacon that “What touches all must be decided by all” has for the most part progressively faded in the imagination and practice of the federal ideal in India.

During the constituent assembly debates between 1946 and 1949, Ambedkar was joined by Nehru and Vallabhbhai Patel to prioritise national unity and integrity over regional autonomy. In the shadow of the horrific Partition bloodbath of religious violence and the sometimes reluctant integration of the princely states, they chose for India a federal structure but with a strong central bias. Nehru felt this was essential for stability and unity in the vast hinterland of illiteracy, communal forces, caste and ethnic divisions. He was convinced that a strong Centre also was essential to establish a secular, socialist welfare state.

Some in the constituent assembly like Sarangdhar Das and Frank Anthony advocated for maximum powers to be vested in the Centre to ensure national unity and stability in light of the challenges India faced post‑Partition. Brajeshwar Prasad feared that the creation of semi‑sovereign states could lead to dangerous centrifugal forces, that regional forces might tear the country apart.

Others like BM Gupte felt that the truly federal idea had been given short shrift. He argued: “The units are kept completely dependent on the Centre for finances. This so‑called independence is just a façade because the provinces rely entirely on the Centre’s good will for financial support.”

Linguistic reorganisation of states

Linguistic and regional aspirations soon began to test India’s quasi-federal system. A powerful demand rose from the ground after independence to reorganise states boundaries on linguistic grounds. The Yiddish linguist Max Weinreich famously described a “language” as “a dialect with an army and a navy”. It was language that was to result in the bloody separation of Bangladesh from Pakistan. The language agitations in India were not on the backs of armies and navies, but spurred by passionate and sometimes militant activists.

The Congress committee known as the “JVP” committee – named after its members Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, and Pattabhi Sitaramayya – both advised against linguistic reorganisation and the creation of new provinces because they felt that maintaining national unity was the priority of the time.

But linguistic aspirations refused to die down. In December 1952, Potti Sriramulu died after a hunger strike demanding a Telugu-speaking state. This sparked rioting and many died. Nehru eventually agreed to the creation of Andhra Pradesh and to establish an independent commission to address other statehood demands.

After the States Reorganisation Act of 1956, the Telangana region of Hyderabad State was merged with Andhra Pradesh, the Malabar district of Madras Presidency was joined with Travancore-Cochin to create the state of Kerala, Kannada-speaking regions from Bombay, Hyderabad, and Madras Presidency were added to Mysore State to form Karnataka, and the Bombay State was expanded by merging it with Kutch, Saurashtra, and Marathi-speaking parts of Hyderabad.

In 1960, Maharashtra and Gujarat were created from the former Bombay province, and in 1966, Haryana was separated from Punjab. Tripura and Mizoram were created on the basis of languages that were not even in the list of 22 languages scheduled in the Constitution. These were Kokborok and Mizo respectively.

Avinash Kumar describes how the imposition of Hindi as the national language was associated with fears of a centralised state encroaching on regional aspirations, from the times of Lal Bahadur Shastri to Narendra Modi. When in the 1960s, prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri’s government dropped English as the second official language with Hindi, 27-year-old Chinnasamy from Tiruchi left a note stating “I plan to die in order to protect Tamil. One day, my goal will be met”, before setting himself on fire. Six more youths set themselves aflame or consumed poison and 70 lives were lost before Shastri withdrew his order.

The government promulgated a three-language formula, requiring all students to learn English, Hindi and any one modern Indian language, but Tamil Nadu under Annadurai refused to implement this. Fast-forward to 2025. Udhayanidhi Stalin of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam declares that “If Hindi is imposed on us, not hundreds, but thousands of youths are ready to sacrifice their lives to protect Tamil and our rights.”

While the legitimacy of linguistic states are accepted in principle, the Indian state has been consistent in resisting demands of religious states. Nehru firmly turned down the demand for a separate Punjabi Sooba for Sikhs. This demand was partially conceded in 1966 only after it was reframed to focus on linguistic rather than religious grounds.

Over the decades, regional aspirations not restricted to language – but not on the basis of religion – formed the ground for the creation of new states. Sikkim became a new state after it joined the Indian union in 1975. Goa became a state in 1987 as well as various states in the north-east responding to regional aspirations. Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand became states in 2000, and Telangana in 2014.

Fiscal federalism

Avinash Kumar describes fiscal federalism as “both a tool of cooperation and a source of friction”. He identifies it as being the most contested arena in India’s federalism. The Constitution empowers the Union to collect major taxes such as income tax, corporate tax, and excise duties, while States can levy taxes on land, agricultural income, alcohol, and sales of goods, among others.

Ambedkar in the constituent assembly was a strong advocate of defending the states’ right to levy and collect sales tax, so that at least one major source of revenue lay with the states, securing for them some autonomy in financial decision-making. The Planning Commission was criticised by states at times for being top-down in determining the scale of central resources available to states and how they will deploy these.

From the late 1960s onwards, the Central government through the Planning Commission launched a growing number of important centrally-sponsored schemes for combating poverty, including programs for livelihoods, credit, food and housing. These on balance had positive results from the prism of equity, but also had the effect of expanding further the central control over dissemination of resources to the states.

The Finance Commission is appointed by the President, and helps determine how tax revenues are distributed between the Union and States. It is supposed to function as a transparent arbiter and a defender of State finances and the finances of local governance bodies. Its performance has however been uneven.

The greater control over resources by the centre faced less resistance as long as the Congress was in power in the centre and the majority of the states. As this changed, state governments of other political parties began to express their dissatisfaction with this tilt of India’s federal arrangements to the union government.

An important landmark in this resistance was when in its 1989 manifesto the National Front coalition called for greater decentralisation as articulated by non-Congress state chief ministers, each of considerable political stature – Ramakrishna Hegde, NT Ramarao, Jyoti Basu and MG Ramachandran.

This argued that the States “ought to enjoy genuine autonomy – political, legislative, economic, fiscal and administrative – without submitting themselves to the indignity of becoming supplicants before the Centre, with a begging bowl”. Kumar however points to the irony that although the 1990s and early 2000s was the era of coalition governments in the union that relied hugely on regional parties, in practice even this period did not see a significant reworking of centre-state fiscal relations.

He also describes the impact from the 1990s onwards on India’s fiscal federalism of economic liberalisation policies. The Centre was subjected to greater financial discipline reducing the share of states in the fiscal pool.

States like Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Orissa, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal began to lobby and compete for alternative sources of revenue, mostly in the form of foreign direct investment or by directly supporting the setting up of businesses and industries by foreign companies. This new era of “competitive federalism” however led to greater inequality between states and enhanced migration of unskilled labour from poorer states to those that were able to mobilise private and international capital.

Taking federalism to local bodies

It was hoped that the 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments would empower local bodies, bringing to life at last Gandhi’s principle – “What touches all must be decided by all”.

However, what actually mostly happened was that the real power of decision-making mostly remained with district-level bureaucracies. These officials are both influenced and controlled by the state and central governments. Local bodies have no real power over them.

It was as late as in 1992 that amendments were brought into the constitution to belatedly and in very limited measure implement Gandhiji’s idea of swaraj or village-led self-rule. Until then the federal contestation was primarily between the centre and the states. Urban bodies and people’s direct assemblies did not even enter the picture.

For this reason, the 73rd and 74th Constitutional Amendments of 1992 were optimistically hailed as a significant milestone in India's democratic federalism. These amendments for the first time conferred a constitutional status to local self-governments – Panchayati Raj Institutions in rural areas and Urban Local Bodies in towns and cities. These were touted as promoting decentralisation, and bringing the administration closer to the people by ensuring direct people’s participation in governance.

India’s federal structure in this way evolved from a two-tier to a three-tier structure. A new Eleventh Schedule was added to the Constitution, listing 29 subjects that could be devolved to the rural bodies and 18 to the urban bodies. Seats were reserved not just for Scheduled Castes and Tribes but also, for the first time, for women. Many states like Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Karnataka did take some steps to empower the local bodies. States like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar showed greater reluctance to do this. Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh raised women’s reservations to 50%.

However, despite the rhetoric and self-congratulation that accompanied the 73rd and 74th amendments, real decentralisation of funds, functions and functionaries to this third tier barely occurred in practice. When programs like the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act were implemented through rural local bodies, this did enrich them with funds but panchayats became as Kumar observed, “implementers of central schemes, not autonomous planning bodies”. Decentralisation remained administrative, not political, and with little fiscal independence.

Gandhiji in Hind Swaraj had imagined these very communities not just as the bulwark against centralized despotic regimes but also as self-dependent economic communities. The 73rd and 74th amendments while paying lip service to these ideals in practice have done very little to make them a reality.

Hindutva and dismantling federal democracy

Kumar also maps the uneven implementation of the federal idea in India in the decades after freedom, and identifies periods marked by its conspicuous erosion. This was visible most of all under prime minister Indira Gandhi; and now even more damagingly under Narendra Modi. Kumar describes the Emergency (1975-77), under Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, as representing one peak of centralization, with the suspension of civil liberties and the undermining of federal autonomy. The Modi era from 2014 reflects the second peak, a phase of the ideologically driven erosion of India’s federal idea.

MG Golwarkar is one of the foremost Hindutva leaders who Narendra Modi once identified to be his greatest influence. Golwarkar writes starkly, “We are one country, one society, and one nation, with a community of life-values and secular aspirations and interests; and hence it is natural that the affairs of the nation are governed through a single state of the unitary type. The present federal system generates and feeds separatist feelings. In a way, it negates the truth of a single nationhood and is, therefore, divisive in nature. It must be remedied and the Constitution amended and cleaned so as to establish Unitary form of government.”

Hindutva demands a homogenisation of religion, language and culture, the denial of rights even of citizenship to religious minorities, and unquestioning obedience to the supreme leader. All of this is manifestly incompatible with federal and secular democracy.

We therefore understand that the rapid centralisation under the Modi government is the outcome of the rise of aggressive Hindutva.Kumar also refers to the deployment of popular films to push the Hindutva narrative at the expense of the complex political histories of states. Films like The Kashmir Files, Article 370, The Bengal Files, and The Kerala Story hinge on false and incendiary narratives of Hindu victimhood and Muslim radicalisation.

This is perhaps the most compelling part of Avinsha Kumar’s monograph, when he explains Hindutva's opposition to federalism is ideological.

We understand that the multiple assaults on federal democracy under Narendra Modi are not simply the outcome of an autocratic ruler hungry to amplify and centralise his power. We recognise it for what it is: an ideological project constituting an assault on both the idea of India but also the constitutional imagination of a secular democracy.

Federalism in the Indian Constitution today stands in mortal danger.

Harsh Mander is a peace and justice worker and writer. He leads Karwan e Mohabbat, a people’s campaign for solidarity and justice for the survivors of lynching and hate violence. He is visiting faculty in the South Asia Institute of Heidelberg University. His latest book, Under Grey Smoggy Skies: Living Homeless on the Streets of Delhi Cities, is in the bookstores.

The Union government on Friday said that of the 26 Indians whose families had moved the Supreme Court seeking their safe return from Russia, 10 have died while fighting the war in Ukraine, reported Live Law.

Most of them had joined the Russian military voluntarily, the Centre claimed.

In December, the Union government told Parliament that 26 Indian citizens, of the 206 believed to have been recruited into the Russian military, had been killed. Seven Indians were missing, Minister of State Kirti Vardhan Singh had said.

The external affairs ministry has repeatedly issued advisories warning Indian citizens against joining the Russian military. New Delhi contends that many are duped by unscrupulous agents and are often hired as support staff, such as cooks and helpers, amid Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Russia began its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, triggering the deadliest conflict in Europe since World War II.

On Friday, a Supreme Court bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant, and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul Pancholi was hearing petitions by the family members of 26 Indians who were allegedly forced to fight the war in Ukraine.

The families said that the Indian citizens had gone to Russia in search of jobs, reported Live Law.

During the hearing, the petitioners alleged that the Ministry of External Affairs had not contacted the family members of the Indian citizens who had been forced to fight in Russia’s war.

“They have not collected our DNA sample, we have been trafficked out of the country, they are not even in touch with us, it is not a case of inaction, they are not even in contact with us,” the petitioners alleged.

In response, Additional Solicitor General Aiswharya Bhati said that though there were some instances where recruiting agents had misled Indian citizens into joining the Russian military, “many of the individuals had entered into voluntary contracts with Russian entities”, reported Live Law.

Bhati added that apart from the 10 who have died, one person was in jail in a criminal case, and another was “voluntarily continuing” in the military.

“The Indian government has been doing a multi-pronged strategy, we have been guiding them not to accept these [job offers],” said Bhati.

The Russian defence ministry stopped recruiting Indians in April 2024, according to the country’s embassy in New Delhi. However, contracts for military service have delayed the release of several Indians.

In December, Singh said that 119 Indians have been discharged from service in Russia. Efforts are being made to secure the release of the remaining 50 persons, he added.

He also said that New Delhi and Indian diplomatic missions in Russia have been assisting citizens discharged from the Russian Army for their return to India by facilitating their travel documents and providing them with air tickets.

“The Indian mission in Russia has also assisted with the task of evacuation of mortal remains,” Singh said. “Once the mortal remains are shifted to a safe zone, the identification process involves matching of DNA samples with the next of kin.”

The discharge of Indian citizens is discussed bilaterally at several levels, including during interactions between leaders, ministers and officials, he added.

A Delhi court on Friday dismissed an interim bail petition of jailed Lok Sabha MP Abdul Rashid Sheikh to meet his father, who is critically ill, PTI reported.

Sheikh, who is popularly known as Engineer Rashid, has been in jail since August 2019 in connection with a terror-funding case filed by the National Investigation Agency.

He has been held under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act.

Sheikh had sought an interim bail, saying he needed to meet his critically ill father, who is hospitalised and is on a ventilator, the news agency reported.

The National Investigating Agency opposed the plea, saying that he can meet his father even on custody parole.

Custody parole entails a prisoner being escorted by armed police personnel to his place of visit.

In July 2024, Sheikh was granted custody parole for two hours to take the oath in Parliament. He had contested and won the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Baramulla while in jail, defeating National Conference leader Omar Abdullah.

He was also released from Delhi’s Tihar jail in October to allow him to campaign for the Assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir.

The Bharatiya Janata Party’s former national president Ram Madhav on Friday said that he was “factually incorrect” when he remarked that India had stopped buying oil from Russia and Iran to ensure good relations with the United States.

During a panel discussion titled “New paths forward for the US-India relationship” held in Washington, Madhav said that New Delhi had taken the decision to halt the oil trade with Iran and Russia despite “much criticism” from the Opposition parties.

“India agreed to a 50% tariff without saying too much,” he said. “So, where exactly is India not doing enough to work with America?”

Former diplomat Elizabeth Threlkeld and US Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell were also part of the panel. It was unclear when the discussion was held.

After videos of the discussion were shared on social media, the Congress on Friday claimed that Madhav’s statements were proof that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was US President Donald Trump’s “puppet”.

“It’s obvious – Narendra Modi is completely compromised, and the country is paying the price for it,” alleged the Congress.

मोदी और उनकी सरकार के सरेंडर की कहानी BJP के वरिष्ठ नेता राम माधव बता रहे हैं 👇

• हमने ईरान से तेल लेना बंद किया
• हमने रूस से तेल लेना बंद किया
• हमने 50% टैरिफ पर कुछ न कहा
• हमने 18% टैरिफ भी झेल लिया, जो एवरेज से बहुत ज्यादा है
• इन सब के लिए विपक्ष की आलोचना भी झेली… pic.twitter.com/KOXKoNJH5q

— Congress (@INCIndia) April 24, 2026

Party MP Shama Mohamed said that Madhav’s remarks confirm the Opposition’s charge that Modi “compromised India’s interests to please the Trump administration”.

Later in the day, Madhav said what he had said was “wrong”.

“India didn’t agree to stopping import of oil from Russia anytime,” he said. “Also it vigorously protested 50% tariff imposition. I was trying to make a limited counterpoint to the other panellist. But factually incorrect. My apologies.”

What I said was wrong. India didn’t agree to stopping import of oil from Russia anytime. Also it vigorously protested 50 percent tariff imposition. I was trying to make a limited counterpoint to d other panelist. But factually incorrect. My apologies. https://t.co/D3VNkYJ7pU

— Ram Madhav (@rammadhav_) April 24, 2026

Indian goods had been facing a combined US tariff rate of 50%, including a punitive levy of 25% imposed in August for buying Russian oil.

The US had repeatedly alleged that India’s purchases of Russian oil helped fuel the war in Ukraine, while New Delhi had maintained that its oil purchases were aimed at ensuring its own energy security.

On February 7, Trump issued an executive order to remove the additional 25% punitive tariff on imports from India over New Delhi’s purchase of Russian oil. This brought the effective US tariff rate on Indian imports to 18% after the interim trade deal was agreed to.

Gerrymandering is the act of redrawing the boundaries of political constituencies in a way that gives the ruling party a clear advantage over its rivals. The term, which originated in the United States, entered mainstream political discourse in India last week when the Modi government convened a special session of Parliament to push for early delimitation in the name of implementing women’s reservation.

The bills were defeated. But the threat of gerrymandering is real, as we know from the case of Assam.

The state saw a delimitation exercise in 2023 which altered political boundaries in a way that led to absurd outcomes: one panchayat, for instance, is now represented by two MPs and three MLAs.

The larger impact was that Muslim representation in the state shrunk with the Bharatiya Janata Party acquiring a permanent edge over its rivals.

In this episode of True Story, Scroll’s Executive Editor Supriya Sharma and reporter Rokibuz Zaman pore over constituency maps in Assam to explain what changed and how.

Sugar-free products with sugar. ‘Real’ juices with artificial ingredients. Misleading food ads are fuelling a public health crisis in India. Help Scroll expose the systemic failure. Support our investigation.

The Aam Aadmi Party’s legislature party in the Rajya Sabha was splitting and a faction was merging with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, said AAP MP Raghav Chadha. Chadha claimed that two-thirds of the AAP’s members in the Upper House of Parliament were supporting him.

The announcement was made at a press conference alongside AAP MPs Sandeep Pathak and Ashok Mittal. Other AAP MPs Harbhajan Singh, Rajinder Gupta, Vikram Sahney and Swati Maliwal were supporting the decision to merge with the BJP, Chadha claimed. The AAP had 10 members in the Rajya Sabha before the split. It has three MPs in the Lok Sabha.

AAP leader Sanjay Singh said that the seven MPs had “backstabbed the people of Punjab”. Read on.

The Supreme Court was informed that 65 election duty officers are among persons deleted from West Bengal's voter lists during the special intensive revision of the electoral rolls. Their counsel told the court that while the officers’ duty orders mention their Electors’ Photo Identity Card numbers, “now those numbers are deleted”.

However, the bench told the petitioners to approach the appellate tribunal against their exclusion.

The court also said that if persons whose names were deleted from voter lists are able to make a case showing urgency, the appellate tribunals may give them out-of-turn hearings. The second phase of polling in Bengal will be held on April 29. Read on.

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said that the Opposition parties have submitted a fresh notice in Rajya Sabha seeking a motion to remove Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. Ramesh added that there are “nine specific charges” against Kumar that cannot be “whitewashed”.

The notice was signed by 73 MPs. On April 6, Rajya Sabha Chairman CP Radhakrishnan and Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla rejected notices submitted by Opposition MPs seeking the removal of Kumar. They had not provided reasons for their decision. Read on.

The Mumbai Police said that a complaint has been filed against a woman who confronted Bharatiya Janata Party leader Girish Mahajan and police personnel for blocking a road during a protest march on Tuesday. However, it said no first information report has been registered in the matter.

The incident had taken place when the protest by the state's ruling Mahayuti coalition led to traffic congestion in the Worli area.

The woman, whose identity is unclear, reportedly stepped out of her vehicle, and was heard asking Mahajan, a state minister, and police officers not to block the road and protest at a ground instead. Read on.

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Seven of the 10 Aam Aadmi Party MPs in Rajya Sabha were merging with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, Raghav Chadha said on Friday.

Chadha claimed that two-thirds of the AAP’s members in the Upper House of Parliament were supporting him.

He made the announcement at a press conference alongside AAP MPs Sandeep Pathak and Ashok Mittal. However, he claimed that other AAP MPs Harbhajan Singh, Rajinder Gupta, Vikram Sahney and Swati Maliwal were supporting the decision to merge with the BJP.

Before the split, the AAP had 10 members in the Rajya Sabha. The party has three MPs in the Lok Sabha.

“The AAP, which I nurtured with my blood and sweat, and gave 15 years of my youth to, has deviated from its principles, values and core morals,” Chadha told reporters. “Now this party does not work in the interest of the nation but for its personal benefits...For the past few years, I could feel that I am the right man in the wrong party.”

Chadha said that he was “distancing” himself from AAP.

A letter expressing their intent to merge with the BJP’s legislature party had been submitted to the Rajya Sabha chairperson, he added.

The split came just over a week after the Enforcement Directorate on April 15 conducted raids at the home of Mittal, as well as several other premises linked to him in Punjab and Haryana, in connection with alleged foreign exchange violations.

The searches had been conducted two weeks after Mittal replaced Chadha on April 2 as the party’s deputy leader in the Rajya Sabha.

Chadha had been removed as the party’s deputy leader in the Upper House following his alleged absence from recent party activities.

He had also not publicly reacted after a Delhi court in February cleared former Chief Minister and party chief Arvind Kejriwal, and former Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and 21 others in the Delhi excise policy case.

Sanjay Singh, the leader of the AAP legislature party in the Rajya Sabha, said that the seven MPs who were joining the BJP had “backstabbed the people of Punjab”. Except Maliwal, all other MPs had been elected from Punjab, where the AAP is in power.

The BJP has launched “Operation Lotus” to “obstruct the good work of the Bhagwant Mann government” in Punjab, he added.

“Operation Lotus” is a term used by Opposition parties to describe alleged attempts by the BJP to break away their legislators or topple Opposition governments in states.

It may be premature to talk about what happens to the Gulf after the US-Israel war on Iran. But that doesn’t mean officials and analysts connected to the Gulf haven’t begun thinking about what comes next.

“There’s the belief in the Gulf that, after the war, it’s impossible to come back to the status quo that prevailed before,” says Jean-Loup Samaan, senior research fellow at the Middle East Institute of the National University of Singapore and a non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and the Institut Montaigne. “In the short-term, it seems clear that the six Gulf states are not going to revise their arrangements with the US… They are faced with a difficult reality: There is no external partner that can replace the Americans, and they don’t have sufficient indigenous capabilities to tell the Americans, ‘we don’t need you anymore. We’re going to handle our security.’”

Embedded within that scenario planning is the question of which actors – including South Asian ones – are going to be important players in calculations on either side of the Gulf over the next decade.

“One interesting and unanticipated development is this revived role of Pakistan [though] it has its limitations,” says Samaan. “I would see the mediation of Pakistan in this conflict in a negative light actually. What it represents is a lack of critical actors when it comes to this conflict. Because China was reluctant to play a major role. We saw that they barely invested in mediation. They came up with a very general five-point plan. Russia cannot play that role. The Europeans cannot, because they are considered too weak or too close to the US. So, the only actors left were regional actors.”

As for New Delhi: “One of the reasons that the Gulf states have difficulties seeing India as a credible strategic player is that India maintains confusion regarding its priorities in the Middle East… there is no Indian narrative for its regional policy.”

Much of Samaan’s research speaks directly to the current moment. He is a former research advisor at the NATO Defense College and associate professor in strategic studies with the United Arab Emirates National Defense College. He is the author of New Military Strategies in the Gulf: The Mirage of Autonomy in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar. He has a forthcoming volume on the history of Israel’s military strategy.

And, as recently as December 2025, Samaan wrote a piece for the Atlantic Council titled, “Is India losing clout in the Gulf?” – presaging some of the debates now consuming India about what Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s heavy investment in the Gulf has brought the country, alongside the surprising role being played by Pakistan, which New Delhi has long sought to isolate internationally (note External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar’s recent comment about India not being a “dalal nation” unlike its next-door neighbour).

I spoke to Samaan the day after news of the ceasefire broke to talk about his analysis of what comes after this war, no matter how the negotiations go, why the UAE-Saudi rift and Iran’s desire to isolate Abu Dhabi will play a big role in regional calculations, and why he thinks IMEC (and therefore India’s main strategic idea for the region) is in the “past tense”.

It feels like all of your research really brings us to this moment – the strategic planning of Gulf states and the “mirage of autonomy”, the involvement of Asian and especially South Asian powers, how Israel plays into it. I wanted to start off with the big picture. Any initial thoughts about the ceasefire?

There are a lot of unknowns. It’s unclear if it can hold with regards to Lebanon. What is clear to me is that this US administration is desperate to find an honourable exit. Apart from that, right now, the Iranian regime feels emboldened, confident that it has the upper hand. And that means probably very strong demands from them.

The ceasefire is a positive development, especially for civilian populations. But diplomatically, militarily, there’s a lot – if not everything – that is unanswerable right now.

Are there misconceptions, things that everyone – especially the media – is getting wrong about this conflict, about this moment?

There are some problems with any media coverage of a conflict. The first one is that the news cycle is always hungry for the latest developments. If a conflict lasts more than two weeks these days, it’s called a “quagmire” That’s a major analytical mistake, because, apart from limited wars with one technical goal, there are no conflicts in history that last only a few days.

The second – and this is not just the media, I include everyone on this – we tend to listen to Trump instead of focusing on what is actually happening on the battlefield. If you look at the last two-three weeks, everything in terms of the news cycle was chasing Trump’s statements. The crazier the statement, the more central it was to news coverage.

As a result, it felt like there was nothing going on in terms of airstrikes, military activities. We almost forgot about the deployment of ground forces, about the speculation of occupation of islands.

There’s a phenomenon around the communication of Trump that makes everyone almost forget that those words are not the main thing. The main thing is actually the military action, which was in many ways unprecedented in terms of the intensity of the firepower that the Americans deployed against Iran.

You are one of the few folks who is not only commenting on the Gulf, but you spent time there – teaching at the UAE National Defense College from 2016-2021 – you’ve studied it closely. Has coverage of the Gulf been too simplistic?

Yes. Especially in the first few weeks, there was all this interest in the Western media, that was connected to all the misconceptions that you usually hear, about Dubai in particular. A lot of the media coverage of Iranian missile and drone attacks on the Gulf almost read like a cautionary tale, a way for the Western commentators to say, “look, we always knew that Dubai was unsustainable, now we have the ultimate evidence”.

I didn’t feel there was a strong understanding, apart from those who were from or based in the region, of the social and psychological impact the war has had on Gulf citizens and residents. And that’s something that will last beyond the war.

That takes us to the after. You’ve thought about this and written about it at length. You’ve pointed out that the “Gulf” encompasses multiple players with independent approaches. In light of the ceasefire –which didn’t really seem to mention the interest of the Gulf – what does the after look like from various Gulf capitals?

In the short-term, it seems clear that the six Gulf states are not going to revise their arrangements with the US. I say in the short-term because the security situation is such that they have no credible options. Even though they didn’t want this war, even though they don’t really trust the US administrations, in general, and particularly this one, they are faced with a difficult reality: There is no external partner that can replace the Americans, and they don’t have sufficient indigenous capabilities to tell the Americans, “we don’t need you anymore. We’re going to handle our security.”

So, in the short-term, I think they will keep it this way. Some of them, in particular the UAE, will even deepen security arrangements with the US, thinking that that’s the most viable strategy.

Then – and this I have no proof of, this is purely speculation – some of these countries might be interested in reducing the public display of US presence. The countries with the biggest American military presence – like Kuwait, like Qatar, and not in the next six months but in the next two to five years – they might reduce the permanent presence will maintaining military cooperation like training and procurement.

I live in Singapore, so this is an example I have in mind. Singapore is a close partner of the US and has lots of military initiatives with the US, but there is no US military base in Singapore. Some Gulf states might be tempted to follow that model among others.

As you said, one thing for sure is, I don’t believe we’ll see closer coordination among the six member states of the GCC. After the initial expression of solitary among them, very quickly we saw explicitly different ways of conducting foreign policy. If you look at Oman, the UAE, these are very different foreign policies, and this will remain the case even after the ceasefire.

After the Israeli airstrike on Qatar in 2025, there was a sense that the fear in the region was what happens in a period where the US withdraws and the region has, to some extent, Israeli hegemony. Has that been complicated now by how resilient Iran has been in this war, and how it has emerged, especially with its control over Hormuz? From a more scholarly point of view, now, what is the security architecture of the region?

To be blunt, there is no security architecture. It’s an intellectual construct. We don’t have any robust mechanism to manage the conflicts of the Gulf, and I can even extend that to the Middle East. The only credible actor at a regional level – the GCC – has never been able to solve internal disputes among its members. The case in point being the blockade of Qatar from 2017 to 2020. As a result, you don’t have a security architecture. Each of the states has its own foreign policy arrangements, with the US, with China, with India. There’s no coordination of these types of relations. And it’s the same at the regional level – with Iran, with Israel. It’s six different foreign policies.

You have the UAE, which is an exception on this, which has very open, very dense relations with Israel. But that’s it. Even Bahrain, which recognised Israel [in the Abraham Accords], has lesser, more discrete relations with Israel. The rest of the Gulf states have been very reluctant, to this day, to recognise Israel.

So, for many reasons and unfortunately, we can’t talk of a security architecture.

I was going back to a piece from 2014 that you wrote, called “The Ties that Do Not Bind”, which talks about the limits of South Asia-Gulf rapprochement, primarily Pakistan and India’s involvement with the Gulf. Last year, you wrote about India “losing clout” in the Gulf. I have been a bit surprised at how central of a role Pakistan is playing in this, and I’m curious how you see that.

I also share your surprise. Ten years ago, the impression in the Gulf was very different. In 2016, remember, Pakistan had decided not to join the Saudi coalition in Yemen, and as a result, relations were quite difficult between the Saudis, the Emiratis and Pakistan. Everything then was about India. Modi was just starting to be this “strong man” that the Gulf leaders loved. So if you take that forward, it looks very surprising.

But there are three elements to note. The first is the pact between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan last year, showing Pakistan was still able to maintain close ties with Riyadh. This is the specificity of the Pakistani political system. I suspect relations were difficult with the civilians, but not the Pakistani military. And the pact that was signed reflected that.

The second is the Trump effect. I don’t know if it is a well-designed strategy or a strategy by accident, but Trump found a way to create tensions with India, because of its ties to Russia, but while doing that he also restored the international image of Pakistan. When the chief of the Pakistani Army [Field Marshall Asim Munir] visited Washington, DC he had a meeting with Trump. There aren’t a lot of army chiefs that have had that honour. That has created fresh momentum for Pakistan.

The last, which complicates things for India is that there is pressure for Gulf states to distance themselves from Pakistan. There’s the belief that India is not at the moment a major power at the level of China or the US – maybe it will be in the future – but it is not at the moment, and so the Gulf states do not have to navigate its sensitivities. I think the Saudi-Pakistani pact was the first time that India went public and said something about Riyadh needing to be mindful of its sensitivities. But prior to that, the Gulf states honestly didn’t care how India would perceive their interactions with Pakistan or even China.

To go back to your point: One interesting and unanticipated development is this revived role of Pakistan. It has its limitations. I don’t think Pakistan can suddenly become a major actor, because it is still vulnerable, it still heavily depends on financial support from countries such as Saudi Arabia.

Is Pakistani involvement coming from a place of anxiety and necessity, that it will be dragged into this, given it already has a hot front with Afghanistan, and India on the other side? Remember, Pakistan and Iran were lobbing missiles at each other two years ago. Or is it coming out of a space of strength? Did the pact generate leverage that pushed Pakistan to be more involved?

Honestly, I don’t think the pact matters so much at the operational, military level. I don’t think the Saudis or Pakistanis would seriously consider a scenario where, even now with the conflict with Iran, you would have a situation where Pakistan sends troops to support Saudi Arabia. The pact had more meaning in signalling Saudi Arabia’s frustration with the US, the idea that Saudi Arabia has different options, and at the same time, that Pakistan is an actor that matters. I would almost disconnect the pact from mediation efforts.

I would see the mediation of Pakistan in this conflict in a negative light actually. What it represents is a lack of critical actors when it comes to this conflict. Because China was reluctant to play a major role. We saw that they barely invested in mediation. They came up with a very general five-point plan. Russia cannot play that role. The Europeans cannot, because they are considered too weak or too close to the US.

So, the only actors left were regional actors, which are in one way or another maintaining ties with different parts of this conflict: Turkey, Pakistan. But I don’t think this meant that Pakistan is getting stronger. It’s a situation where it’s difficult to find credible mediators, and we’ll have to see if the ceasefire holds. That’s also one of the reasons I’m sceptical about the current framework.

You’ve written – in December 2025, before this war – about how, in your “discussions with Gulf officials and intellectuals, India is rarely mentioned in their strategic equation”. I wanted to ask about Modi going to Israel right before the attacks began, and what has happened sense.

Is there a sense, from those you’re talking to, that India has picked a camp in the Gulf? And two, even more so now since the war, is there a sense that India is not relevant strategically, especially with Pakistan playing an important role?

The response would be very different from one Gulf state to another. Honestly, right now, the only Gulf state that considers India as a serious, credible strategy partner is the UAE. If you look at other countries – Saudi Arabia or Qatar – that they go beyond the idea that India is a trade partner that matters. Only the UAE, right now, has ambitions at the strategic level with India.

For the first part of the question, which was more about the perception of India in the region. One of the reasons that the Gulf states have difficulties seeing India as a credible strategic player is that India maintains confusion regarding its priorities in the Middle East. I can understand the bilateral relations of India with each of these countries – energy, trade, defence cooperation, it makes sense.

But there is no Indian narrative for its regional policy. And whether we like it or not, there is a China narrative for the Middle East – which is that, “we are not here to get into local disputes. We are here to make business, to sign trade deals, and that’s it. Mutual prosperity.” It has its limitations, but it is, I think a compelling narrative, especially after three years of war in the region.

The US has a narrative. It might not be popular these days, but it has one. I don’t see that for India. The only narrative I can find is this idea of multi-alignment. But multi-alignment doesn’t say much in terms of how you see the priorities for your foreign policy in the region. As a result, that undermines the perception of India as a strategic player that matters in the region.

That’s one of the reasons why countries like Saudi Arabia, don’t dismiss India, but they will politely ignore India in their strategic assessment.

To prod you on that, what do you make of IMEC – the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor? The idea that India can be pivotal with the Europeans, the Americans and the Israelis in bringing prosperity through logistical centrality. You don’t see that as the role of Indian strategy to the region?

It was. But I would use the past-tense. Because IMEC and I2U@ were initiatives mostly launched by the previous US administration, Biden’s presidency, with the idea that India was to become the new regional power that would help the US in building the security architecture that we were discussing.

Over the last year of the Trump presidency, there hasn’t been much on IMEC, apart from what the Europeans or the Indians or the Emiratis have said, there hasn’t been much. I honestly have the impression that this is no longer a topic in Washington. And with the latest conflict, even if we assume the war is over with Iran, I don’t think this will be the top priority.

A lot of this has nothing to do in a way with India, it has a lot to do with American politics and local politics. Keep in mind that IMEC was supposed to rely on both Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Both of them have been distancing themselves from each other over the last two-three years. Even after this war, I doubt that Riyadh and Abu Dhabi will have warmer relations just because of IMEC.

That also complicates the initiatives where India was supposed to be a major player.

We noted, in fact, last year, when Trump visited the Gulf, he made no mention of IMEC. You mentioned the Saudi-UAE rift. You mentioned the UAE getting closer to the US. Pakistan in its messaging has not taken into account the UAE. How do you see, from a strategic standpoint, the right playing out – especially if Iran continues to control Hormuz?

The dispute between the UAE and Saudi Arabia is not a recent crisis. It is deeply rooted in the bilateral relations. There has always been suspicion between the ruling families in Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. If you look at the history of relations between the two countries, they were more often difficult than easy. There was a honeymoon for almost 10 years between the moment Mohammad bin Salman became the crown prince in Riyadh and the last two years. This was mostly a marriage of convenience for several reasons that had to do with a common desire to put pressure on Qatar, Turkey… but that was it.

There were always lingering issues, border disputes, business competition, especially with Saudi desire to raise its profile as a place that attracts foreign investors. That’s not going to disappear.

One thing we can expect in the short term, is that they will try as much as possible to maintain that under the radar. There’s no appetite in either country to publicise and inflate this, to create a crisis. There might have been before the war, but for the moment, I think they will keep it under the radar. I’m not expecting there will be great relations, but at least they will try to manage those tensions away from the public eye.

Having said that, you mentioned Iran. One thing that is quite significant for the future of Gulf politics is that fact that Iran, during the war, tried as much as possible to isolate the UAE. For a while it was one of the biggest targets of Iranian attacks, and the narrative I heard many times in the region was that Iran targets the UAE, not just because it has US military presence, but because it has close ties with Israel.

This will also shape the evolution of Gulf politics. Because I can imagine the Iranian regime continuing with that strategy, even without military means. By propaganda, diplomatic rhetoric, other means, to push the idea that the UAE is destabilising the region, because it has those relations with Israel and the US. And this might feed the tensions among Gulf states.

With Iran flexing its muscles, its ability to under the very basis of these economies, and the understanding that Trump will eventually look away, or eventually there won’t be a Trump… what happens next? Are these states going to become little Spartas? Can they? Are they going to find a detente with Iran? In five years time, will we see a fundamental reshaping of the Gulf, or do you imagine it’ll go back to what it was, with a few arrangements on the margins?

It’s hard to say. In the short-term, I don’t expect major changes. But right now, there’s the belief in the Gulf that, after the war, it’s impossible to come back to the status quo that prevailed before. That has implications for relations with Iran and with the US. One thing we have to keep in mind, is that the US may leave, but Iran is still going to remain in the Gulf. That will constrain the strategic calculus.

Some of those Gulf states, particularly Oman and Qatar will try as much as possible to build ties with Iran, partly out of necessity. But at the end of the day, even when there was a deescalation process between Gulf states and Iran in the last five years, there was never any illusion that they could have good relations. If you look at the Saudi-Iranian deal of 2023, this was basically a non-aggression pact. Both states agreed to reopen their embassies but there was not much behind that.

What I see in coming years is the US will stay a significant player. But, in the case of Saudi Arabia and the UAE, there will probably be a great interest in strategic autonomy, meaning modernising their armed forces. But, if we exclude Saudi Arabia which is, in terms of size, the only strong, credible regional actor here, the rest are a collection of small states. Meaning, they have no strategic depth, limited demography, and as a result, it’s very difficult for them to consider their security without external partners.

Even in the case of the UAE, arrangements with foreign partners will remain key. They may diversify more and more. This means that this will be more volatile, more complex, but at the end of the day, I don’t see that in five years time, the US will be gone and these countries will rely on their own armed forces. I don’t think that’s their objective.

This article was first published on India Inside Out.

The Opposition parties on Friday submitted a fresh notice in Rajya Sabha seeking a motion to remove Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar on grounds of “proven misbehaviour”, said Congress leader Jairam Ramesh in a social media post.

The notice was signed by 73 MPs, Ramesh added.

“There are now nine specific charges against the [chief election commissioner] that have been documented in great detail and that simply cannot be denied or whitewashed away,” said the Rajya Sabha MP. “His continuation is an assault on the Constitution.”

73 Opposition MPs in the Rajya Sabha have just submitted to its Secretary General a fresh Notice of Motion for presenting an Address to the President of India praying for the removal of Shri Gyanesh Kumar, Chief Election Commissioner of India, on the ground of proven misbehaviour…

— Jairam Ramesh (@Jairam_Ramesh) April 24, 2026

On April 6, Rajya Sabha Chairman CP Radhakrishnan and Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla rejected notices submitted by Opposition MPs seeking the removal of Kumar.

Radhakrishnan and Birla did not provide reasons for their decision.

The notices, submitted on March 12, were signed by 63 members of the Rajya Sabha and 130 Lok Sabha MPs, meeting the minimum requirement for such motions.

The removal process for the chief election commissioner follows the same procedure as that for judges of the Supreme Court and High Courts.

An impeachment motion is required to be signed by 100 Lok Sabha MPs or 50 Rajya Sabha members. If the motion is admitted in both Houses, a three-member committee investigates the matter. A vote is conducted in Parliament on the impeachment if the panel finds misconduct. If the motion gets two-thirds of the votes, the president is advised to remove the election commissioner.

The Mumbai Police on Friday said that a complaint has been filed against a woman who confronted Bharatiya Janata Party leader Girish Mahajan and police personnel for blocking a road during a protest march on Tuesday, PTI reported.

The complaint was filed at the Worli police station on Wednesday by a person.

The police said on Friday that no first information report had been registered against the woman.

The incident had taken place when the protest by the ruling Mahayuti coalition in the state led to traffic congestion in the Worli area. The protest was to be held at the Jambori Maidan.

The woman reportedly stepped out of her vehicle, and was heard asking Mahajan, a state minister, and police officers not to block the road and protest at a ground instead.

The woman, whose identity is unclear, said that she had been stuck in the traffic and had to pick up her child. She told a police officer that she had been waiting in traffic for more than an hour.

When Mahajan asked her to calm down, the woman asked him to “get out of here”.

“What is wrong with you?” she had asked. “There are hundreds of people waiting. There’s an empty ground there.”

She asked the police to clear the traffic.

In August, the Maharashtra government had designated Azad Maidan as the only venue for all protests in South Mumbai.

The woman had been praised by social media users.

On Wednesday, Mahajan said that the woman was not wrong, IANS reported. However, he said that a protest march such as this, irrespective of the organiser, “has to move from one place to another”, which would mean that the “road is bound to be blocked”.

“Some inconvenience is inevitable in any protest,” he added. “Still, there is a proper way to express anger and I feel the language used was inappropriate.”

The complainant claimed that the woman created a ruckus, used abusive language against police officers, obstructed the protest march and caused public disturbance, PTI reported.

“You have problems, you have a total constitutional provision to go and file a complaint,” ANI quoted the complainant as saying.

The complainant has sought that an FIR be registered against the woman under sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to obstructing public servants on duty, assault or criminal force to deter public servant from discharge of his duty, intentional insult, assaulting or obstructing public servant and statements conducing to public mischief, PTI reported.

On Wednesday, Mumbai Mayor Ritu Tawde, who belongs to the BJP, expressed regret for the inconvenience caused to commuters during the rally.

The BJP protest march

The BJP on Tuesday was protesting against the Opposition for defeating a constitutional amendment bill in Parliament on April 17. The ruling party claimed that the Opposition was against women’s interests because it stood against what the BJP describes as the women’s reservation bill.

The 2026 Constitution 131st Amendment Bill, one of three draft legislations, was defeated in the Lok Sabha. As a constitutional amendment bill, it required a two-thirds majority of votes to pass. The ruling National Democratic Alliance does not have a two-thirds majority of MPs in any House and had required the support of the Opposition to pass the amendment.

Opposition parties have maintained that they supported the amendments to the Women’s Reservation Act, but were opposed to the proposed delimitation of electoral constituencies.

Watch: Mumbai woman confronts BJP leader for blocking road for protest

The Supreme Court was told on Friday that among those deleted from the electoral rolls of West Bengal after the special intensive revision of the lists are 65 election duty officers, reported Bar and Bench.

Their counsel, Senior Advocate MR Shamshad told a bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant, and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi that the officers’ duty orders mention their Electors’ Photo Identity Card numbers.

“Now those numbers are deleted [from the rolls],” he was quoted as saying. “This is, on the face arbitrary.”

However, the bench told the petitioners to approach the appellate tribunal.

“This election, yes, perhaps they cannot vote,” Bar and Bench quoted the court as saying. “The more valuable right to remain on the rolls shall be preserved.”

Tribunals will grant ‘out-of-turn’ hearings: SC

The Supreme Court also said that if persons whose names were deleted from the West Bengal electoral rolls are able to make a case of urgency, the appellate tribunals may give them out-of-turn hearings, reported Live Law.

“If matter requires judicial intervention, petitioner or similarly placed persons can approach the High Court on judicial side,” added the bench.

This came after advocate Kalyan Bandopadhyay told the court that only 136 voters out of the 27 lakh whose appeals were pending before the appellate tribunal were added to the electoral rolls before the cut-off date for the first phase of the elections in West Bengal.

The approval rate for the appeals was 98.5% as only 138 cases had been decided on by the tribunals as part of the special intensive revision of electoral rolls. The remaining two appeals were rejected.

“We need most speedy disposal in these matters,” Live Law quoted Bandopadhyay as telling the court.

In response, the chief justice said that the persons can raise the matter before the Calcutta High Court chief justice.

Polling in 152 of West Bengal’s 294 constituencies was held on Thursday, with the state reporting record 91.8% voter turnout till 6 pm, showed data from the Election Commission.

Voting in the remaining seats in West Bengal will be held on April 29 and the results will be announced on May 4.

About 34 lakh appeals were reportedly pending before the tribunals. Of these, seven lakh were against names being included in the rolls and 27 lakh were filed by persons who were excluded.

On April 16, the Supreme Court directed the Election Commission to publish a supplementary electoral roll in West Bengal to include voters whose appeals against deletions have been accepted by the appellate tribunals.

The court had said that persons whose appeals have been cleared by the tribunals before April 21 should be included for voting in the first phase of Assembly elections. Those who are cleared by April 27 should be included in the final electoral rolls for the second phase of the polls.

All decisions made by the tribunals on the addition and deletion of voters by those dates must be reflected in the final voter lists.

This came after the Election Commission froze the electoral rolls for the first phase of polling on April 9.

SIR appellate tribunals

The Election Commission on February 28 published the final electoral roll for West Bengal, showing that more than 61 lakh voters had been excluded. However, the process had continued with about 60 lakh “doubtful and pending” cases remaining under adjudication based on their objections to their exclusions from the draft rolls published in December.

Several supplementary lists were released, in which the names of more voters have been included.

The process had concluded on April 6 after judicial officers adjudicated the 60 lakh claims and objections. However, voters who were removed during the adjudication process can appeal in 19 tribunals set up for the purpose.

On February 20, the Supreme Court ordered that judicial officers of the rank of district judge or additional district judge be appointed to help complete the revision exercise in the state.

On March 10, the top court ordered the formation of appellate tribunals composed of former High Court chief justices and judges to hear appeals against exclusions. A person whose claim for inclusion in the electoral rolls has been rejected by a judicial officer can approach the tribunal.

Nearly 91 lakh voters have been removed from West Bengal’s voter lists as part of the special intensive revision of the electoral rolls. The deletions represent nearly 11.9% of the state’s electorate of 7.6 crore that existed before the revision process began.

Also read: Bengal goes to the polls today, but lakhs of voters, including my family, don’t count

India is projected to have 313 billionaires and more than 25,200 ultra-high net worth individuals by 2031, according to a study by global property management firm Knight Frank.

India currently has 207 billionaires and 19,877 ultra-high net worth individuals, the study showed.

The firm defines ultra-high net worth individuals as persons having assets valued at $30 million, or Rs 283 crore, or more.

The study published on Thursday said that “rapid domestic wealth creation is reshaping the top end of the [property] market, particularly in Mumbai”.

This comes even as the 2026 World Inequality Report released in December showed that India is one of the most unequal countries in the world, with the top 1% of the population holding 40% of the wealth.

Inequality in India has shown no signs of reduction in recent years, the findings of the study published by the World Inequality Lab had shown.

The richest 10% hold about 65% of the total wealth, it had said.

Five of the richest families in India saw their wealth increase by 400% between 2019 and 2025, according to the 2026 Wealth Tracker India study published by non-profit organisation Centre for Financial Accountability and Tax The Top campaign on April 1.

The study said that the share of the bottom 50% in the country’s wealth stagnated at 6.4% by 2024.

The All India Muslim Personal Law Board on Thursday told the Supreme Court that there is no bar in Islam on Muslim women visiting mosques, The Indian Express reported.

However, they cannot demand entry through the main door of the mosque, or not to have a barrier inside separating them from the men, the board told a bench hearing a case involving constitutional questions related to the entry of women into Kerala’s Sabarimala temple and discrimination at other religious places.

The case before the Supreme Court stems from a September 2018 verdict of a five-judge Constitution bench which had, by a 4:1 majority, lifted a ban on women of menstruating age from entering the Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala.

Petitions seeking the entry of women into mosques and offering prayers have been tagged along with the Sabarimala reference due to constitutional questions related to the right to practice religion and the right of religious denominations to manage their internal affairs, Live Law reported. A nine-judge bench headed by Chief Justice Surya Kant is hearing the matter.

On Thursday, advocate MR Shamshad, for the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, was replying to the petitions on the entry of women into mosques, Live Law reported. During the proceedings, the chief justice sought clarity on whether women are allowed to enter the religious sites.

“There is no quarrel among the religious denominations in Muslims that women can enter into mosques,” The Indian Express quoted Shamshad as saying. “And that too for prayer… But there is certain discipline that has to be followed.”

Shamshad said that it is mandatory for men to take part in congregational prayers, but it is not mandatory for women.

Justice Ahsanuddin Amanullah said that the reason for it not being mandatory for women to visit mosques is that they may be needed at home “to look after the children” when others go for prayers, The Indian Express reported.

Shamshad also said that the board has no problem with women entering mosques, petitions seeking directions “to permit Islamic women to enter through main door, have an Islamic right to visual and auditory access to Musallah [main sanctuary]” and “to pray in the Musallah without being separated by barrier” deserve to be rejected.

The lawyer also said that there is no concept of a sanctum sanctorum in a mosque.

“If there is no sanctum sanctorum inside the mosque, then nobody can insist to stand at a particular place or, for that matter, to be the first to lead the namaz,” Live Law quoted him as saying.

At one point, Amanullah also asked the advocate to “elaborate for everybody’s consumption that right from the beginning, there is also no dispute [that women can enter], that it started from the holy Prophet [Mohammed] himself”, The Indian Express reported.

In response, the advocate said that the prophet himself had said that women should not be stopped from coming to the mosque, Live Law reported.

“There is clarity on this,” the legal news portal quoted Shamshad as saying. “And many of those who have recorded the hadith in many volumes have recorded this narration that the prophet instructed that don’t stop women coming to the mosque.”

A hadith is a recorded report of the sayings, actions, or silent approvals of the Prophet Muhammad.

The advocate also claimed that the doctrine of essential religious practice has been wrongly applied by the courts in the context of Islam.

Noting that Islam is a thoroughly written religion with some acts being categorised as forbidden and others as required or recommended, Shamshad added that the practices of the religion often failed the essential religious practice doctrine because they did not appear mandatory to the courts.

The hearings will continue next week.

The nine-judge bench has been asked to examine the interplay between freedom of religion granted under Articles 25 and 26 of Constitution and other provisions, especially in Article 14, that grant right to equality before the law and equal protection of the laws.

The bench has been asked to determine whether the rights of a denomination to manage its religious affairs under Article 26 are subject to any other provisions of Part III the Constitution apart from public order, morality and health. Part III of the Constitution deals with fundamental rights.

The Gauhati High Court on Friday rejected Congress leader Pawan Khera’s petition seeking anticipatory bail in a case registered against him by the Assam Police, Bar and Bench reported.

The police have filed a case of defamation, forgery and criminal conspiracy against Khera based on a complaint by Riniki Bhuyan Sarma, wife of Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma.

Justice Parthivjyoti Saikia had reserved his verdict on Khera’s anticipatory bail petition on April 21, according to Bar and Bench. He rejected the petition on Friday.

Riniki Bhuyan Sarma had filed a complaint against the Congress leader after he claimed on April 5 that he had documentary evidence showing she holds passports of the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Antigua and Barbuda. Both the chief minister and his wife denied the allegations. They also alleged that Khera’s claims were based on forged documents.

On April 10, the Telangana High Court granted Khera transit anticipatory bail for a week. Transit anticipatory bail is a temporary protection from arrest granted in one state to enable persons to approach the courts where the case has been filed.

However, the Supreme Court stayed the High Court order on April 15, and directed Khera to approach the Gauhati High Court instead.

Himanta Biswa Sarma alleged on April 6 that the documents cited by the Congress had been supplied by a Pakistani social media group.

The chief minister had also claimed that the Congress had used details from a passport that had been allegedly lost. This document, he claimed, had been uploaded to the Pakistani social media group.

The Indian government on Thursday described as “inappropriate” and “in poor taste” remarks made by an American political commentator, which were shared by United States President Donald Trump on social media, that termed India as being among “hellhole” countries.

“The remarks are obviously uninformed, inappropriate and in poor taste,” Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said. “They certainly do not reflect the reality of the India-US relationship, which has long been based on mutual respect and shared interests.”

The remarks were made by Michael Savage, an author and political commentator, on US-based TV channel Newsmax after hearings in the US Supreme Court about the case pertaining to birthright citizenship.

Birthright citizenship is the automatic acquisition of nationality by a child born within a country’s territory, regardless of their parents’ citizenship or immigration status.

Trump on Wednesday shared on social media the transcript of comments made by Savage about ending birthright citizenship in the US.

“A baby here becomes an instant citizen, and then they bring the entire family in from China or India or some other hellhole on the planet,” Savage claimed. “You don’t have to go far to see that. English is not spoken here anymore.”

Soon after the remarks were shared, a spokesperson at the US Embassy said: “The president [Trump] has said ‘India is a great country with a very good friend of mine at the top’,” The Indian Express reported.

Trump has long been a proponent of ending birthright citizenship in the US. In January 2025, Trump signed an executive order to stop automatically granting citizenship to those born in the US in specific scenarios.

Legal consensus, however, broadly holds that the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees birthright citizenship. The matter is being heard by the Supreme Court.

In his arguments, Savage said that a referendum must be held to determine if birthright citizenship should continue.

“Our nation is being overrun with Chinese coming here just to drop a baby on our shore then bring in the entire family,” he said. “How about some common sense in a bankrupt nation?”

Also read: India is a ‘hellhole’: Trump shares commentator’s views questioning US birthright citizenship

India is establishing a number of new institutions of higher education. Even as work is underway, there is a great deal of debate about the research output at existing elite institutions such as the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institutes of Management, which count among its alumni world famous business executives and scientists.

The Indian Institute of Science (IISc) is the top-ranked Indian university based on the quality and quantity of their research, according to the latest Scimago Institution Ranking World Reports, which assesses global universities based on research published in international journals. IISc features only at 386 in the list of more than 2,700 universities and has been sliding from its rank in previous years. Of the 16 IITs, only eight make it to the list – the seven oldest IITs feature between ranks 465 and 1,201. IIT Hyderabad is the only new IIT that makes the cut at the penultimate position (2,743).

Scimago assesses research every year over five-year periods from universities that have published at least 100 articles in international journals. The IIMs don’t even feature on the Scimago list. IIM Bangalore’s research output ranged between 39 and 78 articles a year during 2010-2013.

The six institutions that produce the best quality research in the country are non-IIT establishments, finds a soon-to-be-released study that uses Scimago data to track research performance within India. University of Delhi, Banaras Hindu University and Jadavpur University have as much research output as the IITs.

[JNCASR: Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research; TIFR: Tata Institute of Fundamental Research; NIPER: National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research; GRI: Gandhigram Rural Institute]

Gangan Prathap of the National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology, who conducted the analysis, observes that on the quality scale, ‘1’ is the global benchmark. “If you see top institutions abroad they will be scoring much higher than 1 on the quality indicator. Many of our institutions are just at the global average, which is not to say that they are doing very well,” he said.

Indeed, of the medical schools on the India list, three barely score 1 on quality. The other six languish below the global standard.

[PGIMER: Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh; SGPGI: Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Lucknow; CMC: Christian Medical College, Vellore; CSMMU: Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj Medical University, Lucknow; SCTIMST: Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology, Thiruvananthapuram; UCSM: University College of Medical Sciences, New Delhi]

The good news comes from private institutions that have raised their output and quality over the last five to six years. Gandhigram Rural Institute is now the 10th among government funded and private institutions in the country when it comes to quality of research.

“IISc and IITs have really huge budgets, Jadhavpur’s budget will be a fraction of that. Some of these private institutions, if they get budgets like the National Institutes of Technology, they will do much better,” Prathap said.

[VIT: Vellore Institute of Technology, Vellore; BITS: Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani; GRU: Gandhigram Rural University, Dindigul, Tamil Nadu]

With their large budgets, IISc and the oldest IITs still come up trumps in a composite analysis of volume and quality of research in the country. But the performance of these schools is only average at best on global rankings like the Academic Ranking of World Universities and the QS World University Rankings.

This post originally appeared on Qz.com.

United States President Donald Trump on Wednesday shared on social media the transcript of remarks made by an American political commentator about birthright citizenship in the US that described India as being among “hellhole” countries.

The remarks were made by Michael Savage, an author and political commentator, on US-based TV channel Newsmax after hearings in the US Supreme Court about the case pertaining to birthright citizenship.

Birthright citizenship is the automatic acquisition of nationality by a child born within a country’s territory, regardless of their parents’ citizenship or immigration status.

On Thursday, in response to a question about Trump’s post, the Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said: “We have seen some reports. That’s where I leave it.” Later in the day, NDTV quoted Christopher Elms, the spokesperson for the US Embassy in New Delhi as saying that Trump described India as a “great country with a very good friend of mine at the top”.

Trump has long been a proponent of ending birthright citizenship in the US. In January 2025, Trump signed an executive order to stop automatically granting citizenship to those born in the US in specific scenarios.

Legal consensus, however, broadly holds that the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees birthright citizenship. The matter is being heard by the Supreme Court.

Savage said that the arguments should not be conducted “in the abstract of a courtroom” as the demand to revoke birthright citizenship was “really not about law” but rather about public opinion.

The political commentator said that the US Constitution, which guarantees birthright citizenship, had been written before air travel, and questioned “how relevant are some of these arguments when people are coming here by airplane in the ninth month of their pregnancy”.

“A baby here becomes an instant citizen, and then they bring the entire family in from China or India or some other hellhole on the planet,” Savage claimed. “You don’t have to go far to see that. English is not spoken here anymore.”

He added that “there’s almost no loyalty to this country amongst the immigrant class coming in today, which was not always the case”. The immigrants are “not like the European Americans of today and their ancestors”, Savage added.

Savage argued that a referendum must be held to determine if birthright citizenship should continue.

“Our nation is being overrun with Chinese coming here just to drop a baby on our shore then bring in the entire family,” he said. “How about some common sense in a bankrupt nation?”

Savage alleged that American Civil Liberties Union Attorney Cecillia Wang was “pushing to destroy our national identity, turn us into a colony of China, but it’s not limited to China, it’s also India”. The American Civil Liberties Union is a non-profit civil rights organisation.

Savage added: “I used to be a great supporter of Indians in India until I opened my eyes up to what’s going on here.”

He said that white men “need not apply” for jobs in California, “never mind in high tech” as “you’re not getting a job at high tech in California” despite “what your qualifications are”.

“Your chances are nil,” he added. “You have to be from India or China because almost all the internal mechanisms are set up to [be] run by Indians and Chinese.”

Trump against birthright citizenship

On January 21, 2025, Trump directed federal agencies to refuse to recognise citizenship for children who were born in the country to mothers who are in the country illegally or are there legally on temporary visas, if the father is not a US citizen or a green card holder.

A green card, officially known as a Permanent Resident Card, allows an individual to stay and work permanently in the US.

The executive order would have denied citizenship to children who are born on US soil starting 30 days from the order, if at least one parent is not a United States citizen or a lawful permanent resident.

The executive order had been challenged in court by 22 states in the US.

Three days after Trump signed the order, a lower court temporarily blocked it and described it as “blatantly unconstitutional”.

On April 1, Trump attended the hearing in the Supreme Court, where the matter is now being heard, becoming the first sitting US president to attend such a session.

“We are the only country in the world stupid enough to allow ‘birthright’ citizenship!” Trump said on social media that day.

The Congress on Thursday said it was “extremely insulting and anti-India” that United States President Donald Trump had shared on social media remarks made by an American political commentator that described India as being among “hellhole” countries.

The Opposition party also urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to take up the matter with the US president.

“However, given his track record so far, it cannot be expected that he will say anything in front of Trump,” said the party.

Meanwhile, in response to a question about Trump’s post, the Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said: “We have seen some reports. That’s where I leave it.”

US President Trump has called India a “HELLHOLE.”

This statement is extremely insulting and anti-India. It hurts every Indian.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi should take up this matter with the US President and register a strong objection.

However, given his track record so far,… pic.twitter.com/a3FZH2lEu5

— Congress (@INCIndia) April 23, 2026

On Wednesday, Trump shared on social media the transcript of comments made by Michael Savage, an American political commentator, about ending birthright citizenship in the US.

“A baby here becomes an instant citizen, and then they bring the entire family in from China or India or some other hellhole on the planet,” Savage claimed. “You don’t have to go far to see that. English is not spoken here anymore.”

Sharing the comments on social media, the Congress alleged that Trump “has repeatedly made insulting remarks about India, and Modi has remained silent”.

“Narendra Modi is a weak prime minister, and the entire country is bearing the brunt of it,” said the party.

Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge asked Modi what he “was so scared of” and questioned why the prime minister has stayed silent on “these ridiculous utterances”.

He added that Indians have played a vital role in America’s success and asked what was stopping New Delhi from raising the matter at the “highest levels of the American government”.

“Amid the high-voltage election campaign of the prime minister, I sincerely hope that he gets sometime to react to this intimidation and indignation of 140 crore Indians,” Kharge added.

Modi ji’s dear friend, “Namaste Trump” has shared a note abusing India and using an extremely disparaging term.

Modi ji remains absolutely mum on these ridiculous utterances.

MEA Spokesperson said “That is where I leave it” @narendramodi ji, what are you scared off?… pic.twitter.com/TE3uCGIbSh

— Mallikarjun Kharge (@kharge) April 23, 2026

Congress leader Supriya Shrinate questioned how Trump could make such statements and criticised the “pin drop silence” from the Modi-led government so far.

How dare Donald Trump call India a “hellhole”?

How dare he refer to Indians as “gangsters with laptops”?

He made these remarks in the US Supreme Court on birthright citizenship issue.

We must oppose this vehemently, but there is pin drop silence from the Modi govt, so far. pic.twitter.com/L59170ffRa

— Supriya Shrinate (@SupriyaShrinate) April 23, 2026

Her party colleague Shama Mohamed said that Modi would “not utter a single word against his ‘dear friend’”.

“He can only show his power against the opposition in India,” she added.

US President Donald Trump, in his post on Truth Social, has racially attacked India and the Indian diaspora.

He has termed India a “hellhole.” We are sure that PM @narendramodi will not utter a single word against his “dear friend.” He can only show his power against the… pic.twitter.com/VSSiW0qtIB

— Dr. Shama Mohamed (@drshamamohd) April 23, 2026

Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra asked the prime minister whether he was going to express his protest.

Hello @narendramodi ji your Phraand Trump just called India a “hell hole” and all Indians “gangsters with laptops”. Are you going to protest or are you just going to Khi Khi your way to your next poll rally in Bengal?

— Mahua Moitra (@MahuaMoitra) April 23, 2026

Aam Aadmi Party leader Manish Sisodia criticised Trump and said insulting India “may win you headlines”, but the country “does not need your approval”.

“A nation of 1.4 billion people with dignity, talent, and civilizational depth will not be defined by your rhetoric,” Sisodia said, adding that Trump’s comments only exposed the US president’s “ignorance and hollow arrogance”.

Mr. Trump @DonaldTrump

Insulting India may win you headlines. But India doesn’t need your approval.

A nation of 1.4 billion people with dignity, talent, and civilizational depth will not be defined by your rhetoric.

Calling India a “hellhole” doesn’t insult India- it exposes… https://t.co/sWiRBqUasA

— Manish Sisodia (@msisodia) April 23, 2026

Trump has long been a proponent of ending birthright citizenship in the US. In January 2025, Trump signed an executive order to stop automatically granting citizenship to those born in the US in specific scenarios.

Legal consensus, however, broadly holds that the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees birthright citizenship. The matter is being heard by the Supreme Court.

In his arguments, Savage said that a referendum must be held to determine if birthright citizenship should continue.

“Our nation is being overrun with Chinese coming here just to drop a baby on our shore then bring in the entire family,” he said. “How about some common sense in a bankrupt nation?”

Also read: India is a ‘hellhole’: Trump shares commentator’s views questioning US birthright citizenship

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United States President Donald Trump shared on social media the transcript of remarks made by an American political commentator that described India as being among “hellhole” countries. The statements were made by Michael Savage, an author and political commentator, who was speaking about birthright citizenship in the US.

Birthright citizenship means that children born in the US automatically become US citizens, regardless of their parents' citizenship or immigration status.

“A baby here becomes an instant citizen, and then they bring the entire family in from China or India or some other hellhole on the planet,” Savage said, adding that “there’s almost no loyalty to this country amongst the immigrant class coming in today”.

The Congress party said it was “extremely insulting and anti-India” that Trump had shared the comments. The Ministry of External Affairs stated that New Delhi had “seen some reports” about Trump’s post. “That’s where I leave it,” said a ministry spokesperson. Read on.

HSBC downgraded Indian equities to “underweight” from “neutral” as global oil prices remain high amid the war in West Asia. This is the second time the global brokerage firm has lowered its rating for Indian equities in a month.

It had downgraded Indian stocks to “neutral” from “overweight” on March 31. The firm has advised investors to hold fewer Indian stocks because of inflation and high oil prices hurting corporate earnings.

HSBC said that it expects oil and gas markets to remain tight throughout most of the June and September quarters. Read on.

A voter turnout of 91.6% was recorded till 6 pm in the first phase of polling in West Bengal. The voter turnout in Tamil Nadu was 84.5%.

Polling concluded in both states at 6 pm. In West Bengal, voting is being held in 152 of the state’s 294 constituencies. The rest of seats will go to polls on April 29.

The state saw sporadic instances of violence during the day. In Murshidabad, a scuffle broke out between Trinamool Congress workers and Aam Janata Unnayan Party founder Humayun Kabir. The Trinamool Congress on Thursday alleged that three women were assaulted by Central Reserve Police Force personnel at a polling booth in the Lakhipur ward. Read on.

From jhalmuri to fish, how BJP is trying to shed its outsider image in Bengal, reports Anant Gupta

The Union government said there is “no proposal under consideration” to increase the prices of petrol and diesel amid the war in West Asia. This came after a news report quoted brokerage firm Kotak Institutional Equities as having estimated that fuel prices could be hiked by Rs 25 to Rs 28 per litre after the Assembly elections conclude on April 29.

The petroleum ministry said that the reports “are designed to create fear and panic amongst the citizens and are mischievous and misleading”.

Kotak Institutional Equities had estimated that high global crude oil rates could have led to a hike in fuel prices. The gap between global oil prices and domestic retail rates has widened as petrol and diesel prices have remained unchanged amid the conflict. Read on.

The Delhi High Court directed social media platforms to take down videos of court proceedings in which Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal had sought that Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma recuse herself from hearing the Central Bureau of Investigation’s challenge to his discharge in the liquor policy case. On April 15, the court directed the police to remove unauthorised videos of Kejriwal’s arguments.

The bench was hearing a public interest litigation seeking contempt action against Kejriwal and journalist Ravish Kumar for “unauthorisedly” recording and sharing videos of the proceedings. Read on.

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A Delhi court on Wednesday ordered that a first information report be registered against commentator Abhijit Iyer-Mitra for his social media posts in which he made sexually abusive remarks about the women employees of news outlet Newslaundry, Bar and Bench reported.

Iyer-Mitra could be charged under Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita sections pertaining to sexual harassment and insulting the modesty of a woman for the “contents of the tweets”, Judicial Magistrate First Class Bhanu Pratap Singh of the Saket Court was quoted as saying.

He also said that the “police investigation is necessary as the offence has been committed in cyber space”. Singh added that the probe will have to verify the user account on social media platform X and “trace and recover the computer source/electronic device from which the said tweets were published”.

Newslaundry’s Managing Editor Manisha Pande and other women journalists working for the news outlet had approached the court, stating that Iyer-Mitra had repeatedly used derogatory language and slurs to target them.

On August 13, the judge had directed the station house officer of Malviya Nagar Police Station to file an action taken report in the matter, Live Law reported. The police were asked whether any complaint was made and if any action was taken.

In November, the police were given a final opportunity to file the action taken report, which was eventually filed only on February 18, the legal news outlet reported.

The journalists then approached the court under Section 175 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, which allows a magistrate to order a police investigation into cognizable cases.

The journalists have separately also approached the Delhi High Court with a defamation suit against Iyer-Mitra, seeking a public apology and Rs 2 crore in damages.

It was argued before the High Court that the remarks had “falsely and maliciously” targeted the news outlet’s women employees using derogatory language and slurs.

“They are sexist slurs aimed at humiliating women professionals,” they had said. “They directly attack their dignity and right to work without fear or sexual harassment.”

On May 21, Iyer-Mitra took down the remarks he had posted on social media between February and April after the High Court reprimanded him.

On February 26, the journalists told the High Court that they will not withdraw their suit and the matter is still pending before the High Court.

The Union government on Thursday said that there is “no proposal under consideration” to increase the prices of petrol and diesel amid the war in West Asia.

This came after a report by stock broker Kotak Institutional Equities estimated that fuel prices could be hiked by Rs 25 to Rs 28 per litre after the Assembly elections in five states conclude, reported CNBC-TV18 on Wednesday.

Polling in Assam, Kerala and Puducherry was held on April 9. Voting in Tamil Nadu and in the first phase of the West Bengal polls was taking place on Thursday. The second phase of polling in West Bengal will be held on April 29. The votes in all states will be counted on May 4.

On Thursday, the Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas said that the reports “suggesting a price hike of petrol and diesel are designed to create fear and panic amongst the citizens and are mischievous and misleading”.

“In fact, India is the only country where petrol and diesel prices have not increased in the last four years,” the ministry claimed. “Government of India and Oil PSUs [public sector undertakings] have taken relentless steps in order to insulate the Indian citizens from steep increases in international prices.”

FAKE NEWS

There are some news reports suggesting a price hike of petrol and diesel. It is hereby clarified that there is no such proposal under consideration by the Government.
Such news items are designed to create fear and panic amongst the citizens and are mischievous and… pic.twitter.com/yTAfJdah2o

— Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas #MoPNG (@PetroleumMin) April 23, 2026

In its report, Kotak Institutional Equities had estimated that fuel prices may rise as crude oil rates have remained high since the war in West Asia broke out on February 28. With the benchmark Brent crude hovering above the $100 per barrel-mark, the gap between global oil costs and domestic retail prices has widened.

The price of Brent was $78 per barrel on February 27, a day before the conflict started.

Fuel marketing companies in the country have been under strain as retail petrol and diesel prices have remained frozen despite a surge in global oil prices.

Global energy supplies have been disrupted as Iran has effectively blocked the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow water body connecting the Gulf to the Arabian Sea, for most international commercial vessels. About 20% of the global petroleum supply passes through the maritime chokepoint.

On April 17, Iran said that it had fully reopened the strait to commercial vessels after a 10-day ceasefire between Israel and Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon. However, a day later Tehran that said it was reimposing military control on the waterway, alleging “repeated breaches of trust” by the US.

Washington began blockading all Iranian ports on April 13.

Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal on Monday told the Delhi High Court that the orders issued by Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma and her conduct outside the court has created reasonable apprehensions in his mind about getting a fair hearing in the liquor policy case, Bar and Bench reported.

The former chief minister made the statements in his petition seeking that Sharma recuse herself from hearing the challenge filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation to his discharge in the case.

During the hearing on Monday, Kejriwal, appearing in person, claimed before Sharma that she had repeatedly passed orders in favour of Enforcement Directorate and CBI in the liquor policy case.

He claimed that there was a “pattern” in which “every single argument of ED, CBI is endorsed by the court”, adding that every petition filed by the two central agencies had been converted into judgements, The Times of India reported.

The AAP chief added that this trend, which he had observed in several earlier orders, had contributed to his apprehensions.

Citing the pace at which certain proceedings had been conducted in the case, Kejriwal also claimed that no other matter was being heard “at this speed”, especially those concerning the “most prominent” political opponents, the newspaper reported.

He also raised concerns about “perceived ideological proximity”, referring to Sharma attending an event of an organisation linked to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The RSS is the parent organisation of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.

“If your honour is attending a programme of a particular ideology, then it creates reasonable bias,” The Times of India quoted the former chief minister as having told the court.

Kejriwal added that he, along with the AAP, opposed this ideology.

During the proceedings, the AAP chief said that the matter did not pertain to the integrity of the judge but to the perception of fairness, the newspaper reported. Referring to previous Supreme Court judgements, he added that reasonable apprehension alone can justify recusal.

The judge reserved her verdict in the plea after the hearing that lasted for about four and a half hours, Bar and Bench reported.

Sharma said that this was the first time that someone had asked her to recuse herself, the legal news portal reported.

“I have learnt a lot on the recusal jurisdiction,” she was quoted as saying. “I hope I will give a good judgement.”

Kejriwal, along with AAP leaders Manish Sisodia and Durgesh Pathak, and other persons accused in the matter including Vijay Nair and Arun Ramchandra Pillai, have sought that the judge recuse herself because of the grounds of a reasonable apprehension that she lacks impartiality, The Hindu reported.

Their plea cited previous rulings by Sharma in related cases as proof of bias.

At the previous hearing on Wednesday, the CBI opposed the applications filed by Kejriwal and the others seeking Sharma’s recusal.

In its response before the High Court, the CBI argued that the judge’s decision to attend a legal seminar organised by the Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta Parishad, a lawyers’ organisation linked to the RSS, cannot be treated as evidence of ideological bias.

The CBI argued that the claim was untenable, adding that if attending events shows ideological bias of any judge, “then [a] large number of sitting High Court and Supreme Court judges would have to recuse [themselves] from hearing any case where politically exposed persons are accused”.

The case

The CBI had alleged irregularities in the Delhi government’s liquor excise policy, which has since been scrapped. Based on the CBI case, the Enforcement Directorate also launched an investigation into allegations of money-laundering.

The policy came into effect in November 2021. It was withdrawn in July 2022 with Vinai Kumar Saxena, the Delhi lieutenant governor at the time, recommending an investigation into the alleged irregularities of the policy.

The two central agencies alleged that the Aam Aadmi Party government at the time modified the liquor policy by increasing the commission for wholesalers from 5% to 12%. This allegedly facilitated the receipt of bribes from wholesalers who had a substantial market share and turnover.

On February 27, the trial court discharged Kejriwal and 22 others accused by the CBI in the case. There was no overarching conspiracy or criminal intent in the excise policy, the Rouse Avenue Courts had ruled.

The trial court also criticised the central agency for implicating Kejriwal without any cogent material. It said that the chargesheet had several gaps not supported by any witnesses or statements.

However, the High Court on March 9 stayed the adverse observations made by the trial court about the CBI. The matter was heard by Sharma, who prima facie observed that the trial court’s findings were erroneous.

Kejriwal had written to the chief justice of the High Court seeking the transfer of the case from Sharma to another judge, but the request was declined. The former Delhi chief minister had contended that no specific reasons had been recorded for commenting against the trial court’s order.

He also noted that the judge had earlier denied bail to several persons accused in the case who had been subsequently granted relief by the Supreme Court.

The Aam Aadmi Party chief sought the transfer on the ground of a “grave, bona fide, and reasonable apprehension that the matter may not receive a hearing marked by impartiality and neutrality”.

The Delhi High Court on Thursday directed social media platforms to take down videos of proceedings where Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal had sought that Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma recuse herself from hearing the Central Bureau of Investigation’s challenge to his discharge in the Delhi liquor policy case, Live Law reported.

Videos of Kejriwal arguing his case before the High Court on April 13 had been shared widely on social media. On April 15, the court directed the police to remove unauthorised videos of Kejriwal’s arguments.

On Thursday, a division bench of Justices V Kameshwar Rao and Manpreet Pritam Singh Arora was hearing a public interest litigation seeking contempt action against Kejriwal and journalist Ravish Kumar for “unauthorisedly” recording and sharing videos of the proceedings, Live Law reported.

The others mentioned in the petition are the Congress’ Digvijay Singh, and AAP leaders Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh, Sanjeev Jha, Purandeep Sawhney, Jarnail Singh, Mukesh Ahlawat and Vinay Mishra.

During the proceedings, the counsel for technology company Meta, which owns social media platforms Instagram and Facebook, told the court that they have complied with the direction, reported The Indian Express.

Google told the court that some of the YouTube videos flagged in the petition are not from the proceedings. The company was directed to take down any videos that contain such clips.

Similar directions were also issued to X.

The court also issued notice to Kejriwal, Kumar and others mentioned in the petition, Bar and Bench reported.

The matter was listed for further hearing on July 6.

The petitioner had accused Kejriwal and others of circulating clippings of the proceedings “intentionally and deliberately and with the wilful intention to malign the image” of the court.

He also alleged that only parts of the proceedings, which “serve a political agenda”, were shared online, Live Law reported.

The case

Kejriwal and others had sought Sharma’s recusal arguing that the apprehensions of bias on her part were “direct, grave and impossible to ignore”.

However, on Monday, Sharma rejected the plea seeking her recusal in the matter arguing that it “would not be prudence but abdication of duty”, adding that it “would be an act of surrender”.

She also said that the petition seeking her recusal amounted to putting “the institution of judiciary on trial”, adding that the “strength of judiciary lies in its strong resolve to decide the accusations”.

Sharma added that she would decide the main case “without being affected by the recusal application”.

The main CBI case has been listed for further hearing on April 29.

The CBI had alleged irregularities in the Delhi government’s liquor excise policy, which has since been scrapped. Based on the CBI case, the Enforcement Directorate also launched an investigation into allegations of money laundering.

The two central agencies alleged that the Aam Aadmi Party government at the time modified the liquor policy by increasing the commission for wholesalers from 5% to 12%. This allegedly facilitated the receipt of bribes from wholesalers who had a substantial market share and turnover.

On February 27, a trial court discharged Kejriwal and 22 others, ruling that there “was no overarching conspiracy or criminal intent in the excise policy”.

One of the three container ships at which Iran opened fire in the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday may have been headed for Gujarat, PTI reported, citing vessel-tracking data from maritime intelligence firm MarineTraffic.

The data indicated that the container ship, Liberia-flagged Epaminondas, was en route to the Mundra port, while another vessel, Panama-flagged MSC Francesca, signalled that it was headed to the Sri Lankan port of Hambantota, The Indian Express reported.

The third vessel, Panama-flagged Euphoria, had indicated Jeddah in Saudi Arabia as its destination.

The three vessels were attacked by Iran hours after United States President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that the US’ blockade of Iranian ports would continue, even as he announced the extension of the ceasefire with Tehran. In the past few days, the US had seized some Iranian ships that were trying to slip through the blockade.

Against this backdrop, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps stated on Wednesday that it had opened fire on a ship in the Strait of Hormuz after it “ignored the warnings of the Iranian armed forces”, reported AP.

The MSC Francesca and the Epaminondas were “seized” off the coast of Iran, reported the Iranian state-owned news agency Tasnim. The Euphoria was also “grounded off the coast of Iran” by the military later.

The Indian Express cited MarineTraffic data as indicating that the Mundra-bound Epaminondas had departed from the United Arab Emirates’ Jabel Ali port on March 4, but had since been stuck in the Persian Gulf as the West Asia war led to Iran effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz.

The container ship is managed and operated by Greece-based companies, the newspaper quoted international shipping data as saying.

On April 17, Iran had fully reopened the strait to commercial vessels after a 10-day ceasefire between Israel and Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon. A day later, however, Iran had said it was reimposing strict military controls on the waterway, alleging “repeated breaches of trust” by the US.

Washington began blockading all ports in the Iranian gulf region on April 13.

The developments come amid continuing uncertainty over whether fresh talks between Iran and the US will take place. An initial round of peace talks between Iran and the US in Islamabad collapsed on April 12.

Last week, reports had said that two Indian vessels, Jag Arnav and Sanmar Herald, were forced to turn back from the strait. Jag Arnav was reportedly fired upon by the Iranian Navy while Sanmar Herald, which was in the vicinity, was not harmed.

The Indian government lodged a protest against the firing with the Iranian Ambassador to India Mohammad Fathali.

The war

The US and Israel launched an attack on Iran on February 28, claiming that Tehran’s action posed an existential threat to Israel. Washington acts as a guarantor of Israel’s security. Iran retaliated by striking Israel and US military bases in the region and targeting major cities in Gulf countries.

Tehran also effectively blocked the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterbody connecting the Gulf to the Arabian Sea, for most international commercial vessels, triggering a global energy crisis. About 20% of global petroleum supply passes through the maritime chokepoint.

Israel has been claiming that Iran is close to obtaining a nuclear weapon, which could alter the regional security balance. Tehran has long maintained that its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes.

West Bengal is holding elections even as more than 27 lakh voters have been deprived of their right to vote. Many of them are people who voted in the last election, but have been removed from the electoral roll despite attending hearings and producing their documents during the special intensive revision.

Analysts who studied the deletions found that Muslim voters have been hit the worst. How are those excluded from the voter list responding to this? And what does it mean for politics in the state?

To find out, Scroll travelled through the districts of Malda and Murshidabad, speaking to disenfranchised voters and politicians on the ground.

Ramjan Sheikh was among the hundreds from Ahiran village who showed up for a public meeting organised by the Trinamool Congress in Murshidabad’s Jangipur on April 10. The main attraction: Bengali film actor Srabanti Chatterjee, who had flown down from Kolkata to campaign for Jakir Hossain, the local MLA.

But Sheikh was not impressed.

“I came here hoping that they would talk about SIR [special intensive revision],” complained the 28-year-old whose name was deleted from the voter rolls last month. “But nobody from Trinamool is saying that the rights of voters like us should be ensured before elections.”

Sheikh is not alone. The names of 91 lakh voters have been removed from the state’s electoral rolls as part of the special intensive revision. In stark contrast to other states, many voters in West Bengal had to attend hearings and produced documents to establish their bona fides in this SIR.

Analysts who studied the deletions found that the state’s Muslim voters have been hit the worst. A disproportionately large number of Bengali Muslims will not be allowed to vote in the upcoming Assembly elections.

Travelling through the Muslim-majority districts of Malda and Murshidabad, which elect 34 of West Bengal’s 294 MLAs, Scroll found Muslim voters seething with anger. Their disenfranchisement has become the main election issue even for those who made it to the final list.

Anger against the Trinamool Congress-led administration for governance failures has taken a backseat as the SIR has triggered fears of detention centres and foreigners’ tribunals, similar to those faced by Muslims in neighbouring Assam. This benefits Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who has pitched herself as the sole protector of Bengali Muslims against efforts to question their citizenship.

“I believe that only Didi [Banerjee] can get our names included in the voter list again,” said Ramjan. However, in the same breath, he complained that the Trinamool had backtracked on its promises of not allowing the election to proceed if legitimate voters were left out.

Other Bengali Muslim voters also shared grievances with the ruling party, but added that they would vote for Banerjee because she was their best bet to keep the Bharatiya Janata Party out of power. Activists and researchers argued that this shows how the citizenship politics unleashed by SIR has restricted the community’s political choices.

‘We have no choice’

Muslims make up nearly a third of West Bengal’s population, according to the 2011 census. While some members of the community, especially in and around Kolkata, are Urdu speakers who trace their roots back to Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, the vast majority of them are Bengalis.

Bengali Muslims are among the most backward communities in India, faring poorly on crucial human development indicators. A sizeable chunk of their population is clustered in the backward districts of Malda, Murshidabad, Uttar Dinajpur and Dakshin Dinajpur, which have historically seen large-scale outmigration of labour to other states.

Over the past year, it is these Bengali Muslims that have repeatedly been mislabelled Bangladeshi as the BJP made a poll plank out of so-called illegal immigration. In some cases, migrant workers from the community have even been wrongly deported from BJP-ruled states on the mere suspicion that they were undocumented migrants from Bangladesh.

Mehebub Sheikh is one such Bengali Muslim who was picked up from a Mumbai suburb in June and pushed across the Bangladesh border, allegedly at gunpoint. Border Security Force officials subsequently brought him back after the government of West Bengal confirmed his Indian nationality.

“I thought I was done with NRC [National Register of Citizens],” Mehebub said at his home in Balia Hasennagar village of Murshidabad, likening his ordeal to Assam’s citizenship verification exercise in 2019. “When SIR began, the village pradhan [chief] had told me that my family would be ok because we had already been through NRC.”

As things turned out, the Sheikhs were put in the dock once again. Though some of their names were present in the 2002 voter list, Mehebub and his family were summoned for hearings because of so-called logical discrepancies in their documents.

When the final voter list came out on February 28, Mehebub’s father and his sister-in-law had been placed “under adjudication” along with half his village. His sister-in-law was eventually cleared to vote, but his father’s name was deleted. For this, he blames not only the Election Commission but also the state government.

“Trinamool has failed to protect its own voters,” Mehebub lamented, adding that most of the deleted voters in his village were Bengali Muslims who supported the ruling party. However, when asked who he would vote for, he named the chief minister. His wife liked Banerjee for her welfare schemes, he explained.

His brother Majibur, though, was more candid about why the family continued to support Banerjee. He had heard that if Trinamool lost the election and BJP came to power, deleted voters like his father would be placed in detention camps.

“We have no choice,” he said. “Whether we live or die, we have to keep voting for them [Trinamool]. No other party can win the whole state. Why waste our vote on somebody else?”

Spoilt for choice?

Contrary to this feeling of having no viable options, the political field in Murshidabad and Malda suggests that Bengali Muslims are spoilt for choice. Besides Trinamool and BJP, the Congress party and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) are in the fray. Both parties have previously enjoyed considerable support from the community.

Then there are the smaller but more assertive Muslim parties such as MP Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen and Humayun Kabir’s Aam Janata Unnayan Party, which is rallying support for the construction of a Babri Masjid replica in Murshidabad. But even voters sympathetic to their politics don’t see them as having a real shot at power in these elections.

Ajijul Sheikh, a 63-year-old resident of Alinagar village in Malda who worked as a labourer in Delhi and Mumbai before retirement, claimed that seven members from his family would not be able to vote this time because of the SIR. He saw Owaisi as the only leader who would take up the issue in Parliament. Still, he said he could not vote for his party.

“The AIMIM has just started building its organisation here,” he added. “It will take time to grow. I will vote for it when the time is right.”

As far as the Congress party is concerned, it is busy fighting battles of its own while voters feel disconnected from it. Two of its candidates from the region also found their names on the deleted list, which rendered them ineligible to contest elections.

Eventually, they moved the Supreme Court and managed to get the appellate tribunals set up for deleted voters to hear their appeals on an urgent basis. The tribunal found their documents to be legitimate and their deletions were reversed in the nick of time. But this, too, left a bad taste in the mouth of ordinary voters, given that no such hurry was shown in entertaining their appeals.

Asadul Hoque, an e-rickshaw driver, was loading sacks of watermelons into his vehicle when Congress candidate Motakkin Alam’s cavalcade went past him in Baharal village of Malda. He did not even stop to take a look at the leader.

“He got his name included, but I cannot,” the 30-year-old deleted voter told Scroll. “I don’t have a big party behind me. All I have is my two hands and legs.”

An SIR election

This kind of resentment is fast gaining ground among Bengali Muslims, explained Saifulla Samim, a professor of the Bengali language at the state-run Aliah University in Kolkata.

For the last month and a half, activists and intellectuals like Samim have been protesting against the SIR in Kolkata’s Park Circus Maidan. Their protest has received little attention from the media and political parties. Fellow Muslims have also largely stayed away from it, Samim complained.

“Urdu-speaking Muslims and non-Bengali Hindus have not stood up for us,” he added. “Only some Bengali Hindus have.”

Part of the reason for the resentment among Bengali Muslims was the state government’s decision last year to remove several Muslim castes from Bengal’s list of Other Backward Classes. According to Samim, the access to reservations had “opened a big door” for the community, which did not sit well with many Bengali Hindus.

“Bengali Muslims were acceptable only as long as they sold vegetables and drove rickshaws,” he said. “That we started using reservations to get government jobs and live with dignity angered reactionary forces.”

Samim blamed the Trinamool government for succumbing to the pressure from Hindutva groups and withdrawing reservation benefits from many Bengali Muslim castes. It was able to do so, researcher Sabir Ahamed argued, because it can afford to take their support for granted. The SIR has reinforced this dynamic, forcing Bengali Muslims to set aside their grievances with the Trinamool and vote for it to keep the BJP out.

“Elections should be fought based on developmental indicators, not who is able to vote,” Ahamed said. “Unfortunately, this election is solely about the SIR.”

“If you’re among the corrupt and wealthy 1% loved by the BJP, stop watching,” communist leader Dipsita Dhar said at the start of the video, looking into the camera. Though the line echoed the Communist Party of India (Marxist)’s longheld ideology of class struggle, the vocabulary of “1%” was new, borrowed from the politics of the United States.

The video also broke from the CPI(M)’s usually stern communication style. In this short video, which has garnered over a million views on Facebook since it was uploaded a week ago on March 29, the 32-year-old sounded cheeky while attacking the Bharatiya Janata Party. It was shot with her walking down the street with stylised music and colourful, blocky text.

The impetus for this change? “Zohran Mamdani,” said Dhar, who studied at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi. “His videos are very refreshing to look at. As young people we should be talking like this.”

The research scholar is contesting the upcoming Assembly elections in West Bengal from Dum Dum North, a seat situated in a Kolkata suburb. She was not the only one to bring up the socialist Mamdani’s viral election campaign from 2025, which catapulted him from being a minor politician to mayor of New York.

Afreen Begum, who also appears in the video, seconded her. The CPI(M) has fielded Begum, 29, from Kolkata’s Ballygunge seat. “Mamdani’s campaign material inspired us a lot,” she said. “We got some ideas from there.”

David versus Goliath

The Communist Party of India (Marxist), which ruled West Bengal for 34 years before Mamata Banerjee rose to power in 2011, is fighting for its very existence in the state. In the last two Lok Sabha elections as well as the 2021 Assembly polls, it failed to win even a single seat in West Bengal.

While the BJP, too, has struggled to defeat Mamata Banerjee, it has successfully managed to replace the communists as her principal opponent. That is why the CPI(M)’s messaging is focused more on the BJP than the ruling Trinamool Congress.

“What we see today is less politics and more identity,” lamented Dhar, bemoaning the fact that many Bengalis have been voting along religious lines of late. “We want young people to think beyond that.”

Given that this is the predicament that the CPI(M) faces in West Bengal, taking a leaf out of Mamdani’s book was a no-brainer for Dhar. “Fighting in New York, which has a large number of Jewish people, he talked about Palestine so firmly and unapologetically,” she explained.

Besides Mamdani’s style and ideology, the young Bengali communist also spoke admiringly of the David-versus-Goliath nature of his victory in New York. The head of her party’s social media team in West Bengal echoed this.

“The lack of resources makes you creative,” said Dhrubajyoti Chakraborty, who conceptualised the viral CPI(M) video from last week. “If you don’t have money to do theatre, you start doing theatre in the streets.”

The two-minute video took over two days to make with most of the time spent on writing the script and planning the production, Chakraborty said. Shooting with the candidates was easy, he added, because they are both young, camera-friendly and social media savvy.

Once the footage was ready, the editors took over. Chakraborty remembers the prompt he gave them: “Make a Zohran Mamdani-like video.” The 44-year-old himself knows a thing or two about visual content. He has a master’s degree in film studies from Jadavpur University.

Now, he heads a team of roughly 25 people that has been tasked with making and circulating audio-visual content for the CPI(M). About half a dozen are volunteers with longstanding ties to the party, while the rest are paid professionals. Chakraborty underlined that nobody in his team is above 30.

The party plans to put out more Mamdani-style videos as the election campaign picks up. “It gets more viewership,” the social media head stated directly. “We have tested it over many weeks and analysed the reactions. During elections, people want to hear something from candidates, not other party leaders.”

Begum, who is contesting from Ballygunge, said the style was working. She even claimed that being in the video had made offline canvassing easier. Some residents of middle-class neighbourhoods and high-rise buildings had brought it up when she visited them. “We have seen your video,” is something she’s heard from voters, she told Scroll.

Speaking of revolutions

Directing time and resources towards promoting the party online, however, has opened them up to criticism, some of which comes from fellow communists. “Biplob social media tey hoy na,” Dhar recalled one of her comrades telling her. The revolution will not take place on social media.

But the “technological revolution” had already taken place, she argued, and CPI(M) was late to the party. Even though they finally had a team in place, they were still not the “narrative makers” in West Bengal.

“There is a lot more to do,” Dhar complained. “We should up our game and be more and more dominant on social media.”

Chakraborty, the party’s social media head in the state, agreed. While he, too, admitted that the CPI(M) was late to jump on the social media bandwagon, he attributed the delay to what he called a “tragic coincidence”.

“Between 2010 and 2015, when social media was on the rise and smartphones were becoming universal, the CPI(M) was going down in West Bengal,” Chakraborty pointed out. The party also had little money to play with, he added.

That is why adopting the Mamdani model made sense for the Bengal unit of the CPI(M). The videos look slick, but don’t cost a lot. In fact, Chakraborty claimed that they use iPhones, and not any sophisticated cameras, to shoot.

Still, the CPI(M) continues to face disapproval from sections of the Left for bringing professionals on board. When it put out a hiring call on Facebook last September, the comments section was flooded with adverse reactions.

“We are not like I-PAC [Indian Political Action Committee],” Chakraborty said in his party’s defence, referring to the political consultancy firm that works for the Trinamool in West Bengal.

“I-PAC is dictating what Mamata should do,” he alleged. “What we communicate is solely guided by the party. The professionals are just to make the content attractive so that people engage with it.”

The National Investigation Agency on Wednesday alleged before the Delhi High Court that separatist leader Yasin Malik was in contact with the top leadership of Pakistan, including its prime minister and president, and used these links to propagate the secession of Jammu and Kashmir from India, The Hindu reported.

The central agency made the remarks in a rejoinder before a bench of Justices Navin Chawla and Ravinder Dudeja while seeking to enhance Malik’s life term in a terror funding case to the death penalty.

The bench listed the case for hearing on July 21. It also told Malik, who virtually appeared for the proceedings from Tihar jail, that a copy of the rejoinder would be supplied to him through the jail authorities.

In May 2022, a trial court had sentenced the separatist leader to life imprisonment in the terror funding case.

Malik, along with other separatist leaders and groups, had been accused of allegedly acting in connivance with active militants of proscribed terrorist organisations for raising, receiving and collecting funds domestically and abroad.

He was found guilty of several offences under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act and the Indian Penal Code.

In an earlier reply to the appeal for the death penalty filed by the central agency, Malik said that he spent nearly three decades as a key figure in a state-sanctioned “backchannel” mechanism, working with a succession of prime ministers and intelligence chiefs to foster peace in Jammu and Kashmir.

However, the NIA told the court that Malik’s claim of having a “working relationship” with successive Indian governments was only aimed at garnering public sympathy and had no connection with his crime, Live Law reporrted.

The agency in its rejoinder said that Malik had been in contact with the “top leadership of Pakistan, including the prime minister, the president, senators of the Pakistani Senate, and the chief ministers of all provinces, and was using such contacts to propagate narratives against India and to further the secessionist agenda in Jammu & Kashmir”, The Indian Express reported.

The rejoinder noted that the separatist leader had also “admitted that he was the commander-in-chief of JKLF [Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front]”, The Hindu reported.

The mere mention of names of senior politicians and senior bureaucrats does not negate the fact that Malik “had linkages with militant Hafiz Saeed and other militants”, the rejoinder added.

The NIA also said that the separatist leader has admitted to having connections with Sayeed Salauddin, who is chief of the militant group Hizb-ul-Mujahideen.

The Supreme Court on Thursday stayed the conviction and life sentence of Amit Jogi, son of Chhattisgarh’s former Chief Minister Ajit Jogi, in a 2003 murder case, reported Bar and Bench.

He had been convicted by the Chhattisgarh High Court on April 2 for conspiring to kill Nationalist Congress Party treasurer Ramvatar Jaggi. The NCP leader had been shot dead in Raipur in June 2003, when Ajit Jogi was chief minister.

Jaggi was killed ahead of a massive rally by the NCP, which was said to have been posing a challenge to the Congress government at the time.

On April 6, the High Court sentenced Amit Jogi to life imprisonment.

A bench of Justices Vikram Nath, Sandeep Mehta and Vijay Bishnoi on Thursday asked how Amit Jogi could be sentenced without hearing him, reported Live Law.

“What kind of judgment...conviction and sentence before hearing?” asked the bench.

The court also issued notices on Amit Jogi’s application against the conviction.

In May 2007, a trial court convicted 28 persons for Jaggi’s murder. Amit Jogi, however, had been acquitted.

The Central Bureau of Investigation had challenged the acquittal in 2011. However, the High Court had rejected the application on the grounds of delay. It had also rejected appeals by the Chhattisgarh government and Satish Jaggi, son of Ramavtar Jaggi.

At the time, the CBI had moved the Supreme Court against the order.

In November, the top court referred the case back to the High Court, directing it to consider the investigating agency’s application afresh.

The Supreme Court had held that although the CBI filed the application after a significant delay, it was equally true that “the charges against respondent Amit Jogi were very grave, involving a conspiracy to murder a member of a rival political party”.

While convicting Amit Jogi, the High Court had described his acquittal by the trial court as “palpably illegal, wrong, perverse, contrary to the evidence available on record and without any concrete basis”.

“It is pertinent to note that the learned trial judge has unnecessarily attempted to distinguish the role of accused Amit Jogi from that of the other co-accused/convicts,” the High Court had said.

It added: “The finding that the co-accused acted independently to please Amit Jogi, without his knowledge, and in a manner not contemplated by him, is unsustainable.”

The Election Commission on Wednesday sent a show cause notice to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, alleging that he prima facie violated the Model Code of Conduct for the Assembly elections by calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi a “terrorist” on April 21.

Kharge had made the comment at a press conference in Chennai on the last day of campaigning for the Tamil Nadu elections.

The Congress chief later clarified that he meant to say that the prime minister was “terrorising” the country’s democratic fabric by misusing government machinery, and that he did not refer to him as a terrorist in the literal sense, the Hindustan Times reported.

Election Commission of India takes note of Congress National President Mallikarjun Kharge calling PM Narendra Modi a “Terrorist” and issues a notice to Kharge to explain his stand within 24 Hrs

The notice reads, "Whereas, the Commission is prima facie of the opinion that… pic.twitter.com/H7xaWWb6pw

— ANI (@ANI) April 22, 2026

The Election Commission said on Wednesday that the use of “intemperate and highly objectionable and dehumanising choice of words by a seasoned politician against a constitutional functionary” appeared to be inconsistent with the standards of public discourse and undermined the dignity of democratic institutions.

The poll panel said it was of the preliminary opinion that Kharge had violated provisions of the Model Code of Conduct, which state that criticism of political parties should be confined to their policies and programmes, past record and work.

It also said that the Congress chief appeared to have disregarded advice expressed in a letter to political parties to observe “utmost restraint and decency” in the election campaign.

The Election Commission directed Kharge to explain his stand on the matter within 24 hours.

The Congress chief had on Tuesday made the remark about Modi while questioning the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam’s decision to ally with the Bharatiya Janata Party.

“How do these AIADMK people, who themselves put the photo of [former chief minister CN] Annadurai... how can they join with Modi?” he had asked. “He is a terrorist...He doesn’t believe in equality. His party won’t believe in equality and justice.”

#WATCH | Chennai, Tamil Nadu | Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge says, "How these AIADMK people, who themselves put the photo of Annadurai, how can they join Modi? He is a terrorist. His party won't believe in equality and justice. These people are joining with them; it means… pic.twitter.com/znLvE7hutP

— ANI (@ANI) April 21, 2026

A day later, a BJP delegation comprising Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal met the the Election Commission, seeking strict action and an apology from Kharge.

Voting is underway on Thursday in all Assembly constituencies in Tamil Nadu, and in 152 seats in West Bengal. Elections in Assam, Kerala and Puducherry took place on April 9, while the second phase of the West Bengal election will take place on April 29.

The results in all states will be announced on May 4.

In January, the Booth Level Officer of my village in West Bengal’s Purba Bardhaman district rang me with a routine request: could I meet him to submit copies of my passport for verification under the Special Intensive Revision – the Election Commission of India’s sweeping audit of the state’s electoral rolls? I handed them over to him at the local tea stall.

Two weeks later, our family had our scheduled hearing at the Khandaghosh BDO office with the assistant electoral registration officer and the booth level officer about our names on the rolls. I attended by video call from Manchester, where I work. I had every reason to feel confident. I had submitted my passport, my father’s passport and land ownership records predating Independence. What more could the state possibly require of us?

Quite a lot, it turned out. As I made plans to return to India this month, intending to vote in the assembly elections before travelling onward for academic engagements, I discovered that my family of four – my father, two siblings and myself – had been erased from the electoral register.

We were not alone. According to the independent Sabar Institute, approximately 91 lakh names have been deleted from West Bengal’s voter list. This happened in three phases. Around 58 lakh names were deleted in December with the publication of the draft electoral roll; a further 5 lakh in the “first final list” in February; and 27 lakh more between late March and early April, classified under the elastic category of “logical discrepancies”.

The category of “logical discrepancies”, which is being used for the special intensive revision only in West Bengal, has resulted in names being deleted because of a mismatch with the spelling of their parents’ names, the age gap between parents and children that is considered low, or because parents have more than six children.

According to Sabar Institute, even accounting for genuine deletions – about 24 lakh voters who have died and 15 lakh-20 lakh people who permanently shifted – about 45 lakh to 50 lakh of the names removed from the rolls in West Bengal are living, eligible people with every legal and moral right to participate in Indian democracy.

When I spoke to people in and around Khandaghosh in Purba Bardhaman, I encountered a scale of disenfranchisement that no set of statistics can adequately convey.

Among those struck off from the rolls was Golehara Begum, an 85-year-old widow I have known since I was a child. Begum has survived on the charity of neighbours. As documentary proof of her existence in this republic, she possesses only a voter card and an Aadhaar number. She has no land records, passport or paper trail compatible with the proof the Election Commission’s algorithms apparently demand.

She is, by any ordinary measure of belonging, more rooted in Bengal than most: her family’s presence in these villages predates the formation of the state itself. Yet under this revision, she has been classified – implicitly, bureaucratically – as suspect.

The overall deletions across West Bengal disproportionately affected Muslims like Begum, who account for 60%-65% of the deleted names, according to Sabar Institute. If the names of Dalits, Adivasis and other marginalised communities who have been deleted as counted along with Muslims, they all account for 90% of those wrongfully removed in the rural assembly constituency, according to this map prepared by the Sabar Institute.

The media coverage of the crisis has resolutely remained focussed on the individual and the anecdotal: the retired civil servant inexplicably deleted, the local politician forced to re-register, the statistical curiosity of a particular booth or region. There has been little sustained examination of the logic that produced these outcomes.

How did the Election Commission of India, a body whose independence is constitutionally mandated and historically celebrated, come to deploy artificial intelligence tools in a manner that systematically disadvantaged the most vulnerable sections of the electorate?

By what institutional reasoning was a verification process designed so that those with the fewest documents – precisely those whose precarity the democratic system ought to be most zealous in protecting – became the easiest to delete?

Glimpse of integrated District control room for media monitoring for #WBLA2026 at Dakahin Dinajpur District West Bengal. #WBLA2026 #DistrictControlRoom @ECISVEEP@SpokespersonECI@PIBKolkata@airnews_kolkata @DM_DDinajpur pic.twitter.com/NzkAEGBAfK

— CEO West Bengal (@CEOWestBengal) April 22, 2026

In January, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wrote to the Election Commission claiming that the errors were the result of Artificial Intelligence tools being used to delete voters’ names. The same logic that presents algorithmic digital governance as neutral and efficient also insulates it from the kind of accountability that is implicit in human decision-making, however flawed.

When a booth-level officer makes a wrongful deletion, there is a face, a chain of command, a mechanism of redress. When an algorithm classifies a Bengali Muslim widow as a “logical discrepancy”, the process is opaque, remote, and apparently beyond appeal.

In the 1970s, postcolonial theorists described how colonial relations were reproduced within the boundaries of the nation-state. They showed how peripheral communities – rural populations, and historically marginalised groups – were subjugated by urban, educated and institutionally empowered elites. With the special intensive revision, it would seem that something similar is underway. But instead of colonial intermediaries, the exercise of control is being carried out through centralised algorithmic digital governance.

The political narrative that has enabled this process is well established. Hindutva supporters have reframed Bengali Muslims as a demographic threat and “infiltrators” from Bangladesh.

Ironically, many names of members of the Matua community, primarily Dalit Hindu refugees from Bangladesh, have also been deleted. The Bharatiya Janata Party has repeatedly promised them Indian citizenship under the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act. This act from 2019 introduced a religious element into Indian citizenship law. Together with a planned National Register of Citizens of “genuine” Indians, these instruments are being used to threaten Bengali Muslims in West Bengal.

The special intensive revision effaces the deep roots of many communities in Bengal – roots that, in many cases, precede the modern states of either India or Bangladesh. It also transforms bureaucratic exclusion from a failure of democracy into an instrument of democracy: a mechanism by which genuine citizens are distinguished from presumed interlopers.

The Election Commission has insisted that the special intensive revision process is routine and legally mandated. The courts have agreed. But legality and legitimacy are not synonyms. The question at stake here is what kind of democracy India is becoming and who, in that democracy, counts.

I think of Golehara Begum at her humble home in Purba Bardhaman, and I think of her erasure: silent, administrative, bloodless, and for that reason all the more difficult to resist. India is becoming a nation in which voters are removed by mechanisms that mistake documentation for belonging and algorithmic arbitrariness for democratic legitimacy.

The world’s largest democracy cannot mistake the disappearance of over a half a million citizens from its electoral rolls as a technical problem awaiting a technical fix. It is a political problem and it demands a political reckoning.

The author is an academic based at the University of Manchester, UK. He grew up in Purba Bardhaman district, West Bengal. The views expressed in this article are his own.

The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday stayed an order issued by Election Commission officials to the police in West Bengal to take preventive action against “troublemakers” ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections in the state, Bar and Bench reported.

The police observer in the office of the chief election officer had “erred in issuing a blanket direction by treating certain citizens as troublemakers”, the Hindustan Times quoted a bench of Chief justice Sujoy Paul and Justice Partha Sarathi Sen as saying.

The judges stayed the order till June 30.

The matter pertained to an alleged order, titled “Preventive action against persons involved in voter intimidation”, issued by the police observer in the CEO office to the state director general of police on April 21, the newspaper reported.

The order allegedly had a list of “troublemakers”, and had claimed that they were involved in intimidating voters and disturbing the electoral process.

Subsequently, a public interest litigation was filed in the court by an advocate named Mohammed Danish Farooqui, who claimed that he had found out about the list of “troublemakers” from “multiple credible, trustworthy and independent sources”.

The petition claimed the purported list of about 800 persons largely contained the names of workers, office-bearers and elected officials from the ruling Trinamool Congress in the state.

It alleged that the move was aimed at targeting the Trinamool Congress, adding that it could impact the conduct of free and fair elections in the state.

“Not a single ground exists, nor has any been communicated, for the proposed arrest of any of the persons featured in the said list,” Bar and Bench quoted Farooqui as saying. “This action is being taken solely to prevent these individuals from participating in the election process for their party.”

The petitioner contended that any such arrests would amount to a “direct assault on personal liberty and the democratic process”.

The first phase of polling is being held on Thursday and the second on April 29. The votes will be counted on May 4.

The West Bengal Police and the administration are reporting to the Election Commission as the Model Code of Conduct is in force in the state for the polls.

Read Scroll’s coverage of the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections here.

During the hearing on Wednesday, the petitioner’s counsel said that citizens cannot be deprived of their right to personal liberty except according to the procedure established by law, Bar and Bench reported.

The Election Commission does not have any unbridled powers, the counsel said.

The counsel for the state government also supported the petition, saying that preventive action or detention that curtailed the freedom of a citizen could be taken only in accordance with law.

On the other hand, the Election Commission told the court that endeavour was to ensure free, fair and peaceful elections, the legal news portal reported.

“In order to do the same, concerned police authorities are reminded of their duties,” Bar and Bench quoted the counsel for the poll panel as saying.

The Election Commission has not directed the police to do anything without following due recourse of law, the counsel added.

The bench said that it will consider whether the poll panel, while exercising its powers under Article 324 of the Constitution, could issue such general instructions when election-related offences were already governed under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Representation of the People Act.

Article 324 vests the power of overseeing and conducting national and state elections in an independent Election Commission.

The poll panel was granted four weeks to respond to the petition, Bar and Bench reported. The bench also noted that the stay would not stop authorities from proceeding against any person who commits an offence.

Also read:

• Bengal elections: EC announces restrictions on motorcycles, pillion riders ahead of polling

• From jhalmuri to fish, how BJP is trying to shed its outsider image in Bengal

• Bengal SIR: EC adds 136 voters cleared by tribunals from 27 lakh appeals before first polling phase

“Why fuss over I-PAC like this?” an irritated Shashi Panja asked reporters at a Trinamool Congress news conference in Kolkata on Sunday when they inquired about a report in the Deccan Herald that the political consultancy had paused operations in West Bengal. Her reaction summed up her party’s confused position on the issue.

On the one hand, the cabinet minister from Bengal dismissed the report as “baseless”. On the other, she criticised the Bharatiya Janata Party for purportedly using Central investigative agencies to go after the Trinamool’s election consultant.

Panja claimed that her party was in close contact with the Indian Political Action Committee and that the consultancy was ensuring that the Trinamool’s campaign was “in full swing”.

However, according to an email that I-PAC’s human resources department sent out in the early hours of Sunday, all the company’s employees in West Bengal were asked to go on leave for 20 days with immediate effect. Scroll has seen this email, which says that the decision had been taken because of “certain legal issues”.

I-PAC has been on the radar of the Enforcement Directorate since January. The Central investigative agency has, in recent weeks, raided its offices in several cities and summoned its three directors for questioning. On April 14, it even arrested one of them, Vinesh Chandel, on allegations of money laundering.

The news of I-PAC deciding to retreat from the campaign came with just 10 days left for elections to conclude in West Bengal. The consultancy firm started by campaign strategist-turned-politician Prashant Kishor over a decade ago has acquired a reputation for delivering election victories. Could its absence prove to be a big setback for the Trinamool, which has for years relied on I-PAC to manage its affairs?

I-PAC employees, Trinamool insiders and other consultants said that the company usually plays a critical role in the final stages of campaigning and particularly on voting day. As a consequence, most of them expect I-PAC’s exit from the elections to hurt the party.

But, they added, the impact would be limited, given that both the Trinamool and I-PAC had time to prepare contingency plans for a situation like this after the January raids.

Advisors to event managers

Though the consultancy first came under the scanner three months ago, the pressure was ratcheted up last week after the Enforcement Directorate arrested one of its directors. After this happened, a mid-level employee had told Scroll that the company’s other directors were spending most of their time in Delhi, while middle management ran the show in Kolkata.

“They are smart people, but if you throw a spanner in the works, they don’t know what to do,” this person said, requesting anonymity. “This will obviously affect the Trinamool. It is already affecting [them].”

At the news conference on Sunday, Trinamool leaders sought to understate the role that I-PAC plays for the party, characterising it as a “political advisor”. But the company’s former employees say it offers more than advice.

“They do less advising and play the role of event managers,” said a consultant who spent a year working at the company before switching jobs. “In the final stages of campaigning, pamphlets have to be distributed, flags have to be put up, walls have to be painted and bike rallies have to be taken out. All of this is included in the I-PAC model.”

This person, requesting anonymity, explained that as voting day nears, the top leadership of political parties are wary of relying solely on local workers to organise campaign events.

“Politicians who did not get the ticket are unhappy and won’t organise rallies well,” this person added. Even those contesting an election, this person pointed out, sometimes view it as an opportunity to make a quick buck by embezzling party funds. This is where consultants come in, promising to hold events cheaply and efficiently.

“Someone like Mamata [Banerjee] or Abhishek [Banerjee] trusts I-PAC more than their own workers or party leaders,” this person claimed, referring to the Trinamool’s top leaders. “This is the reason for the proximity between them and consultants. Why else did Mamata come forward to protect Pratik?”

This was a reference to the Enforcement Directorate raid on the Kolkata home of Pratik Jain, one of I-PAC’s founders, in January. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had made headlines at the time by dramatically interrupting the search midway and walking away with what she said were party documents.

Another former employee who worked on the Trinamool campaign during the 2021 Assembly elections said that the impact of I-PAC’s absence went beyond events. This person contended that the party needed I-PAC’s ground teams on voting day.

According to this person, these ground teams spent months studying constituencies to identify booths they consider to be strong, weak or could swing for the party. Then, on the day of polling, they monitor the turnout trends across booths from the candidate’s war room.

“If voting is slow in favourable booths, they have ways to mobilise voters,” this person explained. “Likewise, sometimes they tell the candidate, ‘See, this is a BJP booth. A lot of votes are being cast there.’ In my experience, this can make a difference of about 2%-5% on the vote share.”

I-PAC still around?

If I-PAC’s exit indeed reduces the gap between the vote shares of the Trinamool and the BJP, it could theoretically swing the election. The gap between the two leading contenders for power in West Bengal shrank from 10 percentage points in the 2021 Assembly polls to seven in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

Given that the Trinamool alleges that the special intensive revision carried out by the Election Commission has targeted its voters, this gap could have narrowed even further in the run up to voting.

However, most consultants and Trinamool politicians that Scroll spoke to said that there was little need to discuss the impact of I-PAC’s exit since many of its ground teams were still at work in the campaign.

“They will not pull out all their ground resources because it is just a matter of a few days,” said the former employee quoted above, pointing out that voting in Bengal is scheduled to conclude on April 29. “Those on the ground will try to finish their work quietly.”

At least three Trinamool insiders also claimed that the ground teams were still working with the war rooms of candidates. Scroll was unable to independently confirm this. Neither I-PAC’s media team nor its leadership team responded to calls and messages.

The chief minister’s own comments on this issue, too, have given legs to the theory that I-PAC staffers on the ground are working for her party. “If you [BJP] scare those who work for us, we will absorb them in our party and give them jobs,” she announced at a rally on Sunday.

One former I-PAC employee who worked at the company till last year suggested that it must have anticipated this situation and put plans in place after the January raids.

“Both the party and the company had time to prepare for something like this,” they said, adding that the arrest of director Vinesh Chandel did not come out of the blue. “After the first raid in January, they must have prepared a plan.”

Shutting down the head office in Kolkata was not the same as stopping work altogether, this person underlined. In their assessment, the impact of I-PAC’s so-called pause in operations would be “marginal”, if at all.

In the final analysis, the effect of the scrutiny on the consultancy and its eventual retreat from the campaign might turn out to be psychological. One of the former employees quoted earlier contended that this is what the BJP at the Centre wanted.

“They want to tell undecided voters that BJP has become strong enough to enter Trinamool’s home turf and hit it where it hurts,” this person surmised. “That was the primary intent behind all of this. It is a psychological game.”

Congress MP TN Prathapan has moved the Supreme Court against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s national address on April 18 which was aired by public service broadcaster Doordarshan, Bar and Bench reported on Wednesday.

The petition has alleged misuse of government-controlled television channels to criticise Opposition parties during an active election period, in violation of the Model Code of Conduct.

Prathapan highlighted in his petition that the speech was broadcast live on Doordarshan and Sansad TV, both of which are funded from the public exchequer and are controlled by the government, the legal news outlet reported.

Modi, in his address, had criticised Opposition parties for defeating in the Lok Sabha the Union government’s bill to amend the 2023 Women’s Reservation Act and redraw the boundaries of electoral constituencies.

On April 17, the 2026 Constitution 131st Amendment Bill, one of three draft legislations introduced by the Centre during a special session, was defeated in the Lower House of Parliament.

As a Constitution amendment bill, it required a two-thirds majority of votes to pass. The ruling National Democratic Alliance does not have a two-thirds majority of MPs in any House and had required the support of the Opposition to pass the amendment.

In his address the following day, Modi had claimed that Opposition parties stood against the draft legislation, which he described as the women’s reservation bill, for their “selfish political interests”.

Opposition parties, including the Congress, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the Trinamool Congress, have maintained that they supported the amendments to the Women’s Reservation Act, but were opposed to the proposed delimitation of electoral constituencies.

On Tuesday, the Congress submitted a privilege notice to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla against Modi, alleging that his national address “cast aspersions” on Opposition MPs.

India’s top metros – Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai, home to 75 million people – rank among the world’s 10 most populous cities. However, “population scale has not translated proportionately into urban productivity, liveability or global economic influence,” the Union government’s Economic Survey 2025-26 admits.

While calling cities “engines of growth, magnets for talent, and crucibles of innovation”, the Survey also labels them “sites of daily strain: long commutes, uneven services and shared spaces that often fall short of collective expectations”.

Indian cities score low in their liveability quotient despite allocations to urban local bodies by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs and the XIV and XV Finance Commissions topping Rs 8.36 lakh crore in the last decade, according to a new report by Janaagraha and the Jana Urban Space Foundation, not-for-profits working to transform the quality of life in the country’s towns and cities.

The key reason for this lapse, experts say, is the fragmentation of urban functions across urban local bodies, development authorities, state line departments and parastatal agencies. Essentially, local governments haven’t been empowered to do whatever is expected of them.

India’s urban population is expected to grow from 522 million today to 723 million by 2050.

If nothing is done to improve the way cities are managed, Akash Pharande, managing director of Pharande Spaces, a real estate developer in Pune, expects “escalating water wars, public-health emergencies and economic drag” to impede life in them.

Already, India’s affluent – desirous of bettering their lifestyle – are shifting to integrated townships and gated communities to make up for deficient urban public services. But their choosing to do so is worsening conditions for the less privileged.

“When the wealthy disengage, cities see deteriorating services and weakened political pressure for municipal reform,” said Amit Kapoor, chair, Institute for Competitiveness, the Indian knot in the global network of the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness at Harvard Business School.

Urban service

Sonia Sarkar, 45, shifted from rental accommodation in Delhi’s Chittaranjan Park to a gated complex in Noida in 2015, a move prompted by the need “to own a place because how long could I have kept living out of rented accommodation”, the Kolkata-native told IndiaSpend.

Sarkar opted for an apartment in a gated community consisting of 11 high-rise buildings in Noida because “high-rises started booming when I booked the apartment in 2010”. Safety, an important element when a single woman like Sarkar goes house-hunting, was much better in the complex than in a building opening onto the street in the same area, even if it meant contending with the residents’ welfare association’s rules that disallow a cab or three-wheeler into the premises.

The complex is clean “because maintenance employees are accountable to residents”, added Sarkar. The electricity back-up works, and the pavement stays intact unlike the road beyond, which “is dug up by civic authorities without any prior intimation of the utilitarian project they are undertaking”.

Unsafe, dark, potholed roads in cities across India are an outcome of governance vacuums. Speaking of Pune, Pharande points out that “three years without elected corporators had left the city’s residents chasing departmental signatures for streetlights and pothole repairs”.

With no general body, budget oversight has vanished, and project slippages have also multiplied, added Pharande, citing Pune’s Mahalunge-Maan town planning scheme, the region’s flagship hi-tech city launched in 2017 as an example. Nine years on, “flood-line errors, litigation and a lapsed contractor have left 250 hectares of half-built towers surrounded by dirt tracks, tanker water and construction debris”.

Essentially, “legal RERA-approved buildings now stand in an officially unapproved city”, he said.

Meanwhile, previously serene Pune suburbs such as Baner, Kalyani Nagar, and NIBM Road have seen bungalows flipped into restaurants, tuition centres and hostels without parking, fire access or waste systems, turning residential lanes into 24×7 traffic corridors.

Bureaucratic bottlenecks for routine civic issues as well as municipal urban planning failures are a national challenge, according to Pharande. “While 39% of state capitals lack an active master plan, those that do routinely see spot-modifications, plots are de-reserved within months of notification to monetise land before public scrutiny.”

Integrated townships that boast green spaces, and harmonious commercial and residential spaces – a step beyond gated communities – represent India’s best urban model today, he said, adding that “bringing such harmony at a city level is a monumental task given the decades of damage and neglect that have already passed, and requires far more political will than we have seen to date”.

What about the rest?

Two in five households in India’s top 50 cities today opt to live in a gated complex, up from one in three households five years ago, according to a new report from Redseer Strategy Consultants on the rise of gated communities in India.

Leading metros such as Bengaluru, Gurgaon and Hyderabad have a lot of supply and matching demand for gated community living, including integrated townships, according to Santhosh Kumar, vice chairman of the ANAROCK Group, real estate consultants.

“Other cities seeing rapidly improving infrastructure and real estate development options at lower price points like Pune, Lucknow, Indore, Chandigarh, Jaipur, Nagpur, and Coimbatore are capturing 15-20% of the annual demand,” he said.

Satellite images of leading cities in 2003 and 2020 – which clearly show increasing densification, and as a result a loss of green cover and shrinking water bodies – as IndiaSpend reported in January 2026, explain why this shift has become a national trend.

Those who can afford a better lifestyle are relocating to pockets that promise to deliver what they’re looking for.

Forty-four-year-old Arshia and her family relocated from an ungated apartment complex in Panchkula, Haryana, to a gated community in Noida consisting of eight high-rise buildings, a place she saw as “safer, especially for parents and children, and offering better quality living by virtue of a host of amenities – a clubhouse, swimming pool, play area, hobby classes, building maintenance and so on".

Advertisements for upcoming or exclusive communities promise landscaped open spaces, play areas, gyms, club houses, sports centres, all of which are supposed to be part of city development plans, but aren’t.

So while on the one hand, “shortcomings in municipal service delivery have played a role in the rise of gated communities”, Ravi Shankar Singh, managing director of Residential Services at Colliers India, a real estate advisory, also attributes this trend to “lifestyle aspirations and the desire for hassle-free living”.

“For many families, the appeal lies not in escaping the city, but in experiencing a more organised, community-oriented and convenient version of it,” said Singh.

The Covid-19 pandemic, which introduced the hybrid work formats that endure even today, also gave self-contained living a new meaning, and thereby majorly contributed to the rise of gated communities, added Kumar.

Municipal lapses, social fabric

Framing the rise of gated communities as a story about the wealthy and their preferences misses the entire picture, and the consequences thereof.

“The rise of gated communities is also a story about who bears the cost when public systems fail and that cost is not borne equally,” said Kapoor of the Institute for Competitiveness.

Residents of gated communities are wealthier than those living outside gates. Redseer has estimated their per capita income to be about $14,500, five to seven times the India average. Essentially, they are wealthy enough to pay a municipal tax for living in a city and a monthly maintenance fee to a Residents’ Welfare Association for water, waste management, security and green spaces.

In choosing so, however, they are disengaging from urban governance, a disengagement that people who cannot choose likewise – the sanitation worker, the auto driver, the family in the resettlement colony 3 km away – pay a heavy price for.

The “active engagement of citizens, especially in critical domains like budget formulation and urban development planning… guarantees that the concerns and perspectives of underprivileged individuals receive top priority in policy formulation”, according to the Institute for Competitiveness’s 2024 report on municipal performance, which evaluated governance, services, technology, finance and planning in 134 cities.

“When a city’s most resourceful residents disengage, it can create conditions where the needs of the less affluent are more easily deprioritised and over time, the city’s sense of shared responsibility can quietly narrow,” said Kapoor.

In India, gated communities have another drawback, tending to be exclusionary along intersecting lines of class, caste, and often religion, said Ubaid Sidique, research associate, Department of Political Science, Aligarh Muslim University. He is the author of a March 2026 paper in Discover Cities on sustainable urbanisation in non-metropolitan India, which looks at reasons for the failure of public services in Aligarh.

Sidique points out that housing societies in metros like Mumbai, Delhi and Ahmedabad routinely, albeit informally, employ discriminatory screening practices against people of scheduled caste, Muslim or other marginalised backgrounds.

In doing so, “gated communities risk hardening pre-existing social hierarchies into the very geography of our cities”, he said. “The sanitised enclaves where the urban elite effectively secede from the broader city restrict access to roads, parks and amenities that could otherwise serve the wider public.”

Alongside this deepening socio-spatial inequality, Sidique said gated communities also raise concerns about the weakening of the social contract between citizens and municipal institutions.

Public services

The Twelfth Schedule of the Indian Constitution, added in the 74th Constitutional Amendment of 1992, outlines the powers, authority, and responsibilities of municipalities. With this amendment, for the first time in independent India, cities got a constitutional identity, and were envisaged to have elected, empowered, locally-accountable city governments.

However, a Comptroller and Auditor General audit of urban local bodies across 18 states in 2024 found that while on average, they have been entrusted with 17 of 18 listed functions, only four of these functions have been entrusted with full autonomy.

Urban planning, the function that would most directly prevent the fragmented, infrastructure-starved sprawl that drives people behind gates, is among the least devolved functions of all, Kapoor pointed out.

Urban local bodies in 10 of 18 states had no powers over the recruitment of their staff and the average staff vacancy against the sanction strength stood at 37%.

Cities also need sufficient resources to run but India’s municipalities are under-resourced, and don’t have the authority to make financial decisions.

The Comptroller and Auditor General’s audit found that urban local bodies have a resource-expenditure gap of 42%, a gap that has steadily been growing despite the Twelfth Schedule. Own revenue made up 89% of municipal revenue in 1961, but barely 51% in 2021.

“GST reforms introduced in 2017, while nationally necessary, stripped ULBs of a further 19% of their own-source revenue as octroi, entry tax and local surcharges were absorbed into the central pool without direct compensation to cities,” noted Kapoor.

Urban local bodies also don’t have the autonomy to decide their own property tax rates, which Kapoor said is “a structural incompatibility between the scale of India's urban ambition and the fiscal architecture actually available to its cities”.

Presently, cities realise only 56% of their own property tax demand, and that too, Kapoor points out, “at anaemic rates”.

While urban India generates 66% of the country’s gross domestic product, municipal own revenues – primarily from property taxes and user fees – are less than 1% of GDP. Property tax yield is estimated to be between 0.16% and 0.24% of India’s GDP as compared to 1.9% of GDP in OECD countries.

Insufficient revenue leaves cities heavily dependent on government grants but financial transfers to municipalities amount to 0.45% of GDP in India, much lower than 5.1% in Brazil, 5.4% in Indonesia, 2.5% in the Philippines, and between 6% and 10% in parts of Europe, according to the Institute for Competitiveness.

Its report evaluating municipal performance clearly saw “adequate intent and absent authority in practically every city”, said Kapoor. “This points to an issue of delegation without devolution.”

He attributed this to the wording of the 74th Amendment. While the Amendment imposes mandatory obligations on states with respect to elections and institutional structure, the devolution of the 18 functions listed in the Twelfth Schedule remains discretionary.

“Article 243W’s use of ‘may’ rather than ‘shall’ has left the pace and extent of functional devolution to the discretion of state governments,” said Kapoor. “That permissive language has, over time, created space for state governments to centralise authority in ways that were perhaps not originally intended.”

IndiaSpend has reached out to the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs for comment on what the ministry is doing to alleviate this situation. We will update this story when we receive responses.

Urban body reform

Reform would involve the genuine devolution of functions from state governments to municipalities. For this to happen, “India needs a shift in political culture,” said Sidique. “Without that, India’s urban governance ecosystem will continue to operate within a deeply centralised state-level framework, wherein chief ministers and state bureaucracies treat municipalities as extensions of state authority rather than as autonomous democratic institutions.”

Until that occurs, to improve service delivery, “coordination across ULBs, parastatal agencies and line departments, the different agencies entrusted with different functions, is a must”, said Sidique.

Cities must be given the authority to assess what personnel they need, advertise positions, select candidates and determine pay scales.

“Nothing else will work if the institution at the centre of delivery cannot hire the people it needs,” said Kapoor. “Cities cannot function without adequate, well trained and remunerated engineers, planners, public health officers, accountants and administrators.”

Cities also need more revenue resources and greater control over them.

The 16th Finance Commission recommended significant fiscal corrections for urban local bodies include an allocation of Rs 3.56 lakh crore for 2026-31, more than double the previous Commission’s outlay. With this, the urban share of local-body grants will rise to an all-time high of 45%. Sidique emphasised the need to “make fiscal decentralisation a priority so that ULBs have greater control over revenue sources”.

The spending of this allocation matters more than allocations by Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs because the latter’s allocations have been predominantly consumed by metro rail and affordable housing projects in the last decade, according to analysis by Janaagraha and the Jana Urban Space Foundation.

In fact, more than a third of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affair’s current year budget is for metro projects alone. Consequently, schemes covering the delivery of everyday urban services like Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban), for solid waste management, and Atal Mission Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation, for water security and sewerage coverage, have seen 50% and 20% reductions in the last year alone.

Sidique also emphasised the need to operationalise accountability and citizen participation provisions to rebuild trust in public institutions, some of which already exist on paper but remain largely dormant. For instance, the 74th Constitutional Amendment proposed ward committees to be the grassroots tier of urban democracy. But in most states, he said, “they either don’t exist or function as rubber stamps”.

“Social audits, which have been successfully employed in rural India under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, particularly in states like Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, need to be adapted and mandated for the delivery of urban services such as water supply, sanitation and waste management,” he added.

Participatory budgeting wherein people have a direct say in how municipal funds are allocated is another step towards citizen participation, which Sidique pointed out had had a good start in Pune in the early 2000s, although it lost momentum due to the lack of political will.

Although new schemes like SMART Cities and Swachh Bharat have introduced digital tools to track the delivery of public services, Sidique said that they remain “top-down in design, rarely translate into genuine downward accountability, and lack grievance redressal platforms”.

Charu Bahri is a freelance writer and editor based in Mount Abu, Rajasthan.

This article first appeared on IndiaSpend, a data-driven and public-interest journalism non-profit.

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In a supplementary list, the Election Commission added 136 voters to the electoral rolls in West Bengal whose appeals were accepted by the appellate tribunals. However, 27 lakh appeals filed by persons who have been excluded are pending.

As the first phase of the Assembly elections in the state will be held on Thursday, the approval rate of appeals was 98.5%, as only 138 cases had been decided on by the tribunals so far as part of the special intensive revision of electoral rolls. Read on.

Watch: As lakhs of Muslim voters lose out to Bengal SIR, who stands to gain?

The Calcutta High Court asked the Election Commission why it needed to order the arrest of alleged “troublemakers” ahead of the Assembly elections in West Bengal. The court was hearing a plea by an advocate who claimed that he had found out about the list from “multiple credible, trustworthy and independent sources”.

The plea claimed that the purported list largely contains the names of the Trinamool Congress’ workers, leaders and elected officials.

The counsel representing the Election Commission told the court that there were “emergent circumstances” that required such measures, adding that the information was sensitive and could not be disclosed at the moment. Read on.

The Election Commission has directed that “outsiders” have been barred from the housing societies designated as polling booths for the West Bengal polls. “No outsiders who are not electors of that constituency can stay as guests in residential complexes where booths are located,” said the poll panel.

The restriction will remain in place until the end of the second phase of voting. Read on.

Iran opened fire on three container ships in the Strait of Hormuz hours after United States President Donald Trump said that he was extending the ceasefire with Tehran. Trump said the US will “hold our attack on the country of Iran until such time as their leaders and representatives can come up with a unified proposal”.

However, Mahdi Mohammadi, advisor to the speaker of the Iranian Parliament, said that the extension of the ceasefire “means nothing”. “The losing side cannot dictate terms,” he asserted. Read on.

The Bombay High Court quashed an order passed by a special court for framing of charges against four men accused in the 2006 Malegaon blasts case. They were the last remaining persons accused in the matter.

The special court had in September ordered that Manohar Narwaria, Rajendra Chaudhary, Dhan Singh and Lokesh Sharma be charged for murder and criminal conspiracy, and under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act.

On September 8, 2006, bomb blasts took place near a mosque and a cemetery in Maharashtra’s Malegaon in which 31 persons were killed. The case is not linked to the 2008 Malegaon blast in which Bharatiya Janata Party leader Pragya Singh Thakur, Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit and five others were acquitted in July. Read on.

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In a supplementary list published on Wednesday, the Election Commission added 136 voters out of the 27 lakh whose appeals were reportedly pending before the appellate tribunal, ABP Ananda reported. The appeals of these 136 voters were accepted before the first phase of the Assembly elections.

The approval rate for the appeals was 98.5% as only 138 cases had been decided on by the tribunals before the first phase of polling, as part of the special intensive revision of electoral rolls. The remaining two appeals were rejected, Aaj Tak Bangla reported.

About 34 lakh appeals were reportedly pending before the tribunals. Of these, seven lakh were against names being included in the rolls and 27 lakh were filed by persons who were excluded, News9 reported.

On April 16, the Supreme Court directed the Election Commission to publish a supplementary electoral roll in West Bengal to include voters whose appeals against deletions have been accepted by the appellate tribunals.

Persons whose appeals have been cleared by the tribunals before April 21 should be included for voting in the first phase of Assembly elections, the court had said. Those who are cleared by April 27 should be included in the final electoral rolls for the second phase of the polls.

All decisions made by the tribunals on the addition and deletion of voters by those dates must be reflected in the final voter lists.

The first phase of polling will be held on April 23 and the second on April 29. The votes will be counted on May 4.

This came after the Election Commission froze the electoral rolls for the first phase of polling on April 9.

SIR appellate tribunals

The Election Commission on February 28 published the final electoral roll for West Bengal, showing that more than 61 lakh voters had been excluded. However, the process had continued with about 60 lakh “doubtful and pending” cases remaining under adjudication based on their objections to their exclusions from the draft rolls published in December.

Several supplementary lists were released, in which the names of more voters have been included.

The process had concluded on April 6 after judicial officers adjudicated the 60 lakh claims and objections. However, voters who were removed during the adjudication process can appeal in 19 tribunals set up for the purpose.

On February 20, the Supreme Court ordered that judicial officers of the rank of district judge or additional district judge be appointed to help complete the revision exercise in the state.

On March 10, the top court ordered the formation of appellate tribunals composed of former High Court chief justices and judges to hear appeals against exclusions. A person whose claim for inclusion in the electoral rolls has been rejected by a judicial officer can approach the tribunal.

Nearly 91 lakh voters have been removed from West Bengal’s voter lists as part of the special intensive revision of the electoral rolls. The deletions represent nearly 11.9% of the state’s electorate of 7.6 crore that existed before the revision process began.

Videos of a commuter in Mumbai confronting Bharatiya Janata Party leader Girish Mahajan and police personnel for blocking a road during a protest march were widely shared on social media on Tuesday.

The protest by the ruling Mahayuti coalition led to traffic congestion in the Worli area on Tuesday. The protest was to be held at the Jambori Maidan. The woman reportedly stepped out of her vehicle, and was heard asking Mahajan and the police officers not to block the road and protest at a ground instead.

The woman, whose identity is unclear, said that she had been stuck in the traffic and had to pick up her child. She told a police officer that she had been waiting in traffic for more than an hour.

When Mahajan asked her to calm down, the woman asked him to “get out of here”.

“What is wrong with you?” she asked. “There are hundreds of people waiting. There's an empty ground there.”

She asked the police to clear the traffic.

Get out of here!

Mumbai woman explodes at Maharashtra Minister & BJP MLA Girish Mahajan during a BJP's "Mahila Jan Aakrosh" rally in Worli that blocked roads over the failed Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill. Stranded while rushing to pick up her child from school, she… pic.twitter.com/Fin9zXjU2o

— Piyush Rai (@Benarasiyaa) April 22, 2026

On Wednesday, Mahajan told IANS that the woman was not wrong.

However, he said that a protest march such as this, irrespective of the organiser “has to move from one place to another” which would mean that the “road is bound to be blocked”.

“Some inconvenience is inevitable in any protest,” he said. “Still, there is a proper way to express anger and I feel the language used was inappropriate.”

Mumbai, Maharashtra: On his viral Video, Minister Girish Mahajan says, "I will not say it was wrong. Yesterday, there was a women’s ‘Jan Aakrosh Morcha’ organised by women against Congress after the Bill was passed, and thousands of our sisters participated in it. But when such a… pic.twitter.com/SA2j8qc7Hk

— IANS (@ians_india) April 22, 2026

Aam Aadmi Party’s Mumbai chief Preeti Sharma Menon said that while the police allow protests only at Azad Maidan, the BJP “was allowed to protest on the roads”.

In August, the Maharashtra government had designated Azad Maidan as the only venue for all protests in South Mumbai.

The woman was praised by social media users.

A user said that the BJP’s “event-mongering has now started directly testing the patience” of residents. “Is jamming the roads and harassing ordinary people just to spread a false narrative in the name of women's reservation really your politics?” the handle asked on social media platform X.

The BJP was protesting against the Opposition for defeating a constitutional amendment bill in Parliament on Friday. The ruling party claimed that the opposition was against women’s interests because it stood against what the BJP describes as the women’s reservation bill.

The 2026 Constitution 131st Amendment Bill, one of three draft legislations, was defeated in the Lok Sabha. As a constitutional amendment bill, it required a two-thirds majority of votes to pass. The ruling National Democratic Alliance does not have a two-thirds majority of MPs in any House and had required the support of the Opposition to pass the amendment.

Opposition parties have maintained that they supported the amendments to the Women’s Reservation Act, but were opposed to the proposed delimitation of electoral constituencies.

Commenting on the video of the confrontation on Tuesday, a social media user said that the woman had “taught a very good lesson to these two-bit leaders who keep harassing the public day and night”.

इस महिला ने बहुत हीं अच्छा सबक सिखाया है इन दो दो कौड़ी के नेताओं को जो दिन रात पब्लिक को बस परेशान करते हैं

मुंबई में BJP के नेता और कार्यकर्ता महिला आरक्षण बिल को लेकर सड़क जाम करने की नौटंकी कर रहे थे, तभी घंटों भर जाम में फंसी एक महिला ने इनलोगों को इनकी औकात दिखाई और सबको… pic.twitter.com/1YzwyeXmdy

— Gautam Thakur (@gautamthakurx) April 21, 2026

Another user said that “BJP’s ‘Nari Shakti’ [women power] drama in Mumbai got busted by one bold woman!”

“They blocked Worli roads for hours ‘for women’s reservation’ – while real women were stuck in traffic, late to pick up kids,” the account said.

The user added: “Protesting for women by torturing women? The hypocrisy is real. Even women aren't buying this anymore. Real Nari Shakti doesn’t block roads.”

Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) MP Priyanka Chaturvedi praised the woman “who showed a mirror to minister Girish Mahajan and BJP protesters for blocking traffic to carry out their political protest”.

The woman’s anger “is not just of hers but every single Mumbaikar who face the commute woes”, she added.

Chaturvedi asked asked: “Why was BJP protesting on the streets instead of designated ground? Who gave them the permission to carry out the protest during peak traffic hours? Why should people suffer due to political showmanship of BJP?”

Hats off to the lady from Mumbai who showed a mirror to Minister Girish Mahajan and BJP protestors for blocking traffic to carry out their political protest.
In Mumbai daily commute includes hours of being stuck in traffic jams and instead of understanding the fast losing…

— Priyanka Chaturvedi🇮🇳 (@priyankac19) April 22, 2026

The women’s wing of the Congress said that the woman was brave and had “raised her voice and gave a proper scolding to the shameless BJP minister who was shedding crocodile tears!”

“Outsiders” have been barred from the housing societies designated as polling booths for the West Bengal Assembly elections, The Times of India quoted the Election Commission as directing on Tuesday.

“No outsiders who are not electors of that constituency can stay as guests in residential complexes where booths are located,” the state’s Chief Electoral Officer Manoj Agarwal was quoted as saying.

The restriction will remain in place until the end of the second phase of voting, added Agarwal.

Polling in the state will take place in two phases on April 23 and April 29, with results scheduled to be declared on May 4.

The new curbs came a day after the poll panel announced several restrictions on motorcycles during the night and disallowed tourists from visiting Digha, a popular beach destination in the state.

Additionally, the sale of liquor was also banned on Monday for 96 hours ahead of polling on Thursday. The Election Commission usually mandates a 48-hour ban on the sale of liquor before polling across the country.

Read Scroll’s coverage of the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections here.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday stated that a chief minister cannot “put democracy in peril” by interfering with an investigation, reported Bar and Bench.

“What right of the state does this involve?” asked a bench of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and NV Anjaria while hearing a petition filed by the Enforcement Directorate against West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and several state police officers for allegedly obstructing the searches at the premises of political consultancy I-PAC on January 8.

The bench added that this was not a dispute between the state and the Union government, reported Live Law.

The Enforcement Directorate had moved the court under Article 32 of the Constitution that allows persons to approach the Supreme Court directly against the alleged violation of fundamental rights.

During the hearing on Wednesday, the court said that the chief minister cannot walk in the “midst of an inquiry”, Live Law reported.

The court’s statement came in response to the state government questioning the maintainability of the plea, arguing that Article 32 was available only to individuals and not a government department.

“There was no criminal conduct, there was no intimidation, there was no infraction,” said advocate Menaka Guruswamy, representing the West Bengal government.

She further submitted that the matter raises a “substantial question of law” and must be referred to a five-judge bench.

However, the court disagreed with the contention. “In every question there will be some question of law,” it said. “That does not mean every 32 petitions are referred to a five-judge bench.”

The raids

In January and April, the Enforcement Directorate carried out searches at locations in several cities, including premises linked to I-PAC officials.

One of its directors, Vinesh Chandel, was arrested on April 13 in connection with the case and remanded to 10 days custody of the central agency.

The January 8 searches at the political consultancy’s office in Kolkata’s Salt Lake area, the home of its head Pratik Jain and the office of a trader in the city’s Posta neighbourhood had led to a political dispute.

Banerjee arrived at Jain’s home around noon while the search was underway and stayed for about 20 to 25 minutes. She then came out with a file and claimed that the central agency’s officials were “taking away” party documents ahead of the Assembly polls.

After the raids, the Trinamool Congress and I-PAC had moved the Calcutta High Court, challenging the legality of the searches. The central agency also approached the High Court, alleging “illegal interference” in its work.

The agency’s case stems from a November 2020 first information report registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation about an alleged coal smuggling syndicate that was used to “steal and illegally excavate coal from [Eastern Coalfields Limited] leasehold areas” in West Bengal.

The ED has alleged that a hawala operator linked to the network facilitated transactions worth tens of crores of rupees to Indian PAC Consulting Private Limited, the registered entity of I-PAC.

I-PAC has managed the Trinamool Congress’ election campaigns, including the 2021 Assembly elections. It is also managing the party’s campaign for the upcoming state polls.

The elections in West Bengal will be held in two phases on April 23 and April 29. The results will be announced on May 4.

The Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday asked the Election Commission to take “strictest action” against Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge for calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi a “terrorist”, reported PTI.

On Tuesday, while criticising the All India Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam for its alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party, Kharge had said, “How can [the AIADMK] join with Modi…He is a terrorist”, The Hindu reported.

The Congress leader made the comments in Chennai on the last day of campaigning for the Tamil Nadu elections to be held on Thursday. The votes will be counted on May 4.

Kharge later said that he had not called the prime minister a terrorist but said that he was “terrorising” Opposition leaders.

“I said that tax terrorism is happening, the Enforcement Directorate, the Income Tax department and the Central Bureau of Investigation are conducting raids,” he told ANI.

He added: “This terrorism is being facilitated by the prime minister. I did not call him a terrorist...he is scaring people. He is trying to silence people through raids and attempting to defeat them in elections.”

On Wednesday, a delegation of BJP leaders, including Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju and Union Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal, met the Election Commission, reported PTI.

Speaking to reporters later, Sitharaman, who was part of the delegation, described Kharge’s remarks as “outrageous”.

“It is an insult to the mandate given by the people of India,” the finance minister was quoted as saying. “More importantly, it is an insult to the entire system where people choose their leader through elections, and once chosen, he is the leader for the entire country.”

She added: “We have demanded that the Election Commission take the matter in all seriousness. We requested the poll panel to act firmly and sternly.”

Rijiju said that the BJP delegation had “demanded that Kharge and the Congress be directed to apologise to the country”, reported PTI.

He added that the poll panel had assured it would take “appropriate action” in the matter.

The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday verbally asked the Election Commission why it needed to order the arrest of alleged “troublemakers” ahead of the Assembly elections in West Bengal, Live Law reported.

The bench of Chief Justice Sujoy Paul and Justice Parthasarathy Sen was hearing a plea by an advocate who claimed that he had found out about the list from “multiple credible, trustworthy and independent sources”, Bar and Bench reported.

The plea claimed the purported list largely contains the names of Trinamool Congress workers, office-bearers and elected officials, Live Law reported.

The petitioner contended that any such arrests would amount to a “direct assault on personal liberty and the democratic process”.

The first phase of polling will be held on April 23 and the second on April 29. The votes will be counted on May 4.

On Wednesday, the counsel representing the poll body told the court that there were “emergent circumstances” that required such measures, adding that the information was sensitive and could not be disclosed at the moment.

The counsel asked for time until Monday to file a counter affidavit in the matter.

In response, the chief justice verbally asked why there was a need for such an order.

“If there is an offence, they are described under the Acts, and there are statutory authorities who are under a duty to carry out the law,” Live Law quoted the chief justice as saying. “Those authorities have the power to ensure fair elections take place.”

The poll body’s counsel asserted that the order was required to tell the state administration that the persons on the list “cannot interfere” with the elections.

“Judicial officers were held at gunpoint and gheraoed,” the lawyer told the High Court. “The Supreme Court had come down heavily on us. They said it was our duty to take all steps necessary.”

Read Scroll’s coverage of the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections here.

HC allows college faculty deployment for election duty

A separate bench of the High Court on Tuesday stayed a single-judge bench’s order that had disallowed the Election Commission to deploy government college faculty as presiding officers of polling stations in the state, Bar and Bench reported.

A division bench of Justice Shampa Sarkar and Ajay Kumar Gupta set aside Justice Krishna Rao’s Friday order in which he had held that the poll body failed to justify the “unavoidable circumstances” mandating such appointments.

On Friday, the single-judge bench had said the poll body’s power to appoint officials is not unfettered.

It highlighted that the body must comply with its own circulars, and pointed out that such appointments violate a 2010 circular that said unavoidable circumstances requiring the deployment must be recorded in writing, Bar and Bench reported.

The petitioner’s main argument was that the Election Commission had made procedural lapses in the process. It also alleged that the poll panel had failed to consider the rank, status and pay mandated by its own guidelines for such deployments.

However on Tuesday, the two-judge bench held that the Friday order could pose last-minute logistical challenges to the polling process.

“The effect of the order impugned before us will result in a chaotic situation,” the bench said. “The Election Commission will not be in a position to either requisition fresh persons to act as presiding officers and more importantly impart training to them.”

Also read:

• Bengal elections: EC announces restrictions on motorcycles, pillion riders ahead of polling
• From jhalmuri to fish, how BJP is trying to shed its outsider image in Bengal
• Bengal SIR: EC adds 136 voters cleared by tribunals from 27 lakh appeals before first polling phase

The Union government has alleged before the Delhi High Court that the YouTube channel 4PM News had been blocked in March for “peddling anti-India sentiments” and alleging that Indian authorities were involved in the Pahalgam terror attack, reported Bar and Bench on Tuesday.

In an affidavit filed before the court, the Union government also alleged that the channel’s content was a classic case of “digital lobbying” to aid foreign actors who intend to influence India’s sovereign decision-making, according to Live Law.

The Union government had ordered the blocking of the channel on March 12, citing concerns about national security and public order.

4PM News and its editor Sanjay Sharma had moved the court challenging the decision. They said that neither Google, which owns YouTube, nor the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology had provided them with a formal order or reasons for blocking the channel, reported Bar and Bench.

In response, the ministry has alleged before the court that the channel had a “sustained pattern” of hosting content that was speculative, one-sided, malicious and unsubstantiated, reported Live Law.

“It is submitted that the videos hosted on the blocked channel attributed grave acts to the Union of India, such as compromising India’s strategic autonomy, having prior awareness of military action in West Asia and endangering Indians abroad,” read the affidavit.

The content on the channel also includes “per-se false, inciting, destabilising information on subjects such as terrorism, internal security of the border state of Jammu and Kashmir and Manipur”, it added.

The Union government told the court that the channel had also questioned the genuineness of India’s military response to the Pahalgam terror attack and “presented defence-related debts and schemes through fabricated narratives that could erode confidence in the armed forces”.

The terror attack at Baisaran near the town of Pahalgam on April 22, 2025, had left 26 persons dead and 17 injured. The terrorists targeted tourists after asking their names to ascertain their religion, the police said. All but three of those killed were Hindu.

The ministry stated in the affidavit that the content on 4PM News was found to be detrimental to the sovereignty and integrity, defence and security of India, and friendly relations with foreign states, which fell within the ambit of the grounds referred to under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act.

Under Section 69A of the Act, an authorised official in the Union government, not below the rank of a joint secretary, can send content removal orders to social media platforms if the content is deemed to threaten national security, sovereignty or public order.

“It is submitted that the manner in which petitioner’s channel operates, clearly reflects the hallmark of a ‘digital echo chamber’, where selected and repetitive content is circulated to promote a single narrative to influence public opinion,” the ministry alleged.

Speaking to The Wire after the channel was blocked, Sharma had claimed that the Union government had been repeatedly banning the portal because of its sharp criticism.

In April 2025 as well, the Union government had blocked the YouTube channel. At that time too, it had cited “national security or public order”.

Also read: Shifting viewership and Centre’s fresh attempt to control news online

The Bombay High Court on Wednesday quashed an order passed by a special court for framing of charges against four persons accused in the 2006 Malegaon blasts case, The Indian Express reported.

They were the last remaining persons accused in the matter.

The special court had in September ordered the charges to be framed against Manohar Narwaria, Rajendra Chaudhary, Dhan Singh and Lokesh Sharma for murder and criminal conspiracy under the Indian Penal Code, along with provisions of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act.

The High Court on Wednesday allowed their appeals against the special court’s order, PTI reported.

On September 8, 2006, bomb blasts took place near a mosque and a cemetery in Maharashtra’s Malegaon. The blasts killed 31 persons and injured more than 300.

The state’s Anti-Terrorism Squad had arrested nine Muslim men in connection with the blasts, PTI reported.

The Central Bureau of Investigation, which took over the probe in 2017, had also named them as the accused in the matter, The Indian Express reported.

However, the National Investigation Agency, which began its probe in 2011, had said that the Muslim men were innocent and had suspected members of Hindutva organisations of having carried out the blasts, the newspaper reported.

The prosecution’s change of stance was based on a statement made in 2010 by Aseemanand, a person accused in other cases, The Indian Express reported. Aseemanand had alleged that members of Hindutva organisations had planted the bombs, Live Law reported.

The National Investigation Agency had then charged the four men, among others.

Aseemanand later retracted his statement and was acquitted in other blast cases in which he had been accused. The courts hearing the other matters had rejected Aseemanand’s confession as having been unreliable.

During the hearing in the High Court in the present case, the counsel representing the four men had argued that there were no eyewitnesses in the matter, The Indian Express reported. The lawyer also contended that a confession that no other court was willing to accept could not be used to frame the four men.

They had been arrested in 2013 and had been granted bail in 2019.

The nine Muslim men had been discharged in 2016. An appeal against the discharge has not been heard since 2019, The Indian Express reported.

The case is not linked to the 2008 Malegaon blast in which Bharatiya Janata Party leader Pragya Singh Thakur, Lieutenant Colonel Prasad Purohit and five others were acquitted in July.

With two days to go for the first phase of polling in West Bengal, the Election Commission on Monday announced several restrictions in the state.

Among the curbs is a ban on motorcycles on roads during the night and tourists not being allowed to visit Digha, a popular beach destination in the state.

Polling in the state will take place in two phases on Thursday and April 29. While curbs ahead of phase one began on Tuesday, phase two curbs will begin from April 27.

Ban on motorcycles

Motorcycles will not be allowed on the roads between 6 pm and 6 am starting two days before the polling for the Assembly elections in West Bengal, The Telegraph quoted Election Commission officials as saying on Monday.

In a directive, the poll panel further said that pillion riders will not be allowed during the relaxation window between 6 am and 6 pm, except in medical emergencies, for family functions or for dropping and picking up children from school.

“In order to ensure free, fair, peaceful and violence-free elections... in the state and to prevent any form of intimidation and source jamming… restrictions on use of motorcycles are hereby imposed with immediate effect from polling day minus two onward,” the newspaper quoted the poll panel as saying.

An unidentified Election Commission official told The Telegraph that motorcycles with multiple riders, or groups of bikes, were often used to intimidate voters.

The directive was to ensure that motorcycles did not become “a tool of intimidation or inducement”, added the official.

However, delivery services, riders working with transport apps and office-going commuters with proper identification will be exempted from the ban, the Election Commission clarified later on Tuesday.

96-hour liquor ban

Additionally, the sale of liquor was also banned on Monday in West Bengal for 96 hours ahead of polling on Thursday, The Telegraph reported.

The Election Commission usually mandates a 48-hour ban on the sale of liquor before polling across the country.

The poll panel stated that there was an “unusual spurt” in the sale of liquor in West Bengal.

“There has also been a sudden growth in lifting of packaged liquor by retailers from WBSBCL [West Bengal State Beverages Corporation Limited] Depots during April, 2026 in comparison to the corresponding period last year,” NDTV quoted the poll panel as saying.

Ban on tourists

The Election Commission has also instructed tourists to leave Digha, reported the Bengali daily Bartaman Patrika.

Hotels in the Purba Medinipur were reportedly directed not to allow anybody from outside the district.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday issued notice on a public interest litigation challenging the validity of the 2008 National Investigation Agency Act, Live Law reported.

The Act set up the National Investigation Agency in 2008 and contains a list of scheduled offences that it has the power to investigate. Under the legislation, state governments forward all cases relating to these scheduled offences to the Centre, which then determines whether the NIA should investigate them.

A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta sought responses from the Centre, the NIA and others on the petition that described the Act as arbitrary, lacking in legislative competence and an encroachment on state power.

The petition against the NIA Act was filed by an advocate based in Kerala who had been booked in connection with the activities of the banned organisation Popular Front of India. The NIA had filed the first information report in 2022 under sections of the erstwhile Indian Penal Code, the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act and the Arms Act on the orders of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs.

The petitioner was arrested in relation to the case and had been in custody for a year before being granted bail by the Kerala High Court, Live Law reported.

The petition also referred to a another case filed by the Kerala Police in 2022 about the killing of a Bharatiya Janata Party member allegedly by PFI members. While proceedings were pending in the matter, the Centre passed an order under the NIA Act asking the central agency to take up the investigation.

The petitioner challenged the invocation of Section 6(5) read with Section 8 of the NIA Act by the central agency and the investigation of a case already being looked into the state police, Live Law reported.

Section 6(5) of the NIA Act empowers the Centre to direct the central agency to investigate a scheduled offence if it believes such an offence has been committed, overriding the requirement for a state recommendation. Section 8 allows it to investigate any non-scheduled offence if it is connected to a scheduled offence (terror-related or serious crime) under investigation.

Noting that the police is a state subject under Schedule 7 of the Constitution, the petitioner added that it also has the power to investigate offences under the Code of Criminal Procedure, according to the legal news portal.

Urging the Supreme Court to set aside the NIA Act as unconstitutional, the petitioner sought a direction for the Centre to frame appropriate rules and guidelines for the exercise of powers under the Act.

For most tourists heading to the picturesque meadows of Pahalgam in Kashmir, the first stop for many years has been a stone-paved pathway built along the banks of river Lidder.

Standing in its middle, a decorative frame of wooden beams with colorful letters saying “I love Pahalgam”, serves as a popular “selfie point” for travellers.

But now, just 200 metres away, a wall of black granite competes for attention. Two tricolours flutter on top of it. As you step closer, you see etched into stone the names of 26 people gunned down by militants on April 22 last year.

The memorial has come up about 6 km from the Baisaran meadow, the site of the terror attack.

As he stood looking up at the wall in mid-April, Manu Madhavan, a tourist from Kerala, described the experience as “a bit unsettling”.

“Until now, we had just heard about the Pahalgam massacre on television or read it in the newspaper,” said Madhavan, who was visiting Kashmir with his family. “Now, it feels real.”

But not many tourists are likely to share Madhavan’s experience – very few of them have been making their way to Pahalgam after last year’s terror attack.

The attack more than halved the number of tourists coming to Kashmir – from nearly 30 lakh in 2024, the number fell to less than 12 lakh in 2025, official data shows.

While tourist arrivals in the rest of Kashmir have largely recovered this year, Pahalgam, once a popular destination for travellers, continues to lag behind.

“Tourists prefer spots like Sonmarg and Gulmarg,” said Adil Ahmad, a cab operator in Srinagar. “There is a sense of fear about Pahalgam.”

Abdul Waheed Wani, president of the local ponywallah association, agreed. “Before April 22, 2025, there was one Pahalgam,” said Wani, who was among the first to reach Baisaran on the day of the attack. “Today’s Pahalgam is a different one.”

Security lapse

It was a sunny afternoon last year when a group of militants swooped down on the Baisaran meadow and shot 25 tourists in the head after identifying them by their religion. A local ponywalla was also killed in what was the deadliest attack on tourists in the history of Kashmir’s 37-year-old armed insurgency.

The attack came at a time when militancy-related violence in Kashmir had fallen to its lowest. Ever since the Modi government had scrapped the special status of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019, the region’s security apparatus had come under the direct control of the Centre through its representative, the lieutenant governor.

However, on the day of the attack, despite the presence of hundreds of tourists in the area, no security personnel were deployed in the Baisaran meadows or along the trekking route leading up to it, survivors said.

After the gunshots rang out in the meadow, the first persons to respond were local ponywallas who earn a living by offering horse rides to tourists.

Wani, the president of the ponywalla association, still has on his phone WhatsApp voice notes that he sent out that day, beseeching more and more ponywallas to reach Baisaran and join the rescue operation.

“The police came twenty minutes after we had reached the spot,” he said.

Another ponywalla, Rayees Ahmad, recalled reaching the Baisaran meadows through a shortcut to help rescue the tourists. When he saw many of them were injured and bleeding, he borrowed shawls and fabrics from local sellers “to cover their wounds and prevent their blood loss”.

Wani added: “That day, none of us cared for our life. We just went and started rescuing people.”

Act of bravery

A ponywalla, Syed Adil Hussain Shah, even lost his life while trying to protect the tourists. According to eyewitness accounts, he confronted one of the militants in an attempt to stop him from firing upon the visitors. In the process, Shah sustained several bullet injuries, including two on his chest, said his father.

Shah, 29, a daily-wage worker from Anantnag’s Hapatnar village, was the eldest among his parents’ six children. He used to earn Rs 300- Rs 500 per trip for taking tourists on horseback to Baisaran.

His father Syed Haider Shah said: “We miss him a lot but then there is this contentment that he died while trying to save people irrespective of their religion or identity. He set an example of humanity for all of us.”

Despite the bravery and courage shown by the ponywallas, in the weeks after the attack, there was a rise in the vilification of Kashmiri Muslims in sections of the media.

A security crackdown in the region saw nearly 3,000 youth being detained for questioning.

Although security agencies said two of the three militants responsible for the massacre were Pakistanis, they demolished nine houses belonging to the families of local militants. This was a first in the Valley.

In July, Union home minister Amit Shah announced in Parliament that the three suspected militants involved in the Pahalgam attack had been killed in a gunfight with security forces in Srinagar.

‘Take us to Baisaran’

In the last one year, the Shah family has, somehow, learnt to live with the loss.

His parents wanted to visit the spot where their son fell to the bullets – but were unable to.

“I have never been to Baisaran in my life,” remarked Syed Haider Shah. “My wife and I tried to go to Baisaran a couple of times, but we weren’t allowed by the security forces.”

A week after the terror attack, the administration had ordered the closure of 48 of the 87 official tourist destinations in Kashmir Valley. By October, the administration reopened at least 28 spots for visitors. But the Baisaran meadow has remained shut, along with several other sightseeing spots in Pahalgam, said local people working in the tourism industry.

As a result, tourism-related businesses in Pahalgam continued to suffer. “I came here to check if there is any flow of tourists,” said a Srinagar local, whose hotel in Pahalgam has almost zero business since April 22 last year. “Last year, I had taken a loan of Rs 20 lakh and renovated my hotel before the season. After the Baisaran episode, my investment sank,” the hotelier said, adding that his hotel will continue to remain shut due to lack of tourists. “I will close this by evening and head back to Srinagar.”

“Earlier, a tourist would spend at least two nights in Pahalgam,” said Wani, the president of the ponywalla association. “But ever since the main sightseeing spots have been closed down for tourists, they return to Srinagar by evening.”

An activist in Pahalgam said the government – both the administration led by the Lieutenant Governor as well as the elected government led by Omar Abdullah – need to do more to attract tourists to Pahalgam.

The closure of tourist spots “sends the wrong message,” said the activist, who requested anonymity. “Why can’t just the government deploy security at these spots so that tourists can visit these places and be safe?”

He also questioned the specific closure of the Baisaran meadow. “A tourist from the mainland doesn’t have an idea of the geography of the place. When he comes to know that Baisaran is closed, he feels as if that place is under the control of militants,” the activist said.

The activist also suggested that the memorial wall for the victims of last year’s terror attack be relocated to a more appropriate spot. “Tourists come to experience nature and its beauty,” he said. “If the first thing they see on their arrival is a memorial of a massacre of tourists, it disturbs them and creates fear in their mind.”