Sitting amid the blackened remains of his home, 32-year-old Nikesh Gawali carefully broke open a half-melted plastic box with a screwdriver. His hands shook slightly, not out of fear, but out of hope. “I’m trying to find my daughter Aarti’s gold earrings,” he said quietly, still focused on the box. “She’s just five. I got them made recently after months of labour work.” The plastic box, warped and blackened by heat, was one of the few things left from his two-room house on the outskirts of Dhamangaon village . All around him lay ash, broken tin sheets and charred wooden beams. The walls had cracked under the heat and the front room’s tin roof had caved in completely. What remained was a blackened debris all around - almost nothing to suggest a home once stood there. Nikesh earns his living as an agricultural labourer, like many in the village. Work is uncertain and depends on the season. Those earrings weren’t just jewellery - they were a small dream, a reward for his hard work,...
- Appoint anti-terror court, crush terror outfits mercilessly, demands AIATF president Bitta
- Cong going soft on terror, forgetting Indira and Rajiv, laments former YC president
By Dheeraj Fartode
Accusing political parties of pursuing “political terrorism,” Chairman of the All-India Anti-Terrorist Front (AIATF) and former chief of the Indian Youth Congress Maninderjeet Singh Bitta on Tuesday lashed out at people who are trying to level allegations against Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Dr Mohan Bhagwat about his alleged involvement in Samjhauta Express blast case. Such petty accusations is hampering our fight against terrorism, lamented Bitta, who was attacked several times by Khalistani terror groups.
Bitta also lashed out at his own party and claimed that Congress was deviating from the path of late Indira Gandhi and late Rajiv Gandhi. Both of them sacrificed their lives for the nation, but present Congress leaders are least bothered to crush terrorist movement and stand with those in forefront of fight against terrorism, he stated.
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| Maninderjeet Singh Bitta |
“Court had sentenced terrorists to gallows, however, the terrorists are yet to be hanged due to dillay-dally policies by political parties,” Bitta bitterly remarked. Raising demand to set-up an Anti-terrorist military court, the Congress leader said that it would help in sternly dealing with the menace of terror and also prevent political interference in the execution of death sentence awarded to anti-national elements.
Bitta, who has earned the name ‘Zinda Shaheed’ after he lost his leg in a bombing that killed 13 people in the Punjab’s holy city of Amritsar on July 7, 1992, was interacting with reporters during a ‘meet the press’ organised by Nagpur Union of Working Journalists at Tilak Patrakar Bhavan.
Bitta lashed out at undue mercy and leniency shown towards terrorists and repeated hearings accorded to relatives of such terrorists by Government and President who approach with mercy petition to delay the execution. The policy of hearing mercy pleas of terrorists should not be allowed after anti-terror courts are set-up, he demanded. And, the Judges of existing Military Court should only be appointed as the judges of the Anti-terrorist military court, he demanded while informing that he had already forwarded this demand to Centre.
Giving a new theory about hanging of 26/11 terror attack accused Ajmal Kasab, Bitta claimed that Kasab was hanged only after death of Shiv Sena supremo Balasaheb Thackery as the government wanted to divide sentiment of crowd which had gathered for last rites of late Balasaheb.
President of Tilak Patrakar Bhavan Trust Pradip Maitra, Secretary Shirish Borkar, President of NUWJ Bramha Shankar Tripathi, Secretary Anupam Soni and others were present at the press conference.
- ‘Ishrat Jahan encounter was genuine’
Bitta virtually gave a clean chit to Intelligence Bureau (IB) and Gujarat Police in Ishrat Jahan encounter case and claimed that it was not a fake encounter. Bitta said that Ishrat Jahan was an active terrorist as the Gujarat police and IB officers would not kill an innocent woman. Our police force or IB sleuths may conduct operations at the behest of political masters, but they would never kill a young girl just to earn praise from their bosses. He also criticised the IB for buckling too much under the pressure of political establishment.
- AAP leaders are anti-national
When asked about Aam Aadmi Party leader and Chief minister of Delhi, Arvind Kejariwal, the former president of Youth congress said “I was very happy after rise of AAP. However, AAP leader Prashant Bhushan and Arundhati Roy’s statements have hurt patriotic sentiments of the country.” Arundhati Roy is known supporter of naxalites, he alleged. Indians can tolerate inflation and corruption but, will never ever accept secession of Kashmir, Bitta asserted while blasting Bhushan and Roy for their anti-national remarks. He dubbed the proposed Third Front as a disaster for national integration.
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