GUWAHATI, India: Indian police on Friday said they are investigating an academic, a journalist and a peasant leader for possible sedition for publicly opposing a proposal to grant citizenship to non-Muslims from neighboring Muslim-majority countries.
Critics have called the proposal blatantly anti-Muslim and an attempt by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to boost its Hindu voter base ahead of a general election due by May.
The cases have been filed amid a wave of protests in the BJP-governed northeastern state of Assam. A small regional party in India quit the ruling coalition on Monday in protest against the plan.
The Modi government is facing growing criticism for stifling criticism, including in the media. A television journalist in the region was jailed last month for criticizing the government on social media.
“We have registered a case against a few people based on certain statements that they made at a public rally in Guwahati,” Deepak Kumar, a police official from Guwahati in Assam, told Reuters.
The three have not been charged.
Many people fear such a move could change the demographic profile of Assam, where residents have for years complained that immigrants from Bangladesh have put a big strain on resources.
Hiren Gohain, an 80-year-old academic, peasant leader Akhil Gogoi and journalist Manjit Mahanta have been accused of criminal conspiracy and attempting to wage a war against the government, Kumar said.
The bill, which seeks to give citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Christians and Parsis from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh, has been passed by the lower house of the parliament.
The bill will be tabled for approval in the upper house in the next session, where it is expected to face resistance from the opposition Congress party. The BJP does not have a majority in the upper house of the parliament.
India slaps cases against critics of plan to grant citizenship to non-Muslims
India slaps cases against critics of plan to grant citizenship to non-Muslims
- Critics have called the citizenship proposal blatantly anti-Muslim
- Many people fear such a move could change the demographic profile of Assam
UK government publishes files about the appointment of Epstein friend Mandelson to ambassador post
- The government has said the files will show that Mandelson misled officials about the extent of the relationship
- Starmer is facing a political storm over his decision to give him the Washington job
LONDON: The British government on Wednesday published a batch of documents related to the appointment of Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the US, as police investigate potential misconduct stemming from the ex-diplomat’s ties to the late Jeffrey Epstein.
The 147-page release was published Wednesday on the government website.
Lawmakers have forced Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government to disclose thousands of files about the decision to name Mandelson to the key diplomatic post at the start of US President Donald Trump’s second term, despite a past friendship with the convicted sex offender.
The government has said the files will show that Mandelson misled officials about the extent of the relationship. But Starmer is facing a political storm over his decision to give him the Washington job.
Mandelson, 72, a former Cabinet minister, ambassador and elder statesman of the governing Labour Party, was arrested Feb. 23 at his London home on suspicion of misconduct in public office. He has been released without bail conditions as the police investigation continues.
He has previously denied wrongdoing and hasn’t been charged. He does not face allegations of sexual misconduct.
Cabinet minister Darren Jones said the “first tranche of documents” will be published Wednesday afternoon.
The documents are being published in batches after review by Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee. Police have asked the government not to release files that could compromise their criminal investigation into Mandelson.
“The documents that will be published today later to Parliament will provide full transparency about the appointments process, bar one document that has been held back by the Metropolitan Police because of an ongoing criminal investigation,” Jones told broadcaster ITV.
Starmer fired Mandelson in September after an earlier release of documents showed he had maintained contact with Epstein after the financier’s 2008 conviction for sexual offenses involving a minor.
Further details about Mandelson’s ties with Epstein, revealed in a huge trove of files published by the US Department of Justice in January, drove opponents and even some members of Starmer’s Labour Party to call for the prime minister’s resignation. Starmer survived the immediate danger, but his position remains fragile, even though he never met Epstein and is not implicated in his crimes.
Starmer has apologized to Epstein’s victims and said he was sorry for “having believed Mandelson’s lies.”
The Epstein files suggest that Mandelson sent market-sensitive information to the convicted sex offender when he was the UK government’s business secretary after the 2008 financial crisis.
That includes an internal government report discussing ways the UK could raise money, including by selling off government assets. Mandelson also appears to have told Epstein he would lobby other members of the government to reduce a tax on bankers’ bonuses.
Mandelson is also facing a separate probe by the European Union’s anti-fraud office for the time he spent as the bloc’s trade representative.
