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A career diplomat, a former top cop, demolition man and one who arrested LK Advani join Team Modi

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Cabinet PIB

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]While expanding his council of ministers on Sunday, the Prime Minister relied on people’s experience with governance and administration and not politics alone

The expansion of the Union council of ministers that took place on Sunday established at least one similarity between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and former premiers Dr Manmohan Singh and Rajiv Gandhi, though neither the BJP nor the Congress would be willing to admit to the fact. The similarity is the premium that Modi and his predecessors from the Congress placed on technocrats in actively taking up political roles and running the government as its ministers.

Rajiv Gandhi was known for his proclivity for technocrats – bringing in field experts like Sam Pitroda (a telecom engineer and entrepreneur who Rajiv brought in to set up the Center for the Development of Telematics), Mani Shankar Aiyar (who resigned from the IFS under Rajiv’s influence in 1989 and joined the Congress), Arun Nehru, (a businessman) and Arun Singh (entrepreneur). Dr Manmohan Singh too relied heavily on the likes of Montek Singh Ahluwalia and Jairam Ramesh when it came to matters of policy formulation and governance.

On Sunday, Modi joined the trend started by Congress prime ministers and inducted four former bureaucrats – two of whom, KH Alphons and Hardeep Puri, are yet to be elected to either House of Parliament – into his council of ministers, even though he had ample number of party MPs to choose from for these coveted ministerial berths. Though new inductees former IAS officer RK Singh and former IPS officer Satyapal Singh had both formally joined electoral politics in 2014 when they contested and won Lok Sabha polls from Bihar’s Arrah and UP’s Baghpat constituencies respectively, ex-IAS officer Alphons had quit the CPM and joined the BJP in 2011 while career diplomat Puri was so far just a BJP sympathizer.

Here’s what you need to know about the former babus who will now take on political robes:

Hardeep Puri

Hardeep Singh Puri – a career diplomat with a political past… and future

A retired IFS officer with a distinguished four-decade long career in diplomacy, 65-year-old Hardeep Singh Puri, has served as India’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations both in Geneva (2002-2005) and in New York (2009-2013). He is one of the few Indians to preside over the United Nations Security Council and the only one to have chaired its Counter-terrorism Committee.

A 1974-batch Indian Foreign Service officer, Puri, most recently served as Vice President at the International Peace Institute and as the Secretary General of the Independent Commission on Multilateralism in New York. He was also India’s envoy to Brazil and the United Kingdom.

The author of ‘Perilous Interventions: The Security Council & The Politics of Chaos’ Puri has had a brush with politics many decades ago when, before he joined the IFS, he was a student leader at Delhi University’s Hindu College and participated in the JP movement.

He is known to share excellent relations with several BJP leaders though his induction into Team Modi, sources said, was formalised after a recommendation from Union finance minister Arun Jaitley.

KJ AlphonsKJ Alphons –Delhi’s demolition man

A retired IAS officer of the 1979 batch, Alphons Kannanthanam had made his entry into politics as an independent candidate backed by the CPM during his first election in Kerala in 2006. Though he won with the backing of the CPM, he ditched the party in 2011 to join the BJP. However, it was his stint in bureaucracy that had catapulted Alphons into the hall of fame.

Alphons had featured in Time magazine’s list of 100 Young Global Leaders in 1994. During his stint in Delhi, as the as the Delhi Development Authority’s land commissioner, he was known as the “demolition man” for his strong drive to remove encroachments from across the national capital.

Modi had cleared his appointment as the administrator of Chandigarh in 2016 but the order had to be withdrawn after protests from the then ruling Akali Dal government of Punjab.

Alphons has a good rapport with the politically crucial Syrian Christian community in Kerala as also with members of the Church in the state. The BJP has been desperate to make inroads into Kerala politics and the status of Alphons as a key Christian leader could bolster the BJP’s poll prospects in the southern state.

Satyapal SinghSatyapal Singh – former Mumbai police commissioner who defeated veteran Ajit Singh in Baghpat

A former Mumbai Police Commissioner, Satyapal Singh was a 1980 batch Maharashtra cadre IPS officer who is credited with taking on the organised crime syndicates of Mumbai in the 1990s. In January 2014, Singh resigned from the force as Mumbai Police Chief and successfully contested the Lok Sabha elections on a BJP ticket from his home district of Baghpat, defeating Rashtriya Lok Dal chief Ajit Singh in his pocket borough.

Satyapal Singh had made headlines in 2016 with his allegations that the UPA government had wanted him to frame Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Ishrat Jahan encounter case.

 

RK SinghRK Singh – The babu who had ordered BJP veteran LK Advani’s arrest 26 years ago

If BJP veteran LK Advani could sulk anymore over his fate ever since his acolyte Narendra Modi became Prime Minister and pushed him into political wilderness, he would possibly be sulking today over the induction of RK Singh as a minister of state in the Union council of ministers.

It was Singh who, 26 years ago while serving as a secretary in the then Lalu Prasad Yadav-led RJD government in Bihar, had placed Advani under arrest and stopped his famous Ram Rath Yatra. While the orders for Advani’s arrest had been issued by Lalu Prasad, he had chosen RK Singh and IPS officer Rameshwar Oraon to stop Advani’s rath yatra from Somnath in Gujarat to Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh in October 1990.

Singh and Oraon were flown in a state government chopper early in the morning from Patna to Samastipur where Advani was putting up. It was RK Singh who knocked on the door of the Circuit House where Advani was staying and told the top BJP leader that he had a warrant for his arrest. Singh and Oraon then flew Advani to Patna and from there to the Masanjor guest house in Dumka district of what is now Jharkhand state.

Advani’s rath yatra to demand a Ram temple in Ayodhya changed India’s political landscape, just as the demolition of the Babri Masjid had and when, six years later, the BJP first came to power at the Centre, Advani served as the country’s Home Minister and then deputy Prime Minister.

RK Singh went on to become the union home secretary under the Congress-led UPA government, and was known to enjoy the confidence of then home minister P Chidambaram, though the two often had differences on how the issue of terrorism and naxalism should be dealt with. Singh often advocated an all out aggressive approach to flush out and execute terrorists and naxalites.

After retiring from the IAS, Singh promptly joined the BJP in 2014. He contested and won from the Lok Sabha constituency of Arrah in Bihar.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

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PM Modi says Congress badly exposed after Kharge’s comments on election promises

“Now, they stand badly exposed in front of the people!” the Prime Minister said.

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Reacting apparently to Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge’s comment on poll promises, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday slammed the grand old party, saying they are badly exposed in front of the people.

In Karnataka, Congress is busier in intra-party politics and loot instead of even bothering to deliver on development, the Prime Minister said in a post on X. “Not only that, they are also going to roll back existing schemes,” he claimed.

The Congress Party is realising the hard way that making unreal promises is easy but implementing them properly is tough or impossible, Modi said. “Campaign after campaign they promise things to the people, which they also know they will never be able to deliver. Now, they stand badly exposed in front of the people!” the Prime Minister said.

Earlier, Kharge made the guarantees remark while pulling up Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar over his statement that the state government would review the ‘Shakti’ guarantee.

“If we do not go as per the budget, we will go bankrupt and there will be no money to even develop roads. If this government fails, there will be nothing left to pass on to the next generation (of Congress leaders) except for the bad name and the latter has to bear the brunt for another 10 years,” he said while interacting with reporters.

However, Shivakumar on Friday said his statement on the ‘Shakti scheme’ was distorted and presented as if the Congress government in the state wanted to withdraw it.

“Check any state where the Congress has Governments today – Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana- the developmental trajectory and fiscal health is turning from bad to worse. Their so-called Guarantees lie unfulfilled, which is a terrible deceit upon the people of these states,” PM Modi said.

The victims of such politics are the poor, youngsters, farmers and women, who are not only denied the benefits of these promises but also see their existing schemes diluted, he added.

“The people of the country will have to be vigilant against the Congress sponsored culture of fake promises! We saw recently how the people of Haryana rejected their lies and preferred a Government that is stable, progress oriented and action driven. There is a growing realisation across India that a vote for Congress is a vote for non-governance, poor economics and unparalleled loot. The people of India want development and progress, not the same old,” said PM Modi.

In Himachal Pradesh, salaries of Government workers are not paid on time, PM Modi claimed. The Prime Minister said, in Telangana, farmers are waiting for the waiver they promised.

Previously, in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan Congress promised certain allowances which were never implemented for five years, he said. The Prime Minister said there are numerous such examples of how the Congress works.

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Jammu & Kashmir CM Omar Abdullah attends BJP leader Devender Rana’s last rites

Rana is survived by his wife, Gunjan Rana, their daughters Devyani and Ketki, and son Adhiraj Singh.

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Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Friday paid the last rites of BJP leader Devender Singh Rana. Abdullah was accompanied by Deputy Chief Minister Surinder Choudhary, Ministers Satish Sharma and Javed Ahmed Rana, and Party Treasurer Shammi Oberoi.

The 59-year-old Rana, BJP MLA from Nagrota and brother of Union Minister Jitendra Singh, passed away on Thursday at a private hospital in Haryana’s Faridabad.

Rana is survived by his wife, Gunjan Rana, their daughters Devyani and Ketki, and son Adhiraj Singh.

“The terrible news from late last night isn’t really sinking in. I know the last few years have been marked by our differences Devender but I prefer to focus on the fun times we shared together, the excellent work we did together & the memories. You have been taken from us all too soon & will be missed. May your soul rest in peace now DSR. My heart goes out to your family as I struggle to find the words to convey my condolences to them,” the Chief Minister posted on X.

Apart from Omar Abdullah, Jammu and Kashmir BJP chief Ravinder Raina and Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat were among those who attended the last rites of Rana.

On his demise, the National Conference party said: “JKNC President Dr. Farooq Abdullah and Vice President & Chief Minister Omar Abdullah are deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Devender Rana, MLA Nagrota. They expressed their heartfelt condolences to his family, friends, and supporters, acknowledging his dedicated service and contributions to the people of J&K. The JKNC leadership and party members stand in solidarity with his loved ones during this difficult time.”

Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi mourned the demise of Rana and said he was a veteran leader who worked diligently towards Jammu and Kashmir’s progress.

“Shri Devender Singh Rana Ji’s untimely demise is shocking. He had just won the Assembly polls and had also played a noteworthy role in making the BJP stronger in J&K. In this hour of grief, my thoughts are with his family and supporters. Om Shanti,” PM Modi said on X.

In a post on X, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said Rana, who was always dedicated to the peace and development of Jammu and Kashmir and the interests of the people, made an invaluable contribution to the progress of the region. His demise is an irreparable loss for the BJP family, he added.

BJP chief JP Nadda also paid tribute to the party leader and said: “His dedication to public service and contributions towards the development of the people of Jammu & Kashmir will be remembered. His departure is an irreparable loss to the party”.

Rana’s elder brother and Union Minister Jitendra Singh posted on X, “Untimely demise of my brother Sh Devender Singh Rana is a deep personal loss, which is not only irreparable but painful and the void created will continue to haunt me for the rest of my life. I sincerely thank all those standing by me and the family in these testing times”.

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After India-China disengagement, Indian troops start patrolling Demchok sector in eastern Ladakh

Union Minister Kiren Rijiju said on Friday that he interacted with Chinese soldiers at Bumla Pass during Diwali celebration with Indian Army personnel in Arunachal Pradesh’s Tawang district.

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Two days after the disengagement between India and China, Indian troops started patrolling the Demchok sector in eastern Ladakh on Friday.

On Wednesday, both countries agreed to disengage and initiate coordinated patrols based on their understanding of the Line of Actual Control in the Demchok and Depsang sectors.

Patrolling by Indian troops in the Demchok sector of Eastern Ladakh kicked off Friday. Patrolling in the Depsang sector is expected to start soon, according to ANI. Coordinated patrolling means that both sides will be aware of each other’s patrol schedules.

Union Minister Kiren Rijiju said on Friday that he interacted with Chinese soldiers at Bumla Pass during the Diwali celebration with Indian Army personnel in Arunachal Pradesh’s Tawang district.

Sharing a video of him interacting with the Chinese soldiers on X, Rijiju said: “After talking to Chinese soldiers and seeing the infrastructures, everyone will feel proud of India’s border development now.”

The Union Minister said he also celebrated Diwali at the Army Helipad in Tawang. “It felt proud to celebrate Diwali with brave soldiers. Our country is safe only because of their dedication and courage. Jai Hind!” the senior BJP leader said.

On Thursday, soldiers from India and China shared sweets at various border locations in the Ladakh sector to celebrate Diwali. The exchange occurred at Hot Springs, Karakoram Pass, Daulat Beg Oldi, KongkLa, and the Chushul-Moldo border meeting point.

Additionally, Chief of Army Staff General Upendra Dwivedi emphasised that rebuilding trust along the LAC would be a gradual process, aiming to revert to the status quo of April 2020. He detailed that key measures—disengagement, de-escalation, and buffer zone management—are vital for alleviating tensions between the two nations. He also noted that this process would occur in phases, with each stage focusing on diminishing hostilities.

Chinese Ambassador to India Xu Feihong remarked that differences between neighboring countries like India and China are natural, but the critical aspect lies in how these differences are managed and resolved.

The border standoff began in eastern Ladakh in 2020 due to Chinese military actions and has led to prolonged tensions that have significantly affected relations between the two countries.

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