Union minister of state for Energy Jyotiraditya Scindia will be launching his innings as chairman of Congress campaign committee for the coming Madhya Pradesh Assembly election by addressing a big public rally on September 12 at Kukshi in Dhar district, where a convoy of Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh and Leader of the Opposition in the state Assembly Ajay Singh was attacked by ruling BJP workers last Friday.
Mr Scindia will be chairing the first meeting of the state Congress campaign committee in the state capital on September 11.
The Kukshi Assembly constituency, which is reserved for Scheduled Tribes, is crucial from the Congress party’s point of view.

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Sandhu becomes first woman CIC
New Delhi, Sept. 5: Deepak Sandhu, who has been an information commissioner for the last four years at the Centre, on Thursday became the first woman Chief Information Commissioner of the country.
A former Indian Information Service officer of 1971 batch, she was administered the oath of office by President Pranab Mukherjee at a function in Rashtrapati Bhavan, attended among others by Vice President Hamid Ansari.
Ms Sandhu had served in many key positions like principal director general (media and communications) in the Press Information Bureau, director general of DD (News), director general (News) All India Radio before taking over as information commissioner in 2009.
She had represented the country at international Film Festivals in Cannes, Berlin, Venice and Tokyo, International Conference on Terrorism and Electronic Mass Media at Glendzhik (Russia) and Cyprus besides Heads of News Meetings at Atlanta, USA and Beijing. She said the RTI journey which began in 2005 is just a beginning and she propose to take it forward by engaging with various stakeholders. The new CIC said her priority will be to reduce the pendency of cases at the commission. The 64-year-old officer is joining office for a relatively smaller tenure of nearly three months in which her biggest challenge would over 30,000 pending cases with the commission. — PTI

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HC reserves ruling on PIL over VHP yatra
age correspondent
Lucknow, Sept. 5

The Lucknow bench of Allahabad high court on Thursday reserved its order on a PIL challenging imposition of prohibitory orders by district magistrates of several districts around Ayodhya in view of VHP’s yatra last month. A division bench of the court, comprising Justices Imtiyaz Murtaza and Devendra Kumar Upadhaya, was hearing the PIL filed by an NGO “Hindu Front for Justice” through its seven associate members who are practising advocates of the high court.
The petitioner sought a direction to quash the district magistrates’ orders passed under Section 144 of CrPC for maintaining peace and tranquillity.
Petitioners’ counsel argued that under Article 25 of the Constitution, every citizen has the right to practice and propagate his religion.

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BJP bandh call shuts down Muzaffarnagar
age correspondent
Lucknow, Sept. 5

All shops and business establishments remained closed in Muzaffarnagar district in response to a bandh called by the BJP. The bandh call was given by the BJP to press its demand to withdraw cases registered against two youth in connection with Kanwal incident in the district, they said. No untoward incident was reported during the bandh.
As a precautionary measure, the district administration had arrested some BJP activists in the city from different areas on Wednesday night.
Two persons had been arrested in connection with the August 27 incidents of communal violence in Kanwal village. SSP Subhash Chand Dubey said one Vikram and Mukarram were booked under the National Security Act for their alleged involvement in inciting violence in the village.