This setup will now connect the Mumbai coastal road project and the Bandra-Worli sea link via a bow arch string girder by using tidal conditions in the open sea
Maharashtra Congress leader Muhammed Arif ‘Naseem’ Khan has stepped down from the party’s campaign committee, expressing displeasure over the party not nominating any Muslim leader in the state. He wrote a letter to party chief Mallikarjun Kharge stating that he won’t campaign for the Lok Sabha elections as the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) bloc had not fielded a Muslim candidate.
“From total 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra, MVA has not nominated a single Muslim candidate in Maharashtra,” the former state minister wrote.
Many Muslim organisations, leaders and also party workers from all over Maharashtra were expecting the Congress to nominate at least one candidate from the minority community, but unfortunately this has not happened, he noted.
The 60-year-old politician said that all these party leaders and workers are now asking him, “Congress ko Muslim vote chahiye, candidate kyun nahi (Congress wants Muslim votes, but why not candidates.”
“Due to all this reasons, I will not be able to face and I have no answers to Muslims (sic),” Mr Khan wrote in the letter.
Mr Khan also said he is also resigning from the Maharashtra Congress Campaign Committee.
Add image caption here
The Congress is contesting 17 out the 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra in alliance with the Shiv Sena (UBT) and the NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar). They are constituents of the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA).
Muhammed Arif Khan was in race for a ticket from Mumbai North Central, but the party chose city unit president Varsha Gaikwad for the constituency. He had contested the 2019 assembly elections from Chandivali in Mumbai, where he lost by 409 votes.
Speaking separately to PTI, Mr Khan said the Congress it seems has deviated from its long-held ideology of inclusivity.
The senior Congress leader said he was inundated with calls from organisations representing minorities and party workers from these social groups, asking why the Congress has ignored them while allotting tickets for elections in Maharashtra.
“I am unable to face questions of why injustice has been done (to minority groups). The party has deviated from its inclusive ideology and giving representation to all communities,” said a miffed Mr Khan.
A US professor was knocked down to the ground by the police and handcuffed as pro-Palestine protests intensified in top universities across the country.
In a video recorded by CNN reporters, Professor Caroline Fohlin can be seen attempting to intervene as police officers wrestle one student protester to the ground during a pro-Palestine protest at Emory University in Atlanta.
As she asked the police personnel to “get away” from the student, an official pushes her to the ground. Another cop joined to help press her into the ground. The two pinned her hands behind her back with zip ties as she repeatedly tells them, “I’am a professor.”
FULL VIDEO OF ELDERLY AMERICAN ECONOMICS PROFESSOR CAROLINE FOHLIN BEING ASSAULTED BY POLICE
She is an over 65 year old American woman.
Americans attacked for Israel.
What if this was your mother/grandmother? pic.twitter.com/ne7uDsPGIX
— Sulaiman Ahmed (@ShaykhSulaiman) April 26, 2024
The spreading protests began at Columbia University, which has remained the epicenter of the student protest movement.
More than 200 people protesting the war were arrested Wednesday and early Thursday at universities in Los Angeles, Boston and Austin, Texas, where around 2,000 people gathered again on Thursday.
Police have carried out large-scale arrests in universities across the country, at times using chemical irritants and tasers to disperse protests
Student protesters say they are expressing solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, where the death toll has topped 34,305.
US ally Israel launched its war in Gaza after the Hamas attack on October 7 that left around 1,170 people dead, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Hamas militants also took roughly 250 people hostage. Israel estimates 129 remain in Gaza, including 34 presumed dead.