Tax vexations
The UPA governments assurance that it will work out ways to exempt Muslim religious bodies from the purview of the Direct Tax Code (DTC) and will also consider keeping out madarsas from the ambit of the Right to Education Act has been criticised by the RSS.
The DTC bill,which has received cabinet nod recently,brings under its ambit donations made to religious institutions. Earlier 50 per cent of the amount donated was exempted from tax. Now this will be fully taxed. But Sibal assured the Muslim leaders that he would present their case to the government and do the needful. This is gross injustice says the Organiser. It contends that the same will not apply to temples as the government directly controls incomes of all major temples and use the money for running government expenditure. The shameful capitulation that the Congress party did in front of the paranoid Deobandis over Salman Rushdies visit to India is a classic proof of the partys attitude, says the editorial.
All for Modi
An Organiser article says that the clean chit given by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and his government again confirms the propaganda unleashed against Modi. The propaganda against the state government was so powerful that even the media was carried away by it. Now it has come to light that many of the social activists as well as the NGOs were directly funded and supported by Muslim organisations and governments in West Asia, says the article. This is the third independent investigation into the role of the state government and its chief minister in the Gujarat riots of 2002. All the three investigations have come to the same conclusion that neither the state government nor the chief minister can be held culpable for any kind of conspiracy or inaction during the riots.
Tears apart
The Sangh Parivars Hindi weekly Panchjanya has lashed out at the Congress for its overt attempt to woo minorities in Uttar Pradesh with the Batla House issue,especially Law Minister Salman Khurshids claim that Congress President Sonia Gandhi wept when shown pictures of the encounter. Panchjanya says Khurshids act raises the question of whether Gandhis tears were only for terrorists,and whether they dry out for those who give their lives fighting terror. While party general secretary Digvijaya Singh had denied that Ms Gandhi had cried,the Congress president herself has chosen to remain silent on the issue,says the editorial.
The Congress may be playing with Muslim sentiments for electoral gains,but the party is still unable to speak in one voice,claims Panchjanya. Salman Khurshid and Digvijaya Singh are contradicting each other now,even though the latter had until lately maintained that the Batla House encounter was fake,and demanded an inquiry,which was dismissed by Home Minister P. Chidambaram who contended that the encounter was genuine. The Congress may be using the Batla House incident for political gains,yet its own leaders are outdoing each other in trying to endear themselves to Muslims says the editorial. On the other hand,neither Prime Minister Manmohan Singh nor Salman Khurshid or Digvijaya Singh have a single word of solace for Mohan Chandra Sharma,who died fighting the terrorists at Batla House,says Panchjanya.
Compiled by Swaraj Thapa
