Voice from the Rooftop

The results of Maharashtra and Haryana Legislative Assembly elections are out and new governments are to be formed in next few days.
In Maharashtra out of 288 seats BJP won 105, Shiv Sena 56, NCP 54 and Congress 44. BJP had hoped to cross 144. Last time BJP had won 122 seats. It was not in alliance with Shiv Sena. Devendra Fadnavis made virtue of necessity and talked of 70% strike rate.
Devendra Fadnavis, first BJP CM of Maharashtra, completed term as CM and set to be CM again. His predecessors from 1972 onwards had not completed term. Some became chief ministers twice or more times.
In Haryana out of 90 seats BJP won 40, Congress 31, JJP 10, HLP 1, INLD 1 and independents 7. BJP had hoped to cross 75. Last time BJP had won 47 seats. First BJP wanted to form government with independents and Gopal Kanda of Haryana Lokhit Party. Gopal Kanda was taken in plane to Delhi. He fancied himself as kingmaker. Soon there was criticism of BJP for taking help of Gopal Kanda who was accused of abetment of suicide of Geetika Sharma who was an air hostess in Murli Dhar Lakh Ram Airlines. BJP dumped Gopal Kanda and went for alliance with JJP. Dushyant Chautala will be Deputy CM.
Exit polls were mostly wrong. Their forecast was in Haryana BJP will get 52-80 seats and in Maharashtra BJP-Shiv Sena will get 204-243 seats. India Today – Axis My Poll forecast of 32-44 for BJP in Haryana and 166-194 for BJP-Shiv Sena in Maharashtra was close to the results.
There were some by elections in some states. Udayanraje Bhonsle had won Lok Sabha election from Satara as NCP candidate and had quit just after three and half months to join BJP on 14/9/2019. This time he contested as BJP candidate and lost. In Gujarat, Alpesh Thakor who had quit Congress to contest again as BJP candidate lost from Radhanpur.

BCCI is free from the rule of Committee of Administrators and now has an elected President and other officials after almost three years. Till some days back Sourav Ganguly was not a candidate for BCCI President. When election schedule was announced Brijesh Patel was reported to be the candidate. Overnight something changed and Sourav Ganguly emerged as the only candidate. Brijesh Patel is also a former Test player.
Supreme Court had appointed CoA in January 2017 to administer BCCI and see that it has a new Constitution as per Justice Rajendra Mal Lodha Panel recommendations and Constitutions of cricket associations affiliated to BCCI are in line with BCCI Constitution. It had Vinod Rai as chairman and Ramachandra Guha, Vikram Limaye and Diana Eduljee as members.
There was resistance by many persons who did not like changes. They went to Supreme Court which modified some changes. Associations of Baroda, Saurashtra, Maharashtra and Vidarbha were allowed to continue as full members. However there was no escape from age limit of 70 years. CoA was to solve problems facing BCCI and act suitably. There were differences between members. Ramachandra Guha quit CoA as it did not stand firm against Virat Kohli’s demand to remove Anil Kumble as coach and CoA did not address several cases of conflict of interest. Vikram Limaye quit as he got a job. In 2019 differences between Vinod Rai and Diana Eduljee were public and Supreme Court appointed Ravi Thodge as CoA member to break the tie between the two.
As the term of CoA came to an end Supreme Court ordered payment of 40 lakh rupees to Ramachandra Guha, 50.5 lakh rupees to Vikram Limaye, 3.62 crore rupees each to Vinod Rai and Diana Eduljee and 60 lakh rupees to Ravi Thodge based on the monthly calculation of 10 lakh rupees for 2017, 11 lakh rupees for 2018 and 12 lakh rupees for 2019. As per reports Ramachandra Guha and banker Vikram Limaye, who were part of the BCCI’s Committee of Administrators (CoA) for limited periods, have declined to accept the payment.
As per BCCI’s Constitution, Sourav Ganguly has around 10 months as BCCI President. Those who could not get elected as officials of BCCI or state associations have got their proxies elected. They want to change BCCI’s Constitution. There is also issue of conflict of interest which prevents cricketers from holding more than one office. Sourav Ganguly will do what he has to do. He will talk to Virat Kohli as BCCI President talks to captain. Ravi Shastri has to be careful about what he says about Sourav Ganguly.

Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative Bank is under Reserve Bank of India administration due to loan default of 6,500 crore rupees by Housing Development and Infrastructure Ltd. First RBI said depositors can withdraw only 1,000 rupees for six months. Later it increased that amount to 10,000 rupees. PMC is forbidden to accept deposits and give loans.
Rakesh Kumar Wadhawan and Sarang Wadhawan are senior executives of HDIL. Rakesh Kumar Wadhawan is Executive Chairman, Founder and a promoter of HDIL. Sarang Wadhawan is Vice Chairman and Managing Director. Lalit Mohan Mehta, Raj Kumar Aggarwal, Hazari Lal and Sandhya Baliga are independent directors.
Police have registered FIR under IPC sections 120B, 409, 420, 465, 466 and 471. Economic Offences Wing has formed a Special Investigation Team to probe the matter.
49 fixed deposit accounts were shut prematurely and money withdrawn 6 days before PMC collapse.
As per police complaint, PMC officials used more than 21,000 accounts to hide loans to HDIL. This began in 2008. RBI audit was lax. Innocent depositors had to suffer. Those who had their weddings in November are in trouble. Families need more than 10,000 rupees for six months. It is said that 63% depositors can fully withdraw their amounts with 10,000 rupees limit.
Bharat Mankermi had his life savings worth 30 lakh rupees in PMC. He suffered a stroke.
Satinder Singh, 42, had deposited 2.6 crores in PMC. He had earned it over 20 years. He said if he does not get his money back he will commit suicide in front of RBI building. His wife and parents have accounts in PBC. He planned to take his mother for knee replacement surgery.
Depositors should keep money in different banks. All money should not be put in one bank. Government is making that difficult by merging banks. It merged with SBI its subsidiaries. Two banks were merged with Bank of Baroda. Soon six banks will be less as they will be merged with other banks.
Suspended Managing Director of PMC, Joy Thomas, has given excuses for not reporting bad loans like fear of reputation loss and not being able to charge interest once a loan is declared non-performing asset. On 17/9/2019 RBI received a letter about PMC. On 18/9/2019 Joy Thomas met RBI Executive Director Rabi Mishra and sought time to put things in order. On 23/9/2019 RBI took over PMC. As per one report Joy Thomas in untraceable.
On 1/10/2019 PMC depositors protested in front of RBI building, Bandra-Kurla Complex. There were protests in Andheri, Mulund and other places.
Many co-operative banks are under RBI administration due to bad loans. Many national public sector banks have bad loans running into lakhs of crores of rupees. There should be suitable punishment to deter crimes. Sentences should run consecutively, not concurrently. If punishment for opening a fake bank account is 2 years, it should be 42,098 years jail for 21,049 accounts. If punishment for fraud of 1 rupee is 1 day jail, it should be 6,500 crore days jail for fraud of 6,500 crore rupees. It should be full punishment for each criminal involved. Properties of criminals should be confiscated to recover loss. When number of jail days adds up to 14 years it should be converted to death penalty. If the days add up to 140 years it should 10 death penalties.