Women’s bill a plan to finish regional parties: Lalu

RJD chief Lalu Prasad has joined SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav in opposing Women’s Reservation
Bill in its present form, alleging that it was a “big conspiracy” to prevent the backward sections from coming up and to “finish” the regional parties.

Lalu, who was joined by former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Kalyan Singh, warned of a major movement if quotas for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, OBCs and minorities were not included in the legislation.

Participating in the debate in Lok Sabha on the Motion of Thanks to the President for her address, Prasad said, “Mulayam Singh had said there was a conspiracy (in bringing the bill in its present form) and I am now exposing it.”

He alleged that moves were afoot to prevent progress and development of backward sections and “finish” the regional parties.

“These (backward) sections need to be represented and therefore we must have quota within the quota,” the RJD chief said and warned “we will not agree if you don’t do this.”

Kalyan Singh also spoke of a “deep conspiracy” and alleged that sections in both the ruling Congress and opposition BJP were involved in it.

“The conspiracy is to keep these (downtrodden) sections away from power and development,” he said adding that his voice was “not heard” by the BJP leadership when he was in that party.

Swedish pirates capture EU seat

Sweden’s Pirate Party has won a seat in the European Parliament.

The group - which campaigned on reformation of copyright and patent law - secured 7.1% of the Swedish vote.

The result puts the Pirate Party in fifth place, behind the Social Democrats, Greens, Liberals and the Moderate Party.

Rickard Falkvinge, the party leader, told the BBC the win was “gigantic” and that they were now negotiating with four different EU Parliamentary groups.

“Last night, we gained political credibility,” said Mr Falkvinge.

“People were not taken in by the establishment and we got political trust from the citizens.”

The profile of the Pirate Party and issues surrounding copyright law have dominated headlines in Sweden over the past few months.

Rallying cry

In April, a court in Sweden sentenced the four men behind The Pirate Bay, the world’s most high-profile file-sharing website, to a year in jail and ordered them to pay $4.5m (£3m) in damages.

Mr Falkvinge said it had played a significant role in getting them the vote.

“The establishment is trying to prevent control of knowledge and culture slipping from their grasp.

“When the Pirate Bay got hit, people realised the wolf was outside the front door.

“That happened one month before the ballot opened, so it had quite a rallying effect,” he said.

Parties within the European Parliament tend to join one of the big voting blocs, otherwise their MEP can become marginalised.

Mr Falkvinge said they were still considering their position.

“We’re looking at four different EU Parliament groups,” he said.

“However, we’re probably going to join either the Green block or the ALDE group.”

The biggest loser in Sweden’s election was the eurosceptic June List party, which saw its share of the vote fall by more than 10 points to 3.6% of the vote. The Left Party also saw its vote halved to 5.6%