WTF Just Happened: December 24

#1. In Uttar Pradesh, the always-innovative Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath — who, last month, came up with the Kamadhenu model to kickstart the state’s economy — has solved the problem of backlog in the state courts. His government will soon withdraw nearly 20,000 cases against politicians.

The move is aimed at reducing the pendency of cases. Yogi said that the police usually registers petty cases against people’s representatives staging dharna or protesting on some issue. “These cases should be closed.”

And another one…

The famed “Falahari Baba” in Rajasthan has been charged with raping a 21-year-old woman at his ashram.

Kaushlendra Prapannacharya Falahari Maharaj, 70, is in a private hospital in Alwar over “high blood pressure”. A police team searching for him tracked him down to the hospital and are now waiting to be allowed to speak to him.

The story.

The art of living irresponsibly

An early front-runner in the annual WTF-ery Award stakes is Sri XXX Ravi Shankar, who says his organisation should be applauded for choosing such a polluted venue as the Yamuna for its birthday party.

Sandip Roy takes the whole exercise in self-aggrandisement apart with surgical skill.

The President of India has cancelled his attendance. And this just in:

#BREAKING | PM Modi unlikely to attend @SriSri‘s mega cultural event #SriSriYamunaMess pic.twitter.com/Vf4QvmV8Ss

— CNN-IBN News (@ibnlive) March 8, 2016

Good on you, Mr Modi.

PS: Via Scroll, a first person account of the construction activities being carried out in connection with the festival.

Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed…

Just the other day, FirstPost carried an extended piece on the World Culture Festival being organised by the Art of Living folks, and the consequent risks to the Yamuna’s fragile ecosystem, and the possibile impact on Delhi.

Now, this — despite internal reservations, the army has apparently been ordered to build bridges across the Yamuna for the project.

So much for the politicians pontificating about “our brave jawans fighting on the borders” — when we treat the army like domestic staff and order them to do chores for assorted “godmen”, we demean them, we denigrate who they are and what they stand for.