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दो साल पहले दिल्ली में विधानसभा चुनाव हुए थे, इस दौरान बीजेपी के नेताओं अनुराग ठाकुर और प्रवेश वर्मा पर भड़काऊ नारे लगाने के आरोप लगे थे. ‘देश के गद्दारों को गोली मारो ** को’  जैसे नारे लगे थे. विपक्ष ने सवाल उठाए, मामला कोर्ट तक पहुंचा. कोर्ट ने इस मामले में दोनों नेताओं के खिलाफ FIR दर्ज करने की याचिका खारिज कर दी. कोर्ट के इस फैसले के खिलाफ CPI(M) की वरिष्ठ नेता बृंदा करात (Brinda Karat) ने दिल्ली हाईकोर्ट (Delhi High Court) का रुख किया. इसी मामले पर 25 मार्च को दिल्ली हाई कोर्ट ने सुनवायी करते हुए एक टिप्पणी की है. कोर्ट की ये टिप्पणी चर्चा का विषय बन गई है.

कोर्ट ने क्या कहा?

इस मामले की सुनवाई कर रहीं दिल्ली हाईकोर्ट की जस्टिस चंद्रधारी सिंह की सिंगल बेंच ने कहा कि राजनीतिक भाषण के मामलों में FIR करने से पहले खुद जांच परख कर लेनी चाहिए. जज ने कहा,

“चुनाव के दौरान दिए गए भाषण अलग होते हैं. अगर यही भाषण किसी और वक्त दिया होता तो ये भड़काने के लिए होता.”

जस्टिस चंद्रधारी सिंह ने आगे कहा,

“चुनावी भाषण में नेता एक दूसरे को तमाम तरह की बातें बोलते हैं, जो कि काफी गलत है. लेकिन अगर कुछ बातें सिर्फ माहौल बनाने के लिए कही जा रही हैं, तो अलग-अलग राजनीतिक पार्टियां अलग-अलग बातें बोलती हैं. मुझे ये देखना होगा कि ये बातें आपराधिक मंशा से कही गई हैं या नहीं.” 

इस केस में बृंदा करात का पक्ष रख रहीं एडवोकेट अदित पुजारी और तारा नरूला ने अपनी दलीलों में कहा कि इन भाषणों ने दिल्ली के अलग-अलग हिस्सों में हो रहे सीएए के विरोध प्रदर्शनों के दौरान हिंसा को भड़काया. इसके साथ ही पुजारी और नरूला ने तर्क देते हुए कहा कि भाजपा नेता द्वारा इस्तेमाल किया “ये लोग” शब्द प्रदर्शनकारियों और एक विशेष समुदाय को निशाना बना रहा था. इसपर जज ने पूछा,

“इस भाषण में समुदाय विशेष को कहां निशाना बनाया गया है. इस प्रदर्शन में तो सभी समुदायों के लोग शामिल थे.”

फिलहाल इस मामले में कोर्ट ने अपना फैसला सुरक्षित रखा है. दूसरी तरफ, चुनावी रैली में दिए गए भाषणों पर उस वक्त चुनाव आयोग ने भी एक्शन लिया था और अनुराग ठाकुर को 29 जनवरी 2020 को कारण बताओ नोटिस भी भेज दिया था. दिल्ली हाई कोर्ट की तरफ से भले ही कहा गया है कि इस तरह के भाषण चुनाव में माहौल बनाने के लिए दिए गए, लेकिन ऐसे नारे दिल्ली विधानसभा चुनाव के पहले भी लग रहे थे. इस तरह के भड़काऊ नारों के वीडियो आज भी मौजूद हैं.

वीडियो: दिल्ली हाई कोर्ट ने गिरफ्तारी में चीटिंग करने पर यूपी पुलिस को क्या कहा?

Sadly, actress Estelle Harris has passed away.

The 93-year-old actress passed away on Saturday night of natural causes in Palm Desert, California, just two days shy of her 94^th birthday on April 4. She was born on April 4, 1928.

Her son, Glen Harris told Deadline, “It is with the greatest remorse and sadness to announce that Estelle Harris has passed on this evening at 6:25 pm. Her kindness, passion, sensitivity, humor, empathy, and love were practically unrivaled, and she will be terribly missed by all those who knew her.”

She was best known for her roles as George Costanza’s (Jason Alexander) mother Estelle Costanza on NBC’s sitcom “Seinfeld.” She may also be best known to younger fans for voicing Mrs. Potato Head in the “Toy Story” franchise.

Estelle Harris Was Beloved By So Many: ‘She Made Everything That Much Funnier’

One of my favorite people has passed – my tv mama, Estelle Harris. The joy of playing with her and relishing her glorious laughter was a treat. I adore you, Estelle. Love to your family. Serenity now and always. #RIPEstelleHarris

— jason alexander (@IJasonAlexander) April 3, 2022

Jason Alexander, her on-screen son George Costanza, tweeted, “One of my favorite people has passed – my tv mama, Estelle Harris. The joy of playing with her and relishing her glorious laughter was a treat. I adore you, Estelle. Love to your family. Serenity now and always. #RIPEstelleHarris”

So sad to hear about the passing of the hilarious Estelle Harris.
On “Seinfeld” set with her and the great Jerry Stiller shooting “The Rye.”
She made everything we wrote that much funnier.
A true gift to work with her! pic.twitter.com/UDEK0iOQum

— Carol Leifer (@carolleifer) April 3, 2022

Carol Leifer tweeted, “So sad to hear about the passing of the hilarious Estelle Harris. On ‘Seinfeld’ set with her and the great Jerry Stiller shooting ‘The Rye.’ She made everything we wrote that much funnier. A true gift to work with her!”

Estelle Was ‘Funny, Beautiful, Kind & Incredibly Talented’

Estelle Harris was funny, beautiful, kind & incredibly talented! We made a commercial together once and she told the director “I’m not doing another take until you promise to give Giselle this dress to keep!” ♥️♥️♥️ They gave me the dress. I will cherish knowing Estelle forever. pic.twitter.com/c7rSpqxtCp

— Giselle Eisenberg (@gisellezenberg) April 3, 2022

Giselle Eisenberg tweeted, “Estelle Harris was funny, beautiful, kind & incredibly talented! We made a commercial together once and she told the director ‘I’m not doing another take until you promise to give Giselle this dress to keep!’ ♥️♥️♥️ They gave me the dress. I will cherish knowing Estelle forever.”

Estelle Harris gave us so many laughs over the years, playing an overbearing mother on SEINFELD and as the voice of Mrs. Potato Head in the TOY STORY movies. She was a one of a kind funny lady. #RIPEstelleHarris pic.twitter.com/zY0lnUBPj6

— Courtney Howard (@Lulamaybelle) April 3, 2022

Courtney Howard tweeted, “Estelle Harris gave us so many laughs over the years, playing an overbearing mother on SEINFELD and as the voice of Mrs. Potato Head in the TOY STORY movies. She was a one of a kind funny lady.”

Estelle Will Be Remembered For Her ‘Pure Comic Brilliance’

R.I.P. Estelle Harris, who played Estelle Costanza on “Seinfeld.”

“GEORGE LIKES THE BANANAS!”

Andrew Mason tweeted, “For my money, there were no two retired parents more perfectly cast and portrayed in sitcom history than Jerry Stiller and Estelle Harris as Frank and Estelle Costanza. Pure comic brilliance.”

Farewell Estelle Harris. Scenes with these three together are as funny as TV has ever been pic.twitter.com/H4OcUaTkRe

— Darren Richman (@darrenrichman) April 3, 2022

Darren Richman tweeted, “Farewell Estelle Harris. Scenes with these three together are as funny as TV has ever been.” He also shared a clip of the jello scene.

Estelle & Jerry Stiller Were ‘One Of The Greatest Joys Of Seinfeld’

The Costanzas are one of the great joys of Seinfeld. Always funny and horrifying. Such great performances from Jerry Stiller and Estelle Harris. RIP https://t.co/YfiO53x44d

— Richard K Herring (@Herring1967) April 3, 2022

Richard K. Herring tweeted, “The Costanzas are one of the great joys of Seinfeld. Always funny and horrifying. Such great performances from Jerry Stiller and Estelle Harris. RIP.”

Sad to hear about Estelle Harris passing away. Not sure comedy like this, with these two, will ever exist again. The chemistry was surreal. https://t.co/t1cONjEITH

— Dan LaMorte (@DanLaMorte) April 3, 2022

Dan LaMorte tweeted, “Sad to hear about Estelle Harris passing away. Not sure comedy like this, with these two, will ever exist again. The chemistry was surreal.”

On Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time,” host Bill Maher argued that “The people who can’t take a joke now aren’t old ladies in the Bible Belt. They’re Gen Z at elite colleges.” And that losing out on jokes and thoughts over self-censorship “are the invisible scars of cancel culture.”

After pointing out that Will Smith initially laughed at Chris Rock’s joke at the Oscars before getting offended because his wife was upset, Maher stated, “I’ve seen the same syndrome happen in comedy clubs, woke hecklers who literally have to wait for the laughter to die down before they yell, ‘That’s not funny!’ This war on jokes must end. Will Smith didn’t get kicked out of the Oscars for going Ike Turner on Chris, but Kevin Hart got kicked out of hosting it for a joke. Who are these people who say cancel culture isn’t a real thing? Just among comedians who’ve gotten fired and lost gigs for exercising their freedom of expression, the toll is high. Gilbert Gottfried and Kathy Griffin were tasteless. So what? That’s why we like them. Comedians are the ones testing where the line is, we can’t always be perfect any more than Tom Brady will never throw an interception.”

He later added, “The people who can’t take a joke now aren’t old ladies in the Bible Belt. They’re Gen Z at elite colleges. Colleges, where comedy goes to die. Kids used to go to college and lose their virginity. Now they go to lose their sense of humor. … Judd Apatow has an awesome new documentary coming here to HBO about George Carlin, owner of the most famous 180 in comedy history, when he turned his back on a lucrative career in nightclubs in order to let his hair down and be himself in front of a younger crowd who welcomed irreverence. … Oh George, it’s a good thing you’re dead. Because today, the seven words you can’t say on TV are Jada, can’t wait for ‘G.I. Jane 2.’ For all those who are constantly demanding an apology for jokes, maybe it’s you who should apologize to us for all the great jokes that we never got to hear, the brilliant thoughts that were never uttered. Those are the invisible scars of cancel culture.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett

A couple of weeks ago, Pink Floyd’s guitarist and singer David Gilmour was asked if he’d seen the Instagram feed of Andriy Khlyvnyuk, frontman of Ukrainian rock band BoomBox. Gilmour had performed live with BoomBox in 2015, at a London benefit gig for the Belarus Free Theatre – they played a brief, endearingly raw set of Pink Floyd songs and Gilmour solo tracks – but events had moved on dramatically since then: at the end of Feburary, Khlyvnyuk had abandoned BoomBox’s US tour in order to fight against the Russian invasion.

On his Instagram, Gilmour found a video of the singer in military fatigues, a rifle slung over his shoulder, standing outside Kyiv’s St Sofia Cathedral, belting out an unaccompanied version of Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow, a 1914 protest song written in honour of the Sich Riflemen who fought both in the first world war and the Ukrainian war of independence. “I thought: that is pretty magical and maybe I can do something with this,” says Gilmour. “I’ve got a big platform that [Pink Floyd] have worked on for all these years. It’s a really difficult and frustrating thing to see this extraordinarily crazy, unjust attack by a major power on an independent, peaceful, democratic nation. The frustration of seeing that and thinking ‘what the fuck can I do?’ is sort of unbearable.”

The result is Hey Hey, Rise Up!, a new single by Pink Floyd that samples Khlyvnyuk’s performance, to be released at midnight on Friday with proceeds going to Ukrainian humanitarian relief.

Most observers assumed Pink Floyd were long defunct. They last released original new music 28 years ago, although in 2014 Gilmour and drummer Nick Mason reconvened to turn outtakes from their 1994 album The Division Bell into the largely instrumental The Endless River, as a tribute to the band’s late keyboard player Rick Wright. At the time, Gilmour was insistent that was the finale for a band that began in 1965 and sold more than 250m albums. Pink Floyd couldn’t tour without Wright, who died of cancer in 2008, and there was to be no more music: “It’s a shame,” he told the BBC, “but this is the end.”

The invasion of Ukraine changed Gilmour’s mind. “I hate it when people say things like ‘As a parent, I …’, but the practicalities of having an extended Ukrainian family is part of this. My grandchildren are half-Ukrainian, my daughter-in-law Janina is Ukrainian – her grandmother was in Kharkiv until three weeks ago. She’s very old, disabled, in a wheelchair and has a carer, and Janina and her family managed to get her all the way across Ukraine to the Polish border and now they’ve managed to get her to Sweden, literally last week.”

After “finding the chords for what Andriy was singing and writing another section that I could be” – Gilmour rolls his eyes – “the rock god guitar player on”, he hastily convened a recording session last week with Mason, Pink Floyd’s longstanding bassist Guy Pratt, and musician, producer and composer Nitin Sawhney on keyboards, layering their music with Khlyvnyuk’s sampled voice; Rick Wright’s daughter Gala also attended. They also shot a video for the song, with Mason playing a set of drums decorated with a painting by Ukrainian artist Maria Primachenko (the fate of her paintings remains unknown following the bombing of a museum in Ivankiv).

“I rang Nick up and said: ‘listen, I want to do this thing for Ukraine. I’d be really happy if you played on it and I’d also be really happy if you’d agree to us putting it out as Pink Floyd.’ And he was absolutely on for that.

“It’s Pink Floyd if it’s me and Nick, and that is the biggest promotional vehicle; that is, as I said, the platform that I’ve been working on for my whole adult life, since I was 21. I wouldn’t do this with many more things, but it’s so vitally, vitally important that people understand what’s going on there and do everything within their power to change that situation. And the thought, also, that mine and Pink Floyd’s support of the Ukrainians could help boost morale in those areas: they need to know the whole world supports them.

“When I spoke to Andriy, he was telling me about the things he’d seen, and I said to him, ‘you know this has been on the BBC here in England, and on television around the world? Everyone is seeing these terrible things that are happening.’ And he said, ‘Oh really? I didn’t know.’ I don’t think that most people there have got such great communication and they don’t really understand that actually, the things they are going through are being shown to the world.”

Gilmour says it took some time for him to track Khlyvnyuk down, trawling Instagram and trying phone numbers. Eventually he found an email address. “He wanted to speak on FaceTime – I think he wanted to be sure it was me. The next time I saw him, he was in hospital, having been injured by a mortar. He showed me this tiny quarter-inch piece of shrapnel that had embedded itself in his cheek. He’d kept it in a plastic bag. But you can imagine, if those kind of things are going off, it could just as easily have been a piece over an inch across, which would have taken his head off.”

Prior to the band’s unexpected reconvening, Pink Floyd’s post-1987 output – and the solo work of their late founder, Syd Barrett – was removed from streaming services in Russia and Belarus as part of a cultural boycott. Their most famous work, from the 1960s and 70s, was not removed, leading to rumours that moves to do so had been blocked by former Pink Floyd member Roger Waters, whose relations with his former bandmates are legendarily strained. A week before Russia invaded Ukraine, Waters told an interviewer on Russia Today that talk of a Russian invasion was “bullshit … anybody with an IQ above room temperature knows [an invasion] is nonsense”; he has subsequently condemned the invasion calling it “the act of a gangster”, while also condemning “propaganda to demonise Russia”. It’s a subject on which Gilmour won’t be drawn. “Let’s just say I was disappointed and let’s move on. Read into that what you will.”

Gilmour last spoke to Khlyvnyuk on Tuesday. “He said he had the most hellish day you could imagine, going out and picking up bodies of Ukrainians, Ukrainian children, helping with the clearing up. You know, our little problems become so pathetic and tiny in the context of what you see him doing.”

Nevertheless, Gilmour sent him the song and was “pleased and relieved that he liked it. I can tell you what he said,” he nods, fumbling for his mobile phone and reading out Khlyvnyuk’s message. “Thank you, it’s fabulous. One day we’ll play it together and have a good stout afterwards, on me.” He smiles. “I said, ‘yes, let’s do that’.”