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Shah’s rally raises storm in Punjab politics
Chandigarh: Even before it has been held, BJP president Amit Shah’s rally in Amritsar to launch a campaign against drugs in Punjab has created a virtual storm. It has not only brought out fissures within the Akali Dal-BJP alliance but led to infighting in the Congress too.
The rally, postponed twice this month, was to be held initially Jan 12. The date was later shifted to Jan 22. But, with the Delhi assembly polls announced for Feb 7, it has been postponed again. It will be held some time in February.
After the Punjab BJP leadership announced that the anti-drugs campaign would be launched at Shah’s rally, it caused a lot of heartburn to its ally, the Akali Dal. This was because the BJP gave, and the Akalis assumed, the impression that the blame for the drugs problem was on the Akali Dal government and its leaders.
This was mainly a fallout of the Enforcement Directorate summoning Punjab’s Revenue Minister and Sukhbir Badal’s brother-in-law Bikram Singh Majithia for questioning in a money laundering racket involving NRIs linked to a Rs.6,000 crore international synthetic drugs racket busted in 2013 by Punjab Police.
The Akalis, led by its president and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal, tried to pre-empt the BJP rally of Jan 12 by announcing that they would hold protests Jan 5 against the Border Security Force (BSF) along the border with Pakistan for failing to curb smuggling of drugs into Punjab.
The Akali Dal move was to embarrass the Narendra Modi-led government. Sukhbir Badal’s wife and Bikram’s sister Harsimrat Badal is a minister in the Modi cabinet.
The whole episode and statements of Akali Dal and BJP leaders made it clear that the Amit Shah rally had ruffled feathers in the ruling alliance.
As the Akalis announced the Jan 5 date for protests, the BJP shifted the Shah rally to Jan 22. This led to another controversy – this time in the opposition Congress.
Former chief minister and Congress MP from Amritsar Amarinder Singh announced that he would hold a parallel rally the same day (Jan 22) to counter Shah’s rally in Amritsar. He even rallied 35 of the Congress’ 45 legislators and top leaders for the showdown with the BJP.
The Amarinder move was not to the liking of Punjab Congress president Pratap Singh Bajwa and his supporters. Feeling isolated, Bajwa tried to hijack the Amarinder move by claiming that the rally to counter the BJP’s rally was a state Congress event.
Amarinder, who has gone public about his dislike for Bajwa and has even sought his removal from the post from the party high command, immediately rebutted Bajwa.
Both Congress leaders were involved in a bitter war of words over countering the BJP president.
The anti-climax was that the BJP postponed the Jan 22 rally saying Shah and other leaders would be busy with the Delhi elections. Amarinder and his camp immediately claimed victory, saying the BJP “ran away” after the threat to counter Shah.
BJP leaders are now saying that the anti-drugs rally will surely be held, but only after the Delhi elections. The new date is set to bring another set of political fireworks in Punjab.
International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.
The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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