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Sunday,
October 6, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Panchayats to get more
teeth J.N. Dixit joins
Congress Sinha leaves for Germany
today
Park Street to be named after Mother Teresa |
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Haj pact with S.
Arabia CCS reviews security scenario Book on Amitabh to be released on Oct
11 Manisha, Nair bury ‘chhoti si’ hatchet Parents oppose films in schools Pritiman Award for UT Film Society
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Panchayats to get more
teeth New Delhi, October 5 “I would like the winter session of Parliament to suitably celebrate the 10th anniversary of the 73rd and 74th Amendments to the Constitution (providing for more powers to panchayats) and also to debate the desirability of a new constitutional amendment,” Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said while inaugurating a conference of Project Directors of District and Rural Development Agencies (DRDAs) here. “If all political parties agree, the Ministries of Rural Development, Finance and Law will together work out a draft amendment,” Mr Vajpayee said. He said, “Experience has shown that without adequate administrative and financial powers, the institutions are unable to discharge new responsibilities.” Describing the 73rd and 74th Amendments as a historic step in the democratic decentralisation, he said the panchayats had limited source of income and as such they were unable to do justice to the responsibilities thrust upon them. The Prime Minister said speedy and realistic implementation of rural development schemes would change the face of the country. The institutions should be fully involved in the planning and the implementation of the programmes at the village level. Project Directors should encourage gram sabhas to hold meetings regularly to discuss and decide on issues relating to the government’s rural development programmes. The Prime Minister regretted that some states were unable to spend money allocated to them depriving the people of its benefit. Mr Vajpayee said the country still lagged behind in so many areas of development with villages remaining deprived of even the most basic amenities of life. “We neither have well-ordered cities nor reconstructed and rejuvenated villages.... This is because, after Independence, we did not attach high priority to agriculture, rural development and creation of productive employment,” he said. |
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J.N. Dixit joins
Congress New Delhi, October 5 Mr Dixit met Congress President Sonia Gandhi a few days ago. He said senior Congress leaders were in touch with him for the past about four months. An author, Mr Dixit has been writing on various national issues since he retired from the Indian Foreign Service eight years back. “I agree by the principles and policies of the party,’’ he said. Mr Dixit also recalled his family’s association with the party between 1921 and 1946. The announcement about Mr Dixit’s inclusion in the Congress was made by senior party leader Natwar Singh. Referring to the stand-off between Iraq and the USA, Mr Natwar Singh said the Congress was of the view that anticipatory military steps should be taken against any country only after all other political and diplomatic means have been exhausted. Referring to a recent statement of Finance Minister Jaswant Singh in Washington justifying the doctrine of pre-emptive military action, Mr Natwar Singh wondered if this reflected the policy of the government. |
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Sinha leaves for Germany today New Delhi, October 5 The visit represents the first high-level interaction between India and Germany after the recent elections in that country. During his visit, Mr Sinha would meet his German counterpart Joschka Fischer. Mr Sinha will join Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in Copenhagen for the third
India-EU Summit on October 10. PTI |
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Park Street to be named after Mother Teresa Kolkata, October 5 The ceremony would be held as soon as sainthood was conferred on her, but in case the process is delayed, it would be held in December, Mr Mukherjee said. President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam will be invited, among hosts of Indian and foreign dignitaries’’, the Mayor said after the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) finalised the resolution renaming Park Street area after the founder of the Missionaries of Charity, at its monthly meeting. The resolution was earlier passed by the Mayor in-Council and later by the KMC’s Renaming Committee.
PTI |
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Haj pact with S.
Arabia New Delhi, October 5 Now visas will be issued to the PTOs involved in the Haj trade in a minimum group of 50 pilgrims and the PTOs will have to arrange accommodations in Mecca, Mukarramah and Medina Munawwarah with beds for Indian pilgrims, a press note issued by the Central Haj Committee here said. The Saudi authorities have also made it clear that the total number of pilgrims to be taken by all PTOs together should not exceed 45,000. The PTOs should enter into agreements with the transport syndicate within 45 days of the Haj agreement, which was signed on September 28, so that an adequate number of buses could be arranged for them. These agreements will have to be backed up by bank guarantees from Saudi banks. All pilgrims will have to furnish inoculation certificates against quadrivalent strains of meningitis on arrival in Saudi Arabia. Besides, all pilgrims going through the PTOs or the Haj Committee should wear metal bracelet with their name, passport number and health information. |
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CCS reviews security scenario New Delhi, October 5 The meeting at the Prime Minister’s residence with Mr Vajpayee in the chair was attended by Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani, Defence Minister George Fernandes, External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha, Finance Minister Jaswant Singh, National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra and the chiefs of the three Services. The committee cleared procurement of certain vital defence-related equipment and is understood to have also discussed purchase of Advanced Jet Trainers (AJTs) for the Indian Air Force (IAF) Mr Fernandes left midway through the meeting as he had to leave for Oman on an official visit.
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Book on Amitabh to be released on Oct 11 Mumbai, October 5 The book sails through the highs and lows of the actor’s life and chronicles the journey of his trials and tribulations, his hits and flops, his brush with death, his career decline and then his ultimate resurrection. “The idea of compiling a book on ‘Amitji’ has been with me for a while now. It is a perfect gift for this birthday, when he crosses a milestone age in his life,’’ Jaya Bachchan said in a statement here. The title, an allusion to the famous line from ‘Hamlet’, one of the Shakespearean tragedies, was chosen for more than one sentimental reason, as it has always been the actor’s desire to depict the character of ‘Hamlet’ on screen. Published by Jaya Bachchan and written by veteran journalist Khalid Mohammed, along with pen portraits of Amitabh contributed by the family — wife Jaya, daughter Shweta Nanda, son Abhishek and son-in-law Nikhil Nanda, the book is scheduled to be released at a book-signing on his birthday, to allow fans to interact with him.
UNI Armed
intruder in Bachchan's house Mumbai |
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Manisha, Nair bury ‘chhoti si’ hatchet
Mumbai, October 5 Lawyers of Manisha Koirala and Nair informed Mr Justices R.M. Lodha and Dilip Bhosale that both were working for an out-of-the- court settlement. Taking note of the submission, the judges adjourned to October 17 an appeal filed by the actress challenging an earlier order which dismissed her plea to delete the “objectionable” portions in the movie in which her duplicate had performed. Nair, appearing in person, tendered an unqualified apology in reply to the contempt notices issued suo motu by the court against him and Manisha for referring their dispute to an extra-constitutional authority in spite of the matter being subjudice. “I am extremely sorry for what had happened”, he said and also filed an affidavit. The judges have not accepted his apology so far.
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Parents oppose films in schools New Delhi, October 5 The damage done by Bollywood fanfare to cinema as an art form is such that films are often looked down upon as “sacrilegious,” said participants at a discussion today at the 33rd International Film Festival of India. The discussion was on “the role of film societies in promoting film appreciation in educational institutions”. Educational institutions often look down upon cinema as responsible for all social evils, said P. K. Nair, founder director of the National Film Archives, Pune. The National Film Policy recommendations included introduction of film appreciation courses in 8th standard, but like many other recommendations, it has been ignored, he said. “The opposition came from parents when we tried to introduce film appreciation in one of the schools. They are already seeing films on TV, and you want to show them in schools also was their question,” Nair said. Perhaps the parents are afraid that kids will see the kind of mere entertainment stuff that they themselves are quite attuned to watching, he said. One often wonders why not a film appreciation course for children in school when it is okay to watch movies on TV, said film critic Vinod Das. Lalit Joshi of Allahabad University, who had been associated with the campus film society for 20 years, said the University Grants Commission’s measures on film courses have not been followed through. Arun Kaul, a veteran of the film society movement, said he was unhappy with the government measures in this respect, and lamented that some masterpieces of world cinema had been lost from the Central Film Library because of poor maintenance. The library was once provided with some classic films which were lost as their prints were run on bad machines. It was not realised then that 16 mm prints had shelf value of only 200-300 screenings, and no follow up action was taken to preserve additional prints, said Nair.
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Pritiman Award for UT Film Society New Delhi, October 5 While the Cine Club of the AIIMS received the award for 1999-2000 (received by its president Dr C.S. Panday), the Delhi Malayalee Film Society got it for 2000-2001 (received by Mr C. Balakrishnan), and the Chandigarh Film Society was awarded for the year 2001-2002 (received by its secretary Tapesh Sharma). The awards were presented by renowned filmmaker K. Vishwanath at a function coinciding with the Film Society Day (since the first Indian film society was set up on this day). Mr Gautam Kaul, vice-president, Federation of Film Societies of India, which has instituted the award in memory of the bureaucrat who encouraged cine literacy, and FFSI (Northern Chapter) secretary U. Radhakrishnan were also present. Mr Kaul said the award was instituted in 1992 for the best film critic, but later given only to film societies. It could not be given during the last three years because no international film festival was held last year. Pritiman Sarkar died in 1995.
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