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Sunday,
April 27, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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Make India corruption free, Kalam to jurists
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NJPC LAND ACQUISITION CASES BJP in catch-22 situation in UP 3 more SARS cases Aerospace command on paper only |
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Film ‘incites’ hatred against Sikhs IAS officer
convicted for
offering bribe 3 more arrested in Pandya murder case
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Make India corruption free, Kalam to jurists New Delhi, April 26 “Removal of corruption will be an important foundation for our nation. If we cannot eliminate it and make governance transparent, the vision to become a developed India by 2020 will be a remote dream. I am asking the judicial community to start a nationwide movement to form a corruption-free India just like your forefathers who started the movement for independence. Will you do it?” the President asked, while addressing a seminor on “Access to Justice” here. Addressing gathering of Judges of the Supreme Court and Delhi High Court and lawyers in the seminar, presided over by Chief Justice of India V.N. Khare, the President said: “Time has come to start the second movement against poverty and corruption to protect the rights of every citizen and to ensure proper sharing of national resources.” Expressing concern over the huge number of pending cases in courts across the country, Mr Kalam said justice had to be oriented towards providing better access of it to all people who were not aware of their rights. Listing cyber crime as one of the major challenge in the 21st century, he said: “In the new era of information technology, crime, law and justice will be completely different from the present.” He said in the digital world, the crime might originate from a strange place even outside the country’s shores but it could cause enormous damage to its economy. Mr Kalam felt the need to enact laws for the protection of Indian space above 30 km altitude as the International Law on it was not sufficient.” The geosynchronous orbit has become a competitive business orbit (about 38,000 km),” he said. On the question of comman man’s access to justice, he said equality before law and equality of access to courts was only a theory as even a literate person found himself
illiterate about the first basic step of access to law. “Therefore, there is need to make procedural formats user friendly so that access to justice is easy, meaningful, cost-effective and productive,” the President said. |
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NJPC LAND ACQUISITION CASES New Delhi, April 26 The high court will consider the appeals by the Nathpa-Jhakri Power Corporation (NJPC) in two other cases pertaining to 25 respondents along with Ranidra Kumari’s case, remitted to it for reconsideration, the apex court, in its order, has said. The mega-hydroelectricity project being executed by the NJPC at Jhakri in the Rampur Bushahr subdivision in Shimla district is nearing completion as its two turbines of 250 MW capacity each are almost ready for inauguration. The litigation about the land acquired for the project and the setting up of infrastructure, including housing facilities to employees and construction of roads, is going on in different courts, petitioner’s counsel J.S. Mehta said. The NJPC had challenged the high court order, which had upheld the Shimla district Judge’s verdict for enhancing the compensation in the case of Ranidra Kumari to Rs 1 lakh per bigha without quantifying the amount. The other petitioners, whose land had been acquired, had approached the high court, seeking the same amount of compensation by applying the principle of equality and uniformity. Since the high court had disposed of the cases of Ranidra Kumari, Ram Rattan (having 22 litigating claimants) and Shiboo (three claimants) and some other claimants with a common order, the apex court said the high court should reconsider all cases together and dispose these of. The high court had said there was no error in the order of the assessing authorities to decide the compensation and the district judge’s order enhancing it. The claimants in the cases pertaining to the petitions of Ram Rattan and Shiboo, in their counter affidavit, had alleged that they had been discriminated against in the awarding of the compensation as they were only given Rs 48,000 per bigha, while Ranidra Kumari, a kin of Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, had been paid at a higher rate of Rs 1 lakh per bigha. Their counsel had contended that the land of his clients was of better quality, with the potential of high agricultural yield, and was suitable for raising apple orchards, yet they had been given the compensation less than half awarded to Ranidra Kumari. However, the NJPC had contended that it had challenged the award of enhanced compensation to Ranidra Kumari in the high court, which without deciding the quantum of the amount, had passed on a common order, upholding the lower court award. Aggrieved by the high court’s order, the NJPC had filed appeals in the apex court, which referred the matter back to the high court to decide the issue afresh. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court set aside the order of the high court pending a decision on the issue after the cases were remitted to it. |
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BJP in catch-22 situation in UP New Delhi, April 26 Whether to continue its alliance with the BSP or abandon the Mayawati government midway for retrieving its fast eroding political base in Uttar Pradesh is a question which has been haunting the BJP top leadership for weeks now as resentment among the cadres is growing every day. Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani, who has the onerous task of finding a wayout of the dilemma, reportedly summed up the issue, saying that the crisis in the state unit of the BJP was because of lack of “tolerance, and immaturity” among party legislators and leaders. The statement was apparently made more to send signals to the state leaders and the Chief Minister that the Central leadership was not going to take any hasty step while deciding the fate of the second experiment of an alliance with the BSP in UP. The main architects of the idea of a coalition government with the BSP had extended the argument that handing over the reins of the state to Ms Mayawati would help the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections when Dalit votes would keep the BJP’s Lok Sabha tally intact if it did not increase. As a result, the party high command, which included Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, Mr Advani and Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi, accepted Ms Mayawati as Chief Minister and only bargained for the post of the Speaker of the Assembly. The top leaders thought that they were sacrificing only the small for the big. The BJP chose to ignore the lessons from the mistake of former Congress Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao who had sacrificed Uttar Pradesh in order to remain in power at the Centre. The BJP leaders, abandoning the principles of mass politics, chose to tread the path of manipulative politics in UP, where the caste calculus has apparently become the sole instrument of determining the political behaviour of the electorate for the present leadership of political parties. Lack of clarity, attraction for short-term gains and power have further added to the present dilemma of the party. The BJP decision and policy-makers did not draw appropriate lessons from its first experiment with the BSP. While in 1995, the BJP had played the masterstroke of extending outside support to the first Mayawati government, in 1997, the BJP had installed Ms Mayawati as the Chief Minister on the principle of sharing power between the two, with each partner getting the post of Chief Minister for six months. After six months, Ms Mayawati went back on the agreed formula and refused to vacate the chief ministerial seat and then Mr Kalayan Singh, who later left the BJP, encouraged a split in the Congress and the BSP and became the Chief Minister. The BSP went on to become more strong after the first experiment and this time Ms Mayawati refused to share power on equal terms and dictated that the BJP has to play the second fiddle. In the process, the BJP has only contributed to the growth of the BSP at its own cost and has to accept blames of various acts of commission and omission of Ms Mayawati whose mercurial temperament and unpredictable nature has added proverbial fuel to fire. |
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3 more SARS cases New Delhi, April 26 Of the three freshly confirmed cases, one is being treated in Kasturba Hospital, Mumbai, and the other two in Apollo Hospital, Kolkata, and Naidu Hospital, Pune, the officials added. The officials said 11 samples were being tested and results were awaited. Of these six were being tested at the National Institute of Communicable Diseases here and five at National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune. Giving details of the fresh SARS positive cases, officials said in all cases tests were carried out at NIV. The new Pune case, an uncle of the index case (the patient who arrived from abroad and tested
positive a few days ago), had been in close contact and was now a symptomatic. He was admitted in Naidu Hospital. Another SARS positive case was reported from Mumbai. The person arrived from Hong Kong on April 13 and travelled to Delhi where he stayed till April 20, the officials said adding that the person then travelled to Chennai and finally returned to Mumbai on April 22 when he developed fever. The officials said chest X-ray of this patient was clear and he did not have any fever. In view of the criticism of the ongoing screening procedure at the country’s international airports, Indian Medical Association has sought government permission for a visit to various airports by its members so that they come out with recommendations in this regard. While other countries are even taking body temperatures, government doctors in India are reportedly just watching or asking for SARS symptoms besides getting filled in a written proforma, Dr Sanjeev Malik from the IMA told
reporters today.
PTI |
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Aerospace command on paper only New Delhi, April 26 While the present security scenario in the Indian subcontinent urgently demands the creation of an aerospace command, which would also bridge the gap for the IAF from being just an air force to being an aerospace force, no progress has actually been made in studying the various concepts for establishing such a command. Of the five years which the Ministry of Defence (MoD) had initially projected to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence in December, 2000, which the IAF would take to undertake a study on the creation of such a command almost two and half years have already elapsed without any serious effort being made to get the concept off from just a proposal stage. The creation of such a command would incidentally put the IAF among the most modern and only a select few air forces around the world to have an aerospace command. The MoD had put forward the proposal as part of its plans to modernise the IAF, which included among other things the acquisition of modern war planes, mid-life upgradation of various aircrafts, induction of force-multipliers, induction of major air defence systems and improving the training and infrastructure facilities. The lack of interest shown in the creation of an aerospace command was noticed by the same Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence at its meeting earlier this month. The committee expressed its unhappiness that despite the proposal having been put forward in December, 2000, “no concrete ground work has been done so far on its development”. In the report tabled in Parliament on Wednesday the committee reiterated that the development of aerospace command, considering the futuristic scenario, should be taken up seriously by the MoD and the planning and groundwork should be initiated at the earliest. The MoD had stated that the Air Force would undertake preparatory work of defining viable concepts and drafting various doctrinal and command/control models for the final approval of the government with regard to aerospace command. This work would largely be exploratory involving interaction with numerous agencies and academies for generating possible options and concepts. This would establish a core of an aerospace command, the ministry had said. But leave aside the core, reports suggest that not even the basic ground work has been done. This the IAF officers suggest has not been done as there were presently no space assests with the force. While the satellites remain with the ISRO, there is no dedicated military satellite which could come under the command. Besides the IAF is still to get the AWACS, which would form part of the complete cycle, including the combat aircrafts and the UAVs. In reply to a query from the committee members, the MoD said the development in space technologies could be utilised by the IAF for building real time situational awareness through space communication and space sensors. Besides it could also be used to link radar and other communication network over the entire length and breadth of the country. The other important use will be to develop a ballistic missile defence system |
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Film ‘incites’ hatred against Sikhs New Delhi, April 26 Indian Consulate General in New York in a communication to Miramax Film Corporation had pointed out that the depiction of the character was meant to be a comedy, “the film could incite hate crimes against Sikh Americans.” The Foreign Secretary, Mr K. Sibal, in a communication to the Chairman of National Commission for Minorities, Mr Tarlochan Singh said the understanding that appears to have been reached is that Miramax is going to make amends in a subsequent production. The NCM had objected the “racial” portrial of Sikh character in the film and the Indian Government and Sikh association in the USA took up the case with the production house. |
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IAS officer
convicted for offering bribe New Delhi, April 26 Special CBI Judge R.K. Gauba convicted the Himachal Pradesh-cadre officer under the Prevention of Corruption Act for abetting the Investigating Officer (IO) to take bribe for making a report in such a way that one Sashi Prabha Sharma was cleared of the allegations. The sentence for the offence, which will be pronounced later, is imprisonment of not less than six months and may extend up to five years. The convict, in addition, may also be asked to pay some fine.
UNI |
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3 more arrested in Pandya murder case Hyderabad, April 26 After obtaining a transit warrant from a local court till April 29, the accused were taken to Ahmedabad where they would be produced before a magistrate, the police said here today. The three, all belonging to Gujarat and identified as Kalim Ahmed, Shahnawaz Gandhi and Anas Machiswala were in the age group of 24 to 30 years. |
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