Mumbai, June 15
The Maharashtra ATS was left red faced today with a court granting bail to Abdul Samad Bhatkal, arrested in connection with an 2009 arms seizure case and alleged to be involved in the Pune blast case, saying there was no evidence against him.

Samad (23), a resident of Bhatkal district in Northern Karnataka, had filed a bail application in the court of Additional Sessions Judge SL Pathan claiming that he was an accused in the 2009 arms case for which he had been arrested.The Maharashtra ATS picked up Samad on May 25 at Mangalore airport after he was returning from Dubai and immediately Union Home Ministry was informed about it. He was charged with supplying of arms to three persons arrested from South Mumbai in August, 2009.

The judge observed there is no evidence against Samad and that even the ATS had never shown Samad as a “wanted accused” in the 2009 arms seizure case and ordered his release on a surety of Rs 25,000.Only one person, named Arif Mirza Baig, was shown as “wanted accused” in this case, the judge observed and pointed out that the other three co-accused arrested earlier were out on bail. Hence on parity grounds, Samad was granted bail.

The ATS had claimed a breakthrough in this year’s Pune German Bakery blast, which claimed 17 lives, with the arrest of Samad. Even Union Home Minister P Chidambaram had issued a statement complimenting the ATS for the breakthrough. Defence lawyer Solkar argued that Samad’s name was not included in the investigating agency’s remand application filed in 2009, while the ATS has been claiming that Samad has been named as an accused in the 2009 arms seizure case.

The ATS claimed that Samad, allegedly close to gangster Chhota Shakeel, had provided arms to Haji Imran, Suleiman Patel and Afzal Shaikh who were arrested on August 5 last year from a Mazgaon hotel.

New Delhi, June 15
The first convoy of trucks carrying supplies to Manipur via the National Highway No. 39 will be accompanied by an armed escort on Friday. Separately, Union Home Secretary GK Pillai will be meeting the Chief Secretaries of Nagaland and Manipur to discuss future action plan tomorrow.

The Nagaland Students Federation has announced that its fellow protesters will lift the blockade on the NH 39 in Nagaland. The Home Ministry will need an armed escort to ensure safety of trucks as the highway passes through northern parts of Manipur that are dominated by Naga tribes. The tribesmen are blocking not only the crucial NH 39, they have also jammed the NH 53 within Manipur.

Around 2,000 paramilitary personnel will accompany the trucks as the truckers are wary of the next move of protesting Nagas.

Giridih (Jharkhand), June 15
A local court today acquitted former Jharkhand Chief Minister Shibu Soren in the 1974 Kudko double murder case for lack of evidence. The court of Additional District Judge (9th-fast track), Mohammad Qasim, who had reserved the judgement on June 3, pronounced the verdict in the presence of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha chief.

An FIR was filed on April 15, 1974, by Bahadur Singh, who had accused Soren of leading a group that allegedly killed Khirodar Singh and Chundi Singh following the slaughter of a goat at Kudko village under Pirtand police station in Giridih district. Soren was the sole accused after eight others had been acquitted in 1986. The chargesheet was filed in 1978.

Jhargram, June 15
The CBI has arrested a leader of a Maoist-backed organisation for his alleged role in the derailment of Gyaneswari Express last month that left 148 persons dead. Also, the premier investigation agency has sought permission from court for invoking the stringent Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) in the case.

The accused, Hiralal Mahato, was produced before a local court, which remanded him in police custody for 10 days, a CBI spokesman said. He said the CBI had also moved an application in the court for invoking Section 16 (committing terrorist acts) and Section 18 (No suit or legal proceeding against the Government in respect of any loss or damage) of the UAPA.The spokesman said Mahato, who belonged to People's Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCPA), was arrested from Rasua village in Midnapore district with the active cooperation of the West Bengal police. — PTI

New Delhi, June 15
Bhopal is now in the news for its mistreatment of its elderly. A significant new study of 800 old respondents across eight major cities of the country has revealed that Bhopal has the highest percentage of elderly facing abuse -- a whopping 79.3 per cent.

The National Capital, surprisingly, has improved its track record with the lowest abuse rates being reported by the elderly -- 15.4 per cent. Physical abuse of the old is the highest in Kolkata at 22.8 per cent, followed by Hyderabad at 21.7 per cent, Mumbai (21%) and Ahmedabad (20%).

The findings form part of HelpAge India’s publication on elderly abuse in the country. The study was released in the Capital to mark ‘World Elder Abuse Awareness Day’ today. The main survey for the study was quantitative with structured interviews of elderly men and women in the 60 plus age group, primarily among the educated middle class.

Importantly, one-fifth of the elderly didn’t know what constituted abuse and among those who were aware, over one-third felt elder abuse constituted feeling disrespected, verbal abuse, economic abuse, neglect, emotional abuse and physical abuse. The study also shows the top forms of prevalent abuses, as stated by the elderly -- 40.2 per cent old feel disrespected, 37 per cent face verbal abuse; neglect and economic abuse is faced by 28.2 per cent, while emotional abuse is faced by 25.8 per cent and physical abuse by 14 per cent old.

About 44 per cent elders consider neglect as a form of abuse and of those abused, 33.7 per cent stated that they faced neglect. Topping the reasons for neglect was family members too preoccupied with their own lives and work.

As for dependence of elders, half of them live with their sons. Of those who are financially dependent, 57 per cent depend on their sons. Of those facing abuse, a little over half said they were abused by their son followed by a close second by their daughter-in-law (43.3%). In Delhi, even domestic helps are abusing the elderly -- 19 per cent admitted to having faced such abused.

About property, the percentage of elderly who own property is the highest in Delhi (68.3%), Patna (68%) and Bhopal (62.1%). The main source of income for most elderly was their pension (45 %) with Delhi once again topping the list with 62%.

Awareness of legal rights among the old remains poor. It is the highest in Delhi (53.8%), followed by Mumbai (44.7%) and Kolkata (40.3%). The awareness level is the lowest in Bhopal (8%).

New Delhi, June 15
Jaswant Singh who was summarily expelled by the BJP on August 19, 2009, is shortly rejoining the BJP.

When asked about unconfirmed reports to this effect, BJP general secretary Ananth Kumar said: “The (BJP) president will meet you personally, ending all speculation in this regard. But he refused to set a time frame in the face of reports that the formality may be completed even as early as tomorrow.

Already Ram Jethmalani has rejoined the BJP and given a ticket to contest Rajya Sabha polls from Rajasthan, notwithstanding the opposition by party general secretary Vasundhara Raje and Leader of Opposition Arun Jaitley at the insistence of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, whose Gujarat riots’ cases he is fighting in the Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, Gadkari constituted his Central Election Committee (CEC) and announced the presidents of various party cells called ‘Morchas’ in BJP parlance here today.

The announcement made by Ananth Kumar has definitely pleased at least one person, BJP Bhagalpur MP and erstwhile convener of its Minority Morcha Syed Shahnawaz Husain, who has been inducted into the CEC, ostensibly in the Muslim quota.

Bangalore, June 15
The demand for the transfer of controversial Karnataka High Court Chief Justice PD Dinakaran raised by a section of advocates here has got a fresh boost in the wake of the open spat breaking out between the CJ and his colleague Shylendra Kumar.

“The spat is damaging the image of the judiciary. All these problems are taking place because Dinakaran continues to remain the CJ of the high court. He should be transferred at the earliest,” said KN Putte Gowda, president of the Advocates’ Association, Bangalore (AAB).

Shylendra Kumar, who is one of the pioneer judges to make his assets public, recently criticised Dinakaran in an open court here for transferring a tax case originally heard by him to the court’s circuit bench at Dharwad. The case came back again to the principal bench here. Although the date of hearing had been fixed, it was not included in the proceedings. When Justice Kumar questioned the registrars about the issue, they said they did not have any information about it, as the appeal was before the CJ. This prompted Shylendra Kumar to make some uncharitable comments against Dinakaran.

The latter retaliated by having a petitioned filed by the high court in the Supreme Court for “berating the Chief Justice in an open court in intemperate language …with a view to ensure that the same is printed in the news media”.

The Supreme Court today pulled up Shylendra Kumar for “breaching judicial discipline by using intemperate language and encroaching upon the administrative authority of the Chief Justice”. Kumar’s criticism of the CJ in the open court has not earned him any friends among the members of the Bar either.

Rajannah, AAB general secretary, also felt that Shylendra Kumar should not have criticised the CJ in the open court. “He could have called the registrar in his chamber and aired his views,” he said. He, however, added that Dinakaran had been arbitrarily posting cases before various benches resulting in a lot of difficulties for everyone involved. Shylendra Kumar had, on his blog, earlier criticised Dinakaran for running administration of the high court even after he had been divested of his judicial powers following eruption of a controversy over land-grabbing and corruption charges against him by some Tamil Nadu-based lawyers.

Mumbai, June 15
A year after the Supreme Court released him on bail, suspended senior police inspector Ravindra Angre was arrested this morning for allegedly trying to kill a builder.

Angre, an encounter specialist credited with killing more than 50 criminals, including gangster Suresh Manchekar, came under the scanner for trying to extort money from builder Ganesh Wagh in 2008. Angre managed to obtain bail from the Supreme Court after spending 14 months in prison. He remains suspended from the police force. On Monday, an unidentified gunman shot at Wagh’s brother Mahesh while he was riding a bike. Mahesh was hit on the shoulder by a bullet and was rushed to hospital. His condition is out of danger. The Wagh family filed a complaint saying they suspected Angre to be behind the attack. Angre was arrested and produced before a Magistrate's court in Thane which sent him to police custody till June 18. The police said Angre himself opened fire at Mahesh Wagh in revenge for the complaint filed against him. — TNS

New Delhi, June 15
Over 100 people on board an Air India plane had a close shave when two tyres of the left landing gear of the aircraft deflated soon after it landed at the IGI airport here today.

A Civil Aviation Ministry spokesman said that the tyres got deflated after the aircraft had landed and while it was taxiing. Seeking to allay fears, he said this was not ‘uncommon when temperatures are so high’. “Air India’s Mumbai-Bhopal-Indore-Delhi flight (IC-133) with 100 passengers and six crew members landed at Delhi airport around 10.58 a.m. and was taxiing towards the parking bay when ground engineers noticed two deflated tyres of the left landing gear and sparks emanating due to friction,” an airline official said.

The pilot, he said, did not experience any jerk and ground engineers were the ones to notice the sparks. The Airbus-320 aircraft was immediately stopped and there was no breach of safety, the spokesman clarified.

Tyre bursts of late have become a little too frequent for comfort at Indian airports, although aviation experts say that the incidence is still rare. A busy airport like the IGI, they pointed out, could be handling as many as 700 landings and take-offs every day. By that token, incidence of tyre bursts is not very high, they maintained.

Aviation experts also pointed out that pilots are trained to use special techniques in case of tyre bursts.

Mumbai, June 15
Normal life was disrupted in Mumbai with the very first showers of the monsoon flooding low-lying areas and throwing transport service out of gear. Heavy flooding was reported from different parts of the city on Monday night and the fire brigade and the police were called in to evacuate people from a number of low-lying areas, according to the police control room. “Residents in two slum clusters of Malwani in the suburb of Malad were evacuated as a precautionary measure,” the police said.

Most of the 5000-odd people were asked to leave after mud began to slide down from a hill nearby. There have been no casualties so far, fire brigade officials said.

Train services were thrown out of gear till the wee hours of today after water logging was reported on the rail tracks. According to the Western and Central Railways, train services were restored later this morning though commuters said trains were running late. According to the Meteorology Department, parts of the city received more than 230 mm of rainfall in just a few hours on Monday night. The Mumbai municipality said the antiquated stormwater drains in parts of the city take several hours for accumulated water to drain off.

Luckily, for the city the rains paused this afternoon at the time of high tides. High tides up to 4.75 metre scheduled for 2.30 pm passed off without incident. During high tides, the city’s marine outfalls which push flood water out into the sea are shut down to prevent sea water from rushing in. 

BDR troopers opened fire on Indian villagers who had gone for cultivation, sources said. — PTI