Naryamaswamy Naik went to the cupboard and took out a tin of pesticide. Then he stood before his wife and children and drank it. “I don’t know how much he had borrowed. I asked him, but he wouldn’t say,” Sugali Nagamma said, her tiny grandson playing at her feet. "I'd tell him: don't worry, we can sell the salt from our table."

Nagamma (41) showed us a picture of her husband - good-looking with an Elvis-style hairdo - on the day they married a quarter of a century ago. "He'd been unhappy for a month, but that day he was in a heavy depression. I tried to take the tin away from him but I couldn't. He died in front of us. The head of the family died in front of his wife and children - can you imagine?" The death of Naik, a smallholder in the state of Andhra Pradesh, in July 2009, is just another mark on an astonishingly long roll. Nearly 200,000 Indian farmers have killed themselves in the past decade. Like Naik, a third of them choose pesticide to do it: an agonising, drawn-out death with vomiting and convulsions.

The death toll is extrapolated from authorities' figures. But the journalist Palagummi Sainath is certain the scale of the epidemic of rural suicides is underestimated and that it is getting worse. "Wave upon wave," he says, from his investigative trips in the states of Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra. "One farmer every 30 minutes in India now, and sometimes three in one family." Because standards of record-keeping vary across the nation, many suicides go unnoticed.

"Poverty has assaulted rural India," says Sainath. “Farmers who used to be able to send their children to college now can't send them to school. For all that India has more dollar billionaires than the UK, we have 600 million poor. The wealth has not trickled down." Almost all the bereaved families report that debts and land loss because of unsuccessful crops were among their biggest problems.

The causes of that poverty are complex. Sainath points to the long-term collapse of markets for farmers’ produce. Vandana Shiva, a scientist-turned-campaigner, also links failures of cotton farming with the farmer suicides: she says the phenomenon was born in 1997 when the government removed subsidies from cotton farming. This was also when genetically modified seed was widely introduced.

Beyond any argument - though no less politically charged - is the role of the weather in this story. India's climate, always complicated by the Himalayas on one side and turbulent oceans on the two others, has been particularly unreliable in recent years. In Rajasthan, in the north-west, a 10-year drought ended only this summer, while across much of India the annual monsoons have failed three times in the past decade. Country’s 600 million farmers and the poor are often the same people: a single failed crop tends to wipe out their savings and may lead to them losing their land. After that, there are few ways back.

Suicides and even the selling of children for marriage or as bonded labour - a common shock-horror news story in India - are the most dramatic results. But far more common is the story of rural families migrating, in tens of millions, to cities, swelling the ranks of the urban poor and leaving holes in the farming infrastructure that keeps India fed.

I visited an idyllic village, Surah na Kheda, last month in the limerick-worthy district of Tonk, Rajasthan. We arrived to find the rows of whitewashed mud-walled houses gleaming in the rising sun, while inside the courtyards women in bright saris were stirring milk to make yogurt and butter for the day's meals. Their daughters kneaded dough for the breakfast chapattis. But there was an odd thing: a distinct lack of people. There were the old and the very young - but virtually no one of working age. Half the village, some 60 adults and many children, had gone to Jaipur, the state capital, to look for work.

Prabhati Devi (50) said four of her seven children had joined the exodus. "They had to go," she said. "Twenty years ago, we could grow all we needed, and sell things too. Now we can't grow wheat, we can't grow pulses, we can't even grow carrots, because there is not enough rain. So we go to the cities, looking for money." I found the other end of Surah na Kheda's story under a flyover in Jaipur. Here, in the early morning, hundreds of men and boys, farmers from all over the North, gather looking for work as labourers.

Shankar Lal, one of the Surah na Kheda émigrés, was sipping tea at a stall under the flyover with half a dozen other young men from the village, waiting for a contractor to give them a lift. "If the rains came back we would be farmers again. But will they?" He did not think so: "In 10 years’ time, there will be no village. Everyone will be here in the city. Or they will be dead." According to the World Food Programme, 20 million more people joined the ranks of India's hungry in the past decade, and half of all the country's children are underweight.

It is widely agreed that there have been radical shifts in the weather patterns in India in the past two decades; what is less certain are the causes. Is the change in the weather "climate change"? For many development workers, the question needs answering, because the collapse of India's rural economy - if it continues - will bring about a catastrophe that will affect people far beyond country’s borders: even rumours of a poor monsoon or bad harvest in India tends to send food prices on the world commodity markets soaring, as they did again this spring.

At Rajasthan's Institute of Development Studies, Surjit Singh believes the calamitous weather shifts are as much to do with changing patterns of farming, growing population and failed government policies as any greater human-induced change to the climate. "The state has failed the rural poor, and so has the private sector. Economic liberalisation has clearly failed. How long can the boom go on? The economy may be growing at 9 per cent but food-price inflation is running at 16 to 18 per cent." Dr Singh is in no doubt, though, that the changes in weather have increased poverty in rural India - and that there lies a huge injustice. "Climate change puts the onus on the poor to adapt - but that's wrong. Who is using the planes, the cars and the plastic bottles? Not the poor man with no drinking water."

New Delhi, January 2
Senior BJP leader L.K. Advani Sunday charged the Congress with trying to make the late Sanjay Gandhi a scapegoat for all the “misdeeds” during the the Emergency and said its promulgation was “an unforgivble crime against democracy".

In the latest post "Emergency of 1975 akin to Nazi rule" on his blog, Advani said that the book published by the Congress, "Congress and the Making of the Indian Nation," carries just two curt paragraphs to tell the country what happened during the Emergency of 1975-77 but has two pages about factors leading to the Emergency, including Jayaprakash Narayan’s “extra-constitutional and undemocratic movement” and the Allahabad High Court’s verdict charging former prime minister Indira Gandhi with violating the election law to win her seat and invalidating her election.

Referring to the paragraph mentioning Sanjay Gandhi, Indira Gandhi's son, Advani said it is “a ridiculous attempt to make Sanjay Gandhi a scapegoat for all the misdeeds the country had to suffer during the Emergency".

“In the last 60 years, whenever the executive has found a judicial verdict unpalatable, its reaction has been to have the verdict undone by mobilising legislative support for the executive’s view point. In 1975 also this was sought to be done by amending the law in respect of electoral corruption. "But Mrs. Gandhi did not stop there. Without consulting her cabinet, or even her law minister and home minister, she made president Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed invoke Article 352 to put democracy under indefinite suspension," Advani wrote.

He added: "The Congress party publication indicates that the party regrets only the ‘excesses’ committed during the Emergency, because Sanjay Gandhi promoted worthwhile causes such as slum-clearance, anti-dowry measures, and literacy, but in an arbitrary and authoritarian manner.” Advani said he holds that “promulgation of the Emergency itself was an unforgivable crime against democracy and that the constitution makers had never ever conceived that any prime minister of independent India would so grossly abuse Article 352 of the Constitution.”

The BJP leader said almost all MISA (Maintenance of Internal Security Act) detenues had filed habeas corpus petitions in their respective state high courts and at all places and almost all the courts rejected the government’s objection. “The diary I used to maintain while I was in prison records the names of 19 judges who were transferred to other high courts because they had decided against the government!”

He also noted that pronouncing majority judgement in the appeal, the Supreme Court bench comprising of chief justice A.N. Ray, justices H.R. Khanna, M.H. Beg, Y.V. Chandrachud and P.N. Bhagwati (Khanna dissenting ) declared: “In view of the presidential order dated 27 June, 1975 no person has any locus standi to move any writ petition under Article 226 before a high court for habeas corpus. The appeals are accepted. The judgements of the high courts are set aside.”

Advani also recalled that Khanna, in his dissenting judment, observed: “...Supposing a law is made that in the matter of the protection of life and liberty, the administrative officers would not be governed by any law and that it would be permissible for them to deprive a person of life and liberty without any authority of law. In one sense, it might in that event be argued that even if lives of hundreds of persons are taken capriciously and maliciously without the authority of law, it is enforcement of the above enacted law. Thus, in a purely formal sense, any system or norm based on a hierarchy of orders, even the organised mass murders of Nazi regime, can qualify as law.” — IANS

New Delhi, January 2
The Supreme Court has admitted that a 1976 verdict by it endorsing Emergency had violated fundamental rights of a large number of people in the country.

A majority decision of a five-member Constitution bench upholding the suspension of fundamental rights during Emergency in the ADM Jabalpur Vs Shivakant Shukla case (1976) was "erroneous", a bench of Justices Aftab Alam and Asok Kumar Ganguly in a judgment. The observation was made by the court, which in an unprecedented move commuted to life imprisonment the death sentence, earlier upheld by it, of a man who murdered four members of a family.

"There is no doubt that the majority judgment of this court in the ADM Jabalpur case violated the fundamental rights of a large number of people in this country," Justice Ganguly observed.

The judges set aside the court's own judgment of May 5, 2009 wherein it had upheld the death sentence of Remdeo Chauhan, alias Rajnath Chauhan, who murdered Bhabani Charan Das and three members of his family on March 8, 1992.

"The instances of this court's judgment violating the human rights of the citizens may be extremely rare but it cannot be said that such a situation can never happen. "We can remind ourselves of the majority decision of the Constitution Bench of this court in Additional District Magistrate Jabalpur Vs Shivakant Shukla reported in (1976).

New Delhi, January 2
YS Jaganmohan Reddy, who has revolted against the Congress leadership, intends to seek re-election from Kadapa Lok Sabha seat and says he is not keen on destabilising the Congress Government in Andhra Pradesh.

The son of late Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy says he has fast-tracked the process to register and launch his new political party before the bypolls for Kadapa and Pulivendula constituencies are announced.

Both seats were vacated by him and his mother Vijayalaxmi after they quit the Congress on November 29 last year alleging "humiliation" by the party high command.

Jagan claimed that he has no intention to destabilise the Nallari Kiran Kumar Reddy Government in Andhra Pradesh as he is preparing to face the Assembly elections in 2014.

“I will seek re-election from Kadapa Lok Sabha seat,” he told PTI in an interview. He was asked about his future plans and whether he intends to contest from Pulivendula Assembly seat, which his father had represented when he was the Chief Minister.

“I don’t want to be in the state assembly right now. If I am there, they (Congress) will say I am there to destabilise the Government. I don't want that. My focus in on 2014,” he said.

“I alone cannot do anything in the Assembly. I am waiting for 2014. That is my goal,” he said. After Jagan quit the Congress, there was intense speculation that he would contest from Pulivendula.He also dismissed suggestions that he plans to dislodge the Congress Government in the state by luring MLAs, saying, “If I had to, I would have done it in 2009 when 150 MLAs supported me (for the Chief Ministership). Why would I do that now? My focus now is on 2014,” he said.

Asked why he intends to go to the Lok Sabha again, he said: "It makes more sense to seek a larger mandate from 10 lakh people to enter Lok Sabha rather than seeking the mandate of 2 lakh people. “The Lok Sabha is a larger mandate. But, my focus would be state politics and I will be on the move visiting people across Andhra Pradesh,” Jagan, whose 48-hour fast to highlight farmers’ plight saw the participation of 20 Congress MLAs, said.

Asked about the plans to launch his political party, he said the process to register the outfit has already started and the Election Commission will be approached soon in this regard. “I have quit the Congress. The next step is to launch a party of my own. That will be done. The process has already started and it will be completed in sometime,” he said.

To a query what would be the name of the party, Jagan said: "I don't want to reveal the name now. If I do now, then someone will register in the same name and give problems to us." Asked whether the party will be in place before the bypolls, he replied, "Before that".

The former Kadapa MP also alleged that farmers in Andhra Pradesh are facing one of their "toughest times" for the past one year due to the policies of the state and the Central governments. “The governments should help them. Farmers who have lost crops should be adequately compensated. They should be taken care of by the government,” he said.

Jagan also said the ‘Odarpu yatra’ was the beginning of the end of his innings in the Congress and claimed that the party high command never understood his feelings.

“That was the reason (for me to quit the Congress). I had two options --- either to toe the Congress line or stick to my position. I chose the second one. ‘Odarpu yatra’ is a personal tour,” he said.

He also said he would embark on the ‘Odarpu yatra’ in Visakhapatnam district from tomorrow during which he will console the families of those who allegedly died or committed suicide after hearing about the death of Rajasekhara Reddy in 2008. — PTI

Hyderabad, January 2
Casting a shadow over UPA government’s exercise to resolve the Telangana tangle, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi today decided to boycott the all-party meeting called by Union Home Minister P Chidambaram on January 6 to discuss the Justice BN Srikrishna Committee report on the bifurcation issue.

The TRS, which has been in the forefront of the statehood movement, is a key player in the unfolding political drama over Telangana. Its decision to stay away from the crucial meeting is fraught with far-reaching consequences.

Ridiculing the Home Minister’s decision to invite two representatives each from eight recognised parties in Andhra Pradesh, TRS president K Chandrasekhar Rao said, “This move is aimed at further complicating the issue since it is a virtual invitation for divergent views from political parties. It is unethical and will not help solve the problem.”

Rao’s statement came against the backdrop of reports that the five-member panel may have suggested a “range of options” to the government instead of a firm recommendation in favour of creation of separate Telangana state.

“Inviting two representatives from each party is clearly a mischievous move. This is nothing but a move to dodge the issue of statehood. We stand by our demand that the Centre introduce a Bill for formation of Telangana state in the budget session of Parliament,” the TRS chief said.

The TRS is of the view that the January 6 meeting would be a repeat of a similar all-party meeting held in January last year where major parties had expressed divergent views on Telangana issue. While Telangana representative from each party had rooted for statehood cause, the other advocated status quo.

TRS is the second party to announce its decision to boycott the meeting after Andhra Pradesh BJP, which had made it clear that it had no intentions of attending the meeting since the Srikrishna Committee itself lacked any constitutional sanctity and validity. Besides these two parties, Telangana MPs from the ruling Congress are also mulling over the idea of boycotting the meeting, while the main opposition Telugu Desam Party is still undecided about its stand.

The TRS chief, whose fast-unto-death in November last year had prompted the Centre to announce that it would take steps for the formation of a separate Telangana state, said he had every reason to believe that the Home Minister’s move was to ensure that no consensus emerges from the meeting.

States, specially when they feel vulnerable and insecure, are known to crack down on dissent and dissenters. Even the United States, which prides itself on its democratic credentials, has witnessed various witch-hunts, notably against communists. So much so that an American was sent to prison on charges of sedition during the First World War when he was overheard saying in public that he wished Germans would arrive and clean up the country.

Iran last month imprisoned filmmaker Jafar Panahi for six years and ordained that he would not be allowed to make films for the next twenty years !

In India also half a dozen well-publicised cases hogged the headlines. They included sedition charges against Arundhati Roy, the author and activist, and Ali Shah Geelani, the Kashmiri separatist leader, both of whom attended a seminar in the national capital on "Azaadi-the only way out". Curiously, Delhi police did not find any material to prosecute the duo but the judiciary ordered the police to proceed. In Karnataka, the police had egg on their face when they slapped a case of sedition against the vice-president of the state unit of the People's Union of Civil Liberties ( PUCL) for allegedly publishing a journal, which had ceased publication in 2007.

An activist in Tamil Nadu was less lucky when he chose to distribute pamphlets at the District Collector's Republic Day function. Although the pamphlet spoke of the government's failure to implement the Supreme Court's directives, the poor chap was thrown into prison for sedition. On Christmas eve came the verdict against the Raipur-based Dr Binayak Sen (61), who was ordered to be imprisoned for life for ostensibly aiding and abetting Maoists and helping them wage a war against the government. At the same time, hundreds of other lesser-known cases may have gone unnoticed because they involved poor villagers in remote areas.

Sen, like all doctors working in Maoist strongholds, would necessarily have known many of the rebels. He would have treated some of them, known families of others and counseled a few. As the PUCL general secretary too, he would have been expected to meet Maoists, former Maoists, their sympathisers and officials. Some of them would possibly have visited his home as well and written to him. The question is, whether that made him also a rebel and a collaborator ?

The Binayak Sen case raises five basic issues. First, is it possible for doctors, journalists, police officers and activists in Maoist strongholds to avoid contacts with the rebels ? One would think such contact is unavoidable if they try to discharge their duty, which really leads to the second question. Could the state have taken advantage of Sen's contacts to either have a dialogue with the Maoists or to nab them ?

The third question that arises is what the state would have gained by prosecuting the doctor. The verdict has caused outrage both here and abroad. Amnesty International has called him a 'prisoner of conscience'.

It is also fine to say, as former Chief Justice of India V.M. Khare said, that our judicial system is perfect; that if the trial court has erred, the superior courts can always review and overturn the judgment. But with the Indian judiciary , specially the lower judiciary, being notorious for kowtowing to the powers that be, it is difficult indeed to keep the faith. And even if the doctor earns his freedom after three years or five, will the state ever be able to return the lost years to him ?

Finally, when the state takes no action against separatists like Simranjit Singh Mann in Punjab, Geelani in Kashmir, votaries of a Tamil state in Tamil Nadu, Muivah in Nagaland and now decides to have a dialogue with ULFA leaders, how does it explain the double standards ?

I am very upset about the court decision in Chhattisgarh about Binayak Sen. It is a huge perversion of our system of justice, and particularly of the laws concerning sedition.

It's not at all clear, to start with, that the thing he has been exactly accused of - of passing letters - has been really proved beyond doubt.

Secondly, even if this were correct, that doesn't amount to sedition. He hasn't killed anyone, he hasn't incited anyone to rise in violent protest or rebellion. In fact, we know that in his writings he has written against the use of violence in political struggle, arguing that this is neither correct, nor is it ultimately successful. So, I think, even if this is the case - that the exact thing he is accused of is exactly what they are saying it is, which is by no means clear - even then the charge of sedition does not stand.

Thirdly, in exercising any kind of judgment, one has to take into account the character of the person. In this case, Binayak Sen is a very dedicated social worker, working extremely hard for the welfare of some of the most neglected people in the world. He has dedicated his life to doing that rather than having the prosperous, successful life of a doctor, and making a lot of money. So his dedication is not 
in doubt.

To turn the dedicated service of someone who drops everything to serve the cause of neglected people into a story of the seditious use of something - in this case, it appears to be the passing of a letter, when sedition usually takes the form of inciting people to violence or actually committing some violence and asking others to follow, none of which had happened - the whole thing seems a ridiculous use of the laws of democratic India.

This is part of a legal process, and we have to bear in mind that this is only the first step in a state which has been extraordinarily keen in keeping Binayak Sen behind bars.

And the legal process will not stop there. If the high court in Chhattisgarh has its thinking straight and unbiased, it will overturn the decision. But if it turns out that - as it happened in Gujarat - justice is difficult to get in the state, which is under the control of a political regime that is keen on justifying its policies, some of which are very deeply problematic, rather than bringing justice to people living in Chhattisgarh, then the issue will have to be dealt with at the central level, that is the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court has shown, time and again, that it is very committed to the fundamental rights of all human beings, and I don't doubt that if Chhattisgarh is left in this utterly unsatisfactory state we will get satisfaction from the Supreme Court. So, I am not suggesting that we overrule the judicial system in any way. But the reasoning that makes many concerned citizens think that this is a deep miscarriage of justice should be aired and should be known to the people as well as the court. That is the reason for my willingness to make a statement in a case where I am outraged, upset, and feel unjustly treated.

As Rabindranath Tagore said, the maltreatment of any human being is a mistreatment of me as well. I do feel as if I have been mistreated.

I hope to make it clear that in spite of the similarities of our names, Binayak Sen is no relation of mine. But then he is also a relation of mine as an Indian citizen, and he is a relation of yours too as an Indian citizen. He is a relation of a lot of people as a global citizen, particularly a relation of those who, like him, fight against injustice in the world, right across the globe. 

Lucknow, January 2
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and BSP president Mayawati Sunday ordered the suspension of party legislator Purshottam Narain Dwivedi for his alleged involvement in the gangrape of a minor girl in the state's Banda district.

The suspension would remain in force during the CID probe ordered by the chief minister Saturday night.

The announcement of the suspension came amidst strident criticism of the ruling party by opposition leaders, who accused Mayawati of "shielding" the rapist of a minor girl belonging to a backward community.

"Besides ordering immediate suspension of the MLA from the party, the chief minister has also made it loud and clear that Dwivedi would be expelled from the party and even put behind bars if he were found guilty," cabinet secretary Shashank Shekhar Singh said at a press conference here.

"However if the CID did not find the charges against him to be true, his suspension would be revoked," he added.

The 17-year-old victim had accused Dwivedi and his henchmen of not only subjecting her to gangrape but also using his influence to falsely implicate her in a case of theft.

Dwivedi accused her of stealing the legislator's licensed revolver and Rs. 5,000 from his house, for which she was currently lodged in jail in Banda, 180 km from here.

"The chief minister has always been very sensitive on such issues and has never hesitated in taking prompt punitive action against anyone, including her own party men, if they were found involved in anti-social or criminal activities," Singh said.

"On the contrary, chief ministers of other political parties rarely showed such courage in initiating action against their own party leaders accused of criminal activities," he alleged, citing a long list of offences committed by leaders of different political parties as also other major crimes committed during successive regimes in the state.

Besides citing a number of such cases of the Mulayam Singh Yadav regime, he also went as far back as the early 1980s to cite the case of the murder of then chief minister Vishwanath Pratap Singh's brother Justice C.S.P.Singh, who was gunned down in broad daylight.

Jaipur, January 2
Fresh round of talks between the agitating Gujjars and the Rajasthan Government began here tonight at the Secretariat to resolve the 14-day-old stir by the community demanding 5 per cent reservation in government jobs.

A 51-member Gujjar delegation, led by Basanta Gujjar, is holding the third round of the talks with a committee of ministers comprising Energy Minister Jitendra Singh, who is a member of the community, Home Minister Shanti Dhariwal and Transport Minister BK Sharma. This meeting between the government and Gujjars comes after the protesters on Friday demanded the intervention of the Congress leaders from the community before the third round of talks.

Later, the Gujjar Congress leaders, including Union Minister of State Sachin Pilot, held a meeting at Jaipur to end the deadlock. Representatives of nomad communities are also a part of this delegation, which arrived here in the evening and met minister Singh at his residence. After the meeting between the representatives and Singh, fresh parleys started at the Rajasthan Secretariat.

The second round of talks was held on Thursday last between a 11-member delegation and government officials at Bayana, while the first round was held on Sunday at Pilukapura, the epicentre of the agitation, with Energy Minister Jitendra Singh representing the state government. The High Court on December 22 had stayed the operation of an Act granting 5 per cent reservation to Gujjars and directed the state government to undertake a data collection exercise within one year to justify the quota for members of the community.

The agitators have been blocking Mumbai-Delhi rail tracks and Jaipur-Agra National Highway and several other roads in support of their demand. — PTI

Jaipur, January 2
Rights activist Binayak Sen’s opposition to Salwa Judum, an anti-Naxalite force promoted by the Chhattisgarh Government, and state repression had made him a target of the authorities, his wife Ilina claimed today.

“I have faith in judiciary of the country....but I would say that the conviction of Sen would be a blot on the judiciary,” Ilina said here, during an interaction with rights activists.

“Binayak Sen and his family members are suffering today but implication of the case would go beyond this. Vague charges were framed against Sen and our logical explanation and evidences were not considered,” she alleged.

Ilina said Sen opposed Salwa Judum and raised his voice against state repression and became the target of the state government.

Sen, Naxal ideologue Narayan Sanyal and Kolkata businessman Piyush Guha were found guilty of sedition and sentenced to life by a Raipur court last month.

Meanwhile, social activist Swami Agnivesh on Sunday demanded immediate release of Sen. Terming the judgment by the court in Raipur as “miscarriage of justice”, Agnivesh alleged that Sen, a prominent doctor and social worker in Chhattisgarh’s backward area, was framed in a false case as he used to meet CPI(Maoist) Politburo member Narayan Sanyal in Raipur Central Jail.

Describing Sen as his old friend, Agnivesh urged higher court to come forward in Sen’s rescue, as already a number of Nobel laureates including Amartya Sen have expressed solidarity demanding Sen’s release immediately.

“We will fight in High Court and if required in the Supreme Court too for Binayak Sen’s release,” Agnivesh said, adding that the entire case was based on “fictitious charges.”

“Whenever he went to meet Narayan Sanyal in Raipur Central Jail, jail officers accompanied him and there was no business in hiding,” he said.

“I want his release with honour. Rather Sen, who did his MD from Christian Medical College Vellore and was involved in social works in backward areas sacrificing his bright career, should be given highest award of the country because of working for humanity,” Agnivesh demanded. --- PTI

Sibsagar, January 2
ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa today said his outfit was ready to sit for peace talks without any preconditions for an "honourable" solution to relieve the people of Assam of their suffering.

"A new chapter begins in our long struggle. As per the wishes of the National Convention, we will sit for peace talks with the government without preconditions," the 54-year-old ULFA leader, who was released from jail yesterday, told a massive gathering in front of the historic Ranghar where the ULFA was formed by him and five others on April 7, 1979.

He did not mention the outfit's core demand of sovereignty.

"We will definitely try for an honourable solution to the conflict. If not, then we will again come to the people of the state and proceed on our next step as per their advice as to whether take up arms again, join politics (rajpath) or what else. Whatever direction they give us we will follow", Rajkhowa said. The ULFA leader was released from Guwahati Central jail yesterday after he was granted bail by the designated TADA court.

Rajkhowa assured the people that this time "bari sukot lukai ami kaam nakoru (we will not hide in our backyard and operate subversively). We will openly discuss with the people and on their opinion our decision will be taken."

Addressing another public rally at Boarding Filed here, he appreciated the role of the National Convention of the state's intellectuals in initiating the peace dialogue.

"We also want to sit for the discussions without preconditions.... but the final decision will be taken only after the arrival of our general secretary Anup Chetia".

Chetia is now imprisoned in Bangladesh. Rajkhowa said the Indian government should take an initiative for his return to Assam.

Rajkhowa said "since the inception of ULFA, the people of Assam have suffered for long and lead a miserable life either due to our arms struggle or the retaliatory anti-insurgency operations by the government and security forces".

"Considering the consensus among the people in the state and their miserable condition, we want to relieve them of their suffering. So we have decided to come forward for the peace parleys," the ULFA chief, who was flanked by vice chairman Pradip Gogoi by his side, said in the meeting.

After the meeting, he proceeded to his native place Lakhwa in the district that he had left 32 years ago to go underground.

In an emotionally charged atmosphere, Rajkhowa met his bed-ridden 98-year-old mother Damayanti Rajkumari in his ancestral home and then paid homage at the samadhi of his freedom fighter father Uma Kanta Rajkonwar. — PTI

I retired from Government Ranbir College, Sangrur, in February, 2009 and a case for my case for revised pension was sent to the DPI (Colleges), Punjab, in February, 2010. However, the DPI (C) office in Chandigarh fixed my pension wrongly and sent it to the college in March, 2010. A request to fix the correct pension was sent on March 30, 2010 by the college principal. However, no answer was received till August, 2010. The principal sent a reminder on August 25, 2010 but to no avail. Even after the passage of 11 months, the DPI (C) has failed to rectify the error. As a result of this inordinate delay, I have been unable to receive my revised pension.