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| Friday,
January 12, 2001, Chandigarh, India   
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China denies giving N-technology to Pak Hearing adjourned on Shah’s bail plea Dehra Dun plagued by disease-hit slums Bihar arms find way into Bengal Foreign Secy weapon to fight Cong? |
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Irregularities in AICC lists: workers President gives nod to 3 Bills 2 Kashmiri ultras held in Kolkata Special vehicle for Hawking designed Samata crisis over: Digvijay VHP to mobilise
people on temple IAS exams: Jan 15 last date for forms
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China denies giving N-technology to Pak NEW DELHI, Jan 11 — China today firmly denied the supply of nuclear and missile technology to Pakistan with the second-most important Chinese leader Li Peng asserting here that relations with Islamabad were not defence-related. “There is no such thing. There is a traditional friendship between China and Pakistan which we are using for economic development of the two countries”, Mr Li said, adding that India did not pose any threat to China and the two countries shared similar view on a multipolar world. Answering questions at a meeting with Indian parliamentarians, the visiting Chairman of the National Peoples Congress of China allayed India’s fears stating that China was not helping Pakistan in their missile technology programme. Arrival of former Chinese Prime Minister Li Peng here today from Mumbai for his official interactions with top Indian leaders marks another high point in bilateral relations. While Mr Li will have discussions with the President, Mr K.R. Naryanan and the Prime Minister, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee during his stay in the Capital, there are strong indications that talks will go beyond the bilateral framework. |
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Hearing adjourned on Shah’s bail plea MUMBAI, Jan 11 (PTI) — Film financer Bharat Shah today moved the Mumbai High Court urging for bail and challenging his arrest under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) for an alleged nexus with the underworld. His petition was adjourned to January 15 by Mr Justice S.S. Parkar after public prosecutor Vidya Kapse-Tahilramani sought time to seek instructions in the matter. Shah was represented by a battery of lawyers, including V.R. Manohar, Mr Ramrao Adik, Mr Sirish Gupte and Mr Peter Lobo. Shah’s lawyers made a plea for medical examination of the accused by a team of doctors in view of his ill-health. The panel includes Dr Hemant Kumar and Dr Rachmale
(J.J. Hospital), Dr Tushar Medhekar (KEM hospital) and Dr J.J. Dalal (Hinduja hospital). The judge directed the prosecutor to consider the plea of the accused and inform the court today itself so that he could pass suitable orders. Shah has pleaded for regular bail and if that was not possible at this stage then he has pressed for interim bail on medical grounds. Shah has challenged his arrest and also the order of designated judge A.P. Bhangale remanding him in police custody. He has argued that the arrest and subsequent remand was not at all justified in his case because he had appeared before the police for interrogation on three occasions earlier and fully cooperated with the police officers. Shah pleaded that custodial interrogation was not required since he had handed over certain documents to the police and the cops had raided his premises. Shah submitted that he had financed film “Chori Chori Chupke Chupke” whose producer Nasim Rizvi was arrested on December 13. Thereafter, the police interrogated the matter and arrested him on January 8. Even without his arrest the probe continued during the intervening period between December 13 and January 8. It can go on even now without his custody. Shah urged that no specific allegation was made against him and that he was informed about his alleged nexus with the underworld for the first time on the day of his arrest. He said the police had alleged his links with Chhota Shakeel (Karachi-based gangster) on the telephone and further told him that he had paid US $ 75,000 to Bathija who in turn paid the amount to members of the underworld based in Dubai. Shah said he had denied these allegations when they were told to him by the police before his arrest. He has further contended that the allegations were serious and demonstrated that investigations by the police were not bona fide and that cops were trying to malign his image. |
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Dehra Dun plagued by disease-hit slums DEHRA DUN: The capital of newly formed Uttaranchal is plagued by lack of planning, inadequate infrastructure and official apathy. Clusters of unauthorised structures and slums have grown during the last two decades, degrading burdening the civic amenities and environment. There are at least 77 small and big clusters of poor afflicted with starvation and diseases. From 15,000 in 1970, their number has swelled to one lakh now, which comprise about 23 per cent of the total population. A startling fact about the occupation of urban poor is that there are about 35 thousand casual labourers in the city. Most of them live along the dry bed of the Rispana river from Sahastradhara road to Nehru Colony. Other occupation categories have been identified as unskilled labourers, skilled workers, vehicle drivers, animal husbandry and agricultural workers, cleaning workers and domestic helps. A large number of slum dwellers are engaged in low status low income jobs such as rag picking and repairing, and some of them are self-employed vendors and hawkers. In most of the clusters no health facilities have been provided by the local administration. Unhygienic surroundings, infection-breeding milieu, heaps of garbage, water logging and blocked drains are common scenes which make the slum dwellers vulnerable to diseases. In some clusters, girls and women are reported to be engaged in prostitution. Stray animals are an added menace. In the absence of any strict norms abound in these clusters and deliveries conducted by untrained ‘dais’. When contacted, Mr Ajay Bhatt, State Minister of Health, admitted that quacks were thriving here and in other parts of the state. The government has asked the CMO to prepare a list of unauthorised medical practitioners of the city within a month so that action could be initiated against them. According to a senior medical practitioner of the city, more than 95 per cent of the women visiting his clinic from such areas are anaemic. The education scenario is equally abysmal. Most of these clusters do not even have primary school. Children below the age of 12 years can be seen engaged in rag-picking or begging in the city. It should be concern for the government but also for more than 500 NGOs registered in the city. Water shortage and irregular supply of power is common complaint. Due to the use of electric pumps by some residents the problem worsens during summer. A few open drains in such clusters are not cleaned. Carcasses are thrown in these drains, which leads to foul smell. The dry Rispana river bed is used for defecation. Surprisingly, the district administration did not take any timely action to prevent construction of unauthorised structures and remove encroachments. “What’s more, the slums are becoming breeding grounds for small-time criminals. The life-style of the slum dwellers is affecting the social milieu in the city,” says Mr Naresh Gupta, a city resident. Although, a master plan for expansion was prepared in the last decade, but the concept of planned growth was ignored. There should be a gradual shift towards creation of a civil society where the services of the state government and the municipal corporation are managed through people’s involvement. The development and social transformation areas should be increasingly given to the community to make them sustainable. |
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Bihar arms find way into Bengal PATNA, Jan11— West Bengal’s recent violence may not have any connection with Bihar but the arms that the marauders are using in the state might have a “made in Bihar” mark on them. The state happens to be the largest buyer of the illegal arms manufactured in large numbers in Bihar. Naxalites and criminals in West Bengal are getting arms manufactured in Bihar’s Munger, Nawada and Shekhpura districts. This was revealed recently after a drive was launched in Munger district to bust arms factories. The Munger police seized seven pistols with fake labels of made in USA, England, Germany and Bulgaria on them. The SP, Mr
D.N. Gupta, said four persons, two from Uttar Pradesh and one from West Bengal, were arrested on the spot. They had come to place orders for guns and cartridges. Their interrogation revealed that arms were being supplied from Bihar to West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh. In Munger and Nawada districts, illegal gun factories are abundantly found in rural areas and in forests. Two or three persons use a boat and make guns in the Ganga’s midstream to evade detection and arrest. The raids recovered 9mm pistols with 12 cartridge chambers that are in great demand with the Naxalites and Left insurgents in the West Bengal and Assam areas. The pistols, with foreign made labels on them, resemble their original makes on all counts. The 9mm pistols are also used by the
police. The criminals find it convenient to commit crimes with these guns as they point to police complicity. Interestingly, the illegal guns are not only of high quality but also cheap. |
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Foreign Secy weapon to fight Cong? NEW DELHI, Jan 11 — With the appointment of Ms Chokila Iyer as the country’s first woman Foreign Secretary last month, the ruling BJP’s domestic agenda has appeared on the foreign policy front also. While Ms Iyer will lead the Ministry of External Affairs from the front for 15 months, the top political leadership of the BJP will “exploit” the appointment for political objectives in the coming Assembly elections and elsewhere. Ms Iyer, presently India’s Ambassador to Ireland, was chosen after
careful deliberations in the BJP and the RSS top leadership, sources said. After the Congress was able to score points on the women reservation issue in the winter session of Parliament, the BJP top leaders were keen to strike back at the main opposition party. The idea came from the RSS, suggesting to the BJP that Ms Iyer would not only be a befitting answer to their search for a weapon to fight the Congress but would also be useful for giving a soft touch to the Indian diplomacy. With the political objective in focus, the Prime Minister, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, took the decision of making Ms Iyer Foreign Secretary, ruling out objections that she had not served in any of the major capitals of the world. Incidentally, another requirement of having served in at least one of the neighbouring countries was also waived in her case. Ms Iyer, a woman of Sikkimese origin and born in Darjeeling, she has the distinction of being a tribal and this would be used in the BJP campaign. At the same time, her appointment is also a message to the North-Eastern states where the BJP has been making efforts to expand its base. The BJP will stress that its government has not only brought a woman to lead the Indian diplomacy but also promoted the cause of the North-Eastern states which had been neglected by the previous Congress governments. |
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Irregularities in AICC lists: workers NEW DELHI, Jan 11 — Even as Congress president Sonia Gandhi has begun the exercise of finalising names for nomination to the Congress Working Committee (CWC), uncertainty remains over the All India Congress Committee (AICC) lists which have yet not reached president of the Congress Central Election authority. Congress constitution requires that elections to the AICC are completed before the process of electing CWC members begins. Though the amended party constitution stipulates that 12 of the 24 CWC seats should be elected by the AICC members, Ms Sonia Gandhi has been authorised to nominate all 24 members. Party insiders say that central election authority (CEA) Chairman Ram Niwas Mirdha had not approved the AICC lists sent to him because these were not in keeping with the party constitution according to which 33 per cent of berths should be given to women and 20 per cent to minorities, SCs and STs. Confirming that the lists were yet to be submitted to them, a CEA official indicated that these were still lying with a senior leader looking after the organisation work at the AICC. The leader has reportedly been told by the CEA to amend the lists to reflect the party’s commitment to the weaker sections. There have been complaints of large-scale irregularities in the preparation of the AICC lists with party workers alleging that many persons, who were not even PCC members, had been included in AICC lists. Amid reports that the AICC lists were prepared by three senior leaders in Delhi, party workers from various states have been calling on Ms Sonia Gandhi with their grievances. Mr Lal Babu Lal, a senior Bihar Congress leader, has met the Congress President twice in the past week to inform her of the irregularities in the lists of the PCC and the AICC. Mr Lal has demanded an inquiry into the “high-level conspiracy to keep people belonging to Scheduled Castes out of the party affairs.’’ Though there are little chances of a CWC election now, there is a craze among party leaders to be AICC members because the 1300-member committee is like the national executive of the party. Only the AICC members can participate in discussion and voting at the party’s plenary session. An AICC session can be called if one tenth of the AICC members make such a request to the Congress President. Only AICC members are allowed to speak on the resolutions at such sessions. There is demand that dedicated workers of the party should be compensated by co-opting them to the
AICC. |
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President gives nod to 3 Bills NEW
DELHI, Jan 11 (UNI) — President K.R. Narayanan has given assent to the Taxation Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2000, the Appropriation (No 5) Bill, 2000 and, the Appropriation (Railways) No 5 Bill, 2000, which were passed in the recently-concluded winter session of Parliament. These have been notified as Act Nos 1, 2 and 3, respectively, of 2001, an official note said today. The Taxation Laws (Amendment) Act, 2001, seeks to increase the rate of surcharge payable by domestic companies for the assessment year 2001-2002 from the existing 10 per cent to 11 per cent of the income-tax payable. The increased surcharge is intended to form corpus for the National Centre for Calamity Management, which has been set up by the government to monitor natural calamities like cyclone, drought, earthquakes, fire and flood. Assistance provided by the Centre to states in this regard will be financed by such additional levy of special surcharge on the central tax for a limited period. |
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2 Kashmiri ultras held in Kolkata KOLKATA, Jan 11 — Two dreaded Kashmiri militants were detained after a midnight swoop by the Jammu and Kashmir police on Tuesday from a hotel in central Kolkata. They are Jahur Ahmed (31) and Naseer Ahmed(29) of the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen group which was involved in the last year’s attack on the Badamibag Army Headquarters in Srinagar and various other subversive activities in the Kashmir valley with the help of the ISI. They were also behind the recent anti-India and anti-Hrithik Roshan riots in Nepal. The Chief Minister, Mr Buddhadev Bhattacharya, has asked the city police chief to improve the intelligence network, identify hideouts of criminals and destroy them. According to official sources, a commando group of the Jammu and Kashmir police which landed in the city on Tuesday morning from Srinagar, raided the hotel in the Jakaria street and arrested the militants. Interrogation of the militants revealed that they were on way to Bangladesh en route Nepal on an assignment to train militants in a hideout at the Chittagong hills. Special vehicle for Hawking designed NEW DELHI, Jan 11 — Internationally renowned physicist Professor Stephen Hawking’s visit to Delhi on Sunday may after all not be as embarrassing for his hosts as anticipated. A vehicle designed by a hydraulic lift expert along with efforts of an occupational therapist here has taken care of Professor Hawking’s problem of moving about in the Capital. Professor Hawking’s hosts have been assured of this vehicle with the intervention of disability rights activist Javed Abidi. The 15-seater Tata 407 fitted with a hydraulic lift will be provided to the physicist. The vehicle costs Rs 5,70,000 and has been sponsored almost entirely by the Japanese Embassy. It can accommodate three wheelchair-bound persons. The brain behind the vehicle is Mrs Madhur Bhandari, occupational therapist with Akshay Pratishthan. Meanwhile, the Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment, Mrs Maneka Gandhi, has said her ministry will give a favourable response to any representation to make ramps in historical buildings for the disabled. “The question is not of making a temporary structure but of making a permanent arrangement for all disabled people. We are proud to have Professor Hawking here. It is an eye opener to see that a person can rise above his body’s limitations to achieve the best that man can be.”
Samata crisis over: Digvijay LUCKNOW, Jan 11 (UNI) — Senior Samata Party leader and Union Minister of State for Railways Digvijay Singh today claimed that crisis in the party was over and the dissidents would join the National Executive meeting to be held at Mysore from January 14. Ruling out any possibility of a merger with Mr Sharad Yadav’s Janata Dal (United), Mr Digvijay Singh said there was no such proposal. He said the crisis erupted following some misunderstanding among the leaders, but it was solved amicably. “When all have accepted to participate in the Mysore convention, there is no question of any differences,’’ he added. |
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VHP to mobilise
people on temple NEW DELHI, Jan 11 — The thinktank of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) would hold a special meeting here later this month to formulate a strategy to mobilise people for the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya. “VHP leaders like Mr Ashok Singhal, Acharya Giriraj Kishore and other senior leaders of the organisation would meet in the Capital in the last week of January to formulate the temple mobilisation strategy,” the working president of the Delhi unit of the VHP, Mr Om Prakash Singhal, said. The special conclave of strategists is likely to be convened soon after the announcement of the date of construction of the Ram Temple by the VHP’s Dharam Sansad on January 22 at the ongoing Mahakumbh Mela in Allahabad. |
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IAS exams: Jan 15 last date for forms NEW DELHI, Jan 11 — The last date for receipt of applications for the civil services (preliminary) examination, 2001, at the “dak counter” in the UPSC office here is January 15. In order to facilitate candidates in the submission of their applications before the closing date, the dak counter and facilitation counter on the commission’s office premises will remain open on January 13, from 9.30 a.m. to 5 p.m., a press note said here today. The applications will be received and acknowledged on the said date. The candidates may also seek information regarding the registration/receipt of applications at the facilitation counter. |
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Fastest Shatabdi LUCKNOW, Jan 11 (UNI) — The superfast Shatabdi Express running between New Delhi and Lucknow, would be the fastest train in the country by March following introduction of imported coaches and engine. Announcing this here today, the Union Minister of State for Railways, Mr Digvijay Singh, said the trial run of the train to a maximum speed of 180 km per hour had already been completed. “We are presently renovating the tracks and signalling system on the section to cut down on time”, he said. |
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Delhi unable to provide
pollution-free buses NEW DELHI, Jan 11 (UNI) — The Delhi Government today expressed its inability to implement the Supreme Court order for replacing the entire public transport fleet with pollution-free buses by March 31 this year due to the lack of availability of adequate number of manufacturers of CNG vehicles. Addressing a press conference here, Delhi Transport Minister Parvez Hashmi said it was simply impossible to take off all 12,000 government and private buses apart from the taxis and autos by the deadline fixed by the apex court as the supply of CNG buses was not adequate. Levy quota of
sugar reduced NEW DELHI, Jan 11 (PTI) — The government yesterday
announced a drastic reduction in the levy quota of sugar mills to 15 per cent and removed about 600 million people above poverty line from the subsidised sugar quota under the public distribution system. The move which is being seen as a step towards further liberalisation of sugar sector, would improve the financial viability of sugar mills, which had been demanding a total decontrol in the post-liberalised era. The above poverty line category people would not get the levy quota from April, onwards thereby slashing the Sugar Subsidy Bill from Rs 238 crore last year to Rs 110 crore per annum, the Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution Minister, Mr Shanta Kumar, told newspersons here yesterday. However, those below poverty line would continue to get enhanced supplies at Rs 13 per kg against the prevailing market price of Rs 15 to Rs 16 per kg.
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landing of balloon from Pak BIKANER, Jan 11 (UNI) — Intelligence agencies are probing the landing of a balloon from Pakistan carrying anti-India propaganda. The police today seized the huge balloon found on a field at Sujasar village in the district. It has been kept at Deshnok police station.
NEW DELHI, Jan 11 (UNI) — Veteran Congress leader Jitendra Prasada continued to be in a critical condition at Indraprastha Apollo hospital here today. Dr Vijay Sheel Kumar, who heads the team of neurosurgeons treating Mr Prasada, said he was in comatose and was under constant observation. |
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