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Wednesday,
August 21, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Kashmiri Pandits call J&K poll
farce George: Pak aims to disrupt poll Dhupgiri massacre: police clueless NCP to form third front in
Gujarat
Aggressive BJP challenges
Cong |
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Contempt notice against Paramhans in Ayodhya case T.P.S. Brar new Corps Commander Border farmers cry for relief
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Kashmiri Pandits call J&K poll
farce New Delhi, August 20 Talking to The Tribune, president of the Kashmiri Samiti Sunil Shakdher said, “There are at least 50,000 persons who are yet to be registered as migrants. The Farooq Abdullah government has done nothing to ensure our return and incidents like Chattisinghpora and Amarnath are still taking place, yet the Election Commission and the Government of India find it feasible to hold elections in the state”. Meanwhile, a delegation of the Kashmiri Pandits today submitted a memorandum to Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray protesting against what they call “meaningless elections” in Jammu and Kashmir. “We have apprised Mr Thackeray about our plight and he has assured us that he will write to the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and the President”, Shakdher said. The demand for “constituencies in exile” is to enable the displaced persons to exercise their franchise in the Assembly elections. “There are no provisions made for the displaced people living in cities like Jaipur, Mumbai and Dehra Dun to cast their votes”, Shakdher pointed out. The samiti also criticised the reported move by the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) to take some displaced people to the valley as a test case for their return. “We have been denied our rights. Even the election forms that have been printed are in Urdu, a language the younger generation is not familiar with. How do you expect the Kashmiri youngsters to read a language they are not familiar with? Also, how do you account for the 50,000 odd displaced members of the community whose names are not on the electoral list”, questioned Shakdher. The members demanded that the poll be postponed and President’s rule be imposed ahead of the elections. “We have been thrown out of the territory and in spite of that we are expected to participate in the poll. This is not how the elections are conducted”, Shakdher said. |
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George: Pak aims to disrupt poll New Delhi, August 20 Mr Fernandes said the attempt to infiltrate 18 militants on Saturday in the Kupwara sector was an indication that Pakistan was making plans to disrupt elections in the state. In an interview to Doordarshan, Mr Fernandes said the government had got hold of several messages exchanged between militants in Pakistan and groups in Jammu and Kashmir which indicated that Islamabad planned to disrupt elections in the state. To a question, Mr Fernandes described as baseless the reports that he was asked to be a facilitator for talks between the Nepal Government and Maoist rebels.
UNI |
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J&K poll: BJP meeting today New Delhi, August 20 Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani will not be present at the meeting as he is on a two-day official tour to the United Kingdom. Besides, party president Venkaiah Naidu, Central Election Committee secretary Arun Jaitley, senior leaders M M Joshi, Jaswant Singh, Pramod Mahajan, Sushma Swaraj, Rajnath Singh will be among others who will be present at the meeting. |
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Dhupgiri massacre: police clueless Kolkata, August 20 Six persons detained for interrogation could not give any clue about the identity and whereabouts of the terrorists. The police claimed that KLO terrorists who had been undergoing special
training by the ULFA had been behind the massacre. ULFA’s link with the ISI was also established. The DGP, Mr D. Vajpayee, who went to Jalpaiguri yesterday as directed by Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee to supervise the police operation against the terrorists, became the target of attack by angry CPI (M) workers and supporters. The police chief, in the presence of the IG, the DIG, the SP and several junior police officers and the district administration, was mobbed and manhandled, while a large contingent of policemen stood as helpless spectators. At a distance, the OC of the local police station, Mr Achinta Gupta, was also beaten up by CPI (M) workers and supporters. He was, however, soon rescued and whisked away in his car by the District Magistrate, Mr Subrata Gupta. Concerned at the attack on senior policemen, the Chief Minister would visit Jalpaiguri shortly to meet the police and district authorities in an attempt to pacify the angry policemen and bring back confidence in them. A batch of senior party men would also leave the city for Jalpaiguri to study the situation. CPI (M) state secretary Anil Biswas said they would fight the KLO politically. The Chief Minister, however, said the necessity was not to fight the KLO terrorists with firm police action. Accordingly, a company of the special commando force, which had been trained at the Army headquarters, had been dispatched to Dhupgiri to take on the terrorists. Meanwhile, the entire Indo-Bhutan and Indo-Nepal border in north Bengal was sealed off. The Bengal border with Assam was also closed. The north Bengal police was negotiating with the Bhutan border police for launching a
joining crackdown on terrorist hideouts in Bhutan forests, where KLO activists had been undergoing special terrorist training by ULFA leaders. According to official sources, a team of doctors left for Jalpaiguri today to treat the injured victims admitted in Siliguri
hospital. The condition of four of the 13 victims was stated to be “very critical”. Another victim died in hospital last night, bringing the death toll to six. The Chief Minister said he had specific information that the ULFA, with the help of the ISI, had set up a large network in the Bengal-Assam-Nepal-Bhutan border areas. The KLO outfits in north Bengal districts had also joined hands with the ULFA. Saturday’s gruesome incident was an instance of the KLO attack on the CPI (M), the Chief Minister alleged. |
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NCP to form third front in
Gujarat New Delhi, August 20 “We have no plans to have any alliance with the Congress for Gujarat elections,” NCP general secretary Tariq Anwar told newspersons here. “So far, there had been virtually a bi-party system in Gujarat, with the electorate having forced to choose between the Congress or the BJP. In the next elections, we want to give them a third option by forming a third front along with non-Congress secular parties,” Mr Anwar said. The NCP leader said party chief Sharad Pawar and former Prime Ministers Chandra Shekhar and Deve Gowda had started talking with other parties. He also announced that the NCP would hold a two-day national camp on September 7 and 8 to deliberate on important issues confronting the nation. |
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Aggressive BJP challenges
Cong New Delhi, August 20 “The BJP warns the Congress to stop forthwith all false, baseless and abhorrent campaigns of character assassination and may join, if it has any iota of public morality, an open, face-to-face debate on all so-called allegations and issues, to be directly telecast on the national network, so that the countrymen themselves may see and understand these baseless, false and abhorrent conspiracies being hatched by the Congress,” party general secretary and spokesman Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi told newspersons here. Dubbing the Congress as “bhrashtachar ki mayee” (mother of corruption) and “ghotalon ki tayee” (aunt of scams)”, the BJP spokesperson said, “The Congress has never allowed and has always avoided a discussion in parliament on all allegations and issues on which the party is making hue and cry.” |
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Tributes paid to Rajiv
Gandhi New Delhi, August 20 Congress President Sonia Gandhi, Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, Uttaranchal Chief Minister N.D. Tiwari, Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Manmohan Singh and AICC treasurer Motilal Vora were among those who paid their tributes. An all-religion prayer meeting and was held on the occasion. A blood-donation camp was held at the AICC office. Congress President Sonia Gandhi today launched another unit of the Rajiv Gandhi Mobile AIDS Counselling Services project and distributed aids to the physically challenged. She flagged off a mobile van, gifted to the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation by the FICCI’s Socio-Economic Development Foundation. The van would cover six slum areas of Delhi to increase awareness about HIV/AIDS among people, especially those in the high-risk group. |
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Sadhbhavna award presented New Delhi, August 20 While former bureaucrat Harsh Mander resigned in March in the wake of the Gujarat riots, Teesta Stelvald was actively involved in working with like-minded organisations to hold public hearing of riot survivors. Mr Mander is the Country Director of Action Aid India, a 30-year-old development agency. Describing the recipients as “exceptional individuals”, Congress President Sonia Gandhi said they played an important role in bringing down barriers which had been built by fundamentalist forces in Gujarat. She said they were an example of how people can make a difference.
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Contempt notice against Paramhans in Ayodhya case
Lucknow, August 20 The Bench, comprising Mr Justice Sudhir Narain, Mr Justice S. Rafat Alam and Mr Justice Bhanwar Singh of the Lucknow Bench of the High Court, took a serious note of the situation when the Mahant publised his views in newspapers. The Bench directed TV channels and the print media not to show or publish opinion of the parties or their counsels in regard to the dispute.
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T.P.S. Brar new Corps Commander New Delhi, August 20 Commissioned into the 1st Maratha Light Infantry in 1966, Lieut-General Brar is an alumni of the National Defence Academy. He took part in the 1971 Indo-Pak war and later commanded his battalion with distinction in Sri Lanka as part of the Indian Peace Keeping Force, when he was awarded the Yudh Sewa Medal. A graduate of the Defence Services Staff College Wellington, General Brar has held various staff, instructional and command appointments. |
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Kamal Nath writes to CEC New Delhi, August 20 |
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Border farmers cry for relief Sriganganagar, August 20 This may be for the second consecutive season that farmers in the border areas may not be able to reap any crop. After the Army was mobilised in December last following an attack on Parliament by militants, large tracts along the international border with Pakistan were mined. This led to farmers being unable to reap their standing wheat crop. Although the Central Government announced compensation for farmers, who were unable to reap wheat on this account, no such provision has been made for cotton crop. Cotton plantation begins around mid-May and troops continue to remain deployed. According to farmers and local traders, about 25,000 hectares of cultivable land in Sriganganagar district has been mined and hence off-limit for all practical purposes. “We have sent proposals to the Central Government to draw up a policy to compensate farmers again,” the District Collector, Mr Ram Avtar Raghuwanshi, told TNS when contacted. The issue was also reportedly taken up by local residents with the Rajasthan Chief Minister, when he visited Sriganganagar last week. Of the total compensation of Rs 76 crore earmarked for the state by the Central Government, sources told TNS that Sriganganagar district was to receive Rs 12 crore. While some amount had been paid to the affected farmers, the remaining amount was yet to be disbursed. Although farmers are not apprehensive over pending payments in case of loss of wheat crop, they are worried about the future cotton crop. “Even those who are still awaiting wheat compensation are not a worried lot as it has been assured,” said Ravinder Singh, a local farmer. “If we do not get compensation today we know that we will get paid tomorrow or even the day after. “If we are not compensated for being unable to sow cotton, we will suffer a terrible loss. Already our earnings have been declining over the past few years and matters are only becoming worse,” remarked Malkiat Singh, another farmer. With no end to the prolonged border deployment in sight and the inability of the government to foresee the farmers predicament and consequently devise a compensation policy, farmers fear that they may suffer further losses as they may not be able to cultivate their fields even the next season and demining the fields after troops are deinducted would take months.
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BUS PLOUGHS INTO
CROWD, KILLS 10 19 TSR JAWANS KILLED ONE YEAR RI FOR DOCTOR COUPLE |
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