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Wednesday,
September 4, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Pak move on LoC ‘sagacious’ Replace Sonia, NCP asks
Cong Another kid dies in Bengal hospital PM voices concern over water crisis |
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Krishna
denies Jaya’s charge TC men hold protest
at Writers Building 2
labourers killed
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Pak move on LoC ‘sagacious’ New Delhi, September 3 The sources also voiced concern over the “rigid” stand of the Government of India on accepting the LoC as the border and said New Delhi ought to show some magnanimity and bring more flexibility in its approach. Pakistan, too, has been berating India for being “rigid” in its Kashmir policy by demanding that New Delhi should sincerely work towards the resolution of the Kashmir issue rather than stick to its decades-old stand. The official position of New Delhi on Kashmir is a total commitment to Parliament’s resolution on Kashmir which says that the undivided state of Jammu and Kashmir, including the PoK and the Northern Areas, was an inalienable part of India. The sources said the USA was deeply interested in the speedy and amicable resolution of the “core issue” in the protracted Indo-Pakistan tension - the Kashmir problem in pursuance of its short-term and long-term strategic interests. In the short-term, peace in the Indian subcontinent would enable Washington to have a sharp focus on its war against the loose canons of the Al-Qaida and the Taliban, including Osama bin Laden and Mulla Omar. In the long-term, if Pakistan were to provide a military base to the USA in Skardu (PoK), it would be yet another attempt by Washington to counter China, the perceived next superpower and a rival. In strategic terms, if such a move were to fructify, it would have two connotations. First, it would be yet another step in the USA’s strategic encirclement of China after Washington made military bases in several former Soviet republics in the wake of the September 11 airborne terrorist strikes in New York and Washington. Secondly, it would also mean that Pakistan is finally taken out of the ambit of China with which Islamabad has forged an all-weather relationship. Meanwhile, an influential section in the corridors of power here view the reported Pakistani intentions to discuss with the USA the “LoC-as-border” and the news leak as a cautious attempt by General Musharraf to test domestic waters. |
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Replace Sonia, NCP asks
Cong New Delhi, September 3 “The BJP-led NDA government is continuing because there is no alternative. If the Congress changes its leader, secular parties can come together,” NCP general secretary P.A. Sangma told newspersons. Congratulating Ms Jayalalithaa for her statement, Mr Sangma, who had been expelled from the Congress along with NCP chief Sharad Pawar for raising the issue of Mrs Gandhi’s foreign origin, wrote a letter to Ms Jayalalithaa, saying the initiative taken by her would set in motion social and political forces that would once and for all prevent the prospects of the country’s governance falling into the hands of persons of “foreign origin, rootless feudal coteries and vestiges of imperialism”. Asked what he meant by the expression “foreign origin”, he said it was someone not born on Indian soil or not born to Indian parents. He said another alternative was the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister’s suggestion that all non-Congress and non-BJP parties should come together to work out an alternative to the BJP-led NDA in the country. Asked if the NCP would join the proposed non-Congress, non-BJP front, Mr Sangma said the idea had just been floated. “We will talk to Ms Jayalalithaa and Mr Naidu”, he said. To a question whether the NCP would pull out of Congress-led governments, Mr Sangma said, “We are in power with the Congress in two states out of certain local compulsions. When an alternative emerges, certainly (we will pull out) as we have no intention to go on with the Congress permanently”. Referring to the Centre’s spat with the Election Commission on the issue of holding Assembly elections in Gujarat, he said it was “most unfortunate”. |
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Another kid dies in Bengal hospital Kolkata, September 3 The government rejected a judicial probe into the deaths saying there was “nothing unusual”. It also dismissed reports that the hospital was understaffed or had inadequate infrastructure. “The death rate according to the latest annual report of the hospital is 3.39 per cent which means out of every 250 children admitted, about 10 die. The cases since Sunday are absolutely no reason for such huge outburst,” Health Minister Surya Kanta Mishra told a press conference here. Mr Mishra said on certain days there were no deaths, on certain others one or two children died and on some occasions the cumulative toll went up to 10 or more. Five-year old Puja Kumari Gupta, who was suffering from breathing problem, died this morning.
PTI |
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PM voices concern over water crisis New Delhi, September 3 He asked the scientific community to find “research-based, practical and affordable solutions” to overcome such problems. “Our country has not yet woken up sufficiently to the looming water crisis. We have to manage our land and water resources better if we want to avoid this crisis...Problems in the energy sector are another area of serious concern for our country”, the Prime Minister said after giving away the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar awards for 2001. Stating that there was a growing sense of urgency for collective action on the conservation and better utilisation of water, energy and land resources, Mr Vajpayee said: “More than ever before in human history, the need for sustainable development, properly balanced with environmental protection, has engaged the attention of governments, NGOs, scientists, entrepreneurs and common people all over the world”. Stating that the country had to vastly step up the use of solar, wind, bio-mass and other renewable sources of energy, the Prime Minister said the country could generate over the next 10 years nearly 25,000 MW of power through energy conservation and demand-side management, and another 12,000 MW of power through renovation and modernisation of existing plants. “There is also much saving to be achieved by cutting the losses in our transmission and distribution systems and by improving our billing and collection activities”, he said. “The more science flourishes, the more India will benefit. The more Indian scientists are recognised, the brighter will India’s image shine”, Mr Vajpayee said. Stating that science could make an immense contribution to country’s all-round development and to improving the lives of people, the Prime Minister said: “We have adopted the energising vision of India as a developed nation by year 2020”. Human Resources Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi said the government would have a serious look at the weaknesses in the educational system, especially relating to basic science and research in the light of inability to produce the requisite best, innovative and creative minds. Despite several initiatives like attractive fellowships and renumerative packages and awards, the number of students taking up science as career has been declining, Mr Joshi said, adding that “what is causing concern is the unavailability of required number of eligible students and researchers to win these awards and fellowships”. The recipients of the Bhatnagar awards are: Amitabha Chattopadhyay, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad and Umesh Varshney, Department of Microbiology and Cell Biology Indian Intitute of Science Bangalore (both in biological sciences). T.K. Chandrashekar, Department of Chemistry, IIT Kanpur and Uday Mitra, Department of Organic Chemistry Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore (both in chemical sciences). Prashant Goswami, CSIR Centre for Mathematical Modelling and Computer Simulationi, Bangalore and Koluru Sree Krishna, National Institute of Oceanography, Goa (both in Earth, atmosphere, ocean and planetary sciences). Gadadhar Misra, Indian Statistical Institute, Bangalore and T N Venkataramana, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai in mathematical sciences. Birendra Nath Mallick, School of Life Sciences, JNU, New Delhi in Medical Sciences and Rahul Pandit, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore in physical sciences. |
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Bitta seeks action against Sibal New Delhi, September 3 Mr Bitta told mediapersons here that the act of defending
Devinder, who was awarded the death sentence for the 1993 bomb blast at the Youth Congress headquarters in Delhi, amounted to a “conspiracy against the Congress and me.” Mr Bitta was the then chief of the Youth Congress and was injured in the 1993 blast in which 35 persons were killed. “I suspect there is somebody who is using Mr Sibal as a vehicle to achieve a sinister objective. A true Congress worker will never commit himself to defend a hardcore terrorist like Devinder Pal Singh, who may pursue his terrorist activities again from the jail premises if his sentence is commuted to life imprisonment,” Mr Bitta said. He said that even the BJP had removed Mr Ram Jethmalani from the party when he took up the case of culprits in the Indira Gandhi assasination case. The Congress leader said he had also cautioned party President Sonia Gandhi to be on guard. Mr Bitta cautioned Mrs Gandhi that terrorists might try to reach “top targets” in the Congress, including herself and her children. ``It could be you. It could be Ms Priyanka Gandhi Vadra or Mr Rahul Gandhi,” he said in a letter to Ms Gandhi. “The access of a terrorist to Mr
Sibal, a senior Congress leader, is a dangerous thing. It is an indicator of an imminent threat to the security of important functionaries of the Congress party,” he said in the letter which was written on August 15. Mr Bitta said he had recently received a fresh alert from Canada, speaking of a fresh danger to him and some senior Congress leaders. He urged Ms Gandhi to direct Mr Sibal, a Rajya Sabha MP of the party, not to defend terrorists like Devinder Pal Singh. “When a man like him comes to the defence of a terrorist, who was awarded the death penalty by the Supreme Court, eyebrows are raised in public and political circles as well,” he added. Mr Bitta also wanted to know as to who might have hired Mr Sibal to represent the terrorist as his family did not have the required sources of income. “Who approached Mr Sibal to defend this terrorist. Is he in India or abroad. Or is Mr Sibal doing charity, feeling emotional about a man going to the gallows,” he said. Mr Bitta said though he had raised the issue with senior Congress leaders, including Ms Ambika
Soni, Mr Motilal Vora and Mr Oscar Fernandes, he had not received a satisfactory response. |
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Krishna denies
Jaya’s charge Bangalore, September 3 Reacting strongly to the statement of Ms Jayalalitha that Rs 30 crore was paid by Karnataka to Veerappan to secure the release of Dr Rajkumar, Mr Krishna termed the remark as a great insinuation. He said people in responsible positions should not make such an allegation. “I deplore and emphatically deny such a false allegation by my honourable colleague,” he added. On the issue of efforts to free the former JD(U) minister H. Nagappa, the Chief Minister said he was in constant touch with the STF based at Gundal at MM Hills. The proposal to send emissaries to negotiate the release of Mr Nagappa was making progress, but the Tamil Nadu Government, had made it clear that negotiations with the outlaw were ruled out, he added. Meanwhile, the state government urged the Centre to depute Central forces to nab Veerappan. |
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TC men hold protest
at Writers Building Kolkata, September 3 About 100 TC workers and supporters arrived before the state government’s headquarters at around 3 p.m. and started shouting slogans denouncing the Left Front government’s tackling of the law and order situation. They demanded Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharjee’s resignation. Some tried to forcibly enter the Writers Building to hand over a memorandum to the Chief Minister, but Mr Bhattacharjee had already left for lunch at his south Kolkata residence. There was a scuffle between angry TC men and the police. Some TC workers were beaten up by the police. Ms Sonali Guha, one of the close associates of Ms Mamata Banerjee, was injured. However, the situation was soon brought under control at the intervention of senior police officers. Over 70 TC workers were arrested for violating the prohibitory orders. Later all were released on personal bonds. |
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2 labourers killed Jaipur, September 3 The bodies were sent to the SMS
hospital for a post-mortem examination, the police said, adding that
the labourers belonged to Sawai Madhopur and were working on daily
wages at Transport Nagar. PTI
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Kolkata, September 3
In video (
