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Ranchi, February 1 Taking a swipe at Congress President Sonia Gandhi for her accusation that his government was spreading “mayajaal,” Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee today countered it saying that the NDA coalition was instead spreading a “web of prosperity”.
EC set for elections in
April
CPM decision to support Congress
opposed
NCP symbol: EC to hear rivals’ claim
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Mulayam wins Gunnaur
poll
Jaya hosts dinner for Advani
RPF to provide security in
trains
States can’t tax Union property:
SC
IT Deputy Director held on graft charge
Agriculture to get fillip in interim Budget
President extends Id greetings
Sushma lays stone of AIIMS
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Ranchi, February 1 “Maya is with Ms Sonia Gandhi but we are spreading the jaal (web) of prosperity,” he said addressing a “virat vanvasi sammelan” here. “What the Congress could not do in 50 years, we have achieved in five years. We promise more progress in the next five years (if voted back to power),” he said. Focusing on development as the coalition’s theme, he said his government would execute projects linking the country end-to-end with better roads and take up interlinking of rivers. He, however, said there would be no reduction of employment opportunities. “We want to increase employment. Let me assure you all that we are doing for modernisation and quickening connectivity in the country is not aimed at reducing jobs but at increasing them,” he said. Mr Vajpayee referred to a discussion in Parliament where Ms Sonia Gandhi had questioned his statement on the creation of more jobs and likened it to day-dreaming. “In Parliament, Soniaji questioned our pledge to create over 80 lakh jobs and said we are day-dreaming. But I had laid out a chart of 82 lakh jobs before her,” he said. When the government promised to increase jobs, it was referring to the creation of more opportunities through projects it was executing, he said and asked the youth not to seek only government jobs. Earlier, he inaugurated a road constructed under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana at Bodaia panchayat and laid the foundation stone of a regional institute of medical sciences, near here. Stressing on the need for self-employment, the Prime Minister said the way development projects were being taken up, there was enough room for employment in factories and industries. Referring to the government’s performance in the economic field, he said: “What we say, we do it. Our mind and word work in tandem. No power on earth can stop us from taking the country to the developmental path.” “During the last Assembly elections, I came here (undivided Bihar) and promised to create a new state. I fulfilled the promise,” he said. The Prime Minister referred to India’s growing popularity in the international arena and said: “Our fame is growing everywhere. Countries which earlier did not want any relations with us are now embracing us.” —
PTI |
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New Delhi, February 1 As a first step, the Commission has convened a meeting of Chief Election Officers (CEOs) of all states and Union Territories on Wednesday to review their work. The Commission, is expected to seek a detailed report from the CEOs on the electoral rolls and to set a deadline to ensure that the election work is completed by April end. The Commission will interact with government agencies and assess poll staff requirements to see that adequate personnel are deployed on polling days. The poll panel, on the basis of input from CEOs, will decide on the number of phases in which it proposes to conduct elections as well as the possible dates. Broadly, the Commission will conduct the poll in three or four phases covering the entire country. There will be a difference of five to seven days in each phase of polling to ensure that the security agencies moved from one spot to another within the stipulated period. While no decision on the poll dates will be taken during the meeting, the EC may be considering the possibility of holding them in the middle of April, by which time school examinations would be over. Before taking a final decision, the Election Commission will also hold meetings with Home Ministry officials keeping in view security needs of elections. The decision on the elections dates will be taken by the new Chief Election Commission TS Krishnamurthy, who is taking over on February 7 following the retirement of the present incumbent J M Lyngdoh. The poll panel is clear that preparations will begin in full swing only after the electoral rolls are revised. —
UNI |
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CPM decision to support Congress
opposed
Kolkata, February 1 Criticising the CPM’s decision as ‘double standard”, the Forward Bloc today announced that it would fight against the Congress and the CPM at those Lok Sabha seats, where the CPM and the Congress reached an electoral understanding. To us both the Congress and the BJP are political enemies and for a minor political gain we would not sacrifice our ideologies said, Mr Ashoke Ghosh, Forward Bloc leader. The RSP general secretary, Mr Debabrata Bandopadhyya, said they would contest against the Congress candidates supported by the CPM. He said the CPM had taken a suicidal step in deciding to support the Congress in the Lok Sabha poll. He felt the CPM’s decision would harm the unity of the Left Front. The Bengal Left Front Committee at its meeting today decided to release the list of their candidates on February 6. The committee directed the CPI, the RSP and the Forward Block to finalise their lists of candidates and submit these to the front chairman, Mr Biman Bose, before the meeting. At its Hyderabad meeting, the CPM decided to contest 70 Lok Sabha seats in different states. The party tentatively decided to nominate Mr Rabin Dev, MLA from Ballyagunge, against Ms Mamata Banerjee in South Kolkata and Md Selim, State Minister for Minorities, against Mr Ajit Kumar Panja in North-East Kolkata and Ms Minoti Ghosh, a state minister, against Congress’s Mr Priya Das Munshi in Raiganj (West Dinajpur). Three sitting CPM MPs would not get nominated this time. They were S.P. Lepcha (Darjeeling), Ms Sandha Bawri (Bishnupur) and Abu Hasnat (Jangipur- Murshidabad), party sources said. The Left Front Committee also decided to oppose the Banglabandh on February 3, called by the Trinamool Congress. But the committee would support the industrial bandh called by CITU and other trade union organisations against the Vajpayee government’s alleged anti-labour policies. |
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NCP symbol: EC to hear rivals’ claim
New Delhi, February 1 In its notices served on Sharad Pawar and P.A. Sangma, the EC said the leaders of the two factions had been asked whether the party constitution was followed while effecting the split in the organisation, how many working committee members, office-bearers and legislators, including MPs, were with each group. EC sources said a hearing would be held on February 13 to decide on the issue. |
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Badaun, UP, February 1 Mr Yadav won the seat by defeating his nearest rival, Mr Arif Ali of the BSP, by a record margin of 1,83,899 votes. The record in the UP Vidhan Sabha elections was earlier held by Congress leader Pramod Tiwari who had won by a margin of 1,26,000 from the Rampur Khas Vidhan Sabha seat in Pratapgarh district in 1996. Sources here today said the Chief Minister received a record total of 1,95,213 votes while Mr Arif Ali got 11,314 votes. Besides, Mr Gulfam Singh Yadav of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) received 6,991 votes in the byelection. The sources said the BJP and the BSP boycotted the re-poll yesterday by not sending their polling agents. Incidentally, the byelections to the Gunnaur seat was held on January 24 but following complaints of irregularities by the BJP and the BSP, re-polling was held under the orders of the Election Commission yesterday at 107 polling booths. —
UNI |
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Jaya hosts dinner for Advani Chennai, February 1 After the two-hour dinner meeting, Mr Advani drove straight to the airport without speaking to waiting newsmen. Only some TV crew and photographers were allowed inside the Poes Garden residence to take pictures. |
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RPF to provide security in
trains
New Delhi, February 1 Interestingly enough, the announcement of the additional responsibility to RPF comes a few days after the death of Manish Mishra, grand-nephew of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Mishra was reportedly thrown out of a running train in the Mathura-Kosi Kalan sector while protesting against alleged eve-teasers. Manish, a grandson of Prime Minister Vajpayee’s sister, succumbed to his injuries later. Some observers say that the decision of entrusting the responsibility of security of passengers to the RPF was long overdue and should have come much earlier. The death of Manish is one of the several cases of harassment and manhandling of passengers on trains which are usually reported from various parts of the country. Late last year, there were reports of harassment of several passengers from the North-east. They were allegedly manhandled (and in some cases reportedly molested) while passing through Bihar in the wake of the anti-Bihari agitation in Assam. It, however, remains to be seen, whether the RPF is equipped adequately enough for such a responsibility as it would involve unfettered mobility for the force across several sectors. Moreover, technologically it may find itself under-equipped to fulfil the new responsibility in the absence of specialised signal corps. “The Railway Protection Force is gearing up to take over the additional responsibility of train escorting and security of passenger areas with effect from July 1, 2004”, Railway Minister Nitish Kumar said in his Interim Railway Budget speech. Under the existing legislative and administrative norms, the RPF is dedicated exclusively for protection of railway property while the Government Railway Police (GRP) was mandated with the task of maintaining law and order in train passenger areas. |
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States can’t tax Union property:
SC
New Delhi, February 1 The protection granted to the Union Government offices and properties all over the country
from service tax under Article 285(1) could not be overridden
by any executive order issued
by the authorities, either at
the Centre or in the states, a
Bench of Mr Justice S.N.
Variava and Mr Justice H.K.
Sema ruled, rejecting the
imposition of such tax by the Municipal Corporation of
Amritsar on the Postal
Department. The court dismissed an appeal
by the corporation against the
Punjab and Haryana High
Court order allowing a petition
by the Postal Department and
quashing its order for imposition
of service tax on seven of their buildings falling within the
corporation’s jurisdiction. “It is a well settled law that administrative circulars cannot override the constitutional provisions,” the Bench said, adding that “Article 285(1) provides that the property of the Union shall, save in so far as Parliament by law otherwise provide, be exempt from all taxes imposed by a state or any authority within the state.” Corporation’s counsel Mahabir Singh had argued that the Corporation was “justified and entitled” to payment of service tax in view of a circular issued by the Union
Finance Ministry to this effect in March, 1963. But the court said the circular was issued by an officer of the rank of Deputy Secretary. “By no
stretch of the imagination, such circulars, issued by an officer of this rank, “The interplay of the constitutional and legal provisions being well
cut and well-defined, it was clearly not within the competence of the corporation to impose tax on the property of the Union of India,” the court said. The court further clarified that under Clause (2) of Article 285, it had also been specifically made clear that no service tax could be imposed on the Railways for its properties located in the territory |
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IT Deputy Director held on graft charge
New Delhi, February 1 Those arrested are Umashankar Dhayani, Deputy Director of Income Tax (Investigations), Satya Prakash, chartered accountant, and Ravi Verma, his employee. Sources said the Deputy Director called up the company owner that a man would be collecting Rs 3 lakh from him last night. The company owner informed the CBI. A trap was laid and the man was arrested. His interrogation led to the arrest of the Deputy Director and the chartered accountant. The suspects were produced in a court which remanded them in custody for two days. Umashankar Dhayani, a 1994-batch Indian Revenue Services officer, is posted at Jhandewalan Extension Office of the Income Tax Cell. He had allegedly demanded Rs 30 lakh from the businessman to settle an income tax case. |
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Agriculture to get fillip in interim Budget
New Delhi, February 1 He will also present a vote-on-account in the Lok Sabha along with the interim Budget for government expenditure during the first four months of 2004-05. There will also be a finance Bill to enable the government to continue with the existing indirect tax rates beyond February 28, 2004, and the direct tax rates beyond April 1, 2004, official sources said. When the new government assumes office and presents the full Budget, there would be yet another finance Bill containing fresh tax proposals. He is expected to lay emphasis on bringing about a second Green Revolution by increasing public investment in rural infrastructure so as to sustain the possible double-digit growth in farm output on the back of good monsoon this fiscal. He has earmarked a total package worth Rs 50,000 crore for the next three years to boost the agricultural sector. The interim Budget will announce programmes aimed at wasteland development, minor irrigation, assistance for cooperatives and promote agri-processing, cold chains and modern abattoirs. Nabard has been asked to work out details for the creation of an agricultural infrastructure and credit fund to implement the programme by extending loans at 2 per cent lower than PLR. —
PTI |
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President extends Id greetings
New Delhi, February 1 “I extend my greetings and good wishes to all my people in India and abroad,” he said in a message released from Rashtrapati Bhavan. “Id-ul-Zuha signifies what maximum in a human life one can sacrifice,” he said. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee said the festival was an occasion of happiness, camaradarie and sacrifice. “May the festival this year strengthen the unity of our cultural mosaic and usher in joy and prosperity for all.” he said. —
PTI, UNI |
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Sushma lays stone of AIIMS
Hardwar, February 1 Speaking at the function, Mrs Swaraj said initially Rs 300 crore had been allocated for each of these AIIMS which would have ultra modern equipments and state of art facilities. |
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