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Congressmen back Indo-US N-deal
Pak TV to hold telethon with Bollywood stars
Gandhara name proposed for Pak airport
Gurinder Chadha honoured
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Congressmen back Indo-US N-deal
Washington, June 18 US Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Dick Lugar joined his counterpart in the House of Representatives Henry Hyde in commending the agreement scheduled for a review on June 21. “A congressional rejection of the agreement or an open-end delay risks wasting a critical opportunity to expand beyond our Cold War alliance structures to include dynamic nations with whom our interests are converging,” said Lugar. Both Houses of the Congress are satisfactorily “working through language that will guide our policy toward India, “ he said while receiving his 40th honorary degree from the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. In announcing his decision to support the US-Indo nuclear deal a couple of weeks ago, Lugar’s counterpart in the House panel on international relations, Hyde, had expressed confidence that the Bill would pass and he was willing to push it through. Lugar and Hyde’s endorsement of the deal indicates that the Bush administration is nearing the process of building a consensus on the deal in the House and Senate in a bid to get Congressional approval by July-end. The agreement also would be a powerful incentive for India to cooperate closely with the USA in stopping proliferation and to abstain from further nuclear weapons tests. These outcomes could represent important advancements for non-proliferation policy. Answering critics of the deal, Lugar said he believed that it could help solidify New Delhi’s commitments to implementing strong export controls, separate its civilian nuclear infrastructure from its weapons programme and place civilian facilities under the IAEA safeguards. The Bush administration’s declaration that it would welcome India’s advancement as a major economic and political player on the world stage represents a strategic decision to invest political capital in a country with a vibrant democracy, rapidly growing economy and increasing clout, he said. It can also be a key partner in countering global extremist trends, he added, as both countries understand the importance of opposing violent movements through the promotion of religious pluralism, tolerance, and democratic freedoms. The USA was already beginning to see strategic benefits from developing closer relations with India, he said, citing India’s votes at the IAEA on the Iran issue in September 2005 and February 2006. These demonstrate that New Delhi was able and willing to adjust its traditional foreign policies and play a constructive role on international issues, Lugar further said. In his view some analysts’ contention that India’s ability to act as a counterweight to China is the primary strategic benefit of the deal oversimplifies global relationships in the 21st century and underestimates the broader value of engaging India as a partner in a changing world. The USA should not see India as a card to play in the balance of power games as alliances based on shared dangers could have a long shelf life if the threat was intense enough, but they were rarely transformational, Lugar said. The USA needed more from India than security cooperation. It needed a partner that sits at the intersection of several strategic regions and that can be a bulwark for stability, democracy, and pluralism. Seeing India as merely a counterbalance to China also makes the mistake of presuming that China is destined to be an enemy, he added.
— IANS
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Pak TV to hold telethon with Bollywood stars
Islamabad, June 18 Sridevi, Amisha Patel, Shilpa Shetty, Neha Dhupia, Zeenat Aman, Jackey Shroff, Javed Akhtar, Shabana Azmi, Aftab Shivdashani, Dino Morea, Celina Jaitley, Raza Murad are among the stars who have confirmed participation in the event scheduled for June 25, PTV Marketing Director Khawar Azhar said here today. Boney Kapoor, Dalip Tahil, Prem Chopra and Gulshan Grover will also take part. Efforts were on to bring legendary Bollywood couple Dilip Kumar and Saira Banu to take part in the programme, he said. The Indian stars would be brought to Karachi by a special Pakistan International Airline (PIA) flight which would be named “Mughal-e-Azam”, the famous Prithviraj Kapoor movie which earned the distinction of being the first Indian film to be permitted for screening in Pakistani theatres, ending a four-decade old ban. A PTV team would also be on board and record interviews of the artistes during the flight and arrival of the artistes would be live covered on the PTV, Azhar said. PTV has built a special set featuring Mughal architecture as the venue for the programme with a cost of Rs 3 million. The income generated would be donated for the special quake relief fund set up by President Pervez Musharraf, he said. — PTI
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Gandhara name proposed for Pak airport
Islamabad, June 18 The name Gandhara has been proposed for the new airport, “keeping in view the historical and cultural background of the area where it will be constructed,” local media quoted a Pakistani official. Officials believe the name Gandhara would help promote a “soft image” of Pakistan abroad but are wary of the reaction of hardline clerics and their political outfits who usually oppose anything distinctively
unIslamic. Buddhism flourished from the second century BC to 10th century AD in the region known as Gandhara province with its nearby town of
Taksila, where a famous Buddhist university once flourished. Separately, as part of providing an international look to the country's top cities, the government has decided to bring the famous London black cabs to replace old taxis in Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi. Islamabad is allowing duty-free import of 300 black cabs from a Britain-based company which is also making an investment of 850 million pounds to manufacture 18,000 cabs in Pakistan. The company, owned by a California-based Pakistani, also plans to export these cabs, the country's Investment Minister Omar Ahmed Ghumman said.
— PTI
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BBC charged with misrepresenting Sikh history
London, June 18 According to a report in the Eastern Eye, an ethnic Indian newspaper in Britain, Taranjit Singh has claimed that the BBC’s Asian Network, in a show, manipulated and took out of context the content of his game and made it look like one of the “Sikhs killing Muslims”. Taranjit Singh, who also works as a web researcher in the Museum and Art Gallery at Birmingham, has lodged a complaint with the Office of Communications (Ofcom), Britain’s official media watchdog. “I created this game because books were not enough to educate the youth on the complicated history of Sikh-Muslim tension,” he told the newspaper. “Instead of trying to create discussion and offer a balanced platform for dialogue, they tried to make trouble between two communities.” The game’s website describes Sarbloh Warriors as a pioneering Sikh computer game, combining the latest 3D action technology with the historical setting of the 18th-century northern India. Based on true events of the period, a story has been created to take the player back in time and experience how bands of Sikhs were forced to fight back from the brink of extinction, using typical weaponry of the time against the imperial Mughals, who ruled India then. The game, still under development, is to be released at the end of next year. Taranjit Singh also told the newspaper how he had not been able to sleep for days . “This has brought me to tears because I felt as if I was branded a racist,” he said, demanding an apology from the BBC. In the website, he describes the creation of this game as his goal in life. The BBC’s Head of Communications, Mr Andrew Bate, meanwhile, told the newspaper: “The BBC Asian Network always aims to cover stories responsibly and with great care. We believe that in this case we did just that so don’t believe that an apology is warranted.” “We tried to explain why it was seen by some to be offensive and always put the game into its historical context.” He also added that Taranjit Singh was given extensive opportunity to comment on the issue, including on Sonia Deol’s programme, and the network’s new daily lunchtime show ‘The Wrap’. “After the show Taranjit Singh said it was a ‘good debate’ and asked for audio footage of the full interviews to put on his website,” Mr Bate told the newspaper. Taranjit Singh, however, claimed that the 40-minute interview was “edited and taken out of context”.
— IANS
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Gurinder Chadha honoured
London, June 18 Founder of low-cost airline EasyJet Stelios Haji-Ioannou has been made a Knight of the British Empire in the twice yearly list. Retail tycoon Philip Green also becomes a ‘Sir’ and so does BBC’s longest-serving foreign correspondent Charles Wheeler. From the world of film and music an officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) went to film director Gurinder Chandha of ‘Bend it Like Bechkam’ and ‘Bhaji on the Beach’ fame. Her next project -a film version of the 80s soap ‘Dallas’ is due for release next year.
— PTI
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