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France to meet deadline on Scorpenes
Prez: Judge growth from happiness index
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Bangladesh denies access to Indian goods
Will SP deliver?
Gowda positions himself for trust vote
For Speaker, it’s business as usual
PGI to promote telemedicine in SAARC countries
Light a solar lantern, save kerosene
India, Pak for effective border measures
Nutan to get Meena Kumari Award
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France to meet deadline on Scorpenes
New Delhi, July 18 India has signed a deal for six submarines costing about $4 billion with France and the transfer of technology was one of the major components in it. The DCNS is one of the major naval shipbuilders of the world and they manufacture the Scorpene at their facility at Charboug in France. Poimboeuf, who was in the Capital yesterday with his team, expressed satisfaction over the training of Indian technicians at the Mazagon dock, Mumbai. “We will deliver the first 1,800 tonne Scorpene submarine as per schedule in 2012 and one each will be delivered for the next five years till 2017.” Talking to a select band of mediapersons after the meeting, he said France was very keen to transfer technology to India. Technology transfer includes training and building capacities. To start-off, even the tools of the existing unit of the DCNS in France have been shifted to Mazagon. The DCNS team, that also had its India office director Xavier Marchal, said some shape of the first submarine would be visible by the end of this year. The hull of the Scorpene was being totally made in India and almost 30 per cent of the components would be sourced from Indian industries. Agreements were being inked with local companies, said Paris-based Poimboeuf, while adding that products developed in India would also be used at the DCNS plant in Europe. This included the propulsion compression and the platform management system, he added. The French original equipment manufacturers are also being asked to have their own tie-ups in India. Building a submarine was a far more complex task than building a ship, said the CEO. “We are training technicians from scratch. There has been no experience in the past as India has not made a boat in the past 20 years. About 100 Indian technicians have been trained in France and another 300 will be trained in Mumbai. The last time a submarine was built in India was in the late 1980s when under licence two German HDW submarines were built at Mazagon.” The French government has put no restrictions at all on transfer of technology, Poimboeuf said. The DCNS also interacted with defence ministry officials on future contracts, including for the next generation Scorpenes that would be capable of firing long-range air-breathing missiles.
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Prez: Judge growth from happiness index
New Delhi, July 18 She was addressing a select gathering of media personalities at the Rashtrapati Bhawan after she was presented the first copy of interviews-based book “Jane Mane Chheron Se Yadgaar Mulakat” by author Alok Mehta, president of the Editors Guild of India. The book is a compilation of 47 interviews with top national and international personalities from all walks of life, including Presidents and Prime Ministers of India. The book carries interviews conducted by Mehta since 1972 when he started his journalism career. Mehta is the Editor-in-Chief of Nai Duniya, a new Hindi daily scheduled to be launched from here in near future. He also presented to the President copies of his recently published four books - “Safar Suhana Duniya Ka”, ‘Patarkarita ki Lakshman Rekha”, “Chidya Phir Nahin Chehki” and “Sihansan Ki Nayya”. The President was of the opinion that while achieving economic growth, it was also necessary to develop human values. “A concept like the GNH can be the real index of the level of people’s happiness and that would be called actual richness,’’ she said informing the gathering that Bhutan had recently taken the lead in adopting the innovative GNH model. Noted senior journalist Kanahiya Lal Nandan described Mehta as “India’s Larry King”, a famous American TV journalist who is known the world over for doing interviews with international personalities.
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Bangladesh denies access to Indian goods
New Delhi, July 18 This was once again evident during the foreign office consultations between the foreign secretaries of India and Bangladesh here yesterday. Sources privy to the talks said the issue of transit facilities through Bangladesh figured prominently at the meeting though no conclusive decision could be arrived at. “The India-Bangladesh relationship is a picture of eternal stalemate,” they added. The sources said Dhaka had all along apprehended that allowing Indian goods to pass through its territory would affect Bangladesh’s sovereignty, besides hitting the Bangladeshi market. India has, on several occasions, sought to dispel Bangladesh’s fears. New Delhi’s contention is that the transportation of Indian goods from West Bengal and other states through the Bangladeshi territory would be cost-effective. The sources said Bangladesh was only looking for lame excuses to deny India the transit facility as it also did not want the north-eastern states to join the Indian mainstream. “Allowing access to India to transport its goods through its territory does not serve the geo-political strategic interests of Bangladesh,” they added. They said another issue that figured at the meeting was the river water dispute, which has been a major source of irritant between the two countries. On the issue of terrorism, the sources said India again pointed out to Dhaka that various militant groups operated from the Bangladeshi territory and indulged in anti-Indian activities. In this connection, India drew attention to the activities of groups like Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islam (HUJI).
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Will SP deliver?
New Delhi, July 18 On record there are 39 MPs elected on the SP ticket. Of these two namely Raj Babbar and Beni Prasad Verma left the party long ago. Another one, Munnawar Husain Rana, also crossed over to the BSP side quite sometime back. He will vote against the government. After the Left withdrew support, reducing the UPA government to a minority and making it necessary for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to seek a confidence vote, another two SP MPs, namely Jai Prakash and Rajnarayan Budholia, have also gone over to the BSP. They may also vote against the government. This way the SP numbers come down by five to just 34. But party general secretary Amar Singh has reportedly promised to deliver 35 MPs at the daily stock-taking exercise conducted by the UPA managers. Two jailed party, MPs Ateeq Ahmad and Afzal Ansari, are naturally included in its list. They will participate in the special session, but have refused to confirm their vote along the party line. Amar Singh has included Beni Prasad Verma and Raj Babbar in his flock, only because he is confident that they will vote with the Government. He has also included the name of a rebel BSP MP Baleshwar Yadav in his list. But on Friday Yadav disowned any association with the SP. To count its numbers and demonstrate its real strength, the SP summoned all its MPs here at Parliament House on Friday. Of these, only 30 turned up, according to reliable sources within the party. Two MPs Salim Shervani and Usha Verma seemed to have genuine reasons to miss this all-important meeting. Shervani, party sources said was occupied with a wedding in the family. Shervani, in any case, is very enthused by SP-Congress tieup. Therefore, he will vote for the government. Amar Singh later privately conceded to newsmen that only 31 MPs turned up for the meeting but insisted that the party enjoyed the support of 34 MPs. Notwithstanding this claim, apart from Beni Prasad Verma and Raj Babbar, the SP seems to be capable of mobilising only 32 MPs when the final count is taken.
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Gowda positions himself for trust vote
Bangalore, July 18 Gowda thereby sent the message that he has control over three votes rather than two, which would have been the strength of JD(S) minus Veerendra Kumar. Kumar, who had fallen out with the party chief after winning on a JD(S) ticket from Calicut constituency of Kerala with support from the Left Democratic Front, had earlier announced that he would vote against the Indo-US nuclear deal and would defy the party whip if the decision of the party was on the contrary. Gowda, who chaired a meeting of the JD(S) leaders in his Bangalore residence today to deliberate on the issue of trust vote, announced that the disgruntled MP had returned to his “parent party”. “Veerendra Kumar is a very senior leader of the party. He fell out with us when the JD(S) joined hand with the Congress and the BJP for setting up coalition governments in Karnataka. Now the JD(S) is once again on its own and as a result Veerendra Kumar has again come back to the party,” Gowda said. Though Kumar did not turn up at today’s meeting, Gowda said they were in touch and the Kerala MP would be taken into confidence by him in future for important decisions of the party. Gowda also revealed that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh telephoned him this morning and he would be meeting him tomorrow in Delhi. “He is the Prime Minister of the nation. I have talked to many others also about the trust vote, including Ajit Singh and Om Prakash Chautala,” Gowda said. It is, however, believed that the JD(S) chief, after having enhanced the number of JD(S) votes in the Lok Sabha from two to three, will try to drive a hard bargain with the beleaguered premier for the three JD(S) votes. “The most important issue before us is to strengthen the party in Karnataka. This will be the foremost issue before us while taking any decision on the trust vote,” Gowda said. “If the party gets eroded, then we will stand nowhere,” he added. While Gowda refused to elaborate on the objective of “strengthening the party in Karnataka”, what he had in mind could be putting a stop to defection by JD(S) MLAs in Karnataka for joining the ruling BJP.
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For Speaker, it’s business as usual
New Delhi, July 18 In an indication of his commitment to office and obligations that come with it, Chatterjee today attended the meeting of the Commonwealth Parliament Association (CPA). The Association consists of national, provincial, state and territorial parliaments and legislatures of the countries of the Commonwealth. The CPA today met to be briefed by officials of the ministry of external affairs on issues of topical concern, internationally. The briefing comes in the wake of the international meet of the CPA to be held in Kuala Lumpur from Aug 1-10. Sources said the Speaker, evinced keen interest on a slew of topics that were discussed. He was concerned about how the gap between the rich and the poor within the countries associated with the CPA was widening when it should be shrinking. Similar views were expressed today at the meeting, primarily held to orient the members of CPA delegation with India’s position on important global issues like food crisis and climate change. The CPA’s executive committee is currently being chaired by Hashim Abdul Halim, Speaker of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly. The Speaker attended the meet in his official capacity, which has remained under severe Left scrutiny since it withdrew support to the Congress-led UPA government. Significantly, the Speaker’s office has also denied knowledge of any letter written by the Speaker to CPM’s Prakash Karat, saying he would not resign until July 22.
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PGI to promote telemedicine in SAARC countries
Chandigarh, July 18 Announcing this on the occasion of the 29th convocation of the PGI here today, Union minister for external affairs, Pranab Mukherjee, said that an MoU had been signed and telemedicine services will begin this year, first in Bhutan and then in Sri Lanka. He said with the advances in communication technology, telemedicine had become a reality and its benefits will now be available to the patients of the SAARC countries. While emphasising on the importance of quality health care amongst the poor, he said, the 11th plan envisaged tripling the allocation to health sector from the existing Rs 42,000 crore. "Since the faculty is amongst the best in India, I urge the doctors to focus their energies on answering the health needs of this country. We need a lot more grass roots research on the epidemiology of our diseases, on infections, nutrition and its interaction with disease processes, on simplified treatment regimens, and so on.” Earlier, Anbumani Ramadoss, Union minister of health and family welfare, in his address, narrated the recent national achievements in the health sector through national rural health mission. National school health programme, national trauma programme, urban health mission and cancer programme were few of the activities in the pipeline to improve the overall health of the urban and rural people, Ramadoss added. Speaking on the occasion, KK Talwar, director, PGI, said, “In the academic field, postgraduate training programmes have been initiated in the specialty of nuclear medicine, forensic medicine, hospital administration, public health, gastroenterologic surgery and hepatology. M.Sc. courses in medical physics for radiotherapy and nuclear medicine have been started in collaboration with the Panjab University, which have been approved by the Bhaba Atomic Research Centre (BARC).”
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Light a solar lantern, save kerosene
New Delhi, July 18 Minister of state for new and renewable energy Vilas Muttemwar today discussed expansion plans for large-scale introduction of solar lanterns for replacing kerosene in rural areas while interacting with solar lantern manufacturers. He explained that the better quality of light of a solar lantern would also help the children in their education and encourages productive works apart from avoiding health hazards associated with the poor quality light and the pollution due to burning of kerosene. The government can save kerosene subsidy by providing solar lanterns, he added. Representatives of the industry gave the assurance that the Indian photovoltaic industry had geared up for this challenge. The sector can supply up to four million solar lanterns in a year. Issues relating to manufacturing, distribution, after-sales services and product quality were also discussed. The representatives reaffirmed that the quality of the product developed in the country has better quality of light and reliability and the switchover from kerosene lamp to solar lanterns would be smooth.
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India, Pak for effective border measures
New Delhi, July 18 While New Delhi cancelled the talks between the CBI and the Federal Investigating Agency (FIA) of Pakistan, it went ahead with the meeting of the working group on cross-LoC CBMs in Islamabad today. The fifth round of the composite dialogue between the two countries will be formally launched by the foreign secretaries of the two countries as scheduled on July 21 here. The talks between the investigative agencies were cancelled when it became quite apparent that Pakistan’s ISI had a hand in the embassy blast at Kabul. None other than Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai went on record to confirm Islamabad’s involvement in the Kabul attack. In what must have unnerved Pakistan, the United States had made a public announcement that it was conducting probe into the allegations of the ISI’s hand in the Kabul blast. Official sources said India’s move was aimed at conveying its strong displeasure to Islamabad over the Kabul incident. However, New Delhi was determined to stay engaged with Islamabad and was committed to the peace process. At a meeting in Islamabad today on cross-Loc measures, the two countries reviewed measures to ensure effective implementation of the existing measures. The Indian delegation was led by T.C.A. Raghvan, joint secretary, ministry of external affairs, while the Pakistan delegation was headed by Aizaz Ahmed Chaudhry, director general, South Asia & SAARC.
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Nutan to get Meena Kumari Award
Mumbai, July 18 The club has instituted two awards, one to be presented to an actress of the current era and another to a contemporary of Meena Kumari, a release issued here said today. The awards will be presented in September, with the leading lady of current generation to be announced later. Each award carries a cash prize of Rs 50,000, a trophy and a citation, the release said. Meena Kumari began her acting career at the age of six as a child star and her first movie was “Farzand-e-Watan” in 1939. She grew into a very talented actress and enacted a variety of roles in films like “Parineeta”, “Sharda”, “Dil Apna Preet Parayi” and “Pakeezah”. — UNI
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Official suspended on phone-tapping charge Tabloid to hone skills of kids UNFPA award for ‘Laadli’ Four electrocuted Gurjar is Lt Guv of Puducherry 
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