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Over 150 die in AP, Karnataka floods
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78-kg gold to add glitter
to Tirumala
Maya gives Bapu, Shastri statues a miss
Dimple Yadav set for political debut
Ill-fated Reliance SEZ may sink Cong, NCP in Raigad
Jet plane makes emergency landing in Budapest
Shiney out of jail
BJP slams Cong over austerity drive
Army to procure 300 light tanks
Sanawarians celebrate 162nd Founder’s Day
TN fishermen begin indefinite strike
Suspicious ship near N-plant
Cong-TMC alliance suffers setback
CBI seeks withdrawal
of case against ‘Q’ ‘Foreign varsities need to stick to quota laws’ Scuffle on AI flight
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Over 150 die in AP, Karnataka floods
Hyderabad/Bangalore, October 3 Karnataka disaster monitoring authority secretary HV Parashwanath today said 101 people had lost their lives in the recent spate of floods, though unofficial estimates put the death toll at over 140. The highest number of 30 deaths have been reported in Bijapur, followed by Bagalkote (20), Raichur (19) and Koppal (17). Karnataka CM BS Yeddyurappa has asked the Centre to declare the “unprecedented” rainfall and flood situation in Karnataka as a “national disaster”. Fifteen districts had been affected in varying degrees by the deluge, Karnataka Home Minister VS Acharya today said, adding the unprecedented rain in northern Karnataka had damaged over one lakh houses. IAF helicopters, which have been called in for relief and rescue operations in the wake of the floods, today dropped 10,000 packets consisting of food, water and medicines for the people marooned in various pockets of the flood affected areas of the state. Today, the helicopters evacuated 12 persons from low-lying areas in Bellary district, apart from others rescued from Mantralayam in Raichur district. The helicopters hovered close to the rooftops on which the people had gathered with flood waters surrounding them from all sides. A round-the-clock flood relief cell has been set up at Air Force station at Yelahanka, near Bangalore, to meet the situation. Metrological department has predicted that coastal areas of the state may receive heavy rains in the next 48 hours. In Andhra Pradesh too, the situation was no better. With Krishna basin receiving highest inflows in recorded history, the flood situation in the state remained grim even as massive evacuation was launched with the help of military personnel. Army, Navy and Indian Air Force personnel swung into action to assist the overstretched civil authorities in relief and rescue operations. Around 120 army boats were engaged in rescuing people in the worst-affected Kurnool town, about 240 km from the state capital. Chief Minister K Rosaiah, who held an emergency cabinet meeting to review the situation, said six IAF helicopters and 250 naval boats were pressed into service to assist in relief operations. About 600 army personnel dropped food and drinking water packets in the badly affected districts of Kurnool and Mahabubnagar. Over 4.5 lakh people from low-lying areas were shifted to safer places. About 105 relief camps were set up in Kurnool, Mahaboobnagar, Krishna, Guntur and Nalgonda districts. Rosaiah spoke to his Karnataka counterpart BS Yeddyurappa this evening and requested him to ensure that water was not let out from the upstream Krishna and Tungabhadra projects. As a result of heavy rains in the upstream area, Srisailam reservoir in Kurnool district received an inflow of 23 lakh cusecs, the highest in the 100 year recorded history of Krishna basin. The water at Srisailam dam was flowing at 896 ft as against the full reservoir level of 885 ft. For the first time, the authorities opened the 12th emergency gate of the dam to its maximum level to release more water into the river to prevent the backwaters from flooding Kurnool town which is already submerged. The power house on right bank of Srisailam project was shut down following flooding. Meanwhile, train and road transport services were hit badly in both the states. Boat capsises
Bangalore: Four children and a woman are feared drowned in Bagalkot in north Karnataka after a boat engaged in rescue operations capsised in a river today. The boat, rescuing marooned people from Hiremagi village in Hungund, was reportedly overloaded and it capsised in the Malaprabha river.
— PTI Trains cancelled
Hyderabad: In wake of submerged railway lines in Kurnool and Mahabubnagar districts due to unprecedented floods in Krishna river, South Central Railway (SCR) cancelled 17 long-distance and nine passenger trains besides diverting 29 others for tomorrow.
— PTI
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78-kg gold to add glitter
to Tirumala
Hyderabad, October 3 The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD), which manages the affairs of the country’s richest shrine, has already received 78 kg of gold as donation for the multi-crore project christened as ‘Ananda Nilayam Anantha Swarnamayam’. From business tycoons and corporate houses to ordinary people, the devotees of Lord Venkateswara have been offering gold chains, rings and gold biscuits ever since the project was unveiled in March. The ambitious programme, involving covering the interiors of the main temple with gold plates, is expected to cost Rs 1,000 crore and would require 100 kg of gold. The temple board decided to pool in the entire cost involved for completion of the work by way of inviting donations from philanthropists without burdening the TTD coffers. “We are getting overwhelming response from devotees. The chiseling work has already started,” TTD chairman DK Adikesavulu Naidu said. The project is expected to be completed by the middle of next year. The TTD Board had consulted Agama pundits, peethadhipathis and other spiritual leaders and obtained their nod before embarking on the ambitious project. Temple executive officer IV Krishna Rao said enough precautions had been taken for preservation of inscriptions on the temple walls. The inscriptions found on the outer and inner walls of ‘Ananda Nilayam’, the sanctum sanctorum stretching around 10,000 square feet, have been digitised. The devotees who offer a kg of gold or multiples would be offered the privilege of free VIP darshan once a year, besides free ‘laddu prasadam’ and accommodation, the official said. In 1958, the TTD authorities got the outer wall of the sanctum sanctorum, stretching about 200 sq metres, goldplated with 12 kg gold donated by devotees. Meanwhile, the temple board has set up a high-security workshop at Tirumala where expert craftsmen would be engaged to chisel out the gold plating to be fitted on to the interior walls of the temple. “We will take the financial support of donors from all over the country and abroad to implement this mega plan,” the TTD chairman said. Tirumala, nestled among the picturesque string of seven hills, is the richest temple in India with its annual revenues crossing Rs 1,300 crore. The shrine attracts, on an average, 50,000 pilgrims every day and the number crosses one lakh mark during festivals and
special occasions.
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Maya gives Bapu, Shastri statues a miss
Lucknow, October 3 Since independence the highlight of Gandhi Jayanti in the state had been the Chief Minister and Governor’s garlanding of Bapu’s statue at GPO and a formal function at the Tilak Hall inside the Vidhan Sabha where floral tributes were paid and short speeches delivered by the Chief Minister and Governor. This year for reasons not being explained Mayawati gave a miss to the garlanding of the GPO statue and did not utter a word at the Tilak Hall function which was quickly over after the Governor and she paid floral tributes and the singing of the national anthem. While there was heavy deployment of security at the GPO indicating that the Chief Minister had earlier planned to come, it appears that the decision to skip was taken at the last minute. Till last year Mayawati had followed the tradition of garlanding the Bapu statue at GPO. Incidentally, in another break from tradition she did not even garland the statue of former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri that is in the compound of her very own office called the Lal Bahadur Shastri Bhavan. The task to pay floral tributes to late PM was left to the Cabinet secretary and the chief secretary. This apparent apathy towards the Father of the Nation has shocked political circles. "Coming from Mayawati this is not out of the ordinary. She has repeatedly made objectionable remarks against Mahatma Gandhi. This year one such matter had gone up to the Supreme Court”, remarked Congress media chairman Vivek Singh.
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Dimple Yadav set for political debut
Lucknow, October 3 Dimple has been named the party’s candidate in the forthcoming bye poll in Firozabad that her husband Akhilesh had won along with the Kannuaj seat. He had resigned from Firozabad, necessitating the bye poll. The date for the election, however, is still to be announced. Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav will accompany her to Firozabad where at a public meeting he is scheduled to formally introduce her to the people of the constituency. While at least half a dozen family members of Yadav are in active politics, including four being party MPs; Dimple is the first woman to enter the political fray. Till now a low profile coy bahu with her pallu firmly covering her head, this daughter of an army man is to start her campaign and is expected to mainly concentrate on road shows. According to a party spokesperson, she is being introduced as the daughter-in-law of the constituency and will seek votes as moonh dikhai (a traditional ritual in north India in which the daughter-in-law is welcomed with gifts). Way back in 1984 Jaya Bachchan had used the same technique to seek votes from the voters of Allahabad from where her husband Amitabh had won on a Congress ticket. Firozabad is set to witness a keen political battle where the SP candidate is pitted against actor-turned-politician Raj Babbar who has been nominated as the Congress candidate. Starting his career in the SP Babbar is said to have once been close to the Yadav family till he was expelled from the SP in 2006 for voicing reservation against the role of Amar Singh in the party.
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Ill-fated Reliance SEZ may sink Cong, NCP in Raigad
Mumbai, October 3 “We will never give our land to the Ambanis, Tata or Birlas” is the resounding cry in this fertile region which supplies Mumbai and Pune with agricultural products, including rice, fruits and vegetables. It was here that largely rural residents came together and forced the government to withdraw the proposal to allow Reliance Industries to set up India’s biggest Special Economic Zone. The adjacent Maha Mumbai and Navi Mumbai SEZ would have been more than two-thirds the size of Mumbai and would have brought in more than Rs 30,000 crore worth of investments. But residents who did not want their homes and land to be forcibly acquired and given to the corporate houses kicked up a storm and forced the Maharashtra government to back-track. “The Assembly elections here are a referendum on the SEZs,” says Jayant Patil, who heads the Peasants and Workers Party here. Patil and other leaders of the PWP, who successfully organised the villagers, tasted victory in the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year when they forced the Congress-NCP to bite the dust. The PWP in alliance with the Shiv Sena is poised to upset the ruling front’s applecart here. According to information available from the Ministry of Commerce website, 24 SEZ projects spread over nearly 17,000 hectares have been proposed all along Raigad and neighbouring Maval. “People here are not opposed to development and youngsters do want jobs in companies, but nobody wants to give up their ancestral land which gives two to three crops every year,” says Baban Patil, who heads the local Shiv Sena. Though the PWP and the Sena have been bitter rivals in the past, they have joined hands to take on the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party. NGOs like the Forum Against Globalization headed by local leader Ulka Mahajan are labelling the Assembly elections as a referendum on the SEZs. “We will show the politicians that they cannot cheat us of our land,” says Mahajan. She adds that the region’s close proximity to Mumbai and good road and rail connections makes it attractive for industrialists. However the same attractions also enable the farmers to earn more than their counterparts across the state, according to the activists. Fruits like mangoes and jackfruit, rice and other crops are routinely trucked to Mumbai and sold by farmers directly to customers. After derailing Reliance’s SEZ projects, the villagers have now turned their ire on the massive power plants mooted by Reliance Power and Tata Power here. The villagers say apart from the pollution caused by these plants, they would take away more than 6000 hectares of land. With opposition mounting, Chief Minister Ashok Chavan has belatedly agreed to respect the views of the locals. “The SEZ has been scrapped due to public pressure and people won’t have to worry on this count,” Chavan said at a meeting here earlier this week. But Chavan’s own colleagues here feel it’s a case of too little too late. The Congress-NCP joint campaign seems sluggish and the two parties may not put up more than a token resistance, say observers.
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Jet plane makes emergency landing in Budapest
Mumbai, October 3 The flight would take off from Budapest tomorrow after the fault was attended to and reach Mumbai tomorrow, the spokesperson said
— PTI |
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Shiney out of jail
Mumbai, October 3 Shiney’s lawyer Shirish Gupte told IANS on Saturday evening that he was not aware when Shiney would be leaving for Delhi as stipulated by the high court while granting him bail on a surety of Rs.50,000 with several conditions. Justice AP Deshpande had imposed strict conditions on the actor, ordering him to live in New Delhi till the trial begins in a fast-track court in Mumbai. Shiney has been accused of raping his teenaged domestic help at his Andheri (West) home on June 14 and was in custody since then. Following an assurance by Maharashtra CM Ashok Chavan, Shiney’s case was transferred from a sessions court to a fast-track court in Sewri where the trial is due to start soon.
— IANS
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BJP slams Cong over austerity drive
Jaipur, October 3 UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, Union Minister for Rural Development CP Joshi, CM Ashok Gehlot and several of his cabinet colleagues attended the function. “Huge advertisements were splashed in a number of newspapers merely to please the Congress president and the government threw all austerity measures to wind. The government spent crores of rupees on the event,” said state BJP chief Arun Chaturvedi.
— TNS
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Army to procure 300 light tanks
Chandigarh, October 3 A request for information issued to prospective vendors has pegged the requirement at about 200 wheeled light tanks (armoured cars) and about 100 tracked light tanks. The Army wants tanks for effective employability in the high-altitude areas and mountainous terrain as well as in the deserts and urban and semi-urban terrains in the western sector. The numbers and type of tanks and the projected areas of deployment is indicative of the Army’s threat perceptions and operational requirements in various theaters and its doctrinal approach. Defence sources say the numbers could rise. The army, at present, has 63 armoured regiments out of which about half a dozen have been re-equipped with the T-90 Russian T-90s, procured a few years ago, faced problems while operating at high temperatures in the desert, affecting the tanks’ electronics, fire control system and thermal imagers. According to sources, trials are on in desert to evaluate ratifications and modifications to overcome the problems. About a dozen Russian experts are assisting the Army in the Rajasthan ranges. The Army initially bought 310 T-90s and placed an order for another 330 in 2007 besides license producing another 1,000 by 2020. Military experts say that light tanks would primarily be used for reconnaissance, where speed and stealth are preferred over firepower. Wheeled tanks have a much lower audio signature and are more manoeuverable than tracked tanks. Maj Gen Raj Mehta, a cavalry officer, said light tanks are more effective in areas like paddy field, water-logged terrain, sand and marshy ground, where the ground pressure is very low. Then there is the issue of logistics and cross-country transportation. A light tank weighs up to 14 tonnes while the T-90 or the Arjun weigh 45 and 58 tonnes, respectively. This makes it easier to transport them to the high-altitude areas in Ladakh or North-East by road or air.
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Sanawarians celebrate 162nd Founder’s Day
Sanawar, October 3 The 3-day extravaganza, which commenced yesterday with Gandhi Jayanti celebrations, was followed by chapel service for the 1959 and 1984 batches that are commemorating their golden and silver jubilees, respectively. “Twenty-five years have passed by but the aura of this place has remained intact. Though the education and teaching system have undergone a huge change but one thing that has stayed is its signature values,” asserted a ’84 batch Sanawarian. The second day began with an athletic meet that was presided over by Col (retd) Rupinder Singh Brar, an Arjuna Awardee and a renowned polo player. The meet symbolised the school motto -never give in. Akshita Singh and Pallavi Jain were declared the best athletes (girls) while Angadbir Singh was the best athlete in the boy’s category. The overall trophy in the meet was bagged by the Shivalik House. It was followed by a hockey and basketball match between the present and old Sanawarians. A musical concert was held in the Barne Hall which left the audience mesmerised and waiting for the cultural program Tatto. The Founder’s Day parade will be held tomorrow with Chief Election Commissioner Naveen Chawla being the chief guest.
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TN fishermen begin indefinite strike
Chennai, October 3 A meeting of various fishermen associations which called for the strike condemned the inaction of the Centre and also announced a protest demonstration on October 6. Two groups of fishermen belonging to Nagappattinam who returned to shore wearing gunny sacks on September 25 complained that the Sri Lankan navy and the Chinese who were on their boats attacked them and ill-treated them. Some of the fishermen, who participated in an interactive programme with students organised by People's Watch, a human rights organisation, asserted that Chinese soldiers were present in Sri Lankan naval vessels. They could distinguish between Sinhalese and non-Sinhalese, since they were meeting the Sinhalese regularly for several decades. They said they were stripped naked, made to stand in the midnight sea breeze with ice boxes on their head. The fishermen were asked to tear the Indian national flag in their boats and forced to wear them as loin cloth, while saluting the Sri Lankan national flag. They were forced to eat food, which was urinated by the Chinese soldiers, they said. They alleged that the Indian navy and the coast guard immediately vacated the area, when they noticed that Indian fishermen were being tortured by the island navy.
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Cong-TMC alliance suffers setback
Kolkata, October 3 Mamata would be visiting Siliguri tomorrow on an official visit and would be announcing the party’s plan for fighting under an alliance with the Congress. She said she had been convinced that the Congress’s decision of seeking the CPI(M)’s support against the TMC at the Mayoral poll at Siliguri had been taken by the local Congress at the instance of the AICC leadership. But the AICC secretary K Keshava Rao, who is also in charge of West Bengal, claimed that the decision had been taken purely at the local level and the AICC had no role to play in this regard. He hoped that the Siliguri election would have any impact on the Congress-TMC alliance move against the CPI(M) and both the parties would be fighting unitedly against the CPI(M) in the coming Assembly and the municipal elections in the state. The WBPCC core committee today met in Kolkata and reviewed the post Siliguri poll situation and the party’s future plan for contesting the Assembly byelections.
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CBI seeks withdrawal of case against ‘Q’ New Delhi, October 3 The court said any order on it could be passed only after perusing the response of the agency to the application filed by an advocate, who has challenged any move for closure of case against the Italian businessman. Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Kaveri Baweja before whom the case is pending posted the matter for October 9 asking the CBI to respond to the objections raised by advocate Ajay Agrawal, who has contended that the Centre and probe agency were trying to drop the case against Quattrocchi despite having sufficient evidence against him. CBI sought withdrawal of the case against the 69-year-old businessman on the ground that “continuance of his prosecution will be unjustified”. The agency said it has arrived at this conclusion after its failure on two occasions to extradite him from Malaysia and Argentina to face trial.
— PTI
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‘Foreign varsities need to stick to quota laws’ New Delhi, September 27 The ministry has already prepared a draft bill dealing with the issue, which it expects to put before the cabinet soon. Giving details of the draft bill on Foreign Education Providers, Sibal said they also needed to take clearance from the accreditation committee for quality control. “Reservation laws, as applicable to Indian institutes, will be applicable to the foreign institutes. There will be no discrimination,” Sibal said when asked if these universities are expected to implement quota. The Central Educational Institutions, except minority institutions, have quota for Other Backward Classes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the ratio of 27 per cent, 15 per cent and 7.5 per cent, respectively. Asked whether the international universities will have 100 per cent ownership of the campuses, Sibal said "why not". "If there is 100 per cent ownership of private sector here, why not 100 per cent ownership of foreign universities," he said. Sibal has also made it clear that no foreign institute will be allowed to take back home the surplus income generated at their campuses in India. The surplus has to be spent for the expansion of the campus within the country. Asked if there will be objections from political parties to the provision of 100 per cent ownership to the foreign universities, Sibal said objections are welcome on any issue. — PTI
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Scuffle on AI flight New Delhi, October 3 “A pilot and a cabin crew of Air India’s IC-884 Sharjah-Lucknow-Delhi flight were injured after they had a scuffle over some issues mid-air,” an airline official told. The incident took place at around 4.30 am when the flight was over Pakistan, he said adding the flight with 106 passengers and seven crew member had left for Lucknow at 12.35 am Sharjah time.
— PTI
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Torrential rains that battered various parts of Karnataka have claimed over 100 lives in the past six days while at least 33 persons were killed and thousands rendered homeless in neighbouring Andhra
Pradesh.
The Centre has been approached for emergency assistance. A sum of Rs 100 crore has been released for the relief and rescue operations in affected areas
We’re extremely vigilant and closely monitoring the situation. Relief and relief measures have been launched on war-footing. Food is being air-dropped. 
“Sanawar is not a school but an institution” - the words of former-Prime Minister IK Gujral seemed thoroughly justified as thousands of Sanawarians flocked to their alma-mater Lawrence School to celebrate its 162nd Founder’s Day.
