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CM tells police to hasten probe in scribe’s murder
Cong leaders lying to defame me: Hazare to Sonia
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Cong mouthpiece blames DMK for drubbing in
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2G Spectrum Scam
Land allotted to Ramdev may be taken back: Gogoi
Invasive alien species a threat to coastline
SP: Girl found in police station wasn’t murdered
CPM: Mistakes in Singur and Nandigram led to poll defeat Oz Govt portal omits J&K, Arunachal as
part of India
Jantar Mantar
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CM tells police to hasten probe in scribe’s murder
Mumbai, June 12 “We are probing the incident from all angles. But our line of investigation is going towards checking the possible involvement of people associated with the oil mafia. The journalist had extensively written a number of news reports on the oil mafia, which may have triggered them to eliminate him,” a senior police officer said on condition of anonymity, Dey had extensively covered crime and underworld over two decades. Four men on two motorcycles intercepted Dey while he was going home from the Hiranandani Gardens and opened fire at him. In all nine bullets were fired of which five found their mark. The postmortem report said there were five entry wounds and four exit wounds on Dey's left side and chest. Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan today convened a high-level meeting to review the investigations into Dey's murder. Chavan asked senior police officials to speed up the probe and nab the culprits at the earliest, police officials said. Others who attended the meeting included Home Minister RR Patil, Mumbai Police Commissioner Arup Patnaik, Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Himanshu Roy and Joint Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Rajnish Seth. Meanwhile, mortal remains of Dey were cremated at the Rajawadi crematorium at suburban Ghatkopar. Apart from journalists ordinary people in large number attended the funeral. Chhagan Bhujbal, Maharashtra's Public Works Department Minister, who came to pay his last respects told journalists that a special team set up by the police would look into all aspects, including the role of the oil mafia in the murder of Dey. A section of the journalists who were present at the funeral felt that senior police officials accused of colluding with criminals must also be investigated for their possible role in the murder. Veteran crime reporters who attended the funeral felt that neither Chotta Rajan nor Dawood Ibrahim gangs would have ordered the hit on Dey because none of his stories in recent times were targeted at them. “It could very well have been a senior police officer unhappy with Dey who may have ordered the killing,” said a veteran crime journalist turned senior editor who regularly tracks the Mumbai mafia. “The contract may have been given to some freelance shooters from UP or elsewhere,” he added. The senior journalist also added that the modus operandi adopted by Dey's killers differed from the established Mumbai gangs. Journo murders: India ranks 13th
NEW DELHI: India has earned the dubious distinction of being listed in the 2011 “Impunity Index” prepared by an international media watchdog on the basis of unsolved murders of scribes. Only 13 countries, with five or more unsolved cases of murder of journalists from January 1, 2001, to December 31, 2010, have been included on the index. India is at the 13th spot with seven such instances. The index lists Iraq (92) as the top country in respect of unsolved scribe murders.period, while the Philippines (56) is second. The index released earlier this month places Pakistan at 10th spot and Bangladesh at 11th. Six of South Asian nations, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh and India, are on the
list — PTI
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Cong leaders lying to defame me: Hazare to Sonia
In a three-page letter, Hazare said such remarks were part of a "conspiracy" to defame him and ensure that those people who supported him during the April protest did not do so in future. A "hurt" Hazare said, "I request you to ensure that responsible leaders from your party should not resort to character assassination and mislead people on the Jan Lokpal Bill. If the Congress party has any concrete evidence (to prove the allegations), please make it public," he said. He also said it did not augur well for the country if responsible leaders start "telling lies only to clinch to power" by misleading people on issues. His letter came in the backdrop of Congress general secretary Janardhan Dwivedi dubbing him as a "mask" of BJP, while other leaders attacked the civil society on the Lokpal Bill. "If the responsible leaders in the party and government resort to spreading lies, it is not good for the future of the country. Many senior leaders in your party have said that I am a mask of the BJP and the RSS. In 73 years of my life, I have never gone close to any party or front because there is corruption everywhere," he said. To buttress his point, he said he had criticised the Gujarat Government for corruption and asked, “Had I been associated with BJP, I would not have talked about such things.” Hazare had earlier kicked up a controversy by praising Modi for development works in rural Gujarat. Hazare said he had made it clear earlier that he would attend Ramdev's protest only if there was no participation of communal elements in his agitation. The Gandhian said no party leader was allowed to share dais with him during his hunger strike in Jantar Mantar in April and "everyone knew this. You (Sonia) also know this. So in these circumstances, is it right to raise such allegations to defame?" He reminded that he had fought against corruption in Maharashtra against all parties, including the Shiv Sena, the BJP and the Congress and many of their leaders were forced to resign. Hazare said he will go on fast again on August 16, if the Lokpal Bill was not passed by then and that he was ready to sacrifice his life for the cause.
— PTI
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Cong mouthpiece blames DMK for drubbing in
TN
New Delhi, June 12 In an editorial, a member of the editorial board, wrote that there was a need for the Congress to take a “relook” at its strategy in the state as the party must not lose its vote bank due to “mistakes of its coalition partners”. The remarks come at a time when the party and the government are fighting a sharp opposition attack on corruption while its relations with the DMK are strained because of the ongoing probein the 2G Spectrum case.
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2G Spectrum Scam
A Bench comprising Justices BS Chauhan and Swatanter Kumar will hear her bail petition along with that of Kalaignar TV MD Sharad Kumar. Both Kanimozhi and Sharad Kumar hold a stake of 20 per cent each in the television company. The two have challenged the June 8 order of the Delhi High Court rejecting their bail plea, observing that they might influence the witnesses in the case using their “political and financial clout.” The TV channel allegedly received Rs 200 crore as kickback from a telecom company that benefited from the Spectrum scam. A Raja, former Telecom Minister and DMK leader, is a prime accused in the case. The HC had pointed out that both Kanimozhi and Raja “are important functionaries of the same political party” and Raja helped in Kalaignar TV getting registration with the government and in its inclusion in the bouquet of Sky TV. There was prima facie evidence of Kanimozhi’s complicity in the conspiracy relating to the transfer of Rs 200 crore to the account of the TV company, the HC had noted.
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Land allotted to Ramdev may be taken back: Gogoi
Guwahati, June 12 I remember allotting him a plot of land. However, I do not know whether it was actually allotted or not. If the land was allotted and not being used for the purpose it was taken, it might be taken back as per the recent decision taken by my government,” Gogoi told journalists here. “In fact, not just the land allotted to Ramdev, all such cases will be reviewed by the government. We want to regularise land allotments and have a proper land policy to tackle with the scarcity of land,” Gogoi said. The CM fired a broadside at both social activist Anna Hazare and Ramdev for ‘doing politics’ on the issue of corruption.
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Invasive alien species a threat to coastline
Organisms transported via ballast water to Indian ports have been blamed for the pernicious algal bloom and more recently black-stripped mussel, originally found in North Atlantic Ocean, was spotted around Mumbai and Vishakhapatnam. Not just this, the threat of radioactive water being transferred to India from Japan via ballast water post Fukushima also gave some sleepless nights to the Indian authorities. Dona Paula-based National Institute of Oceanography is carrying out a ballast water management programme in collaboration with the Directorate General of Shipping through electronic monitoring programme at four major ports that will be extended to eight more by 2016. Besides this, scientists from NIOT are also collaborating with Pune-based National Chemical Laboratory and Mumbai University’s Institute of Chemical Technology to develop treatment technology for the ballast water, which is also eco-friendly as it does not use any chemicals for the treatment process NIOT scientist AC Anil, who is actively involved in the project, told The Tribune that a low-cost and economically-viable equipment based on hydrodynamic cavitation has also been developed through which species alien to marine ecology can be destroyed to the levels prescribed by the International Maritime Organisation. “Upscaling of the project, the technology of which has already been patented, is now underway,” he said. The problem of invasive alien species has been worrying the governments around the world as the transfer has shown leading to uncontrolled growth of organisms alien to the local technology that can wipe out local marine life. Electronic monitoring facility to track ballast water, which has been implemented at two ports in Mumbai and one each at Vishakhapatnam and Goa, by 2016 is expected to cover all major 12 ports in the country. This will give India the understanding of how much ballast water is coming and which ships have to be quarantined. Ballast water is laden to stabilise the ships when the required weight is not obtained with cargo to sail. Thus, a cargo ship may carry sea water from extreme temperature and situation to absolutely different situation. A single bulk cargo ship of around 200,000 kg in weight may carry 60,000 kg ballast water. “While harmful algal bloom is not new to the country, the real fear is that any treated ballast water may picking up inoculums of the seeds required for such a bloom in their ballast water and discharge them to induce the formation of bloom that will have deleterious effect on fisheries and in extreme cases on human health,” Anil said.
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SP: Girl found in police station wasn’t murdered
Lakhimpur, June 12 “The post-mortem report mentioned asphyxia, as a result of hanging, the cause of death which rules out the allegation of murder,” Superintendent of Police DK Rai said. He said there was no injury mark on the victim's body. There was a minor abrasion on her right leg. “To confirm the second allegation of rape, a slide had been sent to women hospital for testing and a final conclusion will be drawn only after the report is received,” the SP said. The victim's mother in her complaint had alleged that the girl was raped and murdered. He said the postmortem was conducted by a panel of three doctors and the procedure was video-recorded to avoid any doubt. Missing since Friday evening, the girl, who was allegedly raped, was was found hanging from a tree on the premises of the police station. Eleven policemen posted there were suspended after her body was found. Meanwhile, the NHRC has decided to send a probe team after it took suo motu cognisance of media reports alleging that a teenage girl was raped and killed at a police station in
Lakhimpur. — PTI
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Electoral reforms will focus on decriminalisation: Moily Guwahati, June 12 Addressing the 7th and the last regional consultation on electoral reforms organised jointly here today by the Law Ministry and the Election Commission of India, Moily said, “We have to stop criminals from entering into the electoral fray to prevent democracy from being polluted and necessary legislation would be enacted to dispose off criminal cases within three years to meet both ends of justice.” On anti-defection law, Moily said stringent provisions would be made to prevent members violating the anti-defection law from entering into the electoral arena for at least six years. He further stressed on the need for arresting the flow of black money during elections, reduction in proliferation of candidates, restriction on contesting elections from more than one constituency, restrictions on opinion polls, prohibition on campaigning during final 48 hours before polling, including newspaper advertisements and door-to-door visits, and stern action against those making false expenditure statements. The CEC, SY Quraishi said, “While the world marvel on the beauty of our democratic polity and we take pride of being the largest democracy in the world, our eyes get lowered when we see the rise in number of candidates with criminal backgrounds making it to the corridors of power. This is an issue that has to be dealt with seriously.”
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CPM: Mistakes in Singur and Nandigram led to poll defeat Hyderabad, June 12 A meeting of the party’s Central Committee, which concluded in Hyderabad today, reviewed the poll debacle in West Bengal and Kerala, identified certain organisational defects and decided to take “corrective steps at political and organisational levels”. However, the Marxist party ruled out leadership change, with its General Secretary Prakash Karat saying that the leadership roles in the party were not determined by the poll outcomes but by the political line. The soul-searching exercise looked into the reasons for the electoral setbacks and analysed the reasons for erosion of support for the CPM and the shortcomings which had resulted in alienation of various sections of the people.
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Oz Govt portal omits J&K, Arunachal as part of India Melbourne/New Delhi, June 12 Following the protests, Australia admitted that the map was an "error" and said it will be removed from the website. "The map was an error and is being removed from the website." an Australian High Commission spokesperson in New Delhi said today. The Indian community in Australia had lodged strong protests with the Australian government over the incorrect map of India, posted on a government website in Australia which omitted the border states of J&K and Arunachal Pradesh. The website of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC) of Australia had the "incorrect" map in its website. The Council of Indian Australians Inc, an apex body representing the Indian Australian community in New South Wales, had asked the DIAC to correct the map. — PTI
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Jantar Mantar
Ramdev, Cong & changing plans
There is a twist in the ongoing controversy regarding the UPA government’s decision to dispatch four ministers to welcome yoga guru Ramdev at the airport before he began his indefinite fast at the Ramlila Maidan. It now transpires that it was originally decided that two ministers - Kapil Sibal and Pawan Kumar Bansal - would fly down to Ujjain where Ramdev was holding a yoga shivir to talk to him and convince him not to sit on fast since the government had already initiated several steps on the twin issues of black money and corruption which had been flagged by him. In case, the ministers failed in this mission, their mandate was to tell Ramdev that he would not be allowed to enter the Capital. This decision was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs a few days before the ministers rolled out the red carpet for Ramdev. However, everybody, including senior ministers and Congress leaders, are mystified about the sudden change in plans and who proffered this advice to the Prime Minister. While the guessing game is on, the government is still red-faced over this move. Sharad Yadav stumped
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Centrestage
What has been described as the ‘most significant terror trial’ in the United States has left many in India cold. The coldest was the reaction of the Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, who acidly declared, “ US declaring Tahawwur Rana innocent in Mumbai attack has disgraced the sovereignty of India and it is a major foreign policy setback”. Indeed it is difficult to make sense of the verdict that found the Pakistani doctor, Tahawwur Hussain Rana, guilty of extending material support to a terrorist organisation but held him not guilty for the 26/11 attack on Mumbai. What is more, the law in the United States prevents the government from appealing against a ‘not guilty verdict’. So, while a defendant, Rana in this case, may appeal against a ‘guilty’ verdict, the government cannot seek a reversal of a ‘not guilty verdict’ , quite contrary to the Indian legal system in which both the defendant and the government can appeal against court rulings. What is clear is that the prosecutors in the United States had far more evidence to establish Headley and Rana’s links with the abortive plot to attack a Danish newspaper. The evidence of their role in the Mumbai attack, in contrast, is almost entirely based on the testimony given by Headley, who turned an approver on condition that he is spared death penalty and is not extradited to India. It appears the US Intelligence did not take the leads on Headley seriously enough ( see accompanying piece on warnings not heeded) till after the Mumbai attack. It is worth noting that after the November Mumbai attack, Headley turned his attention to the “Mickey Mouse project” ( code given to the planned Danish strike) and even flew to Copenhagen to visit the office of the Danish newspaper. It is also worth noting that the LeT actually advised Headley to go slow on the “project in the North” in view of the intense pressure brought upon the terror outfit following the Mumbai attack, telecast live throughout the world. That would explain, at least in part, why the evidence of the conspiracy and complicity of Headley and Rana in the Mumbai attack was not as strong. The surveillance of the two by the US Secret Service apparently intensified after 26/11. In any case India will never be able to put Headley on trial because of his plea bargain with the US Justice Department. He chose to sing only after he was assured that he would not be sent back to India to face trial. While the United States has provided access to Indian prosecutors and investigating agencies to Headley, and indicated its willingness to allow further access to him in future, it is far from clear if India can get much more than what he has already told the Americans. In his testimony in Chicago, stretched over five days, Headley had no inhibition in naming LeT operatives in Pakistan and the retired and serving officers of the ISI and Pakistan Army, who trained him, funded him and sponsored his trip to Mumbai. He has already provided a fascinating account of how the targets were chosen, how instructions were given to target foreigners, specially Americans, and why his handlers wanted to single out a Chabad House ( because they felt it was a front for Mossad) in Mumbai. But evidence produced in Chicago clearly established that Rana did help Dawood Gilani change his name to David Coleman Headley and secure an Indian Visa. He did allow him to pose as a representative of his immigration firm ( see infograph). Headley, therefore, landed in Mumbai as the Regional Director of the ‘First World Immigration Services’ and set up office. It is a reflection on Indian policing and intelligence that nobody here raised any question about his activities. For more than two years he kept visiting Mumbai, flying in for extended stays and after each visit he would fly to Pakistan to brief his handlers. Neither this pattern raised an alarm nor the fact that he did not seem to be generating any business for his company, alerted Indian Intelligence agencies. The photographs he took in Mumbai and the information he picked up from casual conversations , the sketches he made in Pakistan for his handlers etc. certainly went a long way in training the terrorists and perfecting the plot. That he did it over a sustained period of time, and willingly at that, makes him one of the prime accused in the Mumbai attack case. But then of course he has already got away. His testimony has prompted the US to identify Ilyas Kashmiri , Major Iqbal, a retired Army officer by the name of Pasha and several other LeT operatives as wanted terrorists. It, however, remains to be seen if Pakistan cooperates with the US. It appears unlikely and recent reports of Kashmiri’s death in an American drone attack is already being described as a red herring. The wanted terrorists, for all we know, could be building new identities for themselves right now. Even if Rana had been found guilty for the Mumbai attack, it is doubtful if the US legal system would have allowed him to be extradited for a fresh trial in India. By getting the benefit of doubt on this count, Rana may have escaped the death penalty or life imprisonment but faces a 30-year prison term for his complicity in the abortive Danish strike. For India, a far more engaging and important trial is going on in a Pakistani anti-terrorism court conducting the trial of LeT’s Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi and six other suspects charged with involvement in the Mumbai attack. The Pakistani court on Saturday gave prosecutors a week’s time to provide copies of statements of key Indian witnesses and other relevant documents to defence lawyers. All eyes will be on what the prosecutors do on June 18 when the hearing resumes.
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One of Headley's ex-wives told U.S. officials that she suspected he was linked to the 2007 bombing of a train in India that killed dozens of people and has been blamed on the Lashkar-e-Taiba militant group. During that meeting, just seven months before the Mumbai attacks, she also warned that Headley was on a "special mission". The First Warning
The first tip about Headley came in New York City in the tense weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001. The source was a former girlfriend of the fast-talking former drug dealer. (Headley has been married four times and had several wives simultaneously.) Agents from the Joint Terrorism Task Force in New York interviewed the woman, who worked as a bartender, on Oct. 4, 2001, after another bartender contacted authorities. The ex-girlfriend alleged that Headley and his mother supported Pakistani extremists, officials say. She quoted Headley as saying he was ready to fight in Pakistan and that Pakistan had suffered at the hands of the United States. But she also told investigators that he had criticized the Sept. 11 attacks, officials say. Agents interviewed "more than three people" including Headley's mother, Serrill, a wealthy and flamboyant Philadelphian who had divorced his father, a prominent Pakistani broadcaster, officials say. She told them her son was passionate about Pakistan's struggle with India over the Kashmir region, but she also insisted that he opposed the Sept. 11 attacks. Mother Mentions Terror
Headley trained at a Lashkar camp in the mountains near Muzaffarabad in February 2002. He returned to the East Coast that summer, according to a source close to the case. In July, the owner of a business where Headley's mother was a regular customer called an FBI tip line in Philadelphia and said that Headley's mother often talked about her son and described him as an increasingly fanatical extremist, officials say. Headley had told his mother about training with terrorists at a Pakistani camp and meeting 16-year-old trainees who later died in combat, officials say. The phone conversation with the official who answered the terror tip line lasted about three minutes, the business owner said. "I figured the FBI would take it from there," the business owner said. "There was no follow-up. I never heard anything else about it." Headley trained again in Pakistan in August 2002 and three times in 2003 and 2004, court documents show. U.S. ignored Lashkar links
The third tip came in August 2005 after a domestic dispute that resulted in Headley's arrest. His wife in New York phoned the Joint Terrorism Task Force and described his ties to Lashkar. In three interviews, she told investigators about his training, fundraising and work as an informant. She offered to show them his e-mails, an offer they rejected. By 2005, though, it was already clear that Lashkar's reach extended beyond Kashmir and India. An aggressive FBI investigation in Virginia had resulted in life sentences for American Lashkar militants who had less contact with the group than Headley did. And former Lashkar trainees had been prosecuted in bomb plots against New York, London, and Australia. A year later, Headley began using his cover as a businessman to scout targets in Mumbai under the direction of terrorist handlers and a Pakistani intelligence officer, according to investigators and court documents. Two Warnings from Wife
In December 2007, Headley's Moroccan wife went to the U.S. embassy in Pakistan with what would become the fourth tip. She met with agents of the State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security and of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The wife hoped to get a U.S. visa and was angry at her estranged husband, officials say. During two meetings, she told them Headley was involved with "big people" and "looking to participate in jihad against the U.S." She mentioned suicide bombing and terror training but without "actionable details," officials say. The allegations again connected Headley to Lashkar and, for the first time, to a terrorist attack. In July 2009, the U.S. Treasury Department accused a chief coordinator for Lashkar of playing a central role in the bombing of the Samjhauta express train, which killed 68 people. Indian investigators have recently pursued theories that Hindu militants were behind the attack. No link to Headley has been disclosed. Connections Discovered
On Dec. 1, 2008 a final tip surfaced -- once again in Philadelphia. Headley's mother had died 11 months earlier, but the news of the Mumbai tragedy spurred a friend of hers to contact the FBI. The friend told agents about a past conversation with Headley's mother that now led her to believe Headley "had been fighting alongside individuals in Pakistan to liberate Kashmir for the past 5 to 6 years," officials say. Just weeks later, however, Headley traveled from Chicago to Denmark and did reconnaissance for a plot against a newspaper that had published caricatures of the Prophet Mohamed in 2005, according to court documents. He even met with newspaper representatives about advertising opportunities, the documents say. Lashkar suspended the Denmark plot in March, but Headley continued working on it with al-Qaida until he was arrested in Chicago in October 2009. In the final months of his odyssey, Headley scouted targets for Ilyas Kashmiri, the al-Qaida boss who officials say is behind recent threats of Mumbai-style attacks in Europe.
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The trial of Tahawwur Rana, a minor accomplice whose trial ended last week in a guilty verdict on two of the three counts, offered an extraordinary look into the underworld of terrorism and espionage. The five days of testimony of self-confessed American terrorist and Pakistani spy David Coleman Headley were unprecedented in a U.S. courtroom. Headley delivered explosive revelations about how officers in Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) funded, supported and directed the 2008 Mumbai attacks along with the terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba. Because of his mix of front-line experience and high-level contacts, Headley's testimony was like a seminar in how terrorists communicate in code, do surveillance on targets and assemble plots while spies oversee the operations from the shadows like puppeteers. The case also showed how a growing number of serving and former Pakistani military officers have put their lethal talents at the service of Lashkar, al-Qaida and other groups. It revealed the impunity with which ISI officers and terrorists alike operate in Pakistan. The trial did not answer questions about whether Sajid Mir, a Lashkar mastermind caught on tape directing the slaughter in Mumbai by phone, was once a Pakistani military officer. It did not explore the extent to which ISI chiefs beyond Headley's handler, known only as Major Iqbal, were aware of the Mumbai plot, which ultimately killed 166 people. Headley testified that he believed top ISI leadership was not aware, but he also said he thought Iqbal's commanding officer and his unit of the spy agency knew about the operation. Prosecutors also managed to skirt two delicate and interconnected issues that the U.S. government refuses to discuss: Headley's role as a U.S. informant and the failure of the FBI to stop his terrorist activity despite at least six warnings during seven years. Headley testified that he stopped working for the DEA in September 2002, but that did not change contradictions and gaps in the U.S. government's official version. The DEA has stated that he was deactivated in early 2002, while other agencies have said he remained an informant until as late as 2005. The lack of clarity reinforces suspicions that the U.S. government knew more about Headley than it has revealed and that his role as an informant shielded him from more aggressive scrutiny in the years before his arrest in October 2009. The jury did not get the whole story either. Headley had already pleaded guilty to doing reconnaissance in Mumbai and for a plot in Denmark. The official focus of the trial was the narrower issue of charges of material support of terrorism against Rana, who owns an immigration consulting firm in Chicago. The verdict suggested a common-sense analysis by the jury. Headley testified that the Mumbai plot was a joint operation in which he was directed by Major Iqbal of the ISI and the Lashkar handler named Sajid Mir. The defense established that Rana communicated with Major Iqbal, but not any Lashkar masterminds. Rana's lawyers argued that Headley, Rana's boyhood friend, was a skilled manipulator who convinced Rana that he was doing intelligence for the ISI against India, Pakistan's arch-enemy, and kept him in the dark about the Mumbai plot. The acquittal on the charge of supporting the Mumbai plot indicates that the jury accepted that argument. Rana's conviction is a small victory. Washington has been pressing Pakistan for more than a year to arrest Major Iqbal as well as Mir and a half-a-dozen other Lashkar chiefs who have been implicated as masterminds. Despite abundant evidence and the U.S. federal indictment, the Pakistani government has not pursued those fugitives. They are not in hiding and continue to be involved in terrorist plotting, U.S. investigators say. Lashkar is simply too powerful and too close to the Pakistani security forces, according to Western and Indian counterterror officials. Pakistani officials fear that arresting major figures in Lashkar, which has not attacked the Pakistani state, could result in violent backlash and further instability. "They think they have to leave these Lashkar cadres free to control the organization," an Indian anti-terror official said. "They are worried that if they move against them, it could be a civil-war situation."
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Maoist graveyard found EU grant for research on diaspora
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New Delhi, June 12
New Delhi, June 12
Dona Paula (Goa), June 12
The latest shoe-throwing incident at the Congress office has had at least one positive fallout - it has put an end to the longstanding cold war between senior AICC general secretaries Janardan Dwivedi and Digvijay Singh. This “lovefest” was there for all to witness when Digivijay Singh rushed out of his room as soon as he heard the commotion in the media briefing hall next door and landed a few punches on the “journalist” who had threatened to throw a show at Dwivedi while he was addressing presspersons. Digivijay Singh then proceeded to commiserate with Dwivedi in effusive terms and heaped high praise on him for his excellent briefing. Digvijay Singh, subsequently, joined Dwivedi in the latter’s room where the two chatted amiably in the presence of media persons. The former Madhya Pradesh CM then held forth before TV cameras blaming that day’s incident on the RSS while Dwivedi was happy to let him do so.
Fuming at the government, the ultimate self-confessed agnostic, Janata Dal (U) leader Sharad Yadav, telephoned a senior UPA minister and gave him an earful about the Centre’s decision to engage with Ramdev. Describing the yoga guru in his characteristic colourful language, Yadav told the minister that the government had clearly lost its balance as it was willing to go all out to hold talks with the likes of Ramdev but was unwilling to enter into a dialogue with the opposition parties. Yadav was, however, stumped for an answer when the minister told him that it might be a good idea if he would restrain his coalition partner, the BJP, from whipping up a campaign in favour of Ramdev.
It is important to overcome the outrage at the verdict delivered by a Chicago court because for India,
an even more important trial is being conducted behind closed doors at Adiala jail in Rawalpindi.
How much has David Coleman Headley shared with interrogators in the US is not clear. Nor is it clear how much he has withheld. What is clear though is that even the sophisticated US network had turned a blind eye to warnings that could have led them to Headly and possibly averted the tragedy in Mumbai.
