The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

	India extends $250m credit line to Nepal Ashok Tuteja Tribune News Service New Delhi, October 21 India today extended a 250 million Line of Credit (LoC) to Nepal and signed a key bilateral investment promotion and protection agreement (BIPPA) with the Himalayan nation after talks between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Nepalese counterpart Baburam Bhattarai. The two countries also signed an MoU regarding India’s assistance for goitre control programme in Nepal and pledged to work in close cooperation on various bilateral projects. During their delegation-level talks at the Hyderabad House here, the two PMs discussed the entire gamut of bilateral relations apart from taking stock of the international situation. This was their second meeting after Bhattarai became Nepal’s PM about two months ago. They had met last month in New York on the margins of the UN General Assembly meet. The Prime Minister is understood to have assured New Delhi’s all possible assistance to Nepal in completing the peace process and framing the new constitution in the Himalayan nation. Bhattarai is learnt to have briefed the Indian leader on the progress in the peace process. He is also believed to have apprised him of the steps being taken by Kathmandu to provide security to Indian business establishments in his country in the wake of attacks on some of them in recent months. The $ 250 million LoC will be used to finance infrastructure projects such as highways, airports, bridges, irrigation, roads, railways and hydropower projects. The BIPPA seeks to promote and protect investments from either country in the territory of the other nation with the ultimate objective of increasing bilateral investment flow. The accord requires each country to encourage and create favourable conditions for investor of the other country to make investments in its territory and to admit investments in accordance with its laws. Provisions have also been made in the agreement for grant of compensation to the investors whose investments suffer losses owing to war, armed conflict, a state of national emergency, etc. and such investors shall be accorded treatment by the host country, no less than the treatment accorded to its owns investors or investors of any third state.
	BJP team meets PM, seeks President’s Rule in Manipur New Delhi, October 21 A BJP delegation today met the PM to convey its concern over the situation in Manipur-caused by the nearly three-month economic blockade-and demanded imposition of President's Rule in the state. The BJP delegation, comprising Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and party president Nitin Gadkari, met Manmohan Singh along with some party leaders from Manipur. — PTI
	Yeddyurappa bail plea adjourned Shubhadeep Choudhury/TNS Bangalore, October 21 Former Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa was dealt two blows in quick succession by the High Court here today. While the interim bail petition of Yeddyurappa, currently lodged at Parappana Agrahara Central Prison on the outskirts of Bangalore, was adjourned by Justice BV Pinto to October 24, in another court hall Justice V Jagannathan quashed proceeding against Yeddyurappa’s bete noire and former Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy and his wife Anita, a JD(S) MLA. On October 15, a Special Lokayukta Court had remanded Yeddyurappa in judicial custody till October 22. Talking to the The Tribune, Sandeep Patil, one of the advocates representing the former Chief Minister - charged by two Bangalore-based advocates of being involved in land scams - said Yeddyurappa would personally appear before the Lokayukta Court again tomorrow when the judge would pronounce order on the extension of his judicial remand. Tomorrow Yeddyurappa would appear before the public for the first time since he returned to the prison on October 19 morning after having spent the previous three days in two hospitals. Uday U Lalit representing Yeddyurappa today continued his argument against Yeddyurappa’s judicial remand and said the detention was against the right to individuals guaranteed by the Constitution.
	Jayalalithaa owns up jewellery, disowns sandals, saris, silver Shubhadeep Choudhury/TNS Bangalore, October 21 Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa told a special court here today that 750 pairs of footwear allegedly found by police during a raid in her residence in Chennai were planted by them (the police). Jayalalithaa, who is facing disproportionate asset charges, was answering questions before the special court here for the second day. While searching her residence, jewellery, silver, saris and shoes worth crores of rupees were found by the police. A lawyer, who was present in the court, held inside the Parappana Agrahara Central Prison to record the AIADMK supremo’s answers, said Jayalalitha did not deny the ownership of the jewellery but said that many of the items were given to her by her supporters before she became chief minister in 1991. “She, however, claimed that the silver articles, expensive saris and shoes and sandals were planted in her residence by police”, the lawyer said. The lawyer said during the two days of questioning by judge B M Mallikarjunaiah here, Jayalalitha answered a total of 567 questions, including 379 questions answered by her yesterday.
	Sonia chairs first NAC after surgery Tribune News Service New Delhi, October 21 The National Advisory Council (NAC) Working Group on child labour has recommended complete ban on child labour, extending the current abolition from hazardous to non-hazardous industries too. The 16th meeting of the NAC, held for the first time since its chairperson Sonia Gandhi underwent her surgery, took up several issues today including abolition of child labour, scope of Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY), social security for minorities’ development, schemes for unorganized workers and the sub-plan for Scheduled Castes. Those who attended today’s meeting included apart from Sonia Gandhi, MS Swaminathan, AK Shiva Kumar, Narendra Jadhav, Pramod Tandon, Aruna Roy, Deep Joshi, Anu Aga, Farah Naqvi and Harsh Mander. The working group on child labour stressed that till the government completely bans child labour, attempts to ensure education for all may be difficult to achieve, since a lot of parents find it profitable to put their young children to work very early. The government has already effected a ban on labour in hazardous industries for children between the age of 6 to 14. It is assumed that children below six are anyway not put to work. The working group on Rajiv Awas Yojana presented its concept of how to free urban centres of slums. But it took serious objection to the current trend of relocation of slum-dwellers and instead suggested their settlement there itself. It suggested inclusion of domestic help in the category of those needing to be settled permanently with statutory tenurial rights being given to them. The group also recommended a law to protect urban poor slum settlers from the current trend of relocation. Also to be included are the shelter-less and pavement dwellers. In her presentation on Scheduled Caste Sub-Plan (SCSP), the joint convener of the Working Group on Dalit Issues Farah Naqvi mentioned the need to restructure the SCSP for SCs in the 12th Plan since the group felt that the benefits were still not reaching the targeted sections of the SCs. Farah, who is also the Joint Convener of the Working Group on Minority Affairs, also gave an update and presented draft recommendations on development of minorities, with particular reference to the 12th Plan. There again, she pointed out how the schemes designed to help the minorities are somehow not reaching them. The group suggested that since there are very few applicants coming forward to avail of the facility, the government should not reject any applications for the time being.
	Sanitation campaign has come a cropper: Jairam Aditi Tandon/TNS New Delhi, October 21 Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh today slammed the government’s Total Sanitation Campaign as an absolute failure, saying sanitation had been a ‘complete disaster’ in India. The minister also claimed that areas where the country had posted significant improvements were areas where the Union Government had assumed leadership roles, like, education and drinking water supply. He said the Centre should forget the formality of the State list, the Concurrent list and take up a bigger role now in health and sanitation, where India remained a laggard. “Total Sanitation Campaign has been a failure. It is neither total, nor sanitation nor a campaign,” Jairam said after the launch of India Human Development Report 2011, which reveals that the country has a long way to go before ensuring toilet access for all and before improving basic health determinants. The report reveals that even villages presented with the Nirmal Gram awards for eliminating dry toilets were using these facilities not for defecation but for storage, bathing and washing clothes. Lack of sanitation directly impacts nutrition and in India the percentage of households with access to toilets increased only marginally from 40 in 2002 to 51 in 2009. The rest continue to defecate in the open posing the risk of infection to others. Inter-state disparity on total sanitation is also shocking - 79 per cent of households in Orissa lack toilet access as against less than 2 pc in Delhi. Experts today suggested a complete overhaul of the Total Sanitation Campaign to make the programme demand driven and community led. In Haryana and Himachal, community-led drives have shown the way to ensure sanitation. This example needs to be replicated instead of money being spent in creating toilets that will later be used as store-rooms just because the community does not want these, Santosh Mehrotra, lead author of the report said.