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sohrabuddin fake encounter
We have once again been cheated on Lokpal, says Anna
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Lokayukta calls for removal of another UP minister
Indians in Bhutan facing eviction?
A writer, peace broker & teacher
Army hospitals may outsource disposal of biomed waste
Issues raised by Rahul fundamental to good governance: Congress
FDI in retail
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sohrabuddin fake encounter
New Delhi, November 29 Pointing out that the CBI had made a contemptuous statement in its status report on its investigations in the case, a Bench comprising Justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana Desai sought the agency’s explanation for questioning the impartiality of the trial court. Asking the agency to specify as to what prompted it to come to the conclusion that the trial court in Gujarat would not be impartial, the Bench also wanted to know whether the CBI wanted to retain the allegations or drop them. The apex court made the observations when Gujarat Government counsel Tushar Mehta took serious exception to CBI raising doubts over the integrity of the lower judiciary of the state. Appearing for the CBI, Additional Solicitor General Vivek Tankha, however, said the agency would like to retain its remarks. The ASG said he would give the reasons when he got his turn for arguments. The SC Bench was hearing arguments on the CBI’s plea for transferring the trial of former Gujarat Home Minister Amit Shah, a close aide of Chief Minister Narendra Modi, outside the state. The CBI has named Shah as key conspirator of the November 2005 fake encounter in which Sohrabuddin was killed. The Gujarat Government, however, maintained that the CBI had “adopted” the chargesheet filed by the state police by retaining as many as 14 accused, including top police officials. The CBI had merely added Shah as the 16th accused, it contended. Senior counsel Mehta also argued that the atmosphere in Gujarat was very much conducive to holding the trial and as such there was no need for entertaining the CBI plea. Shah has already contended that the CBI had implicated him in the case as part of a political conspiracy to destabilise the Modi government. Both Shah and the state government said Sohrabuddin was an extortionist and terrorist and that the CBI had accepted this fact.
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We have once again been cheated on Lokpal, says Anna
New Delhi, November 29 “We have once again been cheated on Lokpal issue. It seems we need to go on protest again,” Anna Hazare warned today, clearly indicating that the government should start drawing an action plan to tackle the social activist again in the public domain, immediately after the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Lokpal Bill submits its recommendations after last-minute touches on the issue of bringing the Prime Minister under the ambit of the Lokpal in the coming two days. Hazare has been quoted as saying that recommendations in the draft report of Standing Committee do not help in tackling corruption. Adding that he would fast on December 11 in Jantar Mantar in Delhi, Hazare cautioned that if the government does not agree to his demands after his one-day fast on December 11 at Jantar Mantar, he would revive the protest from December 22, the day the winter session ends. As rumblings of dissent against the document, which is still shrouded under Parliamentary privileges, started, panel head Abhishek Singhvi maintained: “We are here not to please everyone but to discharge our duties.” Responding to allegations of being “let down” levelled against his panel by Team Anna, all that Singhvi said was: “Have you read the report? Where is it written that the Bill will be a true copy of the government draft or the Jan Lokpal Bill? My suggestion is let the report come and then react,” Singhvi asserted. A senior Congress leader, however, said, “Whatever “we (government) do, they (activists) will agitate”. Team Anna today expressed disappointment over the apparent exclusion of the Prime
Minister, judiciary, lower bureaucracy and the CBI’s investigation wing from the Lokpal’s purview.
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Kani walks free after 193 days in jail
New Delhi, November 29 While a huge media contingent waited outside country's largest prison to capture the moments of her release, 43-year-old Kanimozhi was whisked away in a convoy of cars from a gate which was out of the media's view. Besides Kanimozhi, those released from the prison today included Kalaignar TV MD Sharad Kumar, Swan Telecom promoter Shahid Usman Balwa, Bollywood filmmaker Karim Morani and Kusegaon Fruits and Vegetables Pvt Ltd directors Rajiv Aggarwal and Asif Balwa. The daughter of former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi, who was arrested on May 20, was granted bail yesterday by the Delhi High Court following the Supreme Court's order in the case of five other accused last week. She had to spend one night extra in prison as orders for her release from Tihar was issued by the special CBI court this evening. Wearing a pink salwar suit, Kanimozhi drove straight to her residence along with her husband Aravindan. DMK parliamentary party leader T R Baalu gave her a bouquet as she got out of the car at her residence in Central Delhi after a 40-minute drive from the prison. "Kanimozhi was released at 7.30 pm and all the other four left in one car," Tihar Prison spokesperson Sunil Gupta said. A group of DMK MPs was allowed to go inside the Tihar jail with bouquets and water bottles to receive Kanimozhi. Outside the Tihar premises, confusion prevailed as there was no clear indication about which gate Kanimozhi would take to go out. At her residence, a stone's throw from Parliament House, a crowd of well wishers and DMK activists gathered, burst crackers and distributed sweets to welcome her. Kanimozhi will not go to Chennai till December 3 as she has to attend court hearings. After today's order of Shahid Usman Balwa's bail, only three out of 14 accused persons — former Telecom Minister A Raja, former Telecom Secretary Siddharth Behura and Raja's former Private Secretary R K Chandolia — in the 2G scam will remain in the prison.
— PTI
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Lokayukta calls for removal of another UP minister
Lucknow, November 29 He is the fifth minister in the Mayawati government who has been accused of corruption and misuse of office by the state’s anti-corruption ombudsman during the last one year. Mehrotra has sent a report to the Chief Minister, recommending removal of Ahirwar after indicting him on charges of misusing his local area development fund and encroaching on village land. He has also sought recovery of funds allocated to a school run by Ahirwar’s family-controlled trust, which was technically not eligible to receive money from the local area development fund as it did not have the required recognition. The Lokayukta has asked the CM to remove Ahirwar from the post immediately as according to him, the case cannot be finalised as long as he continues in office. The Lokpal has also recommended action to be taken against officials including the then divisional commissioner of Jhansi, SS Yadav, who had released funds to the school. A complaint in this regard had been lodged against the minister by Kamlapat Rai of Jhansi, accusing him of encroaching upon Gram Samaj land for constructing a college building by misusing his official position. Reacting to the Lokayukta recommendation, Samajwadi Party spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhury today asked UP Governor BL Joshi to immediately dismiss the Mayawati government as 40 per cent of her ministers were facing corruption charges. Clearly, in an attempt to cleanse her government of corrupt ministers, CM Mayawati has already removed four tainted ministers on the Lokpal’s recommendation. They are Rajesh Tripathi, Awadhpal Singh, Badshah Singh and Rangnath
Mishra.
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India keeping tabs on Chinese activity along LAC: Antony
New Delhi, November 29 The replies came after MPs, cutting across party lines, questioned China’s infrastructure, on the manner India was keeping a watch on its neighbour and even our own lackadaisical road construction at the front. Each of the questions had more than 30 MPs questioning the ministry. From the region, Navjot Sidhu (BJP) and Partap Bajwa (Congress) were among those who had sent in the questions. In the past month, there has been extensive news reporting, including in The Tribune, about growing Chinese assertiveness along the Line of Actual Control (LAC), especially in the eastern Ladakh sector. The LAC is not delineated and China has been building airfields, roads and watch towers on its side. India had set up sophisticated equipment and stationed its troops, but a lot needs to be done. The ministry today assured, “The government is closely monitoring all developments in our immediate and extended neighbourhood.” It admitted that there was no delineated LAC between India and China. There are a few areas along the border where India and China have different perceptions of LAC. Both sides patrol up to their respective perceptions of LAC due to the perceived differences in alignment of LAC. “Areas along the LAC are kept under constant surveillance by regular patrolling by troops and other means,” the ministry said. Defence Minister AK Antony said, “All developments on the borders are being watched and a review of the threat perception is being done regularly, he added.
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Indians in Bhutan facing eviction?
New Delhi, November 29 Recently, the Bhutanese authorities had reportedly questioned at least two Indians who were staying there and verbally asked them to leave the country. New Delhi is learnt to have taken up the matter with Thimphu, expressing confidence that the Bhutan Government would allow the Indians settled in that country to stay. “We understand that the Bhutan government is in the process of counting foreign nationals, including Indians. These nationals have been living with work permits and residence permits. We are in touch with the Bhutan Government and have requested it to handle the issue fairly,’’ sources said. Meanwhile, BJP Overseas Affairs Convener Vijay Jolly met Bhutan Ambassador to India Maj. Gen.Vetsop Namgyel yesterday and sought reversal of the order asking the Indians to leave the country. He said the Indian nationals settled there should be granted permanent citizenship of Bhutan. However, it is realised even in official circles here that Bhutan cannot permit foreign nationals in the country beyond a point or they will outnumber the local population.
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Noted litterateur Indira Goswami dead
Guwahati, November 29 Popularly known as Mamoni Raisom Goswami among her fans and friends and winner of India's highest literary award Jnanpith, the prolific novelist took a brave initiative in 2005 to bring the outlawed United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) to negotiating table as she wanted an end to the continuing violence and bloodshed in her home state. She had acted as a bridge between the ULFA leadership and the PMO as well as the then national security adviser. Her novels and short stories are based on varied socio-economic settings in Assam and various north Indian construction sites where she accompanied her late engineer husband, Madhavan Raisom Iyenger. She was also India’s first Principal Prince Claus Laureate (2008). She won Sahitya Akademi Award
in 1982 and was conferred honorary D Litt by several universities, including Ravidra Bharati University, IGNOU and Rajiv
Gandhi University in Arunachal Pradesh.
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A writer, peace broker & teacher
Chandigarh, November 29 Goswami’s life reads like an unputdownable work of fiction. She survived suicidal depression for years, was widowed just eighteen months after her marriage, lived with the widows of Vrindavan to carry a research on their lives, as also to lend her life some semblance of normalcy. She taught in a Sainik School in Assam and finally found her solace and calling in writing, that saved and liberated her from her dreaded bouts of depression. Later she joined Delhi University, as a lecturer, from where began her journey as an accomplished writer, poet, scholar and professor, who was conferred with awards by Sahitya Akademi and Jnanpith (2000). She also became India’s first Principal Prince Claus Laureate( 2008). Her name came to prominence on the contemporary Indian literature scene after the publication of ‘The Moth Eaten Howdah of a Tusker’, ‘Pages Stained with Blood’ and the controversial ‘The Man from Chinnamasta’, for which she is also said to have received threats to her life. In ‘The Blue Naked Braja’, published in 1976, her own experiences as a widow as well that of Radhaswamis of Vrindavan, who live in abject poverty and sexual exploitation, she gave a deeper expression to their need for a human touch and companionship. In an interview when she was asked to describe her experiences of the days of terrorism, she said, “ I have seen worse than what terrorists do, in Vrindavan I saw how cruel human beings can be to other human beings and it was taken so normally that I would call its worse than the feeling of terror…” In ‘Pages Stained With Blood’, she wrote a first person account on the bloodiest chapter of the independent India, the anti-Sikh riots of 1984. She had witnessed the riots while staying in the Shakti Nagar area of Delhi. “I had learnt that human beings could be really very cruel to each other,” she had said about her observations on the riots. All her works are carried on the strength of her fearlessness in tackling the issue that disturbed her at a deeper level, may it be the widows of Vrindavan exploited in the name of god by relatives and touts, or, against the animal sacrifices carried on at Kamakhya Devi temple for thousands of years in ‘The Man from Chinnamasta’. In ‘The Moth Eaten Howdah of a Tusker’, she once again antagonised the Satra religious institution by writing about the plight of their Brahmin widows. This novel was anthologised in the masterpieces of Indian literature and was also made into a film, titled ‘Adajya.’ She also wrote a candid autobiography titled ‘The Unfinished Autobiography’.
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Army hospitals may outsource disposal of biomed waste
Chandigarh, November 29 Senior Army Medical Corps (AMC) officers familiar with the Guidelines for Management and Handling of Biomedical Waste in the Armed Forces and its current review said many large corporate and government hospitals have already adopted the system of outsourcing bio-medical waste to a centralised disposal agency, reducing their financial and legal liabilities. Waste is collected and processed appropriately till it is transported to the hospital’s ‘kerb site’, from where its safe disposal becomes the responsibility of the concerned agency. “Outsourcing bio-medical waste is being deliberated upon within the services as it may not be practical and prudent to maintain incinerators in each and hospital owing to emerging economic, environmental and legal issues,” an AMC officer said. “Moreover, outsourcing facilities are available in most stations where our larger hospitals are located,” he added. Service medical establishments located in the field, remote areas or highly sensitive areas would not be covered under the scheme. At present, the armed forces have their own in-house system of disposing bio-medical waste. Following the enforcement of the Bio-Medical Waste Management and Handling Rules by the Union government in 1998, the Ministry of Defence nominated the Director General Armed Forces Medical Services as the nodal authority for enforcing and reviewing the rules in all defence establishments. Consequently, detailed guidelines pertaining to the organisational setup for bio-medical waste management, methodology of segregation, collection and handling, transportation and final disposal as well as audit were issued. Entitlement and authorisation of equipment and the requirement of developing in-house capacity for final disposal facilities like incinerator, waste steriliser, microwave and shredder, depending upon the size of the hospital, was also laid out.
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Issues raised by Rahul fundamental to good governance: Congress
New Delhi, November 29 Describing Gandhi's remarks as "frank, forthright and clear", party spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi said the crux of his elaborate articulation on inclusive growth is that there should be equal distribution of the benefits of development among all. Asked whether Congress agrees with Rahul Gandhi's contention that the biggest corruption lay in the country's political system which cannot be changed unless youths are brought in, Singhvi said, "Political system does need a radical reform". However, the Congress spokesman said it does not mean politics is the only sector plagued by corruption. Singhvi said the crux of what Rahul Gandhi said is that while it is important to keep the growth rate high, more important is how the cake of development is to be distributed among all.
— PTI
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FDI in retail New Delhi, November 29 The combined Opposition has put down two conditions before the government: rollback the policy on foreign investment in retail trade or accept its adjournment motion. The Opposition's demand is aimed at exploiting the differences within the ruling coalition as key UPA allies, Trinamool Congress and the DMK, have opposed the FDI policy. The government, on its part, is not averse to an adjournment motion provided it does not have an element of censure. Though BJP leader Sushma Swaraj today said the content of the motion is non-negotiable, the two sides could settle for a resolution which does not pin down the government or call for the withdrawal of the policy. Congress leaders are also confident that despite their opposition, UPA allies will not vote against the government. However, UPA leaders also admit, that the stand-off is unlikely to be resolved in a hurry although both sides are under intense pressure to sink their differences to allow Parliament to function smoothly.
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