What "A" India

Prabhakaran Dead ?

2009-05-17T18:47:00.002+05:30

Reports coming from Sri Lanka suggest that LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran has committed suicide and the body has been recovered by the Srl Lankan army and DNA test are been done to verify and Identify , the body of the LTTE chief was found with 150 other body's which may include his son and the top leadership of the LTTE

The Sri Lankan army for its part is not coming out with any details and is not confirming the reports of Prabhakaran's deaths.

If the reports are true then this bring to end of civil war in Sri Lanka after 30 years

Quattrocchi gets clean chit but Modi gets probed

2009-04-28T13:12:00.002+05:30

The Interpol has removed the red-corner notice issued against Ottavio Quattrocchi, an Italian businessman who is being sought in India for criminal charges for acting as a conduit for bribes in the Bofors scandal, Times Now reported.

The 12-year-long Interpol red corner notice against Quattrocchi has been withdrawn by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).This comes just three weeks before the Congress-led UPA government's term ends.

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The Supreme Court on Monday asked the Special Investigation Team to probe a complaint against Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi that he and his Cabinet colleagues orchestrated the post-Godhra communal riots in 2002 in connivance with police officials and senior bureaucrats.

A two-judge Bench of Justices Arijit Pasayat and A.K. Ganguly asked the SIT to look into the complaint by Jakia Nasim Ahesan, wife of the former Congress MP, Ehsan Jafri, and submit its report in three months.

Make your own conclusions

Dogs Day Out In IPL - 2

2009-04-18T19:29:00.003+05:30

Leaders Who Got The Shoe

2009-04-18T08:14:00.001+05:30

Indian Spy satellite undergoing final stages of testing

2009-04-16T20:57:00.000+05:30

India's spy satellite, built by Israel, is undergoing final stages of testing and integration at the spaceport of Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh for an April 20 launch.The 300-kg radar imaging satellite, which would primarily keep a watch on movements on the borders and help the country in anti-infiltration and anti-terrorist operations, is set to be launched on board the 230-tonne core-alone, home-grown rocket Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle without strap-on motors in view of the light weight of the payload.

"The satellite is expected to be launched at around 6.45 am", an Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) official told PTI here today.

The Bangalore-based space agency has kept the mission low-profile, given the sensitiveness of the venture.Top ISRO officials, including the agency's Chairman G Madhavan Nair, are expected to address a media conference after the launch on Monday.This imaging satellite, built by Israel Aerospace Industries, has all-weather capabilities which means it can take pictures during day and night and under cloud cover.

In addition to surveillance applications, the spacecraft will add to the capabilities of ISRO in managing disasters like cyclones, floods and landslides.Anusat, a 40-kg satellite built by Chennai-based Anna University, is the co-passenger on board PSLC-C12.

Case against Dhoni and Harbhajan

2009-04-16T15:25:00.002+05:30

A lawyer Sudhir Kumar Ojha as filed a case against Dhoni and Harbhajan for 'hurting' fans by staying away from the Padma awards function. Senior advocate Sudhir Kumar Ojha filed the case in the court of the CJM Ramdarash seeking to book the cricketers under sections 499 (defamation), 500 (punishment for defamation), 503 (criminal intimidation) and 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace).

If the lawyer wants a cheap publicity , then the news media will give it him. But can I file a case against this type of people who wants cheap publicity and are wasting time of the Courts, where we have large backlog of cases which has been pending for a "Very" long time.

Chidambaram get the shoe

2009-04-07T20:54:00.003+05:30

Was it right to give the "Shoe" to the poor man Chidambaram ? what the hell he is suppose to do , when ever thing in this country is done on the wishes of Sonia "Gandhi"

The Price of Tata Nano

2009-03-24T23:08:00.003+05:30

City	BS II	BS III	CX BS II	CX BS III	LX BS III
Chennai	-	132,056	-	157,055/160,055	180,248
Mumbai	-	134,249	-	160,322/163,457	185,375
Delhi		123,361		148,361/151,361	172,360
Kolkatta		130,784		155,782/158,783	180,447

The prices are in Indian Repues(Rs.)

India gets spy satellite from Israe

2009-03-20T22:34:00.001+05:30

India gets spy satellite from Israel to secure its borders. India has bought a spy satellite from Israel. The satellite is almost of the same sort that Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) put in the orbit last year.

But last year it was for Israel that ISRO had put the satellite in the orbit. This year India has bought a satellite for its own use.

The best part is that whether the weather is cloudy, rains or storm or for that matter night, the satellite will be able to work effectively round the clock without any hiccup.

Last year when Indian scientists launched Israel’s Techsar satellite, it was beginning of a new era of co-operation between the two nations.

It was very significant. The importance of the satellite launch was magnified by the fact that this launch was earlier stalled owning to intense objections by Arab states which viewed the satellite to be a direct threat to their defence integrity.

Such was the pressure on the Indian government to not support the Israeli space aspirations, that according to a senior Indian intelligence official, the launch was "dismantled" completely to prevent even a future launch if the government changed its mind.

But despite threats and objections, India had launched the satellite.

Now India is launching a similar rocket for its own use. The 300 kilogram (650 pound) RISAT 2 will be launched by India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle rocket in the next few weeks, the report said.

ISRO is becoming an increasingly important space organization for countries across the world.

Last year ISRO launched 10 satellites simultaneously. It was a big feat for any space organization in the world. In its thirteenth flight conducted from Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) SHAR, Sriharikota, on April 28, 2008, ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, PSLV-C9, successfully launched the 690 kg Indian remote sensing satellite CARTOSAT-2A, the 83 kg Indian Mini Satellite (IMS-1) and eight nanosatellites for international customers into a 637 km polar Sun Synchronous Orbit (SSO). PSLV-C9 in its ‘core alone’ configuration launched ten satellites with a total weight of about 820 kg. ?

The important flight events included the separation of the first stage, ignition of the second stage, separation of the heatshield at about 125 km altitude after the vehicle had cleared the dense atmosphere, second stage separation, third stage ignition, third stage separation, fourth stage ignition and fourth stage cut-off.

The 690 kg main payload, CARTOSAT-2A, was the first satellite to be injected into orbit at 885 seconds after lift-off at an altitude of 637 km. About 45 seconds later, Indian Mini Satellite (IMS-1) was separated after which all the nano satellites were separated in sequence. The initial signals indicate normal health of the satellites.

Indian Mini Satellite (IMS-1), flown as an auxiliary payload on board PSLV-C9, is developed by ISRO for remote sensing applications. Weighing 83 Kg at lift-off, IMS-1 incorporates many new technologies and has miniaturised subsystems. IMS-1 carries two remote sensing payloads - A Multi-spectral camera (Mx Payload) and a Hyper-spectral camera (HySI Payload), operating in the visible and near infrared regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. The spatial resolution of Mx camera is 37 metre with a swath of 151 km while that of HySI is about 506 metre with a swath of about 130 km. The data from this mission will be made available to interested space agencies and student community from developing countries to provide necessary impetus to capacity building in using satellite data. The versatile IMS-1 has been specifically developed to carry different payloads in future without significant changes in it and has a design life time of two years.

Eight Nanosatellites from abroad are carried as auxiliary payloads besides IMS-1 as well as CARTOSAT-2A. The total weight of these Nanosatellite payloads is about 50 Kg. Six of the eight Nanosatellites are clustered together with the collective name NLS-4. The other two nanosatellites are NLS-5 AND RUBIN-8. NLS-4, developed by University of Toronto, Canada consists of six nano-satellites developed by various universities. Two of them - CUTE 1.7 and SEEDS - are built in Japan, while the other four - CAN-X2, AAUSAT-II, COMPASS-1 and DELPHI-C3 are built in Canada, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands respectively. NLS-5 is also built by University of Toronto and RUBIN-8 is built by Cosmos International, Germany. The eight nanosatellite payloads of PSLV-C9 are built to develop nano technologies for use in satellites as well as for the development of technologies for satellite applications.

In its twelve consecutively successful flights so far, PSLV has repeatedly proved itself as a reliable and versatile workhorse launch vehicle. It has demonstrated multiple satellite launch capability having launched a total of sixteen satellites for international customers besides thirteen Indian payloads which are for remote sensing, amateur radio communications and Space capsule Recovery Experiment (SRE-1). PSLV was used to launch ISRO’s exclusive meteorological satellite, KALPANA-1, into a Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) in September 2002 and thus proved its versatility. The same vehicle will be used to launch Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, India’s first mission to Moon during this year.

In the meantime the vehicle integration has already begun at the spaceport at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh for Israeli satellite launch. The launch campaign is gathering speed. The vehicle, PSLV-C12, will also deploy a mini-satellite called Anusat, built by Anna University, Chennai.

RISAT is a radar-imaging satellite used for remote-sensing. It can take pictures of the earth 24 hours of the day, through rain and cloud. The satellite has already reached Sriharikota from Israel.

US and India brothers in arms.

2009-03-19T23:15:00.002+05:30

According to government sources, the United States has asked India to pull back troops along the Indo-Pakistan border as a gesture of goodwill.

India in turn has told America that the country hasn't moved more troops along the border, and that it was the neighbouring country, Pakistan, that deployed more troops along the Line of Control (LoC), and that America should ask Pakistan to pull back its troops.

Earlier, defence sources said that Pakistan had deployed several army brigades along Indo-Pak border in Jehlum-Chenab and Chenab-Ravi corridors sparking concern in the Indian armed forces.

The forces had been withdrawn from Pakistan's troubled north-western tribal belt where they were battling Taliban to put pressure on the US, which had been pressing Islamabad to act against terrorists operating from its soil, and diverted to the border with India, they said.

Pakistan had deployed several brigades (each comprising 4,000 to 6,000 personnel), including 33 brigade, 27 brigade, 7 brigade, 28 brigade, 331 brigade, two battalions (with 1,000 personnel each) of 37 Punjab and 39 Punjab Rawalkote in Hajira, Mandol, Hajipeer, Uri, Bhimber, Nikial, Kotli, Sailkote, Zafarwal, Neelam valley and other areas, sources said.

"The deployment had been a surprising move. It is an area of concern for us," they said adding that the Pakistani side has already cleaned the bunkers along the borderline.

The sources said "several brigades involved in the war against Taliban in north-western tribal belt had been withdrawn and deployed along Jehlum-Chenab corridor in the past one week."

US approves sale of anti-sub P8I planes to India

2009-03-18T20:50:00.002+05:30

Washington has approved the sale to India of eight Boeing anti-submarine aircraft, a 2.1 billion dollar transaction which would be the largest ever sale of US arms to India, the State Department said Tuesday.

"The Department of State has notified Congress of the potential sale of eight P8i long-range maritime reconnaissance, anti-submarine warfare aircraft to the government of India," State Department spokesman Robert Wood told reporters.

"The US government is prepared to license the export of these items, having taken into account political, military, economic, human rights and arms control considerations," he said.

The sale is in keeping with India's drive to modernize its military. The Indian military plans to hand out contracts worth 50 billion US dollars by 2018.

India, which has tense relations with fellow nuclear-armed neighbor Pakistan, currently is mostly outfitted with military equipment from the former Soviet Union.

Slumdog has 8

2009-02-23T21:31:00.002+05:30

Has any one seen the movie in India, except those people in the news channels , I have seen the movie 3 times just to make sure that i am not missing out anything. The movie is a crap, no logic, no story , oh my god , the song , i came out of the hall before it begin. I have seen a lot of movies , I see about 6 movies a week , so trust me , I have seen more movies which deserve the awards , then this crape. If i am wrong , comment on this.

Surfing Child Porn May Land You in Jail

2009-02-16T23:46:00.001+05:30

After the amended Information Technology Act made it illegal to publish and transmit obscene material or any sexually explicit act/content last month, a newly passed IT Bill is set to punish offenses revolving around child pornography.

So what exactly has been touted as an offense? The new bill is set to make it illegal to not only create and transmit child pornography in any electronic form, but even to browse it, as reported by The Times of India. Publishing and transmitting material depicting children in a "obscene or indecent or sexually explicit manner" can put you behind bars for a long duration - five years, not to mention the hefty Rs. 10 lakh fine it attracts.

Section 67 of the existing act will now be amended. Section 67B proposes particularly to punish acts of publishing and transmitting any electronic sexually explicit act/content that depicts children as opposed to Section 67, which does not specifically mention children anywhere. Now, it will also be an offence to "cultivate, entice or induce children to have an online relationship with other children for a sexual act," the report added. (Report : Techtree.com)

India's indigenous N-sub

2009-02-14T17:11:00.001+05:30

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has added a feather to its cap. It is delivering on schedule— in 2009— India's first indigenously built nuclear powered submarine (SSBN) as it had promised at the beginning of the United Progressive Alliance's (UPA) term in office.

The secret of the indigenous nuclear submarine programme seems to be finally out. Defence minister A. K. Antony has confirmed what was being speculated all this while - that the country is ready to launch the third arm of its nuclear triad.

India is getting a batch of submarine launched ballistic missiles (SLBM) and submarine- launched cruise missiles (SLCM), ready to wed with the SSBNs, which would presumably be nuclear tipped. This would, in turn, underline the deterrence posture of the nuclear weapons programme providing it a failsafe 'second strike' capability.

But this would also entail fundamental change in the country's nuclear weapons policies for the peculiar nature of nuclear submarine deployment.

A nuclear submarine remains submerged underwater for most of its deployment period thus making communication difficult especially in times of a national emergency.

A nuclear submarine commander is therefore armed with a separate launch regimen that is qualitatively different from those used above ground.

Hence, when India launches its nuclear submarine, reportedly three, it would have to put in place launch codes that would provide a degree of autonomy to the commanders. This, in turn, would change the deployment pattern of at least a portion of the country's nuclear forces to 'ready arsenal'. This would require a political decision.

The Indian development is important in terms of the changing Chinese deployment by which they are modernising their nuclear submarine fleet, putting into waters the refurbished Xia class and a new Jin class.

The country had been working on the submarine, coyly termed Advanced Technology Vehicle (ATV) since 1985. The design is reportedly based on the old Charlie II- class submarine - a former Soviet make.

The programme was bedevilled with problems in developing a reactor suitable for the platform and then, building a containment vessel for the reactor. The attack submarine design is said to have a 4,000- ton displacement and a single- shaft, home- built nuclear power plant.

The estimated speed of the vessel is 12- 15 knots on surface, and 30- 34 knots submerged.

The reactor is of the pressurised water variety.

The nuclear submarine would beef up the country's presence in the Indian Ocean.

It brings to fruition a programme that was kicked off under the leadership of the late Rajiv Gandhi who had leased a Charlie- class nuclear submarine that was renamed in 1988 as INS Chakra.

Banning Sri Ram Sena !

2009-02-14T16:45:00.003+05:30

What is happening in India ? We are having a national debate about whether women should drink or not, whether women have right to have a drink ? When Sri Ram Sena roughed up a few women , the nation went up in arms ? All the English 24 hr NEWS channels telecasted the story for nearly 3 days. In between a clergy in UP issued a fatwa against women studding along with boys, not a sole in this country notices. The so called secular batons of this country raise a finger. Why ? because that was fatwa and if we appose any fatwa , we will be branded as Hindu right wing terrorist. There was no live telecast of passionate debate in Headlines Today ! "o" sorry Entertainment Today ! No Burkha Dutt the award winning journalist trying a put words into people mouth in the name of national debate. The News channels are behaving like any thing Hindus dose is wrong and any thing against is secularism. Why? the majority of Hindus doesn't case what others tell about them , Hindus are only people in the world who take things laying down again and again, should this change ? Will like to know your views.

Let us ban Sri Ram Sene

2009-02-07T16:32:00.004+05:30

Are we living in a Democratic country? If yes, can we ban these English news channels?
The minister Renuka Chowdhury states that the state government has lost control of the law and order , where was she when Raj of Mumbai was attacking north Indians, she did not open her mouth because the state government was a Congress one.

Date Feb 8 2009

Two days after the attack on CPM MLA's daughter and her friend, the accused claim to be a part of CPM's student wing-the DYFI. More shockingly, these men say that their attempt was to protect the MLA's daughter's modesty. While police refused to share details,the arrested claim they belong to CPM's student wing - the DYFI. On asked as to which party they belonged, the driver of the bus the couple was travelling in - Arvind Das said, "DYFI." Surprisingly, the accused claim they were keeping the MLA's daughter out of harm's way. "They were oly trying to protect the girl's modesty from being compromised," defence lawyer

State Election - 2008

2008-12-08T11:38:00.001+05:30

The reports coming suggest the Congress will take Rajasthan, Delhi and the BJP will have M.P.

What dose this suggest, Dose this mean that Congress will win the next general election which may be held in Apr-May(2009), or is these results reflect the confidence in their C.M's

The final count may look like

Party's	RAJASTHAN (200)	DELHI (69)	CHHATTISGARH (90)	MADHYA PRADESH (230)	MIZORAM (40)
Congress	(90-110)	(30-39)	(35-42)	(65-72)	(19-25)
BJP	(65-75)	(28-37)	(35-50)	(125-160)	N/A
Others	(25-32)	(5-8)	(2-5)	(25-35)	(5-10)

In Delhi the other will hold the key to form the next government, The BJP has to find the the re sons for loosing out Rajasthan, the Congress has to work hard if it wants to come to power in the next general election.

One More Party Of The Family - PrajaRajyam

2008-12-08T10:34:00.004+05:30

There goes one more party which will have family members of the founder as the leaders, Prajarajyam. Chiranjeevi's brother Pawan Kalyan was named as the leader of the youth wing of the party, Dose this mean that we don't have any one else in the party who is capable of heading that department. All party's starts for the people but some were on the road they trend to become a family issue, we all know Pawan Kalyan and his character, his arrogant behaviour, If Chiranjeev thinks that his brother is good to lead the youth wing even before contesting a election , then we can imagine whom he will select after wining a seat in the coming election , may be his wife as the women wing president. Come on give us a break.

Indian P.M play the wait game again

2008-12-06T18:07:00.001+05:30

India’s expectation that a global effort led by the US will be mounted to urge Islamabad to clamp down on suspects of the Mumbai carnage has a steely edge in a military doctrine — called “cold start” — that has been adopted in the years since the Parliament attack of December 2001.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said there was an “obligation” to ensure that the perpetrators of the crime were booked.

“I have impressed upon all the world leaders who called me that people of India feel a sense of hurt and anger as never seen before,” he said at a media conference he addressed with visiting Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

The Prime Minister’s observations, a week after the attacks, did not carry the threat of an offensive that some sections in India are demanding or that Pakistan’s political and military leaders have sensed in other responses from the Indian government.

“We will wait for the outcome,” the Prime Minister replied when asked what political, diplomatic and military options India was considering on Pakistan.

But public outrage in India and clear signals from the security establishment that New Delhi was ploughing through a list of options means that the use of force, with some form of international backing, is still a course of action that can be dovetailed into a global agenda that a new regime in the US will implement from mid-January.

A new military doctrine that India has adopted since 2004 allows the Centre to give up the kind of policy that the NDA government adopted in December 2001 when it quickly ordered a total mobilisation of the armed forces.

In simple terms, the doctrine envisages that the Indian military will be able to reduce the time taken from W (warning) to D-day (day of offensive) by slashing the time taken for M (mobilisation).

Both Manmohan Singh and foreign affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee have said in meetings of the Congress Working Committee and within the government that a knee-jerk order to the military to mobilise would fritter away the diplomatic moral capital that New Delhi has acquired.

But within the security establishment here, there is a conviction that a show of restraint is possible because India’s armed forces have acquired a capability they did not have in 2001.

It was not immediately clear from what the Prime Minister said today if he wanted a response from Islamabad to India’s demand or a move from the global diplomatic effort to put pressure on Pakistan, or both. But it was evident that New Delhi was waiting to suss the mood before deciding on an agenda of coercion.

The only evidence of a movement of forces since the Mumbai attacks has been on the home front — with security agencies ramping up efforts in public places such as railway stations, hotels and airports. In contrast, within a week of the December 13, 2001, attack on Parliament, a full-scale mobilisation of the armed forces was ordered without a public announcement.

Within two days — on December 15, 2001 — the cabinet committee on security (CCS) had met and in an order to the military had asked it to prepare for war.

Leave for soldiers was cancelled, special trains were mobilised to move tanks, troop carriers and bridge-laying equipment, and fighter aircraft were moved to forward bases and staging posts and the frontier was mined. The eastern fleet of the Indian Navy was deployed to the west coast. Operation Parakram, as the mobilisation was called, lasted nearly a year.

The then army chief, General Sundarrajan Padmanabhan, announced in a media conference on January 11, 2002, that the armed forces were fully mobilised in “record time” and were ready for an offensive. It took more than three weeks for the army to mobilise by pulling out assets from deep in the south and from the east and deploying them to the north and the west.

In the nine days since the Mumbai carnage that began on November 26, there is little to suggest that army headquarters is in the middle of such forward movement.

The most important reason for this is not only the political restraint and the calibrated response the government has determined. It is also because the “cold start” doctrine, military sources insist, is being implemented for the last four years.

In essence, the “cold start” capability rests with the defensive formations of the Indian Army acting with the air force. Eight of the 11 corps of the Indian Army are “defensive” or “holding” formations.

Of these, six are in the western and northern command areas. Each of these corps has, the army says, become “pivot corps” because they have been equipped with divisions that are capable of not just defence but also assault.

A series of exercises to adapt to the new doctrine began with Divya Astra in 2004 and was followed by Vajra Shakti in 2005 and Sanghe Shakti. All of them envisaged an assault on enemy territory without large-scale mobilisation.

Battle groups in the pivot corps would act with air support, under the doctrine, to create openings in enemy defences through which the “strike” corps (the Indian Army has three strike corps — 1, 2 and 21) would go deeper at designated targets.

Hoax call pushed Pakistan to brink of war with India

2008-12-06T18:02:00.001+05:30

Report in ET

Nuclear-armed Pakistan put its forces on alert when its president received a threatening call from someone posing as Indian Minister
for External Affairs Pranab Mukherjee following last week's Mumbai attacks, a media report said Saturday.

The caller, who was put through to President Asif Ali Zardari late Nov 28 without verification of his claimed identity, warned that India would take "military action if Islamabad failed to immediately act against the supposed perpetrators of the Mumbai killings."

According to the Dawn newspaper, as the phone call ended many in the president's office were convinced that the "Indians had started beating the war drums." Intense diplomatic and military activity started in Islamabad, the report said further.

Pakistan's air force was put on highest alert and jet fighters patrolled over and around the federal capital with live ammunition, while messages were sent to top officials in Washington, including US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, about the gravity of the situation.

But Mukherjee denied that he had made any phone call to Zardari when Rice contacted him in the middle of the night November 28. With international efforts, the situation was defused next day.

But "for nearly 24 hours over the weekend the incident continued to send jitters across the world. To some world leaders the probability of an accidental war appeared very high," the newspaper reported, citing several unnamed Pakistani political, diplomatic and security sources.

Investigations are underway to establish the identity of the caller. Pakistani authorities suspect the phone call came from a number in New Delhi and might have been someone in India's foreign ministry, a claim the Indians rejected outright.

Tensions between India and Pakistan escalated after last week's terrorist attacks in Mumbai that left more than 172 people dead and nearly 250 injured.

Early this week, Rice visited both New Delhi and Islamabad and called upon Pakistan to help in the Mumbai investigations and punish the culprits behind it. At the same time, she urged India to show restraint.

A Attack On India - Mumbai Attack

2008-12-06T17:40:00.003+05:30

I am a Indian, so I am a bit late in responding to the attack on Mumbai, So what? Nothing is going to change and nothing has really changed from the day of the attack to this day, the Home minister resigned, any thing new? The funny part was he did not resign on his own but his boss told him to resign, so he lost his job, (when i meant "Boss" it was not the P.M , but Sonia Gandhi) . The Ex. C.M of Maharashtra did not resign the job because of people pressure but his boss told him to do so ( Again Sonia Gandhi), Did he come to power because of the people or his boss , wet to be decided. I am hearing a lot of "Enough is Enough", Why did the people of India suddenly woke up to the issue, was it because the rich and the power full was killed in the attack , why were we sleeping for the past 60 years? We Indian do not have the guts to stand up against the state, so why waste time and energy.

India a 'third world' country for Matthew Hayden

2008-11-15T10:28:00.003+05:30

Matthew Hayden of OZ has discribed India a "third world" country

Back home after the 2-0 series defeat, Hayden spoke about, what he perceived, poor ground conditions and inordinate delays during the matches "that happen in Third World countries".

If he feels that India is "Third World" country then why the hell he played in the IPL , I think he may not like the country but he like the money that this "Third World " country pays for the sports men,

A player like Hayden should have looked at his own team performances instead of blaming other things, This shows what a bad loser's the OZ are,

China Doubts India's Moon Mission

2008-11-10T11:32:00.001+05:30

Chandrayaan, India’s unmanned mission to the moon which was launched late last month, has received favourable international reaction. On Saturday, the spacecraft successfully entered the lunar orbit, where it is to spend two years scanning the moon’s surface for signs of significant minerals and also water and ice. In many ways, the country’s first flight to the moon projects the spirit of international scientific cooperation in a relatively virgin field. Of the 11 instruments it is carrying on board, three are from the European Space Agency (ESA), two from the US, and one from Bulgaria. Seen in this light, the Indian effort is a part of the shared striving for widening the frontiers of knowledge to benefit the human race. It is therefore surprising to find a contrary reaction to Chandrayaan from China. This is not an official reaction of the Chinese government or its scientific community, but convoluted write-ups in the media purporting to examine technical parameters when the launch was only a few days old. The disparaging observations, whose scientific validity is yet to be commented on, are decidedly premature.

Only a week from now are we expected to have a clearer picture of how India’s unmanned moon probe is going. A couple of months ago, China landed an astronaut on the moon, a remarkable feat. India has moved slower in that direction, and hopes to have its first "gagan-naut" only in the next decade. Its own quicker progress should have made the Chinese self-confident. But that is apparently not the case. Only recently China had become uncertain of itself and made unsuccessful sideways manoeuvres to block the international acceptability of this country’s civilian nuclear programme. A certain element in China’s dealings with India is now becoming evident. It seeks to expand trade and business ties with India. But it continues to remain obstreperous on sorting out the boundary mess, and appears resentful of India’s advances in the more rarefied fields of science and technology involving nuclear and space probes. Of course, these areas have a military side. However, India’s space programme is seen by the leading powers as being wholly civilian in nature, but the same cannot be said of China’s space programme. And perhaps it is this which irks Beijing. Perhaps it is somewhere fearful of India moving in step with the leading democracies in the field of space research (unlike the nuclear field in which India’s experience has been a painful one, much to Chinese glee). The Chinese need be apprehensive of nothing at this stage if they dedicate themselves to building their own brand in the field of space rather than running down another country’s.

Chandrayaan-1 In The Moon's Orbit

2008-11-09T10:10:00.002+05:30

Isro’s mission controllers on Saturday evening plucked the lunar spacecraft Chandrayaan-1 out of earth’s gravitational influence and safely inserted it into an orbit around the moon.

Isro executed the maneuver by sending a command to the spacecraft at 4.51 pm from its nerve center in Peenya, Bengaluru, to fire its engine for precisely 817 seconds. Isro chairman Madhavan Nair said the operation was the "most critical part" of the mission. "We have done it," he exulted. "For the last 20 minutes almost all our hearts were at a standstill," he said.

"The reason the lunar orbit insertion is risky is that we do not get an extended time window to conduct the operation. It had to be done when the spacecraft was exactly 500 km from the moon," Isro spokesperson S. Satish told this newspaper. "At the precise moment that the spacecraft goes out of the influence of earth’s gravity, it must also be captured by the moon’s gravity. Otherwise the spacecraft will be lost in deep space," he explained.

In the past, this earth-to-moon hand-off has proved to be the death knell of several spacecraft which either missed the moon to be lost in deep space, or crashed onto the lunar surface,

Chandrayaan-1 is now in an elliptical orbit that passes over the moon’s polar regions. Its nearest point to the moon (periselene) is 504 km and farthest (aposelene) 7,502 km. In about four further maneuvers, Isro will lower the spacecraft into a circular orbit 100 km above the moon.

The first instrument on the spacecraft has been switched on. The honor went to the Bulgarian instrument Radom which is gathering radiation intensity data.

The Moon Impact Probe piggybacking on Chandrayaan-1, with the Indian tricolor embossed on it, will hard-land on the moon by November 14-15. Isro will then test and switch on one instrument every day.

Bhutan crowns new king

2008-11-06T11:16:00.002+05:30

The Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan has crowned an Oxford-educated, 28-year-old bachelor as its new king.

In an ancient ritual in the white-walled palace overlooking the Thimphu valley on Thursday, Jigme Singye Wangchuck handed his eldest son, Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck, the Raven crown which gives him the title of Druk Gyalpo, or Dragon King.

The palace was packed with hundreds of foreign dignitaries, including Pratibha Patil, India's president, Sonia Gandhi, India's ruling party leader, as well as Bollywood stars.

It was also surrounded by lines of jubilant locals dressed in their national costumes.

The new king has been assuming the responsibilities of monarch since his father abdicated nearly three years ago in an effort to allow the "leadership of a new king and a democratic system of government".

But the coronation was delayed as the century-old Wangchuk dynasty waited for astrologers to give an auspicious date.

Reforms

The three-day ceremony caps the former king's vision of reforming and modernising the deeply traditional and insular nation.

"The best time to change a political system is when the country enjoys stability and peace," the deeply revered former king, who is 52, had said when he first initiated the reform process in 2005.

"Why wait for a revolution? Why crown an heir only when the nation is in mourning for a late king?"

Bhutan, a nation of just over 600,000 people wedged in remote hills and mountains between India and China, held its first democratic elections for a new parliament and prime minister in March.

The new king - the world's youngest reigning monarch - will continue to face the challenge of striking a balance between traditional values and exposure to the world, especially with the younger generation having access to satellite television and the internet.

Bhutan had no roads or currency until the 1960s and allowed television only in 1999.

The new king has pledged to maintain his father's unique philosophy of improving "gross national happiness," and not common economic indicators, to ensure well-being in the country.

Despite being tucked away in the Himalayas, however, the tiny nation has not been immune to modern problems such as drugs and crime, as well as potential external threats.

"The changes we've had are good but there have also been less good things happening," Sonam Subha, a local trader, said. "I'm sure our king will keep us safe."

Obama wins the WhiteHouse

2008-11-05T06:42:00.000+05:30

Reports coming in suggest that Obama will win the race for the White House by a two third majority in the US election.

India's First Woman Saint ?

2008-10-29T19:44:00.000+05:30

Francois Gautier, PioneerIndian media went into a tizzy while covering the canonisation of Sister Alphonsa, an obscure nun, to prove its secular credentials! Indian journalists forget that this country has had other women saints too.As a Frenchman, I was coached right from childhood that logic, what we in France call cartesianism, is the greatest gift given to man and that one should use one's reason to tread in life. Thus, I taught to my students in a Bangalore school of journalism, the SSCMS, that the first tool of a good reporter is to go by his or her own judgement on the ground, with the help of one's first-hand experience — and not go by second hand information: What your parents thought, what you have read in the newspapers, what your caste, religion, culture pushes you into…Yet in India, logic does not seem to apply to most of the media, especially when it is anything related to Hindus and Hinduism. One cannot, for instance, equate Muslim terrorists who blow up innocent civilians in market places all over India to angry ordinary Hindus who attack churches without killing anybody. We know that most of these communal incidents often involve persons of the same caste — Dalits and tribals — some of them converted to Christianity and some not.However reprehensible was the destruction of the Babri Masjid, no Muslim was killed in the process. Compare that with the 'vengeance' bombings of 1993 in Mumbai, which killed hundreds of innocent people, mostly Hindus. Yet Indian and Western journalists keep equating the two, or even showing the Babri Masjid destruction as the most horrible act of the two.How can you compare the Sangh Parivar with the Indian Mujahideen, a deadly terrorist organisation? How can you label Mr Narendra Modi a mass killer when actually it was ordinary middle class, or even Dalit Hindus, who went out into the streets in fury when 56 innocent people, many of them women and children, were burnt in a train?How can you lobby for the lifting of the ban on SIMI, an organisation which is suspected of having planted bombs in many Indian cities, killing hundreds of innocent people, while advocating a ban on the Bajrang Dal, which attacked some churches after an 84-year-old swami and his followers were brutally murdered?There is no logic in journalism in this country when it applies itself to minorities. Christians are supposedly only two per cent of the population in India, but look how last Sunday many major television channels showed live the canonisation ceremony of Sister Alphonsa, an obscure nun from Kerala and see how Union Minister Oscar Fernandes led an entire Indian delegation to the Vatican along with the Indian Ambassador. It would be impossible in England, for instance, which may have a two per cent Hindu minority, to have live coverage of a major Hindu ceremony, like the anointment of a new Shankaracharya. What were the 24×7 news channels, which seem to have deliberately chosen to highlight this non-event, trying to prove? That they are secular? Is this secularism?The headline of the story "India gets its first woman saint", run by many newspapers, both Indian and Western, is very misleading.For India has never been short of saints. The woman sage from over 3,000 years ago, Maithreyi, Andal, the Tamil saint from early in the first Millennium CE and Akkamahadevi, the 15th century saint from modern-day Karnataka, are but a few examples of women saints in India. What many publications failed to mention in the story is that this is the first woman Christian saint — not the first Indian woman saint. This statement is ok, when it comes, for instance, from the BBC, which always looks at India through the Christian prism (BBC ran a few months back an untrue and slanderous documentary on Auroville), but when it comes to the Indian media, it only shows the grave lack of grounding in Indian culture and history of most Indian journalists. As a result, they suffer from an inferiority complex.This inferiority complex, as expressed by television's live coverage of the canonisation of Sister Alphonsa, is a legacy of the British, who strove to show themselves as superior and Indian culture as inferior (and inheritor of the 'White Aryans', a totally false theory). Is it not time to institute schools of journalism, both private and public, where not only logic will be taught, but where students shall be made aware of Indian history and of the greatness of Indian culture, so that when they go out to report, they will use their own judgement and become Indian journalists, with a little bit of feeling, pride and love for their own country?

http://indiaview.wordpress.com/

The new age news media

2008-10-29T19:18:00.003+05:30

The new news channels in India have learned there lessons from the US media , which sensationalizes every thing, which is making news viewing in India a bit complicated, as Indian we don't have the habit of knowing the personal lives of others, we are more like the French people. we don't care what happens inside the house but try to behave in the public , that is why we have a CM in T.N who has 2 houses. but we don't care. The news readers in the TIMES NOW try to shock you with there news items, but to tell you truth , the news reader in the channel are really good looking.

Don't try to call there the phone no. which is normally displayed on there screen on some shows, because there won't be any one to pick up the phone. I have called the channel 5 to 6 times with out any reply, and if, by any chances some one picks up the call, they will ask your name and hang up the call. ( Line not disconnected)

Australia dose it again

2008-10-29T18:51:00.002+05:30

The Australian team under pressure is targeting Gautam Gambhir this time, The OZ's knows the how to play the mind game and then even know that they will not be penilised for what ever they do on the pitch,it is always the player from the sub continent who will be pulled up.

Should the ICC look into this issue.

In India, corruption is just a way of life

2008-10-26T11:19:00.001+05:30

By Joginder Singh (DC -Chennai)

The way a country’s administration is run has vital bearing on its citizens. It is a test of good or bad governance. Revealing how the common man is plagued by corruption, right under the nose of the Central government, in October 2008, 15 officials of the New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) were arrested on charges of bribery and extortion. These arrests were made after a month-long sting operation. It appears that the accused had been forcibly collecting sums up to Rs 30,000 as “protection money” on a monthly basis from shopkeepers.

In a positive new trend, common people are now playing a more active role in conducting sting operations. One such operation was conducted by a property dealer last year. More than 100 traffic personnel (in 30 different areas in the Capital) were caught on camera accepting bribes from Blueline bus operators. A vigilance branch probe into the sting operation established their identities and led to the suspension of 98 policemen: 11 sub-inspectors, 11 assistant sub-inspectors, 10 head-constables and 66 constables.

The reason behind the rise in “petty” corruption is the wide range of powers given to petty enforcement functionaries. At least in the national capital and other big towns there is a pro-active media that raises issues of petty corruption. The farther a place is from the seat of power, the more difficult it is to tackle this problem. In fact, corruption has become a happy compromise over compliance of outdated regulations.

Every government talks of ending the “inspector raj”. But every new law enacted has added one or two more inspectors to the already existing plethora of inspectors. At a recent function, after counting the number of functionaries concerned with the running of any industry, I arrived at the conclusion that at least 35 different inspectors visit an industrial unit. I was immediately corrected by an industrialist who said that the number has gone up to 65 with visits from inspectors from health, electricity, labour, municipal, water, environment, sanitary, weights and measures and many other departments.

Corruption is a preferred choice for the simple reason that pointing out what is wrong is not only time consuming, but also one is not sure if the complaint will ever be redressed. Some time ago, I met a friend who edits and publishes a specialised magazine. He had been working out of his home that happens to be in an area which is both a bazaar and a residential area. He told me his home-office was sealed as the official who came for the sealing drive did not consider his magazine a part of the media though the magazine is registered with the Registrar of Newspapers. My friend is now paying Rs 1,000 a month for working from his own home. When I asked him why he didn’t complain, he said it may take months, if not years, for the court to give its final verdict. He had a choice of going to court and running around for months, or buying peace of mind for Rs 1,000 a month.

This year, Transparency International (TI) has placed India two points lower on the Corruption Perception Index compared to its position in 2007. The only saving grace is that compared to its neighbours, India seems to be doing well. Pakistan, for instance, is at the 140th position compared to India’s 74th. Nepal and Sri Lanka are ranked 135 and 96 respectively. China is ranked one place above India. A study by TI and the Centre for Media Studies found that three-fourth of citizens think that the level of corruption in public services has been going up. They believe that there is no active and sustained civil society movement. And that most efforts are sporadic, localised and short-lived and never quite acquire the character of a larger movement.

The main causes of corruption are lack of transparency and accountability in the system, absence of an effective corruption reporting mechanism and lack of honesty in government officials. People feel that acceptance of corruption has become a way of life, custom and culture. Even if a person is caught taking bribe, it takes years to punish him judicially.

To end corruption, the government should outsource services wherever possible. Public service departments cannot cope with all the demands of India’s large population, especially in the field of education and health. In this scenario, departments should purchase outputs instead of insisting on giving inputs. Also, each department should have realistic and measurable action standards (not just statement of intent) for checking corruption and malpractices within. Corruption can go down only when we ourselves become honest and by following Gandhiji who said: “Be the change you want in others.” Public servants and politicians are corrupt because we are willing to pay them for getting things done. Let each one of us do some thing to fight this evil.

Joginder Singh is a former director of the Central Bureau of Investigation

US economy: A jalopy with flat tyres

2008-10-26T11:17:00.000+05:30

By Bob Herbert

The closer you look at the current economic crisis, the more harrowing it becomes.

The focus in the presidential campaign has been almost entirely on the struggles faced by the middle class — on families worried about their jobs, their mortgages, their retirement accounts and how to pay for college for their kids.

Each nauseating plunge in the Dow heightens their anxiety. Each company that goes under and each government report showing joblessness on the rise intensifies their fear.

No one knows how to quell the uncertainty. And no one is even talking about the poor.

Alan Greenspan, uncharacteristically befuddled, went up to Capitol Hill on Thursday and lamented that some sort of fissure had erupted in his previously impregnable worldview. For Mr Greenspan ("I still do not understand exactly how it happened"), this is a moment of intellectual anxiety.

But if we are indeed caught up in the most severe economic crisis since the Great Depression, the ones who will fare the worst are those who already are poor or near-poor. There are millions of them, and yet they remain essentially invisible. A step down for them is a step into destitution.

Listen to Dr Irwin Redlener, president of the Children’s Health Fund, which he founded with the singer-songwriter Paul Simon to bring health services to poor and homeless children: "First of all, at least in the short term, we can expect more families will become homeless as foreclosures continue to mount and jobs become harder to hold and more difficult to find. As jobs disappear and employers begin trimming expenses, we can foresee people losing health insurance, swelling the ranks of the medically uninsured."

"I don’t think the healthcare system can bear another five million or more people uninsured and economically fragile. More people without insurance will crowd into the nation’s hospital emergency rooms when medical problems become too severe to ignore or there is no other access to basic health services. Such a trend will have a seismic impact on our healthcare system."

Few Americans have noticed, but a tremendous number of hospitals, from Boston to Los Angeles, are in serious, even dire, financial trouble.

A survey of 4,500 hospitals by the New York consulting firm Alvarez & Marsal found that more than half were technically insolvent or at risk of insolvency.

The current economic downturn, combined with an anticipated surge in patients without health insurance, will only worsen what is already a crisis.

The nation’s financial system was all-but-overwhelmed by the mortgage crisis because none of the nation’s leaders paid serious enough attention to the widespread symptoms of what turned out to be a metastasizing disease.

A similar situation exists on a number of important fronts right now: the deteriorating national infrastructure, the woefully inadequate public school system, our self-defeating energy policies, healthcare. Symptoms of serious trouble are staring us in the face, but no one is mounting an adequate response.

When a new President takes office in January, the temptation will be to delay bold action on these fronts until the overall economic situation improves.

That is the kind of mistake (like ignoring the housing and credit bubbles until it was too late or refusing to heed the pre-Katrina warnings in New Orleans) that opens the door to additional crises.

The Alvarez & Marsal study noted that at many community hospitals the physical plant itself is in bad shape because capital funding had to be curtailed because of budget shortfalls.

"There are scores of hospitals that are slowly asphyxiating and slipping into insolvency," the report said, and added, "as they divert capital dollars to fund operations".

"For most of these hospitals, it is only a matter of time before they hit a ‘sudden’ liquidity crisis and cannot make payroll without entering insolvency and being forced into restructuring their finances and operations."

Dr Redlener, who is also a professor at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, said: "The federal government currently strains to pay hospitals more than $35 billion each year to cover the costs of the uninsured. That money comes from general tax revenue, and it is a budget line that will need to be increased if we don’t want to see an epidemic of hospital closures."

Most important, of course, is a revamping (in a sane way) of the health insurance system.

There are no good scenarios in the offing. The markets are in turmoil. Banks are being nationalised. The US auto industry has the look of a jalopy with four flat tires.

The evidence of decline and decay is everywhere around us.

There has never been a time since World War II when the nation was more in need of a presidential administration with a comprehensive vision and the ability to lead on several fronts at once.

In the Cold

2008-10-26T11:15:00.000+05:30

Srinjoy Chowdhury,
Senior Editor, TIMES NOW

Before we begin this quirky little tale, here are the numbers. India, a country of 1.1 billion people has an army of 1.1 million soldiers. Thirty thousand are officers and almost at the top of the pyramid, after considerable winnowing, are left about two hundred major-generals. Sixty of them make it to lieutenant-general and of course, there can be only one chief. But just think, two hundred out of many thousands means drastic pruning at every stage. Men are separated from the well, not so capable men and eventually, just a handful has the right to be called ‘General Saab’.

Even among this elite club of 200, there are a chosen few. These are the three-dozen men with a future, men who get to command a division, a unit of about 12,000 men. And among the divisions, many of which are strung along India’s difficult borders is 3 Infantry Division.

Commanding 3 Division is quite a job. First, it’s not really a division but virtually a corps, a unit that usually comprises three divisions. For, it defends 1,160 kms of India’s border, and perhaps, some of the most difficult areas. The gentleman in charge of 3 Division faces China and Pakistan. And yes, a considerable chunk of the division is parked in Siachen, the world’s highest and most inhospitable battlefield. There is also Ladakh, easily -40 degrees Celsius in winter and barren throughout the year, not to mention the small matter of the increasingly aggressive Chinese army on your doorstep. Siachen, weather-wise is even worse. If soldiers didn’t die in the mid-Eighties because of the shelling, the cold killed them.

One man gets the responsibility to be GOC. And he should be quite a guy: capable enough to handle a division as challenging as 3 Divison and therefore, good enough to do better.

Now, for the sting in the tail. Well, tale actually. Look at the list of the last eight major-generals who commanded the division and you see what the army euphemistically calls 100 per cent wastage. The list begins with P.K. Renjen, a gunner officer. After his command, he held several other posts and faded away. His successor, V.S Badhwar, is remembered for all the wrong reasons, being the general in charge when the intrusions into Kargil unexpectedly happened in 1999. Several thousand Pakistani soldiers had entered and dug in, but his patrols hadn’t noticed a thing till they were fired upon.

Expectedly, nothing much happened to Badhwar, but his successor Sheru Thapliyal’s case is even more curious. He had had a good career but they say you can’t choose your parents. Well, it isn’t easy to choose your bosses either. Both his bosses are remembered as men who rarely gave anything more than 7-7.5 on ACRs of officers, a way of ensuring a long, lingering professional death. Thapliyal and his successor Rakesh Das, who was defence attaché in Pakistan, fell to the same ACR trap and were sent on their way.

A few more good men followed: Ravi Malhan and P. Rajagopal, both paratroopers and ‘Tally’ Sidhu, an armoured corps officer, all consigned to obscurity. That brings us to Anil Lal, just dismissed from the army after being under the scanner for a series of alleged un-officer like activities.

Of the eight, two have clearly messed up for different reasons and needed to be sent home. What defies explanation is why the other six generals were made to walk into the sunset. Sure, you will hear how much of a pyramid the army is—200 major-generals and 60 lieutenant-generals-- but as far as explanations go, it is about the lamest one you can find. The man you send to command 3 Division should be and is hand-picked: he cannot be just any major-general but a man with a future, a man with sufficient capability, with élan to face the Chinese and the Pakistanis at the same time. What’s the bottom line then? You’re either sending a lame-duck for one of the most sensitive jobs in the army or you’re sending a good man and then, shafting him after he finishes a really tough assignment! Or, is there another explanation that no one knows about?

There is something that we do know…. One army commander remembered for leaving behind broken careers courtesy, his tough markings, wrote to his army chief in the evening of his career. He admitted he had been a little tough and could anything be done. Some good did come out of it and a major general marching towards obscurity was rescued but it was too late for a couple of GOCs.

The 3 Division hoodoo has got so bad that some officers, rumour goes, would rather opt out of commanding a division comprising 25,000 troops, 675 officers who are part of 23 battalions, including Ladakh Scouts, ITBP and Vikas units. A normal infantry division has only nine.

The question top officers in the army now ask is: “How long will this run of bad luck continue?”

Rape of a Nun in Kandhmal

2008-10-25T10:10:00.004+05:30

The nun who was allegedly raped in Kandhamal in Orissa came before the media on 24-oct and recounted her trauma, which is understandable , but unwilling to cooperate with the Orissa police to identify the culprits is shocking, The SC has already rejected CBI probe into the incident. If every victim wants a CBI probe , then why do we need a police force (A waste of Manpower and money?).
I understand that some people in the police force did not help her in the hour of need, even so, blaming the whole police force is not some thing which is acceptable.

India not ready for WAR

2008-10-25T09:56:00.003+05:30

The latest audit report by Comptroller and Auditor Generalon (CAG) on the armed forces comes up with two stunning disclosures.

1. More than half of India's submarines are not battle-ready.
2. India's radars are too old and too few to provide any credible defence against an air attack.

It went on to state that only 48 per cent of Indian Naval ageing submarines are available for waging war, should India be attacked. The rest are in repair and refit.
Nearly 50% of the of the Indian Navy's submarines are in there last stage of life and nearly 63% of the submmarine fleet would be reddy for phase-out by 2012.

It also stated that the numbers are too few and way below apporved force levels which was apporved 23 years ago.

The air defence radars are in that same state, adding to this submarine-launched Klub land-attack cruise missile, is malfunctioning.

The report also indictment of the lack of hygiene and common sense in India's defence acquisition process

Police will never act against Hindus

2008-10-25T09:51:00.001+05:30

By -- Surendra Gangan (g_surendra@dnaindia.net)
DNA

Many Muslim organisations feel perpetrators of violence are dealt with according to their religion

Muslim organisations are not ready to believe that police will act strictly if Hindu outfits are found to be involved in the Malegaon blast.

Editor of Urdu daily Hindustan Sarfraz Arzoo said that following his pervious experiences, he is not ready to believe that the Hindu perpetrators will be punished. “What is wrong in expecting a fair investigation of the blast and punishment to the people involved? But the perpetrators are treated according to their religion. The accused in the Nanded blast that happened in early 2007 were let off by the police as they were Hindus,” he said.

Samajwadi Party’s state unit chief Abu Asim Azmi said police have always been soft on the Hindu outfits which are involved in terrorist activities. “Whenever bomb blasts take place, Muslims and particularly youths are picked up from areas like Govandi, Mumbra, Naya Nagar and many innocents are booked for no fault of theirs. Police have ruined the lives of well-educated Muslim youths like Khwaja Younis and Dr Matin, who were booked for the Ghatkopar blast few years ago. There are incidents when agitations by the Muslim community have been answered with firing, but police don’t even raise laathis against Raj or Bal Thackeray’s party workers who resort to violence.”

However, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is not ready to accept that any Hindu outfit is involved in the Malegaon blasts case. On the contrary, it says there has been a campaign to spread wrong information in the society. “Police force is being used for political gimmick or pacifying public outburst. The force is totally demoralised. It is made to leak such information without having completed the investigation in a case,” said BJP spokesperson Madhav Bhandari.

Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) has denied its connection with Pradnya Singh, an accused arrested by police in the Malegaon blasts case, and has blamed media for announcing the organisation’s involvement without any firm proof.

ABVP national deputy president Milind Marathe has threatened newspapers for involving his organisation in the Malegaon case. “This is a trial started by the media that has published reports without verifying any fact. This has been a conspiracy of some forces and political minds because our organisation has started fighting against terrorism,” he said.

Gilchriste - Tendulkar a liar

2008-10-24T11:18:00.004+05:30

Gilchrist in his autobiography "True Colours My Life", being released next week, has accused Tendulkar of being a liar and dose not have the sport's man ship after loosing the test, he has even called Tendulkar's witness in the "Monkeygate" affair a joke. He said that when Tendulkar told the initial hearing that he could not hear what was said, he was "certain he was telling the truth" because he was "a fair way away".

But Tendulkar told the appeal that Harbhajan used a Hindi term that sounded like "monkey" to Australian ears. Harbhajan's suspension was quashed, infuriating the Australians. Tendulkar has be accused of many things like ball tampering but never un-sport's manship.
Is this a poly from Gilchrist to sell his book and get some cheap publicity?

Raj Thackeray arrested -- Was it too late and too little ?

2008-10-21T18:31:00.004+05:30

Arresting Raj Thackeray now? what was the government doing all this time? When Congress was making a hue and cry over violence in Orissa Mr. Thackeray was doing what he is best known for , dividing Indian on some flimsy grounds. I have written about Mr.Thackeray a few months ago trying to find what the Maha. Government was going about home. The Congress Government did not try to stop Mr.Thackeray.

Why is EC keeping quite? why can't they debar MNS. Is the Congress party is trying to create a division in Mr.Bal Thackeray's party? Some thing should be done about this and quickly.

No Punjabi loses an election in Canada

2008-10-17T19:04:00.000+05:30

Report in IBNLIVE.COM

It is balle-balle time for over half a million Punjabis in Canada as all the nine Indian-Canadians elected as MPs in Tuesday's election are of Punjabi origin.

In fact, the new parliament now has three turbaned Sikh MPs as Tim Uppal of the ruling Conservative Party joins Gurbax Malhi and Navdeep Bains of the opposition Liberal Party in the 308-member House of Commons.

Uppal, the 34-year-old Canadian-born property investor, has been elected from Edmonton Sherwood Park for the first time.

Another first-time Punjabi MP is Devinder Shory who has been elected from Calgary Northeast, beating two fellow Indian-Canadians - Sanam Kang of the Liberal Party and Vinay Dey of the New Democratic Party (NDP).

Shory, who is a practising lawyer in Calgary, previously tried his luck in the Alberta provincial elections.

Malhi, who was the first turbaned Sikh to become an MP in Canada in 1993, is back in parliament for the sixth time.

"The secret of my success are my diverse constituents - 50 percent of whom are white. I listen to them, I am where they want me to be and I raise their concerns in parliament," Malhi said.

Expressing happiness over the election of another turbaned Sikh, he said: "It is good to have more of our people in positions of importance. Tim Uppal's election is good news for us. He will help spread the message about ourselves - who we are."

In his new term, Malhi said, his priority is to facilitate Canadian visas for visitors from Punjab.

"Right now, the Canadian office in Chandigarh does not issue visas to most people. I introduced a motion on the issue in parliament last year for a bond system and I will do it again now," he said.

The six-time MP said he will also introduce a motion to check fraud marriages by Indian-Canadians in Punjab.

"The motion will make it mandatory that if someone goes to Punjab to get married and bring his or her spouse, he or she should not be allowed to remarry for five years if they divorce after coming to Canada," he said.

Deepak Obhrai, who was a parliamentary secretary in the last government, recorded his fifth victory in Calgary East seat, securing 66.5 percent of the vote.

Chandigarh-educated Obhrai, who is expected to be given a higher position when Prime Minister Stephen Harper announces his new team soon, said: "It is up the prime minister to decide. I am not sure about anything because there are many contenders."

Canada's first Indian-origin MP Nina Grewal was elected for the third time from Fleetwood-Port Kells in British Columbia province, as was fellow Punjabi Ruby Dhalla from Brampton-Springdale on the outskirts of Toronto.

Navdeep Bains retained Mississauga Brampton South and Sukh Dhaliwal Newton-North Delta for the Liberal Party.

Former Canadian health minister Ujjal Dosanjh managed to win by only 779 votes in Vancouver South, securing 16,774 votes as against 15,995 by Wai Young of the ruling party.

"We (Punjabis) are more than half a million among 33 million Canadians. To have nine Punjabi-origin MPs in the 308-member parliament is our big achievement," said Balwant Sanghera of the Punjabi Language Education Association (PLEA) in British Columbia.

Singur after TATA Nano - III

2008-10-16T12:11:00.000+05:30

Land prices drop in Singur
Report in Times Of India

Party time for landowners in Singur is over. As feared, land prices have started falling in and around the area, after the Nano pullout.
This has sent shockwaves among landowners and brokers who wanted to make fast money by selling the Nano dream to investors from Kolkata and other parts of the country.

Meet Mithai Ghosh, a Singur-based land broker. Ghosh played a gamble. He purchased 20 acres of land bang opposite the Tata shed across the Durgapur Expressway at a premium, hoping that the ancillaries with the mother plant would finally be shifted to this plot. It didn't happen. Now Ghosh has no takers for the land at such a high price.

"I, along with some of my friends, had bought the land after the Tatas started setting up the factory. We thought that we would make a kill, because companies from various parts of the country kept calling us, offering three times the existing rates. We chose to hold on to the plot expecting land prices to rise further. We never thought that the Tatas would pull out of Singur especially when the construction work was nearing completion," Ghosh said. The price of the plot has gone down to Rs 20,000 per cottah, which amounts to Rs 12 lakh an acre — the initial offer by the government for double-crop land.

Satya Prakash Das spent all his money in land along the Durgapur Expressway. "I purchased five acres along the expressway at Rs 4 lakh a cottah. It was about two years ago, when the Tatas started setting up the Nano factory. The prices have started falling. Now I don't know what to do because I can’t wait indefinitely," said Das, a Singur resident.

Kushal Saha, former pradhan of the Trinamool Congress-run Beraberi gram panchayat, has met with a similar plight. "We have land in this area, adjoining the Tata compound. At one point of time, brokers offered me Rs 5 lakh a cottah. But now, they have stopped coming to my house,” said Saha. Landowners near the 997-acre Tata compound have all come to realise what they lost. This apart, real estate brokers from Kolkata, who bought huge tracts of land within 20 kilometres of the project area, are left in the lurch.

"Initially we made huge money. We bought land as low as Rs 3 lakh an acre when the project was announced in May 2006. A lot of companies and real estate groups bought land from us. We kept on buying land even Dankuni, 12 kilometres away from Singur. But this time, it didn't pay. Land prices in the area reached Rs 24 lakh an acre. The high price was coming in the way of the second phase of investment. Companies from Mumbai and even abroad such as Indonesia put off their projects because of the abnormal price," a Kolkata based real estate broker said.

Should BBCI team be the only Indian team ?

2008-10-15T12:14:00.006+05:30

The Board of Control for Cricket in India, or BCCI, is the apex governing body for cricket in India. The board was formed in 1929. It is a society, registered under the Tamil Nadu Societies Registration Act. The BCCI often uses government-owned stadiums across the country at a nominal annual rent. It is a private club consortium. Basically to become a member of a state-level association, you need to be introduced by another member and also pay an annual fee. The state-level clubs select their representatives (secretaries) who in turn select the BCCI officials. As for any private club, BCCI or the state-level associations are not required to make their balance sheets public. {Source from WIKIPEDIA}

The Board of Control for Cricket in India was established in December 1928 as the single national governing body for all cricket in India. It is headquartered in Mumbai. {Source BCCI web site http://bcci.tv}

Who gave the right to the BCCI to clam that they are the only team which can represent the country. BCCI is not a government organization and it is not entitled to show its revenues to the public. If it clams that it represents Indian, should the Indian people have a say in it's functions ?

Why cant any other board like ICL clam that they are the representatives for the country in the world stage?

Why can't the Indian government take over the BCCI and run it, why can't the BCCI be placed under Sports Authority of Indian which is under Sports Minister?

Singur after TATA Nano - II

2008-10-15T12:09:00.005+05:30

Report from THE HINDU

Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh, along with Trinamool Congress president Mamata Banerjee, on Tuesday met President Pratibha Patil and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to apprise them of the situation at Singur in West Bengal. They demanded that the State government be asked to honour an agreement to return land to farmers who had not accepted compensation for their plots acquired for Tatas’ ancillary unit.

Seeking dismissal of the State government for the “breakdown of a constitutional agreement,” Ms. Banerjee told journalists here that she was not looking for the 600 acres earmarked for Tatas’ Nano project.

“There are many Tatas, anyone can come there. We want the 400 acres acquired for the adjoining ancillary unit returned to farmers who did not want to part with their land and who have not accepted any compensation. The government will have to implement it or go out of power.”

The Trinamool chief said nobody knew why Tatas withdrew from Singur. “They withdrew unilaterally and the government withdrew unilaterally. The Left parties withdrew support to the United Progressive Alliance government over the nuclear agreement, while they themselves failed to honour the agreement on Singur. We will continue to fight this socially, legally and politically.”

Accompanied by leaders of the West Bengal SP and Janata Dal (United), among others, Mr. Amar Singh said at the joint press conference that they briefed the Prime Minister and the President on the Singur farmers facing tough time due to the policies of the State government. “No jan andolan can run for so long unless the people are with it.”

On Mr. Ratan Tata’s remarks after he shifted the Nano project to Gujarat, Mr. Amar Singh said: “To say Ms. Mamata, who was fighting for the poor, was the bad M and Mr. Modi [Gujarat Chief Minister] was the good M was a personal attack on Ms. Banerjee for which she should sue him. Mr. Tata should decide whether he wants to be an industrialist or politician.”

Mr. Singh said he would raise the issue of special economic zones with the Congress leadership when the UPA-SP Coordination Committee met here on Friday.

MP's from T.N to quit over Sri Lanka

2008-10-15T11:54:00.002+05:30

Mp's from T.N have given the central government 2 weeks time to stop any military aid to Sri Lanka and try to stop the fighting between LTTE and the Sri Lankan army or they have threatened to quit there post. The Sri Lankan army is in the final stage of clearing out LTTE and the MP's in Tamil Nadu want to give some time to the rebels, so that they can re group and strengthen there positions. Political commentator S Murari adds: "Whenever the LTTE suffers serious reverses, pro-LTTE voices protest. Even the two Dravidian giants, the DMK and AIADMK have got sucked into this competitive chauvinism."

Is it not supporting a terrorist organization in an foreign country?

Tamil people are suffering in Sri Lanka because of LTTE, I thing we should support Sri Lankan army in this hour of need and see to that the terrorist LTTE is dismantled for good, the Indian government can help Sri Lanka in negotiations.

Gandhiji wouldn't have approved Smoking Ban

2008-10-14T18:11:00.002+05:30

By all accounts Gandhiji was an abstemious sort of chap. Tee-total non-smoker, who renounced the material world and was a celibate to boot. So on the face of it, no one raised an eyebrow when Union Health Minister Dr. Ambumani Ramadoss decided to ban smoking in public places on Gandhi Jayanti.

Then again the ascetical Father of the Nation was a humanist and everyone just assumed that imposing the ban on his birthday, in the larger interest of public health, would have met with Gandhiji's approval. But had the good doctor been well versed with his 'Gandhi', he would never have instituted the ban on the Mahatma's birthday to begin with.

Sure, a ban on smoking is politically correct and may well be high on symbolism, but sadly it does a great disservice to Mahatma's philosophy and its praxis.

For Gandhiji, 'rational discussion and persuasion', not blanket bans, were the best way to deal with a situation of conflict. Especially with regards to a conflict such as this: A cabinet minister imposing his will upon a resentful public not convinced of the logic behind the firman.

Indeed the debate over the ban has focussed not so much on its benefits but on how it infringes upon the individual's right to chose. Be that as it is, Gandhiji would have frowned upon the method employed by Dr Ramadoss.

The Satyagrahi in Gandhiji would have relied upon a reasoned approach. He would have wanted the contending parties, the minister and the public, 'to discuss, look at the issue from each other's point of view, appreciate the force of each other's arguments and arrive at a view based on the insights of both and acceptable to both'.

This as we all know wasn't quite the route taken by Dr Ramadoss or even those lobbying against his anti-tobacco campaign. Frustrated by the strong backlash his pronouncement elicited from the paying public, the minister went for broke. By imposing the ban, he brutally quashed debate. In the metaphysical universe it was an act of grave violence: A brutish desecration of rationale.

The non-violent cogitator in Gandhiji would have died a thousand deaths than resort to violence (ahimsa) of this variety. In Bapu's view the use of violence emphasises untruth and can never be the path to realising the truth.

This is primarily because the use of violence is predicated on the assumption that those resorting to it are 'absolutely right, the opponent absolutely wrong and that the violence would definitely achieve the desired result.'

Now we know that as far as the ban on smoking is concerned this is not entirely the case. Both the parties to this conflict - smokers and non-smokers - are at best only partially right. And the ban itself does not guarantee a result, morally questionable and practicably ineffectual as it is.

In the end analysis it is then fair to conclude that doctor Ramadoss's strong medicine would have left the Father of the Nation feeling ill at ease.

By Rahul Shivshankar, Senior Editor, TIMES NOW

EU divided over Russian Talks

2008-10-14T13:30:00.000+05:30

EU nations were divided over whether to resume
talks on a political and economic pact with Russia that were frozen in protest over its war with Georgia.

Germany and Italy led the campaign to resume discussions on trade, energy and political ties on Monday after Moscow withdrew its forces from parts of Georgia according to the terms of an EU-brokered cease-fire.

But some EU foreign ministers, led by Britain's David Miliband, said they wanted to see progress in talks on the future of the disputed Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia before pressing ahead with closer ties.

The debate will continue at a two-day EU summit starting tomorrow in Brussels, Belgium, officials said.

EU leaders agreed last month to suspend the talks to show their opposition to Moscow's invasion, a move that irked Russian officials. The leaders of the 27-nation bloc also ordered a review of overall ties and alternative energy sources. Russia supplies a third of the EU's oil and 40 per
cent of its natural gas.

Georgia's Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, said Russian military planes twice violated Georgian airspace yesterday over parts of South Ossetia and western Georgia. Russia's Defense Ministry could not immediately be reached for comment.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told an EU foreign ministers meeting that Russian troops had left Georgian territory outside the separatist regions but had not withdrawn to positions held before the five-day war broke out Aug 7.

Kouchner, who was in Georgia last week, said "there were problems that remain." He said the presence of Russian troops in portions of the breakaway regions that had been under Georgian control before the war, including Abkhazia's Kodori Gorge, a broad swath of South Ossetia, and the town of Akhalgori were still of concern to EU nations.

Indian Deep Space Network (IDSN) is working

2008-10-14T13:28:00.001+05:30

Last week, the Japanese lunar mission SELENE (Koguya), which was unveiled in 2007 and is now orbiting the moon was successfully tracked by Indian Deep Space Network (IDSN), which is an intelligent communications infrastructure, designed and set up by the Indian Space Research Organization to transmit and receive signals from Chandrayaan 1.

According to S. K. Shiva Kumar, Director, ISRO Telemetry Tracking and Command (ISTRAC), “We have been able to establish downlink with the spacecraft with the help of JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency).”

He further added, “We have also been able to bring uplink fairly quickly, establish contact with the spacecraft and track the spacecraft successfully. That has given us ample confidence. If you have tracked a similar object closer to the moon and have been able to establish links with it with good margins, to that extent your comfort level is high. You don’t have to worry about our capability to do [it] with Chandrayaan.”

The IDSN has been set up 40 km away from Bangalore at a village called Byalalu. Cahndrayaan, which is expected to be launched on 22nd October, is all dependent upon this set up, since it is the constant communication link to the lunar satellite from the ground. It has been set up with the aim to track and also to control orbit and housekeeping operations for the entire duration of the moon mission, which is of about two years.

Trouble for NANO in Gujarat

2008-10-14T13:17:00.002+05:30

Congress leaders in Gujarat doesn't want any credit going Mr.Modi's way. The state Congress is up in arms along with the farmers saying the compensation given for their land is not enough. The Congress in Gujarat says they want an RTI into the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between Tata Motors and state government. The Congress clam "This land worth of Rs 1000 crore has been given at almost no cost to the Tatas for their project of only Rs 1500 crore. This is just not only state exchequer lost its income but also the poor farmers have been deprived of their legitimate demands of compensation for their own land," said Arjun Modhvadia, leader of opposition. The farmers in Sanand are almost echoing the anti-Nano protestors in Bengal. The government has argued that this is government land and the farmers have no claim over it. But egged on by the Congress, the farmers in Sanand the site of the plant have intensified their protests. The farmers claim they are historic owners of the land and that the dispute is already in court. They have brought a new legal notice against the government for not compensating them.But many say that this is political posturing by the Congress, which unlike Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal, cannot afford to escalate its anti-Nano protests. Congress leaders say that they welcome the Nano project as it benefits Gujarat. They are only asking for compensation for the farmers. Also, many of the Congress leaders are leading industrialists and have more than just a political stake in Gujarat's economic growth.

Central Govt. to sack Orissa Govt.?

2008-10-10T17:17:00.003+05:30

The nationwide revulsion at the confirmed rape of a 28-year-old nun in the troubled Kandhamal district of Orissa almost gave the UPA government at the Centre the requisite handle to dismiss the Naveen Patnaik Government. Having earlier sent a warning to the state government (though Article 355 was not invoked), a section of the Manmohan Singh government seriously believed that the imposition of President’s rule under Article 356 was the logical next step. It didn’t happen because Congressruled Assam also witnessed communal clashes and because there are multiple power centres in the Cabinet—each one negating the other.

Those with memories may recall that there was still a Congress government in Bhubaneshwar when the Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons were burnt to death in an inaccessible corner of Mayurbhanj district in Orissa on January 22, 1999.

The Vajpayee Government, which was then in power at the Center, sent its senior most Christian minister George Fernandes to the spot to reassure local Christians. The stress was on confidence building measures, not political recriminations.

That was because both the Centre and the state government knew the murder of Staines flowed from local tensions centred on competitive religiosity.

If the center is unwilling to dismiss the W.B and Assam Govt. then what right they have to sack Orissa Govt.?

Chandrayaan-1 to moon without insurance

2008-10-10T17:02:00.003+05:30

India's first moon mission Chandrayaan-1 which will blast off on 22nd Oct, the project which will cost Rs 386 crore, including Rs 100 crore for establishing Indian Deep Space Network near Bangalore that would receive the signals from the satellites.

The project in not covered under any insurance as Chandrayaan-1 is a scientific project, it would not require any insurance cover. “We have not taken any cover for this project,” S Satish, spokesperson of ISRO said. The Made-in-India rocket bearing the lunar spacecraft will lift off as per schedule provided the weather is right. As per the plan, the 1.5-ton Chandrayaan spacecraft will take approximately eight days to travel about 240,000 miles before reaching its final orbit 60 miles above the surface of the moon. A crash landing of a lunar vehicle on the moon's surface is also planned.

According to insurance officials the cost of insuring space launches is extremely high due to high rate of failure. Also the risk almost entirely reinsured since Indian markets do not have the depth to cover launches on their own. Because of the high rate of failure the premium rates vary between 25-33% of the sum insured. “ISRO has a good track record of launches and can go for self insurance,” the official said.

Gov. to ban Bajrang Dal ?

2008-10-08T11:26:00.002+05:30

An influential section of the UPA, including Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav and Minister for Steel Ram Vilas Paswan, are calling for a ban on the Bajrang Dal,the same people who oppose banning SIMI. The role of the Bajrang Dal will be discussed as a part of the Home Ministry report sought by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The advocacy has gained heft with the Samajwadi Party transforming itself into a supporter of UPA.

The National Minorities Commission has recommended a ban on the Bajrang Dal for its alleged role in the attacks on churches in Karnataka. Which never opened there mouth about banning SIMI.

OK lets us ban Bajrang Dal and also ban conversion, who about that? The root issue for all these violence is conversion, why can't we ban it, The Indian Constitution gives the guaranty for following his own religion but never approves conversion. So people can not clam that the Constitution gives them the right to convert people.

India is the only country in world which has majority Hindu population why are we not taking any action to save that image. Hinduism never believes in converting. That is why Hindus are targeted by other religions.

Dangerous politics from Amar Singh & SP

2008-10-07T18:49:00.003+05:30

What is Amar Singh and the SP is trying to do to India, I have seen them raising the communal card in all the places, Only in India we see politician lining to visit a terror suspect houses as soon as he is arrested, whihc shows that they don't belive in the police force of this country.

Lately Mr. Amar Singh has doubted the shootout in the NCR and has tried to dis fame a honest cop. If this type of politics is made to grow in this country we will not a country in next 50 to 60 years

What are these politicians trying to archive by supporting a terror suspects, is it the vote bank politics? What about the people who lost there loved ones and the people who have suffered because of terror acts? Do they not count for the votes?

The present central government is sandwiched between saving the country and saving there own government, and every one in this country knows, which will be saved.

Tata Nano in Gujarat

2008-10-07T18:41:00.002+05:30

Farmers in villages adjoining Gujarat's Sanand have welcomed Tatas' decision to relocate the Rs 1 lakh-Nano car project there and appeared ready to give their land for construction of approach roads to the site. After scouting many sites in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, the Tatas decided to set up the project at Sanand, near Ahmedabad, where the state government will give 1,000 acres land from the Anand Agricultural University (AAU).

"We welcome Tatas for setting up their Nano car plant in the state. There is no trace of objection from farmers of the villages around the site," Bharatbhai Vaghela, a farmer of Kalana village which is near to the AAU farm told media."Farmers are even ready to give their land for approach roads to the site of AAU," Vaghela said, adding this is good for the area and the state.

"I am glad to make the sacrifice of my land for the Tatas project," another farmer-turn-industrialist Ravubhai Vaghela, who holds substantial land in Khoda and Naranpur village from where the approach road to the site is likely to pass, said.The new project site was finalised last evening and a Memorandum of Understanding (Mou) between the Tatas and state government will be signed later in the day.

The site, just 30 km. from city, will be an ideal place for the Tatas as it has close connectivity to National Highway-8 connecting Rajkot and Ahmedabad.Tatas Nano project faced a lot of resistance from farmers in Singur in West Bengal.The site is also near the proposed Dholera port to be set up as part of the industrial development project as part of the implementation of Delhi-Mumbai freight corridor, officials said, adding it will help Tatas in future to export the car.

It is also near to Rajkot where some of the components for the Nano car plants are prepared by ancillary units, they said while noting that local people at Sanand are happy as they think the project will revive the economy of the region."The immediate fallout of the project coming to Sanand will be increase in land prices and it will benefit farmers surrounding the plant a lot," Bharat Vaghela said.

Also the local people hope to get jobs in the huge plant, he said.Expectations are also high among landless labourers of the villages around the site."We expect to get jobs in the Nano car plant. If the project gives jobs to the landless labourers then it is very good for the entire area," Hiteshkumar Kedarsinh, a landless labourer working in the land of Virendrasinh Vaghela said.

The land which is being offered to Tatas is farmland of AAU which was being used to grow grass.
The AAU has already transferred the land to the state government for handing over around 1,000 acres to the Tatas, officials of the university said.

Singur after TATA Nano

2008-10-07T18:11:00.003+05:30

What is in store for Singur after TATA's pullout, many people's dreams were shattered, most of the people were looking forward for a better life in the further, which is now gone in thin air because of mindless politics, who are the real losers , the political class? no way , they have other issue to raise,
every one will forget Singur in the near further and the people will slip in to poverty again , the data available shows increase in number of savings accounts, people trained for new jobs,that in one year the Nano plant has already had positive economic impact on life in Singur. As other states line up to offer the best deal to TATA, hopefully the destitute landowners of Singur (ultimately they must benefit) will start thinking for themselves rather than listening to vested political interests. I read a good article in Times of India the other day "When everyone lost"

Which clearly shows that everyone in W.B have lost. I am unable to think about the people of Singur , who were shows a slice of good life and was taken away from them when they got used to it. what a tragedy.

Indian Laws still ANCIENT

2008-10-01T17:08:00.000+05:30

Law of the land determines the fate of the Nation. Development of a Nation also depends on the law maker, the law made by them, legal system of the country, the administration, rules and regulations and the enforcing and the governing body. It is said that if a law is well made and it has a relevant and specific purpose it is easy to implement it.

Further, with the changing times, the laws and the rules and regulations should also be changed and amended from time to time. But unfortunately in our country, the parliament is not so proactive that they look into the outdated laws and amend suitably according to the changing times.

For an instance, the Punjab Excise Act still says that when you open a bar, you have to call the ‘DHOL WALA’ ( Drummer ) to announce its inaugural. Imagine, that a high society lounge is being inaugurated in a posh area and a DHOLWALA has to be called in the inauguration and get the photographs clicked and submit them to the excise authorities to get the license. A funny sight indeed.

Again, the Indian Factories Act stipulates that each factory in India should have a water pot in the factory premises to provide drinking water to the employees. In today world, no one would install a water pot in its factory but would rather prefer to install a water cooler. Even today authorities inspecting the factory pressing for the water pot. The authorities even fined the factory for not having a water pot in its premises. You all will be surprised to know that the huge multiplexes ( commercial malls etc) are also categorized as a ‘FACTORY’ according to the statute. Now imagine that all the multiplexes in the country having to put a water pot in their premises.

One more funny but true instance of law not being amended can be seen in the Punjab Police Act. According to the act the Punjab police has to send daily reports to its headquarters in Lahore. So Pakistani President Pervez Mussharaf has one more reason to be angry with India as according to the Punjab Police Rules 1914, the act stipulates that the Punjab Police has to keep in touch with it head quarters in Lahore on a daily basis and the rules have not been changed til today—hence they still remain in force. So in a way, the head quarters of Punjab Police is still in Pakistan — A country with which we have fought 3 wars.

If any reader can find any more FUNNY Indian Laws , post a comment.

10 Reasons to marry an Indian Man

2008-10-01T16:49:00.002+05:30

I though this post was funny……

10. They come in a family pack. You get a mother, a father, a few sisters-in-law, half dozen cousins, and countless relatives for free.
9. They would never leave you. They get fat and lazy too fast and no woman will ever be interested in them.
8. You will never get tired of hubby improvement projects. They come with countless imperfections and guaranteed to be really slow learners.
7. Despite their crude exterior and rude attitude, they are docile at heart. They are well trained by their mother to follow orders from woman of the house. You are in control.
6. They would be grateful all their lives; all other 37 girls they interviewed turned them down.
5. They will be available all the time. They do not have any friends or social life or passion to keep them busy.
4. You never have to worry about their past girlfriends: most likely they never had one, or in the rare case they had a girlfriend, she is too busy erasing the memory.
3. You will earn the sympathy of everyone, even your worst enemy.
2. They will stop harassing you once you marry them.

And number one reason for marrying an Indian man

1. For the rest of your life whenever you say “I could have done better,” you will be right

I found it here…. http://6mile.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/10-reasons-to-marry-an-indian-man/

Chiranjeevi's fans allege neglect

2008-10-01T16:20:00.004+05:30

It seems all is not well in actor-turned-politician Chrjaneevi's political party Prajarajyam. His followers allege that Chiranjeevi has no time for them.

The celluloid magic is not working for Chiranjeevi, who began his political stint with words like “I know the suffering of poor, I understand their tears.”

The star has to contend with growing disillusionment in his fledging party in which many lower leaders have apparently felt sidelined. The actor’s party office in Hyderabad's elite Jubilee Hills is reportedly open only to select people.

“We came to the main office with a lot of expectation,” Pullaramana, a fan, said while another person told CNN-IBN that he had been waiting to see the actor for the last one month.

The coterie around the star is calling the shots and veteran politicians are not willing to take it lying down. Already a few, who had crossed over to this dream party, are saying that the party is over.

The common complaint is that it's a family-run establishment. His brother-in-law Allu Aravind, younger brothers Pavan Kalyan and Naga Babu keep a tight leash over things and even decide on who will get access to the leader.

Meanwhile, Spokesperson of Prajarajyam Parakala Prabhakar said, “A decision on Chiranjeevi cannot be arrived at by the number of people who have not met him. Around 5,000 people come to meet him everyday but he cannot meet all of them on the same day.”

Already, the actor's fan clubs and the new entrants are at loggerheads. The discontent is expected to come out in the open once Chiranjeevi begins his tour of the state on Gandhi Jayanti.

Meanwhile, the Congress and the TDP are happily watching the chaos. Unless, the actor-politician is able to overcome these extended teething troubles, his party may not become a real threat to the established parties in the state.

Battle over Gay Rights

2008-10-01T11:30:00.002+05:30

Chapter XVI, Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code a piece of legislation in India introduced during British rule of India used to criminalize homosexual activity.It is also commonly referred to as the ‘Anti-sodomy Law’. The Section 377 was drafted in 1860 by Lord Macaulay as a part of the colonial project of regulating and controlling the British- and Indian-origin subjects, which reads:

* Unnatural sexual offenses: Whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with another person of the same sex shall be punished with imprisonment which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.

* Explanation: Penetration is sufficient to constitute the carnal intercourse necessary to the offense described in this section.

The law was erected in 1860 and that too not by Indians by the British , have we not grown from that time , even the British have accepted Gay rights, but the Home Minister who I thing is still in 1800 on not in the 21st century, the explanation which was given by the Home Ministry is

"Removal of section 377 will open floodgates of delinquent behavior".

Look at it, the man who is supposed to safeguard India , doesn't know what do with the bombs going off , but will appose scrapping a law which was erected nearly 150years ago, what a joke.

The right to select a life partner should be made a fundamental right, who are these guys who can tell us what is right and what is wrong, who gave them the right ? all the laws which were erected before 1947 should be reconsidered.

US Financial Crises

2008-09-30T19:37:00.002+05:30

The turmoil we're seeing on the share market is largely thanks to a free and easy approach to lending by US banks in recent years.

US banks and other lenders made loans to people who would tradtionally not have met credit criteria. When the inevitable happened and these loans turned sour, banks were left with billions of dollars out of pocket.

Here's how it all unravelled.

March 16

-Hard-hit by its heavy exposure to the faltering US mortgage market, Bear Stearns teetered close to collapse after an acute cash shortage caused its trading partners to lose confidence in the firm.

But the US Federal Reserve and Treasury brokered a deal for JPMorgan Chase to buy Bear Stearns at a rock-bottom price, with the Fed agreeing to guarantee $US29 billion in Bear Stearns assets taken on by JPMorgan.

July 11

-US regulators seized control of IndyMac Bank, the ninth-largest US mortgage lender, after a massive run on deposits and mounting loan defaults.

The IndyMac failure, the largest this year and the third largest commercial bank failure ever, was expected to cost the FDIC about $US8.9 billion from its $US52.8 billion insurance fund.

July 25

-The Australian share market suffers its biggest one-day fall in six months, on the back of bad news from National Australia Bank and a weak lead from Wall Street.

The share market fell about 3 per cent after NAB (nab.ASX:Quote,News) announced it set aside an additional $830 million to deal with potential losses stemming from the its exposure to the US sub-prime crisis.

July 28

After revealing a gigantic $1.2 billion bad debt provision for the second half of 2008, the ANZ had its stock hammered, dropping 9 per cent to $16.14.

September 7

-The US Government seized control of mortgage finance institutions Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to stabilise them after massive falls in their share price made it impossible for them to raise needed capital to sustain mounting mortgage losses.

The Treasury's move to put the government-sponsored enterprises into conservatorship and inject up to $US100 billion into each gave their debt and mortgage-backed securities a full US Government guarantee.

September 14

- Investment bank Lehman Brothers files for bankruptcy protection, while rival Merrill Lynch agrees to be taken over by Bank of America.

- The US Federal Reserve says for the first time it will accept stocks in exchange for cash loans and 10 of the world's top banks agreed to establish a $US70 billion emergency fund, with any one of them able to tap up to a third of that.

September 15

- Insurer American International Group (AIG), says it is struggling for survival after losing some 92 per cent of its value this year.

September 16

- The US Federal Reserve Board says the Federal Reserve Bank of New York will lend up to $US85 billion to AIG, in a plan aimed at saving the company from a "disorderly failure" that could damage the global economy.

The US Federal Reserve says under the two-year facility, the US Government will receive a 79.9 per cent equity interest in the insurer and has the right to veto payment of dividends to common preferred shareholders.

September 17

- Plunges on Wall St sent doom and gloom around the world, including in Australia where the local market lost about $40 billion in one day and plenty of companies saw their shares nosedive.

- British bank Lloyds TSB agrees to buy rival HBOS, scooping up Britain's biggest home loan lender in an all-share deal which values HBOS at more than £12 billion pounds ($27 billion).

September 18

- The Fed expands its currency swap lines to $US247 billion, increasing the line with the European Central Bank to $US110 billion and the line with the Swiss National Bank to $US27 billion, while opening new swap facilities with the Bank of Japan of $60 billion, the Bank of England of $US40 billion, and the Bank of Canada of $US10 billion.

- The Lloyds TSB deal for HBOS is officially announced as the UK Government eases competition rules.

- The UK Financial Services Authority imposes a temporary ban on short-selling financial stocks.

September 19

- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson calls for the US Government to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to take toxic mortgage assets off the books of financial firms to restore financial stability.

- News of the bailout plan lifts shares, with the benchmark S&P 500 posting its best two-day rally in 21 years and Britain's top index notching up the biggest gain in its 24-year history.

September 20

- The Bush Administration asks Congress for $US700 billion to bail out firms burdened with bad mortgage debt, seeking extraordinary authority. Secretary Paulson would have sweeping powers over the funds.

- A US bankruptcy judge approves a revised version of British bank Barclays' purchase of the core US business of Lehman worth about $US1.75 billion.

September 21

- Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are granted approval to become bank holding companies regulated by the Fed, effectively killing off the investment banking model.

September 22

- Nomura Holdings says it will buy Lehman's franchise in Asia Pacific, including Japan and Australia and 3000 staff. It also acquires Lehman's business in Europe.

- Morgan Stanley agrees to sell an equity stake of as much as $US8.5 billion to top Japanese bank Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group.

September 23

- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson tells lawmakers that a bailout is "embarrassing" but needed to stave off a deep recession and restore confidence.

September 24

- Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway says it will buy up to 9 per cent of Goldman, which also announced plans to sell $US2.5 billion in common stock.

- CNN reports that the FBI was investigating Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc and insurer AIG and their senior executives for potential mortgage fraud.

September 25

- Washington Mutual is closed by the US Government, in by far the largest failure of a US bank. Its banking assets are sold to JPMorgan Chase for $US1.9 billion.

September 28

- Congressional leaders from both US parties say they have a tentative agreement on the $US700 billion fund.

September 29

- Britain announces the nationalisation of troubled mortgage lender Bradford & Bingley. Spanish bank Santander will buy its retail deposits and branch network.

- The Belgian, Dutch and Luxembourg governments agree to inject €11.2 billion ($20.1 billion) into Benelux banking and insurance company Fortis.

- The US Congress votes against the $US700 billion bailout package overnight.

Today

The share market fell more than 5 per cent this morning, following the biggest ever single-day point decline on Wall St overnight.

India and France have signed the N-Deal

2008-09-30T19:17:00.002+05:30

Reports coming in suggest that India and France have singed a Nuclear deal which will allow India to import nuclear technology from France, this the first deal between India and any country after the NSG paved the way for civilian nuclear copration between India and its member counter, the first deal would have been with the US, but due to the financial crises in the US , the US was unable to sign the deal. The deal "will form the basis for enlarged bilateral cooperation in the fields of energy and research", the French presidency said in a statement.

American Congress had passed and agreement that would allow the US to provide nuclear materials to India last week the Senate, is expected to vote on the deal later this week.

The Framework Agreement for Civil Nuclear Co-operation was agreed with France in January.

Reports say the deal includes providing India with France's latest model of the European Pressurised Reactor as well as other civilian nuclear material.

Indian secularism: Innocent Simi, but a communal VHP

2008-09-26T19:06:00.000+05:30

By Balbir K. Punj

The recent serial bomb blasts across the country have got the “secularists” busy in building smoke screens, raising red herrings and finding scapegoats — all to save the real culprits. The terror machine in India has two faces: The “underground” one which plans and executes the violent operations, while the “over ground” face hides behind masks of human rights, social activists and NGOs and operates under a common brand name of “secularism”. Together, they provide an atmosphere conducive to the germination and growth of terrorism in the country.

How does the “secular” cabal provide covert and overt support to terror in the country? It does so by discouraging the rational and forward-looking elements in the Muslim community and promotes only renegades. Remember how Rajiv Gandhi dumped his progressive minister Arif Mohammad Khan and instead courted bigots and reversed the Supreme Court judgment in the Shah Bano case? Or how V.P. Singh wooed the Shahi Imam?

Not in the too distant past, the Kerala Assembly had passed a unanimous resolution seeking Madhani’s release, a man then behind bars for his alleged role in the 1998 Coimbatore blasts which had left 33 dead and 153 injured. A couple of weeks ago, leaders of three “secular” parties (the Congress, the BSP and the SP) were vying with each other in expressing their support for Abu Basher in Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh, after he was arrested for his involvement in the Ahmedabad blasts. What is the message being sent here?

While subsidy running into hundreds of crores of rupees is given for Haj, nothing tangible is done to wean away the Muslim youth from madrasas and motivate them to join the mainstream. In fact, the reverse is being done. Madrasas are being promoted and computers are being made available in a bid to “modernise” them. Equipment is not the issue; it is the mindset. Modern tools are being used to add to the lethal capacity of a medieval mindset. Right from the young men involved in flying planes into the Twin Towers in New York, to the ones involved in Delhi blasts, all are computer savvy and come from comparatively well-off backgrounds.

The 14-page email of the Indian Mujahideen, sent minutes before the Delhi blasts, started with a quotation from the Holy Quran. It said, “When you encounter (in fight) those who disbelieve, strike their necks first, till when you have completely massacred and wounded many of them. Then bind them firmly (taking them as captives). Thereafter is the time, either for generosity or a ransom, until the war lays down its burden (Quran 47:4).”
In the public outrage following the Delhi blasts, the “secularists” have been careful in not mentioning the fact that the terrorists quoted the Quran.

However, they have repeatedly recounted from the same email message the demolition of the Babri structure and the riots in Gujarat as the cause for jihadi anger. If the presumed injustice to the Muslim community is the cause of strike on India’s capital and other cities, why are their fellow jihadis attacking the national capital of the Islamic state of Pakistan? The continuing jihadi violence against Muslim-majority countries like Pakistan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Egypt and Saudi Arabia and the large number of Al Qaeda-inspired terror modules functioning in many European countries can only lead to one conclusion: This is radicalisation calling for a throwback to strict Islamic laws that deny education to women, discourage all entertainment, insist on strict implementation of purdah and carry out summary executions.

And what about 9/11? The US did not have any history of either Gujarat or Babri. The truth is that a section of the Muslim community is now ideologically motivated to impose its will on the rest of the world.

The demolition of the Babri structure, Gujarat riots or Muslim grievances are just smoke screens which “secularists” build to camouflage the real intention of terrorists. Then there is a well-practiced effort on the part of the “secularists” to blame the police of targeting “innocent Muslims” and of staging “false encounters”. The obvious attempt is to obfuscate issues and prevent security agencies from getting to the conspirators.

To divert attention from the real issues, “secularists” frequently raise red herrings.
For them, the Simi is an innocent organisation of Muslim youth fighting for justice, and a little bit of violence on the side is a minor indiscretion on the part of some misguided among them. So the ban on Simi is wrong. Shift the focus instead to the Bajrang Dal and the VHP, term them dangerous and ask for a ban on them. To “secularists”, Simi’s call for “Nizam-e-Mustafa” is probably only an expression of Muslim aspirations and “Bharat Mata ki Jai” is a provocative slogan endangering communal harmony!

There is no end to this sort of perverse logic. The other day, in a television studio, a Congress leader sought to redefine terror. To him, Hindu-Christian clashes in Orissa and Karnataka and the demolition of a mosque or church were in the same category as the serial bomb blasts. This logic has only one aim: Dilute the severity of the crime of the terrorists and find scapegoats.

If at all the definition of terrorism has to be enlarged, then logically it should include the Congress consenting to Partition, reversal of the Shah Bano judgment, demolition of temples and the forced eviction of Kashmiri pandits, revocation of land allotted to the Amarnath shrine board, the move to demolish Ram Sethu, allowing religious conversions through fraud and bribes, permitting hate literature against Hindu deities, displaying vulgar paintings of Hindu gods and Bharat Mata by M.F. Husain etc... the list is endless. Will “secularists” still insist on enlarging the scope of “terror-related” activities?

“Secularists” won’t allow laws which can help security agencies combat terror. Such laws already exist in most western countries. In most European countries a terror suspect could be detained for up to 30 days before being produced in the court. In the US, the anti-terror provisions are even stricter. Besides, as recent events in our own country have revealed, the trail often goes cold if even one cell is alive.

Muslim alienation and economic distress is leading some of the community’s youngsters to look to terror as an instrument of action — this is another “secular” argument. This is an absolute lie. Every other group that feels alienated or discriminated against is using democratic means of organized protest, political clout and intervention in the political process to get its demands accepted. Why is it that only one community is keeping away and sympathising with the merchants of terror? Why is it that Osama bin Laden is an icon within one community? Is there an theological underpinning to this macabre drama? Will “secularists” have the intellectual honesty to discuss this aspect of the problem?

Balbir K. Punj can be contacted at punjbk@gmail.com

Headlines Today !!!!

2008-09-26T18:37:00.002+05:30

I am an avid news watcher; the only thing I watch on the TV is watch the English News Channels. I am bit confused about one thing, so I am trying to find out from the world whether I have misunderstood the motto of the “Headlines Today” English channel, they clam that they are different for other news channels and what I have found out in the past 6 to 7 months is that then new on this channel is an afterthought, whenever I try to watch the channel I can see only the movie stars and mainly the Bachan’s on the channel, I only advice to the news editors is to stop clamming the channel as a news channel and rename as Entertainment Today channel

Nanavati report

2008-09-26T18:14:00.000+05:30

For the past 24hrs the news channels are making a hue and cry about Js. Nanavati report because the report was not up to what the media was expecting, the media and the so called the secular forces has come to a conclusion that what happened in Gujarat, Narendra Modi is to be blamed and no one else is responsible. If some one tried to question this thought then they are labeled as communal. If the report has blamed Mr. Modi, then justices Nanavati would have been hailed as the savior of secularism, but what to do the man has done his job and now every one is crying foul not because the report was done in a wrong way but the final conclusion in the report was not what the “secular” forces expected. The CPM party Politburo in a statement said that the report comes at a time when the country as a whole was bracing to meet the challenges posed by a series of terrorist attacks.” It (report) tends to reinforce communal stereotypes and prejudices rather than strengthening the need to pursue unbiasedly and impartially the anti-national criminals who are perpetrating such terrorist attacks. We are of the opinion that these findings must be kept aside and the country must await the directions of the apex court and the contingent investigations ordered,” I don’t what to write, I think the only country where bashing the majority in the norm is India, can’t we do some thing about this, the Hindu are also citizens of India.

The other day there was a report about a clash between some Hindus and Christian in Karnataka, the new reader was specific about reporting the causalities on the Christian side and not on the other side. Why this bias against Hindus. Why?

Russia paying back the US

2008-09-23T11:56:00.003+05:30

Russia has sent it warships Peter the Great and destroyer Admiral Chabanenko to the Caribbean for a joint exercises with a Latin America since the end of the Cold War. This action is seen on the world stage as a pay back to US for sending its fleet to the black sea to support Georgia. Peter the Great is armed with 20 nuclear cruise missiles and up to 500 surface-to-air missiles, making it one of the most formidable warships in the world. The Kremlin has courted Venezuela and Cuba as tensions with the West soared over the proposed US missile shield in Eastern Europe and the Russian invasion of Georgia last month. Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister, said recently that Russia should “restore its position in Cuba” – the nation where deployment of Soviet nuclear missiles in 1962 brought Russia and the United States to the brink of nuclear war. Will US be able to take any action against this ? I don't think so. The US is already facing a financial crises. It doesn't have the will or the power to counter the Russians at this point of time.

Nuke deal caught in US financial storm

2008-09-23T11:38:00.000+05:30

Hurricanes Gustav and Ike are gone from mainland United States, but Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is flying into a perfect financial storm that could make the US-India nuclear deal, a pet project of the Indian leader and the US president, a momentary casualty.
Singh, a distinguished economist himself, will understand that, and perhaps even revel in studying the Bush administration's titanic struggle to contain the cataclysm on Wall Street ahead of the nuke deal. By the time he lands in New York late on Tuesday, America's financial landscape would have changed, with the transformation of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, the last of the hoary investment firms on Wall Street, into humble retail bankers who will submit to more rigorous control by Washington in return for greater protection.

"What a fall there was, my countrymen," might well be the week's ironic refrain in reference to the monumental changes on the first day of autumn, the equinox falling on September 22. As the Bush administration rushed its $ 700 billion rescue package to the Hill on Monday, there were dirges aplenty for "the death of capitalism."

There was also a political confrontation brewing in Washington DC over the "You've Got Bail," rescue package that augured ill for the nuclear deal. Democrats sought greater oversight over the $ 700 billion bailout and protection for homeowners. Bush urged them not to stall the emergency legislation to tag their provisions.

"The whole world is watching to see if we can act quickly to shore up our markets and prevent damage to our capital markets, businesses, our housing sector, and retirement accounts... Failure to act would have broad consequences far beyond Wall Street. It would threaten small business owners and homeowners on Main Street," Bush warned, as America held its breath about the next steps for its flailing economy. Oil shot up by $ 25 a barrel – a record for a single day – because of the uncertainty.

The immediate consequence for India of this crisis was the stalling of the nuke deal, a singular obsession for the media in India even though it is on the margins in the US. A Senate panel which held a hearing on the deal last week did not list it for mark-up at Tuesday meeting although it scheduled Nato expansion protocols, US-Brazil Energy Pact, and Foreign Service Overseas Pay Equity Act among other items for consideration.

The House side has not even scheduled a hearing. Congress adjourns on September 26, and Prime Minister Singh is slated to visit Washington on 25th afternoon. There are indications that Congress might extend its sitting by a week or more to deal with the financial crisis, in which case there will be a more time to vote on the agreement, although it won't be done when, or by the time, the prime minister is here.

Both sides are keen that it be tied up before the PM comes here and officials are exploring all kinds of legislative strategies, including a "continuing resolution," to get around the wrinkles, but with little help from a distracted Congress. Some Democratic law-makers, especially on the House side, also want to ensure that President Bush does not take home bragging rights for the nuclear deal – even if it means the Indian prime minister has to return from Washington empty-handed. All that may come out of Singh's meeting with Bush may be a hello, thank you, and goodbye, but no one is ruling out surprises.

Want to settle scores? File police complaint

2008-09-23T11:36:00.000+05:30

Chennai : Most people find a visit to the police station a harrowing experience even if it is for a trivial matter like filing a complaint for a missing ration card or passport. But a few others can get away with complaints that defy all logic. The cops, who normally ask so many questions to find out if a missing passport or ration card was ‘really’ missing, did not even blink at the incredulous claim of a woman that she had gone to the her relative’s home with 32 sovereigns of gold for no apparent reason and that somebody had stolen it while she was on her way back home one evening.

No questions were asked as to why she went carrying so much jewellery at that time. In another incident, the police approached an elderly couple, in their sixties, from Virugambakkam claiming that they had received a complaint from a relative of the couple who claimed that the husband had killed his 100-year-old father-in-law and was trying to swindle their ancestral property.

“My wife and I built this home after taking a loan from a nationalised bank. Since we do not have children, my wife’s brothers are now threatening us to give away the property. When we refused, they went and filed a police complaint against us,” said the retired executive who requested anonymity. The couple spent sleepless nights for more than a week waiting for the local inspector to call them for an interrogation after the police summoned them to the police station. “Such incidents are common. If your neighbour has recently been selected for a government job and you don’t want him to get the job, all one has to do is bribe the local station and file a complaint.

The police will file an FIR which will eventually be withdrawn, meanwhile the job offer goes for a toss,” said a police official. The person who knows his ways around local police stations gets to register a case at will solely for the purpose of harassing people. Corrupt policemen, who sense a kill, also take lot of interest in such cases especially if the person against whom the complaint appears vulnerable with no proper connections. “Ideally they should get in touch with their family lawyer, which often puts off troublesome relatives,” advised a senior police officer.

Is this the end of US Economic Supremacy

2008-09-23T11:31:00.001+05:30

GLOBAL CAPITALISM has now entered a new phase, one that is unprecedented in its history. And the core of capitalism — the US economy — has certainly entered uncharted territory, particularly in the financial sector. The still-unfolding financial crisis has already gone way beyond the predictions of even relatively pessimistic observers and threatens to cause a financial collapse at the heart of the international economy.

Of course, much of this could easily have been predicted even by policy makers in the US if they had not been in denial about the very dubious and fragile foundations of the recent boom in the US. Now there is no doubt at all that the financial deregulation of the 1980s and 1990s, aided by the incentives to finance provided by successive US governments, is essentially responsible.

This financial liberalisation allowed banks and other financial institutions not only to behave in completely irresponsible and greedy ways, but to do it in such a non-transparent manner that they themselves were unaware of the full extent of their own exposure and vulnerability. But US officials and market analysts all tended to underplay this, arguing that finance companies would be efficient at regulating themselves simply because they stood to lose in the event of failure.

This argument even determined the new codes of conduct of the Bank for International Settlements, in its “Basel II norms”, which effectively put the onus on banks to assess their own risks and thereby regulate themselves. So the malaise spread beyond the US to other countries, such as the UK and even developing countries in Asia and elsewhere. Thus, in India too, we have problems in terms of an over-extended financial sector that has tried to disguise its exposure to problematic debt by converting them into securities.

The bubble in the US attracted savings from across the world, including from the poorest developing countries, so that for at least five years the South as a whole transferred financial resources to the North. And now all this is also under threat as the list of creditors, who directly and indirectly transferred funds to troubled US financial institutions, includes workers’ pension funds from developing countries as far apart as Malaysia and Chile. The current chairman of the US Federal Reserve (the US’ central bank) Ben Bernanke actually argued that this financial flow from South to North reflected the innate and continuing real strengths of the US economy, rather than a search for speculative gains during a bubble.

All that is now history as more banks, mortgage companies and insurance providers reveal their problems and it becomes evident that this enormous and dynamic financial structure was mostly rotten. The declared losses are already huge, and major institutions have already collapsed or had to be rescued with enormous bailout packages.

Already, the Bush administration and the Federal Reserve have spent unbelievable amounts — estimated to be more than $600 billion in the past year and more than $200 billion in the past two months alone — to help bail out some of the most respected institutions in American finance. Yet this may still be only the tip of the iceberg as the crisis is far from over and more institutions will definitely face problems.

The former chief economist of the IMF, Kenneth Rogoff, has said that “it is hard to imagine how the US government is going to succeed in creating a firewall against further contagion without spending five to 10 times more than it has already, that is an amount closer to $1,000-$2,000 billion”.

Even that may not be enough in the bottomless pit that is now being created by financial fragility. So, quite apart from the problem of moral hazard generated by such large bailouts, there is the problem of financing these large outlays from the government budget. On September 17, the Fed actually asked the US government to sell debt on its behalf, in order to finance these huge bailouts.

There is more involved than the cost to taxpayers. Even if the bailouts are financed through debt, the prescient Mr Rogoff has noted that ”a large expansion in debt will impose enormous fiscal costs on the US, ultimately hitting growth through a combination of higher taxes and lower spending. It will certainly make it harder for the US to maintain its military dominance, which has been one of the linchpins of the dollar”.

The most recent evidence suggests that the crisis in the US is now entering what economist Charles Kindleberger called “the revulsion phase”, whereby credit dries up as investors seek more safe ways of holding on to their wealth. After the middle of September, many credit markets stopped working normally as investors all over the world tried to move their investments into safe areas, such as buying gold or US Treasury Bills. Indeed, by September 18 the yield on US Treasury Bills, at 0.06 per cent, was lower than it had been for more than 50 years as terrified investors scurrying to “safety” bid up the price. Globally, stock markets have also been falling, and the stage seems to be set for a move from revulsion to the next stage of crisis — panic.

So it is clear why we are moving to a different world economy: in which predatory finance has got itself into such huge problems that it must be rescued with huge resources by the State using taxpayers’ money; where that State itself is weakened and its ability to continue as the dominant imperial power and provide a stable international regime is under question; and most of all, when the economic paradigm that underlined all this is finally being rejected even by many of its own practitioners. This is a tremendous opportunity to reinstate a more progressive international economic order. We in the Left should not waste it.

By --- Jayati Ghosh

Should we change the terror law

2008-09-15T17:53:00.002+05:30

Should we not have a specific law to deal with the terror in this
country? The UPA government tells the country that any anti terror law
will be used against the minorites. Dose this government worry about
only about the minorites and not about the majority. Dont we count for
the votes. Terror dose not target any one community, it affects every
one. Because of this soft handling of terror in this country, we have
become a soft target.

Delhi Serial Blast

2008-09-13T21:41:00.002+05:30

Terror has stuck again in india and that to in the capital city. Reports coming in suggest that nearly 20 dead and many injured. The reports also tells that there were 5 blasts and 2 bombs were defused. This time the terrorest have selected markets to target the people of this country. The first bomb went off around 6.15pm and in the next 45 mins 4 more bombs went off.

Smoking Ban in India

2008-09-10T16:35:00.003+05:30

Should smoking be banned in

India

? Most people will think that I am crazy to ask this question, but think hard, the health minister has come out with a plan that smokers will be fined Rs.200 (which will be increased to Rs.1000), the reason the minister is giving is that nearly a million people die due to smoking related issues, but what is the lose to the government? India doesn’t have welfare system which take care of the it’s people, we don’t have social security net, the government doesn’t pay for the health care, if the minister is so concerned for the public health , why not ban the cigarettes? Which he can not do, the Finance minister will kick his ass, and the tobacco industry is one of the main revenue generators for the government. We have banned drugs which normally kill a few thousand, but we are unwilling to ban cigarettes, why? Don’t we have the right to choose what is best for us? Many people will argue that most of the western countries have banned smoking in public places, there is a good health care system in place where they look after there own people , if a person is admitted in hospital the government incurs a lose. But what about in India, first the minister should look into providing a good health care to the masses. Then we can look into banning things

US offers India 24 harpoon missiles

2008-09-10T12:33:00.002+05:30

The US has offered India a $170 million deal for the sale of two dozen Harpoon air to ground anti-ship missiles to modernise its air force anti-surface warfare mission capabilities and improve its naval operational flexibility.
The Pentagon announced the possible sale of the Harpoon missiles to India as Defence minister A K Antony met his US counterpart Robert Gates Tuesday "to discuss ways to deepen the bilateral security cooperation and exchange views on regional and international issues of mutual interest."
There was no official word from the Indian side but the Defence Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said it had notified the Pentagon of the possible Foreign Military Sale to India of Harpoon Block II Missiles as well as associated equipment and services. Such a deal would be worth as much as 170 million dollars. "The Government of India has requested a possible sale of 20 AGM-84L Harpoon Block II missiles and 4 ATM-84L Harpoon Block II Exercise missiles," the agency said.
"This proposed sale will contribute to the foreign policy and national security of the United States by helping to improve the security of an important partner and to strengthen the US-India strategic relationship, which continues to be an important force for political stability, peace, and economic progress in South Asia," it said. "India intends to use the Harpoon missiles to modernise its Air Force Anti-Surface Warfare mission capabilities and improve its naval operational flexibility.
"The missiles will assist the Indian Navy to develop and enhance standardisation and operational ability with the United States. India will have no difficulty absorbing these missiles into its armed forces," DSCA said. There are no known offset agreements proposed in connection with this potential sale, it said. The prime contractor will be The Boeing Company of St. Louis, Missouri.
The proposed sale of this equipment and support will not affect the basic military balance in the region. There will also be no adverse impact on US defence readiness, DSCA said. The Harpoon is an all weather, subsonic, over the horizon, anti-ship missile which can be launched from surface ships, submarines and aircraft.
The Harpoon Block II is the latest version of the Harpoon missile and is able to strike land-based targets and ships in littoral environments. The Harpoon Block II missile can discriminate target ships from islands and other nearby land masses. The Block II is fully compatible with current operating Harpoon platforms with no modifications required.

Aarushi murder case

2008-09-10T12:20:00.003+05:30

This is not the first time the CBI has not filed a charge sheet and this will be not the last time also.

but why this hue and cry over a single murder case in the media, if a any one watched the news channels on 9Th Sept they will think that this the first murder in India, we had a lot of cases which affect the common man which has gone into cold storage because of CBI not filing the charge sheet, which was not take by the media with this much glee. so let us stop bugging the family any more and let the police and the CBI do there job.

US worried about Zardari's control over N-arsenal

2008-09-06T18:19:00.001+05:30

Several US officials have expressed concern over reports that PPP chief Asif Ali Zardari, who was diagnosed with mental problems as late as last year, will have partial control over Pakistan's nuclear arsenal if elected president, a media report said on Monday.
Though Zardari's spokespersons contend that he had been cured, the American officials were wary of Zardari having a partial control over Pakistan's nuclear arsenal if elected to the post in the September six presidential polls, Newsweek reported.
"Typically (the US) would not want that kind of person involved in a nuclear chain of command," said Pete Hoekstra, ranking Republican on the US House Intelligence Committee.
Doctors hired by Zardari had reportedly diagnosed him with problems like including dementia, depression and post traumatic stress disorder.
Lawyers for Zardari, the report noted, argued in London's High Court that he was too ill to testify in corruption-related cases, and they submitted recent mental health evaluations as evidence.

In March 2007, the Financial Times reported, New York psychologist Stephen Reich concluded Zardari was "chronically anxious and apprehensive" and had thoughts of suicide, though he had not acted on them.
The newspaper wrote that a New York psychiatrist, Philip Saltiel, found that Zardari's long imprisonment in Pakistan while facing corruption probes had left him with "emotional instability" as well as memory and concentration problems.

Indo-US Nuke Deal – Victory in Vienna

2008-09-06T17:54:00.000+05:30

At last India got the much awaited waver from NSG today in Vienna, but China which was supporting the Indian stand (Publicly) played a spoil spot in the private, this incident clearly shows that we can not believe China in the futher for what it tells, India has been as responsible nuclear power which strongly supported non-proliferation unlike China which passed nuclear tech to Pakistan and reports suggest that it even conducted a nuclear test for Pakistan in 1990’s, The victory in Vienna will be a big boost for the UPA and the Indian PM Dr.Monmohan Sing. Now let us come to the economics of this deal. What will be the price of Electricity produced from nuclear power, will Indian consumers willing pay the price. If the cost comes around Rs.7 per Unit, will the state governments willing pay for it? Nuclear energy alone will not be able to meat the demands of Indian power consumption in the coming years, the government should take steps to tap in to other sources of energy generation like wind and tidal power. The waver in Vienna has ended the Indian isolation in the nuclear club.

Indo-US Nuke Deal - Did BUSH mislead India

2008-09-03T20:47:00.003+05:30

Is this the case of Bush misleading India or Indian PM misleading the
country? Reports suggest that our PM knew about the letter but did not inform the parliament or the people of India about it. If what is written in the latter is true then we have to have a close look at the deal once again, The Indian PM gave an assurance in the parliament that there is no link between India testing a nuclear device and the Indo-US nuke deal. The letter clearly states that all cooperation between US and India will end if India conducts a nuclear test. One more thing, why was this letter kept secret for nearly 9 months even though it was not labeled as secret, does Indian PM and the US state dept. knew that the Indian government would not survive the trust vote? The state of India cannot depend on one man’s (US President Bush) word regarding the nuke deal; this is not a deal between two people but a deal between two nations. The fate of the Indo-US nuclear deal will be sealed today, at the all important Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) meeting at Vienna. India specific waiver draft placed in front of the NSG states.India has voluntarily committed itself to continuing its unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing and its readiness to work with others towards the conclusion of a Multilateral Fissile Material Cut-off treaty.India refraining from transfer of enrichment and reprocessing technologies to states that do not have them and supporting international efforts to limit them.The NSG governments can transfer nuclear technology to India for peaceful purposes and for use in IAEA safeguard civil nuclear facilities satisfying clauses.After going trough the draft I am in a dilemma whether we will get that deal.

Tata to shutdown singur nano plant

2008-09-03T07:25:00.004+05:30

What now? Is this the end of industry in West Bengal? The protest will affect the people of Singur who want to get out of poverty. A lot of young people have got jobs in the Tata plant, which will be lost now. All local people did not support the protest in front of the plant. Mamtha may gain some support but she will loose a lot if TATA's pull out of Singur. A man committed suicide on 3rd sept. In Singur because he feared that his 3 sons will loose their jobs if TATA pulls out of Singur. Dose Mamtha wants the people in Singur to live in poverty all their life. I am a son of a farmer and I know from my personal experiences that we don’t get much return from agriculture anymore in India. Daily farm hands can earn a max of Rs.60 to Rs80 a day, but if they work in a factory as daily labors then they can earn nearly Rs150 to Rs250 a day. A person who has visited Singur can tell you the difference last 6 to 8 months. So let us stop bringing in political in to each and every thing in this country.

Tata pulls out executives from Singur

2008-08-29T18:06:00.001+05:30

Irked by constant intimidation of its workforce by agitating Trinamool Congress workers, Tata Motors has evacuated its manpower from Singur.

None of the 600-800 engineers, executives and technocrats came to work since Thursday night after the management decided to pull out the workforce, including about 500 construction workers, sources close to Tata Motors said.

Asked if it was a precursor to pull out the project to manufacture the world's cheapest car 'Nano' from the state the sources said the thinking is not on that line, as safety of workers has taken the precedence because of prevailing tension.

A final view would be taken only after restoration of peace, the source said when asked about Tata Group chief Ratan Tata's threat to withdraw the project from West Bengal.

Contrary to the promise that Trinamool Congress and Khet Majur Samity would stage peaceful 'satyagraha' protest against state government, there have been numerous cases of intimidation during the sit-in protest since August 24, sources said.

"The workers and the executives were afraid and worried and our foremost priority was to ensure their safety... Hence, the management decided to evacuate its manpower from the plant late last evening," a company official said on the condition of anonymity.

When contacted, a Tata Motors spokesperson told PTI from Kolkata: "Since the employees and contract labourers had left the plant late last night, so it was a conscious decision of the company that there would be no attendance at the project site at any of the three shifts today."

Medallist attacks India officials

2008-08-29T16:04:00.002+05:30

India's Olympic champion shooter Abhinav Bindra has hit out at the nation's sports coaches and officials, saying they "know nothing" about sport.
"Indian athletes have no respect for most officials," the 26-year-old told the Times of India.
India won their best ever haul, a gold and two bronze medals, in Beijing. But Bindra, who won gold in the 10m air rifle event, said there was "no magic solution" to make the underperforming nation a sporting power.
'No vision'
"If we want to get to double digits, we need to target 2016 and start working from today," he said. "But the respective federations have no vision and I don't see that changing. I wish I had a magic solution but unfortunately, I don't. The IOA has to play a role in building athletes. It does nothing." Bindra made his comments to the Times of India after being invited to edit the national paper's Friday edition.He said Indian athletes had to "be on good terms with officials because one needs to survive".

"But most officials, and many of the so-called coaches who travel with the teams, know nothing about the sport."The athletes don't talk about this because their careers are at stake. And the officials unfortunately don't care."

He also revealed that he had to fund his travel to Beijing from his training base in Germany, because Indian Olympic officials refused to pay. Bindra also took a swipe at the country's cricket-obsessed media, saying Olympic sports did not get the publicity they deserved.

"Why not just rename the sports pages 'cricket pages'?," he asked.

All of India's eight previous Olympic golds came in the field hockey tournament.

Orissa violence

2008-08-29T15:41:00.003+05:30

The violence in Orissa is an unfortunate indecent , people are been killed in the name of religion which is uncalled for in this 21st century. Before condemning the whole of Hindus in India, we should find the root cause of the issue. The issue started with Conversion, I am unable to understand the reason for converting to a different religion which is not going to help anyone. Do people really think that by converting theycan leave there lower cast tag, I don’t think so. A dalit even after converting to Christianity will remain a dalit. I am not against conversion but in India we should have a law which disqualifies any dalit or SC&ST’s from reservation after converting to other religion, The reservation in India is based on the cast, if person dislikes his cast and converts to other religion then he/she should be willing to forgo the benefits of being in the cast.

Will Turkey Abandon NATO?

2008-08-29T15:26:00.000+05:30

By ZEYNO BARAN in The Wall Street Journal

Will Turkey side with the United States, its NATO ally, and let more U.S. military ships into the Black Sea to assist Georgia? Or will it choose Russia?

A Turkish refusal would seriously impair American efforts to support the beleaguered Caucasus republic. Ever since Turkey joined NATO in 1952, it has hoped to never have to make a choice between the alliance and its Russian neighbor to the North. Yet that is precisely the decision before Ankara. If Turkey does not allow the ships through, it will essentially be taking Russia's side.

Whether in government or in the military, Turkish officials have for several years been expressing concern about U.S. intentions to "enter" the Black Sea. Even at the height of the Cold War, the Black Sea remained peaceful due to the fact that Turkey and Russia had clearly defined spheres of influence. But littoral countries Romania and Bulgaria have since joined NATO, and Ukraine and Georgia have drawn closer to the Euro-Atlantic alliance. Ankara has expressed nervousness about a potential Russian reaction.

The Turkish mantra goes something like this: "the U.S. wants to expand NATO into the Black Sea -- and as in Iraq, this will create a mess in our neighborhood, leaving us to deal with the consequences once America eventually pulls out. After all, if Russia is agitated, it won't be the Americans that will have to deal with them."

Nonetheless, Ankara sided with fellow NATO members in telling Georgia and Ukraine that they would be invited to join the alliance -- albeit without any time frame. But now that Russia has waged war in part over this decision, the Turks will have to pick sides. Deputy chief of the Russian general staff Anatoly Nogoivtsyn already warned Turkey that Russia will hold Turkey responsible if the U.S. ships do not leave the Black Sea. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will travel to Ankara on Monday to make clear that Russia means it.

Russia is Turkey's largest trading partner, mostly because of Turkey's dependence on Russian gas. More important, the two countries share what some call the post-imperial stress syndrome: that is, an inability to see former provinces as fellow independent states, and ultimately a wish to recreate old agreements on spheres of influence. When Mr. Putin gave a speech in Munich last year challenging the U.S.-led world order, Turks cheered. The Turkish military even posted it on its Web site. President Abdullah Gül recently suggested that "a new world order should emerge."

Turkey joined Russia at the height of its war on Georgia in suggesting a five-party "Caucasus Stability and Cooperation Platform." In other words, they want to keep the U.S. and the EU at arm's length. Both Russia and Turkey consider Georgia's American-educated president, Mikheil Saakashvili, to be crazy enough to unleash the next world war. In that view Turkey is not so far from the positions of France or Germany -- but even these two countries did not suggest that the Georgians sign up to a new regional arrangement co-chaired by Russia while the Kremlin's air force was bombing Georgian cities.

Two other neighbors -- Azerbaijan and Armenia -- are watching the Turkish-Russian partnership with concern. Azeris remember how the Turks -- their ethnic and religious brethren -- left them to be annexed by the Soviets in the 1920s. Armenians already fear their giant neighbor, who they consider to have committed genocide against them. Neither wants to have to rely on Iran (once again) as a counterbalance to Russia. Oh, and of course, Iran had its own sphere-of-influence arrangements with the Soviets as well.

Though Turkey and Iran are historic competitors, Turkey has broken with NATO countries recently by hosting President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad on a working visit. As the rest of NATO was preoccupied with the Russian aggression in Georgia, Turkey legitimized the Iranian leader amidst chants in Istanbul of "death to Israel, death to America."

A few days later, Turkey played host to Sudan's Omar al-Bashir, who is accused of genocide by the rest of NATO -- but not by Russia or Iran, or by the Muslim-majority countries who usually claim to care so much about Muslim lives.

Where is Turkey headed? Turkish officials say they are using their trust-based relations with various sides to act as a mediator between various parties in the region: the U.S. and Iran; Israel and Syria; Pakistan and Afghanistan, etc. It may be so. But as more American ships steam toward the Black Sea, a time for choosing has arrived.

Ms. Baran is senior fellow and director of the Center For Eurasian Policy at the Hudson Institute.

Chiru's party 'Prajarajyam' in trouble

2008-08-29T15:09:00.001+05:30

Barely two days after his party was launched, Chiranjeevi's 'Prajarajyam' is under trouble. It is learnt that the Telugu megastar might not be able to use the name Prajarajyam as his party name. Reports says that the name was already claimed by an Andhrite C K Reddy from Kadapa.

Sources said that the in February 2008, Reddy had appled to the Election Commission seeking to register a party by the same name. With his application is still pending, Chiranjeevi cannot name his party 'Prajarajyam'. However, if Reddy withdraws his application, the trouble for Chiru could come to an end.

Padma Bhushan Chiranjeevi launched his political party on Aug 26 at Tirupathi; amidst cheers from the massive crowd who gathered at the temple town to support their 'reel' star take a plunge in the 'real' world of politics. According to sources in Chiranjeevi's party, the plan was to go to the Election Commission a few days after the Tirupati meeting.

Arundhati Roy's Controversial Statement "Azad Kashmir"

2008-08-21T20:42:00.002+05:30

Who dose she think of? If she has written a book about a small state in India, which doesn’t not give her the right to comment on the affairs on the Indian state. The book, which was wrriten by her, has not even read by the majority of Indians. Let us stop this type of writers; they think they can change the world, which is not true. This type of writer have a tendency of poking there nose in to each and ever thing, imagining that they have a right. I ask Arundhati Roy to stop behaving like a child and start thinking like a Indian. We had enough off this type of persons whose only aim is there 15 minuets glory in the news.

NDTV's BMW case expose

2008-08-21T20:28:00.004+05:30

Delhi High Court has found R K Anand and I U Khan guilty in NDTV's BMW case expose that showed the nexus between defence and prosecution lawyers and a witness in the BMW hit and run case. Anand and Khan have been convicted in the case for obstructing administration of justice. A Division Bench headed by Justices Manmohan Sarin and Madan B Lokur has barred R K Anand, I U Khan from appearing in High Court and all Delhi courts for four months. However, they can practice legal consultancy. The court has also recommended stripping the convicted lawyers of their designation as senior advocates while imposing Rs 2,000 as fine on them. Making no bones about their displeasure the two-judge bench of Justices Manmohan Sarin and Madan B Lokur said: "R K Anand and I U Khan on account of their conduct have forfeited the right to enjoy the honour conferred on them by the court of being senior advocates. We recommend to the full court to strip them of their designation as such." It's the first time in constitutional history that senior lawyers like this have faced such a penalty. But what can the Delhi high court do other then to suspend the 2 lawyers for 4 months. If this is what lawyers will get for this type of crime, chat a shame. Where are the lawyers who have a habit of blocking the traffic for all though silly reasons? Are they dead or what?

Arab's Backs Russia Over Georgia

2008-08-19T19:51:00.003+05:30

By - Patrick Goodenough, International Editor , CNCNews

Russia’s military intervention in Georgia in the face of Western protests is being viewed by some in the Arab world as evidence of American weakness, with media commentators voicing barely-disguised delight at what they see as a defeat for Washington.

At the same time, some voices are cautioning the Islamic Middle East not to throw its lot behind Moscow as many of the region’s leading countries did at times during the Cold War.

Russia on Aug. 8 sent troops and tanks across its southern border after Georgia’s pro-Western government mounted an offensive against separatists in the Russian-backed breakaway region of South Ossetia. Russia, saying it was forced to act to protect its citizens and peacekeepers in South Ossetia, drove Georgian forces from the rebel province and then pressed into other parts of Georgian territory.

A European Union-brokered ceasefire is now in operation and Moscow on Monday claimed to have begun pulling back.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was Tuesday attending an emergency meeting of NATO’s North Atlantic Council, called at Washington’s request to discuss a response to the crisis. En route to Brussels, she said NATO must reaffirm membership process bids for both Georgian and fellow former Soviet republic Ukraine, despite strong Russian objections.
“We are also going to send the message that we are not going to allow Russia to draw a new line at those states that are not yet integrated into the transatlantic structures like Georgia and Ukraine,” she said. NATO was determined to deny the Russians the strategic objectives of weakening the Georgian state and undermine its democracy.
In the opinion of some in the Arab world, however, the crisis was a clear victory for Moscow – and some thought this was a good thing.

A Gulf News editor, Abdul-Hadi Al-Timimi, wrote in an op-ed Sunday that Russia’s willingness to use its military might to reassert its influence in the former Soviet space was “long overdue,” and “most urgently needed at a time when the U.S. and its allies are targeting two of the last few Russian allies in the Middle East: Iran and Syria."

The United Arab Emirates’ daily Khaleej Times in an editorial predicted that there would now be changes in the international order.

“America will remain the biggest economy and military, yet its diplomatic [authority] will continually trim till it finally rests at a more acceptable level to the rest of the world,” it said.
“From its handling of Iran to its desire to play a more effective role in the Middle East and world affairs, it is apparent that the new Russia is not prepared to be thrown around like a lightweight any more as it was after the end of Soviet Union,” the same paper opined Monday.
“The return of Russia portends a shift in the balance of political forces in the Middle East that for the moment at least appears to weaken the American and pro-Western side of the balance and to strengthen the Iranian side,” said Cairo’s Middle East Times in an editorial.
It noted that Russia supplies Iran with weapons, is completing its new nuclear reactor and “ensuring the U.N. sanctions are not too burdensome."
Some commentators saw an opportunity to criticize the U.S.
Saudi Arabia’s Arab Times in a Saturday editorial sought to put the blame for the crisis on what it called the “inept belligerence” of the Bush administration, and said the Western Europe was being drawn into a U.S. face-off with Moscow.
Qatar’s Gulf Times, meanwhile, scoffed at the American and British criticism of Russia’s actions in Georgia.
“One would think, in light of the Iraq debacle and the continuing disgrace of detention without charge, that these two world ‘powers’ would have been among the last to plant their flags in the shifting soil of moral high ground."

‘Back to the worst years of the Cold War'

Pundits also wondered what the Russia-Georgia war meant for small, U.S.-backed countries.
An editorial in Dubai’s Gulf News said the conflict “has shown that Washington will not always come to the rescue of its allies in their time of need.”
The son of Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi, Seif al-Islam Gaddafi, said the crisis had sent a warning to other countries that rely on America and think that “closeness to the United States will allow them to do anything they want."
“It’s not so,” he said an interview with the Russian daily, Kommersant.
Gaddafi took issue with Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili’s charge that parts of Georgia were “occupied” by Russia.
“How can you talk about occupation, when you are occupiers yourself? The Georgians along with the Americans occupy Iraq! And now they are trying to portray themselves as fighters for freedom and democracy.”
As the crisis unfolded, the U.S. flew 2,000 Georgian troops back home from Iraq, where they had constituted the third-largest foreign contingent in the U.S.-led coalition.
Gaddafi said the Arab world welcomed their pullout.
“All Arabs are mad at Georgia because it sent its troops to Iraq and took part in the occupation of that Arab land,” he said. “If it weren’t for Russia, Georgian forces would still be in Iraq."
Amid the pro-Russia sentiment, a warning came from the Middle East Times, which in an editorial Monday urged Arabs to think with their heads rather than their hearts.
“There is a potential danger of countries in the Arab world to take Russia’s re-entry into the global political scene as a major power broker as a signal to openly side with Moscow,” it said.
Rallying to the Russians would take Arabs “back to the worst years of the Cold War where the Arab world stagnated economically, forever indebted to the Soviets for arms and munitions that were always a step or two behind those of the West.”
Writing in the independent Arab daily Al Hayat, columnist and political analyst Raghida Dergham cautioned the Islamic world against a rush to embrace the Russian use of force.
“Today, and merely to spite the U.S., many Muslims forget that [Russian prime minister and former president] Vladimir Putin has repeatedly taken violent military stances against Muslims in Chechnya and elsewhere, and celebrate his violence to compensate for their constant failure,” she wrote.
During the Cold War, the Soviet Union had close ties at times with a number of countries, including Egypt, Syria, Iraq, South Yemen, Algeria and Libya. It was also a key ally of the terrorist Palestine Liberation Organization.

Ken Haywood leaves India

2008-08-19T19:07:00.003+05:30

Mr Haywood from whose IP address the terror e-mail was sent before the Ahmedabad blast has left the country from IGI Airport, without informing the police are the ATS which is probing the blasts, the reports informs that Mr. Haywood went to Delhi from Mumbai and left in a Jet Airways flight, Mr. Haywood departure leaves lot of questions to be answered, how was Mr. Haywood was able to leave the country if there was a lookout notice was issued in his name , the reports also suggest that he left with is own papers and he has booked his ticket nearly 5 days back. I am not suggesting that Mr. Haywood has any connection with the blasts but look at our security services, if they are unable to stop a single person from leaving the country what about the terrorists who can plan in a much more detailed ways.
We need to look into the working of our security services and there needs to be a proper coordinations between the services or else we will have lot more bombs going off in this country. Let us hope that the security services will wake up now and take notice and put there acts together

No to Indo-US Nuke Deal from NGO's

2008-08-16T19:39:00.001+05:30

Non-proliferation hawks have roped in "more than 150 experts and NGOs from 24 countries" to derail the India-US civil nuclear deal at the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) meeting next week.
In a letter on Friday to the foreign ministers of the 45 NSG member states, the experts urged the cartel that controls world nuclear trade to avoid a "non-proliferation disaster" by rejecting a US proposal to give India a waiver from its rules.
"India's commitments under the current terms of the proposed arrangement do not justify making far-reaching exceptions to international non-proliferation rules and norms," wrote the critics going by the name of "Abolition 2000 US-India Deal Working Group."
The appeal is part of a global NGO campaign to influence governments' views about the controversial nuclear trade proposal, according to Washington based Arms Control Association spearheading the group with Tokyo based Citizens' Nuclear Information Centre.
The NSG will convene on Aug 21-22 in Vienna to discuss a US proposal to give India a waiver from its rules governing trade with states that have not signed the nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT).
The NSG waiver will clear the second major hurdle before the nuclear deal goes to the US Congress for ratification. The UN nuclear watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has already approved an India specific safeguards agreement for India's civilian nuclear reactors.
Given that the NSG traditionally operates by consensus, the signatories point out that each member state "has a pivotal role to play," the abolitionists said. If the NSG is to allow nuclear trade with India, NSG should establish "meaningful and common sense conditions and restrictions".
The suggested conditions include terminating nuclear trade with India if it resumes testing and prohibiting any transfer of sensitive plutonium reprocessing, uranium enrichment, or heavy water production items to India, which can be used to make bomb material.
"Before India is granted a waiver from the NSG's full-scope safeguards standard, it should join the other original nuclear weapon states by declaring it has stopped fissile material production for weapons purposes and transform its nuclear test moratorium into a meaningful, legally-binding commitment," the letter said.
Unfortunately, Indian officials are demanding a so-called "clean" and "unconditional" exemption from NSG guidelines and are seeking bilateral nuclear cooperation agreements that help provide India with strategic fuel reserves and/or lifetime fuel guarantees in order to allow it to resume nuclear testing in the future without fear of a fuel supply cut off.
"If nuclear testing is to be deterred, meaningful penalties must be available," said the letter to NSG foreign ministers.
"If NSG states do agree to supply fuel for India's 'civilian' nuclear sector, they must avoid arrangements that would enable or encourage future nuclear testing by India," it said. "Otherwise, you and your government may become complicit in the facilitation of a new round of destabilizing nuclear tests."
Unlike 178 other countries, India has not signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, continues to produce fissile material and expand its nuclear arsenal, and as one of only three states never to have signed the NPT, it has not made a legally-binding commitment to achieve nuclear disarmament, the letter said.
"Yet the arrangement would give India rights and privileges of civil nuclear trade that have been reserved only for members in good standing under the NPT.
"It creates a dangerous distinction between 'good' proliferators and 'bad' proliferators and sends out misleading signals to the international community with regard to NPT norms," the letter said.
"In the absence of a suspension of fissile material production for weapons by India, foreign nuclear fuel supplies would free up India's relatively limited domestic supplies to be used exclusively in its military nuclear sector, thereby indirectly contributing to the potential expansion of India's nuclear arsenal," the signatories wrote.
The letter urged NSG participant countries "to support measures that would avert further damage to the already beleaguered global non-proliferation and disarmament regime."
Among the former government officials and experts endorsing the letter is Jayantha Dhanapala, the former UN Undersecretary General for Disarmament Affairs and president of the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference. Other signatories include the mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Ahmedabad serial blasts cracked

2008-08-16T19:30:00.005+05:30

Ahmedabad (PTI): Cracking the Ahmedabad serial bomb blasts that killed 55 persons, Gujarat police on Saturday arrested its mastermind Mufti Abu Bashir and nine others and said that the network of SIMI was behind the explosions. "We believe that the netwrok of SIMI was behind the blasts.... Indian Mujahideen, which claimed the responsibility of the blasts, is connected to SIMI," Gujarat DGP P C Pande told reporters here on Saturday. Bashir was arrested in Lucknow on Saturday, he said, adding that he will be brought to Ahmedabad in a day or two and interrogated for more information. Pande said there are indictions that he might be linked with Hyderabad, Jaipur and Banglore blasts as well. "on Saturday is the big day for Gujarat police which has been able to crack the Ahmedabad blasts case," said Pande. Most of the nine people arrested in the blasts case are active workers of the banned organisation SIMI. The arrests of Bashir and nine suspects was done with the help of Central Intelligence agencies and police of other states, Pande said. "The planning of the blasts was done in Ahmedabad by the SIMI," Joint Commissioner of Police of city crime branch Ashish Bhatia, who is heading the inquiry of the blasts said.

ISI behind 'economic blockade'?

2008-08-14T19:26:00.001+05:30

The Indian Intelligence has reported that the economic blockade to Kashmir is a myth created by Pakistan's ISI to project the Hurriyat as the true representative of the Kashmiris

According to media reports, the observation was made by senior intelligence officers during high-level meetings over the last 2 days, amid mounting evidence that the Hurriyat was using the contrived complaint of 'economic blockade' to nudge the people to look towards Pakistan-controlled Muzaffarabad.

Reports also claim that the home ministry on Wednesday released figures countering claims of an economic blockade arguing that truckers and fruit growers unions who had aligned with Hurriyat were also involved in the ISI's sessionist game-plan.

It is believed that the blockade was not only staged as part of ISI's design to help Hurriyat occupy space which till now had been occupied by political parties but also to unite two sections of the Hurriyat - the Mirwaiz Umer Farooq faction and the rebel faction led by Syed Ali Shah Geelani.

Indigenous Hawk AJT for IAF

2008-08-14T19:23:00.001+05:30

The first indigenous built Hawk-MK132 Advanced Jet Trainer (AJT) aircraft, by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), was formally handed over to the Indian Air Force (IAF) Chief FH Major at the HAL airport in Bangalore on Thursday (August 14), by the HAL Chairman Ashok K Baweja.

As part of a $1.7 billion contract between HAL and Britain’s BAE Systems, 66 Hawks are being acquired for the IAF. The British manufacturer will supply 24 aircraft in fly-away condition and the remaining 42 are to be assembled and license produced at HAL.

The Hawk AJT is a transonic tandem-seat ground attack trainer, powered by a single Rolls Royce Mk 871 turbo fan engine. The aircraft has a one piece moderately swept wing, mounted low on the fuselage, with double-slotted flaps and advanced aerofoil section.

India has built the British Hawk AJT at facilities of state-owned HAL at rates nearly 20% less than those built by BAE Systems, said a senior Indian Defence Ministry official. The cost of the HAL-built Hawk is about $14.2 million per aircraft while the Hawks built by BAE cost more than $20.2 million.

Bias of BBC

2008-08-13T18:31:00.002+05:30

I have been watching the news on BBC for the past 4 days regarding the Georgian Conflict, the news coverage was completely biased, some times the BCC looked liked a Georgian national news channel, the news was so biased that I stopped watching the news. The BCC was so concerned about the people in Georgia, that it completely forgot that people have died on the other side also. The news coverage never mentioned that the whole issue was started by the Georgian military forces on civilians. According to BCC nearly 200 people died on the Georgian side but nearly 2000 people died in South Ossetia. The action of the Georgian president is clear incident of genocide. If launching a military offence against a civilian target (that too in his country) doesn’t amount to genocide then what would? The BBC has a very good name in this part of the world (India & South Asia) but after episodes like this the trust on BCC will vanish as it will be looked upon as a one among the other western news channels reporting news from there government view.

Pak to approach UN over J&K situation

2008-08-13T18:17:00.001+05:30

PTI(13th Aug-2008) -Pakistan on Wednesday said it had begun approaching global bodies like the UN over the "deteriorating situation" in Jammu and Kashmir, ignoring India's warning that such statements amount to "clear interference" in its internal affairs and will undermine the composite dialogue process.

Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Mohammad Sadiq said Islamabad is "deeply concerned over the deteriorating situation" in the Indian state that is "resulting in loss of life and property of the Kashmiri people".

Earlier, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi described the police action in Jammu and Kashmir as the "excessive and unwarranted use of force" against people, drawing strong reaction from India, which said such statements constitute clear interference in internal affairs of an integral part of the country.

Replying to a question on the situation in Jammu and Kashmir, the spokesman said Pakistan has "set in motion" the process to call on the "international community, in particular the UN, Organisation of the Islamic Conference and human rights organisations to take notice".

The world community and global organisation would also be asked to "impress upon India to observe restraint and rein in the extremist elements that are seeking economic destruction of the Kashmiri people", Sadiq said.

Replying to a question on India's assertion that Pakistan's statements on the Kashmir issue could affect the composite dialogue process, Sadiq said Jammu and Kashmir was a "disputed territory" according to UN resolutions.

The composite dialogue process too "considers Kashmir a disputed territory" and the Kashmir issue was the "second item on the agenda of the dialogue process", the spokesman said.

"It is important that an enabling environment, free of violence, is created to sustain the peace process and address the long-standing dispute of Jammu and Kashmir," Sadiq said.

He also asserted that the situation in Kashmir would not affect the composite dialogue.

"Diplomacy is about talking to each other, it is about reaching out to each other for solutions through talks, and we will continue with that path," Sadiq said.

The spokesman also referred to the death of Kashmiri separatist leader Sheikh Abdul Aziz during a protest and described it as "tragic and extremely unfortunate".

He said, "The government of Pakistan condemns the excessive and unwarranted use of force against the people of (Jammu and Kashmir)."

Indian peacekeepers in Congo

2008-08-13T17:27:00.001+05:30

A section of the media was reporting that an internal report prepared by the OIOS (Office of Internal Oversight Service), which indicted that Indian peacekeepers posted in Congo for child abuse and paying minor Congolese girls in North Kivu for sex in 2007 and earlier this year. But after going tough the report and the response given by OIOS to Human Rights Watch (Response), which clearly indicates that, the report were just rumors and no truth were found after a 13 month investigation by the agency. The Indian media should be cautious before reporting regarding this type of allegation. The reports affect the moral of our own forces posted thousands of miles from our country and families.

Georgia Conflict

2008-08-12T19:36:00.003+05:30

The Georgia Conflict is the prime example of how not to run your country. What has the Georgian president archived by this, at least before the conflict his government had some kind of presence in the South Ossetia, now even that is lost believing that the west will support him. The thinking of the eastern block counters is that the west will support them, what ever they do, which have proven wrong by this conflict. Why did the Georgian president launched a military attack on the South Ossetia, thinking that he will get a unconditional support from the west (I.E. U.S.A). which was not forthcoming. Now the Georgian people has only there president to blame on this issue.

Changing the "LAW"

2008-08-10T22:36:00.002+05:30

In the last one week the stat of the "LAWS" in India have come to focus, we have laws which were written when all the people on the earth thought that the world is flat, we have laws which were not even written by Indians but the brits. We are mad to follow laws which were written in 1800. But look at the Constitution of Indian, which was written by Indians (Even though much of it was copied from other Constitutions) has been changed (i.e. amended) to suit the politicians of this country but the ministers are unwilling to change the laws which affect the common man. Why are we asked to follow the laws and the rules written in 1800? , dose the politicians of this country have any other important work then to update the law books of this country, (after writing the last sentence I started to think this – most of the politicians doesn’t know to read the remaining one are the most notorious law breakers). So it should be funny for me to ask these politicians to change the law. Can we the people of India do any thing about it? Or are we helpless like most of the time. It is high time we do some thing about this.

The Cost of the trust vote

2008-08-09T13:42:00.000+05:30

The Samajwadi party is calling the favours it extended to the Manmohan Singh government thick and fast. Now its SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav who has written to the Prime Minister seeking what is quite apparently a favour for 'friend' Anil Ambani.

First it was Amar Singh and now it's his party chief, Mulayam Singh Yadav who's ensuring there is a steady stream of demands flowing into the Prime Minister's Office (PMO). In a letter written to Dr. Manmohan Singh early last month Mulayam Singh has demanded that PMO "intervene'' and direct Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries Ltd to modify its gas allocations from the Krishna Godavari Basin and give "highest priority'' to Anil's Dadri Project.

The second demand is for PMO to direct the Petroleum Ministry to approve the gas price for the Dadri project. All under the guise that this would help alleviate UP's acute power crisis but of course the proximity between Anil Ambani and the SP leadership is no secret.

The demands have already been forwarded to the Petroleum Ministry with a note to take 'appropriate action'. Unlike ordering the concerned authority to act ''At Once'' like the PMO did in its reply to a similar kind of letter penned by Amar Singh earlier.

A brother v/s brother corporate struggle being fought on the political turf and now political pressure mounting on the PMO to favour one side over the other as Manmohan Singh begins his political payback for trust vote support.

Impeaching Musharraf

2008-08-08T19:02:00.003+05:30

President Musharraf will be impeached in coming days. If that happens then this could be the first time in Pakistan history that a president will be impeached, that to a military ruler . The president can now dissolve the National Assembly and impose emergency rule under a caretaker government, which is unlikely to happen. But impeaching the president will not be a cake walk for the political parties, the number in the National Assembly dose not add up. To impeach a president the political parties need 2/3 majority which is not visible now. The friends of president who supported him till recently have abandoned him.(i.e. US). But former ruling PML-Q party says it is confident it can deny the governing coalition the two-thirds majority it needs in both houses of parliament.

Mr Musharraf has been meeting legal advisers to plan his next moves.

Change The Law - Puneet Bedi

2008-08-07T14:36:00.000+05:30

Couples like the Mehtas look forward to an ultrasound examination as an opportunity to meet their unborn child. That is how the health-care industry has oversold the role of ultrasound in pregnancy. The seductive 'come and see your baby’ on one hand and threatening horror stories of foetal abnormalities on the other are spread to ensure business. A casual visit, however, as the Mehtas discovered, can turn into a nightmare.

The simple question, "Is our baby OK?", is answered with maybes and incomprehensible statistics. Indeed, ultrasound is useful in pregnancy but prenatal diagnosis is a complex process and can be inaccurate. For couples, an unending process of specialist 'opinions' and expensive tests follows the initial shock of a possible abnormal baby.

Once abnormality is confirmed the only option in most cases is to terminate the pregnancy. Any treatment currently available to correct foetal abnormalities before birth is at best experimental. The limit of 20 weeks puts undue pressure on the doctors making a diagnosis and on the couples making difficult choices. The haste may lead to grave mistakes, or even worse couples may choose to abort on a suggestion or a doubt, rather than wait for confirmatory tests which may take the pregnancy beyond 20 weeks.

The aim of prenatal diagnosis is to prevent the birth of an abnormal child. The whole science of prenatal diagnosis is meaningless if abortion is not allowed even when gross abnormality is confirmed. Unfortunately abortion is still illegal in India under laws enacted in the 19th century. Some abortions are allowed now under the euphemistic Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971. The Act was made to facilitate abortion for birth control, considered a national priority then, and not quite the 'enlightened legislation' one hoped for. It does not empower women but allows medical practitioners to perform abortion whenever they want, for 'family planning' or for money in private practice.

The limit of 20 weeks was imposed in 1971 as abortion after this was considered a risk to the mother. Abortion performed by specialists at any stage has now been shown to be at least as safe as a normal delivery and we need to re-look at this arbitrary limit.

Foetal abnormality was considered a reason to abort in the 1971 Act but little was available then in terms of prenatal diagnosis. All techniques of prenatal diagnosis including 'triple TEST', ultrasounds, chromosomal and DNA analysis and tests for foetal infections came much later. These are complicated and expensive tests and take weeks. In many cases, the pregnancy crosses 20 weeks by the time a diagnosis is confirmed. The limited access to health care further delays diagnosis in India. The law, however, has not been amended to accommodate these late abortions of the abnormal
foetus if required.

Law, ethics, religion, politics and science cross paths in medical practice everyday, but no issue is as contentious as abortion. It generates passionate opinions at both extremes. While abortion as a right is debatable, nobody except those with extreme pro-life views argue against aborting an obviously abnormal foetus. Laws have been amended in most countries to allow late abortions since prenatal diagnostic techniques became available. In the UK, a grossly abnormal foetus can be aborted at any stage of pregnancy. Even countries where special needs children are provided for by the state, strict laws only lead to illegal abortions and 'abortion tourism'. In a country like ours, with little social support and no public funding to look after special children, the government's right to dictate to individual couples by legislation is questionable.

In a country where at least 80,000 female foetuses are aborted every year without any medical reason at all, the Mehtas could have easily got an abortion done outside the public glare. Instead this couple from Mumbai showed courage in approaching the court. It is, however, unfair to expect the courts to give a judgment contrary to the existing laws, especially in view of the conflicting medical opinions. Individual couples and medical practitioners cannot be expected to find all the answers.

Ethicists, social scientists, lawmakers and medical specialists should discuss such issues on a common platform until a consensus is reached. A new and liberal abortion law is urgently required but we need to be careful as it may be abused to perform female foeticide. The medical profession in the past has refused to accept collective responsibility for this genocide and has a poor record in ensuring ethical conduct of doctors. It does not have any credibility and has failed to self-regulate. All future laws must be transparent and have built-in checks and mechanisms to curb female foeticide, while accommodating late abortions of grossly abnormal foetuses. This can be done by maintaining a nationwide 'abnormality registry'. This could allow late abortions for abnormal foetuses provided all these are followed by autopsies, and any abuse of the law is checked.

Couples who are carrying an abnormal foetus do not have the luxury of the 'best possible choice' as all choices available are terrible. Late abortion is terrible, and so is allowing the birth of a child with a known abnormality. The Mehtas were thus in the unenviable situation of having to make the 'least terrible' choice. Now they need careful counselling and support. This case may not have helped them but has sparked a countrywide debate. We must now urgently demand an 'enlightened legislation' on abortion.

(The writer is a Delhi-based specialist in foetal medicine)

A Separate Hindu Jammu State

2008-08-07T11:46:00.000+05:30

The ongoing agitation in Jammu and Kashmir over the Amarnath land row acquired a new dimension on Wednesday, with the moderate faction of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference and a score of Muslim social outfits saying they had no objection to some Hindu organisations being granted their demand of a separate Jammu state.

In a meeting in Srinagar, the Hurriyat conglomerate said it was acceptable if a separate state was carved out of the two and a half Hindu majority districts, while another meeting in Poonch called for the merger of Muslim majority areas of Poonch, Rajouri and Doda districts.

Among the 22 districts of Jammu and Kashmir, Hindus constitute a majority in Jammu, Kathua, Samba, Udhampur and half of Reasi, while Buddhists constitute a majority in Ladakh's Leh district. The Hurriyat meeting also planned to hold an all-party meeting in Kashmir soon to build up momentum against the Hindu agitation in Jammu, and warned the government against any attempt to restore land to the Amarnath Shrine Board.

The land allocation was revoked due to violence in the Kashmir valley that saw regional political parties joining hands with separatists.

The meeting, chaired by Hurriyat Chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, also endorsed the demand of Kashmiri fruit growers and traders to let them take their produce to Muzaffarabad across the Line of Control if the government was unable to lift the Jammu-Srinagar highway blockade.

In Poonch, a Muslim United Welfare Forum organised a meeting of Jammu division social organisations to call for the merger of Poonch, Rajouri and Doda districts in Kashmir. The meeting was attended by prominent Muslims concerned over the "atrocities being committed on Muslims in various parts of Jammu", and asked the government to ensure safety for Muslims and shopkeepers

Banning SIMI

2008-08-07T10:53:00.001+05:30

The lifting of ban on SIMI by Delhi High Court clearly shows that the government is all talk and no action mode, nothing will happen by just shouting on TV like “War On India” without doing any thing on the ground. India is the only country where the central government informs that a group is responsible for the terrorist attack and the partners in the same government comes out of support for the group. Political parties were quick to seize the opportunity. In election season, having SIMI on their side would be a huge advantage. While SP supremo Mulayam Singh said his party had always backed SIMI, Railway Minister Lalu Yadav called for a ban on Shiv Sena as well. While political sympathy for SIMI will have to wait, the BJP now says it’s an attempt to please its new found allies. Whatever the motive, the facts are clear. Despite implicating SIMI in 53 cases, investigative agencies have little to show by way of hard evidence. So what is the truth? is SIMI been made a scapegoat. Let the investigative agencies come out with clear evidence. Politicians should not see vote bank even if that is costing the nation.

Jammu Burning

2008-08-06T13:20:00.002+05:30

Why are we letting Jammu burn, all this started because of a land measuring 38hetras?
We have already lost nearly 13 lives on this issue. Why can’t both the parties sit and find out a solutions – this is been the question asked all over India, but the issue is much more complicated. The PM has called for an all party meeting (i.e. The Main Party is ASSY which is not called for talks). Now the question before the government is what it should do, it can not give the land to Amarnath shrine board, and then the Srinagar will go up in flames , if the land is not given to the board then Jammu will be burning. Who stared all this PDP or the BJP or the Congress? The political parties have to answer to the nation.

Indian Driving

2008-08-06T11:21:00.004+05:30

After watching some videos on YOUTUBE about the driving habits in India, I started to think whether we have any driving sense at all. But looking at it from a lighter side I can tell you that we Indians are the best drivers in world. It is always easy to drive when you know the rules and even more then that, if you know that the other person will follow the rules. People from the West should know that it takes a lot of talent and imagination to drive on the Indian roads, The Indian driver should be alert all the time, he/she should know how to drive on the wrong side of the road and should be able to drive without any traffic signals. I think that all the people who want to master driving should train on the Indian roads for month without hitting anything or being hit by anything. Good Luck Guys

Nikita's Abortion

2008-08-06T10:42:00.003+05:30

This blog my be a bit late in coming, but I have been thinking about this issue for the past few days and I am unable to understand the Bombay High Court decision, If the mother feels that the child which she is going to bring in to this world in not going to be healthy, who are we to force her to do so. The people on the TV who were talking about the right about the unborn child should have some common sense; we are not talking about aborting the child for any flimsy reasons but for a medical one. Can any one imagine the pain and the suffering the mother and the family will go tough every time the baby suffers or in pain, will they not feel guilty that they didn’t do any thing to stop it when they had a chance? Laws have not jumped from the sky which can not change; Laws has to be adapted according to the current needs. The Health Minister tells that the “LAW” can not be changed for one person, he should remember that he comes from a state where a poet wrote that if there is no food for only one human, and then the whole world should be destroyed. Laws are made to be changed.