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Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Mamata MUTED on MAOIST Stance Even Af...

Mamata MUTED on MAOIST Stance Even After KISHANJI Decalres Open WAR! MATUA Diversion, PSUs   On SALE And ETHNIC Cleansing in Knowledge Economy!Chidambaram to Maoists: Give up violence, come for talks!

 

Indain HOLOCAUST My Father`s Life and Time- One Hundred EIGTHY

 

Palash Biswas

 


 











Abjure violence for talks: Chidambaram to Maoists


Times of India - ‎14 hours ago‎


"If the CPI (Maoist) will make a statement to that effect and call a halt to violence, government would be willing to start a process through which the ...











Need nuanced strategy to tackle Maoists: PM


Hindustan Times - ‎8 hours ago‎


Maoists blew up a state-run primary school at Gerua village in Bihar's Banka district in the wee hours today. Over 100 ultras surrounded the building at ...










Two Maoists held in Orissa


Daily News & Analysis - ‎3 hours ago‎


PTI Rayagada (Orissa): Two hardcore Maoists allegedly involved in many crimes and attacks on police establishments were arrested from Orissa's Rayagada ...







Court dismisses Kobad Gandhy's bail plea


Zee News - ‎2 hours ago‎


The Tees Hazari court while dismissing the bail application of arrested CPI (Maoist) Politbureau member Kobad Ghandy, asked the Medical Superintendent of ...




Court rejects Ghandy's bail plea Press Trust of India






Six arrested for sticking Maoist posters


Times of India - ‎19 hours ago‎


DUMKA: A joint police team of Dumka and Pakur districts on Monday arrested six persons in connection with the Maoist posters put up recently claiming the ...




Trinamool, Maoists are together, says CPM


Expressindia.com - ‎29 minutes ago‎


Kolkata Following the Maoist attack on Sankrail police station in West Midnapore district today, the ruling CPM once again accused the Trinamool of working ...




Hold fire, start talking to Maoists: Activists tell govt


Daily News & Analysis - Gyan Varma - ‎14 hours ago‎


New Delhi: With only a few days remaining before the government strikes hard against Maoists, civil right activists have asked the Centre to stop the ...






Operation Lalgarh 2.0 to start soon


Expressindia.com - Sabyasachi Bandopadhyay - ‎30 minutes ago‎


Home Secretary Ardhendu Sen, who today discussed the issue of Maoist violence with top officials of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, said that he had not ...




Time to be harsh, says CM Calcutta Telegraph








 

News results for mamata banerjee






Deccan Herald

No rule of law in Bengal: Mamata‎ - 4 days ago

KOLKATA: With police "acting as cadres of CPM", there is no rule of law in Bengal, Tri-namool Congress chairperson Mamata Banerjee said in Kolkata on Friday ...
Times of India - 179 related articles »

Mamata muted‎ - Calcutta Telegraph - 2 related articles »




Mamata Banerjee - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Mamata Banerjee (Bengali: মমতা বন্দ্যোপাধ্যায়) (born 5 January 1955) is an Indian politician from the State of West Bengal. ...
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Mamata Banerjee - News, photos, topics, and quotes


The latest news on Mamata Banerjee, from thousands of sources worldwide. High-quality photos, articles, blog posts, quotes, and more.
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: Latest News, Photos and Videos


Explore Profile of at Connect.in.com, see web of connections, news, videos, photos and post your opinions.
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Mamta Banerjee: Latest News, Photos and Videos


Explore Profile of Mamta Banerjee at Connect.in.com, see Mamta Banerjee web of connections, news, videos, photos and post your opinions.
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Kumari Mamata Banerjee - Members of Parliament (Lok Sabha) - Who's ...


This page provides you the details of Members of Parliament (Lok Sabha)
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Is Mamata Banerjee the change Bengal seeks?: | Lok Sabha Election ...


13 May 2009 ... Is Mamata Banerjee the change Bengal seeks? | Indian Lok Sabha Election news 2009 - Get elections news and election results of Indian ...
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Mamata Banerjee Statistics: Indian Elections 2009


3 Sep 2009 ... See complete statistics and profile of Mamata Banerjee.
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Mamata Banerjee


26 May 2009 ... May 6, 2009: TMC chief reacts to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's statement hinting post poll alliance with Left parties myPOPKORN.com.
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mamata banerjee News


Kolkata, Oct 17 (IANS) The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Saturday accused Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee of taking "dual stand" on ...
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Mamata Banerjee inaugurates new Kolkata Metro stretch


22 Aug 2009 ... KOLKATA - Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee Saturday inaugurated the much-awaited six-kilometre expanded stretch of the city's Metro railway ...
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    Mamata Banerjee to woo writers with Matua support - Contribute ...


    Mamata Banerjee to woo writers with Matua support. - by Palash Biswas 20 Oct 2009. This story has been read 9 times. Category: News ...
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    Archive


    Journalism: Rules to remember - by Samyuktha (236 views); Mamata Banerjee to woo writers with Matua support - by Palash Biswas (173 views) ...
    content.msn.co.in/msncontribute/archive.aspx - Cached - Similar -




    MAHASHWETA Diversion from EXTREME Left to EXTREME RIGHT as Mamata ...


    21 Aug 2009 ... Palash Biswas Pl Visit: http://bangaindigenous.blogspot.com/ http://nandigramunited-banga.blogspot.com/ Mamta Banerjee to interact with ...
    palashkatha.mywebdunia.com/.../mahashweta_diversion_from_extreme_left_to_extreme_right_as_mamata_banerjee_rewards_intellectuals... - Cached - Similar -



    Mamata Banrejee Lands in Matua MAHASANGH as Matua religion is ...

    Palash biswas द्वारा 18 अक्टूबर, 2009 9:10:00 PM IST पर .... Trinamool plans a similar postal campaign, with Mamata Banerjee ... the extra ...
    palashkatha.mywebdunia.com/.../mamata_banrejee_lands_in_matua_mahasangh_as_matua_religion_is_captured_in_the_same_m... - Cached - Similar -



    Eclipse CHASE, CPIM ICU at Home and Mamata Bannerjee


    Eclipse CHASE, CPIM ICU at Home and Mamata Bannerjee. Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams, Chapter 294. Palash Biswas. Solar eclipse of July 22, 2009 ...
    o3.indiatimes.com/palashbiswas/archive/2009/.../4971151.aspx - Cached - Similar -



    Palash Speaks

     - 105 visits - 11 Oct
    Palash Biswas. http://indianholocaustmyfatherslifeandtime.blogspot.com. Matyua mela 2008 .... Dr Haldar is also a great supporter of Ms Mamata Bannerjee! ...
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    Harvesting Untruth for Singur | Palash Speaks

    Palash Biswas (Pl publish and send a copy. Contact: PalashcBiswas, c/o Mrs .... “I would like to once again appeal to her (Mamata Banerjee) to call off her ...
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    Anarya Dravid Vanga Indigenous: MAMATA MAIL DESTINED TO HELL!


    Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams, Chapter 274. Palash Biswas ... Kolkata (IANS): Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee's pledge that her ministry will buy 18000 ...
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    Promoted Inferno:Fire guts Kolkata markets, spreads to multi ...


    Contact: Palash C Biswas, C/O Mrs Arati Roy, Gosto Kanan, Sodepur, ... mitigate it,' said Trinamul Congress leader Mamata Banerjee, who rushed to the spot. ...
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    pes 2009 2010 transfers | Addictomatic


    Mamta Banerjee to interact with Ficci, Assocham, CII representatives 20 Aug 2009, ... Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams, Chapter 339 Palash Biswas Pl Visit:. ...
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      Roads deserted, uneasy calm at Bengal police station


      SamayLive - ‎2 hours ago‎


      Sankrail (West Bengal): Amid scattered furniture and blood stains, an uneasy calm prevailed at the Sankrail police station area Wednesday - a day after ...











      Bengal start favourites


      Calcutta Telegraph - ‎14 hours ago‎


      Calcutta: Yet to overcome the shock of all-rounder Avik Chowdhury's accident, Bengal will be hoping to begin their campaign in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy ...








       











      Naxalites attack Bengal police station the Jharkhand way, kill one


      Business Standard - Rajat Roy - ‎17 hours ago‎


      Instead, they selected one police station in West Bengal which is not even the area where the joint police forces were conducting their operation. ...






      Maoists kill 2 cops, abduct 1 Hindustan Times ePaper




      East Bengal look for a big victory


      Calcutta Telegraph - ‎14 hours ago‎


      Calcutta: For East Bengal, Wednesday's encounter against Eastern Railway — their first match in the Calcutta Football League (CFL), will be an opportunity ...







      West Bengal Government To Help Indian Football


      Goal.com - ‎7 hours ago‎


      The government of West Bengal has agreed to help with the land for the National Football Academy while Santanu Jha has agreed to assist with the ...





      No rule of law in Bengal: Mamata


      Times of India - ‎Oct 16, 2009‎


      KOLKATA: With police "acting as cadres of CPM", there is no rule of law in Bengal, Tri-namool Congress chairperson Mamata Banerjee said in Kolkata on Friday ...











      13 (8+5) things you need to (and didn't need to) know about Chad Ochocinco


      Chicago Tribune - ‎12 hours ago‎


      Next week, Bengal Chad Ochocinco's autobiography "Ocho Cinco: What Football and Life Have Thrown My Way" hits bookstores. We got an early copy Tuesday, ...






      Operation Lalgarh 2.0 to start soon


      Expressindia.com - Sabyasachi Bandopadhyay - ‎29 minutes ago‎


      He also said that the operation would be launched simultaneously in six states —- West Bengal, Orissa, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Maharashtra. ...


      Time to be harsh, says CM Calcutta Telegraph





      Cincinnati Bengals Week Six Recap: Duped!


      Bleacher Report - ‎14 hours ago‎


      Bengal players were warned by soothsayers everywhere that a letdown was coming this week. The idea being that they could not sustain the energy necessary to ...







      Luck Ran Out on the Bengals This Past Sunday


      NFL GridIron Gab (blog) - Eric McMackin - ‎22 hours ago‎


      On Sunday, the Bengals came back down to Earth. After a miraculous four-week run that included an improbable sweep through the division and culminated in an ...






      Filling sacks Bengals.com








       










      Mamata muted







      Oct. 20: Mamata Banerjee today neither condemned the ki-lling and abduction of police personnel, nor used the opportunity to criticise Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee’s government for its failure to firmly deal with Left extremists.


      The CPM again pointed at a “Maoist-Mamata nexus”.


      The Trinamul Congress chief merely told a TV channel she was “shocked and hurt (shokahata ebong marmahata)”.


      Unusually, she avoided meeting reporters at her Kalighat home, though she was there through the day.


      CPM state secretariat member Mohammad Salim said Mamata and her Trinamul had made a “common cause” with Maoist leader Kishanji by sharing the demand for withdrawal of the joint forces from Lalgarh.


      Accusing Mamata of doublespeak, Salim said she should make her position clear on the crackdown on the guerrillas.


      “Now, Kishanji wants Mamata to ensure the withdrawal of forces,” Salim said. “If she is opposed to the Maoists, she should ask for Kishanji’s arrest after what happened today.’’


      Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi was clear in his condemnation of today’s attack. “Left-wing extremists must realise that no just cause can be secured by such diabolism; retribution will overtake them,” he said in a statement.


      Mamata skipped the rally at Esplanade this afternoon to protest the “state’s prevailing lawlessness”. Trinamul sources said she did not want to be in a situation where she could be “compelled” to comment on the attack.


      Her lieutenant Partha Chatterjee, who had laid siege to Writers’ Buildings on Friday demanding the chief minister’s arrest, also did not condemn the Maoist strike while speaking to an unusually sparse audience at the rally.


      Instead, he trained his guns on the CPM for its bid “to establish Trinamul workers’ links with the Maoists”.


      Salim iterated his allegation that Friday’s Writers’ siege was Mamata’s attempt to deflect people’s attention from the Congress-led Centre and the Left-ruled state’s agreement on the offensive against the Maoists.


      He asked the Congress to question its partner’s position on the Maoists. “The Centre is co-ordinating with the affected states, including Bengal, for a planned crackdown on the Maoists. But Mamata Banerjee is opposing the move on one pretext or the other despite being a central minister.”


      “The partners owe an explanation to the people if they continue to pull at opposite poles on major issues,’’ he added.


      The Congress condemned today’s attack. It also said “the state government’s inept handling of the Maoists was responsible for the strike”.


      http://www.telegraphindia.com/1091021/jsp/bengal/story_11639334.jsp


       

      Sibal’s 80% is 100% anti-poor : Opposition

      21 Oct 2009, 1014 hrs IST, ET Bureau

       

      NEW DELHI: Opposition parties on Tuesday came down heavily on HRD minister Kapil Sibal’s proposal to set a 80% eligibility criterion for taking the



      IIT JEE, dubbing it as ‘elitist’ and ‘anti-poor’ .

      The Bharatiya Janata Party said the proposal had been mooted without mandatory home-work . “We’ll resist strongly any move to make IIT selection elitist and deny students from poor and humble background , villages and mofussil towns the opportunity to aspire and dream about entering institutions,” BJP spokesman Ravi Shankar Prasad said here on Tuesday.
      The HRD minister, according to the BJP leader, had jumped the gun by coming out with the proposal.

      “Rather than addressing the pressing problems confronting the educational sphere, he’s trying to hog the limelight by projecting himself as the most performing minister. In the process, he has wreaked havoc on the country’s educational system,” Mr Prasad alleged. Students from backward states such as Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, he maintained, would be adversely affected if the proposal was given the go-ahead .

      Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati, too, made it clear that she will oppose the move. She shot off a letter to the HRD minister on Tuesday, arguing that any proposal to raise minimum percentage of marks for admission to IITs would affect the future of lakhs of students from Uttar Pradesh.

      “The number of UP Board students securing 80% and more in standard 12th is not much. Thus, formulating a restrictive policy will affect their future,” Ms Mayawati said. She, instead, suggested that the examination system should be reformed to enable a student to appear in the entrance exam without coaching.

      RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav too rained criticism on the proposal. “It has been brought forward under a conspiracy to deny entry into IITs students coming from the poor and deprived backgrounds ,” he said, adding: “We strongly oppose it. I’ll personally take up the issue with the HRD minister.”

      Terming as ‘anti-poor’ the bid to change the existing eligibility criteria for appearing in IIT exams, LJP president Ramvilas Paswan has asked Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to intervene in the matter.


       

      21/10/2009

      If he is freed, we will all live.., abducted cop's father tells Maoists


      Kolkata: Anxiety writ large on their faces, parents, relatives and friends of abducted police station officer-in-charge Atindranath Dutta Tuesday night appealed to the Maoists to set him free.




      "This is an appeal from an old man, a father. If he is freed, we will all live. I appeal to the Maoists to spare him," said the police officer's father Ashok Dutta, a resident of Belur in neighbouring Howrah district.


      The police officer's mother, Indrani Dutta, who spoke to top Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) leader Kishanjee pleading for her son's release, said: "My son is a very good man. He is not like the other OCs. He has a small child".


      Dutta, a meritorious student, who holds a Master's in chemistry, joined as OC Of Sankrail police station two months back.


      The Left-wing extremists abducted Dutta at gunpoint from his quarters and brought him to the police station under Jhargram sub-division of West Bengal's West Midnapore district. There they killed two of his subordinates, and then abducted him to their hideout.


      Maoists kill police officers, abduct one


      In a 15-minute guerilla offensive, armed Maoist rebels killed two police officers and abducted another during a daring daylight raid on a police station in West Bengal's West Midnapore district Tuesday, officials said.


      "Two police officers have been killed and the officer-in-charge of the Sankrail police station abducted," state Chief Secretary Ashok Mohan Chakraborty told mediapersons after a high-level meeting convened by Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee at the state secretariat Writers' Buildings.











       










      NEW DELHI: As part of its disinvestment programme, the government is considering a two-phase follow-on public offer (FPO) of Steel Authority of



      India Ltd (SAIL), a move that is expected to fetch it over Rs 8,000 crore at current share prices.

      The 20% FPO would comprise a 5% divestment of government equity and SAIL issuing fresh equity of another 5% in each phase, after which the government’s stake in the navratna company would fall to 68% from 85% now.
      The SAIL scrip was over 4% up at Rs 194.74 on the BSE on Monday.

      A senior steel ministry official confirmed the move, saying, “A proposal in this regard has been finalised by us and will be sent to the company board for approval.” Another official told PTI that steel minister Virbhadra Singh has already approved the proposal, which has also got in-principle approval of the Disinvestment Department of the finance ministry.

      While the timing of the FPO is yet to be decided, the official who asked not to be named said the first phase may happen as early as next January.

      SAIL manufactures over 14 million tonnes of hot metal annually and is ramping up its facility with an investment of Rs 70,000 crore to hike its capacity to about 24 million tonnes by 2012. SAIL is likely to use the FPO money to part-fund the expansion programme.

      The company funded its expansion through internal accruals till 2008-09. SAIL plans to borrow close to Rs 6,000 crore this financial year to fund its over Rs 10,000-crore capital expenditure programme. The follow-on-public offer is issue of additional equity to investors.

      The amount raised by the government would go to National Investment Fund created mainly to finance social sector programmes. As the FPO is mix of the government’s stake and issue of fresh equity by the company, the share of the Centre and firm will be Rs 4,000 crore each.
      http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/finance/Selloff-game-SAIL-follow-on-offer-next/articleshow/5143633.cms



      Asia emerging from slum sooner and stronger, says IMF official

      21 Oct 2009, 1425 hrs IST, PTI




      WASHINGTON: Asia, led by China
      , India and Indonesia, is emerging from the current global economic crisis sooner and stronger, a top IMF official has



      said.

      "Asia looks set to emerge from the downturn both sooner and stronger than any other region," the First Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, John Lipsky, said at a conference yesterday.

      "Asia, despite its relatively strong initial condition entering the crisis, was hit hard late last year," he said.

      While it was not directly exposed to the financial assets that were at the epicentre of this global crisis, Asia was severely affected by the sharp downturn in the US and Europe as the trade implications of the global downturn reverberated through the Asian supply chain, capital flowed out of the region, and trade finance stalled, he noted.

      Measured from peak to trough, real GDP has fallen by nearly four 4 per cent in the United States, but it fell by more than 8 per cent in Japan and by about 7 per cent in emerging Asia (excluding China, India, and Indonesia), he said.

      The latest 'World Economic Outlook' of the IMF forecasts global economic contraction of about 1 per cent this year and expansion of around 3 per cent next year.

      At the same time, Asia is expected to grow by over 2 per cent this year and by around 5 per cent in 2010, Lipsky said.


      Steel min: plan 20 pct share sale in SAIL


      Wed Oct 21, 2009 3:42pm IST

       



      [-] Text [+]







      Photo

      1 of 1Full Size

      NEW DELHI (Reuters) – The government has approved a follow-on public offering of 20 percent of state run Steel Authority of India Ltd, the steel minister said on Wednesday.


      The federal government owns nearly 86 percent of SAIL.


      "The scheme has been approved internally. The scheme is for disinvestment and public offer of shares totalling 20 percent... in two instalments," steel secretary P. K. Rastogi earlier told reporters.


      Stake sales have returned to the government's agenda after the Congress-led coalition returned to power in May and as it battles a 16-year high fiscal deficit.


      It has already raised $1.8 billion by listing two state firms and earlier this week approved a 5 percent stake sale in NTPC, the country's largest power producer.


      (Reporting by C.J. Kuncheria; Editing by Jarshad Kakkrakandy)



      (For more news on Reuters Money visit www.reutersmoney.in)


       




       




      Personal Finance

      A guide to gold investment





       












      Photo


      Govt should retain easy monetary policy - panel head 3:21pm IST


      NEW DELHI (Reuters) – The government may hold off with monetary policy tightening until the end of March, a top government economic adviser said on Wednesday, joining a chorus of calls from officials for steady interest rates.  Full Article


       








      India sings old climate tune

      India sings old climate tune

      The government reiterated its refusal to reduce carbon emissions under any new global deal to fight climate change, a day after Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh was reported to have pushed for New Delhi to accept emission curbs.  Full Article | Commentary 











      Photo

      Iran, powers get draft deal for approval by Friday 4:44pm IST 

      VIENNA (Reuters) - The U.N. nuclear watchdog chief said on Wednesday he had given Iran and three world powers a draft text of a deal for approval by Friday to help allay concerns over Tehran's nuclear programme.  Full Article  












      Photo

      Steel min: plan 20 pct share sale in SAIL 3:42pm IST 

      NEW DELHI (Reuters) – The government has approved a follow-on public offering of 20 percent of state run Steel Authority of India Ltd, the steel minister said on Wednesday.  Full Article  























       


       









      Small investors to get PSU shares 5% cheaper


      Economic Times - ‎12 hours ago‎


      NEW DELHI: The government plans to give small investors a 5% discount when it sells shares in three state-owned companies, hoping to lure individual ...


      Govt okays stake sale in PSUs Chandigarh Tribune


      Govt plugs into power selloff Calcutta Telegraph






      PSU refiners face Rs 5000-cr monthly losses as crude oil hits $80


      Hindu Business Line - Murali Gopalan - ‎17 hours ago‎


      Private oil retailers such as Essar and Reliance are selling petrol and diesel at the same price levels as their PSU counterparts. ...





      Michigan-PSU rivalry plays big in the Big House


      Allentown Morning Call - ‎4 hours ago‎


      ''The violence gets out of control,'' the Penn State defensive end said. Even so, Crawford still was mesmerized by the idea of college football when he ...






      PSU seeks jolt from freshmen The Daily Collegian Online




      Sensex volatile; ONGC, SBI, HDFC, ICICI Bk, BHEL decline


      Moneycontrol.com - ‎4 hours ago‎


      However, buying in technology, PSU power, select realty and pharma stocks was helping the markets and limited the losses. Among the broader indices, ...






      Tragedy at uconn has psu's Paterno concerned


      Delaware County Daily Times - Neil Geoghegan - ‎3 hours ago‎


      Penn State's Joe Paterno has frequently stated that he dreads answering early Sunday morning phone calls because it's often bad news involving his players. ...






      PSU builds hay bale house


      Pittsburg Morning Sun - Brett Dalton - ‎5 hours ago‎


      The house was a project of PSU's Family and Consumer Sciences department. By ANDREW NASH Most houses are built with construction equipment like bricks, ...






      PSU winless on road


      The Daily Collegian Online - Audrey Snyder - ‎2 hours ago‎


      Away from the familiar confines of AstroTurf Field, the Penn State field hockey team plays much differently, and it doesn't know why. ...




      Analysis: 'Cheap' PSU bank stocks seeing demand


      Moneycontrol.com - ‎16 hours ago‎


      The public sector undertaking (PSU) sector is looking good because fears of tightening are receding. They are now catching up with private banks. ...





      Penn State York grabs big tennis victory


      York Daily Record - ‎7 hours ago‎


      The Penn State York team tennis team clinched at least a tie for its second straight PSUAC regular-season crown after beating Penn State Wilkes-Barre, 8-1, ...


      Penn State York: Penn State York




      psu's Brown a top 5 prospect


      Pittsburg Morning Sun - Matthew Clark - ‎5 hours ago‎


      Tim Brown did not have the best of times during his pitching tenure at Pittsburg State University. Over his last year as a Gorilla in the ...








       

      21/10/2009

      Mamata orders probe into Mathura train mishap


      New Delhi/Kolkata: Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee today ordered an inquiry into the train accident near Mathura that claimed 23 lives.




      Sources in the railway ministry said that the Commissioner of Railway Safety would conduct the probe tomorrow.


      While expressing grief over the tragedy, the minister announced an ex-gratia of Rs 5 lakh for the next of the kin of those killed in the train mishap. The seriously injured passengers would receive Rs 1 lakh, while those with minor injuries will get Rs 10,000, she said.


       


      In Mathura, UP Agriculture Minister Laxminarain Choudhry announced an ex-gratia of Rs 10 lakh for the next of the kin of the deceased besides a job.


      About 23 passengers were killed and around 20 injured when the Delhi-bound Goa Samparkranti Express rammed into the stationary Mewar Express.


      More than 20 people were injured in the accident that occurred around 5 a.m. at an outer signal, about 55 km from Agra.


      Rajesh Kumar, senior divisional commercial manager at the accident site said: "Twenty three deaths have been confirmed. The condition of some of those injured is critical and unstable. The number could go up. Rescue work is continuing as bodies have to be taken out of the bogie."


      The Mewar Express, in which some people from the Goa Express had been accommodated, had been stopped at nearby Vrindavan. Some buses have also been arranged to take the passengers to Delhi, about 150 km away.


      "Work is progressing at a fast pace and the situation should normalise within a few hours," public relations officer Bhupendra Dhillon at the divisional railway manager's (DRM) office here said.


      Traffic along the busy route that affects Delhi-West and Delhi-South trains has been disrupted. Several trains have been diverted and the Intercity Express from Agra to Hazrat Nizamuddin has been cancelled. The Taj Express and the Shatabdi from Delhi are likely to be delayed, the official added.


      Trains are being diverted from Agra Cantt railway station towards Tundla junction for Delhi. Railway officials said most trains were likely to be delayed. "Arrival at Delhi would be delayed by a few hours, as there would be heavy traffic on this line via Agra Fort junction and Yamuna Bridge station towards Tundla which is connected by a second track," an official said.


      Source: Agencies


       








      Govt okays stake sale in PSUs
      New Delhi, October 19
      The Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) has approved a proposal to divest stake in state-run utilities NTPC and Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam (SJVN).

      OilMin replies to RNRL affidavit
      New Delhi, October 19
      The Oil Ministry today filed its reply to an affidavit filed by Reliance Natural Resources Limited (RNRL) in the Ambani brothers’ gas dispute.

      RBI revises rules for refund of notes
      Chandigarh, October 19
      Coming to the rescue of hundreds of people, the Reserve Bank of India has revised the note refund rules so that the public can adjudicate soiled and mutilated currency notes without any fuss. This simplification of rules for exchange of currency notes will go a long way in solving the problem being faced by the people, who tend to lose money in case the notes get mutilated.
























      EARLIER STORIES
























      THE TRIBUNE SPECIALS
      50 YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE

      TERCENTENARY CELEBRATIONS







      Julia Saner of Switzerland reacts after winning the Elite Model Look Contest 2009 at the beach resort of Sanya, in China on Sunday. — AP

      Ad campaign against oil policy gives distorted image: Firms
      New Delhi, October 19
      The apex body of oil firms has petitioned Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, saying a media campaign questioning the government's oil and gas policies gave a distorted picture of how business is done in India.

      Cost cutting drive by US firms to go on
      New York, October 19
      With the US economy continuing to be in recession, American firms are likely to carry forward their cost cutting drive into next year in doling out starting salaries, except those with expertise, says a survey.

      Set for apex court date
      New Delhi: Two of the top corporate houses - headed by estranged industrialist brothers Mukesh and Anil Ambani - are set for a showdown in the Supreme Court, which will commence hearing on their gas supply dispute tomorrow.

      Telenor gets nod to up stake in Unitech
      New Delhi, October 19
      The government today gave its approval for Norwegian telecom major Telenor's proposal to increase its stake in Unitech Wireless (Tamil Nadu) Ltd to 74 percent.




      Up in Flames


      Fire fighters try to douse flames at a petrol pump in Bhopal on Monday. — PTI


      RIL among top 25 global champions
      New Delhi, October 19
      Reliance Industries has been named among the top 25 global champions for 2009 which managed to outperform the competition in midst of meltdown in the financial markets. RIL is the only Indian company in the 25 AT Kearney Global Champions for 2009 list that has been topped by Japanese firm Nintendo,

      Fund managers may see 35 pc drop in bonuses
      New Delhi, October 19
      Global fund managers are likely to witness up to 35 per cent cut in bonuses this year even as the asset and wealth management industry is upbeat about a recovery in financial markets worldwide.


       http://www.tribuneindia.com/2009/20091020/biz.htm


       


      The Maharashtra government is considering a proposal to ban Hindu right-wing organisation Sanatan Sanstha allegedly involved in the Margao blast on Diwali eve that left two persons dead, Director General of Police SS Virk said here today.


       


      India and China Wednesday signed an agreement to cooperate on ways to fight climate change. They will also continue to work together in international climate deal negotiations.




      The West Bengal government should take initiative to secure release of the police officer, kidnapped by Maoists from Sankrail police station in West Midnapore, CPI(M) said here today.

      "Maoists have declared the police officer as a prisoner of war. This has not taken place in the state before. The state government should take steps to secure his release on a priority basis," state CPI-M secretary Biman Bose said.

      Maoists had yesterday raided the police station, shot dead two police officers and kidnapped officer-in-charge Atindranath Dutta in West Midnapore district, where they also looted a bank.

      Referring to the kidnap a few months ago of two other policemen Sabir Mollah and Kanchan Garai, Bose said the government must also secure their release.

      Stating that such Maoist activities were endangering democracy, the CPI(M) leader alleged that the Maoists and Trinamool Congress were in cahoots.

       


      Railway Minister of India, MATUA Mamata Banerjee is MUTED on Maoist Stance even after Sankrail Invasion and Kishanjee Having DECLARED Open War in Bengal!While Her Government and Alliance UPA LAUNCH Unprecednted OFFENSIVE against Maoist Menace!

       

      I have been writing CONSISTANTLY since beginning that GLOBALISATION is nothing but Post Modern MANUSMRITI and APATHEID Galaxy Rule under TRI IBLIS Satanic Zionst Corporate Imperialist Order and India REMAINS a Peripherry under US War Economy. No one better than KAPIL Sibal Justifies the assessment very well denying Indigenous and ABORIGINAL, Minority and Under Previleged Communities, the EMPOWERMENT, Knowledge quite systematicly. It is ETHNIC Cleansing in Knowledge Economy. PSUs in India are on Sale. Now, SAIL goes for Sell OFF! Privatisation itself amounts to kill the Cosntitutional Safegauard, RESERVATION! On the Other hand,Maoist MENACE enables the RULING Hegemony to Complete SHUDRAYAN Complete with Displacement, Persecution, Repression, EXODUS and Mass Destruction. This is an Indian Holocaus of Third Kind!

       

      Only on Tues day, Mamata Banerjee got the Matua Identity declaring Lord HARICHAND Thakur only God who she would worship denying Hindu FAITH in 33 Crore Gods and Goddesses. Mamata is NO where assocaited with SUBALTERN Movement nor sha has to do anyhing with Mulnivasi Dalit Movement as She Represents the Elite Brahmin Ruling Hegemony of the RIGHTIST Genre. Her matua IDENTITY comes on the same day while NILEKANI declares Unique Identity Number Mandatoryand Kapil Sibal had DECARED CUT OFF of Eighty to Eighty Five percent in IITs! TMC MPs and MLAs do replicate MAMTA Banerjee. Thsi MAMATA Diversion puts Thakurnagar Matua Dham and Matua Mother BAOD MAA Beena Pani devi Devi in Highest Ever IVORY Tower with an UNPRECEDENTED Brand Equity!

       

      Matua candidate for the Assembly ByElection in Bangao, Kartik SETH gets Blessing of badomaaa acompnied by Matua TMC MLA JP Mallick. Govinda Naskarthe present MP from bangaon also suceeded to win in last Loksabha Election only after Mamata Banerjee getting persoanlly, MATUA Blessing!

       

      Our people from Dandakaranya, do Celebrate Matua MAHOTSAV from sixth December in Malakangiri. Thye had informed me earlier andI promised to attend. But the situation is cahnged as SUNANDA Sanyal, leader of Nagarik manch and SANHATI, open Forum for Mamata Intelligentsia Brigade is all set to be present as DIGNATORY. Mamata and her party have tried luck in Arunachal. Now. DIDI looks beyond Bengal. she failed to get entry in tamilnadu with Mani shankar Ayer allying with NDA last time. Now she has got the Matua Identity and Dalit Refugeess are settled Countrywide. hence,she may hope to get National Vote Bank with Matua card without Addrsssing Refugee Problems. Badomaa ASHEERVAD will do the CHARISHMA which Mraxists could not ACOMPLISH during last Six decades. Maraxist refugee Politics saw MARICHJHANPI Genocide and theis Mamata EXCURSION is Potential enough to turn into a BIGGER BOOBYTrap! I am Sorry that I may not join any Matua Convension under Mamata Shadow BRAHAMINICAL!

       

       



      Union Home Minister P Chidambaram offered an olive branch to Maoists saying that Government will be willing to start dialogue process with them if they abjure violence.


       




      "If the CPI (Maoist) will make a statement and call a halt to violence, Government would be willing to start a process through which the State Government concerned and the Central Government can hold talks with them on any issue that concerns them and the people they claim to represent," he said in a letter to former Lok Sabha Speaker Rabi Ray.




      Chidambaram was replying to a statement made by Ray and some eminent persons on the Maoist menace recently.


       




      "I sincerely will prevail upon the CPI(Maoist) to abjure violence," he said in the letter, copies of which were sent to Justice Rajinder Sachar, prof Rajni Kothari, Kuldip Nayyar, Aruna Rai and K G Kannabiran.




      He said the only hurdle to holding talks with the CPI (Maoist) is the violence that "stalks the areas in which they operate".


       


      He drew attention of these eminent persons to the statements made by various Maoist leaders especially Muppala Laxman Rao (Ganapathy) and Mallojula Koteshwar Rao (Kishenji), justifying violence and armed struggle.


       




      Chidambaram pointed out in his letter that in 2009 alone CPI (Maoist) caused 183 violent attacks on economic targets including railway tracks, telephone towers, power plants, mines, school buildings and panchayat bhavans.


       





      Suspected armed Maoists on Tuesday abducted an officer-in-charge, injured an ASI and looted arms from a police station near Lalgarh in West Midnapore district, police said.


       




      A group of about 25 Maoists on motorcycles raided the Sankrail police station, abducted officer-in-charge Atin Dutta and shot at assistant sub-inspector Sukhendu Mansata, they said.


       




      They looted arms and ammunition from the police station which is surrounded by jungles.


       




      The attackers, who included five to six women, left on the motorcycles, the sources said. Among the arms looted were Insas rifles, AK-47s and AK-56s, they said.


       




      Maoist leader Kisenji claimed responsibility for the attack and warned the police and the Director General of Police Bhupinder Singh, who was at Midnapore, to stay put or they would behead the kidnapped officer.




      If the police did not pursue the Maoists, the officer-in-charge would be released unharmed, he said over phone.


       





      Three persons, including the head of a naxal outfit, were killed and six others critically injured when Maoists attacked at Rajpur in the district in the wee hours on Tuesday.


       




      The dead, identified as Umesh Mali, head of a naxal outfit 'Sastra People's Morcha' (SPM), Umesh Singh Bhokta, a local leader of Lokjanshakti Party and Ranjit Rajjak, were watching a cultural programme near Rajpur Middle School around 2 am, when a group of armed Maoists fired on them, District Superintendent of Police Deo Bihari Sharma said here.


       




      The condition of all the injured, including a police driver, is stated to be critical, he said.


       




      The CPI (Maoist) is involved in a turf war with SPM, the Jharkhand Prastuti Samiti and the Tritiya Prastuti Samiti.


       





      The police forces from Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh will be pooled together soon for joint operations to fight Naxals in the border areas of the three states, said Maharashtra’s police chief S S Virk, a little over a week after Naxals ambushed a state police team and killed 17 persons in the worst attack this year.


       




      “What is contemplated here is a joint operation, and I think we should see better operations in time to come,” Virk said at an Idea Exchange discussion at 'The Indian Express' in Mumbai on Friday, adding that a specialised anti-Naxal training facility for Maharashtra Police was also on the anvil and men were already being trained at the Greyhounds Academy in Andhra Pradesh.


       




      Virk said special emphasis is being placed on building expertise to fight Naxals as the state police is at present not equipped for the job. “We have started late, and basic policing is a different game from (fighting) an armed militant struggle. So a force which is trained to maintain law and order and deal with ordinary crime finds it difficult to rise to an occasion and deal with weapons and face fire. As the force faces more violence and more blood, and takes part in more operations, it also results in professional maturity and experience which becomes expertise over a period of time,” said Virk.


       





      With the Union Home Ministry set to launch an all-out offensive against the Naxals, Bihar has decided to use the Rs 19 crore it got from the Centre for a campaign against them.


       




      Bihar Director General of Police (DGP) Anand Shankar recently held meetings with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar where it was decided that Superintendents of Police of 15 Naxal-affected districts in the state would be directed to “expose the real face” of those pretending to be instruments of socialist change, while simultaneously taking welfare schemes to villages. Gaya, Aurangabad, Rohtas, Kaimur, Nawada, Jamui and Banka are the worst-hit Naxal districts. in Bihar.


       




      Inspector General (Operations) K S Dwivedi told The Indian Express that the 15 SPs had been given Rs 5 lakh each last June to start community policing and Rs 3 lakh each to start the campaign against ultras. “We will tell people through pamphlets and advertisements how brutally they kill innocent people and damage public property at will,” says Dwivedi, referring to the recent beheading of a Jharkhand Inspector, Francis Induwar.


       


      Police expect such psychological offensive to be a vital tool in the anti-Naxal operations. They would combine this with construction of toilets, organisation of health camps, and arranging of streetlights in remote villages.


       




      At the same time, the operations against the Naxals will intensify while tougher laws would be applied against those in custody. Dwivedi said police treated Naxals as hardcore criminals and had been pressing for speedy trials against them. Of 274 Maoists facing trials since 2007, 10 have been awarded death sentence and 22 life sentence in the state. However, Dwivedi said this was not enough.


       





      Maoists appear to have stepped up their campaign to hit soft targets in Gadchiroli immediately after their unsuccessful bid to sabotage Assembly elections, killing two civilians on two successive days. Early Saturday, they killed Mahendra Narote, 26, at Kulbhatti village in Dhanora tehsil while on Sunday night, they stabbed Birju Kiranga, 32, to death.


       




      While the Naxals suspecting the victims were police informers, the police have denied any links. The two murders have taken the number of civilian casualties in Gadchiroli this year to 32, highest for any year. Asked if this could be a run-up to facing the planned offensive against Naxals, Gadchiroli Superintendent of Police Jayakumar said, “We can’t say if that is the case.” Hundreds of Naxals who had descended on Gadchiroli to disrupt polls, have reportedly started leaving the district.


       




      Meanwhile, the government has token away the four choppers, deployed during the polls, from Gadchiroli. “During elections, major Naxal offensives could be foiled only because of choppers. And with the planned offensive not far away from taking off, ridding Gadchiroli of the choppers is unfortunate,” said another senior official.












       

      In the North East,Bengal Refugees are targeted most but Mamata is NEVER Known tostand with dalit Refugee Popolation anywhere in the country!

       

       



      The Union HRD minister Kapil Sibal's retraction from his earlier announcement of raising the cut-off percentage for IIT exams has relieved the IIT entrance coaching fraternity in the city. The minister had earlier announced that the cut-off of class 12 percentage for IIT would be raised to 80 and that only those who secure above 80 per cent in their standard 12 exams could appear for the IIT entrance tests.


       




      "I am happy that the decision to raise the threshold has been cancelled. Setting up the cut-off percentage as high as 80 per cent would have been justified had there been a common board in the country for class 12 exams. But taking into consideration the SSC, CBSE, ICSE and other boards, the platforms of competition are different and thus the decision would have been biased towards the comparatively easy-to-score boards. Further, raising the cut-off percentage would have affected students from rural areas, as the conditions under which they study for class 12 are not always favourable. Whereas for IIT entrance training, they come to cities such as Pune where they get better facilities to study and thus are able to perform well."


       





      Opening a new front, HRD Minister Kapil Sibal favoured more weightage be given to Class 12 Board exam for IIT entrance and felt that the required minimum of 60 per cent marks could be raised but left it to a Committee to take a decision.


       




      Sibal's suggestion came in an attempt to ensure that students taking entrance tests to the premier institutes gave equal importance to the secondary school exam and to check the growth of IIT coaching centres.


       




      A Committee of IIT directors has been appointed to work out a revised system for IIT entrance from 2011, he said.


       




      Sibal told reporters the move is aimed at ensuring that students take their class XII seriously and checking the growth of coaching centres, which are thriving on imparting coaching to students for IIT entrance.


       




      Asked whether the higher minimum should be raised to 80 to 85 per cent, Sibal said it all depended upon the IIT system to take a decision.


       





      Asking union HRD Minister Kapil Sibal to reconsider his move to change the existing eligibility criteria for the IIT joint entrance examination, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said the new proposal will discriminate against students with poor socio-economic status.


       




      In a letter faxed to Sibal, Kumar said, "Such proposals will favour students with elite background and discriminate against students with poor socio-economic status. Any examination system should be inclusive. Any change in the existing examination system will have far reaching consequences, which is unwarranted."


       


       




      Sibal had mooted a new proposal whereby a student would have to secure at least 80 per cent marks in the class 12 Board examinations in stead of 60 per cent currently required to sit for the IIT-JEE.


       




      The chief minister said that students from backward regions would be the most affected by the new proposal.


       


      "In the existing system, larger pool of students with different socio-economic background are able to appear in the entrance examination. This explains better performance of students from backward regions in the IIT examination," he added.


       





      Human Resource Development minister Kapil Sibal said today that the government does not have any objection “in-principle” if the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) want to set up campuses overseas.




      He said this after a meeting of the IIM council, the first after he took over in May this year. “IIMs are a global brand,” said Sibal. “The IIMs have a national commitment but we will not hold them back if they want to go international. We have in-principle no-objection to IIMs setting up campuses abroad.”


       




      He said he had suggested that IIMs should join forces to set up these overseas campuses although the final decision rests with them — whether they want to do it alone or by joining hands. The IIMs will come back to the Minister with a proposal by January next year.


       




      Sibal’s position is in contrast to that of his predecessor, Arjun Singh, who had in 2006 prevented the IIMs








       


      to set up campuses abroad. IIM Bangalore had wanting to set up a Singapore campus in 2006, which was rejected by the HRD Ministry under Singh.


       




      Sibal also said that the appointment of directors and board members of the IIMs will be done through an independent collegium from now on.


       




      “The collegium will suggest names for appointment of the board members and the directors. The composition of the collegium will be from various spheres, from academia, industry etc,” Sibal said. He said that the number of members in each IIM’s board of governors will not be more than 13.  


       

      Meanwhile, Links between a leading Indian militant group and the Tamil Tigers have for the first time been confirmed by a rebel leader Wednesday, two days after the army seized documents stating payments made towards weapons bought from the Tigers.


      There were several reports in the past quoting intelligence reports that the outlawed United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) had direct links with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).


      On Monday, soldiers of the 19 Kumaon Regiment seized a large cache of weapons and explosives buried inside a pit, besides documents relating to the ULFA's financial transactions.


      "There was a noting in one of the accounts statement that the ULFA paid Rs.2.3 million to the LTTE towards purchase of weapons," an army commander said. Now, for the first time, an ULFA leader admitted links with the LTTE.


      "It was sometime in the early 90s when I was just an ordinary member at the Lakhipathar camp (in eastern Assam's Tinsukia district) when we saw three lanky Tamil men with our commander-in-chief Paresh Baruah. We were later told they were from the LTTE," Prabal Neog, a senior leader of the pro-talk ULFA faction, told IANS.


      The Alpha and Charlie companies of the ULFA's 28th battalion, the most potent striking unit of the outfit, announced a unilateral ceasefire in June last year. The group now in a ceasefire mode named themselves as the pro-talk ULFA faction.


      "I don't know much about the ULFA-LTTE links, but then we heard from our seniors that something was on. We were too young at that time when such a linkage was established," Neog said.


      The ULFA-LTTE links were established sometime in the early 1990s with LTTE guerrillas training ULFA cadres in the jungles of Assam, according to intelligence and police inputs.


      "LTTE supplied arms to ULFA through its navy with the consignments handed over in Chittagong (Bangladesh) to ULFA leaders. It was Pakistan's ISI agents that introduced LTTE arms suppliers to ULFA," said an intelligence official. However, the ULFA-LTTE links did not continue for long and probably snapped in the late 90s.


      "Now that there is material evidence in the form of the accounts statement and that ULFA leaders have admitted links with the LTTE, things need to be investigated to find out more about ULFA's other connections," Nishinath Changkakoty, a former Assam police chief, said.




       

       



      21/10/2009

      Amid terror shadow, Pakistan shuts educational institutions





      Islamabad, Oct 21 (IANS) All government and private schools, colleges and universities throughout Pakistan have been closed after fears of terror attacks sparked by the twin suicide bombings at a university campus here, officials said.


      The News Wednesday quoted the officials as saying that all educational institutions will remain closed till the security situation improves in the country.


      All schools run by the armed forces have been shut since Sunday in the wake of the military offensive against the Taliban in South Waziristan that began Saturday.


      The government's latest move comes after at least six people, including two women students and two suicide bombers, were killed and several others injured in synchronised suicide bombings at the International Islamic University here Tuesday afternoon when thousands of students were in the sprawling campus.


      The Punjab government has decided that all educational institutions in the province would remain closed till further orders.


      The decision was taken during a meeting presided over by Zulfiqar Khosa, the senior advisor to the Punjab chief minister.


      The Punjab government has also directed the security agencies and concerned departments to take steps on a war-footing to ensure security arrangements in the educational institutions.


      'The decision to reopen educational institutions will be taken only after ensuring a satisfactory security situation,' Ayyaz Sadiq, a member of the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament, told The News.


      The Punjab government would meet daily and seek inputs from the police and the home, education, health and other related departments on the security situation in educational institutions, he added.


      In Sindh, Education Secretary Rizwan Memon said all schools and colleges have shut until Sunday. 'The decision has been taken to avoid any untoward incident in (the) wake of (the) current security situation in the country particularly after the attack in Islamabad.'


      Many private schools in Islamabad and adjacent Rawalpindi informed parents by telephone they were shutting down temporarily for security reasons.


      In the North West Frontier Province, the provincial government spokesperson said all private and state-run schools and colleges had been closed for five days.


      The Balochistan education minister also said educational institutions would remain closed till Sunday.


      The twin bombings at the Islamabad university took place amid heightened security following the Pakistani military launching a major offensive against the Taliban, which has vowed retaliation over US drone attacks. Pakistan has been subjected to a wave of terror attacks in the last fortnight.


      DPA adds: Intelligence officials said Wednesday that troops were engaged in fierce fighting at Kotkai, the birth place of Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud and also the home town of Taliban commander Qari Hussain, known as the 'mentor of suicide bombers'.


      'There are reports of fresh casualties but we don't have the numbers,' said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity.


      Major General Athar Abbas, the military's chief spokesman, said the security forces positioned on high land were engaged in 'an envelopment manoeuvre' around Kotkai, which is on the route to another rebel stronghold - Sararogha.


      The army says it has killed up to 90 militants and suffered 13 casualties since the start of the offensive, but the Taliban rejects the claims. Independent verification is unavailable as journalists are not allowed into the battle zone.


      More than 30,000 soldiers, backed by jet aircraft, helicopter gunships and artillery, are taking on around 10,000 insurgents, with an Al Qaeda contingent of up to 1,500 men, mostly Uzbeks and Arabs.


      The operation, codenamed Path to Deliverance, was launched following a string of brazen assaults on Pakistani security forces and other targets, including UN offices that have killed more than 160 people since Oct 5.


      Authorities are bracing for more violence amid new intelligence about terrorist attacks, most probably hostage situations.


      Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has condemned the wave of terrorist strikes, vowing that 'the operation against the terrorists in Waziristan and other areas will continue till their complete elimination'.



       


      25 schools of atomic energy across India planned




      About 25 schools of atomic energy are proposed to be set up in the next two years to produce at least 500 engineers to assist country’s growing need of human resources for expanding nuclear power industry.




      Gandhinagar-based Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University has tied up with P M Dimensions, an engineering consulting company for M Tech course in nuclear engineering.




      The university is the first to tie-up with P M Dimensions, a private entity which has taken the initiative to set up around 25 schools across the country, firm’s director Makarand Rajadhyaksha said yesterday.




      The course in nuclear engineering began on October 12, he said at the second Indo-French nuclear business meet.




      Rajadhyaksha said his company would introduce a world- class uniform curriculum and at the same time reduce the cost of engineering training for the price-sensitive Indian market and ensure that talent gets attracted to nuclear industry.


       


      New anti-terror security system raised alert on J&K cricketers




      At the heart of the controversy surrounding the arrest and subsequent release of an under-22 Jammu and Kashmir team cricketer, Parvez Rasool, and the police interrogation of his room mate, Mehrajuddin, over the suspicion of the presence of explosives in a kit bag in their room at the Karnataka State Cricket Association’s Chinnaswamy Stadium on Saturday, is a brand new, privately outsourced, anti-terrorism system put in place by the KSCA at the stadium.




      The new mechanised system triggered off a panic wave that resulted in the Bangalore police arresting Rasool. But preliminary chemical analysis of the kit bag and the KSCA Club House room of the two cricketers by forensic experts have revealed no trace of the military explosive material C4 or any other explosive substances.




      “We did vaporisation tests and other rapid chemical analysis tests of the kit bag but it showed nothing for explosives. We tested the handheld detectors used by the private agency on the suspected bag but it is not consistently showing signals for the presence of explosive traces in the bag,” sources in the forensic department said.


      On Saturday morning, the new sophisticated remote explosive detector and handheld explosives detectors deployed at the stadium had reportedly indicated the presence of traces of C4, an explosive mixture containing RDX, in Rasool’s kit bag.




      The new anti-terrorism security services at the Chinnaswamy Stadium has been contracted to a Hyderabad-based private firm, Brio Macro Security Pvt Ltd, who are channel partners of the US-based Homeland Security Strategies Inc. Among the devices deployed by the security agency are programmed remote explosive detectors that claim to pick up traces of explosive substances from distances upto a few kilometres, and handheld detectors that zero in on the explosive material.





      In Gadchiroli’s red zone


      Vivek Deshpande Tags : Gadchiroli, Maharashtra Posted: Monday , Oct 19, 2009 at 0422 hrs

       

       



      The Naxal assault on October 8 that killed 17 policemen is the most recent in Gadchiroli, which is caught in a spiral of violence. THE Indian EXPRESS travels to the tribal district of Maharashtra that has become one of the major Maoist battlegrounds







      With the Pranhita, Godavari and Indravati flowing through its lush landscape, its exquisitely carved ninth-century temples of Markanda, and the thickly-wooded Chaprala sanctuary, Gadchiroli is a land of beauty and serenity. But over the last few months, Gadchiroli, in eastern Maharashtra, has been caught in a vortex of Maoist violence.




      Small huts dot the tarred roads that go right through its interiors, roads that have been built despite violent opposition from Maoists. Mainly inhabited by Madia-Gond tribals, other tribes like the Pradhans and the Kolams, and displaced Bengali refugees who form over half of its over 13-lakh population, there is little here to suggest that these villages are at the centre of a storm. But there is no missing the curious, shy and often probing glances you get from the villagers. It may look calm and sleepy, but Gadchiroli is always in a state of high alert. And everyone knows why.



      Nearly 30 years ago, Gadchiroli was influenced by Naxal ideology that came in from neighbouring Andhra Pradesh. The ideology soon turned into a wave of terror. And now, as the decisive battle between the Maoist insurgents and the state becomes intense, Gadchiroli is the battleground.




      In recent months, Gadchiroli has gone from becoming a relatively less-affected Maoist spot in the Red Corridor to one of the main combat zones between the state and Maoist insurgents. In the past 10 months, Maoist attacks have gone up in the region. On October 8, the Naxals ambushed a police patrol, killing 17 policemen. About 53 policemen and 30 civilians have been killed in four big attacks this year. In the last 28 years, 113 security personnel and 367 civilians have been killed here.




      ... contd.


      http://www.indianexpress.com/news/in-gadchirolis-red-zone/530422/


      Border dispute with China will be resolved amicably: Pranab

      21 Oct 2009, 0326 hrs IST, PTI


      NEW DELHI: Downplaying the recent war of words with China, India today expressed confidence that the boundary dispute with it will be resolved



      amicably through dialogue.

      These recriminations over the border are "not sudden", Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee told PTI while pointing out that such issues have been cropping up earlier also as China has not accepted the McMohan Line since 1914.

      Mukherjee, who held the External Affairs Ministry portfolio in the previous UPA government, disagreed when it was suggested that China had been "strident" recently while India's response was being perceived as soft.

      "Whenever they make any comment, our response is measured and as it should be. Chinese comments on the Prime Minister's visit to Arunachal is not for the first time. And even after that comment was made, I visited Arunachal. After coming from there, I said that Arunachal is an integral part of India," he said.

      On the prospect of resolving the boundary question with China, he said "I am quite confident that all border disputes will be resolved through discussions, amicably".

      On Chinese objections to the visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Arunachal Pradesh recently to address an election rally, the senior Congress leader said "Prime Minister is the leader of the ruling party, therefore it is quite appropriate that he will go and canvass for his party candidates (during elections)."










      AT MAOIST MERCY
      - Rebels kill cops in police station, kidnap OC and loot bank





      Sankrail (West Midnapore), Oct. 20: Maoists led by a young woman today launched their most audacious strike in Bengal in years, riding bikes to a police station, killing two officers and taking the officer-in-charge hostage while robbing a nearby bank.


      The 40-minute afternoon attack in West Midnapore’s Sankrail, just 70km from Midnapore town where state police chief Bhupinder Singh was camping, was marked by careful planning but capricious killings.


      The rebels shot two sub-inspectors dead with their automatic weapons but spared a third who fell at their feet, letting him go after making him do squats holding his ears. At the bank where they met no resistance, they fired at the unarmed cashier, who somehow ducked and saved himself.


      Officer-in-charge Atindranath Dutta, 35, whose quarters are bang opposite the police station, was grabbed as he stepped out to see what was happening. The ex-student of Liluah Don Bosco was blindfolded and taken away on a bike, sandwiched between two Maoists, his family learning about the abduction on TV.






      Maoist leader Kishenji told a TV channel tonight that all women Maoist cadres should be released in exchange for Dutta’s freedom. “You go and give Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee this message,” he told Dutta’s wife. “Your husband is fine; we have given him the status of a prisoner of war.”


      Earlier, Kishenji had told The Telegraph the killings were in retaliation for the security forces’ operation in Lalgarh. “We also want to pass on the message that we are ready for any new offensive, like the one the Centre is planning.”


      A poster the rebels left behind suggested an additional motive: pressuring the government to release Chhatradhar Mahato, leader of the People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities.


      The attacks came on a day Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called for a more calibrated strategy in the anti-Maoist offensive, his government hinting at making a distinction between insurgents who want to secede from India and those who, like the Naxalites, do not. Delhi also reaffirmed it was open to talks with the Maoists if they surrendered arms.







      Atindranath Dutta, the OC taken hostage

      Just this morning, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee had told a cabinet core committee his government might need to be “harsh” on the Maoists. When a grim chief minister returned to his office around 4pm after lunch, he was asked about the Sankrail attack and said: “Yes, I am looking into the matter.”


      As the CPM raised the “Mamata-Maoist nexus” pitch, the railway minister neither condemned the killings nor targeted the government for its failure to deal with the Maoists. She said she was “shocked and hurt (shokahata ebong marmahata)”.


      The Maoists had booby-trapped the road on both sides of the police station and planted an improvised bomb also on NH-6, the police said.


      Villagers said 22 Maoists riding 11 motorcycles had appeared out of the nearby Durgahuri forest around 1.20pm and divided into two groups on reaching the police station (see graphic). Each Maoist who entered the police station carried at least two weapons.


      “They were led by a woman in her early 20s, wearing salwar-kameez. She barked instructions at the others,” said Sukumar Ghosh, a constable who was bathing at a well on the premises with three colleagues.


      Ghosh “shivered in fear” as he saw the woman gun down sub-inspector Dibakar Bhattacharjee, 58, who was sitting at his table wearing a lungi and a shirt. In the next room, sub-inspector Swapan Roy, also in a lungi, was shot as he cowered under a table.


      In the adjoining computer room, assistant sub-inspector Sukhendu Masanto fell at the rebels’ feet. “They pulled me up by my hair and asked where the arms were stocked,” Masanto said.


      He led them to a locked trunk and a wooden box where six .303 rifles and five pistols had been kept. The Maoists broke it open with a rifle butt and grabbed the weapons.


      Next, at the SBI branch 20 metres away, the rebels shot at Sujit Das at his teller’s counter while the four other bank employees trembled in a corner. Das, who escaped unhurt, was made to open the vault and the rebels cleaned out the cash, said to be about Rs 9.27 lakh.


      The raiders grabbed two Hero Honda motorcycles from the police station and, around 2pm, sped off towards the forests with their hostage in a convoy of 13 bikes.


      “They were shouting that they were taking our baro babu (big officer) along with them and dared anyone to stop them,” said pan seller Chandan Sen.


      None dared enter the police station for over two hours till journalists almost forced Masanto to go in around 4.15pm. Only then was it discovered that Roy too had been killed — Masanto had all along been insisting that the Maoists had taken the sub-inspector with them as well.


      “We have increased our forces there to provide more security to the people,” chief secretary Asok Mohan Chakrabarti said. “Our main concern is to trace the kidnapped officer and arrest the criminals,” he added, using a word rarely employed in the state to describe Naxalites.

      http://www.telegraphindia.com/1091021/jsp/frontpage/story_11639424.jsp









      CPM’s slide deeper than diagnosed
      - LS erosion spread across social groups





      Calcutta, Oct 20: The CPM central committee appears to have underestimated the decline in the party’s vote in Bengal in the Lok Sabha polls last May.


      The final poll data compiled by the National Election Study (NES) now shows that the decline in the party’s — and the Left Front’s — vote was sharper than what had been calculated earlier.


      Also, the erosion was spread across all social groups, including the Left’s traditional support bases among tribal and Scheduled Caste voters.


      While expressing concern at the erosion of the party’s support base, the central committee’s analysis argued that the “main base of the party is intact by and large” in Bengal, where the Left secured 1.85 crore votes.


      But the final NES data and the post-poll survey done by the New Delhi-based Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) present a picture that would contradict the central committee’s attempt to downplay the decline.


      According to the NES, the CPM’s vote in Bengal in 2009 fell to 33.10 per cent from 38.57 per cent of the total votes, while its main rival, the Trinamul Congress, saw its vote jump from 21.04 per cent to 31.20 per cent between the two polls.


      The Left Front got 43.3 per cent votes this time, compared with 50.81 per cent in 2004, while the TMC-Congress alliance got 44.6 per cent.


      The alienation of different social groups from the CPM should be particularly worrying for the party. In terms of occupation, the biggest setback for the Left was among farmers — a loss of 26 percentage points — followed by a 16 percentage point decline in support among skilled and semi-skilled supporters in rural areas.


      The only occupational groups that stood solidly by the Left were salaried people in rural areas, whose support rose by 23 percentage points, and skilled and semi-skilled workers in urban areas. Interestingly, despite the reverses it suffered in villages, the support for the Left among marginal farmers and sharecroppers rose by 1 percentage point. Among the social categories, only the Scheduled Tribes and Scheduled Castes remained loyal to the Left. The ST vote for the Left bucked the overall trend to rise from 39 per cent to 47 per cent, while the SC vote remained stable at 55 per cent.


      Party sources, however, indicated that the CPM now faced a daunting task to retain this base among SC/ST voters. For over three decades, the Left has secured over 50 per cent of the votes in Assembly constituencies reserved for SC/ST candidates. Bengal has 69 such constituencies.


      But the anti-government agitation in Lalgarh and the Maoist offensive against the CPM have already dented the party’s bases in these constituencies, particularly in the three districts of West Midnapore, Bankura and Purulia. The operations against Maoists by the joint forces of the Centre and the state have further alienated the party from large sections of people in these districts.


      Equally worrying for the CPM is the loss of support among Muslims — from 47 per cent in 2004 to 36 per cent in 2009 — which is directly related to the Opposition’s campaign over land acquisition for new industries and the perception within the community that the Left Front government had offered it little economic and social benefits.


      Turning the tide would require massive damage-control exercises both by the party and the government.


      The party seems to have identified two social groups in particular — the rural middle class and the Muslims — for special attention.


      The announcement by the school education minister that 6,000 new schools will be set up are an indication of this plan to reverse the trend. CPM state secretariat member Mohammad Salim has been given the task of leading the charge to regain Muslim support.


      Land reforms minister Abdur Rezzak Mollah, who could have helped Salim in this, especially in the villages, has problems with the party leadership, including chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, on major policy issues.


      But the Siliguri municipal poll results last month showed that the Opposition charge is getting stronger and making the Left vulnerable in new areas.


      Contrary to the central committee’s optimism, there seem to be few areas where the CPM’s base is likely to remain intact in the run-up to next year’s elections to 82 civic bodies and then to the Assembly polls in 2011.












      Backlash forces IIT clarification

      New Delhi, Oct. 20: Kapil Sibal today clarified that the Indian Institutes of Technology alone will decide on a proposed hike in their eligibility criteria, after Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar and several other politicians termed the proposal “elitist”.


      A panel of representatives from all the IITs will recommend a set of entrance examination reforms, including any hike in eligibility criteria, the human resource development minister said.


      After a meeting of the IIT Council, the minister had yesterday asserted that a hike in eligibility criteria was essential.


      At present, students need to score at least 60 per cent in their Class XII board examinations to become eligible for an IIT seat. Sibal yesterday suggested that the cut-off be raised.


      He had indicated that the new cut-off could limit eligibility to the top 10 to 15 percentile of students based on their school-leaving exam.


      IIT sources and HRD ministry officials had dismissed the figure as unrealistic as it would bar 85 per cent students from sitting for the entrance examination.


      The Bihar chief minister wrote to Sibal, saying that raising the eligibility criteria to allow just board toppers a chance at IIT seats was “elitist”. “Such proposals will favour students with elite background and discriminate against students with poor socio-economic status. Any examination system should be inclusive,” Nitish said in his letter.


      Similar sentiments were expressed by Lalu Prasad and Ram Vilas Paswan — leaders from Bihar from where many aspirants take the IIT entrance test. Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayavati, the BJP and the JMM also slammed the proposal — all smelling a design to deny seats to poor students and those from the hinterland.


      Sibal today clarified that the figure he had mentioned as a possible new cut-off was just an example, and not what the IIT panel had decided on.


      The team examining JEE reforms may, however, suggest a crucial departure from current admission practices where students are allotted a stream of engineering along with their seat — based on their rank in the entrance test.


      This practice, the IITs feel, often leads to students picking a stream with “preconceived” notions and without adequate knowledge of whether they are suited to the subject.


      Instead, the JEE reform team is considering a proposal to allot streams only at the end of the first year of undergraduate education.


      This will not need any change in curriculum as all students at present study common subjects — involving physics, chemistry and mathematics — in the first year.

      http://www.telegraphindia.com/1091021/jsp/frontpage/story_11639401.jsp









      Spy tag on US scientist tied to India







      Oct. 20: A US scientist, who played a key role in the Chandrayaan mission, was charged yesterday for trying to sell top-secret information to Israel for $11,000, federal prosecutors said.


      Stewart D. Nozette, 52, was arrested on a charge of attempted espionage and is being held pending an initial appearance in US district court in Washington, authorities said.


      They added that the charges stemmed from an undercover sting operation in which an FBI agent posed as an Israeli spy. Nozette allegedly passed the agent sensitive information through a “dead drop” at a Washington DC post office in recent weeks, authorities said.


      Indian officials, who were in touch with US scientists over the country’s first unmanned lunar mission, insisted that there was no compromise with Isro’s security since Nozette was not given access to any sensitive information during his visit to India.


      Nozette was involved in the development of the miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar, one of several foreign-made instruments aboard the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft.


      The mini-SAR was jointly developed by scientists at the Applied Physics Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University, and the US Naval Air Warfare Centre through Nasa. The instrument was intended to detect water ice in the permanently shadowed regions of the lunar poles.


      Nozette was widely quoted and interviewed by the media in the US and in India during the Chandrayaan mission.


      He was president of the Alliance for Competitive Technology, a non-profit group he founded in 1990. The scientist has held security clearances as high as top secret and had regular access to classified information.


      Authorities would not say what prompted their investigation, but an FBI agent wrote in court papers that Nozette acted as a consultant for an unnamed aerospace firm that the Israeli government owned.


      From 1998 to 2008, the scientist “answered the company’s questions and, in return, Nozette received regular payments from the company”, the agent wrote.


      He said the Israeli firm paid Nozette $225,000 during that span.



       










      Time to be harsh, says CM

      Calcutta, Oct. 20: Hours before the Maoists struck today, chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee apparently told a cabinet core committee meeting his government had to be “harsh” on Maoists and their associates “given the ground realities”.


      Some of the CPM’s allies are opposed to the use of the central anti-terror law against the Left extremists, but Bhattacharjee told the meeting his government could not afford to be “toothless”.


      “I’m told that certain questions are being raised on the implementation of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) in our state. (But) just see what the Maoists are doing. Innocent people are being killed. Should a government sit back and watch such incidents or take stern steps against the killers and those associated with them?


      “Our government can’t afford to be toothless. Given the ground realities and the killings by the Maoists, harsh measures are required. The UAPA has to be invoked against the offenders and that’s a fait accompli,” the chief minister was quoted as saying.


      According to an official, it was RSP minister Kshiti Goswami who raised his party’s reservations about the “draconian” act at this morning’s meeting. “Our Left Front government had earlier said the Maoists would be fought politically and that their organisations wouldn’t be banned. Now people with alleged Maoist links or members of their groups are being booked under the UAPA. This is a draconian law and our party is opposed to it. Why aren’t provisions of the IPC (Indian Penal Code) or the CrPC (Criminal Procedure Code) being used to charge them?’’ Goswami was learnt to have told the chief minister.


      However, two other allies interrupted him. Forward Bloc minister Naren De and the Socialist Party’s Kiranmoy Nanda were learnt to have said that a “strict law” was “the need of the hour to combat insurgents and extremists’’.


      “Kshitida, people are being ruthlessly killed by the Maoists and you are questioning the action against them by invoking the UAPA? I think the chief minister is right,” Nanda was quoted as saying.


      Finance minister Asim Dasgupta of the CPM butted in, saying the government could not “stay an onlooker when murders are being committed at will and almost every day”.


      The chief minister also stressed that his government could not ask Delhi to keep Bengal out of the offensive being planned against the Maoists. Other states hit by guerrilla violence — like Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Orissa — will all be covered by the crackdown.


      “I am told that the army won’t be deployed and the pa- ramilitary will launch the offensive. If all states agree to such a central operation, why should we oppose it?” the chief minister asked.


      “The incidents in Jharkhand and Bihar are having an effect on our state. We, too, have a responsibility to combat the crimes for which the central action is being planned. Being in power, I can’t tolerate such killings,” he added.


      PWD minister Goswami refused to divulge the details of the meeting. But he said: “My exchanges with the chief minister on the UAPA were frank and good. Buddhababu explained the government’s position. I stuck to my party’s.”












      Horror on TV after lunch







      Oct. 20: Two families were grieving today and another clinging to hope and holding back tears.


      Sub-inspectors Dibakar Bhattacharya and Swapan Roy were killed by the guerrillas and their boss, Atindranath Dutta, was taken hostage.


      Two years shy of retirement, Bhattacharya was desperate for a transfer to neighbouring East Midnapore where his family stays. “My mother was always scared and wanted him to take a transfer to a safer place. Her worst fears came true,” said Dipankar, 21, who is yet to get a job after having completed his BSc.


      His brother Anirban, 19, is in college, studying law.


      Their mother Alaka, 51, collapsed on a sofa when she saw her husband’s name flash on TV. “I tried to call my father, but his phone was off,” said Dipankar. Around 5pm, an of- ficer called up their home in the Contai police quarters to confirm the death.


      Roy’s wife Rekha, 45, and their two daughters, Barnali, 23, and Rinki, 21, live in the police lines in Midnapore town.


      At Roy’s ancestral house in Murshidabad, brother Uttam said: “He came here almost a year ago but we spoke to each other every week. He would have been here in November for our mother’s death anniversary.”


      Officer-in-charge Dutta’s family last saw him when he visited his ancestral house in Belur during Durga Puja.


      An MSc in economics from Calcutta University and a Don Bosco Liluah alumnus, Dutta was serious about his social commitments. “He would always be here for Puja. He touched my feet on Vijaya Dashami. I don’t know what to say,” said Anit Dutta, his uncle.


      The officer’s father Ashok Dutta, a retired bank employee, lives in Ariadaha on Calcutta’s northern fringes. “My son is very honest. His nine-year career with the police is spotless. I pray to (Maoist leader) Kishanji to let him go,” he said.


      A friend who has known him since school said he was always a gentleman, who chose the profession because he thought it was honourable.


      The officer’s wife Indrani, 28, spoke to Kishanji through a TV channel. “He assured her that her husband won’t be harmed,” said her brother Sanjib.


      Indrani is at her parents’ house in north Calcutta’s Ahiritolla with their two-year-old daughter Oindrakshi.


      The Duttas were casually watching TV after lunch when suddenly the name came up. “We could not believe what we were seeing,” said father-in-law Rajen Dutta. “We don’t know what to do.”

      http://www.telegraphindia.com/1091021/jsp/bengal/story_11639333.jsp









      Bang on with target & timing







      Calcutta, Oct. 20: The Maoists had chosen today’s target with care.


      The poorly armed Sankrail police station is outside the Lalgarh arena of action and near the borders with Jharkhand and Orissa.


      According to a senior officer posted there until recently, the police station was both “topographically and circumstantially vulnerable”.


      Modern weapons had been withdrawn from the personnel at the police station following fears that they could be snatched by the Maoists.


      Automatic weapons were provided only during elections and some of the Sankrail personnel had been living in perpetual fear, aware that they did not have the firepower to match the Maoists’.


      “It is only recently that the Maoists have started killing and kidnapping while snatching arms from policemen,” the officer said, suggesting the force may not have been prepared for the rebels’ change of tack.


      The location also suited the Maoists. “The escape routes (to Jharkhand and Orissa) are easy and well covered and reaching the border takes little time,” the officer said.


      More important, the Maoists knew that Sankrail, though in Jhargram subdivision, was outside the Lalgarh zone, where the Centre and the state’s paramilitary forces were conducting a joint operation.


      With the police station located outside a “typical Maoist-hit” zone, the district’s top cops never considered throwing a security ring around it. “There are no bunkers. The gates are manned by sentries with ordinary .303 rifles,” a senior West Midnapore officer said.


      Local support was a factor, too. “The extremists have the support of local people, tacit or active. Anti-police feelings have grown again after the arrest of Chhatradhar Mahato,” an officer said.


      But today’s raid, intelligence sources said, was meant more to be a signal to the joint forces than a protest against Mahato’s arrest.


      The timing of the afternoon assault also caught the cops off guard. “At 1.30pm, the place becomes desolate, with the shops closed and residents asleep. Having done night duty, most of the policemen also take rest. The few people around are in the bank next door,” the officer said.


      City arrest


      The general secretary of the Bandi Mukti Committee, Chhoton Das, was arrested late tonight from Beleghata in Calcutta for alleged Maoist links.

      http://www.telegraphindia.com/1091021/jsp/bengal/story_11639332.jsp

      First Batch of UID Numbers by 2010-End: Nilekani


















      Click to Share

      The first batch of the Unique Identification (UID) number is expected to be ready by 2010-end, chairman of the national project Nandan Nilekani said on Wednesday.

      “We are hopeful of rolling out the first batch of UID numbers by August or end of next year,” he said. “We look at Andhra Pradesh as a role model for implementing the UID project as it is in the forefront in using information technology for the masses.”


      The Unique Identification Authority of India would shortly draw up a plan for implementing the UID pilot project in Andhra Pradesh as the State was ready with a team and required infrastructure, he told reporters after a meeting with Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister K. Rosaiah and Chief Secretary P. Ramakanth Reddy here.


      To buttress his point, he referred to the effective implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme in Andhra with the help of IT.


      Andhra Pradesh has collected about 50 million Iris images (using bio-metric technology) for public distribution system and also delivering social security pensions. This data could be integrated with the UID data, Nilekani added.


      He said the authority would soon publish guidelines for various States for making use of data available with them for the ambitious UID project.


      The existing data in States should be made UID-ready in the next six months, he said.


      The UIDAI will soon set up its regional office in Hyderabad, Nilekani said.


      Nilekani said there would be emphasis on ensuring there was no duplication of data.


      “We will blend our technology with that of other agencies and integrate it so that duplication of data is minimised. Biometrics will be used for this purpose,” the Infosys co-founder said.


      The UIDAI Chairman, who enjoys the status of a Cabinet Minister, said updating the data would not be a problem as everything would be done online.


      The UID programme, under which a unique identification number would be provided to each individual in the country, has been designed for continuous updating, he pointed out.


      Several enrollment centres would be opened for people to submit their finger prints, he said.


      Replying to a query, Nilekani said UID would not be mandatory initially. But people will accept it once they see leakages coming down, he noted.






      © Copyright PTI. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of any PTI content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without their prior written consent.






       


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        First batch of UID numbers by 2010-end: Nilekani


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        PSUs may be given sell orders soon


        Economic Times - ‎Oct 18, 2009‎


        A bullish market sentiment has also encouraged the disinvestment department to draft a schedule for follow-on public offers (FPO) by listed PSUs. ...






        BSE Sensex set for 20000, NSE 6000:ASSOCHAM


        Commodity Online - ‎4 hours ago‎


        Thirdly, since efforts and policy directions of UPA government support growth of capital market by building a consensus on issue of disinvestment, ...




        Stocks to watch: HCC, R-Infra, SAIL...


        Myiris.com - ‎8 hours ago‎


        Disinvestment in the Steel Authority of India (SAIL) seems to be on the cards, with the government considering a two-phase, follow-on-public offer (FPO) of ...




        Disinvestment and populism


        Livemint - ‎Oct 19, 2009‎


        While there are many reasons for India's huge fiscal deficit, which is estimated at 6.8% of the gross domestic product for 2009-10, financially reckless ...





        Andrew Yule exits JV; sells 26% in Phoenix Yule


        Business Standard - ‎Oct 15, 2009‎


        "Funds raised by way of disinvestment of AYCL shares in PYL will go towards repayment of a part of interest-free government of India loan of Rs 87.06 crore, ...











        Govt allows Coal India to hike prices by 11%


        Hindu Business Line - ‎Oct 15, 2009‎


        Seen in the background of CIL's proposal for 10 per cent disinvestment for an IPO, sources feel that addressing some fundamental weaknesses would help the ...










        Cabinet to decide 5% NTPC selloff today


        Times of India - ‎Oct 14, 2009‎


        NEW DELHI: The government is poised to give a big push to its disinvestment agenda with the aim of capitalising on the resurgence in market sentiment. ...

















        Mamata orders probe into Mathura train collision


        Economic Times - ‎6 hours ago‎


        NEW DELHI: Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee Wednesday ordered an inquiry into the train collision in Mathura that killed at least 10 people and announced a ...











        Mamata muted


        Calcutta Telegraph - ‎14 hours ago‎


        Oct. 20: Mamata Banerjee today neither condemned the ki-lling and abduction of police personnel, nor used the opportunity to criticise Buddhadeb ...





        No rule of law in Bengal: Mamata


        Times of India - ‎Oct 16, 2009‎


        KOLKATA: With police "acting as cadres of CPM", there is no rule of law in Bengal, Tri-namool Congress chairperson Mamata Banerjee said in Kolkata on Friday ...






        Politics of necessity Daily Pioneer





        Buddha calls Mamata's demand juvenile


        Times of India - Mohua Chatterjee - ‎Oct 12, 2009‎


        ... his combative instincts as was evident on Monday when he described Trinamool Congress Mamata Banerjee's demand for his arrest as “juvenile disorder”. ...










        Mamata pays Tollywood in kind: A film city on rly land


        Indian Express - ‎Oct 19, 2009‎


        After introducing a number of new trains, extending Metro Railway and modernising the Railway Sports Complex at Behala, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee has ...







        Sonia call to Mamata


        Calcutta Telegraph - ‎Oct 18, 2009‎


        Calcutta, Oct. 18: Sonia Gandhi called Mamata Banerjee yesterday to convey Diwali greetings, but Trinamul Congress sources said their leader “took the ...







        Friends have become a little too greedy, says Mamata


        Hindu - ‎Oct 4, 2009‎


        Kolkata: “Our friends have become a little too greedy,” Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee told a rally in Siliguri in north Bengal on Sunday, ...











        Mamata seeks CM's arrest after violence


        Times of India - ‎Oct 11, 2009‎


        ARAMBAG: Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee on Sunday demanded the arrest of chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee after CPM and Trinamool men ...










        Chain-pulling before accident being investigated


        Press Trust of India - ‎9 minutes ago‎


        ... incident of chain-pulling before the Goa Express hit the Mewar Express between Mathura and Vrindavan today, Railway minister Mamata Banerjee said today. ...





        CPI-M wants Trinamool to spell out stand on Maoists


        Press Trust of India - ‎19 hours ago‎


        ... the CPI(M) today demanded that Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee spell out her stand on the Maoist menace, accusing her of giving support to them ...






















        Maya writes to Sibal, says withdraw IIT proposal


        Expressindia.com - ‎32 minutes ago‎


        Lucknow Chief Minister Mayawati on Tuesday wrote to Union Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal, asking him to withdraw his proposal to raise the ...










        Nitish, Maya, Lalu oppose Sibal move


        Times of India - ‎13 hours ago‎


        Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar wasted no time in shooting off a letter to HRD minister Kapil Sibal, seeking a rethink. RJD supremo Lalu Prasad too wrote ...






        Plot against Biharis, say Bihar netas


        Times of India - ‎11 hours ago‎


        Chief minister Nitish Kumar wasted no time in shooting off a letter to Union human resources development minister Kapil Sibal, seeking a rethink. "It is a ...




        CBI gets sanction to prosecute AICTE ex-officials


        Times of India - Akshaya Mukul - ‎14 hours ago‎


        NEW DELHI: HRD minister Kapil Sibal has given sanction to CBI to prosecute former AICTE chairman RA Yadav and former member secretary K Narayan Rao in ...





        IIMs' glo-cal dilemma


        Business Standard - ‎17 hours ago‎


        Last week's decision by Minister of Human Resource Development Kapil Sibal to allow the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) to go global is a good idea ...










        Govt scoffs at UGC leniency


        Calcutta Telegraph - Charu Sudan Kasturi - ‎14 hours ago‎


        A review panel appointed by HRD minister Kapil Sibal has argued that a clean chit in the UGC probe cannot be used by deemed universities to claim immunity ...





        An India-US education council to enhance ties: Kapil Sibal


        India Business Blog (blog) - ‎Oct 16, 2009‎


        College enrolment a challenge for India: Sibal Chandigarh, Sep 26 (IANS) Union Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister Kapil Sibal Saturday expressed ...






        US varsity plan Calcutta Telegraph




        We are not satisfied with HRD minister's clarification: JMM


        The Hindu - ‎55 minutes ago‎


        PTI Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) today said it was not satisfied with Union HRD Minister Kapil Sibal's clarification on the IIT entrance examination ...




        Scrap absurd plan at the earliest: Mayawati


        Times of India - ‎15 hours ago‎


        "Instead of removing the shortcomings in the present system of IIT entrance examination, the Union government has come out with a plan which is ...





        Sibal reverses Arjun Singh: IIMs can set up campuses abroad


        Indian Express - ‎Oct 16, 2009‎


        Human Resource Development minister Kapil Sibal said today that the government does not have any objection “in-principle” if the Indian Institutes of ...
























        Congress preparing guidelines to prevent `Dalit picnic' in future


        Times of India - Bhaskar Roy - ‎Oct 6, 2009‎


        NEW DELHI: Upset over reports of some of its functionaries having had a `picnic' in the name of reaching out to dalits in Uttar Pradesh, ...











        Mob blocks Dalits' entry into temple


        Times of India - ‎Oct 14, 2009‎


        NAGAPATTINAM: An attempt by Dalits to enter a temple in Nagapattinam district under police protection turned violent when non-Dalits in Chettipulam hamlet ...










        Dalits allege dumping of garbage near houses


        Express Buzz - ‎Oct 19, 2009‎


        SALEM: About 60 Dalit families facing displacement by a proposed Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board colony at Barathy Nagar have alleged that the Salem ...




        Congress's 'dinner-with-dalits' has oppn fuming


        Times of India - ‎Oct 3, 2009‎


        LUCKNOW: UP Congress party put up an entertaining show on Gandhi Jayanti by wearing its dalit love practically on sleeves. In a bid to emulate Rahul Gandhi ...











        A land battle


        Frontline - ‎Oct 20, 2009‎


        The SVSV came into being as an organisation mostly of Dalits and Dalit Christian labourers and agricultural workers (and a minority of tribal and other ...






        'Dalits are being harassed'


        Express Buzz - ‎Oct 19, 2009‎


        THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Various human rights organisations have alleged that Dalits are being harassed by the police in the wake of the murder and ...




        Congmen 'Dalit prem' drama leaves Rita Joshi fuming


        Times of India - Manjari Mishra - ‎Oct 6, 2009‎


        After her attempts at directing an impromptu drama to woo back the Dalit vote bank backfired, a red-faced Joshi has decided to retaliate. ...






        Cong-NCP goes all out to woo Dalit, Muslim voters


        Times of India - ‎Oct 10, 2009‎


        MUMBAI: With only two days left for the assembly elections, the Congress and the NCP have started wooing Dalit and Muslim voters in a big way. ...




        Playing the Dalit card


        Daily News & Analysis - Sidharth Bhatia - ‎Oct 11, 2009‎


        T he communist leader Jyoti Basu was once asked by a visiting American academic -- "Who represents the Dalits in your party?" The veteran looked at the ...














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