Twenty people, alleged to be Maoists, were killed during an encounter with security forces in Chhattisgarh on Thursday night. So far, the security forces and the state government have conformed that only 4 of them were Maoists, the background check on others are still on. In view of this and in view of severe protests from political parties and social activists that most of those killed
Punjab is apparently suffering from dog menace and Congress legislator Ajit Singh Mofar has a solution: he moved a resolution in the assembly on Thursday seeking to tackle stray dogs in the state by sending them to China, Mizoram or Nagaland, for "whatever they do to them". The house accepted his suggestion. But animal rights groups feel it would be unethical and have threatened to mo
Manmohan Singh is back as finance minister. During his first term in North Block, he launched a series of reforms and put the economy in a higher growth trajectory. Today, the economy needs, if not a magic wand, at least bold initiatives. The political situation then, of course, was different, and moreover the political part was handled by Narasimha Rao. Today, Manmohan Singh is first a prime m
The centre is considering of buying the Delhi-Gurgaon expressway project in case there are no solutions to commuters’ woes at the toll plaza on this stretch. This information came from highways minister CP Joshi. People often complain of jams on the expressway. Locals, too, are unhappy as they have to shell out money even for using a small stretch of the expressway. The developer collects
The takal scheme was introduced to help people get tickets at a short notice. Sadly, this is not happening despite people queuing up at the ticket counters for the entire night. The reason: tickets are sold within minutes of opening the counter, at times in just a minute. Indian railways says 1.1 lakh tatkal tickets are offered every day and the system in the first five minutes receives 4.5 lak
Rural development minister Jairam Ramesh has said there is no use blasting Agni missiles if the sanitation problem is not solved. Ramesh said this at the launch of DRDO’s green toilet in Balasore district of Odisha. "The budget of rural development department is Rs 99,000 crore while we spent double the amount on defence with a budget of Rs 193,000 crore," Ramesh said, a
Ahead to demitting office, president Pratibha Patil has commuted the death sentences of 35 convicts. Most of these are convicted of mass murder, kidnapping, rape and killing of children, some of the most heinous crimes. Our courts are very careful in awarding death penalty which is given only in the "rarest of the rare cases". A mercy petition is filed after the entire judicial proces
Former president APJ Abdul Kalam’s last July letter to foreign minister SM Krishna kept under wraps has come into public domain, slamming Nobel laureate economist Amartya Sen for forcing him out of his brainchild project of the Nalanda University in Bihar, as its first visitor. Dr Kalam felt frustrated with the people at the helm of affairs and his resignation was a rebuff to prof Amartya
India has promised a contribution of $10 billion to International Monetary Fund (IMF) to help the Eurozone which is heading towards a financial crisis. The humble contribution of our prime minister has come at a time when economic growth is going down and inflation is going up in the country. Rating agencies Fitch and S&P have downgraded India which may have consequence on attractiveness of
The national capital is faced with a severe water criris for the past many days with neighbouring Haryana drastically cutting supply to Delhi. Areas across the city have already been grappling with acute shortage of water and the situation may worsen. Top officials in the Delhi government have accused the neighbouring state of playing "foul" with Delhi on the water issue. But
The finance ministry is rightly concerned about the burden of non-performing assets (NPAs) of the public sector banks. To speed up the recovery, the ministry has asked these banks to be pro-active: send three SMSes, followed by one phone call as reminders and then send recovery agents to the defaulter’s home, reports the Economic Times. Of course, the loans must be recovered and there is
As Delhi reels under a severe water crisis for many days now, chief minister Sheila Dikshit on Thursday warned that the water shortage would hit nearly 25 lakh residents in the coming days. She put the blame on Haryana which has “arbitrarily and drastically” cut supply to the parched capital. As residents’ anger spilled in the streets in several colonies of Delh
Press, people, industry and of course the opposition are all taking about the government’s ‘policy paralysis’. Azim Premji and NR Narayana Murthy are disappointed with the current state of affairs of the crumbling Indian economy. Premji said that India was working without a leader. Even the S&P rating of India presents a gloomy picture. While Pranab Mukherjee is hopeful of
Given the fact that diesel consumption by private vehicles is a miniscule amount of total diesel consumption in the country, will oil minister S Jaipal Reddy’s proposal make much of a difference? He says diesel consumption rose to 7.6% in 2011-12 against 6.2% in 2010-11. In contrast, growth in petrol consumption fell from 10.7% in 2010-11 to 5.6% in 2011-12. With most sectors of the econo
Prime minister Manmohan Singh is going to request MPs, MLAs and gazetted officers to voluntarily pay the commercial rate for LPG cylinder. [Read our story here] He (and the petroleum ministry) believes that this will inspire the rich and affluent citizens of the country to follow the example set by the MP
Civil aviation minister Ajit Singh is to discuss with West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee the issue of allowing foreign airlines to pick up stake in Indian carriers, something her party has been opposing. The proposed FDI policy will allow foreign airlines to pick up stakes of up to 49% in the domestic airlines. She is also against FDI in multi-brand retail as it will render many jobless
A parliamentary panel is learnt to have sought privileges for MPs on the Delhi Metro. According to a report in Indian Express, the Delhi Metro has been asked to devise a protocol for MPs wherein staff would be appointed to receive them at stations, facilitate their movement, and assist them in boarding the trains. The “courtesies” may even include a separate ticket counter for MPs.
After facing opposition from certain sections of IIT, HRD minister Kapil Sibal on Tuesday got support from almost all the state governments for common entrance test for engineering colleges including IITs. The government says ‘one nation, one test’ will reduce the burden of students. But the proposed plan is not going down well with IIT faculty and alumni. The All Ind
Bharatiya Janata Party president Nitin Gadkari created a flutter when he touched yoga guru Ramdev`s feet on Monday. Ramdev had gone to Gadkari’s residence for a meeting to solicit BJP`s support for the campaign to bring back black money stashed by Indians abroad. The gesture sent feelers that BJP is fully supporting Ramdev in his fight against black money. While Gadkari&rsq
The Bharatiya Janata Party has backed Baba Ramdev’s movement against black money, with the yoga guru meeting party president Nitin Gadkari at his residence. The yoga guru said the movement is not against any political party but it is for the benefit of the nation. But given the party’s saffron leanings, the Congress may try to dilute the movement as it is being backed by the opposit
