Secure Sikhs in J&K: Punjab MPs to Centre
Our Correspondent
New Delhi,
Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal today asked
the Centre to take a serious view of the threats issued to
the Sikhs in Jammu and Kashmir to either embrace Islam or
leave the state.
“These are not stray incidents and deserve to be taken with
utmost seriousness. The Centre must take effective steps to
help the state government in ensuring safety and security of
the Sikhs,” Sukhbir said after submitting a memorandum in
this regard to President Pratibha Patil.
The same was submitted by a delegation of SAD-BJP members
from Punjab, including former Union minister Sukhdev Singh
Dhindsa, Lok Sabha members Rattan Singh Ajnala, Paramjit
Kaur Gulshan, Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Sher Singh Ghubaya and
Navjot Singh Sidhu and Rajya Sabha members Avinash Rai
Khanna and Naresh Gujral.
The memorandum drew the President’s attention to widespread
anguish and alarm in the minds of the Sikhs in Kashmir over
reported threats to them by some organisations in the state.
It mentioned notes circulated by some organisations carrying
threats of terrible reprisals if Sikhs did not convert to
Islam.
The delegation members said these threats could not be
overlooked in view of the fact that some elements hostile to
communal harmony have been indulging in dangerous
activities. The main objective of these elements is to
rupture the socio-religious fabric of the state, the
delegation said.
Punjab Deputy CM added: “An effective response to the
situation requiring the intervention of the Government of
India is the need of the hour. Additional forces should be
deployed in the state to instill confidence in the minds of
the minority community.”
Amritsar: Meanwhile, MM Singh Cheema, member of the
All-India Congress Committee and vice-president of the
Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee, today met UPA chairperson
Sonia Gandhi and apprised her about the fast changing
political scenario in view of the recent threats being
issued by anti-national forces in Jammu & Kashmir to the
Sikh community.
Cheema has urged Gandhi to take up the matter with the J&K
government and the Home Ministry so that firm steps should
be taken for restoration of confidence of people and the
communal harmony in the state.
New York to light up for Mother Teresa's 100th birth
anniversary
Our Correspondent
New York
Mother Teresa's 100th birth anniversary will be marked in
New York's iconic Times Square with billboards and buildings
emitting a soft blue light to honour the Nobel laureate,
while the Empire State Building has refused to be a part of
the global celebrations.
Named the Great White Way, bright neon lights, the colours
of Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity, will light up
the city's celebrations today which are being organised by
Times Square Advertising Coalition.
"This is in honour of everything she gave to the world,"
said Emily Banks of the Coalition. At the same time, The
Catholic League is organising a rally to protest against the
Empire State Building's refusal to light its top three tiers
in white and blue for Mother Teresa.
In January, the Catholic League in New York put in a request
for the building to glow blue and white on August 26. The
main reason for the refusal, given by the building owner
Anthony Malkin, was a policy not to Honor religious figures,
New York Daily News reported. "The Empire State Building
celebrates many cultures and causes in the world community
with iconic lightings, and has a tradition of lightings for
the religious holidays of Easter, Eid al Fitr, Hanukah, and
Christmas," the statement said. "As a privately owned
building, ESB has a specific policy against any other
lighting for religious figures or requests by religions and
religious organisations," it added.
Although, the Catholic League previously told PTI that it
had evidence that the Empire State Building had lit up on
April 25, 2009 in Honor of the Salesians Sisters who are
catholic nuns. "More people are going to turn out for this
(the rally)," said Bill Donahue, the head of the Catholic
League. "He (Malkin) will look like the biggest buffoon in
New
York and maybe in the world."
However, FOX News reported that Malkin had received some
support from a group called Catholics for Choice and several
other liberal Catholic organisations, which described
Donahue's protest as a "self-promotion campaign." Donohue
"is doing the opposite of what Mother Teresa would have
wanted him to do," said David Nolan, director of
communications for Catholics for Choice. "Mother Teresa was
a very humble woman she would look upon this campaign by the
Catholic League as something that was the very opposite of
how she lived her life."
Mother Teresa, a Nobel peace prize winner and now Roman
Catholic saint-in-waiting, was born on August 26, 1910 to
Albanian parents in what is now Skopje in Macedonia.
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I am the
tribals' voice in Delhi: Rahul
Our Correspondent
Niyamgiri
Playing the tribal card over the Vedanta issue, Congress
leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday said that tribals’ voice has
been muffled in the name of development and he is their
soldier in Delhi who will fight for their cause.
Addressing a tribal rally near Niyamgiri Hills in Orissa's
Kalahandi district, the AICC general secretary said, “We are
only fighting a survival war in Niyamgiri. The rejection of
the mining project doesn't mean that we are against any
development."
“Tribals consider the hills of Niyamgiri as God and believe
that their God is being attacked”, Rahul further said.
Hailing the Union Environment Ministry's rejection of
London-listed Vedanta group's bauxite mining project in the
area, Rahul said, “It is a victory of the people living
here.”
He also praised the adivasis for protesting in a peaceful
manner and not resorting to any violent means.
Wooing the huge number of tribals in the area, the Gandhi
scion said the government at the Centre headed by Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi are
fully committed to the cause of the Dalits, poor and
adivasis.
The UPA Government in Delhi listens to the voice of the
poor. Development cannot be at the cost of the poor, Rahul
said.
The Nehru-Gandhi scion's visit to the backward Lanjigarh
area comes at a time when Vedanta's mining plan in Niyamgiri
Hills, home to Dangaria and Kutia Kandha tribes, has
suffered a body blow with Union Environment Ministry
rejecting the stage-II clearance for its mining proposal on
Tuesday.
Rahul had visited Lanjigarh area in March 2008. Tight
security arrangements have been made in the area for Rahul's
visit with deployment of adequate force.
New Delhi,
The National Capital is witnessing the wettest August of the
past 15 years. The precipitation so far has been the seventh
heaviest over the past 110 years, which has virtually
brought the city to its knees. There was yet another
downpour this morning, the seventh consecutive day of rains,
that aggravated the Yamuna flood situation and derailed
train services to northern and eastern India.
The rail traffic remained suspended for several hours after
a 10-km stretch of the track near the Sabzi Mandi station
went under water.
The Shatabdi had to be stopped just a few minutes before
reaching the Delhi station as a couple of trains had already
lined up there. Passengers said officials had no information
as to when the train would resume its journey and many of
them left it and hired auto-rickshaws and buses to reach
their destinations.
The train also had a few MPs from Punjab and Himachal
Pradesh who were headed for Delhi to attend Parliament.
Railways spokesperson Anant Swaroop said they were able to
pump out water in a few hours and the services resumed
around 2.30 in the afternoon. However, it led to
rescheduling of trains. The evening Shatabdi was delayed by
over three hours.
The trains to eastern India were the worst affected after
the authorities decided to stop using the old Yamuna bridge
when the river water reached the danger level. “We
short-terminated many trains at Shahadra, Sahibabad and
Ghaziabad stations. Some trains have been cancelled and many
others rescheduled as we diverted the traffic,” Swaroop
said.
The New Delhi railway station was a picture of chaos with
scores of passengers stranded there. The city is faced with
daily traffic snarls, flood crisis, dengue outbreak, but the
biggest concern is over the Commonwealth Games projects with
many wondering if the already much-delayed projects would be
able to meet the August 31 deadline.
However, CWG Organising Committee’s general secretary Lalit
Bhanot put up a brave face and said all works would be
completed in time. “These works are about beautification,
laying of grass and other aspects of landscaping. Heavy rain
may force us to stop the work for a while, but we are
confident that we would complete all things in time,” he
told.
Five
Andhra judges suspended for copying in exam
Our
Correspondent
Hyderabad
The Andhra Pradesh High Court has suspended five judges for
bringing disrepute to the judiciary by copying in a law
examination.
The High Court took serious note of the incident in which
five judges were caught red-handed while copying during the
LLM examination at the Arts and Science College in
Hanamkonda, Warangal district Tuesday.
A squad of invigilators had caught the judges while copying
during the examination conducted by the Distance Education
Centre of Kakatiya University.
The judges wrote the examination for promotions.
The High Court has also ordered Kakatiya University to take
action against the judges and submit a detailed report on
the incident.
The judges suspended by the High Court are Ranga Reddy
Senior Civil Judge K Ajit Simharao, Second additional
district judge Vijayanand, Bapatla senior civil judge
Srinivasa Chary, Anantapur senior civil judge M Kishtappa
and Warangal junior civil judge Hanumantha Rao.
The court also directed the state government to initiate
disciplinary action against all judges as they brought
disrepute to the law profession.
Four advocates were also caught along with the judges while
copying. The university has barred all of them from writing
the remaining two papers.
Yamuna
embankment breached
Situation alarming in
Mustafabad village
Our Correspondent
Mustafabad
(Karnal),
Vast tracts of agricultural land in Mustafabad village were
inundated following a major breach near the Jammukhala river
complex on the right bank of the Yamuna early this morning,
even as the floodwaters surged towards Dhakwala Gujran,
Dhakwala Rodan, Motipur and Jammukhala villages, causing
panic among villagers.
“Our villages will be flooded if nothing is done to plug the
200-ft breach which is expected to further widen if more
water is released from the Hathnikund barrage,” said
villagers working to hold the flowing water with boulders,
fallen trees and debris. The situation in Mustafabad is
alarming because of massive soil erosion. Despite the
warning by villagers, the administration did nothing to
salvage the situation and expectedly, embankments and bundhs
on a 200-ft stretch were washed away this morning, causing
floods. The Irrigation Department had asked the people to
take precautionary measures like raising spurs, placing sand
bags and wire crates filled with stone to stop the flow of
the water, but these proved inadequate. The angry villagers
now hope that the breach will be plugged at the earliest.
However, the flood threat persists as more water is expected
to be released from the Hathnikund barrage following more
rain in the catchment areas of the Yamuna in Himachal
Pradesh.The Army was called to assist the administration but
it was withdrawn as technical men were already on work and
no threat to human lives was envisaged. The sarpanch of
Mustafabad, Lucky Ram, who was on the spot since morning,
said that it was due to sheer negligence of the Irrigation
Department that the breach had occurred. “We along with the
sarpanches of Kundu Kalan and Dabarchi had sent a written
request to the department as last year also we had had a
narrow escape,” he explained. “Mustafabad is highly
vulnerable to soil erosion during the monsoon. It is for the
fifth time since 1988 that embankments and bundhs have been
washed away,” claimed the villagers.
The Deputy Commissioner of Karnal who visited Mustafabad
village said the administration had started rescue work and
the breach would be plugged at the earliest. The IG Rohtak
range, V Kamraja, SP Sonepat KK Rao and MLA from Gharaunda
Narinder Sangwan also visited the breach site.
The SE, Yamuna Water Supply, Karnal, SK Sharma, said as the
land level was higher than the level of the Yamuna, the
water flow had not reached an alarming level.
Meanwhile,villagers of Pauwari and Nukumb in Yamunanagar
have been asked to shift to safer places. Agricultural land
in at least 15 villages in the district has again been
inundated with 2.72 lakh cusecs released intothe Yamuna from
the Hathnikund barrage at 6 pm.
Sukhbir
lays stones of projects worth Rs 100 cr
Our Correspondent
Mohali,
Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal today laid
the foundation stone of new projects worth Rs 100 crore,
including a 8.5 km-long eight-laned road that would
ultimately connect the upcoming International Airport with
the Chandigarh-Delhi National Highway and the
Chandigarh-Patiala state highway. He also laid the
foundation stone of a Golf Range in Sector 65 here.
Later addressing a rally in Sector 82, the Deputy CM said
the new road to International Airport would be the harbinger
of prosperity and it would boost up service industry in the
region, apart from providing access to tourists and business
delegates.
On the occasion, Sukhbir also announced Rs 136 crore for
fourth phase of Kajouli to solve the water problem in Mohali.
He pointed out that though Mohali had missed the first IT
revolution, it was all set to emerge as an education,
research and IT hub of the future. He said during the past
three years, the SAD-BJP government had set up ISB in Mohali,
IIT in Ropar, National Centre of Agriculture Biotechnology
at Mohali, besides setting up of Knowledge City.
On the state level issues, he added that there were major
upgrade in the power sector, governance reforms improving
urban civic amenities, education sector, aviation sector,
besides taking health care to every village of Punjab.
The state had made investment of Rs 36,000 crore in the
power sector by setting thermal plants at Goindwal Sahib,
Talwandi Sabo, Rajpura and upcoming thermal plants at
Gidderbah and Bhupal ( Mansa) with combined generation
capacity of 9,140 MW in 2 years against present installed
capacity of 6,200 MW in the state created over a span of 62
years. In the next two years, Punjab would be power surplus.
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