Back to Main Page                                                                Archives

Heat wave sweeps northern, eastern India

          Bhubaneswar/Kolkata: The sun is blazing down in full fury, with the north and the eastern parts of the country in the grip of a severe heat wave. Temperatures in many areas are hovering around 45 degrees Celsius. Increased humidity, dust haze and hot winds added to woes of the people reeling under an oppressive heat wave in most regions in the east. Bhubaneswar, the capital of eastern Orissa state, recorded 45.1 degree Celsius on Thursday, the highest temperature this summer. The city had recorded its highest temperature of 46.5 degrees on May 22, 1972. However, for vendors selling cold drinks, ice creams and watermelons, the heat wave means brisk business. Residents complained that it was no longer possible for them to venture out of their homes during the day. "We cannot go out of our home after 10 a.m. Though schools are all closed but we can not go out at all. This time the situation is worse than last year," said Tripti, a resident of Bhubaneswar. People are being told to stay indoors to avoid the heat, which the weather office expects to continue for another two or three days. S.C. Das, Director of Orissa's Meteorological Department, said: "When the western winds blow, they blow through dry lands...that is why some areas record high temperature."

           Meanwhile in Kolkata, temperatures have already soared 4-5 degrees above normal. With no hopes of respite from the sweltering weather, people could be seen thronging roadside vendors selling cold drinks to beat the heat. Many could also be seen bathing at roadside public taps, to take respite from the sweltering heat. The state government has already issued a heat alert saying the temperatures will remain above normal during next few days.

Tributes to Rajiv Gandhi (Go To Top)

          New Delhi: Rich tributes were paid to former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi on his 13th death anniversary. Prime Minister-elect Dr Manmohan Singh joined Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, the widow of Rajiv, to pay tribute to the departed leader. Sonia was also accompanied by son Rahul, now an MP, and senior dignitaries, including vice-president Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, at the prayer ceremony held at Rajiv's mausoleum "Veer Bhoomi". Sonia and Manmohan were also expected to fly across to Sriperumbudur where Rajiv was assassinated by a suicide bomber in 1991. But, the visit was shelved as the duo quickly returned to have talks with their allies, who are reported to be still bickering over cabinet posts.

Pawan Chamling sworn in as Sikkim CM (Go To Top)

          Gangtok: Pawan Kumar Chamling was sworn in as the Chief Minister of Sikkim for the third consecutive term, here on Friday. State Governor V Rama Rao administered the oath of office and secrecy to him and his small council of ministers at a function held at Raj Bhawan. Chamling has restricted the size of his ministry to 12 in view of the Election Commission's prescribed limit for cabinets at 15 per cent of the assembly strength. He has retained most of the old hands in the ministry and inducted two new faces -- Menlom Lepcha and Somnath Poudyal. Besides Chamling, the 11 other ministers sworn in were former Assembly Speaker Kalawati Subba, Dorjee Dazom Bhutia, Garjaman Gurung, Hishey Lachungpa, Kedar Nath Rai, PS Tamang, Dorjee Tshering Lepcha, Ram Bahadur Subba, SB Subedi, Menlom Lepcha and Somnath Poudyal. The portfolios of the ministers are, however, yet to be decided. All the 11 belong to Chamling-led Sikkim Democratic Front, which swept the polls recently bagging 31 out of the 32 Assembly seats, besides winning the lone Lok Sabha seat to return to power in the state for the third time in a row.

Markets seesaw ahead of new policy (Go To Top)

          Mumbai: Markets remained volatile on Friday as investors waited for the new Congress-led government to outline its economic policies and appoint a cabinet. The benchmark Bombay share index was 0.6 percent higher at 4,962 in thin trade, swinging in a 140-point range as some investors remained nervous following Monday's crash and others sought bargains in software and consumer goods firms. The rupee recovered from an early drop to trade higher, while bonds were subdued in thin volumes. Both have been tripped up in recent weeks by worries about slowing foreign investment under the new leadership of Asia's third-largest economy. Manmohan Singh, who kicked off economic reforms 13 years ago, is set to be sworn in as prime minister on Saturday. He has not yet indicated who will be in his cabinet. Chief economic commentator of the Financial Times, London and a former World Bank associate, Martin Wolf expressed full faith in Singh's potential but cautioned that he must get the support he deserves.

Laloo meets Pawar (Go To Top)

          New Delhi: RJD president Laloo Prasad Yadav met NCP president Sharad Pawar on Friday. Both later clarified that the issue of getting plum posts in the government was not primary in their agenda. After extensive reports of Laloo bargaining for the post of Deputy Prime Ministership, he along with NCP chief Sharad Pawar denied the charge. Pawar, however, said he along with the RJD supremo will discuss the issues raised by Laloo, with the Congress leadership. "The minister issue has not been given importance.It's primary for us to solve the people's problem from where we get elected. He has given some suggestions and we both will raise them with the Congress leadership," said Sharad Pawar. Laloo maintained that he was hurt by the media reports linking him to bargaining for the plum posts. "The Common Minimum Programme and the government headed by Manmohan Singh. We will be partners.We want the welfare of Bihar. I have explained the issues to Pawar.We will not indulge in any tug of war.We want a stable government for five years," said Laloo.

NCP to join Govt (Go To Top)

          New Delhi: The NCP on Friday decided to join the new government at the Centre to be headed by the Congress, party spokesman spokesman Praful Patel announced here after a party meeting. After the meeting between senior Congress leaders Pranab Mukherjee, Ahmed Patel and NCP chief Sharad Pawar, Patel said, "we have already extended unconditional support (to a Congress- led Government) and now after taking into consideration all aspects, we have decided to participate in the Government." He said, "We have left the matter with regard to what ministry to be allotted to the Prime Minister-designate Manmohan Singh." Praful Patel said that his party had left it to Pawar as to who should be included in the Council of Ministers. Pawar would be having talks with Manmohan Singh later tonight, he added. Asked whether Pawar would be given the post of Convener of the Congress-led coalition, he merely said the NCP chief was being given due importance in this government and it would be there.

          Earlier, during the day, in a well-calculated move to mount pressure on the Congress, the RJD and the NCP remained non-committal over joining the Government and said they would take a joint stand on the issue. The NCP and the RJD, who together have 30 MPs, would talk with the Congress leadership on Government formation, RJD president Laloo Prasad Yadav and NCP chief Sharad Pawar told reporters after an hour-long meeting.

I will fight out insurgency: new Manipur MP (Go To Top)

          Imphal: To fight against the insurgency plaguing the state is the top priority for Thokcham Meinya, the newly elected MP from Manipur. 55-year old Meinya, a Congressman, is a highly educated man. He earned his masters degree in Mathemetics and then went on to earn a doctorate in astronomy and astrophysics from Osmania University in Hyderabad. In the last assembly elections, he was elected from the Konthoujam assembly constituency as a DRPP candidate. But, later he shifted his allegience to the Congress and became the Higher and Technical Education Minister in the Congress-led SPF Govt. Meinya says: "I have said that there is no first or second priority as such. But the problem being faced by the state of Manipur is actually the insurgent problem, which is very acute. We shall try to develop a congenial atmosphere where we reach a political solution so that the problem is solved for once and for all." It may be recalled that Congress candidates had been boycotted by the underground group Revolutionary People's Party (RPP) before the elections. With the past safely tucked behind him, Dr. Meinya aims at providing better governance for his people. To solve the problem of insurgency through political dialogue is his topmost priority. The official voter turnout recorded at 55 percent for the Inner seat for which polling was held on April 26 is a clear indicator of the fact that they, have faith in the democratic process and have renounced militancy. They realise that development can only come after militancy has been tackled.

Dr Manmohan Singh: A story from humble beginnings (Go To Top)

          Amritsar: The country's 14th prime minister Manmohan Singh, a man of high moral standing and accomplishment, is also the first Sikh to have reached the country's top legislative position. In this comes the reinforcement of a genuine will to put an end to tensions of the 1980s. ANI tried to visit Singh's roots, which speak of a basic simplicity and a rise from the masses, humble beginnings. The people celebrating Dr Manmohan Singh as prime minister feel he is one amonf them.

           At the dawn of Independent India in 1947, Manmohan Singh, aged 13, displaced by the partition, came to live with his parents in Amritsar from Gah, now in Pakistan, where he was born. The house is today much more than it was in his time. Memories of the locals, his neigbours, friends, many of whom live here even now, reflect a man risen from the grassroots, his success built on dedication and merit overcoming odds. Says Ramesh Kumar, an old resident of the locality, "We are so proud, so happy, that our old friend, someone who has grown up with us is today the country's prime minister. He'll do some good work, negate all the bad things done by politicians in the past. He's a very decent, very balanced person we can identify with. Only someone who has felt poverty first hand knows what it is like." Rajwinder (64), an old family friend who lives in the same area even today, said: "In the early days, his family faced great problems due to poverty. His father had a petty job, and on days it was so bad, there wasn't even bread in the house to eat. He used to go to school barefoot. They didn't have electricity in the house, so he studied under a street lamp. Very often his family had to go to bed hungry for want of food."

           Destiny had big things in store. Congress President Sonia Gandhi's decision to withdraw from the prime-ministership and nominate her most trusted lieutenant alters so many equations, notable among them putting an end to long-standing tensions between the Congress party and the Sikhs. Manmohan Singh's becoming prime minister sets at rest any allegations of bias against the community, and furthers a mending after the tensions of Operation Bluestar to evict terrorists at the Golden Temple, and the assassination of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Manjit Singh Calcutta, General Secretary of the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC), says, "There had been great tension between the Sikhs and Congress since 1984 with Bluestar and the killing of Indira Gandhi. This will bridge the gap. ... A Sikh becoming prime minister with the Congress party's support sends a very positive message."

Illegal arms trade flourishing in B'desh (Go To Top)

           Dhaka: Drugs and weapons. They come in and go out very easily in Bangladesh. Law enforcement authorities are easily bought-off. The shorelines of Chittagong are wide open to the smuggling syndicates of Anwara, Patia, and neighbouring thanas. Collectively a nexus between mafia, politicians and lawmen control this. But, on April 2nd one lot was caught and the huge cache recovered stunned everybody. The cache included 10,000 weapons, 5000 grenades and 300,000 rounds of ammunition, all packed in boxes bearing "Made in China" labels. This is one of the many hauls Bangladeshi police have made in the past few months.

          In New Delhi it is felt that these arms were to be routed to the country's northeastern states via Bangladesh, which has become a major gun-running point for shipment of arms by anti-India elements. These weapons end up killing innocents all across India's northeastern states. Dr. Robert Bradnock, an expert on South Asian affairs said: "India has been very concerned about what they call insurrection war in Assam, the fight by the liberation groups to gain scession from India, for many years. And, of course it has been the country's deep concern where are they getting their supplies and they have suspected that Bangladesh is one of the obvious routes."

           On various occasions lists of terrorist camps operating in India's northeastern states have been provided to Bangladesh. But, there has been no crackdown on camps. In fact Bangladesh refuses to acknowledge their existence. They in turn are claiming that anti Bangladesh rebels are operating from India. They have reportedly listed 39 such camps. Intelligence sources believe that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence is actively trying to realize its plan for a sovereign Islamic state in India's northeast, with full support from fundamentalist elements within Bangladesh government, army, bureaucracy and intelligence. As long as Bangladesh remains unstable vis-a-vis law and order situation, secessionists remain active in the `Seven Sister Hill States', Bhutan, Nepal, and Arakan province of Myanmar, the accessible harbor of Chittagong would bring a deluge of military grade weapons to the sandy shores of Bangladesh. Unfortunately these issue cannot be solved unless Bangladesh agrees to full- fledged joint patrolling of border instead of selective cooperation.

UK envoy injured in a shrine blast in Bangla (Go To Top)

          Dhaka: A powerful bomb explosion at a shrine in north-eastern Sylhet city left at least 15 people injured, including Britain's newly appointed High Commissioner Anwar Choudhury, police and witnesses said. Anwar Choudhury, 52, the Bangladesh born-British envoy, had been in Sylhet to offer a prayer at the shrine early in the day. He was undergoing treatment at a hospital for leg injuries, according to initial reports reaching here. The bomb went off as soon as several hundred people came out of the Hazrat Shah Jalaj shrine, performing the Muslim's weekly Friday prayer at 1.45 p.m. The blast also killed an unidentified man on the spot, witnesses said.

Powell accepts Pak, India as nuke states (Go To Top)

          Washington: The Bush Administration has finally and formally accepted both Pakistan and India as nuclear states. "They both are nuclear, and there's no question about that. They both have nuclear capability," the News quoted Secretary of State Colin Powell as saying at a joint press briefing at the State Department with Pakistan's Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri. He was replying to a question on whether Washington had reconciled to the view that both Pakistan and India are nuclear and whether it was not time for the international community to accept the same. Asked as to what the US administration's new message to India and Pakistan was in the wake of the recent Indian elections, Powell said: "Our message to the new Indian leadership is that we look forward to working with them. We have a solid agenda with the Indian people covering all aspects of our bilateral relationship and we see no reason that that agenda should not continue to be pursued with the new government." In his remarks, Kasuri said the Government of Pakistan is committed to the peace process with India. "We've invested a lot of time and effort, and of course it would be a pity if that were not the case. And I have no reason to believe that it was otherwise."