Mayawati's tour, political gimmickry: BJP

BJP today termed as political gimmickry the tours undertaken by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati ahead of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election, and accused her of misleading the people of the state.

"Tours of Mayawati are nothing more than an eyewash. If she is really concerned then she should start her tour from the state capital where there has been a spurt in crime rate," BJP spokesman Vijay Bahadur Pathak said.

He alleged that while people were dying of infectious diseases, Mayawati was busy with electoral politics.

Can India Defend Its Poverty Line?-Politics Journal

On the margins of the strategic economic dialogue between India and China in Beijing on Monday, deputy chairman of the Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia fired a salvo in defense of a Sept. 20 affidavit to the Supreme Court that fixed poverty line estimates at a lowly 25 rupees ($0.50) a day for people in rural areas and 31 rupees a day for those in urban areas.

People under the poverty line, which has varied over the years, are entitled to highly subsidized food grains and pulses as well as kerosene oil coupons and gas cylinders, but the measure is prone to criticism because many believe it is arbitrary and doesn’t do justice to the much greater levels of poverty that actually exist.

Brushing aside the volley of criticism by civil society activists that greeted the affidavit, Mr. Ahluwalia pointed out that it was “wrong” to accuse the government’s top think-tank of wanting to restrict food subsidy to 32% of the population, when “in internal discussions, we have said we are willing to go up to 41%.”

His remark elicited yet another sharp reaction, a measure of the highly charged nature of the prolonged poverty debate that has over the last 15 years ranged governments of varying ideological persuasion, the Supreme Court as well as development activists on different sides of the divide.

Political battle over 2G: PM on the offensive

Defending the government over the 2G scam, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh went on the offensive. He lashed out at the Opposition saying there is no chance of mid-term polls. 

The political war over the 2G note row is heating up with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh attacking the Opposition upon his return from New York. He has accused the Opposition of trying to force mid-term polls.

The BJP has hit back saying the 2G loot was not the Opposition's creation. 

The Prime Minister and Congress president Sonia Gandhi are expected to meet party leaders on Wednesday to defuse the 2G crisis. 

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee is expected to set the record straight after meeting the PM. It was Pranab's ministerial note saying that his predecessor P Chidambaram could have chosen to intervene and avert the 2G scam.

Congress in troubleshooting mode-2G note

New Delhi:  The Congress was sleepless in Delhi last night. Fire-fighting ministers burnt the proverbial midnight oil in their attempt to quell the 2G note war between the party's two senior-most ministers, Pranab Mukherjee and P Chidambaram, as they prepared for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's return from New York today.

The controversy over a note sent by Mr Mukherjee's Finance Ministry to the Prime Minister' office on the 2G spectrum scam in March this year has the top echelons of the party exercised - Congress president Sonia Gandhi met both Mr Chidambaram and Mr Mukherjee separately last evening. There were reports that Mr Chidambaram had offered to resign.

He is upset because the Finance Ministry note questions his actions when the telecom scam was playing out in 2008. It suggests that Mr Chidambaram, who was then Finance Minister, should have done more to ensure that spectrum was not given at throwaway rates to companies that were being favoured by A Raja, who was then Telecom Minister and is now in jail.

Read more at: http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/2g-note-congress-in-troubleshooting-mode-can-sonia-pm-calm-the-storm-136485&cp

Pranab meets Manmohan, refuses comment on 2G

Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee’s meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today, they were severely disappointed.

Mukherjee in the New York Palace hotel carrying a bouquet of flowers to wish him in advance on his birthday, which falls on Monday. He told the Prime Minister he had sought the meeting while in transit through New York because he would briefly touch down in Delhi on his return from the US and immediately proceed to Calcutta for pitri tarpan ceremonies in his village.

Thereafter, he will travel elsewhere to dedicate a huge power plant to the nation. Mukherjee told Indian reporters there were matters that came up at last week’s annual meetings of the World Bank Group, which could not wait till he returned to New Delhi after almost a whole week.

Singh returns to India on Tuesday night, Mukherjee would already be in Calcutta and, therefore, he took the opportunity of a transit halt in New York to discuss fears of a second global financial meltdown that came up during last week’s meetings, the finance minister said.

Finance ministry note on 2G allocation which has been rocking national politics since the Prime Minister travelled abroad last Wednesday.

Sonia returns to political routine

Congress president Sonia Gandhi is slowly getting back into her normal political routine of meeting people including political leaders although she is yet to make a public appearance after her successful surgery in the United States recently for an undisclosed ailment. 

Over the past few days, Sonia has met several party leaders including former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan, Science and Technology Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh besides party general secretaries including Digvijaya Singh and Janardan Dwivedi, sources said. 

On Friday, she met DMK leader TR Baalu, who conveyed his party leader M Karunanidhi’s wishes. “It is a great opportunity to receive the blessings of a senior leader like Karunanidhi,” Baalu later quoted Sonia as saying. He said no politics was discussed. 

Party leaders said Sonia’s gradual return to normal routine invalidates the talk that she would slowly withdraw from active politics to make way for son and AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi. In fact, just over a week after her return from the US, she decided to attend a Central Election Committee meeting to decide candidates for the UP polls.

Yeddyurappa kin's offices, house searched

The Lokayukta police conducted simultaneous searches and recovered a large number of documents from the offices of firms jointly owned by former Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa's sons and son-in-law on Tuesday.

The early morning operation was a result of an order passed by the Lokayukta Court on August 8 directing the Lokayukta police to register a First Information Report against Mr. Yeddyurappa, his kin and associates and investigate the alleged irregularities in the award of a major works contract for the Upper Bhadra lift irrigation project. 

Yeddyurappa told presspersons in Koppal that he had been expecting the searches. He also assume that leaders of the Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular) were behind it.

“They want to take political revenge against me and my family members,” he said.

In a private complaint to the Lokayukta Court filed on July 27, JD(S) leader Y.S.V. Datta alleged that two firms owned by the two sons and son-in-law of the then Chief Minister received a kickback of Rs. 13 crore from a company for the award of a civil contract for the second stage of the Upper Bhadra irrigation project.

He had alleged that the company had been favoured despite quoting higher rates during the tender process.

Speaking to The Hindu, Additional Director-General of the Lokayukta Police Jeevan Kumar Gaonkar said the searches were conducted on the offices of Sahyadri Healthcare and Diagnostics Ltd. and Davalagiri Properties Ltd. owned jointly by Mr. Yeddyurappa's son-in-law R.N. Sohan Kumar and sons B.Y Vijayendra and B.Y. Raghavendra.

Four separate teams searched the offices situated in Vijayanagar, Tilaknagar and Kumara Park.

Mr. Sohan Kumar's house in Vijayanagar was also searched. Sources in the Lokayukta remained tight-lipped about the recovered documents and merely said that the thousands of seized documents contained details of the firms' bank transactions, financial transactions and other correspondence.

No politics in my fast

Key BJP ally JD(U) has categorically said that it will reject Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi as the PM candidate while BJP says the party will decide its leader at the right time and not in TV studios.

Narendra Modi ended his fasting on Monday evening but the debate rages on, on whether he will be able to see himself as a future Prime Minister.

Key BJP ally JD(U) made it clear that there is no way Modi can ever be accepted for the top job on India at 9 with Rajdeep Sardesai. "We will not accept Modi as a PM candidate," said Ali Anwar, JD(U) leader.

Advani's Yatra

L.K.Advani soon to begin yatra in Narendra Modi's Mission. The Yatra was started from Karamsad in Gujarat. It is the birth place of Sardar vallabhai patel. It seems the venue might be changed to Bihar's Sitabdiara. The reason for the shift was that Karamsad explained only part of his leader's symbolic choice.

Advani is Patel's role model and wanted to pay obeisance to his hero, the date fixed for the launch, October 11, is Jayaprakash Narayan's birth anniversary.

Ananth Kumar, the general secretary in charge of Advani's yatra, sprinted towards Ahmedabad after landing from Singapore where he had accompanied Sushma Swaraj on an official visit. Kumar was supposed to straighten out the nitty-gritties of the road show but he reportedly said that would have to wait for a couple of more days.

Sushma's first tweet on touching Delhi was she would be at "Narendrabhai Modi's" fast on Monday.

There are signs that the Congress's strategy was faltering. The party calculated that rather than cornering Modi over the 2002 violence, because it had proved counterproductive in the past two elections, it would focus on his "corruption" and "misgovernance".

Is Anna Hazare joining politics?

Recent announcements, about supporting one political formation or the other, many are wondering if Anna Hazare is joining politics

Anna Hazare, India’s reincarnated ‘Gandhi‘ has assured his followers that he is not joining politics, but people are not ready to believe it.

“Absolutely not. I am taking extreme care to keep the anti-corruption movement free of politics. There is absolutely no such possibility”, he said while talking to the media. He was replying to a question on the issue of his movement against corruption for a Jan Lokpal Bill being slowly taken into the fold of politics, after the recent announcement of Team Anna bidding public to vote out MPs opposing their cause, in the next Parliament elections.

However, the seventy-four year old activist shared no views on senior BJP front man LK Advani’s proposed anti-corruption “yatra” being a political move to gain credibility for the party.

On the issue raised by Congress leader Digvijay Singh that the anti-corruption movement is being backed by the VHP (as claimed by VHP leader Ashok Singhal) and RSS, Anna’s views were strongly dismissive. He challenged any such allegations.

Hazare re-assured, “Our movement has nothing to do with RSS or VHP. All this is being talked to mislead the people.”

Anna said that he had no doubts about the yoga guru Ramdev’s sincere effort to wipe out corruption from the country.

The anti-corruption icon refused to pay a lot of attention bout Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s bouquet that was sent to Anna wishing him a speedy recovery from his health problems, when Anna was hospitalized after breaking his 12 day fast.

Anna explained, “The bouquet that I received in the hospital was sent by Prime Minister’s office as a matter of procedure.”

“We had no differences of opinion in the past and would not have any differences in future. Friction happens when people are selfish and greedy. All my team members are fighting for a cause with a selfless commitment,” he assured, on being asked about the differences, which coul come up between him and his team-mates.

Politics Journal: Where Did India-Bangladesh Talks Go Wrong?

As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh climbed into Air India One at the end of his visit to Dhaka last week, Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her entire Cabinet lined up on the tarmac. There they waited not only until the plane began taxiing for take off, but until it had completely disappeared from view.

Only hours before, the Bangladesh National Party, Ms. Hasina’s major political opposition, had blamed her for not adequately preparing for the Indian prime minister’s two-day visit and described it as a “diplomatic failure.”

The accusation hurt, not only because it was partially true–a breakthrough agreement on sharing of river waters between India and Bangladesh had collapsed at the last minute–but also because Ms. Hasina’s special friendship with India goes back to 1971 when her father, Sheikh Mujib-ur Rahman, accepted Indira Gandhi’s help in midwifing the new nation of Bangladesh.

Ms. Hasina’s prolonged presence  at the airport was “a huge relief,” a senior Indian diplomat said on condition of anonymity, adding that it “gave teeth to her statements that despite everything, both countries would always remain firm friends.”

Angry Anna

India's decision to take tough steps against political dishonesty may have had a little help from a flying, angry bird.

Angry Anna, a political riff on popular game Angry Birds, helped to spread the word about Indian activist Anna Hazare's campaign to rid the country's government of graft, CNN reports.

In free-to-play Angry Anna, players shoot disembodied heads of Hazare and activists Baba Ramdev and Kiran Bedi against a group of Indian politicians, playing the role of the game's pigs.

The game was created by a New Dehli development company.

"We wanted to go to a candlelight march at (New Delhi landmark) India Gate but we were unable to because of the heavy work load in our office, so we thought, why not build a game so people can vent their frustration by sitting in an office and playing," developer Mohammad Faisal told CNN. "We didn't expect it to be so successful."

The game has been played online about 267,000 times, according to game host GameSalad.

It's an interesting look at how the popularity of a widely played, and known, game can be usurped to help further a political message.

Karachi killing case in SC: Many in police are political appointees: IG

KARACHI, Sept 9: The Sindh police chief conceded before a five-judge special bench of the Supreme Court on Friday that 30 to 40 per cent appointments in police had been made on the basis of political affiliation which hampered action against criminals.

The bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry is hearing a suo motu case on killings in Karachi. The other judges on the bench are: Justices Anwar Zaheer Jamali, Sarmad Jalal Osmany, Ghulam Rabbani and Amir Hani Muslim.

IG Wajid Ali Durrani informed the court that action was being taken against personnel whose political affiliations had been determined.

The chief justice ordered the IG to take an across-the-board action against criminals because all political parties which had appeared before the court wanted peace in the country`s financial hub.

“We are here to strengthen you; we are backing you. You must take action against criminals without any fear or favour,” the chief justice told the IG.

Mr Durrani said sympathisers of political parties in the police force and some other factors were hampering action against criminals. He said politically-affiliated elements in police had a “soft corner” for criminals.

He said that under the Police Order he had powers only to transfer officers up to the rank of DSP. “I don`t have powers to even suspend a DSP.” Justice Sarmad Osmany said it meant “you (Mr Durrani) are not independent”.

The IG said there were hurdles in getting requisite information from mobile phone companies and from banks in respect of ATMs. He said the Inter-Services Intelligence had the facility of GSM/RBS locators.

The chief justice asked the IG if he was under any political pressure to take action against criminals. “We are here to help you,” the CJ said and asked the IG to submit such problem in writing.

The court asked Attorney General Maulvi Anwarul Haq to seek instructions in this regard from the authorities concerned and submit a report at the next hearing.

Justice Amir Hani said that over 900 officers had been given shoulder-promotions in the police department. The chief justice said this practice had been stopped in other provinces on the apex court`s order and asked why was this order not being implemented in Sindh.

When the chief justice wanted know if a case about the presence of a torture cell was registered, Karachi police chief Saud Mirza said it could not be done because the cell had been raided by Rangers personnel and police were yet to get details.

The attorney general placed on record a report of the Intelligence Bureau on the Karachi situation.

Sindh Advocate General Fateh Malik presented a summary of different cases from July 24 to August 24.

The court sought details of certain some criminal cases from provincial authorities.

The chief justice observed that police were capable of controlling the situation, but they were not doing so because of lack of determination and will.

The hearing was adjourned till Sept 13 when Sindh High Court Bar Association President Anwer Mansoor Khan will resume his arguments.

'Time to stop the political circus'-Obama

With the nation’s economy in a particularly rough patch and his own re-election prospects in doubt, President Obama told Congress it’s time to “stop the political circus and actually do something to help the economy.”

“The people of this country work hard to meet their responsibilities,” Obama told a joint session of Congress. “The question tonight is whether we’ll meet ours.”

Specifically, the President offered a $447 billion “American Jobs Act” designed to help those 14 million Americans out of work. It includes extending the payroll tax cut, extending jobless benefits, a “returning heroes” hiring tax credit for unemployed veterans, a $4,000 tax credit for hiring long-term unemployed workers, $35 billion to keep laid-off teachers and first responders in their jobs, and some $100 billion to be spent on major school construction and infrastructure renovation.

Manmohan says Mamata assented to teesta deal

ON BOARD THE PM'S AIRCRAFT: "Some other factors came into play" for West Bengal chief minister Mamta Banerji to pull out of the Bangladesh visit at the last moment, said Prime Minister Manmohan singh hinting that her intransigence had more to do with politics.

Mamata has said the final water-sharing deal on Teesta was different from the one she had agreed to. Gently refuting this, the PM said he and national security adviser Shivshankar Menon had been in touch with Mamata for over a month and that she was fully on board all decisions. 

Mamata reportedly believed that she would be done in by CPM protests if she agreed to the Teesta deal, but more importantly, the CM believed that she did not get enough importance from the Central government regarding a pact of this stature.

"Some other factors came into play and she said she won't come. Its only then I realized about the disagreement with regard to Teesta. One learns from one's mistakes. I'm not claiming I'm infallible. We continue to work with Mamata Banerjee and will take into account the interests of West Bengal." 

Mayavathi Vs Wiki

NEW DELHI (AP) — A top Indian politician lashed out at WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Tuesday, saying he is either insane or being used as a tool of her opponents for releasing U.S. Embassy cables that describe her as a corrupt megalomaniac.

An October 2008 cable called Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati, a powerful leader of the nation's bottom caste untouchables, a 'virtual paranoid dictator' who once sent a private jet to Mumbai to pick up a new pair of sandals.

The cable said Mayawati had institutionalized corruption throughout India's most populous state, charged potential candidates $250,000 to run for Parliament on her party's ticket and was obsessed with becoming prime minister. Similar allegations have been often been made by her political opponents too, but she has consistently denied them.

Mayawati told reporters the Wikileaks accusations were "malicious, incorrect and obscene."

"From this it appears that the owner of WikiLeaks has either gone mad or else this person has played into the hands of parties who oppose us and deliberately want to tarnish the image of our party and government," said Mayawati, who uses only one name.

She called for Assange to be sent to a mental asylum either in his home country of Australia or in Uttar Pradesh, and called news reports about the cables as 'dirty politics' and an attempt to besmirch India's untouchables, or dalits.

Assange responded quickly and equally sharply.

In a statement broadcast by at least two Indian news channels, he said Mayawati should "admit her error and apologize. Should she fail to do so, she is welcome to send her private jet to England to collect me, where I have been detained against my will, under house arrest, for the last 272 days.'"

"I would be happy to accept asylum, political asylum, in India — a nation I love. In return, I will bring Mayawati a range of the finest British footwear," NDTV reported him as saying.

Mayawati has been criticized for excessive displays of wealth and power in a state rife with poverty. Last year, she was photographed inside a gargantuan garland made of 1,000 rupee ($22) notes estimated to total more than $1 million. She has also spent millions on statues of herself and other dalit heroes, while the roads and health infrastructure of the state lie in tatters.

The U.S. Embassy cable painted her as a cosseted megalomaniac.

It quoted local journalists as saying that Mayawati employed nine cooks and two food tasters. She demanded personal security equivalent to a head of state and had a private road built between her home and office that was cleaned every time her extensive motorcade used it.

She once forced a state minister to do sit-ups in front of her as punishment for arriving without an appointment, the cable quoted the journalists as saying.

A separate cable said her chief of staff told U.S. officials that she had a "penchant for personal corruption and strong authoritarian streak."

In condemning the cables, Mayawati seemed unaware they were written by U.S. diplomats, instead assigning the blame for them directly to Assange, as well as to her rivals in the Bharatiya Janata Party, one of several parties challenging her rule in elections next year.

In denying the report she sent a jet to fetch sandals: "Maybe if this BJP leader knows about my sandals then he must have accompanied the owner of WikiLeaks to go in the special plane and buy me my sandals."

The U.S. cable did not say where the allegations about the sandals came from.

Mayawati also denied she employed nine cooks. "I feel that maybe they're (opponents) cleaning dishes in my kitchen and that's how they know this."

The cables also said Mayawati had cowed the press; many reporters thought their phones were tapped and feared losing their jobs if they were critical of her rule. She rarely addressed the media, the cables said, and when she did, she did not take questions, a practice she continued during Tuesday's press conference.

In his response, Assange said: "there is no question that the documents are official papers from the U.S. embassy. The allegations within them are made by U.S. diplomats in their private communications back to Hillary Clinton. If chief minister Mayawati has a problem with the contents of these communications, she needs to take it up with Hillary."