Archives for 2016

Raipur: BJP Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy has described Ratan Tata as the most corrupt chairman in the history of the Tata group.

“The most corrupt person in Tata history is Ratan Tata. He is not even a Tata, as his father was an adopted child,” he said.

“Ratan Tata is doing injustice with Cyrus Mistry. Two months back, the entire board appreciated the work of the Cyrus Mistry and it could be his (Ratan Tata’s) jealousy that prompted the action,” he added.

Swamy told reporters in Raipur that Ratan Tata has been involved in various scams like the 2G scam, Air Asia scam, the Vistara partnership and the Jaguar deal.

“He has taken the step to save himself from getting caught in scam deals, but he will not be spared whenever he is tried in court,” the BJP leader said.

Swamy said, “The government should intervene and set up an SIT. I have written to the Prime Minister and informed him about the sections involved where Ratan Tata has breached the Indian Penal Code.”

Tata Sons has accused Mistry, who was appointed chairman in 2012, of making “unsubstantiated claims and malicious allegations” post his sacking. Mistry has accused the company of governance failures and unacceptable interference by Ratan Tata in running the affairs of the group.

(PTI)

Bengaluru: Bangalore Development Authority on Thursday gave an undertaking to Karnataka High Court that that it will not construct the proposed steel flyover in Bengaluru.

The proposed steel structure which is 6.72 km long, is estimated to cost Rs 1,791 crores and was to connect the city centre to the Hebbal flyover. Authorities say it will decongest the ride to the international airport located on the city’s outskirts.

The high court will now examine all legal and constitutional issues related to the steel flyover for sanctioning a Rs 50 lakh grant to a trust allegedly in a fraudulent manner in 2001.

Some people in Bengaluru are content, after National Green Tribunal (NGT) ordered a month-long stay on the proposed steel flyover project.

Those opposing the construction of the flyover plan to hold a hunger-strike on November 6 to further pressurise the state government to cancel it.

(Agencies)

Bhopal: The entire drama of encounter killings of 8 SIMI under-trials appears to be a fake, dubious and stage managed, said SDPI General Secretary Elyas Muhammad Thumbe, while addressing a press conference at Bhopal on 03 November at Bhopal Press Club.

While terming the encounter as stage-managed, ElyasThumbe said, the entire episode was very tragic, astonishing and has created terror and insecurity in the minds of common people. He charged the high level police officials of their complicity in the dubious encounter which took the invaluable lives of 9 people. He further said, the questions raised in the minds of civil society are unanswered and reasonably proclaiming as the incidents are nothing but a drama with vicious intentions.

The panel furnished some significant questions being raised from all quarters which reasonably proclaim the incident as an unreal drama managed withvicious intentions:

1. How 8 SIMI jail inmates were able to break through the three layered security ring of the Bhopal Central Jail which considered to be a breach proof ISO certified prison. The jail is guarded by abundant police personnel and how can these SIMI under-trials escaped with such impunity in quick time of about 20 minutes that none of the guards on duty were able to see.
2. The fact that Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Bhupendra Singh and STF Chief Sanjeev Shami said that the SIMI operatives did not have firearms while IGP of Bhopal YogeshChowdhary claimed these under trials fired on police.
3. How can the jail guarding police personnel unnoticed the incident of killing of a high secured police colleague and even not heard the screaming during murder. If noticed the incident, why the culprits were scot-free in the jail itself.
4. How did they scale 32 feet height barbed wall of jail using bed sheets which is physically impossible. In the jail only blanket is supplied to the inmate. How these 8 inmates got the 32 bed sheets (not blankets) to make it as a rope to climb the wall. There are two other walls outside of the main wall which are of the height of 20 feet and 5 feet. It’s a mockery that those jail breakers have climbed the two heightened walls but couldn’t climbe the outside compound of 5 feet but to break the strong metal locked gate. It’s surprising that, while smashing the metal gate how the police personnel couldn’t hear the sound and see the breaking.
5. How and where did they procure those alleged weapons as they were gunned down within 10 KM of jail in 10 hours of escaping?
6. If they could procure weapons, why did not they procure a vehicle to make quick escape? Why did they move towards open space where they couldn’t hide?
7. Why no other jail inmates escape when these operatives left a wide trail and open doors behind them?
8. How did these operatives have access to branded clothes, sports shoes, wrist watches and bands that they sported when killed?
9. Why the hundreds of CC Cameras were not working in the jail?
10. How can the locks of jail gates can be opened by a key made up of wooden stick or tooth brush handle? How the inmates can open the lock of jail gates inside the cell, which can open only at the outside.
11. Though the jail breakers have not fired at the police why they have been killed. They can be easily caught and the whole episode could have been investigated.
12. Why the police didn’t shoot them below their waist instead of their chest and head in a close distant.
13. While civil society’s claim with concrete evidence that this was a cold blooded mass killing by the police why the CM has announced monetary gift to the intruders.
14. Though the operatives did not possess weapons, the police defending themselves of the killing of those unarmed operatives. How can the police claim that they can kill even though the operatives possess no arms?

Party leader Mohammed Shafi said, encounter is no way acceptable. Aftermath the incident, we see from the various sources and records furnished by witnesses that the under-trials could have been arrested without even injuring them anyway, but the police choosing to murder them in cold-blood demonstrates larger conspiracy. Still there are numerous questions which arise leading to the conclusion that the entire episode of killing the under-trials was viciously planned, he said.

The party leaders came up with a list of demands:
1. A sitting judge of Supreme Court should investigate the incident within a short time.
2. The entire responsible police and jail officers connected to Bhopal jail should be suspended immediately and all the police personnel in Bhopal jail should be transferred because of chances of tampering the evidences.
3. Immediate arrest of the police involved in the killing of unarmed operatives violating all norms regulated by the Supreme Court.
4. Allow the Human Rights Organizations, Fact finding teams, counsels and relatives of the deceased to meet the other inmates of the jail to know the facts.
5. Immediate resignation of Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh who is responsible for this barbaric and anarchic incident.

The press meet was participated by SDPI MP State President, Adv. Sajid Siddiqui, National General Secretaries Mohammad Shafi, Elyas Muhammad Thumbe and State General Secretary Salim Ansari.

New Delhi: An inter-ministerial committee of the I&B ministry has recommended that a leading Hindi news channel be taken off air for a day after it concluded that the broadcaster had revealed “strategically-sensitive” details while covering the Pathankot terrorist attack.

The ministry may ask NDTV India to be taken off air for a day from November 9 (1pm) to November 10 (1pm), according to sources. This would be the first order against a broadcaster over its coverage of terrorist attacks.

Efforts to reach the channel for its comments could not fructify. The committee felt that “such crucial information” about the Pathankot attack could have been readily picked by terrorist handlers and had the potential to “cause massive harm not only to the national security, but also to lives of civilians and defence personnel.”

When the operation was on in January this year, it allegedly revealed information on the ammunition stockpiled in the airbase, MIGs, fighter-planes, rocket-launchers, mortars, helicopters, fuel-tanks etc “that was likely to be used by the terrorists or their handlers to cause massive harm, the sources said.

Official sources said that as the content appeared to be violative of the programming norms, a show cause notice was issued to the channel.

In its reply, the channel replied that it was a case of “subjective interpretation” and the most of the information they had put out was already in public domain in print, electronic and social media.

The committee, in its order, however observed that the channel “appeared to give out the exact location of the remaining terrorists with regard to the sensitive assets in their vicinity” when they telecast in real time.

The panel expressed “grave concern” that this was a matter of national security and that the channel had revealed sensitive details like location of ammunition depot viz-a-viz the space where the terrorists were holed up, location of school and residential areas.

“Such crucial information could have been readily picked by their handlers, which had the potential to cause massive harm not only to the national security, but also to lives of civilians and defence personnel,” the committee said disagreeing with the channel’s contention that similar content was carried by newspapers.

(PTI)

Bhiwani: Amid tight security, ex-serviceman Ram Kishan Grewal, whose alleged suicide over ‘one rank, one pension’ triggered a political storm, was today cremated in his native village in Haryana which was flocked by political leaders including Rahul Gandhi and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.

Grewal’s eldest son Dilawar lit the pyre at around noon in the presence of a large number of people who had gathered from nearby areas in Bamla, 20 kms away from here.

The 70-year-old ex-serviceman, who was a former sarpanch of his village, committed suicide by consuming poison at a park in New Delhi on Tuesday evening.

The incident snowballed into a political row yesterday with the Congress Vice President, Kejriwal and other opposition leaders attacking the Modi government on the issue while there was high drama that continued late into the night after police detained and prevented them from entering a hospital in Delhi where Grewal’s body was kept.

Tight security arrangements were made today in view of the events in New Delhi.

Rahul, who travelled by road, spent a few minutes with the grieving family members of Grewal. He had to jostle with the crowd to reach the family members of Grewal as slogans of “Ram Kishan amar rahe” rented the air.

Other Congress leaders including former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Haryana Congress President Ashok Tanwar, Leader of Congress Legislature Party (CLP) Kiran Chaudhary, Selja and Kuldip Bishnoi werea also present.

Congress leaders Kamal Nath and Randeep Singh Surjewala and TMC’s Derek O Brien also reached the village.

Kejriwal, who was detained for four hours by Delhi Police last night from Lady Hardinge Hospital when he tried to meet the kin of ex-serviceman, was also among those present at the cremation of Grewal.

BJP MPs Rattan Lal Kataria and Dharambir Singh and Haryana minister Krishna Lal Panwar were among those who spent some time with the family members of the deceased and later left the venue.

Police said Grewal along with some other ex-servicemen was in the process of submitting a memorandum to the Defence Ministry over the issue of OROP. According to his friends, Grewal had been upset over the issue for some time.

Grewal had gone to Delhi with three of his friends from Bhiwani in the intervening night of October 31 and November 1. On Tuesday evening, he allegedly consumed poisonous tablets. One of his friends called the police at 100 and the police personnel immediately took him to RML hospital. Unfortunately, he died after a few hours, police said.

In his last phone conversation with his son Pradeep, Grewal said “injustice” is being done with jawans. “I wanted to fight this (OROP) battle…now it is up to the jawans what they do,” he said.

Subedar Grewal’s suicide has been used by the opposition parties to accuse the Modi government of failing to implement the OROP, an issue which remained pending for about 40 years during the Congress regime.

Grewal is survived by his widow, five sons and two daughters. He served in the Army for six years in the Infantry Battalion and then served the Defence Security Force for 31 years.

He retired in 2004 after attaining Subedar rank. He became Sarpanch of the village in 2006. One of his sons is Havildar in army and the eldest son is in Haryana police.

(Agencies)

First Indo-Japanese Advanced Level Cadaveric Course organized in Bangalore
Sakra World Hospital inaugurates the first-ever 3-day advanced level Indo-Japanese cadaveric workshop for the brain and spine with over 15 Japanese doctors at Bangalore for the purpose of training and experience.

Bengaluru: Sakra World Hospital inaugrated the First Indo-Japanese Neurosurgery Cadaver Course in the city today. Bengaluru, which is popularly known as the Silicon Valley of India and is the hub for Information Techonology, Biotechnology and Aerospace research is swiftly gaining reputation for medical tourism and advanced healthcare services. The collaborative course is the first of its kind where 15 Japanese faculty and staff will be undergoing advanced training in brain and spine surgical techniques conducted by the Institute of Neurosciences, Sakra World Hospital. The course is an initiation of the collaborative effort between the Institute of Neurosciences, Sakra World Hospital, Bengaluru along with Hokkaido University, Japan with a plan to regularly send their faculty and students to train and experience practices in India.

“The Sakra Neurosurgery Cadaver course on skull base surgery and spine surgery is yet another example of the dedicated medical skills development programme now in vogue in Bangalore. For the first time in India we will be hosting an advanced level Cadaveric workshop for the Brain and Spine which is an Indo-Japanese conclave with half of the participants being Japanese faculty and staff which is indeed a matter of pride. Bangalore is emerging as the capital for advanced medical tourism and medical technology,” said Dr. Swaroop Gopal, Director – Sakra Institute of Neurosciences, Sakra World Hospital, Bengaluru.

The department of Neurosciences at Sakra is striving towards initiating medical training and education, to improve the quality of surgeries here. This is a changing trend where surgeons from developed nations like Japan are coming to India – a developing nation to experience and enhance their skills, this shows the level of expertise our Indian doctors have in their field.

Sakra Indo-Japanese Neurosurgery Cadaver Course is an advanced cadaver course training program in collaboration with Hokkaido University, one of Japan’s oldest and most renowned institutions. The collaboration is another historic first in hands-on skills training in India. All of the participants from more than 20 different universities pan India and abroad are to be trained by international level faculty during the three-day rigorous training program.

“Cadaver training gives immense knowledge to evolve as a good surgeon. Having such facility in India was a remote possibility few years ago & it has become realistic at present, with wide experience in Neurosurgical field we are able to teach students from across the world.” said, Dr. Satish Rudrappa, Director – Sakra Institute of Neurosciences, Sakra World Hospital, Bengaluru

“It is indeed a privilege to be a part of the Indo-Japanese Neurosurgery Cadaver Course which is an initiative by the Sakra Institute of Neurosciences at Sakra World Hospital. It shows the skill and expertise the doctors in India have achieved in the field of medicine. It is a matter of pride and honour that a group of 15 Neurosurgeons from Japan are going to be in Bangalore to undergo training on Neurosurgical procedures of brain and spine. This is probably the first ever time that a large contingent of Japanese Surgeons are getting trained at a Bangalore-based hospital.” said, Dr. K. S. Ravindranath Hon’ble Vice Chancellor, Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences, Karnataka