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BRIEFLY<br />
India-China in naval<br />
‘confrontation’<br />
New Delhi: An Indian naval<br />
ship got a measure of China’s<br />
blue water navy when it was<br />
confronted by a Chinese vessel<br />
on the disputed South<br />
China Sea. The incident<br />
occurred in July when the<br />
INS Airavat paid a friendly<br />
visit to the Vietnamese port<br />
of Nha Trang and was on its<br />
way to Hai Phong, its second<br />
port of call. It was challenged<br />
by a Chinese vessel. However,<br />
India has denied any confrontation.<br />
—P6<br />
Raja followed govt<br />
policy: TRAI<br />
New Delhi: The telecom regulatory<br />
authority of India on<br />
Thursday gave a muchneeded<br />
boost to jailed former<br />
telecom minister A Raja,<br />
when it said that Raja had<br />
followed government policy<br />
in the distribution of 2G<br />
spectrum allocation. It said it<br />
was not possible to<br />
determine the losses caused<br />
by Raja’s handling of licences<br />
in 2008. —Agencies<br />
Rajiv case: Centre<br />
skirts mercy plea row<br />
New Delhi: The Centre on<br />
Thursday avoided the controversy<br />
over the T N Assembly<br />
asking the President to<br />
reconsider the mercy pleas of<br />
Rajiv Gandhi's killers but said<br />
as long as the death sentence<br />
was legal, courts would continue<br />
to award it. —P6<br />
WEATHER<br />
High<br />
Low<br />
29.3 0<br />
c<br />
26.3 0<br />
c<br />
FORECAST<br />
High<br />
Low<br />
30 0<br />
c<br />
26 0<br />
c<br />
Rain<br />
5.1 mm<br />
Rain<br />
Cloudy Sky<br />
Sport<br />
Five-wicket haul for debutant<br />
Nathan Lyon takes five to dismiss Lanka for 105<br />
as Aussies take big lead in Galle P14<br />
This is perhaps the most appropriate match –<br />
the World’s Best Player in the World’s most Football<br />
Fanatic City. Lionel Messi and Kolkata,<br />
it seems at the moment, are made for each other.<br />
Kolkata’s projection as the world’s most football<br />
fanatic <strong>city</strong> may not be acceptable to all. But to push<br />
the age-old debate further, Messi, the biggest little<br />
boy of world football, probably at the peak of his<br />
career for his national team, takes centre stage against<br />
Venezuela in an International Friendly<br />
at the Salt Lake stadium on Friday. But it isn’t Messi<br />
alone. You have Gonzalzo Higuain, Sergei Aguero,<br />
KOLKATA FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 2, 2011 Pages 16+8+4 ` 2.50<br />
Messi Mania<br />
� Lionel Messi surrounded by fans, photographers and security outside Salt Lake stadium on Thursday —BP<br />
Javier Mascherano among others – the galaxy of stars<br />
which makes the Albicelestes the most<br />
glamourous (read marketable) team in the world. The<br />
prevalent sentiment in Kolkata, nevertheless, isn’t<br />
concentrated on all; rather Lionel Messi stays the<br />
cynosure of all eyes. And we haven’t yet spoken about<br />
the Venezuelan team. Messi, we all<br />
know, doesn’t love being surrounded by rivals on the<br />
field. But his first few hours in Kolkata have been a<br />
siege with security men shadowing him<br />
for obvious reasons. Fans only hope Friday<br />
will be different. — BP see pages 15,16<br />
Ramdev charged<br />
under Fema<br />
Rajesh Sinha<br />
New Delhi: The enforcement<br />
directorate on<br />
Thursday registered a foreign<br />
exchange violation<br />
case against Baba Ramdev.<br />
The ED reportedly found<br />
evidence of Ramdev and<br />
his trusts receiving financial<br />
aid from the USA,<br />
Britain and New Zealand.<br />
Sleuths are checking if his<br />
investments and transactions<br />
had followed RBI<br />
guidelines.<br />
The probe reportedly<br />
found foreign remittances<br />
and funds inflow. Action<br />
has now been taken under<br />
Foreign Exchange Man -<br />
agement Act (Fema). The<br />
probe seeks to check the<br />
transactions through vari-<br />
World<br />
A new film on pop icon Michael<br />
It will throw additional light on the unique facets of<br />
his personality and life P10<br />
ous Ramdev trusts. The ED<br />
had approached authorities<br />
in the UK, seeking<br />
financial details about an<br />
island in Scotland “gifted”<br />
to the yoga guru by a couple<br />
who are among his followers.<br />
The Little Cumbrae<br />
Island, off the fishing town<br />
of Largs in Scotland, serves<br />
as Ramdev’s overseas base<br />
and also as a wellness centre.<br />
The ED has asked the UK<br />
authorities to help it get<br />
inputs on funding-related<br />
aspects of the island.<br />
Ved Pratap Vaidik, a<br />
Baba aide, said: “The case<br />
timing is suspect. If the<br />
government had all this<br />
information, why didn’t it<br />
file the case earlier?”<br />
Food inflation at<br />
10.05pc; FM upset<br />
New Delhi: Food inflation<br />
entered the double-digit<br />
zone at 10.05 per cent for<br />
the week ended August<br />
20. It was at 9.8 per cent<br />
the previous week.<br />
Finance minister Pranab<br />
Mukherjee on Thursday<br />
called the rise “disturbing”<br />
and said the government<br />
would have to improve<br />
supply. Experts said RBI<br />
could go in for another<br />
rate hike. Onion price has<br />
more than doubled yearon-year.<br />
During the week<br />
under review, onion was<br />
57.01 per cent costlier.<br />
Fruits were 21.58 per cent<br />
costlier and vegetable<br />
prices rose 15.78 per cent.<br />
Food inflation was last in<br />
the double-digit zone in<br />
the week ended March 12,<br />
2011, when it was at the<br />
same level of 10.05 per<br />
cent. Mukherjee said food<br />
prices were rising because<br />
of supply bottlenecks.<br />
“Inflation is always a matter<br />
of concern and we shall<br />
have to ensure and<br />
improve the supply of food<br />
items,” he said. —Agencies<br />
Treat the poor<br />
for free, SC<br />
tells hospitals<br />
Two-judge top court Bench reminds<br />
appellant of ‘social responsibility’<br />
Our Special Correspondent<br />
New Delhi: Delhi’s private<br />
hospitals which got state<br />
government land at concessional<br />
rates must now keep<br />
25 per cent of their outpatient<br />
department capa<strong>city</strong><br />
as also 10 per cent of their<br />
in-patient department<br />
capa<strong>city</strong> for free treatment<br />
to the poor.<br />
Upholding a 2007 Delhi<br />
High Court judgment which<br />
had made it mandatory for<br />
all such hospitals to provide<br />
free treatment to the poor, a<br />
two-judge Supreme Court<br />
Bench of Justices RV<br />
Ravendran and AK Patnaik<br />
held on Thursday that these<br />
hospitals couldn’t anymore<br />
“wriggle out” of their social<br />
responsibility.<br />
Delhi has 37 private hospitals<br />
— almost all them superspecialty<br />
ones — which had<br />
received land at concessional<br />
rates. Only 27 of these have<br />
adhered to the high court<br />
directive.<br />
The rest appealed against<br />
it, saying providing free<br />
treatment to patients with<br />
cancer or those needing<br />
complex surgeries would be<br />
way beyond their means.<br />
Not convinced, the court<br />
said, “The bottom line is:<br />
poor patients are not to be<br />
charged.” It dismissed the<br />
hospitals’ appeal against<br />
mandatory free treatment.<br />
“Why did you (hospitals)<br />
take the land? You hand the<br />
land back to the government<br />
and purchase it somewhere<br />
else,” the Bench told the<br />
counsel for a hospital which<br />
pleaded that it wasn’t practical<br />
to provide free treatment<br />
to the poor in every case.<br />
“You want to wriggle out<br />
after signing the contract<br />
with the government while<br />
taking the land (at concessional<br />
rate),” the Bench said.<br />
It directed the Delhi government<br />
to discuss with these<br />
hospitals the guidelines on<br />
free high-cost health care to<br />
the poor.<br />
The 2007 HC order stipulates<br />
that poor patients “will<br />
be provided free admission,<br />
bed, medication, treatment,<br />
surgery facility, nursing<br />
facility and consumables<br />
and non-consumables. The<br />
hospitals charging any<br />
money from such patients<br />
shall be liable to be proceeded<br />
against in accordance<br />
with the law. Besides<br />
that, this would be treated<br />
as violation of the orders of<br />
the court”.<br />
Last week, the Supreme<br />
Court had sought an affidavit<br />
from the Delhi government<br />
on how 27 private hospitals<br />
were treating poor patients<br />
for free and wanted to know<br />
whether they were giving<br />
free medicines even for diseases<br />
like cancer.<br />
� Justice Soumitra Sen<br />
LC<br />
Justice Sen<br />
quits, sends<br />
letter to<br />
President<br />
Kolkata: Justice Soumitra Sen<br />
of Calcutta High Court<br />
resigned on Thursday, five<br />
days before his impeachment<br />
motion was to take up in the<br />
Lok Sabha.<br />
“I have put in my papers<br />
today,” Justice Sen, against<br />
whom the Rajya Sabha has<br />
approved an impeachment<br />
motion, said.<br />
“I have decided not to go to<br />
the Lok Sabha and instead put<br />
in my papers,” Sen, who was<br />
to have appeared before the<br />
Lok Sabha on September 5,<br />
said.<br />
“I have sent my resignation<br />
to President Pratibha Patil<br />
and a copy of it to the Lok<br />
Sabha Speaker,” Sen said.<br />
In his letter to the<br />
President, Justice Sen has said<br />
that since Rajya Sabha has<br />
decided in its wisdom that he<br />
should not continue as a<br />
judge, he is resigning and<br />
wants to live as a common<br />
citizen, his lawyer Subhash<br />
Bhattacharya said.<br />
The Rajya Sabha had on<br />
August 18 overwhelmingly<br />
approved the impeachment<br />
motion against Justice Sen.<br />
Justice Sen was held guilty<br />
of misappropriating `33.23<br />
lakh in a 1983 case. —PTI
2<br />
CITY<br />
BRIEFLY<br />
� A Ganesh idol in Kolkata<br />
on the occasion of<br />
Ganesh Chaturthi on<br />
Thursday — BP<br />
Woman hit by vehicle,<br />
hospitalised<br />
Kolkata: A female pedestrian,<br />
Anju Dutta, 65, was<br />
dashed by a south bound<br />
vehicle at Behala<br />
Shakerbazar on Thursday.<br />
She was taken to Vidyasagar<br />
hospital by a trauma care<br />
ambulance. Dutta, a resident<br />
of Santosh Roy Road, has<br />
injured her leg seriously. —BP<br />
Metro extends date of<br />
refunding smart cards<br />
Kolkata: Kolkata Metro<br />
Railway announced that the<br />
last date for refunding smart<br />
cards has been extended till<br />
September 30. In their<br />
release, they have decided to<br />
extend the date of refund of<br />
old smart cards, AFC multi<br />
ride tickets. Tickets are ought<br />
to be refunded within the<br />
stipulated period. —BP<br />
Woman knocked<br />
down by car<br />
Kolkata: Saraswati Devi, 65,<br />
was knocked down by a car<br />
near Sukanta Setu while she<br />
got down from a bus around<br />
11 in the morning on<br />
Thursday. The offending car<br />
could not be chased. Sarawati<br />
Devi, a resident of<br />
Vivekananda Road was taken<br />
to KPC Medical College &<br />
Hospital in serious<br />
condition. —BP<br />
Rally to affect traffic<br />
on Friday<br />
Kolkata: A rally comprising<br />
of more than 500 people will<br />
be taken out on Friday from<br />
Diamond Harbour Road to<br />
Tollygunge Circular Road.Due<br />
to the procession, traffic will<br />
be affected along the<br />
Ramtanu Lahiri Sarani,<br />
Sahapore Road, New Alipore<br />
crossing and Nolini Sarkar<br />
Avenue. The procession will<br />
start from 11 am. —BP<br />
Free power connection<br />
to BPL families<br />
Kolkata: Aiming to bring<br />
electri<strong>city</strong> to every house in<br />
Bengal within three years,<br />
the state government on<br />
Thursday announced free<br />
power for BPL families and<br />
basic connections to any person<br />
against payment of `379.<br />
Power minister Manish<br />
Gupta told the Assembly in a<br />
written statement that beneficiaries<br />
would not have to<br />
pay forinstallation of posts or<br />
infrastructure. Monitoring of<br />
the national rural electrification<br />
scheme Rajiv Gandhi<br />
Grameen Vidyutikaran<br />
Yojana would be done by<br />
MLAs, MPs and district magistrates,<br />
he said. —PTI<br />
City to see religious<br />
procession<br />
Kolkata: A religious procession<br />
comprising of 250 will<br />
be taken out from 27, Pollock<br />
Street and return here via<br />
Ezra Street, Canning Street,<br />
Brabourne Road and Tea<br />
Board on Friday. Another<br />
procession will be taken out<br />
from Rani Rashmoni Square<br />
and move along N C Street,<br />
Rafi Ahmed Kidwai Road. —BP<br />
QUOTE TALE<br />
We are ruling out heavy<br />
rainfall as a cause for the<br />
price hike. We are still<br />
investigating the matter,<br />
but one reason could be<br />
rumours of short supply<br />
—Rajesh Sinha<br />
additonal secretary, agricultural<br />
marketing department<br />
Top cop tells force to be on its toes<br />
As jurisdiction expands to include 17 new police stations<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: As the Kolkata<br />
Police added over 17 police<br />
stations in areas formerly<br />
under the South 24-Parganas<br />
police on Thursday, its chief<br />
RK Pachnanda had only one<br />
message for his men and<br />
women: maintain law and<br />
order, reduce the crime rate<br />
and manage the traffic system.<br />
Pachnanda visited the new<br />
police stations with other<br />
senior police officials, including<br />
special commissioner<br />
Shivaji Ghosh and joint commissioner<br />
of traffic Supratim<br />
Sarkar.<br />
According to senior police<br />
officials, one of the challenges<br />
of the new areas was<br />
the traffic congestion. There<br />
are many auto stands on<br />
most roads, creating problems<br />
for daily commuters<br />
and restricting their move-<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
New jurisdiction<br />
The police stations in<br />
added areas taken over<br />
by Kolkata Police are:<br />
Behala, Thakurpukur,<br />
Parnasree, Haridevpur,<br />
Regent Park, Bansdroni,<br />
Patuli, Survey Park,<br />
Purba Jadavpur,<br />
Jadavpur, Kasba,<br />
Tiljala, Pragati Maidan,<br />
Rajabagan, Nadial,<br />
Garfa and Metiabruz<br />
ment. Unlike on <strong>city</strong> roads,<br />
the new areas have a lot of<br />
cycle rickshaws, rickshaw<br />
vans and motor fitted vans.<br />
The <strong>city</strong> police said handpulled<br />
rickshaws and vans<br />
were requested to avoid the<br />
main roads.<br />
After taking charge of the<br />
Pleasant days ahead<br />
for <strong>city</strong>: Met office<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: The pleasant<br />
weather in the <strong>city</strong>, with<br />
alternating clouded and<br />
clear blue skies, cool breeze<br />
and occasional rain will<br />
continue for the next few<br />
days, according to the<br />
Alipore Meteorological<br />
office on Thursday.<br />
The Met office attributed<br />
the pleasant weather to the<br />
persistence of the monsoon<br />
trough over Gangetic West<br />
Bengal.<br />
“There has been a considerable<br />
amount of rainfall in<br />
the state, including the <strong>city</strong>,<br />
given the nature of the<br />
monsoon trough and other<br />
weather phenomenon associated<br />
with it,” said an<br />
Alipore Met department<br />
official.<br />
He said that for a trough<br />
to get stronger it had to persist<br />
in a region without any<br />
movement. With the trough<br />
persisting for a long period<br />
of time, it has its effect on<br />
the region in the form of<br />
rain, thus, bringing down<br />
the temperature.<br />
“At present, the trough is<br />
over Gangetic West Bengal<br />
and is persistent, causing<br />
sporadic rainfall across the<br />
state. This weather will continue<br />
to be pleasant as such<br />
weather formations are<br />
normal for this season of the<br />
year,” added the Met official.<br />
The Alipore met department<br />
said the monsoon<br />
trough was not the only factor<br />
responsible for the rains.<br />
When accompanied by<br />
cyclonic circulation and low<br />
pressure, the rain becomes<br />
more intense, it said.<br />
“This year, occasions of<br />
low pressure and cyclonic<br />
circulation have been more<br />
frequent along with a persistent<br />
monsoon trough<br />
over Gangetic West Bengal.<br />
This has resulted in widespread<br />
rain across the state,”<br />
the Met official said.<br />
In its forecast, the Met<br />
office said the skies over the<br />
<strong>city</strong> would generally be<br />
clouded along with few<br />
spells of thundershowers.<br />
“For the next 24 hours,<br />
this weather will continue<br />
and it will be mostly comfortable.<br />
There is no abnormality<br />
in the trough as the<br />
cyclonic circulation present<br />
over Orissa has moved<br />
away to Chhattisgarh, but it<br />
will have some effects<br />
on the weather,” said<br />
the met officer.<br />
Chief minister<br />
celebrates<br />
Ganesh Chaturthi<br />
Kolkata: The cries of ‘Ganapati Bappa Morya’ reverberated<br />
in the air. No, it was not a scene from Mumbai but a sight<br />
from the <strong>city</strong> itself. Like its western counterpart, the eastern<br />
metropolis also warmly invited Lord Ganesh to be its guest<br />
on the occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi.<br />
And among those welcoming the divine guest was chief<br />
minister Mamata Banerjee, who was a special guest at the<br />
Maharashtra Mandal in south Kolkata. The chief minister<br />
paid her respects to the deity. It was her first visit to the mandal<br />
after assuming office. The chief minister never forgets to<br />
visit the Mandal every year on Ganesh Chaturthi.<br />
According to Pushpa Dhote, the secretary of Maharashtra<br />
Mandal, Banerjee has held several<br />
party meetings at the<br />
Mandal in the past. “We had<br />
formally invited her and sent<br />
an invitation letter to the<br />
Writers’ Buildings. She visits us<br />
every year during Ganesh<br />
Chaturthi and pays her<br />
respects. Her visit was eagerly<br />
expected this time too,” she<br />
said.<br />
Mamata Banerjee<br />
Thursday marked the first<br />
day of the Ganesh Chaturthi,<br />
which will be celebrated over the next 10 days by devotees<br />
across the <strong>city</strong>. Besides Maharashtrians, people from all communities<br />
came to worship the elephant god. The idol of<br />
Ganesha was commissioned from idol-makers of Kalighat<br />
on Wednesday night and was formally installed after the<br />
puja ceremony on Thursday.<br />
Besides the Maharashtra Mandal, there were other organisations<br />
which celebrated the festival. There were many people<br />
at Manicktala, Hazra and Palmer Bazar road who also celebrated<br />
the festival.<br />
“Lord Ganesha signifies wealth and prosperity and we celebrate<br />
the Ganesh festival so that he brings prosperity and<br />
blesses us with good luck. We decided to celebrate it despite<br />
the price hike,” said Hemant Dhavale, who had installed an<br />
idol at Hazra Road.<br />
There was a 30 per cent hike in the cost of Ganesha idols<br />
this time and around 1,000 idols were sold by the artisans of<br />
Kumartuli. According to the artisans at Kumartuli, the price<br />
of Ganesh idols rose due to the inflation, but, people across<br />
the <strong>city</strong> bought idols and prayed for the blessings of Ganesh.<br />
� R K Pachananda inaugrates Purba Jadavpur police<br />
station on thursday — Shyamal Chakroborty<br />
new areas, the Kolkata Police<br />
shifted many auto stands.<br />
The auto stands along NSC<br />
Bose Road, Taratala crossing,<br />
M G Road and other areas<br />
were moved to other areas.<br />
“This step was taken to<br />
make traffic smoother. There<br />
are no broad roads. So it was<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: With laddoos being<br />
the favourite sweet of Lord<br />
Ganesh, sales of the delicious<br />
sweet were brisk on Thursday<br />
as people rushed to sweet<br />
shops and confectioners to<br />
buy the beloved sweet of<br />
Gajanan.<br />
Sweet shop owners said<br />
the sale of laddoos were at an<br />
all time high during the day.<br />
“The sale of laddoos witnessed<br />
a steep rise on the<br />
occasion of Ganesh Chathurti<br />
on Thursday. Numerous of<br />
customers have come and<br />
asked for the sweet in huge<br />
quantities on the occasion,”<br />
said Satish Sharma of<br />
Gangaur sweet shop.<br />
He said the shop sold only<br />
one type of the sweet priced<br />
at `340 per kilogramme.<br />
decided to curb autos, rickshaws<br />
and vans on the main<br />
roads,” said joint commissioner<br />
of police (headquarters)<br />
Jawed Shamim at<br />
Lalbazar.<br />
In another initiative, officers<br />
distributed leaflets<br />
among the residents of the<br />
Call for Peace<br />
“Every day, we sell around 10<br />
kilos of the sweet and today<br />
on the occasion of Ganesh<br />
Chathurthi the sales doubled,”<br />
added Sharma. The<br />
story was much the same at<br />
Ganguram, another confec-<br />
added areas to inform them<br />
of their new police stations.<br />
The 17 new police stations<br />
were created out of nine former<br />
South 24-Parganas<br />
police stations.<br />
However, many of the new<br />
police stations are not fully<br />
prepared to take charge,<br />
except for the Rajabagan<br />
police station.<br />
A few have been constructed<br />
with temporary<br />
materials and have no lockups<br />
as yet. Therefore, those<br />
arrested under the jurisdiction<br />
of those police stations<br />
will be taken to the central<br />
lock-up.<br />
“We are trying to solve the<br />
problem of added area police<br />
stations,” said Shamim.<br />
Pachnanda also held a<br />
separate meeting with all<br />
officers in-charge and other<br />
senior officers of the 17<br />
police stations for better<br />
policing of the new areas.<br />
� Anti-war rally organised by Sara Bharat Shanti O Sanghati Sanstha in kolkata<br />
on Thursday — Shyamal Chakroborty<br />
Sahid Minar to get fresh<br />
coat of paint & lights<br />
Our Special<br />
Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: The Sahid Minar,<br />
once the most prominent<br />
landmark in the <strong>city</strong> along<br />
with the Howrah bridge<br />
and a must-see for<br />
tourists, has now lost<br />
much of its sheen. Its<br />
gleaming white has paled<br />
and the lights around the<br />
dome have stopped burning.<br />
Chief minister Mamata<br />
Banerjee, who wants the<br />
<strong>city</strong> to be as beautiful as<br />
London, is keen to see that<br />
the pristine glory of the<br />
beautiful tower, a mixture<br />
of Syrian, Egyptian and<br />
Turkish schools of architecture,<br />
is restored. She<br />
wants the structure<br />
painted afresh and illumination<br />
revived.<br />
Public works department<br />
secretary A R<br />
Bardhan, who visited the<br />
Minar on Thursday, told<br />
journalists at the Writers’<br />
Buildings that the state<br />
heritage commission<br />
would be consulted before<br />
the tower is given a fresh<br />
coat of paint. “It should be<br />
white including the dome<br />
so that it attracts light<br />
from the tall buildings<br />
overlooking it from the<br />
east,” he said.<br />
The dome had been<br />
painted red during the<br />
United Front regime in the<br />
Sixties when the then<br />
government rechristened<br />
it, too. It was previously<br />
known as the Ochterlony<br />
Monument and put up by<br />
the East India Company in<br />
1828 to mark the victory<br />
of Sir David Ochterlony in<br />
the 1814-16 Nepal campaign.<br />
Bardhan said the illumination<br />
was previously<br />
being provided by CESC.<br />
“We’ve to find out if they<br />
will resume it. Otherwise,<br />
the department will take<br />
upon the responsibility<br />
itself.” He said proper<br />
landscaping of the Sahid<br />
Minar’s surroundings<br />
would also be taken up to<br />
make it more attractive<br />
and ensure a cleaner environment.<br />
It was not immediately<br />
known whether tourists<br />
would be allowed to go up<br />
to the top by negotiating<br />
218 spiral steps. The<br />
authorities had clamped a<br />
ban on visitors’ going up<br />
to the top to take an aerial<br />
view of the <strong>city</strong> in the<br />
early Seventies following a<br />
suicide attempt.<br />
The secretary said a<br />
decision to reopen it to the<br />
public would be taken<br />
after consultations with<br />
the army and the Kolkata<br />
Police.<br />
Asked about the costs<br />
for the renovation initiative,<br />
the official said<br />
the question would<br />
come once the basic<br />
objectives had been identified<br />
and cleared<br />
for implementation.<br />
tioner.<br />
“People are flocking to the<br />
shop and asking for sweets in<br />
huge amounts. We have sold<br />
from 12 pieces to 70 pieces at<br />
a time on this occasion,” said<br />
Manish Chaurasia of<br />
Ganguram at Chowringee<br />
Road. Ganguram, which normally<br />
sells around 200-250<br />
pieces of laddoos every day,<br />
sold around 1,000 pieces of<br />
the sweet on Thursday.<br />
“The laddoo is used for various<br />
purposes on Ganesh<br />
Chathurthi. While few offer it<br />
as prasad to God, some gift a<br />
packet of the sweet to their<br />
family members. Out of all<br />
the sweets, this makes for a<br />
favourite,” said Gopal Sharma<br />
from Haldirams at<br />
Burrabazar.<br />
Sharma further said that<br />
there were primarily two<br />
types of laddoos — one variety<br />
made using vegetable oil<br />
and another made using<br />
ghee. “Although the laddoos<br />
made of ghee are costlier,<br />
they are the favourites,”<br />
added Sharma.<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Private hospitals<br />
in a fix over apex<br />
court’s ruling<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: Private hospitals<br />
find themselves in a fix<br />
over a Supreme Court ruling<br />
on Thursday, directing<br />
them to provide free treatment<br />
to people below the<br />
poverty line.<br />
The board of directors<br />
and the management of<br />
such hospitals in the <strong>city</strong><br />
are yet to take a decision.<br />
Subhamoy Dutta<br />
Chaudhuri, the director of<br />
state health services, said<br />
that the court’s aim was to<br />
make scientific and proper<br />
health services accessible<br />
to all sections of the society.<br />
“The judgment by the<br />
Supreme Court was a bold<br />
step in this<br />
direction. We will formulate<br />
a detailed approach to<br />
the issue after studying<br />
the interpretation<br />
provided by our legal cell,”<br />
he said.<br />
While<br />
most of privatehospitals<br />
have<br />
special<br />
packages<br />
and offers for poor and BPL<br />
category patients, some<br />
are thinking of increasing<br />
such facilities.<br />
“We do have such packages,<br />
in which the people<br />
from the BPL category are<br />
given rebates. There are<br />
times when we have given<br />
them special discounts for<br />
their inability to pay,” said<br />
a spokesperson of Fortis<br />
hospitals.<br />
“We cannot comment<br />
on this recent ruling but<br />
will definitely take a stand<br />
after our management<br />
takes a decision,”the officer<br />
added.<br />
Private hospitals are<br />
� File photo of Shahid Minar<br />
Ladoo sales rise on Ganesh Chaturthi<br />
Supreme Court<br />
directed the<br />
private hospitals<br />
to provide free<br />
treatment to people<br />
below the<br />
poverty line<br />
FREE TREATMENT<br />
TO BPL PEOPLE<br />
taking their time to decide<br />
their stand as they are not<br />
sure about the details of<br />
the judgment. “We are not<br />
sure about the implication<br />
and what<br />
exactly the<br />
judgment<br />
says,” said<br />
Udayan<br />
Lahiri, CEO<br />
of Medica super specialty<br />
hospital.<br />
We will take a little bit<br />
of time to study and assess<br />
it. We are going through<br />
the details and we will<br />
decide our stand soon, he<br />
added.<br />
Hospitals such as<br />
Ruby and Peerless were<br />
also waiting to go through<br />
the judgment.<br />
“We’ve not decided<br />
what stand to take<br />
because it will take us<br />
time to go through the<br />
order’s details,” said<br />
Nivedita Ghosh, chief<br />
operating officer of<br />
Peerless Hospitals.<br />
Traders<br />
meet<br />
Bidhannagar<br />
chairperson<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: Traders of two market<br />
areas located in<br />
Bidhannagar —Sukantanagar<br />
and Baisakhi — on Thursday<br />
submitted their complaints<br />
and suggestions to improve<br />
the complexes to municipality<br />
chairperson Krishna<br />
Chakraborty on Thursday.<br />
The executive members of<br />
the Baisakhi Bazaar Babsayi<br />
Samiti told Chakraborty that<br />
there were faults in the allotments<br />
at the newly constructed<br />
complex. The committee<br />
members from<br />
Sukantanagar complained<br />
that the market area had now<br />
become a shelter for criminals.<br />
“For the past three decades,<br />
we have had temporary sheds<br />
at the Baishakhi market. The<br />
new building was meant to<br />
give us permanent stalls. But,<br />
there are lot of loopholes in<br />
the way the allotted shops<br />
have been distributed,” said<br />
Tapan Saha, the secretary of<br />
the Baishakhi Bazaar Babsayi<br />
Samity. He said that around<br />
190 businessmen were promised<br />
proper relocation but the<br />
distribution of the shops did<br />
not match the profile of the<br />
business.<br />
“Many people selling vegetables<br />
or rations have been<br />
given shops on the upper tier,<br />
thus, hampering their business<br />
as customers miss the<br />
shops at their usual places.<br />
We have also not got the<br />
transfer of ownership for the<br />
shops hence, we are still<br />
under the label of temporary<br />
businessmen,” added Saha.<br />
Asim Guha, the secretary of<br />
ward 19 in Sukantanagar,<br />
raised the issue of criminals<br />
taking shelter in the market.<br />
The chairperson promised<br />
to look into their problems. “I<br />
will discuss the problems<br />
individually. There are many<br />
constraints faced by the<br />
municipality, the financial<br />
crunch being one of the<br />
biggest problems. We will fix<br />
all the problems,” she assured.
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com CITY 3<br />
CBI likely to probe Wakf scam<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: Chief minister Mamata<br />
Banerjee asked for a CBI investigation<br />
into the alleged scam of property<br />
under the Wakf Board in the<br />
Assembly on Thursday. Her<br />
announcement came after former<br />
Left Front minister Abdur Rezzak<br />
Mollah requested her to launch a<br />
probe into the scam.<br />
Mollah requested Banerjee to look<br />
into the allegations of anomalies in<br />
the handover of Wakf properties<br />
across the state along with the money<br />
laundering. Wishing him “Double Eid<br />
Mubarak”, the chief minister made<br />
the announcement after the budget<br />
of the minorities welfare department<br />
was placed.<br />
“Since there is no opposition from<br />
the House and the agenda is one of<br />
those issues in our list of priorities,<br />
we will initiate a CBI probe into it,”<br />
she told Mollah.<br />
Banerjee pointed out that she had<br />
always wanted a conclusive detail<br />
from the investigation into this scam.<br />
“Nothing concrete came out and I<br />
even moved to the Supreme Court to<br />
file a public interest litigation.<br />
However, when you want an investigation,<br />
we’ll ask CBI to do it this time,”<br />
she said in reply to Mollah’s request.<br />
The Wakf Board looks after several<br />
religious properties, belonging to the<br />
Muslims, across the state. In 2008,<br />
No anomalies between<br />
GTA draft and Bill: Govt<br />
Our Special Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: The state government on Thursday<br />
clarified that there were no anomalies<br />
between the Gorkhaland Territorial<br />
Administration (GTA) and the draft Bill, as<br />
alleged by the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha<br />
(GJM) on Wednesday.<br />
Asked whether there<br />
were any anomalies<br />
between the GTA and the<br />
draft Bill, industry minister<br />
Partha Chatterjee told<br />
journalists after the 11th<br />
state Cabinet meeting:<br />
“Yes, all the points are<br />
there and they are the<br />
same.” He also said that a<br />
proposal for the GTA<br />
would be passed in the<br />
Assembly on Friday.<br />
Earlier in the day, GJM<br />
general secretary Roshan<br />
Giri had submitted a letter<br />
to chief secretary Samar<br />
Ghosh, pointing out the<br />
differences between the<br />
GTA and the draft Bill. He<br />
also met the chief minister<br />
over the issue.<br />
Chatterjee said the<br />
Cabinet had also agreed to<br />
hand over the investigation<br />
into the Wakf scam to<br />
the CBI. And, cief minister<br />
Mamata Banerjee<br />
declared her intention to<br />
do so in the Assembly.<br />
The minister further<br />
informed that the Cabinet<br />
also discussed the decision<br />
of the August 19 allparty<br />
meeting where it<br />
was decided that the state � Roshan Giri<br />
would be renamed<br />
Mamata<br />
apprises<br />
Governor<br />
of GTA Bill<br />
Sudarshana Mukherjee<br />
Kolkata: Chief minister<br />
Mamata Banerjee and industry<br />
minister Partha Chatter jee met<br />
Governor M K Narayanan on<br />
Thursday. Acc or ding to sources,<br />
Banerjee apprised Narayanan<br />
of the Gorkhaland issue with<br />
the Bill expected to be placed in<br />
the Assembly on Friday.<br />
A Gorkha Janmukti Morcha<br />
(GJM) delegation had pointed<br />
out certain anomalies in the<br />
Gorkhaland Territorial Agre -<br />
ement (GTA) and the draft Bill<br />
and sought changes. The<br />
Governor reportedly took<br />
interest in the proposed<br />
amendments to the GTA Bill.<br />
The CM sought to offer<br />
autonomy and financial assistance<br />
coupled with unrestricted<br />
support to a ruling<br />
party in the Darjeeling hills.<br />
The changes demanded by<br />
GJM stressed on greater economic<br />
independence and ethni<strong>city</strong><br />
for the new administrative<br />
set-up in the Hills.<br />
As constitutional guardian<br />
of the state, the Governor<br />
wanted to know how the government<br />
would resolve the<br />
differences. Sources further<br />
revealed that the Maoist crisis,<br />
which has been rearing its<br />
head through a spurt of recent<br />
incidents, also figured in the<br />
discussion.<br />
“It is our duty to apprise the<br />
Governor every 15 days, a routine<br />
the chief minister has formulated.<br />
We call it courtesy<br />
call. We had some relevant<br />
discussions, too. The GTA differences<br />
will be settled and<br />
there would not be any problems,”<br />
said Chatterjee.<br />
We plan to affiliate 10,000 madrasas but we’ll not give<br />
them any financial support. Our affiliation will help them<br />
get financial support from many other places, including<br />
the Centre<br />
—Mamata Banerjee, chief minister<br />
� Partha Chatterjee<br />
Paschimbanga. On whether the name would<br />
remain the same in English, he said the ways<br />
to implement the new name would be<br />
chalked out in the House.<br />
The Cabinet discussed reviving the<br />
Legislative Council in accordance with<br />
Article 169 of the Constitution. The issue had<br />
been on the chief minister’s agenda for some<br />
time now, Chatterjee<br />
said.<br />
The Cabinet also discussed<br />
the chief minister’s<br />
oft-repeated line<br />
that the government<br />
would have to work<br />
keeping farmers’ land<br />
and sentiments in mind.<br />
The chief minister said<br />
there would no longer be<br />
any forcible acquisition<br />
of land. Although the<br />
land Bill had not been<br />
passed yet, Banerjee has<br />
been fighting for it.<br />
“The Land Bill is taking<br />
its final shape. A discussion<br />
will be held at the<br />
12th Cabinet meeting on<br />
September 14 to finalise<br />
the provisions of the<br />
Bill,” said Chatterjee.<br />
The minister added<br />
that the enactment of<br />
the Bill would take place<br />
after the final discussion<br />
following the next<br />
Cabinet meeting. Apart<br />
from the main issues,<br />
subjects related to<br />
government employment<br />
were discussed at<br />
the meeting. However,<br />
no details about these<br />
discussions were<br />
mentioned.<br />
allegations were raised against some<br />
senior Left Front minister and leaders<br />
of misappropriating funds and handing<br />
over properties under the Wakf<br />
Board. While the Left administration<br />
had initiated a police investigation,<br />
nothing conclusive emerged.<br />
“We have several plans that would<br />
benefit the Muslim community. We<br />
plan to affiliate 10,000 madrasas. But<br />
we will not give them any financial<br />
support. Our affiliation will help<br />
them get financial support from<br />
many places, including the Centre,”<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: The CPI(M)<br />
announced professor Nandini<br />
Mukherjee as its candidate for<br />
the Bhawanipore Assembly<br />
seat where she would be pitted<br />
against none other than<br />
chief minister Mamata<br />
Banerjee in the by-election on<br />
September 25. The result will<br />
be declared on September 28.<br />
A professor of computer<br />
science at Jadavpur University,<br />
Mukherjee has been associated<br />
with the party for a long<br />
time. She did her PhD from<br />
London after studying at the<br />
BE College in Shibpur. A member<br />
of the party’s Jadavpur<br />
unit, she is the wife of Biman<br />
Mukherjee, the registrar of<br />
her alma mater, known as<br />
Bengal Engineering and<br />
Science University at present.<br />
The other Assembly seat<br />
that will go to the polls also on<br />
September 25 is Basirhat<br />
Uttar. While the Bhawanipore<br />
constituency was vacated<br />
after PWD minister Subrata<br />
Bakshi resigned, the other<br />
constituency will have its byelection<br />
due to the death of<br />
sitting CPI(M) MLA Mostafa<br />
Bin Quasem.<br />
Although Bakshi will continue<br />
as PWD minister, he<br />
resigned from the Assembly<br />
and made way for Banerjee to<br />
contest from his seat. Quasem,<br />
69, had committed suicide on<br />
May 29 after jumping off a<br />
fourth-floor window of the<br />
MLA Hostel on Kyd Street.<br />
Preliminary investigation<br />
said the CM.<br />
Refuting comments by former<br />
chief minister Buddhadeb<br />
Bhattacharjee, she said madrasas do<br />
“not train terrorists but good human<br />
beings”.<br />
“Every year, the state government<br />
will provide 20,000 jobs to Muslims.<br />
The community has not received as<br />
much importance ever. There’s not a<br />
single road at Churulia named after<br />
poet Kaji Nazrul Islam even though<br />
he was born there,” Banerjee said.<br />
She further said that while the state<br />
government had been trying to do<br />
some work, the Left Front was busy<br />
creating problems.<br />
“The previous government has not<br />
done anything over the last 34 years.<br />
But we are here just for three months.<br />
They should be silent for the next 10<br />
years and let us work in our own<br />
flow,” said Banerjee.<br />
JU professor to take<br />
on Mamata in bypoll<br />
� Nandini Mukherjee<br />
revealed that a suicide note<br />
was found which established<br />
that Quasem had committed<br />
suicide.<br />
The CPI(M) announced<br />
Subid Ali Gazi, former president<br />
of Hasnabad panchayat,<br />
as its candidate for Basirhat<br />
Uttar. Gazi is also a member of<br />
the party’s North 24-Parganas<br />
district committee and enjoys<br />
a stronghold against heavyweight<br />
Gautam Deb. While<br />
the ruling Trinamool Congress<br />
seems confident of sailing<br />
through, it is a wait-andwatch<br />
situation for the<br />
CPI(M).<br />
LGBT to hold pride celebrations today<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: The LGBT pride celebrations will be<br />
held on Friday at Lincoln Room, American<br />
Center from 2 pm onwards.<br />
This year’s pride celebrations has an universal<br />
message—that all people are entitled to live with<br />
respect and dignity regardless of their sexual<br />
orientation or gender identity, and regardless of<br />
where they live.<br />
Pride gatherings are an opportunity to reject<br />
that shame and inequality, and to assert legitimate<br />
entitlement of each person to enjoy universal<br />
human rights.
4<br />
STATE<br />
BRIEFLY<br />
30-year-old hangs self<br />
in Barasat<br />
Barasat: A 30-year-old<br />
woman Saharaban Kouri Biwi<br />
was found hanging at her residence<br />
of Banshkul Gram<br />
Panchayat at Ashoknagar on<br />
Thursday morning. Her 11year-old<br />
son, Raju khan said<br />
that Saharaban had a fight<br />
with her husband over a<br />
petite issue. Next morning<br />
when the child found her<br />
hanging, he informed the<br />
neighbours and his family<br />
members. — BP<br />
19-year-old woman’s<br />
body found<br />
Basanti: A 19-year-old<br />
woman’s body was found at<br />
her house at Birinchibari village<br />
under Basanti police<br />
station on Thursday morning.<br />
Suchitra Mandal, who<br />
was married to Prashanta<br />
Mandal had died on Tuesday<br />
night. Though Prasanta had<br />
claimed it to be a suicide but<br />
Suchitra’s father Gopal Jana<br />
held Prasanta responsible<br />
her death. Gopal said that<br />
they were married just two<br />
months ago but Prasanta<br />
used to torture her physically<br />
and mentally for<br />
dowry. — BP<br />
4-year-old girl drowns<br />
in Barasat<br />
Barasat: A 4-year-old girl<br />
drowned in a pond at Chand -<br />
anpur in Barasat on Thursd -<br />
ay. Reportedly, Afroza Khatun<br />
was playing in an around the<br />
house on Wednesday afternoon<br />
after which she went<br />
missing. On Thursday, her<br />
body was found from the<br />
pond near her house. — BP<br />
Two boys drown<br />
in Ganga<br />
Barrackpore: Two boys<br />
drowned while bathing in<br />
the Ganga at Mondalpara,<br />
Ichhapur on Wednesday.<br />
After a night long search<br />
operation, the body of Rahul<br />
Harijan, 9, and Manish Singh,<br />
10, were recovered on Thu r -<br />
sday morning. However, two<br />
others are still missing. — BP<br />
Decomposed body<br />
found in Dubrajpur<br />
Dubrajpur: The decomposed<br />
body of a man was found in a<br />
house in Dubrajpur on Thu -<br />
rsday morning. Police broke<br />
in after neighbours compl -<br />
ained of a foul stench. The<br />
dead man was identified as<br />
Jainal Abedin, a 48-year-old<br />
who used to distribute tob -<br />
acco among bidi makers. — BP<br />
Husband kills woman<br />
at Naihati<br />
Naihati: A 35-year-old<br />
woman was allegedly burnt<br />
to death by her husband at<br />
Naihati on Wednesday night.<br />
The husband was also<br />
injured in the incident and<br />
was admitted to hospital.<br />
Police have detained a<br />
woman named Uma Saha, a<br />
beauty parlour owner, with<br />
whom the husband was<br />
allegedly involved in an illicit<br />
affair. — BP<br />
5 women<br />
among 7<br />
injured<br />
in clash<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Sashan: A clash between the<br />
supporters of the Trinamool<br />
Congress (TMC) and the<br />
CPI(M) left seven persons<br />
injured, including five<br />
women, at Khamar village in<br />
Barasat’s Sashan on Thursday.<br />
The injured have all been<br />
admitted to the Barasat subdivisional<br />
hospital.<br />
Reportedly, a gang of<br />
CPI(M)-backed goons, led by<br />
Satikul Islam, raided the<br />
house of Habibullah, a TMC<br />
worker, early in the morning.<br />
The villagers who tried to<br />
mediate in the clashes were<br />
seriously injured, too.<br />
“Satikul was thrown out of<br />
the TMC for indulging in illegal<br />
activities. So, he attacked<br />
us along along with other<br />
CPI(M) activists,” said TMC<br />
leader Matiyar Sapui.<br />
“Habibulla’s wife and his two<br />
daughters were also assa u l -<br />
ted by the culprits,” he added.<br />
The case is being investigated<br />
by the district police.<br />
Sushanta main conspirator: CID<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: The criminal investigation<br />
department (CID), probing<br />
the Benachapra skeleton recovery<br />
case, is likely to charge former<br />
Left Front minister and<br />
prime accused Sushanta Ghosh<br />
as the main conspirator, along<br />
with three other senior party<br />
leaders of West Midnapore district.<br />
“We’re likely to submit the<br />
charge sheet in the Midnapore<br />
court by September 8. In it, we<br />
will mention Ghosh along with<br />
CPI(M) state committee member<br />
Tarun Roy, Tarit Khatua and<br />
Entaz Ali as conspirators and<br />
planners of the case,” said a senior<br />
CID officer. The CID took over<br />
the case on June 5 and as<br />
required, the charge sheet will<br />
be submitted within 90 days<br />
from the day of taking up the<br />
case, he added.<br />
According to sources, the<br />
charge sheet will state that<br />
around 50 people, including the<br />
CPI(M) leaders, were involved in<br />
the crime and the exact role<br />
played by each of the accused.<br />
Ghosh, Roy, Khatua and Ali did<br />
not just conspire but also<br />
directed others in committing<br />
the crime. Sushanta was present<br />
at the mango orchard at<br />
Daserbandh in Benachapra village,<br />
where bodies of the miss-<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: The newly constituted<br />
task force to look into price rise<br />
and abnormally high prices of<br />
vegetables and other food<br />
products, on Thursday ruled<br />
out the ongoing floods in the<br />
state as the reason behind the<br />
increase. It also denied claims<br />
that the phenomenon was due<br />
to a shortfall in supply.<br />
The nine-member task force,<br />
which was appointed earlier<br />
this week by chief mnister<br />
Mamata Banerjee to probe the<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Howrah: The 500-year-old <strong>city</strong> witnessed a<br />
historic moment as the office of the commissioner<br />
of police was introduced in Howrah on<br />
September 1. Ajey Ranade took charge as<br />
police commissioner of the town. At a press<br />
conference, he said the commissionerate had<br />
been introduced to improve the law and order<br />
situation, control crime and ease traffic. It<br />
includes eight police stations — Bally, Liluah,<br />
Mali Panch Ghora, Golabari, Howrah, Shibpur,<br />
Jagacha and Bantra. The area covered is 98 sq<br />
km.<br />
There will be a joint police commissioner,<br />
six deputy commmissioners and several assistant<br />
commissioners looking after six divisions<br />
– the detective department, traffic, armed<br />
police, Special Branch, headquarters and<br />
police stations. There will be DCs in charge of<br />
north and south respectively, two additional<br />
DCs and 10 ACs for functioning of the<br />
Commissioneriat. The police commissioner<br />
also said 406 additonal posts had been created<br />
which would be absorbed in due course. The<br />
commissionerate would have a similar structure<br />
as the Kolkata Police.<br />
The main action area would be in traffic and<br />
crime control, said the police commissioner.<br />
There would be a DC(traffic) and a DC(headquarters).<br />
Six traffic guards and 13sub-guards<br />
would be formed and placed in charge of<br />
assistant commissioners.<br />
There would be six radio flying squads for<br />
quick response on 100 dial which will be<br />
manned for 24 hours. Two flying squads have<br />
already been deployed in the town. Two heavy<br />
radio flying squads would also be introduced,<br />
said Ranade.<br />
Two flying squads were seen on the day at<br />
Bangabasi crossing and Salkia Chowrasta<br />
crossing respectively. The police commissioner<br />
also said the eight police stations would<br />
Udayan Mukhopadhyay<br />
Nadia: One more deer succumbed<br />
to injury at the<br />
Bethuadahari wildlife sanctuary<br />
in Nadia district on<br />
Thursday. A group of youngsters<br />
had pelted stones at the<br />
protected territory meant for<br />
deer on Wednesday in which<br />
two were severely injured and<br />
one died during the day itself.<br />
The carcass has been sent for<br />
autopsy. Local sources, however,<br />
said there was a possibil-<br />
� Sushanta Ghosh<br />
ing Trinamool Congress workers<br />
were buried in September 20<strong>02</strong>.<br />
While investigating the case<br />
and reconstructing the crime,<br />
the CID sleuths have learnt that<br />
seven Trinamool Congress<br />
activists were shot dead at<br />
Dakshin Piyasala village by<br />
CPI(M) supporters and Ghosh’s<br />
trusted cadres Sona Ruidas and<br />
Shankar Shau.<br />
The bodies were then ferried<br />
to Benachapra on a bullock cart<br />
and party cadres, namely<br />
Biman Ghosh, Baidyanath<br />
Santra and Shanti Prachanda,<br />
were given the responsibility to<br />
decompose the bodies, said the<br />
reasons for the hike in prices,<br />
held its first meeting at the<br />
Kolkata Municipal Corporation.<br />
During the meeting, the task<br />
force discussed its findings and<br />
decided on taking strict measures<br />
against black marketeers<br />
and profiteers.<br />
Six of the task force’s nine<br />
members were present at the<br />
meeting, including agricultural<br />
marketing department additional<br />
secretary Rajesh Sinha,<br />
enforcement branch deputy<br />
commissioner Debabrata Das,<br />
enforcement branch deputy<br />
senior officer.<br />
Another party cadre dug up<br />
the trench at the orchard and<br />
Madan Santra dragged the bodies<br />
to the orchard from the bullock<br />
cart parked on the other<br />
side of the canal. The entire<br />
process was supervised by<br />
Sushanta’s brother Prasanta<br />
Ghosh. The Trinamool activists<br />
were first chased to Dakshin<br />
Piyasala by the CPI(M) cadres<br />
from Khetua near Keshpur, said<br />
the officer.<br />
Seven Trinamool activists<br />
were killed on September 22,<br />
20<strong>02</strong>, and next day, a complaint<br />
was lodged against the CPI(M)<br />
Task force on prices meets at KMC<br />
Howrah top cop outlines<br />
major policing overhaul<br />
superintendent Prabhat Ban -<br />
dhopadhya and KMC’s chief ma -<br />
nager, market, Bhaskar Ghosh.<br />
The task force members had<br />
visited various markets across<br />
the <strong>city</strong> as well as in the districts<br />
and noted down the<br />
prices, figuring out the reasons<br />
behind their rise. The team has<br />
already made seven to eight<br />
visits to not only the markets in<br />
the <strong>city</strong> but also the district<br />
markets.<br />
“We are ruling out the heavy<br />
rainfall that the state has<br />
received in the past few<br />
� Ajey Ranade, the police commissioner<br />
of Howrah — BP<br />
be divided into 17 police stations later for<br />
administrative reasons.<br />
The Howrah (rural) district police have been<br />
created with the remaining 11 police stations<br />
in rural areas. The previous police superintendent<br />
of Howrah, Rabindranath Mukherjee, has<br />
been appointed police superintendent (rural)<br />
of Howrah.<br />
ity of a few more deaths.<br />
The Bethuadahari authorities<br />
said nearly 30,000 people<br />
visited the place on<br />
Wednesday as it was a holiday<br />
for Eid. A group of youths<br />
entered the sanctuary around<br />
10 am and started throwing<br />
stones. Range officer Jyoti<br />
Prasad Guha Roy said the two<br />
deer might have been injured<br />
by the sharp fencing or some<br />
tree bark when they were<br />
being chased. “Search is on for<br />
the other injured deer,” said<br />
Guha Roy.<br />
Sources, however, deferred<br />
the official comment and said<br />
that there might be five<br />
deaths, including that of a<br />
ghariyal which could be due to<br />
food poisoning. The range officer<br />
said until and unless<br />
autopsy reports arrived, the<br />
exact reason for the deaths<br />
could not be cited.<br />
Local MLA Kalyan Khan visited<br />
the sanctuary on<br />
Wednesday and said a probe<br />
was necessary.<br />
leaders, including Ghosh. But the<br />
investigation could not be completed<br />
as the bodies were not<br />
found then. On June 4, this year,<br />
when five skeletons were<br />
unearthed from Daserbandh<br />
near Ghosh’s ancestral home,<br />
one Shyamal Acharya claimed<br />
that one of the skeletons was<br />
that of his father Ajay Acharya,<br />
who was killed on September<br />
22, 20<strong>02</strong>. Subsequently, a complaint<br />
was lodged with the<br />
police accusing 42 people,<br />
including the Ghosh brothers,<br />
Roy and others.<br />
So far, 10 people have been<br />
arrested, including Sushanta,<br />
Biman, Shanti and Madan. Other<br />
prime accused like Prashanta,<br />
Tarun, Tarit and Entaz are still at<br />
large. Moreover, Madan has<br />
agreed to turn government<br />
approver in the case and already<br />
recorded his statement before a<br />
judge in the Midnapore court<br />
under Section 164 CrPC.<br />
“We cannot give any time<br />
limit for submitting the charge<br />
sheet. We are still investigating<br />
it. Several points have been<br />
cleared and we are still working<br />
to get some more evidences.<br />
Though many of the conspirators<br />
are yet to be arrested, we are<br />
trying to submit the charge sheet<br />
as early as possible,” said K<br />
Jayaraman, CID deputy inspector-general<br />
(operations).<br />
months as a cause for the price<br />
hike. We are still investigating<br />
the matter, but one reason<br />
which could be the cause<br />
would be rumours of short supply,<br />
which led the retailers and<br />
the vendors to restrict the sale<br />
of such products, which in turn<br />
led to the rise,” said Sinha.<br />
The task force informed that<br />
districts had been notified that<br />
visits to the market would<br />
continue.<br />
The task force also decided to<br />
visit these markets, starting<br />
from Friday morning.<br />
Chandrashekhar Chatterjee<br />
Asansol: On the lines of the Delhi Police, the<br />
police commisionerate system has been<br />
introduced in West Bengal for the first time<br />
starting with the Asansol-Durgapur industrial<br />
belt from Thursday. The former inspector general<br />
of the counter intelligence force, Ajay<br />
Nanda, is the first commissioner to take<br />
charge. The decision has been taken in view of<br />
the crime trend in the industrial belt in the<br />
past few months.<br />
The new police commissioner, who had<br />
also served as police superintendant of<br />
Jalpaiguri and West Midnapore, took over the<br />
office earlier held by the additional police<br />
superintendent. He expected to curb crime by<br />
October 1.<br />
“The system has been started in 15 police<br />
stations which include nine in Asansol and six<br />
Gautam Paramanik<br />
� The office of police commissioner in Asansol — BP<br />
Purulia: State food minister Jyotipriyo<br />
Mullick declared the setting up of a<br />
five-member vigilance team in every<br />
district of the state to get rid of corruption<br />
in food supply and distribution.<br />
During his recent visit to Purulia on<br />
Thursday, he also sealed four godowns<br />
of Balarampur Thana Large Sized Cooperative<br />
Agricultural Marketing<br />
Society Limited due to some discrepancies<br />
noted here.<br />
The minister had reportedly<br />
received several complaints about the<br />
godowns here. On Thursday, he raided<br />
the godowns along with self-employment<br />
and self-help group minister<br />
Shantiram Mahato, state food director<br />
Joydeb Jana and district food controller,<br />
Sunoy Goswami. He noticed<br />
several discrepancies in the godowns<br />
and found the grain rotting here due to<br />
the leakage of rainwater from a hole in<br />
the roof.<br />
The minister ordered these<br />
godowns to be sealed and ordered a<br />
probe after the local residents alleged<br />
that the food materials from these<br />
godowns are smuggled to Jharkhand.<br />
Mullick then went to a ration card<br />
distribution centre at Bamundiha in<br />
Barabazar and spoke to the cardholders<br />
there. He also visited a rice mill in<br />
Purulia Block II and enquired about<br />
in Durgapur. Kaksa and Budbud in Durgapur<br />
are excluded. Asansol and Durgapur have<br />
been divided into three areas: east, west and<br />
central headed by a deputy commissioner.<br />
The commissionerate (east) includes<br />
Durgapur police station, Newtownship,<br />
Faridpur, Kokbhen, Pandev shwar and Andal.<br />
The commissionarate (west) includes Kulti,<br />
Hirapur, Salanpur, Barabani and Chittaranjan.<br />
The commissionerate (central) includes<br />
Asansol North and South, Jamuria and<br />
Raniganj,” said the new police commissioner.<br />
The ranks of the additional police superintendents<br />
of Asansol and Durgapur have been<br />
changed to deputy commissioners. The DSPs<br />
of Asansol and SDPO of Durgapur are now<br />
additional commissioners. A thousand more<br />
police officers will be employed including 80<br />
inspectors, 120 sub-inspectors and 40 female<br />
sub-inspectors.<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
� State food minister Jyotipriyo Mullick at a godown in Purulia<br />
on Thursday — BP<br />
Food minister sets<br />
up vigilance teams<br />
to stop corruption<br />
Commissioner sets himself<br />
Sept deadline to curb crime<br />
Another injured deer dies in Bethuadahari sanctuary<br />
� The deer killed in Nadia — BP<br />
its functioning.<br />
“Already 63 tonne rice has been<br />
purchased for the district and another<br />
100 tonne will be bought. In the last 34<br />
years, the Left Front government had<br />
failed to supply food to the people of<br />
the state. We will not let that happen.<br />
We will make sure that everyone is fed<br />
and most importantly people from<br />
West Midnapore, Bankura, and Purulia<br />
in Jangalmahal. If everyone is fed properly,<br />
Maoists will no longer be active<br />
here,” said the minister.<br />
On Thursday evening, Mullick also<br />
held a meeting with the district<br />
administration and the district food<br />
officials at the Purulia circuit house. He<br />
also met the ration dealers here.<br />
The minister informed that the date<br />
for surrendering illegal ration cards<br />
had been extended to September 30.<br />
Thereafter, the food department will<br />
start its raids throughout the state.<br />
“The state government has to pay a<br />
subsidy of Rs70 crore every month in<br />
order to keep the food supply and distribution<br />
system going. So, if anyone is<br />
found guilty, strict action would be<br />
taken against him,” said the minister.<br />
On Friday, the food minister will<br />
visit Bankura to look into the state of<br />
affairs there and hold a meeting with<br />
the food officials, the district magistrate,<br />
the MLAs, the sub-divisional officers<br />
and block development officers.<br />
SUCI-CPM<br />
clash leaves<br />
two women<br />
injured<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kultali: A clash took place<br />
between supporters of the<br />
SUCI and CPI(M) which left<br />
two women seriously injured<br />
in Mahishmari village under<br />
Kultali police station in South<br />
24-Parganas on Thursday.<br />
Aslima Sardar and Karima<br />
Gazi have been admitted to<br />
the Joynagar Gramin<br />
Hospital.<br />
Reportedly, post-election,<br />
11 families of SUCI supporters<br />
were rendered homeless. The<br />
SUCI has always won at<br />
Kultali. It was the first time<br />
when the CPI(M) had won<br />
here.<br />
“The CPI(M) supporters<br />
had been attacking SUCI<br />
members here for quite a<br />
long time,” said former<br />
Kultali MLA and SUCI leader<br />
Joykrishna Halder.<br />
“These people had<br />
returned to their homes on<br />
the occasion of Eid. However,<br />
CPI(M) supporters hurled<br />
bombs at them. Aslima was<br />
injured in the bomb blast and<br />
Karima was beaten up as she<br />
protested against the attackers,”<br />
he added.<br />
Additional superintendent<br />
of police, gramin, Kankar<br />
Prasad Barui, said that the<br />
police have already started a<br />
probe. A police picket has<br />
been deployed in the area.
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com STATE 5<br />
Mahasweta Devi meets Lepchas<br />
Community forum agitating in <strong>city</strong> since August 9 for representation in Assembly<br />
Our Special Correspondent<br />
Siliguri: Lepchas campaigning for<br />
constitutional safeguards since<br />
August 9 gained a friend in eminent<br />
thinker-writer Mahasweta Devi on<br />
Thursday. The demonstrators, however,<br />
are distressed at being overlooked<br />
by the state government so<br />
far.<br />
“Despite her physical problems,<br />
Mahasweta Devi met the members of<br />
the demonstrating Indigenous<br />
Lepcha Tribal Association (ILTA) in<br />
Kolkata on Thursday. She sang three<br />
Tagore songs to cheer us up and<br />
returned convinced that we had a<br />
genuine problem. But, where is the<br />
state government?” said Lyangsong<br />
Tamsang Lepcha, the ILTA president<br />
and chief of the Lepcha council.<br />
ILTA members launched a stir in<br />
Kolkata on August 9 demanding a<br />
Lepcha development board/council,<br />
representation of the Lepcha community<br />
in the Assembly, Lok Sabha or<br />
Rajya Sabha and introduction of the<br />
Lepcha language from the primary to<br />
secondary levels at government<br />
BRIEFLY<br />
Ganga in spate<br />
threatens school<br />
Malda: After eroding land<br />
and destroying houses at<br />
Bhutni island in the district,<br />
the raging Ganga has now<br />
found a new target in the<br />
form of a local school. Only<br />
five feet separates the<br />
Munilatola primary school<br />
under Hiranandapur gram<br />
panchayat in the island from<br />
the waters of the furious<br />
river. The school authorities<br />
and teachers said there was<br />
no hope of saving the school,<br />
where 200 students<br />
study.—BP<br />
Today’s temperature<br />
City Max Min<br />
Siliguri 34 0<br />
Darjeeling 25 0<br />
Cooch Behar 35 0<br />
Jalpaiguri 34 0<br />
Kalimpong 27 0<br />
25 0<br />
19 0<br />
25 0<br />
25 0<br />
20 0<br />
*On centigrade scale<br />
� Writer Mahasweta Devi at a meeting with the Lepchas at Wellington<br />
Square on Thursday —Debabrota Biswas<br />
schools in the Hills.<br />
The organisation launched a similar<br />
agitation in Kalimpong on<br />
Thursday and the indication is that it<br />
would step up the movement in the<br />
coming days.<br />
The Lepcha society has a structured<br />
three-tier system called the Shezoom<br />
(council) and at the head is the<br />
Hreepun or chief.<br />
“We are indigenous to the region<br />
spanning from the Kanchenjungha to<br />
Tetulia (now in Bangladesh) and Elam<br />
(in east Nepal) to Bhutan. We call this<br />
area Mayel Lyang, which in Lepcha,<br />
means hidden eternal country. But,<br />
we are the marginalised lot in our<br />
own land, facing an existential crisis,”<br />
alleged Lepcha.<br />
“We cannot bring people from outside<br />
to play with the numbers since<br />
our concentration is in Bengal and<br />
Mob, police clash at Vidyasagar Setu<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Howrah: The toll plaza at Vidyasagar<br />
Setu became a battlefield on Thursday<br />
morning as violence erupted during a<br />
protest by residents of Kazipara area of<br />
Shibpur over shortage of drinking water,<br />
injuring six persons, including an RAF<br />
jawan.<br />
The residents of Kazipara, mainly from<br />
ward 40 and part of ward 39, began<br />
blocked the toll plaza. They said their<br />
area had been facing a drinking water<br />
shortage for the past three months.<br />
The situation had worsened in the<br />
past one month and residents complained<br />
that even during Ramadan and<br />
Eid, they did not have drinking water<br />
supply.<br />
After the toll plaza remained closed at<br />
both ends for an hour, the police tried to<br />
persuade the protesters to lift their<br />
blockade, but they refused.<br />
Following their refusal, the police<br />
decided to apply force to disburse the<br />
protesters and within a moment they<br />
began to pelt stones and throw bricks at<br />
the law enforcers.<br />
Faced with a violent mob, reinforcements,<br />
including Rapid Action Force personnel,<br />
were brought in from Kolkata<br />
and other areas of the district.<br />
The police and RAF then baton<br />
charged the protesters and fired tear gas<br />
to disburse them. Repeated clashes took<br />
place between the mob and security<br />
forces and at least six persons, including<br />
an RAF jawan, were injured.<br />
Among those injured was Seikh<br />
� The scene near the Vidyasagar Setu toll plaza where a clash broke out<br />
on Thursday—Dipankar Majumdar<br />
Mustafa, 66, a local resident of<br />
Mollapara, who alleged he was badly<br />
beaten up by the RAF.<br />
The protesters alleged that their<br />
repeated pleas to the administration to<br />
solve their water crisis fell on deaf ears. A<br />
local resident Md. Rashim Khan said:<br />
“We ran from pillar to post. We appealed<br />
to the councillor, mayor, corporation<br />
officials, MLA and MP, the district magistrate<br />
and even the superintendent of<br />
police. But no one did anything to ease<br />
Five held for carrying arms<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Malda: Five persons have been arrested in the<br />
district for allegedly carrying five pipeguns<br />
and a large number of cartridges and planning<br />
a dacoity. Musharraf Sk., Rintu Sk, Gaisu Sk,<br />
Tajimul Sk. and Madhu Haldar were arrested<br />
by the English Bazar police on Wednesday<br />
night when they had gathered at a mango<br />
orchard near the shrine of Piran-A-Pir.<br />
Police alleged they had assembled there to<br />
plan a dacoity.<br />
Police suspect that they had gathered there<br />
to rob the pilgrims who had come to the<br />
shrine, where many people come to offer<br />
prayers and donate money on Eid. They were<br />
produced in court on Thursday.<br />
Meanwhile, the district superintendent of<br />
police, Bhuban Chandra Mandal, said: “At least<br />
44 illegal weapons were recovered by the<br />
� The Malda SP displays pistols and<br />
cartridges seized from five dacoits in<br />
Malda on Thursday— Pankaj Ghosh<br />
English Bazaar police station this year, including<br />
17 in August itself. Fake currency with a<br />
face value of `43 lakh was also recovered this<br />
year, much of it by the English Bazar police<br />
station. Due to such an achievement, the<br />
police station will be given a reward.”<br />
CPRM seminar on<br />
Gorkhaland in <strong>city</strong><br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Darjeeling: The Communist<br />
Party of Revolutionary<br />
Marxists (CPRM) will continue<br />
with its agitations<br />
demanding a Gorkhaland<br />
with a seminar scheduled<br />
to be held in Kolkata on<br />
September 15. The CPRM<br />
had also held a ‘paydal<br />
yatra’ to Siliguri on August<br />
23 with the same demand<br />
along with organising various<br />
other programmes last<br />
month.<br />
“To spread the awareness<br />
of Gorkhaland, we will hold<br />
a seminar in Kolkata where<br />
we have invited many<br />
political parties from places<br />
like Kerala, Maharashtra,<br />
Punjab and also Bengal.<br />
Apart from the other political<br />
parties, we have also<br />
invited the Leftist parties as<br />
they are the ones that<br />
should understand why<br />
we are demanding<br />
Gorkhaland,” said CPRM<br />
president R B Rai while<br />
speaking about the seminar.<br />
“They will not agree to<br />
the idea of statehood. But<br />
we should discuss with<br />
them and make them<br />
understand our view on<br />
this,” he added.<br />
The CPRM had started its<br />
programme on Gorkhaland<br />
in Kalimpong from July 27<br />
where they had organised a<br />
blood donation camp in the<br />
name of martyrs, who had<br />
died in the Eighties agitation<br />
for Gorkhaland followed<br />
by a two-day dharna<br />
at Jantar Mantar in Delhi on<br />
August 11 and 12 over the<br />
same demand.<br />
The CPRM had also taken<br />
out a rally from Ghoom to<br />
Darjeeling on August 20 to<br />
observe Bhasha Divas.<br />
our problem. So, we had no way but to<br />
protest.”<br />
When contacted, Howrah mayor<br />
Mamata Jaiswal said: “The municipality<br />
is concerned about the problem there.<br />
Our engineers had visited the area for<br />
inspecting defects in the pipelines of<br />
water supply but they could not complete<br />
the work due to non-cooperation<br />
from locals. We can do the job only if the<br />
local residents cooperate with us.<br />
Otherwise things will remain the same.”<br />
Sikkim. Despite being a Scheduled<br />
Tribe, our people continue to remain<br />
marginalised under successive state<br />
governments, which is why we want<br />
a development council/board and<br />
representation in the Assembly, Lok<br />
Sabha or Rajya Sabha,” said ILTA coordinator<br />
N T Lepcha.<br />
“The representation to the<br />
Assembly, Parliament or Rajya Sabha<br />
is a political issue and might require<br />
some time. But we want the state<br />
government to introduce the Lepcha<br />
language in schools from the 2012<br />
academic session. The formation of a<br />
Lepcha board/council can also be<br />
done immediately,” said the ILTA<br />
president.<br />
Incidentally, the ILTA had boycotted<br />
the Assembly election alleging<br />
neglect by the Centre and the state<br />
government. Being a tribal body, it is<br />
affiliated to the Akhil Bharatiya<br />
Adivasi Vikas Parishad (ABAVP),<br />
which is a national apolitical platform<br />
of aboriginals.<br />
The ILTA chief, however, reserved<br />
his comment on his organisation’s<br />
association with the ABAVP.<br />
JIS students<br />
to fight cruelty<br />
on animals<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: First-year students<br />
of JIS are slated to take up<br />
the cause of ethical treatment<br />
of animals. People for<br />
the Ethical Treatment of<br />
Animals (PETA) will be the<br />
social partner and the issue<br />
will be taken up jointly in an<br />
endeavour to educate the<br />
future generation to raise<br />
their voices against cruelty<br />
on animals.<br />
The effort will be marked<br />
by workshops on material<br />
science, metallurgy and<br />
speeches by eminent speakers<br />
and professors who,<br />
apart from instilling the love<br />
for animals amongst the students,<br />
would also educate<br />
them on various fields of<br />
education.<br />
The Bienvenido (Spanish<br />
for ‘welcome’) programme<br />
would also see the inauguration<br />
of the first college magazine,<br />
Reflections.<br />
First-year students would<br />
be given a hearty welcome<br />
by their seniors on the<br />
occasion.<br />
There will also be performances<br />
by college bands.<br />
Enough is enough: N Dinajpur officials<br />
Action force on the<br />
anvil to tackle<br />
highway blockades<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Raiganj: Frequent blockades<br />
of the two national highways<br />
passing through Raiganj have<br />
prompted the North Dinajpur<br />
district administration to<br />
think of raising an “action<br />
force” to tackle such protests.<br />
Political parties had<br />
assured at a meeting convened<br />
by the local administration<br />
two weeks ago that<br />
they would never disrupt traffic<br />
on NH-31 and NH-34 in<br />
the run-up to Durga Puja. But<br />
police said there have been<br />
five prolonged blockades on<br />
the highways in the past<br />
week, causing tremendous<br />
harassment to passengers of<br />
long-distance buses and daily<br />
commuters. “There is not<br />
enough force to clear the<br />
roads occupied by squatters.<br />
However, we are in talks with<br />
the district administration to<br />
raise an action force to stop<br />
blockades,” said Indra<br />
Chakraborty, the sub-divisional<br />
police officer of<br />
Islampur.<br />
According to the district<br />
administration, NH-31 links<br />
North Bengal to the Northeast<br />
while NH-34 connects South<br />
and North Bengal with Bihar<br />
and the rest of north India.<br />
Sajal Das, a resident of<br />
Kolkata and a private firm<br />
employee, said he had to<br />
travel regularly to towns like<br />
Malda, Raiganj and Siliguri on<br />
work. “I face frequent blockades<br />
in Islampur that hold us<br />
up for hours. Even after the<br />
blockades are lifted, it takes<br />
time for the traffic to normalise.<br />
I could have understood<br />
things better had<br />
demonstrations and blockades<br />
been announced in<br />
advance. But such spontaneous<br />
actions should be<br />
avoided,” he said.<br />
The business community,<br />
too, has complained about<br />
losses because of protests.<br />
Damodar Agarwala, a member<br />
of<br />
the Islampur Merchants’<br />
Association, said disruptions<br />
often caused trucks laden<br />
with merchandise to stop for<br />
long periods, upsetting delivery<br />
schedules and deadlines.<br />
Agarwal added that blocking<br />
national highways is a<br />
non-bailable offence under<br />
the National Highway Act.<br />
� Traffic stalled on the NH-34 during a recent blockade<br />
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Disclaimer : The Bengal Post or any of its agents assume no responsibility for the<br />
authenti<strong>city</strong> or reliability of any advertisement published in this news paper. The<br />
adver- tisements carried in the newspaper are acce- pted on good faith.
6<br />
NATION<br />
BRIEFLY<br />
� Ranjit Sinha takes<br />
charge as the new ITBP<br />
director general in New<br />
Delhi on Thursday —PTI<br />
Nine killed in Jodhpur<br />
road accident<br />
Jodhpur: Nine persons,<br />
including three women and<br />
two children, were killed<br />
when the jeep they were<br />
travelling in collided with a<br />
truck on the Jodh pur –Jaisa -<br />
lmer highway on Thursday,<br />
police said. Five persons died<br />
on the spot whereas four<br />
others died on way to the<br />
hospital,” ASP Kesar Singh<br />
said. The injured have been<br />
admitted to Jodh pur hospital,<br />
he added. —PTI<br />
Pro-Bodoland faction<br />
stages protests in Assam<br />
Kokrajhar: Hundreds of supporters<br />
of the pro-talk faction<br />
of the National Demo -<br />
cratic Front of Bodoland -<br />
Progr essive (NDFB-P) on<br />
Thursday staged demonstrations<br />
in various parts of Ass -<br />
am and submitted a memorandum<br />
demanding a separate<br />
state. Protesters handed<br />
a memorandum to the distr -<br />
ict admi n i stration to be submitted<br />
later to the PM<br />
demanding a peaceful solution<br />
to the Bodo tangle. —PTI<br />
Ministry of home<br />
affairs now on Twitter<br />
New Delhi: After external<br />
affairs ministry, the ministry<br />
of home affairs has jumped<br />
onto the Twitter bandwagon<br />
and made it fully operational<br />
to provide regular updates.<br />
The Twitter account “mediamha”<br />
in the micro-blogging<br />
site started from Thursday.<br />
Though the Twitter account<br />
was launched in June, there<br />
were no regular updates<br />
except for an announcement<br />
of the appointment of R K<br />
Singh as the new home secretary.<br />
However, it is<br />
expected that the spokesperson<br />
would be posting tweets<br />
regularly from Thursday. —PTI<br />
R K Tiwari assumes<br />
charge as DGP in UP<br />
Lucknow: Senior IPS officer<br />
R K Tiwari assumed charge as<br />
DGP of UP late on Wedne -<br />
sday. Tiwari took over from<br />
Kara m veer Singh who retired<br />
on Wednesday. Tiwari will<br />
hold his post in addition to<br />
his present charge of DGP<br />
PAC. Official sources had<br />
hinted that Atul, another<br />
senior IPS officer, was set to<br />
become DGP. Tiwari, will<br />
hold the post of DGP for two<br />
to three mon ths. Thereafter,<br />
present special DGP, law and<br />
order, Brij Lal's way to the top<br />
post would be cleared. — BP<br />
Firm blames dengue<br />
for low output<br />
Bhubaneswar: Mahanadi<br />
Coalfields Ltd (MCL), one<br />
among Orissa’s eight staterun<br />
Coal India subsidiaries,<br />
has blamed dengue as one of<br />
the primary reasons responsible<br />
for its low output in<br />
August. MCL CMD A N Sahay<br />
said that coal production fell<br />
by 1.3 million tonne from last<br />
month’s production. Apart<br />
from a host of other reasons<br />
like heavy rain and strikes by<br />
contract workers, the mosquito-borne<br />
virus is blamed<br />
for reduced output. — BP<br />
BJP MLAs in Delhi<br />
Assembly suspended<br />
New Delhi: All the BJP MLAs<br />
in the Delhi Assembly were<br />
on Thursday suspended for<br />
thr ee days and marshalled<br />
out after they created a ruc -<br />
kus in the House dema nd ing<br />
a discussion on corruption.<br />
Twe nty-four MLAs, including<br />
Opposition leader V K Malh -<br />
otra, were marshalled out af -<br />
ter the House met for the se -<br />
c ond time during the day following<br />
a 30-minute adjo ur -<br />
nment forced by vociferous<br />
Opposition lawmakers.—PTI<br />
Pak troops violate ceasefire<br />
twice, three soldiers killed<br />
Srinagar/Islamabad: An Indian Junior<br />
Commissioned Officer (JCO) and three<br />
Pakistani soldiers were on Thursday<br />
killed in a heavy exchange of fire in the<br />
Keran sector of north Kashmir after<br />
ceasefire was violated from across the<br />
border, officials said.<br />
Pakistan violated the ceasefire twice<br />
in the Keran sector as Indian troops<br />
foiled an infiltration bid after exchanging<br />
fire with militants that left the JCO<br />
dead. "There were two ceasefire violations<br />
in the Keran sector of Kupwara di -<br />
s trict from across the Line of Control<br />
(LoC) since 8 pm on Wednesday," def -<br />
ence spokesman Lt Colonel J S Brar said.<br />
The JCO, who was killed, was identified<br />
by the army as Naib Subedar<br />
Gurdayal Singh. Brar said the first<br />
ceasefire violation took place at 8 pm on<br />
Wednesday and the firing from other<br />
side of the LoC continued for nearly 50<br />
minutes. The second ceasefire violation<br />
began at 11 am on Thursday and the<br />
exchange of fire was continuing till last<br />
reports came in, he said.<br />
Official sources said the Pakistani<br />
troops stationed at Saheli post opened<br />
unprovoked firing at the Shalapathri<br />
post on the Indian side of the LoC on<br />
Wednesday, leaving a soldier injured.<br />
The Pakistani troops used mortars and<br />
heavy weapons to target the Indian<br />
position, which retaliated.<br />
The ceasefire violations on Eid came<br />
after troops foiled an infiltration bid in<br />
the same area.<br />
Pakistani Army spo kesman Major<br />
General Athar Abbas told Geo News<br />
that three Pakistani soldiers were killed<br />
in the gunbattle. He claimed that Indian<br />
forces had fired across the border saying<br />
it was "unprovoked".<br />
He identified the soldiers as belong-<br />
ing to the irregular Mujahid battalion.<br />
Abbas said the soldiers had been moving<br />
between forward posts when they<br />
got lost in bad weather in the Neelam<br />
Valley. He said a meeting has been<br />
requested with local Indian commanders<br />
to investigate the violation.<br />
Reacting to the Pakistani Army's<br />
claim, Brar said there was no ceasefire<br />
violation from the Indian side on<br />
Tuesday night. "There was an infiltration<br />
bid by militants in the Keran sector<br />
which was foiled by our troops. We lost<br />
one JCO in the operation," Brar said.<br />
Chinese vessel confronts Indian naval ship<br />
Seema Guha<br />
New Delhi: The Chinese Navy’s growing<br />
assertiveness in the Asia-Pacific region<br />
has resulted in face-offs with Japan and<br />
other countries. But for the first time, an<br />
Indian naval ship also got a measure of<br />
the China’s blue water navy when it was<br />
confronted by a Chinese vessel on the<br />
disputed South China Sea.<br />
The incident occurred in July when<br />
the INS Airavat paid a friendly visit to the<br />
Vietnamese port of Nha Trang and was<br />
on its way to Hai Phong, its second port<br />
of call. It was challenged by a Chinese<br />
vessel. However, India has denied any<br />
confrontation. The Chinese have also not<br />
commented on the incident. The alleged<br />
face-off was first reported by London’s<br />
Financial Times. After talking to the naval<br />
command, Indian authorities have given<br />
a much more prosaic explanation.<br />
The navy has confirmed that when<br />
the INS Airavat was sailing from Nha<br />
Trang to Hai Phong and was around 45<br />
nautical miles from the Vietnamese<br />
coast in the South China Sea, when it<br />
was contacted on an open radio channel<br />
by a caller identifying himself as the<br />
“Chinese Navy” and asserted: “You are<br />
entering Chinese waters.”<br />
No ship or aircraft was visible from the<br />
INS Airavat and there were no Chinese<br />
ships visible in the international waters.<br />
The Indian ship proceeded on her<br />
onward journey as scheduled.The international<br />
community has been noting<br />
with growing concern Beijing’s increasing<br />
assertiveness on both land and sea.<br />
The South China Sea which it claims<br />
as its own is also similarly regarded by<br />
Vietnam, Japan, Taiwan Malaysia and<br />
the Brunei. These claims and counterclaims<br />
have continued for decades, but<br />
Beijing now is much more aggressive in<br />
international waters.<br />
Not worried about China<br />
N-missiles: says air chief<br />
New Delhi: In the backdrop<br />
of US official reports suggesting<br />
that China was<br />
deploying nuclear-capable<br />
missiles along the borders<br />
with India, the Air Force on<br />
Thursday said it was not<br />
“worried” over these developments<br />
and has its own<br />
plans to deal with the issue.<br />
“These are all known, it is<br />
nothing that we are worried<br />
about. We have our own<br />
plans and we are moving<br />
ahead with our own plans.<br />
These are the realities we<br />
have to deal with,” air chief<br />
marshal NAK Browne told<br />
reporters on the sidelines of<br />
a CII event here.<br />
He was responding to a<br />
query on the US Pentagon<br />
reports suggesting that the<br />
Chinese People’s Liberation<br />
Army has deployed nuclear<br />
missiles along the borders.<br />
Asked that what could India<br />
learn from China in develop-<br />
� File photo of INS Airavat<br />
‘26/11 might<br />
have led to<br />
Indo-Pak<br />
nuclear war’<br />
Washington: The 2008 Mum -<br />
bai terrorist attack by the<br />
banned Pakistani militant outfit<br />
Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) alm -<br />
ost started a war between<br />
India and Pakistan that might<br />
have resulted in some kind of<br />
nuclear conflict, former US<br />
ambassador to India Timothy<br />
Roemer has said.<br />
Roemer, who served as the<br />
US ambassador to India from<br />
July 2009 to June 2011, however<br />
did not divulge any further<br />
details of his conclusion<br />
that 26/11 could have led to a<br />
nuclear war between the two<br />
South Asian neighbours.<br />
“Those attacks killed 177<br />
people in Mumbai two years<br />
ago. Six Americans were<br />
killed. And they almost started<br />
a war between Paki stan and<br />
India that might have resulted<br />
in some kind of a nuclear war.<br />
So this self-radicalisation issue<br />
is a critically important one,”<br />
Roemer said at a discussion<br />
on ‘Status of National Security<br />
and the Implementation of<br />
the 9/11 Commission’s<br />
Recomm endations’.<br />
The former US envoy said<br />
he feared a scenario in which a<br />
terrorist group gets hold of a<br />
nuclear weapon and an undetected<br />
self-radicalised or a cell<br />
in the United States.<br />
“We’re often asked a question,<br />
I think every one of us:<br />
What keeps you awake at<br />
night? And I would answer<br />
the question, two things: a terrorist<br />
group getting a nuclear<br />
weapon and a self-radicalized<br />
or a cell in the United States<br />
that is undetected and can pull<br />
off a catastrophic event here,”<br />
Roemer said.<br />
“Now, several months ago<br />
we had something that almost<br />
combined both. There was a<br />
person by the name of David<br />
Headley who was a terrorist<br />
living in Chicago who could<br />
travel between India, Pakistan<br />
and the United States seamlessly,”<br />
he said.—PTI<br />
JD(U) takes a dig at its NDA ally BJP for raising objections over J&K CM’s remarks on Afzal Guru<br />
Will not stop tweeting because of criticism: Omar<br />
Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir chief<br />
minister Omar Abdullah, whose outspoken<br />
views on ‘Twitter’ have been<br />
much talked about, on Thursday said<br />
he would continue to use the microblogging<br />
site despite some hostile<br />
posts which included personal<br />
attacks against him.<br />
“Just in case anyone is under the<br />
mistaken impression that I’ve been<br />
bullied off Twitter — sorry, but here I<br />
am and I’m not going anywhere,”<br />
Omar said in a tweet.<br />
The chief minister, who has come<br />
under severe criticism from<br />
Opposition Peoples Democratic Party<br />
(PDP) leaders for “excessive” use of<br />
Twitter, was earlier forced to abandon<br />
blogging on his National<br />
Conference party’s official website<br />
due to abusive language and personal<br />
attacks against him by some people.<br />
He had significantly reduced posting<br />
comments on Twitter in July citing<br />
writer’s block and then in August<br />
due to the overwhelming coverage of<br />
the fast against corruption by<br />
Gandhian Anna Hazare.<br />
“Since nothing is happening in the<br />
� NAK Browne<br />
ing its indigenous aerospace<br />
industry, the IAF chief said,<br />
“One thing that one could<br />
learn from them is that they<br />
don’t attempt to do everything<br />
themselves.”<br />
“Once you start the<br />
research and development<br />
and then wait and wait, then<br />
world other than Anna and I refuse to<br />
tweet about Anna(.) ergo I can’t tweet<br />
about anything,” he wrote then.<br />
However, Omar announced his<br />
return to the blogosphere on Wedn -<br />
you make it the test-tube<br />
model, it takes you 20-30<br />
years (to finalise the project),”<br />
he said. Browne said<br />
that though India doesn’t<br />
have direct evidence, but<br />
“we still do know that<br />
despite all the sanctions and<br />
all other things, they (China)<br />
got a fair amount of technology<br />
from outside.”<br />
Browne said the Chinese<br />
were spending “a lot of<br />
money on R &D. In case of<br />
our PSUs, the existing levels<br />
are very low.” Asked about<br />
its plans to upgrade the<br />
Nyoma ALG into a fullfledged<br />
airfield, Browne said<br />
the proposal was with the<br />
Government. In the recent<br />
past, India has deployed its<br />
fighter aircraft including the<br />
frontline Su-30MKI in Ass -<br />
am and is in the process of<br />
upgrading its Advanced Lan -<br />
d ing Grounds in Ladakh and<br />
Arunachal Pradesh. —PTI<br />
� People greet Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah (R)<br />
on the second day of Eid in Srinagar on Thursday —PTI<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Rajiv case: Centre<br />
steers clear of mercy<br />
petition controversy<br />
New Delhi: The Centre on<br />
Thursday steered clear of the<br />
controversy over Tamil Nadu<br />
Assembly asking the Pres -<br />
ident to reconsider the mercy<br />
pleas of Rajiv Gandhi’s killers<br />
but said as long as death sentence<br />
is legal, courts will continue<br />
to award it.<br />
“Since there are court proceedings,<br />
I can’t comment on<br />
anything concerning the dec -<br />
ision taken by the President<br />
or the resolution passed by<br />
the Assembly,” home minister<br />
P Chidambaram told<br />
reporters here.<br />
He was responding to<br />
questions on the adoption of<br />
a resolution by the Tamil<br />
Nadu Assembly requesting<br />
President Pratibha Patil to<br />
reconsider the mercy petitions<br />
of Rajiv Gandhi assassination<br />
case convicts—Muru -<br />
gan, Santhan and Perarivalan<br />
and the Madras High Court’s<br />
order staying their execution<br />
for eight weeks.<br />
“No comment as the matter<br />
is pending in the court. I<br />
can’t comment on the<br />
response (to be give to the<br />
court by the home ministry)<br />
unless the ministry receives<br />
the notice of the court on the<br />
writ petition and the contents<br />
of the writ petition,” he said.<br />
Chidambaram said there<br />
have been precedents when<br />
people have moved courts<br />
after rejection of mercy petitions<br />
of death row convicts by<br />
the President.<br />
“Yes, there have been earlier<br />
cases where after the<br />
decision of the President,<br />
people have gone to the<br />
courts. People have gone to<br />
court in Assam, people have<br />
gone to court in Delhi<br />
recently. I am sure that in the<br />
past also there would be<br />
cases where people have<br />
gone to courts after the<br />
President’s decision,” he said.<br />
Asked about the relevance<br />
of death penalty, the home<br />
Holy Procession<br />
� P Chidambaram<br />
minister said it was a larger<br />
question which has to be<br />
debated in a separate forum.<br />
Chidambaram said: “As<br />
long as there is a death<br />
penalty, courts will impose<br />
death penalty in what they<br />
call the rarest of the rare<br />
cases. So, the courts have<br />
imposed death penalty and<br />
all the mercy petitions were<br />
the cases where death<br />
penalty was imposed.<br />
“The only cases that come<br />
to us are death penalty cases.<br />
So, whether death penalty<br />
should be in statute book or<br />
not, on that of course there<br />
are two views. But, at the<br />
moment, we are talking<br />
about administering the law,”<br />
he said. The home minister<br />
gave a detailed presentation<br />
on the mercy petitions of the<br />
death row convicts since the<br />
NDA regime and said when<br />
the Opposition was in power,<br />
14 mercy petitions were submitted<br />
to the President but<br />
not a single one was decided<br />
in those six years.<br />
Meanwhile, the daughter<br />
of Murugan, one of the three<br />
convicts on death row for<br />
their role in the killing of former<br />
Prime Minister Rajiv<br />
Gandhi, on Thursday appea -<br />
led to Congress President<br />
Sonia Gandhi to intervene<br />
and save her father's life.—PTI<br />
� Sikh devotees participate in a religious procession at Golden Temple in Amritsar on Thursday to mark the 407th<br />
anniversary of the Sri Guru Granth Sahib’s installation — PTI<br />
esday by tweeting “Talk about being<br />
back with a bang”. He was apparently<br />
referring to his tweets about Afzal<br />
Guru and the National Sports Deve -<br />
lopment Bill.<br />
Omar’s blogging has often generated<br />
controversies, including the latest<br />
row over his comments on the<br />
Tamil Nadu Assembly passing a resolution<br />
seeking mercy for three convicts<br />
in the Rajiv Gandhi murder case.<br />
In his controversial tweet, Omar<br />
had questioned the “muted”<br />
response to the TN Assembly’s resolution,<br />
asking if the reaction would<br />
have been the same if the Jammu and<br />
Kashmir legislature had passed a<br />
similar resolution for Parliament<br />
attack convict Afzal Guru.<br />
Meanwhile the JD(U) on Thursday<br />
took a dig at its NDA ally the BJP for<br />
raising objections over Omar<br />
Abdullah’s remarks on the issue of<br />
execution of Guru, asking why it had<br />
not raised eyebrows when the matter<br />
relating to Rajiv Gandhi’s killers had<br />
come up. “What Omar Abdullah is<br />
saying is correct. What is wrong in<br />
saying that there would have been an<br />
uproar if resolution had been passed<br />
on amnesty to Afzal Guru by the<br />
Jammu and Kashmir Assembly?”<br />
JD(U) spokesperson Shivanand<br />
Tiwari said. —PTI<br />
2G: ED detects Fema<br />
violation of `10K crore<br />
New Delhi: The Enforcement<br />
Directorate on Thursday told<br />
the Supreme Court that Fema<br />
violation of around ` 10,000<br />
crore has been committed by<br />
various telecom companies in<br />
2G scam and around 200 bank<br />
acco unts are under suspect.<br />
The ED, which filed a fresh status<br />
report in a sealed cover,<br />
said show cause notices have<br />
been issued to six telecom<br />
companies for alleged violation<br />
of Fema and attachment<br />
of property was initiated<br />
under the Prevention of Mon -<br />
ey Laun dering Act.<br />
"We are attaching properties<br />
and issuing show cause<br />
notices as an ongoing pro -<br />
cess," senior advocate K K<br />
Venugopal told a Bench of justices<br />
G S Singhvi and A K<br />
Ganguly. He said the probe<br />
into the money trail has led<br />
the ED to Cyprus, Channel<br />
Islands, Singapore, Mauritius<br />
and Switzerland.<br />
The investigation by the<br />
financial intelligence unit has<br />
revealed there are 200 bank<br />
accounts which are suspected<br />
to be connected with the<br />
scam. He, however, assured<br />
the court to complete the task<br />
within three months after the<br />
Bench expressed reservation<br />
for granting six mo nths' time.<br />
While placing the CBI's status<br />
report, Venu go pal said the<br />
probe has es t ablished that<br />
some tel ec om companies ha -<br />
ve set up front companies un -<br />
der a "cor p orate veil" to get<br />
spectrum.<br />
Meanwhile, the SC was on<br />
Thursday told by the CBI that it<br />
"may exa mine" the then fin -<br />
ance mi n i ster Jasw ant Singh<br />
over all eged wro ng doings in<br />
the co mmu nic ations ministry<br />
in the BJP-led NDA government.Ven<br />
ugopal said that the<br />
investigating agency "may<br />
examine" Singh, who hea ded<br />
the empowered GoM wh en<br />
Arun Shourie was the communications<br />
minister. —PTI
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com NATION 7<br />
BRIEFLY<br />
� Actor Priyanka Chopra<br />
interacting with a group<br />
of girls in Nanakpura, in<br />
Jaipur on Thursday —PTI<br />
Bhatta Parsaul case<br />
referred to state CID<br />
Lucknow: The UP government<br />
has referred the Bhatta<br />
Parsaul case to the state CID<br />
for investigation. The Natio -<br />
nal Commission for Sche -<br />
duled Castes in its report had<br />
said that in the May 7 incident<br />
which triggered a controversy,<br />
rape was committed<br />
there. The state government<br />
has denied there was<br />
any rape.—BP<br />
2 killed, 45 injured in<br />
Kashmir road mishaps<br />
Srinagar: Two Nepalese<br />
nationals, working as porters<br />
with the army, were killed<br />
and 45 others injured in road<br />
mishaps in Kashmir. The in -<br />
ci dent happened near Chani<br />
Gund in Kargil on Wednes -<br />
day. At least 22 others were<br />
injured in over a dozen road<br />
accidents across the Valley<br />
during Eid celebrations on<br />
Wednesday.— PTI<br />
Wife can maintain<br />
adult offspring: HC<br />
Mumbai: The Bombay High<br />
Court has held that an es -<br />
tranged wife can seek maintenance<br />
from her husband<br />
for and on behalf of her adult<br />
daughter or son so long as<br />
the offspring is dependent on<br />
her. The ruling was delivered<br />
on August 26 on an appeal<br />
filed by Vijaykumar Chawla,<br />
a businessman. —PTI<br />
No group set up to deal<br />
with media: PMO<br />
New Delhi: Prime Minister's<br />
Office on Thursday rubbished<br />
reports that Prime Minister<br />
Manmohan Singh has deci -<br />
ded to set up a group to deal<br />
with accountability issues<br />
related to the media. The iss -<br />
ue had come up at the Uni on<br />
Cabinet meeting on Tuesday<br />
with some ministers opining<br />
that media had not played a<br />
constructive role during the<br />
recent Anna Haz a re agitation<br />
and something needed to be<br />
done about it.—PTI<br />
Pak terrorists waiting<br />
to infiltrate LoC<br />
New Delhi: Several Pakistanbased<br />
terrorists are waiting<br />
at the launch pads across the<br />
Line of Control to cross over<br />
into Jammu and Kashmir,<br />
home ministry officials said<br />
on Thursday. “There is information<br />
that many terrorists<br />
are holed up in launching<br />
pads” Union home secretary<br />
R K Singh said. He was present<br />
at Union home minister P<br />
Chidambaram's press conference<br />
where the report card<br />
for the month of August was<br />
given.—PTI<br />
SC reserves order on<br />
black money probe<br />
New Delhi: The Supreme<br />
Court on Thursday reserved<br />
its orders on the maintainability<br />
of the Centre's plea for<br />
recall of its July 4 order appo -<br />
in ting an SIT to probe the<br />
black money issue. A Bench<br />
of justices Altamas Kabir and<br />
S S Nijjar said it would pass<br />
appropriate orders on the<br />
maintainability plea on Sep -<br />
tem ber 20. —PTI<br />
ISRO to launch satellite<br />
Megha-Tropiques<br />
Chennai: The Indian Space<br />
Research Organisation on<br />
Thursday said it planned to<br />
launch Megha-Tropiques, an<br />
advanced weather and climate<br />
satellite, on board the<br />
Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle<br />
(PSLV) later this month. The<br />
satellite would be laun ched<br />
this month-end on board<br />
ISRO's workhorse PSLV from<br />
spaceport Sriharikota, ISRO<br />
chairman K Radha krishnan<br />
told reporters on the sidelines<br />
of a function.—PTI<br />
Masood murder: Cops to quiz BJP MP<br />
Bhopal/New Delhi: BJP MP<br />
Tarun Vijay will be questioned<br />
by Madhya Pradesh<br />
police in connection with<br />
the killing of RTI activist<br />
Shehla Masood in Bhopal<br />
last month.<br />
A police team from the<br />
state will soon visit New<br />
Delhi in this regard, the<br />
police said on Thursday.<br />
"Although it has been<br />
decided to question Vijay in<br />
connection with Shehla's<br />
murder, no date has been<br />
fixed for the visit of the<br />
police team to New Delhi,"<br />
said Bhopal Range IG Vijay.<br />
Yadav Vijay, who is also<br />
spokesperson of BJP, said he<br />
was a "very good friend" of<br />
Masood and that he was<br />
ready to share with any<br />
probe agency whatever<br />
information he had.<br />
Masood was shot at when<br />
she was in her car in front of<br />
her residence in the posh<br />
Koh-e-Fiza locality in Bhopal<br />
on August 16 when she was<br />
just about to head to a rally<br />
that was part of Anna<br />
Hazare's campaign against<br />
corruption.<br />
The Rajya Sabha MP said<br />
he and Masood had regularly<br />
exchanged notes and<br />
demanded that the culprits<br />
should be "booked and<br />
hanged."<br />
"I think that the whole<br />
things got politicised. We<br />
stand by the family of Shehla<br />
and every right thinking<br />
Indian will stand by them,"<br />
he said in New Delhi.<br />
"Whatever information<br />
we have, we will be providing<br />
to all the investigation<br />
agencies, because we are as<br />
much concerned to get justice<br />
for Shehla," he added.<br />
Congress leader Digvijay<br />
Singh demanded that the<br />
Masood case be handed over<br />
to CBI. "The way Masood has<br />
been killed is painful....Now<br />
that Tarun Vijay's name has<br />
cropped up, I believe the CM<br />
should hand over the case to<br />
Delhi HC dismisses petition on<br />
Lokpal, says time not ripe yet<br />
New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on<br />
Thursday dismissed a plea seeking a<br />
direction to declare as unconstitutional<br />
the government's move to refer<br />
four versions of Lokpal bills to<br />
Parliament's standing committee for<br />
consideration, saying the stage has<br />
not yet come where it "will invoke<br />
judicial review".<br />
A Bench of Chief Justice Dipak<br />
Misra and Justice Sanjiv Khanna dismissed<br />
the plea saying that introduction<br />
of bills and having debate on<br />
them are basically parliamentary procedure.<br />
"When the fundamental<br />
rights of the petitioner have not been<br />
affected, Article 226 of the Consti -<br />
tution cannot be invoked. We do not<br />
see any merit in the plea," the Bench<br />
said. The court said, “The writ petition<br />
is without any legal foundation. We<br />
decline to entertain it and the same<br />
is dismissed."<br />
Appearing before the Bench, advocate<br />
Manohar Lal Sharma contended<br />
that the four bills, introduced by the<br />
government on Lokpal issue, are "all<br />
money bills" as the expenses for the<br />
office of the Lokpal will be drawn<br />
from the Consolidated Fund of India<br />
and the President’s permission was<br />
required for introducing such bills. He<br />
claimed that he had sought to know<br />
� Shehla Masood<br />
� Anna Hazare<br />
from the ministry of parliamentary<br />
affairs if the President's permission<br />
was taken to introduce the Bill, but he<br />
was denied the information.<br />
Countering the petitioner's argument,<br />
additional solicitor general A S<br />
Chandihoke told the court that the<br />
bills are not money bills and it was the<br />
discretion of the Speaker to decide as<br />
Festive Fervour<br />
the CBI," the Congress general<br />
secretary said.<br />
A communication from<br />
the Madhya Pradesh government<br />
seeking a CBI probe<br />
into the killing has already<br />
reached the Centre. MP BJP<br />
President Prabhat Jha told<br />
reporters that Vijay may<br />
have known Shehla but this<br />
itself was not enough to say<br />
that he was involved in her<br />
murder.<br />
Prabhat said the MP government<br />
has already ask ed<br />
the Centre to initiate a CBI<br />
inquiry into Shehla's murder.<br />
“I only want that the guilty<br />
are not spared and the innocent<br />
in the case are not punished,"<br />
he said.<br />
Vijay said he had talked to<br />
Masood last on August 16,<br />
the day she was murdered in<br />
Bhopal."She was the campaigner<br />
and convenor for<br />
Madhya Pradesh for India<br />
Against Corruption. It is very<br />
sad," he said.<br />
Vijay admitted that he<br />
knew Masood well and her<br />
event management company<br />
had organised the programmes<br />
in different cities<br />
to whether a Bill is a money bill or not.<br />
The Bench was hearing a PIL which<br />
alleged that the government had followed<br />
an "unprecedented" unconstitutional<br />
procedure by having civil<br />
society members in the drafting<br />
panel. It said the Bill was introduced<br />
under pressure from civil society<br />
members and political parties.<br />
Meanwhile, shouts of 'Vande Mata -<br />
ram' greeted anti-corruption crusader<br />
Anna Hazare as he arrived at his home<br />
in Ralegan Siddharrived following his<br />
discharge from a Gurgaon hospital.<br />
“I am feeling well...recovering fast<br />
and am grateful to all who are wishing<br />
for my good health," Hazare, who<br />
is taking rest at the Bhakta Niwas in<br />
Padmavati temple at his native village.<br />
The 73-year-old Gandhian will<br />
take rest on Thursday and will interact<br />
with the people and the media on<br />
Friday his personal assistant said.<br />
A 'gram bhojan' has been organised<br />
for 10,000 people by the villagers on<br />
Friday in view to celebrate Anna's<br />
"victorious" return.<br />
The assistant said a meeting of<br />
Team Anna, including Arvind Kejriwal<br />
and Kiran Bedi, is scheduled on<br />
September 10 and 11 here to discuss<br />
the further course of action on the<br />
Lokpal Bill.—PTI<br />
� Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan along with his wife Satvasheela worships Lord Ganesha<br />
on Ganesh Chaturthi in Mumbai on Thursday<br />
on the occasion of the death<br />
and birth anniversaries of<br />
BJP ideologue Shyama<br />
Prasad Mookerjee.<br />
"Shehla Masood as an<br />
event manager and owner of<br />
Miracle Company had<br />
helped us and worked on<br />
several projects in Srinagar,<br />
Kolkata and New Delhi. We<br />
knew her. She was a brave<br />
RTI activist, a very good<br />
friend," he said.<br />
Vijay described Masood as<br />
a brave, strong activist<br />
whose murder has been<br />
politicised. He insisted that<br />
he would fight till the culprits<br />
are brought to book.<br />
"It (Shehla's murder) had<br />
hurt us very deepily. We<br />
knew her. We want justice<br />
for Shehla. Shehla's family is<br />
passing through a very difficult<br />
time. I think that the<br />
whole thing got politicised.<br />
We stand by the family of<br />
Shehla and every right<br />
thinking Indian will stand by<br />
them," Vijay said. He urged<br />
people close to Masood to<br />
come forward and share<br />
information with the investigating<br />
agencies. —PTI<br />
Anna’s protest<br />
undemocratic,<br />
says Tharoor<br />
at JNU<br />
New Delhi: Firing a salvo at Anna<br />
Hazare, former Union minister<br />
Shashi Tharoor has said how can<br />
a person "who never stood for<br />
elections" claim to be the voice of<br />
the people. Asserting that laws<br />
can be made only by Parliament,<br />
Tharoor, who is a first-time MP<br />
from Kerala, said: “We cannot<br />
have a small group of unelected<br />
people imposing their will on<br />
Parliament because in the long<br />
term the danger will be to you<br />
the people.”<br />
"I do not believe that we can<br />
conduct democracy either from<br />
Ramlila grounds or from television<br />
studios. Demo cracy must be<br />
conducted through both Houses<br />
of Parliament." The Congress MP<br />
said there are more than 500<br />
MPs and thousands of people's<br />
representatives in state assembles<br />
who have gone out to seek<br />
votes of people and have to preserve<br />
the support they have got.<br />
"If such people cannot claim to<br />
represent the people of India, but<br />
somebody else, who never stood<br />
for elections but has lots of television<br />
cameras around him and a<br />
few thousand people in a<br />
Maidan.... Will he be the voice of<br />
the people? Is that democracy?,"<br />
he said addressing a gathering at<br />
Jawaharlal Nehru University on<br />
Wednesday night.<br />
While stating that arresting<br />
Hazare was a "mistake" and that<br />
no government can disagree<br />
with the cause of the Gandhian.<br />
Tharoor stressed that the "question<br />
is the means". "Saying that I<br />
will starve to death thereby<br />
potentially unleashing disruption<br />
violence and anarchy in the<br />
country unless you pass a Bill. Is<br />
that democracy? That is the<br />
question we have to ask," Tha r -<br />
oor said during a questionanswer<br />
session with students.<br />
The lawmaker, however, wondered<br />
what is the guarantee that<br />
Lokpal will "magically" be something<br />
different from other agencies,<br />
which were created to fight<br />
corruption. He at the same time<br />
made it clear he admired Hazare,<br />
who has an "exemplary record of<br />
service to the country". —PTI<br />
Paradigm shift in outlook needed to make society a better place for girls<br />
PM writes to CMs over skewed sex ratio<br />
New Delhi: Viewing with serious<br />
concern the declining sex ratio,<br />
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh<br />
has written to all chief ministers<br />
asking them act in a swift and concerted<br />
manner to check pre-natal<br />
sex determination which continues<br />
to be a "challenge" in most places.<br />
Singh has asked the chief ministers<br />
to provide personal leadership<br />
as he laid emphasis on spreading<br />
awareness on the issue by involving<br />
civil society, including religious and<br />
community leaders, besides political<br />
representatives as part of “policy<br />
and programmatic action” to end<br />
discrimination against females.<br />
The child sex ratio, measured as<br />
the number of girls between the<br />
ages of 0 and 6 years to 1,000 boys<br />
in the same age group, has declined<br />
from 927 to 914 in 2011 as per the<br />
provisional census 2011 data, he<br />
pointed out in his letter.<br />
“The disaggregated data for states<br />
and Union Territories (UT) reveal a<br />
picture that is even more alarming<br />
than the average child sex ratio for<br />
the country,” Singh said while highlighting<br />
the data of individual<br />
states. Asserting that discrimination<br />
and social prejudice against women<br />
needed to be tackled at all stages.<br />
He said: “We need strong action<br />
against pre-birth sex selection using<br />
modern diagnostic technologies<br />
and neglect of the girl child once<br />
she is born.” Noting that implementation<br />
of law on pre-natal sex determination<br />
"continues to be a challenge<br />
in most areas", he said "the<br />
need of the hour is to strengthen<br />
monitoring and inspection mechanisms<br />
for strict and effective<br />
implementation of the law by<br />
states and UTs."<br />
“I would earnestly request you to<br />
consider putting in place a concerted<br />
plan of action to strengthen<br />
the implementation of the PC (preconception)<br />
and PNDT (pre-natal<br />
sex determination) Act and involve<br />
all sections of society.<br />
In addition to strong implementation<br />
of the PC and PNDT Acts,<br />
there is a need to take a series<br />
of steps to make the society a<br />
better place for girls to be born,<br />
survive and prosper, the<br />
Prime Minister said.<br />
The sex ratio in some states has<br />
seen greater decline. Among these<br />
are Andhra Pradesh with an 18point<br />
drop, Chhattisgarh with an<br />
11-point drop and Bihar with a 9point<br />
decline.—PTI<br />
PM meets Cabinet on<br />
Gujarat Lokayukta<br />
New Delhi: Prime Minister<br />
Manmohan Singh on Thurs -<br />
day held a meeting with his<br />
senior Cabinet colleagues in<br />
the backdrop of the controversies<br />
surrounding the appointment<br />
of Lokayukta in BJPruled<br />
Gujarat.<br />
Singh held consultations<br />
with finance minister Pranab<br />
Mukherjee, home minister P<br />
Chidambaram, law minister<br />
Salman Khurshid and defence<br />
minister A K Antony for 80<br />
minutes at his residence.<br />
There was no official word<br />
on what transpired at the<br />
meeting.<br />
The meeting took place a<br />
day before BJP's scheduled<br />
meeting with President<br />
Pratibha Patil on Friday to<br />
press for the recall of state<br />
Governor Kamla Beniwal.<br />
The BJP has accused the<br />
Governor of appointing the<br />
Lokayukta in the state<br />
withoutconsulting the state<br />
government.<br />
Gujarat chief minister<br />
Narendra Modi on Thursday<br />
wrote to the Prime Minister<br />
demanding Governor Kamla<br />
Beniwal be recalled over her<br />
controversial appo int ment of<br />
Lokayukta bypassing the state<br />
government and annulment<br />
of the appointment of the<br />
Lokayukta.<br />
The Governor had appo -<br />
inted justice R A Mehta as<br />
Gujarat Lokayukta last week.<br />
The BJP has sought to make<br />
a big controversy out of the<br />
issue by disrupting the func-<br />
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tioning of both the Lok Sabha<br />
and the Rajya Sabha. Both<br />
Houses are likely to face disruption<br />
on Friday.<br />
Meanwhile, the Congress<br />
plans to counter the BJP's attack<br />
arguing that the law for the<br />
appointment of Lokayukta in<br />
Gujarat nowhere mentions that<br />
the Governor has to consult the<br />
Council of Ministers before<br />
making any appointment.<br />
The Congress also alleged<br />
the BJP was trying to create a<br />
controversy on the issue to<br />
deflect attention from chief<br />
minister Narendra Modi's<br />
“questionable deeds”.— PTI<br />
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8<br />
EDITORIAL<br />
Vol: 2, Issue: 65<br />
“So the people will<br />
pay the penalty for<br />
their kings’ presumption,<br />
who, by devising<br />
evil, turn justice from<br />
her path with<br />
tortuous speech.”<br />
—Hesiod<br />
(active between 750 and<br />
650 BCE)<br />
People’s leader<br />
Both Tamil Nadu and West Bengal have faced historic<br />
assembly elections in 2011, ushering in new governments<br />
led by J. Jayalalithaa of the All-India Anna Dravida<br />
Munnetra Kazhagam and Mamata Banerjee of the All-India<br />
Trinamul Congress respectively. Yet, the manner in which<br />
the two chief ministers have functioned over the first 100<br />
days could not have been more different. It merits mentioning<br />
that both Ms Jayalalithaa and Ms Banerjee had practically<br />
sank into oblivion after the 2006 assembly elections,<br />
but both the doughty ladies bounced back phoenix-like to<br />
demolish their opponents this year. However, Ms<br />
Jayalalithaa’s victory has not sated her vendetta against the<br />
Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). She has declared war<br />
on land grabbing by influential people. This has resulted in<br />
scores of arrests, including those of several former ministers<br />
of the DMK regime. Several schemes and projects of the<br />
DMK period have been either reversed or replaced. The<br />
scheme of distributing free television sets has been<br />
dropped, a new state secretariat-cum-assembly complex,<br />
built by the DMK, is to be converted into a hospital and a<br />
grassroots heath scheme has been redone. In contrast, Ms<br />
Banerjee has, commendably, turned<br />
swords to ploughshares. She has strictly<br />
prohibited a politics of revenge and has<br />
chosen to involve the opposition parties in<br />
the process of rebuilding the state. It is not<br />
as if Ms Jayalalithaa has shown no interest<br />
in governance; nor is it that the DMK does<br />
not merit a measure of punishment for its<br />
colossal corruption. But, then, the same<br />
can doubtless be said about most political parties in India.<br />
One is inclined to aver that Ms Banerjee’s eschewal of political<br />
vendetta and her single-minded focus on governance is<br />
more beneficial than Ms Jayalalithaa’s truculent modus<br />
operandi.<br />
In pursuing her pro-people goal, it may be mentioned<br />
here, Ms Banerjee has added yet another feather in her cap.<br />
The soaring prices of vegetables have recently deepened the<br />
woes of the common people. Ms Banerjee therefore decided<br />
to personally visit markets at Gariahat and Sealdah and also<br />
the Koley wholesale market for vegetables. There she found<br />
a considerable gap between the wholesale and retail prices<br />
of vegetables like aubergine, ridge gourd, okra and tomato.<br />
It is true that heavy rainfall has damaged vegetables grown<br />
in some areas. But that cannot entirely explain the great difference<br />
of price at the two ends of the farm-to-fork supply<br />
chain. In view of this, Ms Banerjee suspects that a group of<br />
middlemen are responsible for jacking up prices. To remedy<br />
this, the chief minister has constituted a task force to monitor<br />
the prices in vegetable markets. This is truly a pro-people<br />
gesture that the common buyer would appreciate.<br />
Row over death<br />
No civilised nation should defend capital punishment.<br />
However, the case of Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan,<br />
the three convicts on death row for helping to assassinate<br />
former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, is different because it<br />
shows how sadly clunky executive and judicial procedure<br />
can be in this country. The three were convicted by the<br />
Supreme Court in 1999 and the Madras high court has now<br />
granted them an eight-week stay of execution. The three<br />
sought a presidential pardon after being sentenced. It is a sad<br />
commentary that it took Rashtrapati Bhavan close to 12<br />
years to decide to confirm the death sentence and deny<br />
clemency. Since so much time has elapsed, the counsel for<br />
the convicts have pleaded that their clients had undergone<br />
deep “mental agony”, which they indeed may have, and<br />
should be spared death. Their plea is that the death sentence<br />
be commuted to life imprisonment. If this is granted, one<br />
could be quite certain that the three will then seek discharge<br />
from prison on the grounds that they have already been in<br />
prison for 20 years since being committed, following the dastardly<br />
crime.<br />
Capital punishment is an unfortunate reality in India. Till<br />
the day capital punishment is banned, parliament should at<br />
least ensure that legal procedure relating to<br />
such momentous verdicts is made expeditious.<br />
It should lay down that the president<br />
must take a view on clemency pleas within<br />
a stipulated time so that there is no scope<br />
for absurdities to be entertained, as we are<br />
now witnessing in Tamil Nadu. Twelve<br />
years is long by any stretch of the imagination.<br />
In effect, the delay has been that of the<br />
Union home ministry, which has to advise Rashtrapati<br />
Bhavan on such matters. We do not know if Rashtrapati<br />
Bhavan made enquiries with the home ministry in this matter<br />
and in respect of other long-pending cases. The president<br />
cannot in such matters remain a passive recipient of advice.<br />
It is a great pity that political elements in Tamil Nadu have<br />
summoned parochial and communal grounds to intervene in<br />
this discussion. It is this that has given rise to the political<br />
sentiment that parties like the DMK and MDMK are seeking<br />
to irresponsibly spread. By implication, such elements are<br />
suggesting that the Tamil people were being sought to be<br />
penalised for the crime of killing a former Prime Minister.<br />
The passage of the resolution in the state assembly urging<br />
commuting of the Supreme Court verdict unfortunately<br />
invokes the same imagery. Under our law, individuals are<br />
charged with a crime, not their communities. If the matter is<br />
not allowed to rest on this premise, we will be opening an<br />
ugly can of worms.<br />
Back in Time<br />
Ms<br />
Banerjee’s<br />
politics has<br />
consistently<br />
been propeople<br />
Individuals<br />
are charged<br />
with a<br />
crime, not<br />
their communities<br />
On September 2, 1946, the<br />
Interim Government of India<br />
is formed from the newlyelected<br />
Constituent Assembly<br />
of India for the task of assisting<br />
the transition of India<br />
from British rule to independence.<br />
With Jawaharlal Nehru<br />
as Vice President, it remains<br />
in place until August 15, 1947.<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Time to give the gatekeeper the boot<br />
George Monbiot<br />
Who are the most ruthless capitalists<br />
in the western world?<br />
Whose monopolistic practices<br />
make Walmart look like a corner<br />
shop and Rupert Murdoch a socialist?<br />
You won’t guess the answer in<br />
a month of Sundays. While there<br />
are plenty of candidates, my vote<br />
goes not to the banks, the oil companies<br />
or the health insurers, but —<br />
wait for it — to academic publishers.<br />
Theirs might sound like a fusty<br />
and insignificant sector. It is anything<br />
but. Of all corporate scams,<br />
the racket they run is most urgently<br />
in need of referral to the competition<br />
authorities.<br />
Everyone claims to agree that<br />
people should be encouraged to<br />
understand science and other academic<br />
research. Without current<br />
knowledge, we cannot make coherent<br />
democratic decisions. But the<br />
publishers have slapped a padlock<br />
and a ‘keep out’ sign on the gates.<br />
You might resent Murdoch’s paywall<br />
policy, in which he charges £1<br />
for 24 hours of access to the Times<br />
and Sunday Times. But at least in<br />
that period you can read and<br />
download as many articles as you<br />
like. Reading a single article published<br />
by one of Elsevier’s journals<br />
will cost you $31.50. Springer<br />
charges €34.95, Wiley-Blackwell,<br />
$42. Read 10 and you pay 10 times.<br />
And the journals retain perpetual<br />
copyright. You want to read a letter<br />
printed in 1981? That’ll be $31.50.<br />
Of course, you could go into the<br />
library (if it still exists). But they too<br />
have been hit by cosmic fees. The<br />
average cost of an annual subscription<br />
to a chemistry journal is<br />
$3,792. Some journals cost $10,000<br />
a year or more to stock. The most<br />
expensive I’ve seen, Elsevier’s<br />
Biochimica et Biophysica Acta, is<br />
$20,930. Though academic libraries<br />
have been frantically cutting subscriptions<br />
to make ends meet, journals<br />
now consume 65 per cent of<br />
their budgets, which means they<br />
have had to reduce the number of<br />
books they buy. Journal fees<br />
account for a significant component<br />
of universities’ costs, which<br />
are being passed to their students.<br />
Murdoch pays his journalists and<br />
editors, and his companies generate<br />
much of the content they use.<br />
Academic publishers charge vast fees to access research paid for<br />
by us. Down with the knowledge monopoly racketeers.<br />
But the academic publishers get<br />
their articles, their peer reviewing<br />
(vetting by other researchers) and<br />
even much of their editing for free.<br />
The material they publish was<br />
commissioned and funded not by<br />
them but by us, through government<br />
research grants and academic<br />
stipends. But to see it, we must pay<br />
again, and through the nose.<br />
The returns are astronomical: in<br />
the past financial year, for example,<br />
Elsevier’s operating profit margin<br />
was 36 per cent (£724 million on<br />
revenues of £2 billion). They result<br />
from a stranglehold on the market.<br />
Elsevier, Springer and Wiley, who<br />
have bought up many of their competitors,<br />
now publish 42 per cent of<br />
journal articles.<br />
More importantly, universities<br />
are locked into buying their products.<br />
Academic papers are published<br />
in only one place, and they<br />
have to be read by researchers trying<br />
to keep up with their subject.<br />
Demand is inelastic and competition<br />
non-existent, because differ-<br />
Afterthought<br />
ent journals can’t publish the same<br />
material. In many cases the publishers<br />
oblige the libraries to buy a<br />
large package of journals, whether<br />
or not they want them all. Perhaps<br />
it’s not surprising that one of the<br />
biggest crooks ever to have preyed<br />
upon the people of this country —<br />
Robert Maxwell — made much of<br />
his money through academic publishing.<br />
The publishers claim that they<br />
have to charge these fees as a result<br />
of the costs of production and distribution,<br />
and that they add value<br />
(in Springer’s words) because they<br />
“develop journal brands and maintain<br />
and improve the digital infrastructure<br />
which has revolutionised<br />
scientific communication in the<br />
past 15 years”. But an analysis by<br />
Deutsche Bank reaches different<br />
conclusions. “We believe the publisher<br />
adds relatively little value to<br />
the publishing process … if the<br />
process really were as complex,<br />
costly and value-added as the publishers<br />
protest that it is, 40 per cent<br />
margins wouldn’t be available.” Far<br />
from assisting the dissemination of<br />
research, the big publishers impede<br />
it, as their long turnaround times<br />
can delay the release of findings by<br />
a year or more.<br />
What we see here is pure rentier<br />
capitalism: monopolising a public<br />
resource then charging exorbitant<br />
fees to use it. Another term for it is<br />
economic parasitism. To obtain the<br />
knowledge for which we have<br />
already paid, we must surrender<br />
our feu to the lairds of learning.<br />
It’s bad enough for academics, it’s<br />
worse for the laity. I refer readers to<br />
peer-reviewed papers, on the principle<br />
that claims should be followed<br />
to their sources. The readers tell me<br />
that they can’t afford to judge for<br />
themselves whether or not I have<br />
represented the research fairly.<br />
Independent researchers who try to<br />
inform themselves about important<br />
scientific issues have to fork out<br />
thousands. This is a tax on education,<br />
a stifling of the public mind. It<br />
appears to contravene the universal<br />
Kurds must find a peaceful solution<br />
Kaya Genç<br />
The latest escalation of violence<br />
in Turkey is indicative of a new<br />
atmosphere of political unrest in<br />
the country. In the last month<br />
alone, 40 soldiers of the Turkish<br />
military forces have been killed by<br />
the Kurdistan Workers’ party<br />
(PKK) militants. The response to<br />
the attacks came in the form of air<br />
raids in northern Iraq. Targets in<br />
the Qandil mountains, Sinath-<br />
Haftanin, Hakurk and Gara were<br />
demolished by the three-day military<br />
operation last week.<br />
According to the military forces<br />
the operation was a success, with<br />
“the destruction of up to 100<br />
members of the PKK”. That is<br />
almost double the number of<br />
fatalities in Afghanistan in the<br />
same period of time.<br />
The political sphere in Turkey<br />
seems to have been gravely<br />
wounded this summer. And we<br />
should urgently rediscover ways<br />
in which we can dismantle this<br />
atmosphere of war.<br />
Over the course of the last<br />
decade, the ruling AK party has<br />
tried hard to change the official<br />
line on the Kurdish population.<br />
Unable to claim their linguistic<br />
and cultural rights, Kurds were for<br />
a long time refused their proper<br />
and ethnic names: the official etymology<br />
of the word ‘Kurd’, for<br />
example, used to be that it merely<br />
came from the sound made by<br />
boots on snow (‘Kart-Kurd’). At<br />
other times they were claimed to<br />
be the Turks of mountains, speaking<br />
in a strange, undecipherable<br />
dialect. Little acknowledgement<br />
was made of the fact that Turkey’s<br />
Kurds, who make up one fifth of<br />
the national population, have a<br />
distinct sense of their own cultural,<br />
religious and political identity,<br />
and that they have clashed<br />
with the policies of both the<br />
Ottoman empire and the modern<br />
Turkish nation state.<br />
Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government<br />
led the initiative to reform<br />
the debate over Kurdish identity.<br />
Following his “Kurdish opening”<br />
project, more and more politicians<br />
now talk openly about Turkey’s<br />
Kurds and their suppressed political<br />
rights. Erdogan’s government<br />
criticised Turkey’s age-old politics<br />
of nationalism and pointed to the<br />
failures of the modernising ideals<br />
behind the nation state. Instead of<br />
nationalism we were offered a<br />
discourse of Islamic tolerance and<br />
Kurds were invited to be pious citizens<br />
of the country that pledged<br />
never again to discriminate<br />
against them.<br />
However, Kurdish politicians in<br />
the Democratic Society party<br />
believed that the discrimination<br />
was far from being over: it just<br />
took a different shape. Following<br />
last June’s elections the independent<br />
Kurdish candidate Hatip Dicle<br />
was elected to parliament but was<br />
refused entry to Ankara because<br />
of a previous terror conviction.<br />
This resulted in a stalemate in<br />
Turkish politics — Kurdish politicians<br />
decided to protest against<br />
parliament. The conflict was further<br />
intensified by threats from<br />
the PKK’s radical branch, the<br />
Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK),<br />
to attack tourist locations and<br />
destroy as many Turkish soldiers<br />
and civilians as possible.<br />
In this fragile state of affairs,<br />
Erdogan seems to be repeating the<br />
mistakes of his predecessors. He<br />
believes that the Turkish state<br />
apparatus is no longer an unjust<br />
and oppressive organisation, and<br />
that it will behave benevolently<br />
Parliament is the<br />
channel through<br />
which rights for Kurds<br />
can be secured and<br />
this era of political<br />
violence in Turkey<br />
can end<br />
and altruistically to all those who<br />
observes its rules. Turkey’s<br />
Kurdish population are not convinced.<br />
Erdogan needs to understand<br />
how his offerings of a tolerant<br />
but religiously ordered society<br />
might be unattractive to Kurdish<br />
people.<br />
Turkey’s Kurdish politicians,<br />
meanwhile, are not doing any better<br />
at improving the situation. Last<br />
weekend’s bombing of a tourist<br />
beach in Antalya attests to the<br />
desperate state of Kurdish militants<br />
and Kurdish politicians took<br />
pains not to condemn the use of<br />
political violence when it comes<br />
from the Kurdish militants. Antimilitarists<br />
and socialists who<br />
sided with the Democratic Society<br />
party are now irritated by their<br />
essentially religious and at times<br />
militarist discourse of martyrdom.<br />
Kurdish politicians don’t sound<br />
terribly secular when they talk<br />
about glorious operations of liberation<br />
(that is, suicide attacks)<br />
against the military that laid the<br />
foundations of the PKK movement.<br />
We should demand they go<br />
back to the parliament to fulfil<br />
their much-needed function of<br />
struggling for more political rights<br />
for the Kurds. This autumn will<br />
see the drafting of a new constitution:<br />
placing bombs under tourist<br />
beaches won’t help Kurdish rights<br />
in the future. Both state and terrorist<br />
violence should be opposed<br />
by an anti-militarist movement<br />
calling for mutual dismantling of<br />
arms.<br />
It is an appalling sight when<br />
politicians settle their disagreements<br />
at the expense of the lives<br />
of young soldiers. If Erdogan and<br />
his Kurdish counterparts want to<br />
leave a positive legacy, they need<br />
to put an end to this terrifying era<br />
of political violence. And the only<br />
means of achieving this will be by<br />
debating in the parliament buildings<br />
of Ankara, and not with<br />
adventures in the Quandil mountains.<br />
—The Guardian<br />
declaration of human rights, which<br />
says that “everyone has the right<br />
freely to … share in scientific<br />
advancement and its benefits”.<br />
Open-access publishing, despite<br />
its promise, and some excellent<br />
resources such as the Public Library<br />
of Science and the physics database<br />
arxiv.org, has failed to displace the<br />
monopolists. In 1998 the<br />
Economist, surveying the opportunities<br />
offered by electronic publishing,<br />
predicted that “the days of 40<br />
per cent profit margins may soon be<br />
as dead as Robert Maxwell”. But in<br />
2010 Elsevier’s operating profit<br />
margins were the same (36 per<br />
cent) as they were in 1998.<br />
The reason is that the big publishers<br />
have rounded up the journals<br />
with the highest academic impact<br />
factors, in which publication is<br />
essential for researchers trying to<br />
secure grants and advance their<br />
careers. You can start reading openaccess<br />
journals, but you can’t stop<br />
reading the closed ones.<br />
Government bodies, with a few<br />
exceptions, have failed to confront<br />
them. The National Institutes of<br />
Health in the US oblige anyone taking<br />
their grants to put their papers<br />
in an open-access archive. But<br />
Research Councils UK, whose statement<br />
on public access is a masterpiece<br />
of meaningless waffle, relies<br />
on “the assumption that publishers<br />
will maintain the spirit of their current<br />
policies”. You bet they will.<br />
In the short term, governments<br />
should refer the academic publishers<br />
to their competition watchdogs,<br />
and insist that all papers arising<br />
from publicly funded research are<br />
placed in a free public database. In<br />
the longer term, they should work<br />
with researchers to cut out the middleman<br />
altogether, creating — along<br />
the lines proposed by Björn Brembs<br />
of Berlin’s Freie Universität — a single<br />
global archive of academic literature<br />
and data. Peer-review would<br />
be overseen by an independent<br />
body. It could be funded by the<br />
library budgets which are currently<br />
being diverted into the hands of privateers.<br />
The knowledge monopoly is as<br />
unwarranted and anachronistic as<br />
the corn laws. Let’s throw off these<br />
parasitic overlords and liberate the<br />
research that belongs to us.<br />
—The Guardian<br />
World Window<br />
As the killings mount in Syria, the US<br />
and its allies are not the only ones<br />
declaring their revulsion. A number of<br />
President Bashar al-Assad’s longtime<br />
apologists have decided that they can<br />
no longer stand mute. Over the weekend,<br />
the Arab League finally urged Syria<br />
to “end the spilling of blood and follow<br />
the way of reason before it is too late.”<br />
Foreign ministers agreed to send the<br />
group’s secretary general, Nabil el-<br />
Araby, to Damascus with proposals to<br />
end the conflict. According to Al Jazeera,<br />
those include holding presidential elections,<br />
withdrawing the army from<br />
cities, releasing political prisoners and<br />
forming a national unity government.<br />
Set aside the obvious fact that Arab<br />
League members are not strong on<br />
democracy. They are right to worry that<br />
Mr. Assad’s murderous behaviour could<br />
destabilize the region by fomenting allout<br />
civil war between Syria’s ruling<br />
minority Alawites, a Shiite subgroup,<br />
and the majority Sunnis. Even Iran, in<br />
the height of hypocrisy, is urging<br />
Damascus to be more ‘patient’ with its<br />
people — a sign that it, too, is worried<br />
about the instability spreading.<br />
The Arab League can certainly give it<br />
a try, but Mr. Assad has promised<br />
reforms before and kept on killing. On<br />
Tuesday, his forces killed at least seven<br />
people as protesters left mosques after<br />
prayers at the end of Ramadan. The<br />
Arab League needs to impose tough<br />
sanctions, now.<br />
Turkey is also speaking out — but not<br />
as clearly or forcefully as it should. On<br />
Sunday, President Abdullah Gul said he<br />
had “lost confidence” in the Syrian government,<br />
but Prime Minister Recep<br />
Tayyip Erdogan was still giving Mr.<br />
Assad a lifeline by exhorting him to “listen<br />
to people’s demands.” The Obama<br />
administration has frozen all Syrian<br />
government assets here and banned<br />
American citizens and corporations<br />
from doing any business with<br />
Damascus. But Washington has limited<br />
leverage. The European Union, a major<br />
importer of Syrian oil, could have a far<br />
greater impact. The Europeans ann -<br />
ounced last week that they would<br />
impose new sanctions, but members<br />
are still squabbling over details. An oil<br />
embargo is essential, but sanctions<br />
should also be imposed on Syrian<br />
banks and energy and telecommunications<br />
companies.<br />
And Mr. Assad still has a few, far<br />
too powerful, protectors. Russia and<br />
China, along with India, Brazil and<br />
South Africa, are blocking a United<br />
Nations Security Council resolution<br />
that could impose broad international<br />
sanctions on Damascus. Their compli<strong>city</strong><br />
is shameful.
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com OP-ED 9<br />
1<br />
2<br />
A billion words<br />
Cities are built on the<br />
backs of poor labourers,<br />
yet their toil has seldom<br />
been rewarded.<br />
Debasish Bhaduri<br />
captures the faceless of<br />
Kolkata who live and die<br />
in acute poverty<br />
Sudhir Venkatesh<br />
Nothing stirs up the American policymaking<br />
community like talking<br />
about crime. This is understandable<br />
when crime skyrockets, but anxiety<br />
levels have remained high even as<br />
America’s crime rate has descended to<br />
its lowest level in 40 years. Scholars<br />
and wonks rush so quickly to claim<br />
credit — as quickly as they seek refuge<br />
to avoid blame — that getting to the<br />
core of the problem is not so easy. But<br />
when you leave aside the politicking,<br />
you find that it’s actually more important<br />
to understand community respon -<br />
ses to crime, rather than to figure out<br />
exactly how or why crime persists.<br />
But fads are not easy to ignore.<br />
Consider the latest intellectual fashion<br />
that links imprisonment with reductions<br />
in crime rates. Simple enough in<br />
principle, but is it truthful (or just<br />
A <strong>city</strong> that refuses to wake up to its poverty<br />
Karl Marx had once said, “Capital<br />
comes dripping from head to toe,<br />
from every pore, with blood and dirt.”<br />
The urban jungle, ruthless in its disposition<br />
towards labourers and indifferent<br />
to human suffering, is the cradle of<br />
exploitation. It’s the same picture in all<br />
the cities of the world down the ages.<br />
Kolkata, the <strong>city</strong> with a heart, toes the<br />
same line. What is often termed as<br />
development is a thinly disguised<br />
attempt to maximise profits at the cost<br />
of cheap human labour. And, it’s not<br />
going to change, at least not in foresee-<br />
able future.<br />
These photographs pay tribute to the<br />
human machines.<br />
1. On Central Avenue, opposite<br />
Mahajati Sadan, some van pullers of the<br />
<strong>city</strong> and lorry drivers from across the<br />
country sleep blissfully. They even have<br />
a couple of stray dogs for company.<br />
2. These are Gujaratis who trade in<br />
old clothes collected from the rich and<br />
the middle-class. They assemble in<br />
front of Liberty Cinema and sleep on the<br />
footpath for a couple of hours. Around<br />
2.30 am their clients, the <strong>city</strong>’s poor,<br />
Plunging crime graph in the US<br />
‘truthy’)? The chief proponent, besides<br />
US police and sheriff associations, is<br />
public policy Professor James Wilson,<br />
who argues that lengthier penal sent -<br />
en ces keeps potential criminals beh ind<br />
bars.<br />
In the other corner, groups like the<br />
Sentencing Project beg to differ, with<br />
some nifty statistics to prove their<br />
point — for example, that the states<br />
where imprisonment was below the<br />
national average experienced the<br />
greatest drops in crime. It would be<br />
silly to ignore the positive effects of<br />
incarceration — some offenders do<br />
tend to transgress repeatedly over the<br />
life course, so keeping them off the<br />
streets is smart.<br />
But, it is equally foolhardy to think<br />
that incarceration is the always best<br />
answer. Canada, for instan ce, has much<br />
lower incarceration rates than the US,<br />
yet its crime rate is also low.<br />
AFP<br />
Empowering citizens to effectively respond to crime is the best bet<br />
8<br />
3 4 5<br />
The problem is making generalisations<br />
across all crimes and across all US<br />
cities and states. Criminologists still<br />
really don’t understand why Chicago’s<br />
youth homicide rate went through the<br />
roof last year, while New York’s stayed<br />
at a near-historic low. My colleague,<br />
Freakonomics economist Steven Levitt,<br />
shows that changing drug habits can<br />
affect some crimes but not others:<br />
homicides dropped after the early<br />
1990s as crack became less popular, but<br />
other crimes did not.<br />
Instead of studying why crime<br />
occurs, we should instead be looking at<br />
the capa<strong>city</strong> of communities to take<br />
action against it. Local public safety<br />
depends on the locals who can respond<br />
to criminal and delinquent acts before<br />
they destroy the social fabric. No region<br />
in America is free from social problems,<br />
but communities differ widely in terms<br />
of the capa<strong>city</strong> among citizens to<br />
respond. Recent research suggests that<br />
rather than fighting criminals directly,<br />
it may be as advantageous to help communities<br />
fight against crime. As we<br />
champion our favourite deterrents —<br />
prisons on the right, job growth on the<br />
left, we may want to remember that an<br />
active citizenry, able to defend itself, is<br />
a proven ingredient for ensuring public<br />
safety.<br />
Tracey Meares, Yale University's<br />
renowned legal scholar, has demonstrated<br />
the power of ‘take back the<br />
night’ vigils and protests for warding off<br />
criminals, especially when religious<br />
leaders lead the crusade and bring poli -<br />
ce aboard. Social scientists at Harvard<br />
argue that the best predictor for low<br />
crime rates is the “collectively efficacious”<br />
behaviour of residents — a fancy<br />
phrase that refers to the ability of<br />
neighbours to work together when<br />
things go awry. And David Kennedy has<br />
start coming in to buy these clothes.<br />
Transactions go on till 5.30 am. before<br />
the <strong>city</strong> wakes up to its morning chores.<br />
3. At night on Howrah Bridge it is<br />
easy to spot these people pushing carts<br />
with heavy iron pipes. Their job is to<br />
deliver goods from Bajrang Bali, the<br />
steel market in Salkia, to different parts<br />
of Kolkata.<br />
4. Van drivers, rickshawpullers and<br />
porters who supply clay from the<br />
Ganges to the artisans in Kumartuli<br />
have only bare concrete as their bed.<br />
Their workplace is their resting place.<br />
shown proven results with his “Cease -<br />
fire” programme, which focuses on<br />
issuing real threats to criminals, with<br />
consequences that are delivered swift ly.<br />
Such efforts fall under a large<br />
umbrella called ‘community policing’,<br />
which took off in the 1990s — and in<br />
Europe, the decade after. President<br />
Clinton helped cities hire 100,000 cops.<br />
Urban mayors from Chicago to Seattle<br />
to New York built local coalitions of residents,<br />
businesspersons, clergy, school<br />
principals and other so-called ‘stakeholders’<br />
who could respond to crime<br />
before it spiralled out of control.<br />
The power of such coalition-style<br />
policing lies in the phalanx of crime<br />
fighters that confronts local criminals:<br />
not only do the perps feel the weight of<br />
the law around them, but they come to<br />
believe that law enforcement is sincere<br />
when it threatens to lock up criminals.<br />
In short, truth in advertising has proven<br />
to be an excellent deterrent to crime.<br />
But ‘community policing’ is subject<br />
to interpretation — and not surprisingly,<br />
left and right differ in predictable<br />
ways. Advocates of gun rights are quick<br />
to call for the need for relaxed weapons<br />
laws, while those on the left want community<br />
organisations to become even<br />
more empowered with federal funding<br />
and services.<br />
Don't expect any of these debates to<br />
get settled soon. Instead, I’d recommend<br />
a simple exercise when the next<br />
theory about crime rates makes headlines.<br />
Ask yourself, what do communities<br />
do when crime occurs? Can they<br />
act ‘efficaciously’? Or are they held<br />
host age by gangs, car thieves, vandals<br />
and other criminals? We may never<br />
understand with great precision what<br />
causes crime, but we can always<br />
empower citizens to respond when it<br />
occurs. —The Guardian<br />
7<br />
6<br />
5. The tea and foodstall owners in the<br />
Poddar Court area have little option but<br />
to turn the footpaths into bedrooms.<br />
They live and procreate in the open,<br />
while their children grow up amid filth<br />
and squalor.<br />
6. Nearly hundred rickshawpullers<br />
ferrying people in central Kolkata have<br />
the roadside as their homes. On Surya<br />
Sen street these Bihari migrants, who<br />
had come to the <strong>city</strong> long ago in search<br />
of a livelihood, can barely make ends<br />
meet. Even the dreams of prosperity<br />
have eluded them.<br />
7 & 8. They are from Gosaba, Satjalia,<br />
Kumirmari villages of the Sunderbans.<br />
Their homes have been devastated by<br />
cyclone Aila. They come to the <strong>city</strong> to<br />
work as porters in Howrah haat. They<br />
return to their villages on Tuesday,<br />
each earning about `400 for three days<br />
of back-breaking labour. While in the<br />
<strong>city</strong> they sleep on the open road, next<br />
to the Howrah post office. The district<br />
magistrate’s bungalow is a stone’s<br />
throw away. If a speeding vehicle ever<br />
loses control, it will be the end for<br />
scores of these people.<br />
The Guatemala scar<br />
Hugh O’Shaughnessy<br />
The commission call ed<br />
in by President<br />
Obama to investigate<br />
American involvement<br />
in the deliberate infection<br />
of Guatemalans<br />
with sexually transmitted<br />
diseases has repor -<br />
ted its interim findings.<br />
The case concerns 5,500<br />
Guatemalans who were<br />
the subject of ‘medical<br />
research’ that took place<br />
with US collaboration<br />
between 1946 and 1948:<br />
1,300 were deliberately<br />
exposed to sexually tran -<br />
s mitted diseases such as<br />
syphilis, gonorrhoea or<br />
chancroid.<br />
Dr Amy Gutmann, a US<br />
university president who<br />
led the investigation, said<br />
some of the staff inv -<br />
olved were ‘grie vously<br />
wrong’ and ‘mor ally culpable<br />
to various degrees’.<br />
I note however that the<br />
implication that some<br />
were not ‘grievously<br />
wrong’ and others were<br />
only partially guil ty.<br />
To be frank, the<br />
labours of President<br />
Obama’s commission<br />
and Dr Gutmann’s carefully<br />
nuanced statement<br />
would be laughable if<br />
they were not so insulting.<br />
They appear a sort of<br />
political legerdemain<br />
that, by offering a confession<br />
to one crime, is<br />
seeking to divert attention<br />
and escape responsibility<br />
for an infinitely<br />
greater one.<br />
What happened with<br />
the syphilitic atro<strong>city</strong><br />
between 1946 and 1948<br />
was as nothing when<br />
compared with the US<br />
involvement in cataclysmic<br />
genocide of<br />
200,000 people visited<br />
on Guatemala — and<br />
particularly on the May -<br />
ans and other indigenous<br />
peoples — when<br />
that country was under<br />
the heel of military dictatorships<br />
fostered, enc -<br />
ouraged and supported<br />
by Washington.<br />
According to the rep -<br />
ort of the commission<br />
for historical clarification<br />
(CHC), set up under<br />
the Oslo accord on Gua -<br />
temala in 1994 with the<br />
involvement of the EU,<br />
Mexico and the US to<br />
investigate — but not to<br />
judge — the atrocities,<br />
this was rooted in the<br />
overthrow of the constitutionally<br />
elected government<br />
of President<br />
Jacobo Arbenz by conservative<br />
military in<br />
1954.<br />
The coup d’etat<br />
enjoyed the active and<br />
now fully acknowledged<br />
co-operation of the CIA.<br />
Washington was enga -<br />
ged in the cold war, and<br />
US anti-communism,<br />
backed by a misnamed<br />
‘national security doctrine’,<br />
received firm support<br />
from the Guate -<br />
malan right-wing.<br />
This took the form of<br />
“reinforcing the national<br />
intelligence apparatus<br />
and … training the officer<br />
corps in counterinsurgency<br />
techniques,<br />
key factors which had<br />
significant bearing on<br />
human rights violations<br />
during the armed confrontation”.<br />
It was mixed up with<br />
“anti-reformist, then<br />
anti-democratic policies,<br />
culminating in criminal<br />
counterinsurgency”.<br />
The Guatemalan military<br />
then waged a war of<br />
annihilation against tho -<br />
se they considered enemies<br />
whom they termed<br />
“insurgents”, a term that<br />
has reappeared in the<br />
context of the western<br />
invasion of Iraq and<br />
Afghanistan.<br />
The CHC found that<br />
insurgent actions produced<br />
a mere three per<br />
cent of the human rights<br />
violations and acts of<br />
violence perpetrated<br />
against men, women<br />
and children, including<br />
five per cent of the arbitrary<br />
executions and two<br />
per cent of forced disappearances.<br />
It was the<br />
western-supported military<br />
who bathed in the<br />
blood of fellow citizens.<br />
—The Guardian
10<br />
BRIEFLY<br />
WORLD<br />
� China’s Red Eagle air<br />
demonstration team<br />
makes its debut at the<br />
First Aviation Open Day<br />
in Changchun—AFP<br />
Gorkhas bear brunt of<br />
UK defence spending cut<br />
London/Kathmandu: Britain<br />
is to sack another 150<br />
Gorkha soldiers as part of<br />
government's drive to reduce<br />
men-under-arms and the<br />
move has raised hackles in<br />
Nepal, the home of the<br />
fabled fighters. —PTI<br />
Strauss-Kahn leaves<br />
Washington home<br />
Washington: Dominique<br />
Strauss-Kahn on Thursday<br />
left his Washington home,<br />
believed to be en route to<br />
France via New York, one<br />
week after sexual assault<br />
charges were sensationally<br />
dropped against the former<br />
IMF chief. —AFP<br />
Famine situation to<br />
worsen in Somalia: UN<br />
Nairobi: Food will be<br />
increasingly scarce in<br />
famine-struck southern<br />
Somalia until next year's harvest,<br />
the head of the United<br />
Nations refugee agency said<br />
on Thursday.—Reuters<br />
Seven killed by WWII<br />
bomb in Myanmar<br />
Yangon: Seven people died<br />
when World War II bomb<br />
exploded in western Myanmar.<br />
The accident took place on<br />
Wednesday. “We think the old<br />
bomb was left over from World<br />
War II. We have no idea how<br />
many of them are left buried,”<br />
an official said.—AFP<br />
Nepal Maoists hand<br />
over weapons<br />
Kathmandu: The Maoist<br />
party in Nepal on Thursday<br />
handed over the keys of its<br />
armed wing's arsenal to a<br />
special committee, a significant<br />
move that is expected to<br />
boost the peace process. —PTI<br />
Gunmen kill seven in<br />
Pakistan<br />
Islamabad: At least seven<br />
people were killed on<br />
Thursday in Pakistan’s<br />
restive Kurram Agency when<br />
unidentified gunmen opened<br />
fire on a passenger bus, officials<br />
said. —PTI<br />
WikiLeaks may release<br />
unredacted US cables<br />
London: WikiLeaks is conducting<br />
an online poll of its<br />
Twitter followers to decide<br />
whether the whistleblowing<br />
site should publish in full its<br />
unredacted cache of US<br />
diplomatic cables.—Guardian<br />
ASTROLOGY PEN FRIEND<br />
For Advertisement Under<br />
RETAIL<br />
Column Contact<br />
Partha : 9830557648,<br />
Saumik : 9038414135 /<br />
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Disclaimer : The Bengal Post or any of its agents<br />
assume no responsibility for the authenti<strong>city</strong> or<br />
reliability of any advertisement published in this<br />
newspaper. The advertisements carried in the<br />
newspaper are accepted on good faith.<br />
Gaddafi vows to turn Libya into hell<br />
Fugitive leader was<br />
speaking on the<br />
anniversary of<br />
1969 military coup<br />
Tripoli: A defiant Muammar Gaddafi<br />
issued his latest apocalyptic statement,<br />
urging his surrounded followers<br />
to “keep fighting” and promising<br />
to turn Libya “into a hell” , even as<br />
Libya's new interim rulers met world<br />
leaders to discuss reshaping a nation<br />
torn by 42 years of one-man rule and<br />
six months of war.<br />
“Let it be a long battle. We will<br />
fight from place to place, from town<br />
to town, from valley to valley, from<br />
mountain to mountain.Libya will<br />
turn into a hell. How can the Libyan<br />
people surrender?” Gaddafi said in a<br />
message broadcast on Arab satellite<br />
television channels.<br />
“If Libya goes up in flames, who<br />
will be able to govern it? Let it burn.<br />
They don't want to rule Libya. They<br />
cannot rule it as long as we are<br />
armed. We are still armed. We will<br />
fight in every valley, in every street, in<br />
every oasis, and every town.”<br />
The fugitive leader was speaking<br />
Colombo: Hundreds of Tamil<br />
Tiger guerrillas would continue<br />
to be held in jail and the outfit<br />
remain banned under the new<br />
terrorism regulations to be<br />
promulgated in Sri Lanka.<br />
Four new regulations under<br />
the Prevention of Terrorism Act<br />
(PTA) have been sent to the<br />
President Mahinda Rajapaksa for<br />
approval to provide legal cover<br />
to deal with the LTTE, including<br />
its proscription as the nearly 30year-long<br />
state of emergency<br />
ended on Wednesday.<br />
Attorney General Mohan Peiris<br />
said the President is to promulgate<br />
the fresh regulations, which<br />
will allow the continued proscription<br />
of the LTTE and its charity<br />
London: A new film on Michael<br />
Jackson is set to reveal the many different<br />
facets of his personality and<br />
how his family coped during his<br />
molestation trial in 2005.<br />
Michael Jackson: The Life<br />
of an Icon, directed by<br />
Andrew Eastel and<br />
produced by<br />
Michael's close<br />
childhood friend<br />
David Gest, involves<br />
interviews with more<br />
than 50 of his closest<br />
friends and family<br />
members during his<br />
molestation trial in<br />
2005, reported<br />
Contactmusic.<br />
Along with a<br />
rare interview<br />
with Michael's<br />
eldest sister<br />
Atasi Enterprise - to<br />
contact for new friends.<br />
Ph:7797007288/8768223357.<br />
PF629<br />
PUBLIC NOTICE<br />
I Mr. Nasimuddin alias Md<br />
Nasimuddin do hereby<br />
declare that my son<br />
Mohammad Majid Alam r/o<br />
12/1B, Marsden Street,<br />
Kolkata-700016 shall<br />
henceforth be known as<br />
Md. Majid Ali vide affidavit<br />
sworn before the notary<br />
Public Calcutta on<br />
26/8/2011 both are same<br />
and identical Person.<br />
PN656<br />
For Advertisement<br />
Under<br />
EDUCATION<br />
Column<br />
Contact<br />
Soumik :<br />
9038414135<br />
� A Libyan man stands in front of a Tripoli wall covered with pro-rebellion graffiti on Wednesday—AFP<br />
on the anniversary of the military<br />
coup that toppled King Idris and<br />
brought him to power in 1969 when<br />
he was a 27-year-old army captain.<br />
The message gives no clue where<br />
Gaddafi might be hiding, or even if he<br />
is still inside the country. There is<br />
continuing speculation that he is in<br />
or near Bani Walid, 150kms southeast<br />
of Tripoli, where he was<br />
allegedly spotted last Friday.<br />
Alternatively some believe he has<br />
fled further to the southern desert<br />
town of Sabha, 750 kilometres from<br />
the capital.<br />
All three fugitives are wanted by<br />
the International Criminal Court for<br />
alleged crimes against humanity.<br />
LEGAL NOTICE<br />
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Abdel Majid Mlegta, coordinator of<br />
the Tripoli military operations room,<br />
said “someone we trust” had said<br />
Gaddafi had fled to Bani Walid, 150<br />
km southeast of the capital, three<br />
days after Tripoli fell.<br />
An Algerian newspaper said<br />
Gaddafi was in the border town of<br />
Ghadamis and had tried to call<br />
Algerian President Abdelaziz<br />
Bouteflika to appeal for refuge.<br />
Bouteflika would not take the call,<br />
even though Algeria gave sanctuary<br />
to Gaddafi's wife and three of his<br />
children when they crossed the border<br />
on Monday.<br />
The NTC, trying to mop up pro-<br />
Gaddafi forces, extended by a week a<br />
Sri Lanka to announce new<br />
regulations to deal with LTTE<br />
New regulations<br />
would mean that an<br />
estimated 1,200 Tamil<br />
Tiger cadres would<br />
continue to languish<br />
in jails.<br />
organisation, Tamil Rehabilitation<br />
Organisation (TRO). The rest of the<br />
regulations will cover the detention<br />
of the LTTE suspects and<br />
rehabilitation of the LTTE cadres<br />
who surrendered.<br />
The new tough terror regulations<br />
would mean that an estimated<br />
1,200 Tamil Tiger cadres,<br />
who were to be released from<br />
detention would continue to<br />
languish in jails.Unless the new<br />
regulations are promulgated,<br />
the proscriptions of the LTTE<br />
and TRO will become annulled<br />
with the lifting of emergency.<br />
The country has been under a<br />
state of emergency since 1983,<br />
when the LTTE under its late<br />
commander Velupillai<br />
Prabhakaran was posing a<br />
threat to the country's government<br />
and forces. With the government<br />
entering the<br />
Norwegian backed peace talks<br />
with the LTTE, the state of emergency<br />
was lifted in 20<strong>02</strong> only to<br />
be re-imposed in August 2005<br />
when the LTTE carried out the<br />
murder of the foreign minister<br />
Lakshman Kadirgamar. —PTI<br />
It has interviews of his closest friends and family<br />
New film to chronicle<br />
the life and times of MJ<br />
Rebbie, where she speaks about his<br />
difficult relationship with their father<br />
Joe, the movie will also provide insight<br />
into the singer's early years with the<br />
Jackson 5, his solo career and his life<br />
up to his sudden death in June 2009.<br />
“Michael Jackson: The Life of an Icon<br />
is a truly remarkable film that captures<br />
the true character, wit and sensitivity<br />
of my son. Producer David Gest<br />
takes you on an emotional roller<br />
coaster that will bring people to tears<br />
as well as really understand who the<br />
man behind the music was and is,”<br />
Michael's mother Katherine said.<br />
“I have tried to show Michael in a<br />
truly unique light. I have spent the<br />
past fifteen months travelling the<br />
world interviewing people who were<br />
most important in his life. I believe<br />
this film will entertain and educate in<br />
equal measures about who the real<br />
Michael Jackson was,” said Gest. —PTI<br />
CLASSIFIED<br />
Sinthee<br />
Gopinath Das<br />
24/2/25/1,<br />
Mondalpara Lane,<br />
Kolkata - 700 050.<br />
Mob: 9231361327.<br />
9.00 am to 1.00 pm &<br />
5.30 pm to 10.00 pm<br />
on all days<br />
except Sundays.<br />
Sribhumi<br />
Jeevan Sangee<br />
110, Canal Street,<br />
Kolkata - 700 048.<br />
Mob: 9432534138.<br />
10.00 am to 6.00 pm<br />
on all days<br />
except Sundays.<br />
Saturday deadline for the surrender<br />
of the coastal <strong>city</strong> of Sirte, Gaddafi's<br />
birthplace, and other hold-out towns.<br />
“That means there's progress in<br />
the negotiations,” said Mohammed<br />
Zawawi, an NTC spokesman in the<br />
eastern <strong>city</strong> of Benghazi. "We're not<br />
in a rush to get in to Sirte. It has no<br />
economic importance and we're not<br />
going to lose casualties for it. We can<br />
cut supplies and wait, even more<br />
than a week.”<br />
The extension follows a peace<br />
feeler from one of Gaddafi's sons,<br />
Saadi, on Wednesday, even though it<br />
was contradicted by his elder brother<br />
Saif al-Islam and, now, by his father<br />
himself. —Agencies<br />
Hurricane Irene<br />
a major federal<br />
disaster: Obama<br />
New York: Barack Obama has<br />
declared Hurricane Irene a “major federal<br />
disaster” in states across the eastern<br />
US, freeing relief funds for what is<br />
likely to be one of the costliest natural<br />
disasters in American history.<br />
Obama acted as people struggled<br />
with severe flooding in states along<br />
the east coast from North Carolina<br />
going north. The designation means<br />
government money can be used for<br />
temporary housing and home repairs.<br />
The president earlier signed emergency<br />
declarations for other states<br />
including Puerto Rico and Vermont,<br />
where heavy flooding has destroyed<br />
roads and left 13 towns surrounded by<br />
water.<br />
New Jersey's governor, Chris<br />
Christie, called on the president to<br />
designate his heavily flooded state a<br />
disaster funds recipient. Thous-ands<br />
of people were evacuated in cities<br />
along the Passaic river, which has<br />
flooded towns along its banks.<br />
Meanwhile, tropical storm Katia<br />
strengthened into a hurricane over the<br />
Atlantic on Wednesday.—Agencies<br />
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9.00 am to 2.00 pm and<br />
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all days except<br />
Tuesdays.<br />
Paris: US secretary of state<br />
Hillary Clinton said on<br />
Thursday that Libya's interim<br />
leaders should be given the<br />
country's United Nations seat<br />
but they should also work<br />
with their former foes.<br />
Addressing a meeting of<br />
world powers on Libya,<br />
Clinton also said that the Nato<br />
military campaign which<br />
supported the uprising<br />
against Muammar Gaddafi<br />
should carry on as long as<br />
cvilians are under threat,<br />
despite his overthrow.<br />
Clinton said foreign governments<br />
would watch<br />
closely to make sure the<br />
National Transition Council<br />
(NTC) holds to its promises to<br />
establish a fair democracy.<br />
United Nations sanctions<br />
on Libya should start to be<br />
lifted in a responsible way<br />
and the new leaders awarded<br />
Libya's UN seat, she said.<br />
“The work does not end<br />
Halisahar<br />
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9475752617/8653803642<br />
Time: 10 a.m to 7 p.m<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Interim leaders<br />
should get UN<br />
seat, says Clinton<br />
World is my Stage<br />
� Italian actor Vittoria Puccini arrives at the 68th Venice International Film Festival —AFP<br />
with the end of an oppressive<br />
regime,” Clinton told the<br />
“Friends of Libya” conference<br />
hosted by France and Britain.<br />
Libya’s new leaders gathered<br />
with their foreign allies<br />
in Paris to coordinate political<br />
and economic reconstruction.<br />
Some participants will<br />
also be jostling for a share in<br />
postwar contracts in the<br />
wealthy North African oil and<br />
gas producer. Russia recognised<br />
the NTC before the conference<br />
opened.<br />
Given sensitivities among<br />
Muslims after Western military<br />
operations in Iraq and<br />
Afghanistan, British Prime<br />
Minister David Cameron was<br />
at pains to stress that Libyans<br />
were in charge of their own<br />
fate: “This is not being<br />
dropped out of a Nato aeroplane,<br />
this is being delivered<br />
by the Libyan people,” he<br />
said. “It is their revolution, it<br />
is their change.”—Reuters<br />
Mussolini had ‘affair’<br />
with Italy’s last queen<br />
Rome: Not much has<br />
stayed secret about the<br />
tumultuous private life<br />
of Benito Mussolini.<br />
That is apart from the<br />
true nature of his relationship<br />
with the<br />
woman who was to be<br />
Italy's last queen,<br />
Marie-José of Belgium.<br />
Mussolini's mistress,<br />
Claretta Petacci,<br />
claimed in her diary<br />
that in 1937 the then<br />
princess and wife of<br />
the heir to the throne<br />
tried and failed to<br />
seduce the dictator at a<br />
beach resort near<br />
Rome.But Marie-José<br />
may have been more<br />
successful than her<br />
rival suspected, if evidence<br />
that emerged on Wednesday is<br />
to be believed.<br />
In a letter reproduced by the weekly<br />
magazine Oggi, Mussolini's son<br />
Romano quotes his mother as saying<br />
that there was a “brief<br />
period of intimate<br />
romantic relations<br />
between my father<br />
and the then princess<br />
of Piedmont”.<br />
A letter written by<br />
Mussolini's youngest<br />
son in 1971 to Antonio<br />
Terzi, reads: “I can<br />
confirm in all good<br />
faith that the romantic<br />
and political relations<br />
between Marie-<br />
José and my father<br />
were often talked<br />
about at home, and I<br />
can tell you with honesty<br />
that my mother<br />
(albeit with understandablereservations)<br />
was always<br />
pretty explicit: there<br />
was a brief period of intimate romantic<br />
relations between my father and<br />
the then Princess of Piedmont that<br />
was then I believe interrupted at the<br />
instance of my father.” —Guardian<br />
� Mussolini and Queen<br />
Marie-José of Italy<br />
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11.00 am to 8.00 pm<br />
on all days<br />
except Sundays.
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com TODAY 11<br />
ENGLISH<br />
FOX HISTORY &<br />
TRAVELLER<br />
18.00: What’s with Indian Men<br />
18.30: It Happens Only in India<br />
19.00: Persian Food Safari<br />
19.30: David Rocco’s Dolce Vita<br />
20.00: Paul Merton in India<br />
21.00: Food at 9<br />
21.30: David Rocco’s Dolce Vita<br />
22.00: Travel Madness<br />
23.00: Bondi Rescue<br />
BIG CBS SPARK<br />
16.00: Maximum Exposure<br />
17.00: Spark Hitz Weekday<br />
Evenings<br />
19.00: Cheaters<br />
20.00: Smash Cuts<br />
20.30: 9<strong>02</strong>10<br />
21.30: Hawaii Five-O<br />
22.30: Dead Zone<br />
23.30: Jerry Springer<br />
WB<br />
10.00: Superman Returns<br />
12.50: Eight Legged Freaks<br />
14.35: Friends<br />
15.05: Cats & Dogs<br />
16.40: The Perfect Storm<br />
19.10: Exit Wounds<br />
21.00: The Island<br />
23.35: Star Trek: The Motion<br />
Picture<br />
City<br />
STAR PLUS<br />
19.00: Saath Nibhana Saathiya<br />
19.30: Sasural Genda Phool<br />
20.00: Iss Pyaar Ko Kya Naam<br />
Doon?<br />
20.30: Maayke Se Bandhi Dor<br />
21.00: Diya Aur Baati Hum<br />
21.30: Yeh Rishta Kya Kehlata<br />
Hai<br />
22.00: Navya<br />
22.30: Mann Ki Awaaz Pratigya<br />
23.00: Maryada Lekin Kab Tak?<br />
ZEE TV<br />
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19.30: Choti Bahu<br />
20.30: Yahan Main Ghar Ghar<br />
Kheli<br />
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Bahuein<br />
22.30: Sanskaar Laxmi<br />
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SONY TV<br />
13.00: Comedy Circus Ke Tansen<br />
15.00: C.I.D<br />
17.30: Crime Patrol<br />
18.00: Saas Bina Sasural<br />
18.30: Bade Achhe Lagte Hain<br />
19.00: Crime Patrol: Dastak<br />
20.00: X Factor India<br />
22.00: C.I.D<br />
23.00: Crime Patrol<br />
National International<br />
Today<br />
min-max Tomorrow<br />
min-max<br />
KOLKATA 27-33 27-32<br />
BHOPAL 24-28 24-29<br />
DELHI 27-34 26-32<br />
MUMBAI 25-29 26-28<br />
CHENNAI 25-31 25-33<br />
BANGALORE 19-25 20-25<br />
HYDERABAD 22-30 22-31<br />
GUWAHATI 27-34 27-35<br />
AGARTALA 26-33 26-32<br />
SHILLONG 19-28 19-26<br />
� Watch The Island<br />
at 21.00 on WB<br />
HINDI<br />
� Watch Sanskaar Laxmi<br />
at 22.30 on Zee TV<br />
The Weather<br />
Temperature In Celsius<br />
City<br />
Source: Indian Meteorological Department<br />
Today<br />
min-max Tomorrow<br />
min-max<br />
NEW YORK 17-25 22-28<br />
LONDON 14-26 16-26<br />
PARIS 16-28 17-29<br />
BANGKOK 24-33 24-33<br />
BEIJING 18-28 18-27<br />
WASHINGTON 19-29 21-31<br />
GENEVA 16-29 16-30<br />
FRANKFURT 15-26 17-27<br />
TOKYO 26-29 25-29<br />
SINGAPORE 25-31 26-30<br />
BENGALI SPORTS NEWS KIDS SPECIAL<br />
STAR JALSHA<br />
19.00: Bou Katha Kou<br />
19.30: Bhalobasha.kom<br />
20.30: Tapur Tupur<br />
21.00: Sindoor Khela<br />
21.30: Romonir Guney<br />
22.00: Aparojito<br />
22.30: Adwitiya<br />
23.00: Sedin Dujone<br />
23.30: Megher Palok<br />
SONY AATH<br />
7.30: Sera Satya Ghatana<br />
Abalambane<br />
9.30: Bhakter Bhagwan<br />
12.00: Tagori<br />
14.30: Sera Satya Ghatana<br />
Abalambane<br />
16.30: Rupasi Dohai Tomar<br />
19.00: Rakkhak Jakhon Bhakkak<br />
21.00: Sera Satya Ghatana<br />
Abalambane<br />
22.00: Aahat Special<br />
� Watch Charitraheen<br />
at 19.00<br />
on Akash Bangla<br />
ETV BANGLA<br />
14.00: Anurag<br />
17.30: Just Ranna<br />
18.00: Aamar Bangla<br />
18.30: Rojgere Ginni<br />
20.00: Sholoyana<br />
20.30: Binni Dhaner Khoi<br />
22.30: News<br />
23.00: Aaj Sara Din<br />
23.30: Bisarjan<br />
ZEE BANGLA<br />
18.30: Agni Pariksha<br />
19.00: Rashi<br />
19.30: Keya Patar Nouko<br />
20.00: Kanakanjali<br />
21.00: Saat Pake Bandha<br />
21.30: SaReGaMaPa Li’l Champs<br />
2011<br />
23.00: Erao Shatru<br />
AKASH BANGLA<br />
14.00: Akash Superhit Matinee -<br />
Agni Pariksha<br />
18.30: Radhuni/ Cookery Show<br />
19.00: Charitraheen<br />
19.30: Andarmahal<br />
20.30: CIB Bengal<br />
21.00: Kurukhetra<br />
21.30: Exclusive Akash<br />
22.00: Biswa Barta<br />
KNOWLEDGE<br />
DISCOVERY<br />
SCIENCE<br />
14.30: Breaking Point<br />
16.30: More Industrial<br />
Revelations Europe<br />
18.00: Through the<br />
Wormhole with<br />
Morgan Freeman<br />
19.00: The New Inventors<br />
19.30: Weird or What?<br />
20.30: Mega Science<br />
21.30: Deconstructed<br />
22.00: Food Detectives<br />
23.00: Through the<br />
Wormhole with<br />
Morgan Freeman<br />
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� Watch US Open 2011<br />
at 20.30 on Ten Sports<br />
STAR SPORTS<br />
10.00: Barclays Premier League<br />
2011/12<br />
12.00: Champions League<br />
Twenty20 2009 Highlights<br />
14.00: FIM Motocross World<br />
Championship 2011<br />
17.00: Mobil 1 The Grid<br />
18.00 TNA Sikander<br />
20.00: Gp3 Series 2011<br />
21.00: Score Tonight<br />
22.30: Laureus Spirit of Sport<br />
23.00: Champions League<br />
Twenty20 2009 Highlights<br />
NEO SPORTS<br />
7.00: Chilli Factor<br />
8.30: Weekend Kick Off<br />
10.30: Rugby World Cup 07<br />
12.30: Telebrand - Sky Star<br />
13.00: NASCAR 2011 Highlights<br />
14.00: BWF World Badminton<br />
Championship 2011<br />
19.00: Best of WTA Tour<br />
20.00: Flykingfisher Winning Post<br />
21.00: Rugby World Cup 07<br />
23.00: Bundesliga Highlights<br />
STAR CRICKET<br />
8.00: Road to the Final<br />
9.00: Champions League<br />
Twenty20 2010 Highlights<br />
12.00: Best of CL T20<br />
12.30: Natwest Series 20<strong>02</strong><br />
14.00: Caribbean T20 2011 H/ls<br />
15.00: Sri Lanka tour of England<br />
2011 Highlights<br />
16.00: Indian Premier League<br />
2011 Highlights<br />
18.00: Sri Lanka tour of England<br />
2011 Highlights<br />
23.00: India Victorious<br />
TEN SPORTS<br />
4.30: US Open 2011<br />
9.30: FIFA: Futbol Mundial<br />
10.00: Goalfest<br />
10.30: US Open Tennis Highlights<br />
11.30: WWE: Smackdown<br />
13.20: Pakistan Tour of Zimbabwe<br />
2011<br />
17.30: US Open Tennis Highlights<br />
18.30: WWE: Smackdown<br />
20.30: US Open 2011<br />
13.00: Jailed Abroad<br />
14.00: Engineering<br />
Connections<br />
15.30: Seconds from Disaster<br />
16.00: Dog Whisperer<br />
17.00: Dangerous Encounters<br />
18.00: Super Cat<br />
19.00: Nat Geo Amazing!<br />
19.30: Nat Geo Rush<br />
20.00: I Didn’t Know That<br />
20.30: Caught in the Act<br />
21.00: Dog Whisperer<br />
22.00: Nat Geo Rush<br />
22.30: Dangerous Encounters<br />
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13.00: Predation!<br />
14.00: Austin Stevens<br />
Adventures<br />
15.00: Man Eaters<br />
16.00: The Most Extreme<br />
17.00: Lions of Crocodile<br />
River<br />
18.00: Wild South America<br />
19.00: Blackjack-High Stakes<br />
20.00: Fooled By Nature<br />
20.30: Planet Wild<br />
21.00: The Crocodile Hunter<br />
22.00: Deadliest Catch<br />
23.00: Untamed & Uncut<br />
17.00: 24 Ghante 24 Reporter<br />
17.30: Shh Suna Hai<br />
18.00: Khabar Din Bhar<br />
18.30: Reality Report<br />
19.00: Aaj Ki Baat<br />
19.30: Balle Balle<br />
20.00: Fatafat<br />
20.30: 8.30 Special<br />
21.00: 9 PM Report<br />
22.00: Sheela, Shagun, Meenakshi<br />
23.30: Mumbai Live<br />
TIMES NOW<br />
16.00: News Now<br />
18.00: 6 PM<br />
18.30: Live Report<br />
19.00: Primetime<br />
19.30: The Game<br />
20.00: News Now at 8<br />
20.30: Live Report<br />
21.00: The Newshour<br />
22.30: E Now<br />
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NDTV 24X7<br />
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15.30: Night Out<br />
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CNN<br />
13.00: The Best of Back Story<br />
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15.00: Talk Asia<br />
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17.30: News Stream<br />
18.30: World Business Today<br />
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20.30: The Brief<br />
21.00: World Sport<br />
21.30: World Report<br />
22.30: International Desk<br />
23.30: Quest Means Business<br />
BBC WORLD NEWS<br />
14.30: BBC World News<br />
15.00: World Business Report<br />
16.30: GMT with George Alagiah<br />
17.30: BBC World News<br />
18.00: World Business Report<br />
18.30: Impact<br />
19.00: World One<br />
20.00: World Business Report<br />
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23.30: World News Today with<br />
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Nursing Bureau<br />
Swasti - 247448881<br />
Sanjivani - 23607881/8785<br />
Saha Nursing Center -24838830<br />
Mobile Cardiac Unit<br />
Dreamland Nursing Home –<br />
25553216<br />
Divine Nursing Home –<br />
235<strong>02</strong>761<br />
Rameshwara Nursing Home –<br />
23374247<br />
Marwari Relief Society – Indian<br />
Association<br />
Eye Bank<br />
International Eye Bank -<br />
23585758<br />
Howrah Lions Eye Bank-<br />
266<strong>02</strong>015<br />
Susrut Eye Hospital - 2358<strong>02</strong>01<br />
Anandalok Netralaya -<br />
23592931<br />
Disha(Prova) Eye Bank -<br />
CARTOON NETWORK<br />
7.00: What’s New, Scooby-Doo?<br />
8.00: Tom & Jerry Kids Show<br />
9.00: Krishna and Balaram<br />
18.00: Bal Hanuman III<br />
19.00: Richie Rich<br />
19.30: Looney Tunes Show<br />
21.00: Billy, Mandy aur Life Mein<br />
Haddi<br />
21.30: Courage the Cowardly Dog<br />
22.00: Beyblady Metal Fusion<br />
23.00: Justice League Unlimited<br />
POGO<br />
8.30: Galli Galli Sim Sim<br />
9.00: Bob the Builder Marathon<br />
13.00: Mr Bean: The Animated<br />
Series<br />
14.00: Chhota Bheem Marathon<br />
17.30: Soori Poori<br />
18.00: Chhota Bheem Marathon<br />
20.00: Mr Bean: The Animated<br />
Series<br />
21.00: Hagemaru<br />
22.00: Bob the Builder Marathon<br />
HUNGAMA<br />
10.00: Shinchan<br />
10.30: Kiteretsu<br />
14.30: Doraemon<br />
15.30: Kya Bakra Hai<br />
16.00: Chor Police<br />
16.30: Doraemon<br />
17.00: Kiteretsu<br />
17.30: Shinchan<br />
20.30: Hero Bhakti Hi Shakti Hai<br />
21.30: Doraemon<br />
DISNEY CHANNEL<br />
8.00: Jake and the Neverland<br />
Pirates<br />
8.30: Fish Hooks<br />
9.00: Phineas and Ferb<br />
11.00: Jake and the Neverland<br />
Pirates<br />
11.30: Mickey Mouse Clubhouse<br />
12.00: The Cat in the Hat Knows a<br />
Lot About That!<br />
18.00: Phineas and Ferb<br />
18.30: Doraemon<br />
22.00: Phineas and Ferb<br />
22.30: Doraemon<br />
23.30: Phineas and Ferb<br />
� Watch Nat Geo Amazing! at 19.00<br />
on National Geographic<br />
Helpline 22143230/3<strong>02</strong>4<br />
25933737<br />
Medical College -22413853<br />
Electri<strong>city</strong><br />
CESC Fault Reporting Center –<br />
Central/South 1912, North<br />
23500928,<br />
North Suburban 25537581,<br />
Howrah 26669161/62,<br />
Serampore 26524585,<br />
West Suburban 23591896<br />
Wbseb Emergency<br />
23591896<br />
Railways<br />
Howrah Station - (Old<br />
Complex) 1310/1331/1332,<br />
26387412/35422581, (New<br />
Complex) 26382217<br />
Sealdah – 23503535/3537<br />
Reservation Enquiry – 138<br />
Recorded Information –<br />
1331/1332<br />
Passport Office<br />
2554893, 2554762, 2254084<br />
Airlines<br />
�Watch Richie Rich<br />
at 19.00<br />
on Cartoon Network<br />
International<br />
Air India – 22822356/6012/<br />
9831<br />
Aeroflot - 22823765/9861<br />
Air France – 22882161/1169<br />
Gulf Air – 22477783<br />
Kuwait Airways – 22474495<br />
Royal Brunei –<br />
22292092/4464/7112/<br />
7105/2092<br />
Biman Bangladesh –<br />
22292843/2844, 22497309,<br />
25118787<br />
British Airways – 9831377470<br />
Druk Air – 224<strong>02</strong>419,<br />
22805365, 22470050<br />
Klm – 22403151/1636,<br />
25118329/8330<br />
Lufthansa – 22299365/69<br />
Qatar Airways –<br />
22298363/8370, 22208371<br />
Qantas – 22470718, 22400930,<br />
22807777<br />
Royal Jordanian – 24745091/94<br />
Royal Nepal – 22888534/8549<br />
Singapore Airlines – 22809898<br />
Swissair –<br />
22884643/<strong>02</strong>91/4644<br />
Thai Airways – 22801630/35<br />
Gmg Airlines – 29592569,<br />
30969077<br />
Domestic<br />
Indian Airlines Helpline<br />
Number – 1407 (Toll Free<br />
Helpline), From Landlines –<br />
16001801407, Enquiry Manual<br />
Airport – 25119637<br />
Enquiry Manual Airlines House<br />
– 22114433<br />
Tele Check In Airport –<br />
25119633/25118564<br />
Air Deccan – 08039008888(Toll<br />
Free), 9831677008<br />
Jet Airways –<br />
22922277/2237/2214/2813<br />
Air Sahara –<br />
22822786/8969/9075<br />
Airport Enquiry –<br />
International: 25118787,<br />
Domestic: 25118787<br />
Police<br />
STAR GOLD<br />
2.05: Arjun; 5.00: Telemall;<br />
6.00: Police Force; 8.30:<br />
Mela; 12.15: Tere Sang;<br />
15.15: Kurukshetra; 17.50:<br />
Garv: Pride and Honour;<br />
21.00: Jaan<br />
B4U MOVIES<br />
Udaan; 8:00: Khilona; 12.00:<br />
Soch; 16.00: Shree Krishna<br />
Bhakt Narsee; 20:00: 2<strong>02</strong>2<br />
Tsunami<br />
ZEE CINEMA<br />
1.10: Aghaaz; 4.00: Yuvvraaj;<br />
7.15: Purana Mandir; 10.00:<br />
Dildaar; 13.30: Prem Rog;<br />
17.20: Main Prem Ki Diwani<br />
Hoon; 21.15: Andhaa Kanoon<br />
SET MAX<br />
3.30: Aandhi; 6.30: Bawarchi;<br />
9.30: Virasat; 13.30: Beta;<br />
17.30: Ek Ajnabee; 21.00: Rab<br />
Ne Bana Di Jodi<br />
Lalbazar Control Room<br />
MOVIES ON TV<br />
� Watch Miss Congeniality<br />
at 21.00 on Movies Now<br />
STAR MOVIES<br />
11.50: Predator; 13.50:<br />
Underworld: Rise of the<br />
Lycans; 15.35: The Bourne<br />
Ultimatum; 21.00: Death<br />
Race; 23.30: Broken Arrow<br />
MOVIES NOW<br />
12.15: The Glimmer Man;<br />
14.15: Meet the Spartans;<br />
16.45: Boxer From Shantung;<br />
18.15: Fallen; 21.00: Miss<br />
Congeniality<br />
HBO<br />
10.50: Mildred Pierce; 14.10:<br />
Transporter 3; 18.40: Nancy<br />
McPhee and the Big Bang;<br />
21.00: The Hangover ; 22.50:<br />
Crocodile<br />
SONY PIX<br />
10.25: So Close; 12.30:<br />
Dracula; 16.50: The First<br />
Daughter; 21.00: DOV: Dead<br />
or Alive; 23.00: Dracula<br />
� Watch Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi<br />
at 21.00 on Set Max<br />
PBX 22505000<br />
Jorabagan 22184094,<br />
22700428<br />
Butolla 25557599, 25335579<br />
Burrabaazar 22687554, 226838<strong>02</strong><br />
Posta 22595606, 5536<br />
Jorashanko 22697279,<br />
Colleges<br />
Jadavpur University – 24735508<br />
Shyamaprasad College – 24555242<br />
South City College – 24406689<br />
Ballygunge Science College –<br />
24753680<br />
Lady Brabourne College –<br />
22448120<br />
Jogmaya Devi College – 22555242<br />
Car Problem<br />
Automobile Association<br />
Of Eastern India –<br />
24755131/3,<br />
Breakdown Services –<br />
24755131, 24768810<br />
Exide Battery Mobile<br />
Helpline –<br />
22844564/570<br />
Women’s Hostels<br />
City Working Women’s Hostel –<br />
65/C Ramakant Bose Street<br />
Shabari Ladies Hostel – 40, Mg<br />
Road<br />
Animal Helpline<br />
Compassionate Crusaders –<br />
24647030, 22104365<br />
Wildlife Control Room – 30958798
12<br />
BRIEFLY<br />
Anil Ambani to lead<br />
India-China CEO forum<br />
New Delhi: Prime Minister<br />
Manmohan Singh has<br />
cleared the names of corporate<br />
leaders of the Indian side<br />
for the India-China CEOs<br />
forum and the side would be<br />
led by ADAG chairman Anil<br />
Ambani. — PTI<br />
Maruti to start ops of<br />
2nd Manesar plant<br />
New Delhi: Maruti Suzuki<br />
India said it might start operations<br />
of the second plant in<br />
the Manesar unit within next<br />
two days, thereby advancing<br />
it by almost a month. — PTI<br />
Growth to slow down<br />
to 7pc: Deloitte<br />
New Delhi: India’s economic<br />
growth could slow down to 7<br />
per cent in the current fiscal<br />
as investment activity is<br />
likely to be reduced in the<br />
present high interest rate<br />
regime, consultancy firm<br />
Deloitte said. — PTI<br />
Anil Chaudhary<br />
appointed SAIL director<br />
Kolkata: Anil Kumar<br />
Chaudhary, 50, has taken<br />
charge as director (finance)<br />
of Steel Authority of India<br />
(SAIL). Prior to this, he was<br />
executive director (finance &<br />
accounts) at the company’s<br />
Bokaro Steel Plant. — BP<br />
METRO opens<br />
Ludhiana store<br />
Kolkata: METRO Cash &<br />
Carry India, on Thursday,<br />
launched its Ludhiana<br />
wholesale distribution centre,<br />
which will be a one-stopshop<br />
to meet all the needs of<br />
business customers in<br />
Punjab. — BP<br />
Nayak assumes charge<br />
as PGCIL CMD<br />
New Delhi: R N Nayak has<br />
taken charge as the chairman<br />
and managing director of<br />
Power Grid Corporation of<br />
India (PGCIL). — PTI<br />
Videocon d2h reaches<br />
4 million subscribers<br />
Kolkata: Just 8 months after<br />
securing its first two million<br />
customers, Videocon d2h, a<br />
provider of direct-to-home<br />
services in India, has reached<br />
four million subscribers. — BP<br />
Bazaar Kolkata unveils<br />
new scheme<br />
Kolkata: Bazaar Kolkata has<br />
launched the ‘Sone Pe<br />
Suhaaga’ scheme that gives<br />
customers a chance to win a<br />
wide range of gifts while<br />
shopping. This offer is valid<br />
till October 3, 2011. — BP<br />
Arise India holds<br />
dealers’ meet<br />
Kolkata: Arise India, a manufacturer<br />
of inverters, batteries,<br />
gas & electric geysers,<br />
pumps and R.O. systems,<br />
organised its dealers’ meet<br />
on August 25. Managing<br />
director Avinash Jain was<br />
present on the occasion. — BP<br />
Tata Photon on<br />
Rev B launched<br />
BUSINESS<br />
Kolkata: Tata Teleservices<br />
has unveiled Tata Photon on<br />
Rev B, the latest addition to<br />
the Photon family, on the<br />
CDMA platform. — BP<br />
Food inflation in double digits<br />
New Delhi: After a gap of<br />
over five months, food inflation<br />
entered the doubledigit<br />
zone at 10.05 per cent<br />
for the week ended August<br />
20, with finance minister<br />
Pranab Mukherjee describing<br />
the trend as “disturbing”<br />
and experts saying the<br />
Reserve Bank might go in for<br />
another rate hike.<br />
The weekly food inflation,<br />
measured by wholesale<br />
price index (WPI), went up<br />
from 9.80 per cent on<br />
account of expensive onion,<br />
vegetables, fruits and protein-based<br />
items.<br />
The last time food inflation<br />
crossed 10 per cent was<br />
in the week ended March<br />
12. “Food inflation has gone<br />
up... This is really disturbing.<br />
We shall have to ensure and<br />
remove the supply con-<br />
straints on food items,”<br />
Mukherjee said.<br />
As per the official data<br />
released on Thursday, prices<br />
of onion soared by 57.01 per<br />
cent year-on-year and<br />
potato rose by 13.31 per<br />
cent during the week under<br />
review.<br />
Fruits became dearer by<br />
21.58 per cent and vegetables<br />
by 15.78 on an annual<br />
basis.<br />
Prices of protein-rich<br />
items, egg, meat and fish<br />
were up 12.62 per cent<br />
while milk and cereals<br />
became dearer by 9.22 per<br />
cent and 4.64 per cent,<br />
respectively.<br />
Attributing the jump in<br />
food inflation to seasonal<br />
factors, experts opined it<br />
could again force the<br />
Reserve Bank to hike inter-<br />
Power Packed<br />
est rate during its mid-quarter<br />
monetary policy review<br />
scheduled on September 16.<br />
“With headline inflation<br />
remaining well above 9 per<br />
cent, we expect the RBI to<br />
raise key policy rates by 25<br />
basis points at its next midquarterly<br />
review,” Crisil<br />
chief economist D K Joshi<br />
said. Food items constitute<br />
about 14 per cent to the<br />
WPI.<br />
Joshi said seasonal factors<br />
like supply problems due to<br />
heavy rainfall in parts of the<br />
country are pushing up the<br />
� (L to R) MTS India president & CEO Vsevolod Rozanov, Qualcomm India &<br />
South Asia president Avneesh Agrawal and CDMA Development Group chief<br />
operating officer James Person during the launch of MBlaze Ultra in<br />
New Delhi on Thursday — PTI<br />
LIC east targets `6,700 cr<br />
first premium in 2011-12<br />
Our Bureau<br />
Kolkata: Braving its way up<br />
to hold on its commanding<br />
market share in the life<br />
insurance market in eastern<br />
India, Life Insurance<br />
Corporation’s (LIC) eastern<br />
zone is gunning for a 24 per<br />
cent growth in the first premium<br />
income in the current<br />
fiscal at `6,700 crore.<br />
Last year, while the set<br />
target was `5400 crore, the<br />
zone was able to collect<br />
`5200 crore.<br />
Addressing the media on<br />
LIC’s 55th anniversary,<br />
zonal manager, S K Roy said,<br />
“Till mid-August, we have<br />
garnered `1115 crore of new<br />
business premium, which is<br />
less than around `1,800<br />
crore mopped up<br />
during the corresponding<br />
period of the previous<br />
year”.<br />
Asked on whether the<br />
zone could achieve its budgeted<br />
target this year, Roy<br />
said, “Definitely, the main<br />
business picks up during<br />
the fourth quarter and we<br />
are confident of achieving<br />
it. Last year was exceptional<br />
as significant sales happened<br />
and three of the popular<br />
plans including Wealth<br />
Plus and Market Plus 1<br />
closed down.”<br />
“We have a good bouquet<br />
of 50-odd products and the<br />
market is responding well<br />
to both the unit-linked and<br />
non unit-linked plans. Our<br />
approach will be to have a<br />
balanced view of both traditional<br />
and linked plans”, he<br />
added.<br />
It would be interesting to<br />
see how the leading life<br />
major strategises to garner<br />
the budgeted growth this<br />
year. Moreover, with the<br />
volatility in the stock market,<br />
many policy holders<br />
may choose to close their<br />
policies (the initial ulips<br />
which have three years as<br />
the lock-in period). This<br />
may have some impact on<br />
the renewal premium in<br />
general of most life insurance<br />
companies.<br />
Meanwhile on the operations<br />
side, LIC is close to<br />
completing its digitisation<br />
by end of October.<br />
LIC eastern office will<br />
take the opportunity of the<br />
LIC week to reach out to<br />
people with their various<br />
CSR activities in the form of<br />
blood donation camps,<br />
health check-ups for<br />
women and children<br />
among others.<br />
Europe rejects call for more capital<br />
Frankfurt: European bankers<br />
and politicians jumped to<br />
defend the region’s banks on<br />
Thursday, rejecting an<br />
International Monetary Fund<br />
(IMF) estimate that they need<br />
200 billion euros ($290 billion)<br />
in new capital to reflect<br />
sovereign debt losses.<br />
IMF chief Christine<br />
Lagarde’s call on Saturday for<br />
mandatory capitalisation of<br />
European banks to prevent a<br />
world recession has reignited<br />
a debate over whether they<br />
have raised sufficient capital<br />
to withstand a severe<br />
downturn.<br />
The clash highlights<br />
diverging views about the<br />
underlying safety of the<br />
European banking system.<br />
The IMF and the International<br />
Accounting Standards Board<br />
(IASB) have both voiced concerns,<br />
while European regulators,<br />
politicians and banking<br />
associations argue that banks<br />
have a sufficient capital cushion<br />
to cope with market turbulence<br />
and worries over<br />
sovereign debt after several<br />
rounds of capital raising<br />
across the continent.<br />
The IMF had estimated<br />
European banks could face a<br />
capital shortfall of 200 billion<br />
euros, a figure rejected by<br />
� LIC zonal manager S K Roy in Kolkata on Thursday<br />
— Prabir Bhattacharya<br />
European bankers and policymakers,<br />
sources said.<br />
The IMF figure is much<br />
higher than estimates of<br />
banks’ capital needs following<br />
stress tests in July.<br />
J P Morgan has estimated<br />
that based on the stress test<br />
data, European banks showed<br />
a capital deficit of 80 billion<br />
euros, with the UK banks<br />
needing 25 billion euros,<br />
French banks 20 billion euros<br />
and German lenders 14 billion<br />
euros.<br />
The European Commission<br />
reiterated it saw no need for<br />
drastic action since the publication<br />
of the stress test<br />
results, echoing comments<br />
made by the European<br />
Banking Authority on<br />
Tuesday.<br />
“Our analysis of the situation<br />
hasn’t changed. It is in<br />
fact shared by the member<br />
states. We did have an indepth<br />
discussion when the<br />
results of the stress tests for<br />
banks were presented and<br />
there is no reason to change it<br />
now,” European Commission<br />
spokesman Amadeu Altafaj<br />
told a regular briefing.<br />
The bank stress tests did<br />
not factor in the impact of a<br />
significant drop in the value<br />
of sovereign debt. — Reuters<br />
food inflation.<br />
He, however, said as monsoon<br />
has been good so far,<br />
prices of vegetables may<br />
come down in coming days.<br />
Planning Commission<br />
deputy chairman Montek<br />
Singh Ahluwalia also said<br />
seasonal factors are pushing<br />
up inflation.<br />
“Inflation is a worry... If<br />
you see the data, last year at<br />
this time food prices went<br />
down and then rose again.<br />
So, I would not be surprised<br />
if prices rise a little bit,”<br />
Ahluwalia said.<br />
Overall, primary articles<br />
recorded 12.93 per cent<br />
inflation for the week ended<br />
August 20, up from 12.40<br />
per cent in the previous<br />
week. Primary articles have<br />
a share of over 20 per cent<br />
in the WPI. — PTI<br />
IBM to buy<br />
Algorithmics<br />
for $387m<br />
Bangalore: IT major IBM on<br />
Thursday said it has agreed to<br />
acquire Toronto-based risk<br />
analytics firm Algorithmics<br />
for $387 million (about<br />
`1,750 crore).<br />
The acquisition is subject to<br />
applicable regulatory clearances<br />
and other customary<br />
closing conditions. With the<br />
closing of this acquisition,<br />
approximately 900<br />
Algorithmics employees will<br />
join IBM’s software group, the<br />
IT giant said in a statement.<br />
“Combining Algorithmics’<br />
expertise with IBM’s deep<br />
analytics portfolio will allow<br />
clients to take a holistic appr -<br />
oach to managing risk and<br />
responding to economic<br />
change across their enterprises,”<br />
IBM general manager<br />
(business analytics) Rob<br />
Ashe said.<br />
Risk analytics, software,<br />
content and advisory services<br />
of Algorithmics, a member of<br />
Fitch Group, are used by banking,<br />
investment and insurance<br />
businesses to help assess risk,<br />
address regulatory requirements<br />
and make more<br />
insightful business decisions.<br />
Algorithmics’ risk analytics,<br />
software and services combined<br />
with IBM’s acquisition<br />
of OpenPages and recent<br />
investments in predictive<br />
analytics will provide clients<br />
with the broadest range of<br />
business analytics solutions,<br />
IBM said.<br />
More than 350 clients,<br />
including 25 of the top 30<br />
banks and more than twothirds<br />
of the leading insurers,<br />
use Algorithmics’ analytics<br />
software and advisory services,<br />
IBM said. The clients<br />
include The Allianz Group,<br />
BlueCrest, HSBC, Nedbank,<br />
Nomura, Societe Generale,<br />
and Scotia Capital.<br />
“Combining Algorithmics’<br />
thought leadership, technology,<br />
content and services<br />
with IBM’s globally recognised<br />
analytics business<br />
will help a broader group of<br />
clients improve their<br />
business performance based<br />
on a deeper understanding<br />
of risk,” Algorithmics president<br />
and COO Michael Zerbs<br />
said. — PTI<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Car sales see decline<br />
as the big three slide<br />
Toyota, GM, Ford, Honda buck trend, 2-wheeler sales up<br />
New Delhi: Domestic car sales in August hit<br />
road bumps with the three big automakers —<br />
Maruti Suzuki India, Hyundai Motor India<br />
and Tata Motors — posting a decline in their<br />
monthly numbers.<br />
Amid tough market conditions because of<br />
high interest rates and fuel prices, sales got<br />
further hurt for Maruti Suzuki India (MSI)<br />
due to the ongoing labour issues at its<br />
Manesar plant, affecting production. MSI said<br />
it recorded sales of 77,086 units in the<br />
domestic market last month, a 16.82 per cent<br />
fall from 92,674 units in August 2010.<br />
Hyundai Motor India (HMIL) said its sales<br />
declined 6.7 per cent to 26,677 units in<br />
August from 28,601 units in the same month<br />
last year. “The market continues to be tough<br />
and there is no sign of recovery in the immediate<br />
future. The rising fuel prices and interest<br />
rates have been instrumental in this sluggish<br />
market trend,” HMIL director (marketing<br />
and sales) Arvind Saxena said.<br />
Homegrown auto major Tata Motors’ total<br />
passenger vehicles sales in the domestic<br />
market stood at 16,829 units in August, a fall<br />
of 33.25 per cent from 25,212 units in the<br />
same month last year. Sales of Nano stood at<br />
1,2<strong>02</strong> units, down 85 per cent, the company<br />
said.<br />
Some other manufacturers, including<br />
Toyota Kirloskar Motor (TKM) and General<br />
Motors India, reported an increase in sales on<br />
the back of new models. TKM said its August<br />
sales zoomed 83.82 per cent to 11,693 units,<br />
Exports jump 82pc<br />
to $29 bn in July<br />
New Delhi: Exports surged<br />
by 81.79 per cent to $29.3 billion<br />
in July despite uncertain<br />
economic conditions in the<br />
US and Europe. Shipments<br />
stood at $16.14 billion in the<br />
year-ago period.<br />
Imports too jumped 51.5<br />
per cent to $40.4 billion in<br />
July against 26.6 billion in<br />
the same period last year,<br />
leaving a trade deficit of $11<br />
billion, the commerce ministry<br />
said in a statement on<br />
Thursday.<br />
Engineering, petroleum<br />
products and gems and jewelery<br />
exports were worth<br />
$8.7 billion, $4.6 billion and<br />
$3.5 billion, respectively, the<br />
statement said.<br />
Oil imports were valued at<br />
$11.44 billion, an increase of<br />
37.<strong>02</strong> per cent over the same<br />
period last year. Non-oil<br />
imports too grew 58.12 per<br />
cent to $28.98 billion from<br />
$18.32 billion in July 2010.<br />
Overseas shipments in<br />
June this year were worth<br />
$29.2 billion, a robust<br />
growth of 46.4 per cent yearon-year.<br />
Imports too grew by<br />
42.4 per cent to $36.9 billion.<br />
However, commerce secretary<br />
Rahul Khullar had<br />
recently said the high export<br />
growth rate is unlikely to<br />
sustain in coming months<br />
due to uncertainty in the US<br />
and European economies.<br />
“Exports have done well...<br />
But my sense is that it (high<br />
export growth) is not going<br />
to sustain. It is simply not<br />
sustainable. We should see<br />
August-September growth<br />
rates slipping.”<br />
Uncertain economic con-<br />
Fieo warns of<br />
slowdown<br />
Making a Point<br />
The umbrella body of<br />
exports, Federation of<br />
Indian Export Organ -<br />
isations (Fieo) has hailed<br />
the robust export numbers<br />
for July but cautioned<br />
that the industry might<br />
not be able to sustain high<br />
growth in the face of<br />
global uncertainties and<br />
rising interest rates in the<br />
domestic context. “The<br />
growth of 81 per cent in<br />
exports, on a not-so-low<br />
base of July 2010, is unh -<br />
eard of in the recent history,”<br />
Fieo president<br />
Ramu S Deora said in a<br />
statement. He cautioned<br />
about the challenges in<br />
view of global developments<br />
which cannot be<br />
ignored as they will have<br />
serious bearings on<br />
exports in next 2 quarters.<br />
ditions in the US and Europe<br />
are likely to hit global<br />
demand. Together, these<br />
countries account for about<br />
35 per cent of Indian exports.<br />
During the April-July<br />
period, exports grew by<br />
53.98 per cent to $108.34 billion<br />
from $70.36 billion during<br />
the corresponding period<br />
previous year.<br />
During the first four<br />
months of the fiscal, imports<br />
grew by 40 per cent to $151<br />
billion. The trade deficit during<br />
the period stood at $42.6<br />
billion. — PTI<br />
driven by a robust demand for utility vehicle<br />
Innova and its latest products, Etios’ and Liva.<br />
General Motors India posted a growth of 14<br />
per cent at 9,050 units, led by good response<br />
for Chevrolet Beat Diesel.<br />
Mahindra & Mahindra said its domestic<br />
sales rose by 31.09 per cent at 35,756 units<br />
during the month compared to 27,275 units<br />
in the year-ago period.<br />
Ford India said its overall sales grew 9 per<br />
cent at 8,914 units, benefitting from new<br />
Fiesta and compact car Figo.<br />
Volkswagen said it sold 6,091 units in India<br />
during the month, a growth of 72 per cent<br />
over the same month last year.<br />
Honda Siel Cars India reported a 25 per<br />
cent growth in August at 6,907 units.<br />
In the two-wheeler segment, market<br />
leader Hero MotoCorp reported 18.61 per<br />
cent jump in its total sales for August at<br />
5,03,654 units. TVS Motor Company also<br />
posted a 14 per cent growth in sales to<br />
1,94,898 units, while India Yamaha Motor<br />
reported a 29.64 per cent increase in total<br />
sales to 39,490 units.<br />
Shyam Group<br />
seeks coal<br />
support<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Burdwan: Shyam Group of<br />
Industries wants coal support<br />
from the government in order<br />
to complete the first phase of<br />
its plant at Jamuria in the<br />
Burdwan district of West<br />
Bengal.<br />
“Coal is the basic raw material<br />
for any steel plant, at<br />
present we procure coal from<br />
the Trans Damodar coal mine,<br />
but it can only supply 10 per<br />
cent of our requirement,<br />
however we are expecting<br />
things to shape up by<br />
November 2011,” said<br />
Bhushan Agarwal, vice-chairman<br />
& managing director,<br />
Shyam Group, here on<br />
Thursday. Its annual coal<br />
requirement is around 3 million<br />
tonne.<br />
The company has already<br />
invested about `700 crore in<br />
the first phase and aims to<br />
complete it by 2013. “The<br />
total investment for the phase<br />
will be around `1500 crore<br />
and around 30 per cent of the<br />
funding will come from<br />
equity and the balance from<br />
debt,” said Aggarwal. The<br />
company targets to finish the<br />
entire project by 2016.<br />
Production capa<strong>city</strong> after<br />
the first phase will be 3.5 lakh<br />
tonne. It will produce around<br />
1.1 million tonne once the<br />
entire project is over.<br />
Shyam Group expects a<br />
year-on-year growth of 20<br />
per cent.<br />
“We are also going to set up<br />
plants in Bihar, Guwahati and<br />
Siliguri for which the total<br />
investment is around `1,200<br />
crore,” said Aggarwal.<br />
� Paul Bulcke (second from left), CEO of Nestle SA, shows a product to Swiss economy minister Johann<br />
Schneider-Ammann (second from right) and Kurt Schmidt (R), head of Nestle nutrition, after the<br />
inauguration of a new production unit in Konolfingen near Bern on Thursday — Reuters
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com BUSINESS 13<br />
Bids soon to deconstruct Santaldih units<br />
Madhumita Mookerji<br />
Kolkata: West Bengal Power Development<br />
Corporation (WBPDCL) will soon float tenders<br />
seeking proposals for deconstruction of<br />
its existing four units of 80 mega watt (MW)<br />
each at Santaldih to make space for the construction<br />
of a single 800-MW super-critical<br />
power plant.<br />
A highly placed source in the West Bengal<br />
power department told The Bengal Post: “We<br />
will float tenders in one or two months, seeking<br />
proposals for the deconstruction of the<br />
four units.”<br />
The source also said work on construction<br />
of the new thermal power project is not<br />
likely to start before at least one year.<br />
Though WBPDCL had been exploring<br />
options of squeezing in a second unit, the<br />
amount of land that will be available will<br />
only allow for a single unit at Santaldih. “The<br />
decommissioning of the four units, along<br />
with some additional land at WBPDCL’s disposal<br />
will add up to around 500 acres, where<br />
only one, 800 MW unit will be possible,” said<br />
the source.<br />
It will take around one year to empty out<br />
the space through the deconstruction<br />
process. Hence, construction work on the<br />
800-MW unit is not likely to start at least<br />
before one year.<br />
WBPDCL is open to various formats – public-private<br />
partnership, joint venture or even<br />
a lease model, where an investor can put in<br />
his money, set up the project and then exit<br />
after 25 years. The sources said any model is<br />
suitable as long as it is done efficiently with<br />
the least possible cost.<br />
Planning Ahead<br />
� Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia (R) and PMEAC chairman C Rangarajan<br />
releasing a report on efficient management of public expenditure, in New Delhi, on Thursday — PTI<br />
OVL to invest<br />
$1.5 billion<br />
in Iraqi oil<br />
block<br />
New Delhi: ONGC Videsh,<br />
the overseas arm of stateowned<br />
Oil and Natural Gas<br />
Corp (ONGC), is likely to<br />
invest over $1.5 billion in an<br />
Iraqi oil block that was<br />
awarded to it by the erstwhile<br />
Saddam Hussein<br />
regime.<br />
“We are nearing finality on<br />
the contract for the block-8.<br />
It is likely to be signed in the<br />
next six months,” an official<br />
said.<br />
Block-8, located in the<br />
western desert in southern<br />
Iraq bordering Saudi Arabia<br />
and Kuwait, was awarded to<br />
OVL in November 2000 by<br />
the Saddam Hussein government.<br />
However, the government<br />
formed after the US<br />
invasion of Iraq, sought renegotiation<br />
of the contract<br />
which has now been concluded.<br />
The current regime had<br />
initially agreed to sign a production<br />
sharing contract<br />
(PSC), where OVL would<br />
have got ownership of oil it<br />
produced from Block-8. But<br />
the success of post-war<br />
licensing rounds, where<br />
global majors committed to<br />
develop oilfields for a small<br />
fee, has seen Baghdad<br />
change track and offer a<br />
service contract to OVL.<br />
The block already has<br />
a discovery and is estimated<br />
to hold 645 million barrels<br />
of in-place reserves, of<br />
which 54 million are<br />
recoverable, the official<br />
said, adding OVL has committed<br />
investing $86 million<br />
in two phases of exploration<br />
and $1.45 billion in development<br />
of the reserves thereafter.<br />
The agreement will be a<br />
service contract wherein<br />
OVL will be paid about 18 per<br />
cent rate of return on its<br />
investment.<br />
The company holds<br />
100 per cent interest in the<br />
block.<br />
“We are currently agreeing<br />
on finer details of the contract,”<br />
he said.<br />
The exploration and development<br />
contract for Block-8<br />
was signed by OVL and Oil<br />
Exploration Company of Iraq<br />
on November 28, 2000, in<br />
New Delhi. — PTI<br />
IT attrition to decline<br />
despite low wage hike<br />
Kailash Rajwadkar<br />
Mumbai: Employees of IT<br />
companies, who use to hop,<br />
skip and jump from one<br />
organisation to another, may<br />
have to restrain themselves<br />
in the next two years despite<br />
a lower hike in salaries.<br />
“Attrition rates are<br />
expected to fall in FY12.We<br />
do not expect a double-digit<br />
salary hike in FY13 by Indian<br />
IT vendors,” said Karan<br />
Taurani, an analyst with<br />
Khandwala Securities.<br />
This will, however, provide<br />
a cushion to the EBIT (earnings<br />
before interest and tax)<br />
margin of the companies.<br />
“We expect a lower wage<br />
hike for employees in FY13<br />
as the demand in FY12 and<br />
FY13 is not expected to be as<br />
strong as in FY11,” Taurani<br />
said.<br />
In the past few years,<br />
higher attrition was wit-<br />
Factories falter as orders fade<br />
London/Singapore: Factory activity<br />
worldwide stalled last month as new<br />
orders tumbled, a series of surveys<br />
showed on Thursday, heightening fears<br />
that the global economy may be heading<br />
for another recession.<br />
The purchasing managers’ indexes<br />
showed manufacturing activity contracted<br />
in the euro zone for the first<br />
time in almost two years in August, a<br />
similar trend had been witnessed in<br />
South Korea and Taiwan earlier.<br />
Britain’s manufacturing sector<br />
shrank at its fastest pace in over two<br />
years, hurt by a sharp drop in demand<br />
for exports.<br />
Although China’s official PMI<br />
increased slightly, its first rise since<br />
March, it also showed the effects of<br />
slowing demand in Europe and the US.<br />
HSBC’s PMI figure for China, which<br />
relies heavily on private companies<br />
than the large state-owned enterprises<br />
that dominate the government’s PMI<br />
report, showed factory activity contracted<br />
for a second consecutive month.<br />
“The key thing they show is that we<br />
are not out of the woods. The<br />
economies are very vulnerable to any<br />
shock which at this moment in time<br />
there are a few of,” said Jeavon Lolay at<br />
Lloyds Banking Group.<br />
“What is happening in the euro zone<br />
is very important and in the US growth<br />
has weakened markedly in the last two<br />
nessed primarily on the back<br />
of high demand for laterals<br />
(experienced employees) as<br />
a large number of transformational<br />
deals were signed<br />
by Indian IT vendors. Higher<br />
demand for discretionary IT<br />
spend also pushed attrition<br />
rates. “As a result, going forward,<br />
we expect attrition to<br />
dip in near term on the back<br />
of a moderate growth environment<br />
and lower demand<br />
for laterals,” Taurani said.<br />
“In 2010, there was no<br />
wage hike as companies<br />
were recovering from the<br />
global economic turmoil in<br />
the preceding year. Hence,<br />
the hike in 2011 was after a<br />
gap of one year. As things<br />
consolidate, wages are likely<br />
to see a process of stabilisation,”<br />
said Arun Jain, chairman<br />
and CEO, Polaris<br />
Software Lab.<br />
Attrition surged in 2011<br />
despite a high salary hike<br />
quarters. There is a risk of a return to<br />
recession.”<br />
Markit’s euro zone manufacturing<br />
PMI fell to 49.0 in August from 50.4 in<br />
July, revised down from a preliminary<br />
49.7, the first time since September<br />
2009 that the index for the sector,<br />
which drove a large part of the bloc’s<br />
recovery, has fallen below the 50 mark<br />
that divides growth from contraction.<br />
In a worrying sign for policymakers,<br />
the slowdown appears to be spreading.<br />
German factories, which have been<br />
supporting growth in the bloc, eased off<br />
the accelerator and French manufacturing<br />
contracted for the first time since<br />
July 2009.<br />
Around `4,400 crore of investment will be<br />
required for a single 800-MW unit, computed<br />
at the rate of `5.5 crore per mega watt.<br />
Where the controversial Katwa power<br />
given by all the top tier<br />
Indian IT vendors since<br />
demand had witnessed an<br />
uptick, analysts said.<br />
In the April-June period,<br />
Tata Consultancy Services<br />
witnessed an attrition rate of<br />
14.8 per cent compared with<br />
14.4 per cent in the preceding<br />
quarter.<br />
As fears of an economic<br />
slowdown grows,<br />
Khandwala Securities has<br />
cut its revenue estimates for<br />
2011-12 and 2012-13 by 5<br />
per cent and 10 per cent,<br />
respectively, for top IT vendors.<br />
The company, however,<br />
maintains a positive outlook<br />
for the IT sector.<br />
In August, the Bombay<br />
Stock Exchange IT index was<br />
down 13.6 per cent while the<br />
Sensex was down 9.2 per<br />
cent. The IT index has been<br />
witnessing a fall since S&P<br />
downgraded the US credit<br />
rating.<br />
Factory activity worldwide<br />
stalled last month as new<br />
orders tumbled, stoking<br />
fears of another recession<br />
WBPDCL is open to various<br />
formats – public-private<br />
partnership, joint venture<br />
or even a lease model<br />
JSPL open to<br />
buy-outs to<br />
“The West’s deteriorating growth<br />
outlook is becoming an increasingly<br />
heavy burden to bear,” said Donna<br />
Kwok, an economist with HSBC, which<br />
sponsors PMI reports in many Asian<br />
countries.<br />
Weak growth in the US and Europe<br />
has revived worries they will slip back<br />
into recession, which would deal a<br />
heavy blow to Asia’s export-driven<br />
economies.<br />
Most advanced economies have<br />
already cut interest rates to near zero,<br />
and with government finances constrained,<br />
policymakers have limited<br />
options for spurring stronger growth.<br />
The European Central Bank, the<br />
Federal Reserve and the Bank of<br />
England are all seen retaining their<br />
ultra-loose monetary policy for at least<br />
another year. That leaves the big emerging<br />
economies as the best hope for<br />
propping up global growth but they are<br />
also struggling.<br />
Brazil’s central bank slashed its key<br />
interest rate to 12 per cent from 12.5 per<br />
cent on Wednesday in a shock decision<br />
that it said reflects a mounting global<br />
slowdown as well as weaker growth in<br />
Latin America’s largest economy.<br />
“Asian growth is set to slow more<br />
sharply than most expect over the coming<br />
months,” Credit Suisse economist<br />
Robert Prior-Wandesforde wrote in a<br />
note to clients. — Reuters<br />
project is concerned, the source said no decision<br />
has been taken yet on the additional 500<br />
acres that NTPC requires for setting up the<br />
project.<br />
NTPC, the country’s largest power producer,<br />
is slated to develop the 1,600-MW<br />
(800X2) thermal power plant at Katwa but it<br />
has made it clear that it will go ahead only<br />
after the entire quantum of land required for<br />
the project is in place.<br />
At present, around 600 acres are in possession<br />
of the West Bengal Power Development<br />
Corporation (WBPDC). However, about an<br />
additional 500 acres are required, for which<br />
talks are on with the state government. The<br />
source said: “No decision has been taken on<br />
the additional land but there’s an option that<br />
NTPC itself could procure this additional<br />
quantum.”<br />
R-Cap, Nippon to<br />
drive growth explore tie-up<br />
Mumbai/Tokyo: Expanding<br />
New Delhi: Naveen Jindalled<br />
Jindal Steel and Power<br />
(JSPL) on Thursday said it is<br />
not averse to acquisitions to<br />
drive growth even as its<br />
$10.9-billion capa<strong>city</strong> expansion<br />
plans are underway.<br />
“Lot of expansions are<br />
going on. However, we are<br />
open to right kind of steel<br />
plant for acquisition,” deputy<br />
managing director Sushil<br />
Maroo said when asked<br />
whether JSPL would follow<br />
suit of subsidiary Jindal<br />
Power, which has recently<br />
evinced interest for acquisition<br />
in generation space.<br />
Maroo, however, declined<br />
to divulge if JSPL was currently<br />
considering any steel<br />
plant acquisition or has it<br />
any war-chest ready for<br />
making such a move.<br />
JSPL was approached by<br />
the then Ispat Industries of<br />
Mittals, but it turned down<br />
the offer when Naveen’s<br />
elder brother Sajjan started<br />
making serious efforts to buy<br />
the firm.<br />
JSPL had acquired Shadeed<br />
Iron and Steel of Oman last<br />
year. The company has also<br />
got development rights for El<br />
Mutun Iron Ore Reserves in<br />
Bolivia, which has around 20<br />
billion tonne reserve.<br />
JSPL plans to set up a 1.7<br />
mtpa steel plant in that<br />
country.<br />
JSPL operates a 3 mtpa<br />
plant at Raigarh in<br />
Chhattisgarh. — PTI<br />
Sony eyes 30pc turnover growth<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
Kolkata: Sony India, a major<br />
player in the consumer electronics<br />
market, is aiming at a<br />
30 per cent growth in<br />
turnover in 2011-12. It also<br />
expects to notch up business<br />
worth around `2,000 crore<br />
in the festive season with<br />
nearly `245 crore likely to<br />
come from the eastern<br />
region.<br />
“We expect our turnover<br />
to grow 30 per cent, at<br />
around `7,000 crore in the<br />
current fiscal from `5,500<br />
crore last year,” Sunil Nayyar,<br />
its partnership with Nippon<br />
Life, Reliance Capital on<br />
Thursday signed a deal for<br />
exploring stake sale in its<br />
mutual fund and other businesses<br />
to the Japanese major,<br />
to which it has already sold<br />
26 per cent equity in the life<br />
insurance venture.<br />
A memorandum of understanding<br />
(MoU) was signed<br />
on Thursday in Tokyo<br />
between Reliance Capital (R-<br />
Cap) chairman Anil Ambani<br />
and Nippon Life president<br />
Yoshinobu Tsutsui for<br />
strengthening the business<br />
relationship between the<br />
two companies.<br />
Earlier this year, Nippon<br />
Life had signed a definitive<br />
agreement for acquiring a 26<br />
per cent stake in Reliance<br />
Life Insurance for `3,062<br />
crore. The deal is currently<br />
awaiting regulatory and<br />
other approvals.<br />
The MoU would entail<br />
Nippon Life evaluating various<br />
collaboration opportunities,<br />
including strategic partnership,<br />
across all Reliance<br />
Capital-promoted financial<br />
businesses, including mutual<br />
fund, the company said in a<br />
statement.<br />
After signing the MoU,<br />
Anil Ambani said, “Nippon<br />
Life has already agreed to be<br />
our partner in the life insurance<br />
business, and we see<br />
great potential to work<br />
together across our other<br />
senior general manager,<br />
sales, Sony India, said.<br />
“Our national sales target<br />
during the festive season<br />
(August-October) is around<br />
`2,000 crore, which will be a<br />
growth of 35 per cent over<br />
last year. With Durga Puja<br />
round the corner, we hope to<br />
garner sales of `245 crore<br />
from the eastern region, a 48<br />
per cent growth over the corresponding<br />
period last year,”<br />
Nayyar said, adding that<br />
Durga Puja contributes<br />
nearly 35 per cent of the<br />
company’s total sales from<br />
the eastern region.<br />
financial services businesses.”<br />
Nippon Life’s Yoshinobu<br />
Tsutsui said, “We are<br />
delighted to have an opportunity<br />
to expand our relationship<br />
with Reliance, one<br />
of the most respected business<br />
groups in India.”<br />
Nippon Life is a 122-yearold<br />
Fortune 100 company,<br />
ranked as the seventh largest<br />
life insurer in the world and<br />
the single-largest private life<br />
insurer in Asia and Japan.<br />
Its deal with Reliance Life<br />
pegged the total valuation of<br />
the Indian insurer at about<br />
`11,500 crore ($2.6 billion).<br />
In addition to life insurance,<br />
R-Cap, the financial<br />
services arm of Anil Ambaniled<br />
conglomerate, has interest<br />
in an array of financial<br />
sector businesses.<br />
These include mutual<br />
funds, general insurance,<br />
commercial finance, broking,<br />
investment banking, wealth<br />
management, distribution of<br />
financial products,<br />
exchanges, private equity,<br />
asset reconstruction, among<br />
other financial services. — PTI<br />
The company has laid out<br />
a sales plan for the eastern<br />
market, which contributes<br />
nearly 12 per cent to its overall<br />
sales. It plans to sell<br />
around 60,000 units of<br />
LCDs/LEDs, 70,000 units of<br />
cameras and 15,000 units of<br />
laptops in the eastern region<br />
during the festivities.<br />
With brands like Bravia,<br />
Cyber-shot and Vaio under<br />
its umbrella, Sony has a market<br />
share of 40 per cent, 45<br />
per cent and 15 per cent in<br />
the TVs, cameras and laptop<br />
segments, which it plans to<br />
take up to 45 per cent, 47 per<br />
Face Value<br />
Oil retailers<br />
slash jet<br />
fuel prices<br />
New Delhi: For the second<br />
time in a month, stateowned<br />
oil firms on Thursday<br />
cut prices of jet fuel, or<br />
ATF, in line with softening<br />
of rates in the international<br />
markets.<br />
Aviation turbine fuel (ATF)<br />
prices at Delhi’s T3 airport<br />
was cut by `429 per kilolitre<br />
(kl), or 0.75 per cent, to<br />
`56,260 per kl, an official of<br />
Indian Oil Corp, the nation’s<br />
largest fuel retailer, said.<br />
Prior to this, the companies<br />
on August 16 cut jet fuel<br />
rates by `1,156 per kl or<br />
about 2 per cent.<br />
Jet fuel makes up for 40<br />
per cent of an airlines’ operating<br />
cost.<br />
ATF in Mumbai, home to<br />
the nation’s busiest airport,<br />
will cost `446 per kl less at<br />
`56,978 per kl from<br />
Thursday as against the old<br />
price of `57,424 per kl.<br />
No comment could be<br />
immediately obtained from<br />
airlines on the impact of the<br />
price reduction on passenger<br />
fares.<br />
ATF prices vary from airport<br />
to airport, depending on<br />
the local sales tax or VAT.<br />
IOC and its sister public<br />
sector retailers, Hindustan<br />
Petroleum Corp (HPCL) and<br />
Bharat Petroleum Corp<br />
(BPCL), revise jet fuel prices<br />
on the 1st and 16th of every<br />
month, based on the average<br />
international price in the<br />
preceding fortnight. — PTI<br />
cent and 20 per cent, respectively,<br />
during this peak<br />
period.<br />
“Over the same period last<br />
year, from the eastern region<br />
alone we expect a growth of<br />
88 per cent in LCDs/LEDs, 62<br />
per cent in cameras and a<br />
100 per cent growth in laptops,”<br />
Nayyar added.<br />
The company has<br />
increased its marketing<br />
investment towards abovethe-line<br />
(ATL) and belowthe-line<br />
(BTL) activities during<br />
Durga Puja to `15 crore<br />
compared with `11 crore<br />
spent last year.<br />
� A model poses with Sony Tablet P (R) and S at a promotional event in Tokyo, on<br />
Thursday. Sony’s new tablet computers failed to excite gadget reviewers and<br />
analysts who criticised the pricing and quality of the devices, underscoring the<br />
battle Sony faces regaining its consumer electronics crown — Reuters
14<br />
SPORT<br />
Short<br />
Takes<br />
India can rise to<br />
No. 2 in rankings<br />
Dubai: They have lost the tag<br />
of the No. 1 Test team but<br />
injury-ravaged world champions<br />
India can climb to second<br />
in the ICC ODI rankings if<br />
they manage to beat England<br />
4-1 or better in the upcoming<br />
five-match series starting<br />
on Saturday.<br />
Claudius hospitalised<br />
with abdominal pain<br />
Kolkata: Hockey Olympian<br />
Leslie Claudius has been<br />
admitted to a <strong>city</strong> hospital<br />
with severe abdominal pain<br />
on Thursday. However, the<br />
doctors said the 84-year-old’s<br />
condition is stable.<br />
Bagchi gifts tickets to<br />
U-19 squad<br />
Kolkata: The Prayag United<br />
football secretary, Avik<br />
Bagchi, has given tickets for<br />
the coveted Argentina-<br />
Venezuela friendly to all<br />
members of the club’s U-19<br />
squad.<br />
Robinho out of Brazil’s<br />
friendly with Ghana<br />
Rio de Janeiro: AC Milan forward<br />
Robinho has been withdrawn<br />
from the Brazil squad<br />
to face Ghana in a friendly in<br />
London next week because of<br />
a groin injury, the Brazilian<br />
Football Confederation (CBF)<br />
said on Wednesday. “Milan’s<br />
medical department sent the<br />
Brazilian national team’s<br />
medical department the tests<br />
that show the player’s injury,”<br />
CBF said in a statement on its<br />
website www.cbf.com.br.<br />
Zaragoza buy Portugal<br />
striker Postiga<br />
Lisbon: La Liga team Real<br />
Zaragoza signed Portugal<br />
striker Helder Postiga from<br />
Sporting for one million<br />
euros ($1.44 million) on<br />
Wednesday. The Portuguese<br />
club also said the transfer fee<br />
could double.<br />
Atletico take Brazilian<br />
Diego on loan<br />
Madrid: Atletico Madrid have<br />
agreed to sign Brazil playmaker<br />
Diego on loan from<br />
VfL Wolfsburg, the Spanish<br />
club said on Wednesday. The<br />
26-year-old made his name<br />
during a three-year spell with<br />
Werder Bremen before<br />
Juventus bought him in 2009.<br />
Das wins bronze in<br />
taekwondo<br />
Kolkata: Class XI student<br />
Probal Das won bronze medal<br />
in the U-78kg category for<br />
Bengal in the 31st National<br />
Taekwondo Championship at<br />
Harivansh Tana Bhagat Indoor<br />
Stadium in Ranchi from<br />
August 25-28. It was organised<br />
by the Jharkhand<br />
Taekwondo Association under<br />
the aegis of Taekwondo<br />
Federation of India.<br />
Aditi beats Smriti<br />
to title<br />
Bangalore: Amateur Aditi<br />
Ashok made up for her loss in<br />
the first leg, beating veteran<br />
Smriti Mehra on the first playoff<br />
hole to win the third and<br />
final leg of Southern Swing in<br />
the Hero Women’s Profess -<br />
ional Golf Tour on Thursday.<br />
Ghana cleared to take<br />
part in 2012 Games<br />
Berlin: Ghana has been<br />
cleared to compete in next<br />
year’s London Olympics after<br />
the government took steps to<br />
amend a controversial sports<br />
law, the International Olympic<br />
Committee said on Thursday.<br />
Top seed Sinha ousted<br />
by Prabodh<br />
Chennai: Karnataka’s Suraj R<br />
Prabodh put paid to the aspirations<br />
of top seed Vishwesh<br />
Sinha of Punjab 7-5, 6-3 to<br />
progress to the boys’ semi-final<br />
of the Adidas MCC National<br />
Junior Clay Court tennis championship<br />
here on Thursday.<br />
Verma, Sindhu<br />
inducted in squad<br />
Mumbai: Sameer Verma, a silver<br />
medallist at the Asian<br />
Junior Championships, and P<br />
V Sindhu have been named in<br />
the 7-boy and 6-girl squad for<br />
the World Junior Badminton<br />
Championships in October.<br />
— Our Correspondent & Agencies<br />
England remain unbeaten<br />
Manchester: There was no<br />
end to India’s misery in what<br />
has turned out to be an<br />
abysmal tour of England as<br />
they went down by six wickets<br />
in their one off Twenty20<br />
International, paying the<br />
price for yet another stunning<br />
batting collapse here.<br />
Debutant Ajinkya Rahane<br />
shone with the bat with a 39ball<br />
61 but the Indians lost<br />
nine wickets in the final eight<br />
overs to be restricted to 165 in<br />
19.3 overs. The visitors rode<br />
Eoin Morgan’s quickfire 49 to<br />
chase down the target in 19.3<br />
overs on Wednesday.<br />
Morgan, who struck 49 off<br />
27 balls, was the hero of<br />
England’s chase, striking<br />
seven fours and a six while<br />
Ravi Bopara chipped in with a<br />
useful 31 to ensure that the<br />
hosts maintained their dominance<br />
over the hapless visitors.<br />
Morgan put on 73 runs<br />
for the fourth wicket with<br />
Bopara off only 49 balls to<br />
lead England to a comprehensive<br />
victory despite Rahane’s<br />
61 off 39 balls. Jade Dernbach<br />
(4/22) and captain Stuart<br />
Broad (2/37) helped the hosts<br />
with a flurry of wickets as the<br />
visitors scored only 61 runs,<br />
losing nine wickets in the final<br />
eight overs.<br />
Thirty-three of these runs<br />
were scored by Suresh Raina,<br />
who marked Tim Bresnan and<br />
Broad for special attention,<br />
smashing them for three sixes,<br />
as he took only 19 balls for his<br />
cameo. The hosts, who won<br />
the Test series 4-0, gave<br />
Indians a lesson in Twenty20<br />
cricket as well, scoring their<br />
runs with a mix of defence and<br />
attack. The visitors, in contrast,<br />
appeared to play to the gallery<br />
and largely got their runs in<br />
fours and sixes — as many as<br />
92 of 165 came off boundaries.<br />
England lost debutant Alex<br />
Hales (0) to Praveen Kumar<br />
off only the second ball of the<br />
innings but the experienced<br />
Kevin Pietersen gave impetus<br />
to the innings with a strokefilled<br />
33 off 23 balls with five<br />
fours. Pietersen and opener<br />
Craig Kieswetter (18) guided<br />
England to 54 for one in the<br />
Powerplay but then the hosts<br />
lost both of them in the space<br />
of three runs to bring the<br />
match back on an even keel.<br />
Kieswetter offered a simple<br />
catch at short cover and<br />
Pietersen was stumped off<br />
the first ball by Virat Kohli.<br />
Morgan then seized back<br />
the initiative with 17 runs off<br />
Rohit Sharma in the ninth<br />
over of the innings, slamming<br />
the part-time off-spinner for<br />
two fours and a massive six<br />
over mid-on. England were<br />
90 for three at the end of the<br />
10th over. They took two balls<br />
more than India did for their<br />
Zimbabweans ride<br />
Mawoyo’s 82 n.o.<br />
Bulawayo: Rookie opener<br />
Tinotenda Mawoyo produced<br />
a masterclass in concentration<br />
as Zimbabwe reached 245 for<br />
four at the close of the first day<br />
of the one-off Test against<br />
Pakistan at Queens Sports Club<br />
here on Thursday.<br />
Mawoyo, playing in only his<br />
second Test, batted right<br />
through the day, scoring an<br />
unbeaten and unruffled 82 —<br />
his maiden half-century —<br />
after occupying the crease for<br />
six hours and 21 minutes. He<br />
faced 213 balls and struck 10<br />
fours. He also figured in three<br />
significant partnerships as<br />
Zimbabwe looked to carry on<br />
where they left off when they<br />
beat Bangladesh in Harare last<br />
month. But all of the<br />
Zimbabwe batsmen had to<br />
contend with a box full of<br />
tricks from Pakistan off-spinner<br />
Saeed Ajmal, who took<br />
three of the four wickets to fall<br />
as the home batsmen struggled<br />
to pick his doosra.<br />
Pakistan captain Misbah-ul<br />
Haq made the contentious<br />
decision to bowl first after winning<br />
the toss. He pointed to<br />
some green on the pitch and<br />
100 runs — 68 balls to India’s<br />
66 balls. Morgan played a<br />
sensible knock but departed<br />
unhappily as he believed<br />
Rohit Sharma at point hadn’t<br />
caught him cleanly off Munaf<br />
Patel. But after Morgan<br />
departed at 134 for four in the<br />
16th over, the hosts needed<br />
just 32 off 29 balls. Bopara<br />
and Samit Patel (25) then ran<br />
briskly between the wickets<br />
and hit the odd boundaries to<br />
bring the equation to 13 from<br />
the final two overs.<br />
Munaf Patel bowled the<br />
penultimate over, a brilliant<br />
effort as he conceded only<br />
three runs from the over.<br />
Needing 10 off the final over,<br />
bowled by Vinay Kumar, the<br />
first delivery was a wide and<br />
the next three were hit for<br />
fours by Patel as England<br />
reached home with three<br />
balls to spare.<br />
Earlier, the young Rahane<br />
announced himself onto<br />
international stage in blazing<br />
style and Raina exacted his<br />
revenge. The Mumbai opener<br />
had the packed stands in raptures<br />
as he produced almost<br />
every stroke in the book to<br />
rattle up 61 off 39 balls with<br />
eight fours in his maiden<br />
innings in international<br />
cricket. Brought in as replacement<br />
of Virender Sehwag earlier<br />
this week, Rahane gave<br />
India a quick start of 39 from<br />
four-odd overs with Parthiv<br />
Patel (10) and reached his<br />
half-century off only 29 balls<br />
with as many as eight fours.<br />
England’s pace trio of<br />
Bresnan, Jade Dernbach and<br />
captain Broad tried to intimidate<br />
the young right-hander<br />
with short-pitched deliveries<br />
but nearly every such attempt<br />
was met with a ferocious pull<br />
or hook by the right-hander.<br />
Patel got the innings going<br />
with a good-looking backfoot<br />
drive through covers off<br />
Bresnan, but thereafter,<br />
Rahane took over and hit<br />
boundaries at will. He began<br />
with a lofted cut over covers<br />
off Dernbach and then twice<br />
pulled short deliveries from<br />
Bresnan and Broad. — PTI<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Lyon king tames<br />
Lankan lions<br />
Galle: Unheralded Australian<br />
debutant Nathan Lyon took a<br />
stunning five for 34, including<br />
a wicket off his first ball as the<br />
Sri Lankan batsmen capitulated<br />
in the dramatic first Test<br />
in Galle on Thursday.<br />
Sixteen wickets fell on the<br />
dusty, deteriorating track during<br />
an eventful second day’s<br />
play which ended with the<br />
tourists enjoying a commanding<br />
lead of 283 runs with four<br />
wickets in hand. Seamer<br />
Shane Watson claimed three<br />
wickets in 10 balls and<br />
another newcomer Trent<br />
Copeland struck in his first<br />
over as Australia, restricted to<br />
273 on the first day, skittled<br />
Sri Lanka out for 105 by tea.<br />
In the second innings, the<br />
Australians also found runs<br />
hard to come by, collapsing to<br />
115 for six when bad light<br />
forced stumps to be drawn.<br />
The tourists lost Watson first<br />
ball and former captain Ricky<br />
Ponting for four, before skipper<br />
Michael Clarke (60) and<br />
Michael Hussey (15) put on 49<br />
for the fourth wicket. Left-arm<br />
spinner Rangana Herath<br />
spiced up the contest further<br />
when he removed both batsmen<br />
in two balls and dismissed<br />
Brad Haddin in his<br />
next over as Australia slipped<br />
from 110/3 to 112/6. Usman<br />
Khawaja was unbeaten on two<br />
and Mitchell Johnson on three<br />
as Australia look to turn the<br />
screws on the hosts when play<br />
resumes on Friday. Opener<br />
Tharanga Paranavitana’s 29<br />
was Sri Lanka’s top score as<br />
the last seven wickets fell for<br />
just 18 runs.<br />
Off-spinner Lyon never<br />
looked back after removing<br />
Kumar Sangakkara with his<br />
first delivery in Test cricket —<br />
the first Australian in 117 years<br />
to achieve the feat. Brought on<br />
after the morning drinks<br />
break, the 23-year-old had<br />
Sangakkara edging the first<br />
USA mine gold in Daegu, Britain get off mark<br />
Daegu: The USA flexed their muscles at<br />
the world athletics championships on<br />
Thursday, harvesting three of the six titles<br />
on offer, while Britain finally won an elusive<br />
gold medal in Daegu.<br />
Kenya extended their dominance of the<br />
men’s steeplechase and celebrated with<br />
some joyous theatrics on the track afterwards<br />
and double-amputee Oscar<br />
Pistorius produced another momentous<br />
achievement, Lashinda Demus in the 400<br />
metres hurdles, 1,500 metres runner Jenny<br />
Simpson and high jumper Jesse Williams<br />
lifted the USA to the top of the medals<br />
table on a glittering night for the<br />
Americans.<br />
Although Simpson’s winning time of<br />
four minutes 05.40 seconds was the slowest<br />
to win a world title, her triumph left<br />
her euphoric. She crossed the line wideeyed<br />
and holding her head after leading<br />
home Britain’s Hannah England and<br />
Spaniard Natalia Rodriguez.<br />
“I am supposed to say I am not surprised,”<br />
Simpson said. “All I can say is that<br />
a dream has come true. Absolutely there<br />
will be a big celebration tonight — I guess I<br />
will not sleep for the next (few) nights.”<br />
Demus ran 52.47 seconds in the 400<br />
metres hurdles, beating defending champion<br />
Melaine Walker of Jamaica into silver<br />
with Russian Natalya Antyukh bronze.<br />
� England’s Jade Dernbach celebrates<br />
the dismissal of India’s M S Dhoni<br />
during the Twenty20 match<br />
at Old Trafford on Wednesday. — AFP<br />
said he was not afraid to bat<br />
last but local wisdom suggests<br />
that the pitch will be flat and<br />
slow — most captains prefer to<br />
bat first to put up a big score. It<br />
also meant Misbah pitched his<br />
own very green attack in at the<br />
deep end. With Zimbabwe<br />
making tentative steps back<br />
into Test, Pakistan have also<br />
used the tour to blood some<br />
new players — including opening<br />
bowlers Aizaz Cheema and<br />
Junaid Khan, who are both<br />
making their Test debuts. — AFP<br />
Scoreboard<br />
Zimbabwe<br />
First innings<br />
T Mawoyo batting 82<br />
V Sibanda st Akmal b Ajmal 45<br />
H Masakadza b Ajmal 11<br />
B Taylor lbw Ajmal 10<br />
T Taibu c Akmal b Sohail 44<br />
C Ervine batting 38<br />
Extras: (b-2, lb-11, nb-2) 15<br />
Total: (for 4 wkts in 90 overs) 245<br />
Fall of wkts: 1/71, 2/91, 3/111,<br />
4/176<br />
Bowling: Sohail 17-7-42-1,<br />
Cheema 15-7-48-0, Junaid 21-<br />
12-39-0, Ajmal 29-6-75-3,<br />
Hafeez 8-1-28-0<br />
Luka qualifies for<br />
800m semi-finals<br />
Daegu (South Korea): India’s Tintu<br />
Luka made it to the women’s 800m<br />
semi-finals but shot putter Om<br />
Prakash Karhana was eliminated in<br />
the qualifying round of the World<br />
Athletics Championships here on<br />
Thursday. Luka clocked 2:01.89 to<br />
finish sixth in heat number four,<br />
which was enough for her to make it<br />
to Friday’s semi-finals. The 21-yearold<br />
prodigy of legendary P T Usha<br />
has a personal best timing of 1:59.17<br />
which she recorded last year during<br />
the VTB Continental Cup. — PTI<br />
Williams completed a hattrick of golds for<br />
the USA when he won the men’s high<br />
jump with his first attempt at 2.35 metres,<br />
the first USA gold in the event in 20 years.<br />
“We have a great team, with fantastic<br />
talented athletes and they know how to do<br />
well at the big dance,” USA coach Vin<br />
Lananna told reporters.<br />
In the last race on Thursday, Welsh 400<br />
metres hurdler Dai Greene broke the<br />
drought for a British track-and-field team<br />
who will be relieved to have finally got off<br />
the mark less than a year before their<br />
nation will expect them to deliver as<br />
Olympic hosts. “I’m just overwhelmed, I<br />
cannot believe it happened to me,” Greene<br />
told reporters. “I’m so happy with this victory<br />
as now I’m No. 1 in the world.”<br />
Pistorius, who runs on carbon prosthetics<br />
after his lower legs were amputated as<br />
a baby, is redefining athletic achievement<br />
at these championships and, in the scorching<br />
day session, led his 4x400 metres<br />
South African teammates to the final and a<br />
national record. “It is unbelievable to be<br />
one of four names on a list to run a<br />
national record,” the jubilant ‘Blade<br />
Runner’ told reporters.<br />
Pride, too, was written all over the face<br />
of Ezekiel Kemboi who streaked to gold<br />
in the 3,000 metres steeplechase before<br />
setting off on a lap of hip-wiggling,<br />
gyrating celebrations. Kenyans have now<br />
won nine of the 13 world steeplechase<br />
titles. “I am happy to have won,” Kemboi<br />
said, though his smile made the words<br />
redundant. “My friend Usain Bolt was<br />
not in the final and couldn’t dance so I<br />
had to do it for Usain.”<br />
Compatriot Brimin Kipruto won silver<br />
with a bitter Mahiedine Mekhissi-<br />
Benabbad bronze, the Frenchman<br />
believing Kipruto had unfairly denied<br />
him second place. — Reuters<br />
Scoreboard<br />
India<br />
P Patel c Broad b Dernbach 10<br />
A Rahane c Dernbach b Broad 61<br />
R Dravid c Morgan b Bopara 31<br />
V Kohli c K’wetter b Broad 4<br />
R Sharma st K’wetter b Swann 1<br />
S Raina c Broad b Bresnan 33<br />
M S Dhoni c Hales b Dernbach 8<br />
R Ashwin run out 4<br />
P Kumar b Dernbach 1<br />
R V Kumar not out 2<br />
M Patel c K’wetter b Dernbach 0<br />
Extras: (lb-7, w-3) 10<br />
Total: (in 19.4 overs) 165<br />
Fall of wkts: 1/39, 2/104, 3/106,<br />
4/108, 5/117, 6/158, 7/162, 8/162,<br />
9/165<br />
Bowling: Bresnan 4-0-33-1,<br />
Dern bach 3.4-0-22-4, Broad 4-0-<br />
37-2, Patel 3-0-34-0, Swann 4-0-<br />
28-1, Bopara 1-0-4-1<br />
England<br />
A Hales lbw Praveen 0<br />
C K’wetter c Raina b Vinay 18<br />
K Pietersen st Dhoni b Kohli 33<br />
E Morgan c Rohit b Munaf 49<br />
R Bopara not out 31<br />
S Patel not out 25<br />
Extras: (lb-7, w-6) 13<br />
Total: (for 4 wkts in 19.3 overs)166<br />
Fall of wkts: 1/0, 2/58, 3/61,<br />
4/134<br />
Bowling: Praveen 4-0-27-1,<br />
Vinay 3.3-0-35-0, Patel 4-0-25-2,<br />
Ashwin 4-0-37-0, Kohli 3-0-22-1<br />
Rohit 1-0-16-0<br />
MoM: Jade Dernbach<br />
Federer cruises, Venus quits<br />
New York: Third seed Roger<br />
Federer rolled into the third<br />
round of the US Open on<br />
Thursday with a 6-3, 6-2, 6-2<br />
rout of Israel’s Dudi Sela in 1<br />
hour 17 minutes.<br />
Federer was not quite on<br />
top of his game during the<br />
marquee match on Arthur<br />
Ashe, logging 26 unforced<br />
errors, most of which<br />
occurred during his return<br />
games and were very out of<br />
character for one of the best<br />
player in tennis history.<br />
Despite an off-day, the box<br />
score proves that even when<br />
facing a not-so-perfect<br />
Federer, one must have a perfect<br />
match. Federer will next<br />
face either No. 27 Marin Cilic<br />
of Croatia or Bernard Tomic of<br />
Austria in the third round.<br />
The US Open witnessed a<br />
major shock without a ball<br />
being struck in anger on<br />
Wednesday when Venus<br />
Williams quit the tournament<br />
after revealing she was suffering<br />
from an illness that could<br />
threaten her tennis future. The<br />
two-time champion told officials<br />
of her withdrawal from<br />
the tournament less than an<br />
hour before she was due to<br />
face Germany’s Sabine Lisicki<br />
� Roger Federer during his US Open match<br />
at Flushing Meadows on Wednesday. — AFP<br />
in the second round. Then she<br />
dropped the bombshell,<br />
revealing for the first time<br />
exactly what had kept her<br />
recent playing time down to a<br />
bare minimum.<br />
Meanwhile, a dark cloud<br />
appeared over Jelena<br />
Jankovic’s chances to win her<br />
first Grand Slam title when the<br />
world No. 11 injured her back<br />
during a second-round victory<br />
over Jelena Dokic at the US<br />
Open on Thursday. The 2008<br />
US Open finalist received<br />
medical attention several<br />
times during the match but<br />
still managed to advance with<br />
a 6-3, 6-4 triumph at the<br />
National Tennis Center. “I hurt<br />
it in the first set,” said Jankovic.<br />
“I felt a little restricted when I<br />
was hitting my serves and<br />
especially when I had to bend<br />
down when I was waiting to<br />
return her serves.”<br />
Andy Murray, Britain’s<br />
perennial major hope, made a<br />
bright start to his campaign<br />
while Argentina’s Juan Martin<br />
Del Potro enjoyed a successful<br />
return to Flushing<br />
Meadows two years after his<br />
stunning title success.<br />
However, three seeded<br />
women made early exits at<br />
the hands of lower-ranked<br />
players. Marion Bartoli,<br />
Dominika Cibulkova and<br />
Yanina Wickmayer all<br />
departed while the only<br />
male seed to lose was<br />
Nicolas Almagro of Spain,<br />
although sixth seed Robin<br />
Soderling pulled out because<br />
of injury. — Agencies<br />
� South Africa’s<br />
Oscar Pistorius starts<br />
the men’s 4x400 metres<br />
relay heats in Daegu<br />
on Wednesday. — AFP<br />
ball towards the slips where<br />
Clarke dived to his left to take a<br />
low catch. Lyon, who served<br />
on the Adelaide Oval ground<br />
staff until a year ago, then ran<br />
through the tail to justify his<br />
much-criticised selection for<br />
the tour after just four firstclass<br />
matches. He is the 14th<br />
bowler to take a wicket with<br />
his first ball in Tests. — AFP<br />
Scoreboard<br />
Australia<br />
First innings 273<br />
Sri Lanka<br />
First innings<br />
T P’vitana lbw Watson 29<br />
T Dilshan c Ponting b Copeland 4<br />
K S’kara c Clarke b Lyon 10<br />
M J’dene run out 11<br />
T S’weera lbw Watson 26<br />
P J’dene lbw Watson 0<br />
A Mathews b Lyon 5<br />
S Randiv c Ponting b Lyon 9<br />
R Herath c Johnson b Lyon 0<br />
S Lakmal not out 2<br />
C W’gedara c & b Lyon 1<br />
Extras: (lb-4, w-1, nb-3) 8<br />
Total: (in 50 overs) 105<br />
Fall of wkts: 1/4, 2/24, 3/44,<br />
4/87, 5/87, 6/88, 7/100, 8/100,<br />
9/103<br />
Bowling: Harris 8-5-6-0, Cope -<br />
land 12-3-24-1, Johnson 9-1-26-<br />
0, Lyon 15-3-34-5, Watson 6-1-<br />
11-3<br />
Australia<br />
Second innings<br />
S Watson c S’weera b W’gedara0<br />
P Hughes lbw Dilshan 28<br />
R Ponting c Herath b Lakmal 4<br />
M Clarke c Prasanna b Herath 60<br />
M Hussey c Tharanga b Herath15<br />
U Khawaja batting 2<br />
B Haddin c Mahela b Herath 0<br />
M Johnson batting 3<br />
Extras: (lb-2, nb-1) 3<br />
Total: (for 6 wkts in 33.5 overs)115<br />
Fall of wkts: 1/0, 2/5, 3/61,<br />
4/110, 5/110, 6/112<br />
Bowling: W’gedara 3-3-0-1,<br />
Lakmal 5-2-18-1, Herath 12.5-0-<br />
51-3, Randiv 8-2-22-0, Dilshan<br />
5-0-22-1<br />
Indian GP<br />
circuit gets<br />
Whiting’s<br />
thumbs up<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
New Delhi: The Buddh<br />
International Circuit, which<br />
will be hosting India’s<br />
maiden Formula One race,<br />
got the thumbs up from<br />
Formula One race director<br />
Charlie Whiting on Saturday,<br />
for hosting the inaugural<br />
Indian Grand Prix in October.<br />
Whiting spent six hours<br />
on the 5.14km circuit in<br />
Greater Noida, on the outskirts<br />
of the capital, with<br />
officials of the Federation of<br />
Motor Sports Clubs of India<br />
(FMSCI), the apex body of<br />
motorsports in the country,<br />
and race promoters Jaypee<br />
Sports International.<br />
Whiting’s visit was part of<br />
the homologation of the circuit.<br />
He inspected the track<br />
and other technical areas<br />
and appeared happy with<br />
the progress of the work. The<br />
final certification by FIA<br />
(International Automobile<br />
Federation), a common practice<br />
for new circuits, will<br />
happen a week prior to the<br />
race.<br />
FMSCI president Vicky<br />
Chandhok, was at the track<br />
alongside Whiting, said the<br />
Englishman was pleased<br />
with the progress made<br />
since his last visit.<br />
“We spent around six<br />
hours at the track and he<br />
was satisfied. Though this<br />
was a routine inspection, the<br />
track has been cleared for<br />
the race. The progress of<br />
work exceeded his expectations.<br />
There won’t be any<br />
further changes on the track<br />
and the tarmac has also<br />
been laid,” Chandhok said of<br />
the track, which has been<br />
designed to promote overtaking.<br />
JPSI officials were also<br />
happy after the inspection.<br />
“Whiting checked the state<br />
of track services, kerbs, runoff<br />
area, fencing area and<br />
martial’s post besides<br />
inspecting the medical facilities,<br />
the team and the pit<br />
building.<br />
“The work in and around<br />
the track will continue in full<br />
swing and we should complete<br />
everything by the end<br />
of this month,” the promoters<br />
said in a statement.
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com SPORT 15<br />
In the shadow of a revolution<br />
� Venezuela players during a practice session at the Salt Lake stadium on Thursday. — Aditi Saha<br />
Arindam Basu<br />
Kolkata: Like almost every other Latin<br />
American country, Venezuela is an<br />
ether box to this part of the world but<br />
for its coups, political turmoil and<br />
communist socialist movement that<br />
has given it an enigmatic charm. But<br />
in the shadow of the guns, football has<br />
grown over the last decade to challenge<br />
its destiny much like Simon<br />
Bolivar who scripted Venezuela’s rise<br />
to sovereignty.<br />
“Much is not like what it seems<br />
from outside Venezuela. The last<br />
decade under Chavez has seen a lot of<br />
things. He has changed it all—now we<br />
have eight stars not seven on our flag;<br />
the horse doesn’t look right anymore,<br />
it looks left and the Constitution has<br />
been re-written and amended a few<br />
times over,” said an amused Manuel<br />
Llorens, Venezuelan national team<br />
psychologist, to The Bengal Post.<br />
Economic crisis in the 1980s and<br />
1990s led to a political crisis which<br />
saw hundreds dead in the Caracazo<br />
riots of 1989, two attempted coups in<br />
1992 and the impeachment of<br />
President Carlos Andrés Pérez for corruption<br />
in 1993. Coup leader Hugo<br />
Chávez was pardoned in March 1994<br />
by president Rafael Caldera, with a<br />
clean slate and his political rights<br />
intact. A collapse in confidence in the<br />
existing parties saw Chávez elected<br />
Zabaleta, Gutierrez for Messi era<br />
Our Special Correspondent<br />
national side. For the last few years, it's at the Kolkata airport. People were cheer-<br />
not just about Brazil, Argentina and ing us from the very instance, which was<br />
Kolkata: Crown Prince of world football Uruguay but even players from simply amazing.”<br />
Lionel Messi may often be criticised for Venezuela, Paraguay and Chile have “However, our focus is now on the<br />
not showing the same spark when he made it to Europe, which only show that game. It's all about starting from the<br />
dons the Argentina jersey, but team- footballing standard in South America scratch and get the team back to proper<br />
mates midfielder Jonas Gutierrez and has increased by leaps and bounds,” shape. The journey which begins tomor-<br />
defender Pablo Zabaleta feel that the Zabaleta said.<br />
row is important for us and our new<br />
Argentine superstar gives his 100 per Argentina and England may have manager (Alejandro Sabella)," said the<br />
cent while representing his nation. shared a love-hate relationship since Newcastle United footballer.<br />
“Messi tries more than his best when he Diego Maradona's “Hand of God” goal Gutierrez also revealed that their 0-4<br />
plays for Argentina. But you can't compare during the quarterfinals of the 1986 blanking at the hands of Germany in the<br />
playing for Barca and playing for your World Cup between the two countries World Cup was still difficult to over-<br />
country. Those are two different aspects. but Zabaleta said he was yet to face any come."We were improving game after<br />
But the best thing is to leave Messi in the problem in his stint with the Manchester game but World Cup is such a difficult<br />
position he is most comfortable with," City. "I've been playing in England for last tournament that just one hiccup could<br />
both Gutierrez and Zabaleta, said. four years and honestly I've always felt bring an end to your campaign. This is<br />
The defender, who was part of the that the Englishmen have given me the what the World Cup is all about. Still<br />
2008 Beijing Olympics gold medal win- respect I deserve. Also I can speak decent today we find it quite difficult to digest<br />
ning side, said their International friendly English so chances of me facing any prob- the defeat," he admitted.<br />
match against Venezuela will mark the lem is little less," he said.<br />
Both New Castle United and Argentina<br />
road to World Cup 2014 in Brazil. “The Argentine midfielder Jonas Gutierrez may be in a team building mode but<br />
journey starts tomorrow. I will try to do added: "It's an all new experience which Gutierrez said playing for one's country<br />
my best to cement my place in the we had witnessed as soon as we landed was different from that of a club.<br />
Messi mania<br />
grips Arrows<br />
Kolkata: Lionel Messi stays<br />
the best in the world at the<br />
moment, a role model for all<br />
budding footballers. And<br />
amidst the VVIPs, corporate<br />
honchos, Bollywood celebrities<br />
and the innumerable<br />
fans, India’s U-23 footballers<br />
have been losing sleep for<br />
quite some time now, all for<br />
that glimpse of the superstar<br />
from the stands.<br />
Pailan Arrows striker C S<br />
Sabeeth, who with his deft<br />
feints and sudden burst of<br />
speed was the discovery of<br />
the last edition of the I-<br />
League, feels: “It’s a dream<br />
come true. I’m excited. When<br />
you get to watch the world’s<br />
best footballer in action, that<br />
too in your own backyard,<br />
you ought to be excited. I feel<br />
this will prompt other big<br />
teams to turn their attention<br />
to the <strong>city</strong>. The madness for<br />
the sport in Kolkata knows<br />
no bounds.”<br />
“He’s such a small chap. But<br />
look how he shields the ball<br />
from all,” quipped Shilton<br />
D’Silva, Pailan Arrows midfielder.<br />
“I have just 90 minutes<br />
and it’s a lifetime opportunity<br />
for me. I will try to gauge from<br />
the stands as to how he manages<br />
to keep the ball at his feet<br />
all the time.” The pre-season<br />
training for Pailan Arrows has<br />
just begun. — IBNS<br />
President in 1998, and the subsequent<br />
launch of a "Bolivarian Revolution",<br />
beginning with a 1999 Constituent<br />
Assembly to write a new Constitution<br />
of Venezuela.<br />
Much like the rugged northern<br />
mountains of the nation, football<br />
went through the trials and tribulations<br />
of a nation that swayed between<br />
dictatorship and democracy. Finally it<br />
ARGENTINA<br />
Goalkeepers: Sergio SQUADS<br />
VENEZUELA<br />
Goalkeepers: Rafael<br />
Romero, Estaban<br />
Romo, Renny Vega,<br />
Andrada, Mariano Andujar.<br />
Daniel Hern andez.<br />
Defenders: Martin Demichelis, Defenders: Andres Tunez, Oswaldo<br />
Federico Fernandez, Nicolas Vizcarrondo, Cesar Gonzalez,<br />
Burdisso, Nicolas Otamendi, Pablo Roberto Rosales, Rolf Feltscher,<br />
Zabaleta, Nicolas Pareja, Marcos Fernando Amorebieta, Rohel<br />
Rojo.<br />
Briceno, Josef Martinez<br />
Midfielders: Midfielders:<br />
Angel di Franco Sig -<br />
Maria, Javier nor elli, Jos -<br />
Mas cherano, m ar Zamb -<br />
Ever Banega, ra no, Tomas<br />
Ricardo Ri n con, Yoh -<br />
Alvarez, Fabian Rinaudo, Jonas an d ry Orozco, Raul Gonzalez,<br />
Gutierrez, Javier Pastore, Luis Gabriel Cichero, Frank Fel tscher,<br />
Gonzalez, Jose Sosa.<br />
Julio Alvarez, Luis Manuel<br />
Forwards: Gonzalo Higuain, Lionel Seijas.<br />
Messi, Eduardo Salvio, Sergio Forwards: Nicolas Fedor, Salomon<br />
Aguero.<br />
Rondon, Mario Rondon.<br />
Coach: Alejandro Sabella.<br />
Coach: Cesar Farias.<br />
Match Commissioner: Col Goutam Kar<br />
Referee: A Rowan<br />
Assistant Referees: Biplab Poddar, Dinesh Nair and Franky Fernandes<br />
Fourth Official: Pratap Singh<br />
Kick-off: 7 p.m.<br />
was in the 90s that two coaches<br />
brought about a silent revolution in<br />
football that saw the la Vinitinto rise<br />
up the world soccer ladder.<br />
“The first was Serbian Ratomir<br />
Djukovic and then Argentine Jose<br />
Omar Pastoriza who changed the<br />
entire football system of the nation,”<br />
said Nestor Beaumont, team’s media<br />
manager.<br />
“They were integral in setting up a<br />
youth system for Venezuela. They<br />
believed in the philosophy of bringing<br />
a change not only at the players’ level<br />
but also at the coach and support staff<br />
level. They wanted young enterprising<br />
people in football and Cesar Farias<br />
is a product of this system. He began<br />
coaching as early as 23 and by 25 he<br />
was the assistant coach of Nino who<br />
was handling the national youth<br />
side,” Manuel added.<br />
Chavas was a passionate baseball<br />
player and his interest in sports had<br />
only helped the team. “The President<br />
is always interested in what the<br />
national team was doing. He comes to<br />
see our team play whenever he can.<br />
And we are happy that we have been<br />
able to unite the whole nation under<br />
one game. They believe in the jersey<br />
and we get inspiration from them,”<br />
national coach Cesar Farias said.<br />
Venezuela was the host of Copa<br />
America in 2007 and Chavas built<br />
eight new stadiums and made the old<br />
existing one brand new. It was a huge<br />
boost to football in that country.<br />
“Till 2003 the Venezuelans did not<br />
follow their country’s football. They<br />
preferred watching Spanish, Brazilian<br />
and Argentine leagues. But for the first<br />
time in 2006 during the World Cup<br />
qualifiers, Venezuelans wore a T-shirt<br />
with half Brazil and half Venezuela’s<br />
flags. But now they wear Venezuela’s<br />
jersey,” Manuel said.<br />
He said that they did not mind<br />
being treated as underdogs. “We have<br />
turned adversity and ignorance into<br />
our strengths. That is a huge plus for<br />
us. We have used it to inspire our<br />
boys and make them play better.<br />
They have become ambitious. Now is<br />
the time for the team to rise,” a proud<br />
Manuel said.<br />
A youth system and a sincere scouting<br />
mixed with complete faith in a<br />
young audacious coach has seen the<br />
country rise the soccer ladder steadily<br />
and now is the time for them to prosper<br />
like the wide plains of central<br />
Venezuela. Maybe Friday will be the<br />
beginning.<br />
Congress not divided: Maken<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
New Delhi: Under fire in the<br />
cabinet from his party colleagues,<br />
sports minister Ajay<br />
Maken maintained on<br />
Thursday that the Congress<br />
party is not divided over the<br />
proposed national sports<br />
development bill, it is only<br />
debating it.<br />
Maken had fierce opposition<br />
in the cabinet on the bill.<br />
The cabinet rejected the bill<br />
on Tuesday and the sports<br />
minister was asked to revise<br />
the bill, which will be tabled<br />
again in the winter session of<br />
the parliament. Maken has<br />
also been accused by his party<br />
colleague Rajeev Shukla, who<br />
is also the vice-president of<br />
the Board of Control for<br />
Cricket in India, of being ignorant<br />
about the ground realities.<br />
The minister refused to<br />
comment on Shukla’s statement<br />
and iterated that the bill<br />
was not intended at curbing<br />
the autonomy of the sports<br />
federations. Maken said he is<br />
prepared to tweak the bill<br />
somewhat without compromising<br />
on its basic structure.<br />
“Limiting the age and<br />
tenure for the office-bearers<br />
doesn’t amount to curbing<br />
autonomy neither by having<br />
25 per cent representation for<br />
sportspersons in the executive<br />
committee of the sports<br />
federations or by coming<br />
under the RTI. I am ready to<br />
leave out some clauses to<br />
help the sports federations,”<br />
said Maken, at the headquarters<br />
of the Sports Authority of<br />
India (SAI). Asked whether<br />
leaving out some clauses<br />
amounts to a compromise,<br />
Maken said “at no cost was<br />
the sports ministry going to<br />
compromise with the basic<br />
structure of the bill.”<br />
He also said that the ministry<br />
will start working on<br />
the bill once it receives the<br />
minutes of the cabinet meeting<br />
held on Tuesday. Maken<br />
also said that 25 per cent of<br />
reservation in sports federations<br />
will help in efficient<br />
management.
16<br />
SPORT<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Teams ready to play hard ball<br />
Arindam Basu<br />
Kolkata: The Argentina and<br />
Venezuela tie set to unfold at<br />
the Salt Lake stadium on<br />
Friday evening will be<br />
viewed, perceived and played<br />
at three different levels. For<br />
the majority of the 1.2 million<br />
people who will flock the<br />
ground it will be the twinkle<br />
footed Lionel Messi and his<br />
attendant stars who will hog<br />
the limelight. Even before the<br />
players have set foot on the<br />
ground, the soccer crazy <strong>city</strong><br />
has already dreamt up<br />
another emphatic victory for<br />
Argentina.<br />
However, the match as perceived<br />
by the two rival<br />
coaches is very different. For<br />
Alejandro Sabella it is the first<br />
step to the glory heights at<br />
the Macarena Stadium in<br />
Brazil in 2014. For Cesar Farias<br />
it is a collective stock checking<br />
of the arsenal in his<br />
armoury and a stage<br />
rehearsal for the official<br />
World cup qualifier match on<br />
October 14. At the third level<br />
the match will be a battle for<br />
establishing Lionel Messi’s<br />
supremacy as the boss of the<br />
La Albiceleste, while for La<br />
Vinotinto it is trying out a<br />
whole new combination with<br />
as many as five new players<br />
being included into the side.<br />
After their debacle in Copa<br />
America where they have<br />
been champions 14 times but<br />
failed to get past quarterfinals<br />
this time in July,<br />
Argentina are in process of<br />
rebuilding their side under<br />
Sabella with an eye on 2014<br />
World Cup. The former<br />
Estudiantes coach, who has<br />
taken over the reins of the<br />
national team after the dismissal<br />
of Sergio Batista, has<br />
already shown his eagerness<br />
to begin on a winning note.<br />
"This is my first game in<br />
command of the team. It's<br />
very important to make a<br />
good beginning. Winning will<br />
give us confidence. Yes this is<br />
the beginning of a long trip<br />
ahead and hope it finishes<br />
with qualification to the<br />
� Lionel Messi in action at the Salt Lake stadium<br />
on Thursday. — Aditi Saha<br />
World Cup," Sabella said.<br />
Messi is in the prime form<br />
of his career in FC Barcelona<br />
and notwithstanding the criticism<br />
over his dip in performance<br />
when he dons Argentina<br />
jersey, he will be the cynosure<br />
of all eyes. There is also the<br />
Real Madrid duo of Angel Di<br />
Maria and Gonzalo Higuain,<br />
besides Barcelona’s Javier<br />
Mascherano who will be seen<br />
in action.<br />
In Copa America under<br />
Batista, a 4-3-3 formation<br />
was employed, but with<br />
Sabella saying that he wants<br />
to give Messi a free hand it is<br />
most likely that he will have a<br />
creative midfield around him<br />
much like the Bracelona formation<br />
helping him to move<br />
freely forward.<br />
Three Argentina players —<br />
Lisandro Lopez, Cristian<br />
Ansaldi and Ezequiel Garay —<br />
have been ruled out of<br />
Friday’s match after suffering<br />
injury blows while playing for<br />
their respective clubs, but<br />
Sabella has enough ammunition<br />
to make a winning start.<br />
What is most notable is how<br />
the team is churning around<br />
the Messi mania. “Messi tries<br />
more than his best when he<br />
plays for Argentina. But you<br />
can't compare playing for<br />
Barca and playing for your<br />
country. Those are two different<br />
aspects. But the best thing<br />
is to leave Messi in the posi-<br />
tion he is most comfortable<br />
with,” Pablo Zabaleta<br />
said.“Our focus is now on the<br />
game. It's all about starting<br />
from the scratch and get the<br />
team back to proper shape.<br />
The journey which begins<br />
tomorrow (Friday) is important<br />
for us and our new manager<br />
(Alejandro Sabella),"<br />
Jonas Gutierrez insisted.<br />
Venezuela has come without<br />
their captain Juan Arango.<br />
In his absence mercurial midfielder<br />
Tomas Rincon will don<br />
the captain’s hat. Besides this<br />
the Venezuela side may also<br />
try out five new players.<br />
“They are Venezuelans by<br />
birth, but have grown up in<br />
Europe and played there.<br />
They have expressed their<br />
desire to play for Venezuela<br />
now. Some of them will be<br />
tried out in the next few<br />
matches to see how they fit<br />
into the squad. Theyu will<br />
only add depth to the squad,”<br />
said Manual Llorenz, team<br />
psychologist.<br />
The players in question are<br />
Fernando Amorevieta<br />
(Athletico Bilbao), Andres<br />
Tunez (Celta), Frank Fletcher<br />
(Grasshopper), Raul Gonzalez<br />
(Apollon Limassol) and<br />
Josmar Zombrano (Club<br />
Deportivo Tenerife).<br />
For Cesar Farias the game is<br />
only a part of Venezuelan<br />
upsurge in world football that<br />
has seen them rise from<br />
below 200 to 44 in world<br />
ranking in a span of 10 years.<br />
The Copa America semisfinalists<br />
are “serious” about<br />
the game and they shall<br />
ensure that Lionel Messi<br />
doesn’t create problems for<br />
them. “Messi is undoubtedly<br />
a great player but football is a<br />
team game so we would look<br />
to play a team game on<br />
Friday. This match maybe<br />
called a friendly but it is actually<br />
a very serious game as it<br />
is not only about planning<br />
and preparation for the<br />
World Cup qualifiers but also<br />
about our prestige back<br />
home,” said César Farías.<br />
“I think the gap is narrowing<br />
between teams in South<br />
America so if we play well, we<br />
will have a good chance of<br />
reaching the 2014 World Cup.<br />
We are the underdogs for<br />
sure but we believe in our<br />
abilities. We respect<br />
Argentina as they are a quality<br />
side but would still try to<br />
win the game,” he said.<br />
The turf could well be an<br />
issue on Friday and even<br />
more so with the met office<br />
predicting some sharp showers.<br />
The Argentine team has<br />
expressed their inexperience<br />
of playing on artificial turf.<br />
“Frankly we have not played<br />
on artificial turf. We are not<br />
very comfortable. But we<br />
have to adapt,” Sabella said.<br />
But that should not be a case<br />
for Venezuela.<br />
“We recently played on<br />
artificial turf against<br />
Colombia in New York and<br />
against Mexico in Las Vegas.<br />
We also have some grounds<br />
back in Venezuela which have<br />
artificial turf so we have<br />
experience of playing in such<br />
surface,” he said.<br />
Below the façade of a<br />
friendly the undercurrents of<br />
competition and one-upmanship<br />
is quite palpable in both<br />
the ranks and file. While<br />
Argentina are undoubtedly<br />
the heavyweights on paper,<br />
don’t be surprised if the toast<br />
at the end of the match<br />
tomorrow (Friday) is deep<br />
burgundy.<br />
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2nd September, 2011 at 7 P.M.<br />
LIVE & EXCLUSIVE<br />
������������������������<br />
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Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com SPORT I<br />
Let’s dance with the happy prince<br />
Sudeshna Ghosh<br />
Kolkata: You may have to scale the same potholes on your way<br />
to office, wait for the same number of minutes for your conveyance<br />
or once again be delayed for your destination by the<br />
ever-increasing traffic. Yet it is a great day to be in the City of<br />
Joy. Pop icons like Bryan Adams or rock-n-roll legends like The<br />
Metallica may overlook the <strong>city</strong> on their list of concert venues<br />
or a certain Angelina Jolie may warn her good friend Johnny<br />
Depp against shooting in these parts but the crown prince of<br />
world football — Lionel Andres “Leo” Messi — is in the <strong>city</strong> to<br />
erase the petty grievances and mesmerise us with his football<br />
skills.<br />
Battered by India’s World Cup-winning cricket team’s dismal<br />
performance in the Test series in England and coupled<br />
with our senior footballers’ very poor show against Trinidad &<br />
Tobago and Guyana on their Caribbean tour, people here can<br />
find solace in being witness to the football artistry between<br />
two of the best Latin American teams in the world — Argentina<br />
and Venezuela.<br />
When Messi, along with his Argentine compatriots and<br />
Venezuelan rivals, takes the field at the Salt Lake stadium on<br />
Friday, holding hands of kids from an NGO, he will be the object of<br />
admiration for 80,000 eager fans — including top-notch celebrities<br />
from all over the country like Ranbir Kapoor, Anurag Kashyap,<br />
Dino Morea as well as a huge number of local who’s who.<br />
Vital Stats<br />
Full Name: Luis Lionel Andrés “Leo” Messi<br />
Date of Birth: June 24, 1987<br />
Home Town: Rosario, Argentina<br />
Nationality: Argentina and Spain<br />
Height: 5ft 7inch<br />
Weight: 67 kg<br />
Position: Striker/ Winger<br />
Clubs: Newell’s Old Boys (1995-2000); Barcelona<br />
‘B’ (2004-05); Barcelona FC (2000-2004, 2005-)<br />
Team: Argentina U-20, Argentina U-23, Argentina<br />
Senior Team<br />
Debut (for Argentina): June 2004 (in a friendly<br />
against Paraguay)<br />
Club Honours: La Liga (2004-05, 2005-06, 2008-<br />
09, 2009-10, 2010-11); Copa del Rey (2008-09);<br />
Supercopa de Espana (2005, 2006, 2009, 2010,<br />
2011); Uefa Champions League (2005-06, 2008-<br />
09, 2010-11); Uefa Super Cup (2009, 2011); Fifa<br />
Club World Cup (2009)<br />
Country Honours: Fifa U-20 World<br />
Cup (2005); Olympic Gold (2008)<br />
Individual Honours: Fifa Ballon<br />
d’Or (2010); Ballon d’Or (2009);<br />
Fifa World Player of the Year (2009); Fifa Team of<br />
the Year (2008, 2009, 2010); U-21 European<br />
Footballer of the Year (2007); La Liga Player of<br />
the Year (2009, 2010, 2011); La Liga Top<br />
Goalscorer (2010); Copa del Rey top<br />
goalscorer (2011); La Liga Foreign<br />
Player of the Year (2007, 2009, 2010);<br />
La Liga Ibero-American Player of the<br />
Year (2007, 2009, 2010, 2011);<br />
European Golden Shoe (2010); Uefa<br />
Champions League Top Goalscorer<br />
(2009, 2010, 2011); Uefa Best Player in<br />
Europe (2011); Uefa Club Footballer of<br />
the Year (2009); Uefa Champions<br />
League Forward of the Year (2009);<br />
Uefa Champions League Final ‘Man<br />
of the Match’ (2011); Uefa Team of<br />
the Year (2008, 2009, 2010);<br />
Footballer of the Year of<br />
Argentina (2005, 2007, 2008,<br />
2009, 2010); Fifa U-20 World<br />
Cup Player of the Tournament<br />
(2005); Fifa U-20 World Cup<br />
Top Goalscorer (2005); Copa<br />
América Young Player of the<br />
Tournament (2007);<br />
World Footballer of the<br />
Year (2009); World<br />
Football Young Player of<br />
the Year (2006, 2007,<br />
2008); Fifa Club World<br />
Cup Golden Ball (2009);<br />
Uefa Best Goal of the Year<br />
(2007)<br />
However, even a few months back, it would have looked<br />
nothing less than a miracle to imagine that the Argentine protégé,<br />
just like his icon Diego Maradona, would oblige the lovers<br />
of the game by working his magical feet in the football-crazy<br />
<strong>city</strong> of ours. In fact, Messi’s visit, in certain ways, is more mesmerising<br />
than Maradona’s 2008 engagement as we have a<br />
chance to experience his genius at a time when the 24-year-old<br />
is at the top of his game.<br />
Born on June 24, 1987 in the small town of Rosario in<br />
Argentina, Messi has risen to the zenith of world football in a<br />
comparatively small frame of time. The 5’7” striker, who<br />
moved to Barcelona from his local club — Newell’s Old Boys —<br />
in 2000 after the European club promised him treatment for<br />
“growth hormone deficiency”, made his debut for the<br />
Barcelona B team in 2004-05 and, in no time, became the<br />
team’s youngest footballer to score a League goal. And then,<br />
more and more honours followed along with a place in the premier<br />
Barcelona team, the latest being the inaugural Uefa Best<br />
Player in Europe award last Thursday, finishing ahead of<br />
Barcelona teammate Xavi and Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo.<br />
Messi, who has been likened to the legendary Maradona,<br />
even by the God of football himself, has won five La Liga titles,<br />
three Champions League titles with Barca, scoring in two of<br />
those finals, against Manchester United in both 2009 and 2011.<br />
Yet the undeniable fact is that Messi simply does not score<br />
as prolifically for his country as he does for Barcelona. Stats<br />
indicate that his goal-to-minute ratio for the Spanish giants<br />
worked out to be, almost precisely, a goal per game in 2010-<br />
11, as the Catalans collected the La Liga and Champions<br />
League titles.<br />
The striker arrived at 53 goals in all competitions after netting<br />
47 times in 53 appearances in 2009-10, and a further 38 in<br />
51 in his triplete-winning season of 2008-09 at Barcelona.<br />
Since Pep Guardiola’s arrival at Camp Nou, Messi has been simply<br />
insatiable in front of the goal.<br />
The same cannot be said for his spells under a variety of<br />
coaches for Argentina. From World Cup 2006 in Germany,<br />
where he was used sparingly by Jose Pekerman, until<br />
Argentina’s fresh failure at this year’s home Copa America 2011,<br />
Messi’s average in major competitions is over 500 minutes, and<br />
significantly, his last tournament strike was his wondrous lob<br />
against Mexico in the 2007 Copa America semi-final. Two<br />
showpiece events, with the attacker barely missing a minute,<br />
have passed since without the net being rippled.<br />
So, the significance of this friendly to Messi, if not on the<br />
euphoric plane of the spectators at the Salt Lake stadium, is<br />
well enough for us to expect that the wonder boy will not miss<br />
this opportunity to show semblance of his form at Barca, but<br />
this time for his country. This may not be the first time that<br />
Kolkata will host celebrity football stars as football legends like<br />
Pele, Maradona, Branco, Romario, Diego Forlan and Oliver Kahn<br />
have played friendlies in the <strong>city</strong>. But this time around, the<br />
stakes are even higher not just for the striker, who will also<br />
captain his side, but a variety of people as it may just prove to<br />
be the highest-grossing match in India.<br />
The organisers — Celebrity Management Group — have sold<br />
the broadcasting rights for crores of rupees. ESPN has bought<br />
the rights for South Asia, Eurodata for Africa and the rest of Asia<br />
and Swiss-based Kentaro has bought the rights for Europe,<br />
North and South America with live telecast in 150 countries.<br />
The organisers expect $2.5 million (`11-12 crore) from ticket<br />
sales with huge interest from cities like New Delhi, Mumbai,<br />
Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kochi, Trivandrum and Goa. They<br />
have also sold eight corporate boxes for `7.5 lakh each with<br />
bookings by corporates like UB Group, film stars and other<br />
celebrities.<br />
However, a stray match like this cannot change the pathetic<br />
condition of the game in our country. But what any football<br />
lover will hope for is that “Leo” Messi will inspire some kids in<br />
the Friday crowd to take Indian football to a respectable position<br />
on the international stage.<br />
10 things you need to know<br />
about Argentine Wonder Boy<br />
� Messi shares his birthplace with Che Guevara. Both<br />
were born in Rosanio<br />
� Now 5 feet 7”, doctors say if he did not receive<br />
growth hormones his growth would have stopped at<br />
4 feet 7“<br />
� His nickname is La Pulga Atomica (The Atomic Flea)<br />
� He is also called Maradonita, while Spanish press has<br />
christened him Messidona<br />
� He never watches his highlights on television<br />
� His two cousins Maxi Biancucchi (Mexican side Conz<br />
Azni) and Emanuel Biancucchi (German side TSV 1860<br />
Munchen) play football too<br />
� A life size choco idol weighing 115 kg was made of<br />
Messi this Easter at a Catalonian bakery<br />
� Messi’s favourite music genre are Samba and Cumbi<br />
� He grew up playing for Pro Evolution Soccer and now<br />
features on their cover<br />
� He was announced Goodwill Ambassador of UNICEF<br />
in 2010
II<br />
SPORT<br />
Sourav Modak<br />
A<br />
rgentina, the name is inseparable<br />
from the most<br />
famous sport — football.<br />
And whenever we think of football,<br />
we can’t help thinking about<br />
Lionel Messi, who is considered to<br />
be the finest player of the current<br />
generation, may be a few notches<br />
ahead of another great in making,<br />
Cristiano Ronaldo of Portugal.<br />
At the same time, the Messi<br />
who is famous all over the world<br />
is the one in Barcelona colours,<br />
not in blue and whites — the<br />
Argentina jersey. There is a reason<br />
behind that. Many theories have<br />
been put forth by experts and<br />
supporters worldwide behind<br />
Messi’s inability to replicate his<br />
club-level success in the<br />
Argentina shirt.<br />
Whatever be the reason, it will<br />
be unjust for the other players in<br />
the Argentine squad — which will<br />
arrive in Kolkata on Monday to<br />
play the Fifa friendly against Latin<br />
American rivals Venezuela at the<br />
Salt Lake stadium on September 2<br />
— if we don’t pay them the attention<br />
they deserve, treating them<br />
just as teammates of the wonder<br />
boy of world football.<br />
The next big name in Argentine<br />
football after Messi is definitely<br />
Carlos Tevez. However, the<br />
Manchester City forward has been<br />
overlooked by recently-appointed<br />
Argentina coach Alejandro Sabella<br />
for the two friendlies in Kolkata<br />
and Dhaka (on September 6<br />
against Nigeria). Sabella has<br />
declared a squad mainly consisting<br />
players plying their trade in<br />
Europe. Tevez’s exclusion may<br />
have been disappointing but<br />
Kolkatans will still get to see some<br />
excellent players like Sergio<br />
Aguero, Angel di Maria, Gonzalo<br />
Higuain, Javier Mascherano,<br />
Martin Demichelis, Pablo<br />
Zabaleta, Jonas Gutierrez.<br />
Currently ranked ninth in Fifa<br />
rankings, Argentina’s fate will<br />
largely depend on Tevez’s City<br />
teammate Aguero and the Real<br />
Madrid duo — Higuain and Di<br />
Maria. While Messi has found the<br />
back of the net 17 times in 60<br />
appearances for the national<br />
team, Aguero’s scoring rate is<br />
quite high at 13 goals from 30<br />
matches.<br />
Married to Maradona’s<br />
youngest daughter Giannina, 23year-old<br />
Aguero is a centre forward<br />
but can operate from behind<br />
as he often did for his Atletico<br />
Madrid teammate Diego Forlan. A<br />
stocky footballer, Aguero is characterised<br />
by strength, agility and<br />
acceleration, which make him a<br />
dangerous weapon in the attacking<br />
third.<br />
The next big star is Real Madrid<br />
striker Higuain, who enjoys a 50<br />
per cent scoring rate in light blue<br />
shirt with eight goals in 16<br />
appearances.In an equally successful<br />
club career, Higuain has<br />
scored 77 goals from 166 appearances<br />
for Real so far. Because of his<br />
excellent skill and scoring rate,<br />
Real have retained the 23-yearold<br />
since 2007 and in June 2010,<br />
extended his contract till 2016.<br />
Higuain was inducted into the<br />
senior national team for the<br />
2010 World Cup qualifiers by the<br />
then coach Diego Maradona. He<br />
became only the third Argentine<br />
to score an international hattrick<br />
in Argentina’s 4-1 win over<br />
South Korea in their second<br />
group league match of the 2010<br />
World Cup.<br />
Real Madrid winger Di Maria,<br />
another big name on Argentina’s<br />
roster, is known for being really<br />
quick on the left flank and one of<br />
the best dribbler right now.<br />
Mainly known for his ability to<br />
assist strikers, Di Maria has<br />
improved his goal-scoring abilities<br />
as well, scoring nine goals in<br />
53 matches in his debut season<br />
(2010-11) with Real.<br />
Zabaleta, the 26-year-old fullback,<br />
is another player to look at,<br />
who has become a favourite of<br />
Manchester City fans with his<br />
dependable performance since<br />
coming to the Premier League<br />
club in the summer of 2008.<br />
Barcelona midfielder<br />
Mascherano and Malaga centreback<br />
Demichelis are also important<br />
to Sabella’s scheme of things<br />
as they will add experience to the<br />
mainly young squad selected for<br />
the two friendlies in Asia.<br />
While the former Liverpool<br />
player Mascherano has been a<br />
tried and tested name in the<br />
Argentine midfield since his<br />
debut in July 2003 in a friendly<br />
against Uruguay, 30-year-old<br />
Demichelis has also been quite<br />
a familiar name with 33<br />
appearances.<br />
If Sabella can bring out the best<br />
from the Higuains, Di Marias and<br />
Agueros, that will not only help<br />
Argentina to attain the desired<br />
level of performance they can<br />
reach but also bring the best out of<br />
Messi.<br />
The European footballer of the<br />
year is at his best when he is free<br />
from pressure to perform. That is<br />
what happens in Barcelona when<br />
he plays alongside Andres Iniesta,<br />
Xavi Hernandez, David Villa and<br />
Pedro. Equally good at scoring and<br />
assisting, Messi creates quality<br />
moves for Villa and Pedro apart<br />
from receiving good passes from<br />
Iniesta and Xavi at Barca. Sabella<br />
needs to find that kind of a combination<br />
for Messi. So there is life<br />
beyond Messi in the current<br />
Argentina squad but coach Sabella<br />
has to look after them properly.<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com<br />
Messi not Argentina’s only star<br />
Argentina’s fate will<br />
largely depend on<br />
Tevez’s City<br />
teammate Aguero<br />
and the Real<br />
Madrid duo —<br />
Higuain and<br />
Di Maria<br />
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� Gonzalo Higuain (top) and Sergio Aguero<br />
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Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com SPORT III<br />
The rising stars on the<br />
Latin American sky<br />
Our Correspondent<br />
T<br />
he country is famous for<br />
its president Hugo<br />
Chavez. It is also known<br />
for its rich culture and heritage.<br />
But interestingly, the<br />
sporting world knows<br />
Venezuela for a different reason.<br />
This economically backward<br />
nation has produced a<br />
successful football team.<br />
Having performed well in<br />
the recently-concluded Copa<br />
America, the football world<br />
has found a whole new reason<br />
to celebrate.<br />
Over the years, they have<br />
made it clear that Latin<br />
American football is not all<br />
about Argentina and Brazil.<br />
With some brilliant performance<br />
in the 2011 Copa Ame -<br />
rica, the Venezuelans have<br />
proved their worth.<br />
In the Copa, the red and<br />
whites gave some tough times<br />
to their opponents. At a time<br />
when all eyes were on Lionel<br />
Messi, Neymar et al, a handful<br />
of youngsters took Venezuela<br />
to the semi-finals.<br />
Even somebody as great as<br />
Pele were all praise for Chav -<br />
ez’s country. In an interview<br />
to a TV channel, the legend<br />
admitted that coach Cesar<br />
Farias had indeed done a great<br />
job with his young brigade.<br />
“They were just excellent. I<br />
never thought they would<br />
reach the semi-finals. They<br />
were more aggressive than<br />
Brazil and Argentina,” Pele<br />
had said.<br />
As a matter of fact, after<br />
Farias took over as the coach,<br />
things really started to change<br />
for the La Vinotintos.<br />
The team played well in<br />
the practice ties ahead of<br />
Copa America, and were able<br />
to put up a great show<br />
against biggies like Brazil,<br />
Argentina and Chile.<br />
The coach, however, dedicated<br />
the Copa America success<br />
to the president. Chavez,<br />
he said, motivated the boys.<br />
“The boys are really hard<br />
working, and they consider<br />
Chavez as their role model.<br />
He has helped them in every<br />
possible way. We are proud to<br />
represent Venezuela,” coach<br />
� Juan Arango<br />
Farias had said in an interview<br />
right after the Copa<br />
America.<br />
This is the secret of their<br />
success. Once considered an<br />
economically backward na -<br />
tion, Venezuela is now trying<br />
to make a mark on world<br />
stage in every walk of life.<br />
While most of their senior<br />
players play for renowned<br />
clubs like River Plate, Getafe<br />
and Malaga, the Venezuela<br />
Football Federation (FVF) has<br />
also taken special efforts to<br />
dev elop football among the<br />
youth. Having set up a few<br />
residential academies, the<br />
federation is hoping to be able<br />
to spot talents.<br />
It has been learnt that FVF<br />
has decided to field a young<br />
side and still hope to be able<br />
to put up a good show against<br />
some of the biggest stars of<br />
world football.<br />
Under the captaincy of Juan<br />
Arango, the Venezuelans will<br />
look to set the stage on fire.<br />
Having a medley of experience<br />
and youth, the team will<br />
look to put up a strong fight<br />
against the neighbouring<br />
country.<br />
With the world busy talking<br />
about Messi, Aguero and<br />
others, the Venezuelans will<br />
start off as the underdogs.<br />
Most of the players feel this<br />
would be a boon for them. In a<br />
microblogging website, captain<br />
Arango had clearly<br />
pointed out that his team will<br />
try to take advantage of the<br />
inexperience of Argentina.<br />
After the Copa debacle, this<br />
will be the first Fifa friendly<br />
for Messi & Co., that, too in the<br />
subcontinent.<br />
Weather will be a factor. So<br />
will be the ground conditions<br />
at the Salt Lake stadium but<br />
the Venezuelan team are all<br />
set to take up the challenge.<br />
“We are ready. This will be<br />
an interesting outing for the<br />
folks. We are really looking<br />
forward to play Argentina in<br />
India,” Arango wrote on his<br />
web page.<br />
It would indeed be a great<br />
opportunity for the City of Joy<br />
to witness an enthralling<br />
friendly between the two<br />
arch-rivals!
IV<br />
Kolkata Friday September 2, 2011<br />
www.thebengalpost.com
Diganta Guha<br />
Known to make sensible<br />
comedies, it was his directorial<br />
debut Bheja Fry that<br />
brought director Sagar Ballary to<br />
the limelight and now he is ready<br />
with his latest venture Hum Tum<br />
Shabana that hits the theatres on<br />
September 23. PostScript caught up<br />
with the filmmaker for a chat.<br />
Excerpts:<br />
You have given two hits in Bheja<br />
Fry and Bheja Fry 2. Do you feel<br />
the pressure now that Hum Tum<br />
Shabana is slated to release<br />
soon?<br />
Obviously the pressure is<br />
mounting, but I am not letting it<br />
get to me. With Bheja Fry 2 expectations<br />
were very high as I had to<br />
recreate the Bheja Fry magic and<br />
improve upon it. Besides, a lot of<br />
money was at stake. So, there was<br />
more pressure. For Hum Tum<br />
Shabana I was much more relaxed.<br />
In fact, with Kachcha Limboo and<br />
Hum Tum Shabana I am trying to<br />
move away from Bheja Fry.<br />
But you are still known as the<br />
Bheja Fry director, isn’t it?<br />
Well, I am really lucky on this<br />
front that I am identified with<br />
such a film. I enjoy the tag. But as I<br />
said before I am trying to move<br />
away from that. Hum Tum Shabana<br />
is a full-fledged masala entertainer.<br />
It’s total madness. But it’s<br />
not an illogical comedy. It has a<br />
certain sensibility to it. I have consciously<br />
moved away from the<br />
kind of films I have made in the<br />
past. The casting is unusual too,<br />
with Tusshar (Kapoor) and Shreyas<br />
(Talpade) on board. I am very<br />
happy with the end product and<br />
so are my producers.<br />
Tell us more about the film.<br />
It’s a romantic comedy. The first<br />
half is about this beauty pageant.<br />
But the second half gets into the<br />
niches of greedy underworld.<br />
There are five songs in the film<br />
and lots of interesting sequences.<br />
And yes there is an item song . We<br />
have used crazy camera angles.<br />
There is a certain sensuality about<br />
the film. I have not held myself<br />
back in Hum Tum Shabana. I have<br />
delved into a subject which I have<br />
never explored before. The film<br />
has lovely music composed by<br />
Sachin-Jigar. And the songs are<br />
already a hit. It’s a charming film,<br />
nonetheless.<br />
Tell us something about how<br />
Tusshar came on board.<br />
Tusshar and I were discussing<br />
another film that didn’t work out.<br />
And then the script of Hum Tum<br />
Shabana came across. I asked<br />
Tusshar if he would like to do it<br />
and he complied. We have become<br />
very good friends. It was a delight<br />
working with him. Tusshar needs<br />
good directors. I remember him in<br />
Khakee. Look at his performance in<br />
the film because there was Raj<br />
Kumar Santoshi who used<br />
Tusshar’s talents to the hilt.<br />
‘One day I want to<br />
make a tear jerker’<br />
Tusshar responds well to the<br />
director’s requirements.<br />
And what about Shreyas and<br />
Minissha?<br />
Shreyas is a master performer.<br />
He is tremendously gifted and has<br />
great energy level. He is always<br />
active on the sets even when he is<br />
through with his scenes. He is<br />
always there to give suggestions.<br />
In Golmaal he was loud and garish<br />
because the script demanded so.<br />
He would surprise many with this<br />
film. In Hum Tum Shabana he takes<br />
his talent to a different level.<br />
Minissha has improved a lot with<br />
time. She is very sincere and hard<br />
working. The way she has transformed<br />
her image from a simple<br />
girl in Yahaan to the sex bomb in<br />
Kidnap. I remember while we were<br />
shooting for Hum Tum Shabana,<br />
people were singing Mausam awesome<br />
from Kidnap. And look at<br />
Bachna Ae Haseeno. She stood her<br />
ground despite the presence of big<br />
stars.<br />
How do you see the future of<br />
comedies?<br />
It’s a great time to make good<br />
Tollywood is opting for more and more unusual onscreen pairing p4 & p5<br />
Director Sagar<br />
Ballary wants<br />
to move away<br />
from Bheja Fry<br />
with his latest<br />
offering Hum<br />
Tum Shabana<br />
films. And comedies will always<br />
be there. There’s so much of stress<br />
in our lives that we all want to<br />
watch fun films. They work as a<br />
stress buster. And comedies will<br />
make people forget all their worries.<br />
Who are your favourite comedians?<br />
My favourite comedians are<br />
Charlie Chaplin, Kishore Kumar<br />
and Vinay Pathak. Yes, I am placing<br />
Vinay in this category. He has a<br />
lot of energy and has all the qualities<br />
of a great comedian.<br />
Will you ever make an action<br />
film?<br />
Why not? I want to try out different<br />
genres. I have a film on bank<br />
robbery and another comedy lined<br />
up. But no matter which genre I<br />
venture into, my films will always<br />
have a comic touch. However, one<br />
day I want to make a tear jerker.<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
Catch the latest buzz from the telly-world p6
2 MIXED BAG<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
ART<br />
On canvas<br />
Group exhibition by artists<br />
Pradip Pradhan, Runi Misra<br />
Banerjee, Pradip Maiti and<br />
Saktipada Jana<br />
Venue: Academy of Fine Arts<br />
Date: Till September 7<br />
Time: 3pm - 8pm<br />
We Are 10<br />
A group exhibition of sculptures<br />
by Prabir Roy and paintings by<br />
Moloy Karmakar, Soumen Saha,<br />
Ranajit Haldar, Snehangshu<br />
Das, Dibasis Maity, Nilkanta<br />
Mondal, Soumendranath Roy,<br />
Shrabani Roy and Samir Das<br />
Venue: Academy of Fine Arts<br />
Date: Till September 7<br />
Time: 3pm - 8pm<br />
I Have a Face of What I’m Not<br />
A solo installation art exhibition<br />
by Adip Dutta<br />
Venue: Experimenter,<br />
Hindustan Road<br />
Date: Till September 10<br />
Time: 6pm - 8pm<br />
Retrospective<br />
Delhi Art Gallery presents an<br />
exhibition of paintings, puppets<br />
and books by mid-20th century<br />
artist Chittaprosad<br />
Venue: Birla Academy of Art<br />
and Culture<br />
Date: Till September 11<br />
Time: 3pm - 8pm<br />
Visual Means<br />
Artists include Akbar<br />
Padamsee, Tapas Konar, Gogi<br />
Saroj Pal, Achuthan Kudallur,<br />
Amitava Dhar, RM Palaniappan,<br />
Rini Dhumal, Yusuf, RB<br />
bhaskaran, Shekhar Roy, Sunil<br />
De, Gopi Gajwani, Faiza Huma,<br />
Shridhar Iyer, Vilas Shinde,<br />
Jinsook Shinde and Yogesh<br />
Rawal<br />
FATE LINE<br />
Aries: The social animal in you<br />
is most active today, leading<br />
you to devote more hours on<br />
social projects. You may also<br />
have to balance work along with it.<br />
Note: The evening can bring surprises. Be<br />
prepared.<br />
Taurus: You have a strong<br />
opinion on things related to<br />
your area of interest. People<br />
around you may look up to you<br />
for advice.<br />
Note: Have an open mind. Your optimism<br />
may be appreciated.<br />
Gemini: You may have some<br />
wacky ways of dealing with<br />
things but you cannot express<br />
it to others. Present a sober self<br />
to others.<br />
Note: Try and complete your pending<br />
projects today.<br />
Work by Chittaprosad at Birla Academy of Art and Culture<br />
Venue: ECA, Anandpur<br />
Date: Till September 17<br />
Time: 11am - 7pm<br />
Ceramic Art<br />
Celebrations of moods and<br />
emotions in ceramics with artists<br />
Abhay Pandit, Aditi Saraogi, Arun<br />
Mukutti, Ashis Chowdhury, BR<br />
Pundit, Chirayu Sinha, Devi lal<br />
Pattider, Deepali Daroz, Falguni<br />
Bhatt, G Raghu, Jaiita Man Singh<br />
and many more<br />
Venue: Gallery Sanskriti, 5C<br />
Alipore Park Road<br />
Date: Till September 24<br />
Time: 11am - 8pm<br />
Transformations<br />
A selection of paintings from<br />
north, south, east and west of<br />
India. On display are works of<br />
Avijit Dutta, Akhilesh, Asit<br />
Pathak, Bhagat Singh, Fawad<br />
Tamkanat, Laxman Aelay,<br />
Narsimhulu Kandi, Partha Shaw,<br />
Prakash Karmakar, Ramesh<br />
Gorjala, S Harshavardhan,<br />
Sanjay Bhattacharya, Shipra<br />
Bhattacharya, Subramaniam<br />
Gopalsamy and Sudip Roy<br />
Venue: Genesis Art Gallery<br />
Date: Till September 20<br />
Time: 11am - 7pm<br />
Richness of Indian History<br />
An exhibition by Pentagon — a<br />
group of 60 artists<br />
Venue: Academy of Fine Arts<br />
Date: Till September 7<br />
Time: 3pm - 8pm<br />
BOOKS<br />
Cancer: Today, you might have<br />
to deal with a big group of people<br />
without much preparation.<br />
You may still manage to tide<br />
over the situation.<br />
Note: This may be the right time to plan a<br />
vacation with family and friends.<br />
Leo: A family gathering may<br />
keep you busy. You may have<br />
to address the problems of<br />
elders as you deal with them.<br />
Your ideas will be appreciated.<br />
Note: You get success in whatever work you<br />
set out to do.<br />
Virgo: You may be spending<br />
lavishly on your friends and<br />
loved ones. Watch out as the<br />
expenses may exceed your<br />
budget.<br />
Note: If you are feeling stressed then take<br />
care for it rather than brood.<br />
Shiva Triology<br />
Amish Tripathi will launch his<br />
next book The Secret of the Nagas<br />
Venue: Starmark, South City Mall<br />
Date: September 5<br />
Time: 6:30pm<br />
FOOD<br />
Traditional Hilsa<br />
Hilsa festival with<br />
Western, Oriental and<br />
Nouveau preperations<br />
Venue: The Bridge, The<br />
Park<br />
Date: Till September 24<br />
Time: Lunch and<br />
dinner<br />
DRAMA<br />
Festival<br />
The British Council<br />
presents Annual Inter-<br />
School Drama Festival<br />
2011 semi finals<br />
Venue: Kala Kunj<br />
Date: Till September 13<br />
Time: 10am - 5pm<br />
FESTIVAL<br />
Art Festival 2011<br />
The festival aims at creating<br />
new opportunities<br />
for artists<br />
Venue: Gallerie 52d,<br />
Hindustan Park<br />
Date: September 10 -<br />
30<br />
Time: 12pm - 7:30pm<br />
QUIZ<br />
On Heritage<br />
Grand Finale of heritage<br />
quiz<br />
Venue: Gyan Manch<br />
Date: September 3<br />
Time: 9:30am onwards<br />
Libra: Your ability to react to<br />
situations quickly can win you<br />
many a battle. You are likely<br />
to be torn between tradition<br />
and modernity.<br />
Note: Relax with family at home. You may<br />
be overstressing yourself.<br />
Scorpio: There might be<br />
change of work schedule today.<br />
Deal with it as it comes and do<br />
not panic. You are methodical<br />
in your approach.<br />
Note: You may be longing to be loved and<br />
cared for today.<br />
Sagittarius: Close relationships<br />
may take up most of your time<br />
as you deal with emotional<br />
issues. Friends may chip in<br />
with help.<br />
Note: A picnic in the afternoon may be<br />
planned today.<br />
PERFORMANCE<br />
Rising Tonnes<br />
Hosted by Calcutta<br />
Classical Guitar<br />
Society, there will be<br />
performances by Pt.<br />
Debojyoti Bose and Pt.<br />
Subhankar Banerjee<br />
Venue: 9A, Ho Chi<br />
Minh Sarani<br />
Date: September 3<br />
Time: 7:30pm<br />
SEMINAR<br />
On a vacation<br />
Indian Chamber of<br />
Commerce organises<br />
travel and tourism fair<br />
Venue: Hyatt Regency<br />
Date: Till September 2<br />
Time: 10am onwards<br />
EXHIBITION<br />
Style File<br />
Toontooni is holding<br />
an exhibition of exclusive<br />
sarees and kantha<br />
items<br />
Venue: 10, Satyen<br />
Dutta Road<br />
Date: Till September<br />
12<br />
Time: 11am - 8pm<br />
The Rustic and the<br />
Royal<br />
Raja S Biswas’s saree<br />
collection<br />
Venue: 4B, Bondel<br />
Road<br />
Date: September 2-3<br />
Time: 11am - 8pm<br />
Puja Fashion<br />
A wide range of sarees,<br />
silver and eco-friendly<br />
jewellery and hand<br />
printed stoles to<br />
choose from<br />
Venue: Kamala,<br />
Rabindranath Tagore<br />
Centre, Ho Chi Minh<br />
Sarani<br />
Date: Till September 2<br />
Time: 10am - 7pm<br />
In Search of<br />
Solitude<br />
An exhibition of black<br />
and white photographs<br />
by Varun<br />
Gupta<br />
Venue: Ganges Art<br />
Gallery, Jatin Das<br />
Road<br />
Date: September 5 -<br />
17<br />
Time: 7:30pm<br />
NIGHTOUT<br />
Music Mania<br />
Experience hip house<br />
and Bollywood with<br />
India’s celebrated DJ<br />
Aqeel<br />
Venue: Underground,<br />
The HHI<br />
Date: September 3<br />
Time: 9pm onwards<br />
All those who wish<br />
events to be included<br />
in this column write<br />
not less than a week<br />
ahead to: MIXED BAG<br />
The Bengal Post<br />
DN 23,Sector V, Saltlake<br />
Kolkata — 700091<br />
Email:<br />
mixedbagbp@gmail.com<br />
Capricorn: Travel may be on<br />
the cards. You may have to plan<br />
it hurriedly. But take care not<br />
to miss out on important<br />
documents.<br />
Note: You may not be feeling confident<br />
about a project, don’t hesitate to say it.<br />
Aquarius: This may be the<br />
time when you expect support<br />
from your friends and people<br />
close to you. You may be feeling<br />
important today.<br />
Note: Keep open your communication lines<br />
as they may prove helpful.<br />
Pisces: You may be feeling<br />
powerful and energised after a<br />
motivational course. Use your<br />
wisdom to choose your friends.<br />
Note: You may attend a religious ceremony<br />
in the family.
ARCHIE<br />
RUGRATS<br />
QUIZ — KEANU REEVES<br />
1. Where was the Canadian actor born?<br />
2. His central role in which play won him<br />
international acclaim?<br />
3. How many step fathers did he have?<br />
4. In which sport did Keanu excel in school<br />
and dreamt of becoming a professional?<br />
5. Which disability affected him in his<br />
childhood?<br />
6. At what age did he begin his acting<br />
career?<br />
7. Which was his first Hollywood film?<br />
8. Which film established him as a A-list<br />
Hollywood star?<br />
9. For which grunge band did he play bass<br />
guitar?<br />
10. Which film is he planning to direct and<br />
has written the script for?<br />
DAILY CROSSWORD<br />
ACROSS<br />
1. Car grill cover<br />
4. Ugly cut<br />
8. Parboil<br />
13. Look like<br />
14. Hairy Himalayan<br />
15. Shire of "Rocky"<br />
16. Popular cookie<br />
17. Cell content<br />
19. Except<br />
21. __ Wiedersehen<br />
22. "Buenos __, Senor!"<br />
23. Some scouts<br />
25. Huge amount<br />
27. Pressed onward<br />
31. Snake charmer's<br />
attire<br />
35. Game opener<br />
36. Wiser<br />
38. Ernest or Julio<br />
39. Speakeasy risk<br />
41. Farm machine<br />
43. Weigh, as evidence<br />
44. "__ vincit amor"<br />
46. Lawsuit cause<br />
48. Never, to<br />
Wolfgang<br />
49. Cruise stop<br />
51. On the payroll<br />
53. Mascara target<br />
55. By heart<br />
56. Feng __<br />
59. Sense organ<br />
61. Came to an end<br />
65. Baskets<br />
68. Went headlong<br />
69. Poet Ginsberg<br />
70. Wind catcher<br />
71. Idyllic spot<br />
72. Cutting edge<br />
73. Vehicle on runners<br />
74. Made tracks<br />
DOWN<br />
1. Swiss capital<br />
2. Movie spool<br />
3. It often splits<br />
4. Unregistered cruiser<br />
(2 wds.)<br />
5. __ Lingus<br />
6. Ancient colonnade<br />
7. Mooch from (2 wds.)<br />
8. Indy 500 sponsor<br />
9. Volcanic craters<br />
10. Tien Shan range<br />
11. Hartman or Bonet<br />
12. River tamers<br />
13. Worthless coin<br />
18. Never heard __ __<br />
20. Heirs, often<br />
24. "Blume in Love" lead<br />
26. Wheel nut<br />
27. Jet parking<br />
28. Pulitzer category<br />
29. Leaf ribs<br />
30. Reuben sellers<br />
32. Thin pancakes<br />
33. Michael Caine role<br />
34. Observed<br />
37. Steel rod<br />
40. Had no taste for<br />
42. Secured anew<br />
45. Battery size<br />
47. Past the deadline<br />
50. Tech-support caller<br />
52. Bookworm<br />
54. Chicago Black __<br />
56. Mop<br />
57. Incline<br />
58. Bruins<br />
60. Stir up<br />
62. Fizzy beverage<br />
63. Regular<br />
64. Cozy room<br />
66. Flight dir.<br />
67. Country addr.<br />
Answers:-<br />
1. Beirut, Lebanon<br />
2. Hamlet<br />
3. Four<br />
4. Hockey<br />
5. Dyslexia<br />
6. Nine<br />
7. Youngblood<br />
8. Speed<br />
9. Dogstar<br />
10. Man of Tai Chi<br />
SUDOKU<br />
MIXED BAG 3<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
YESTERDAY’S SOLUTION
4 K FACTOR<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
Tanushree<br />
Sudipta<br />
Indraneil<br />
Srijit<br />
WACKY pairs on<br />
Supreeta Singh<br />
At this moment, the one defining<br />
word to describe the mood<br />
in Bengal is ‘change’. If one of<br />
the greatest forces in the state,<br />
politics is celebrating its new found<br />
freedom, how can the other one, entertainment<br />
remain far behind? Tollywood<br />
too is riding high on positive developments<br />
and one of the clear signs is casting<br />
of new faces and using unlikely<br />
actors as lead pairs.<br />
Neelakshi Roy of Orion<br />
Entertainment, whose recent film<br />
Chaplin has a fresh cast, says, “There is<br />
no guidebook or formula on casting. It’s<br />
an art like music or painting.”<br />
Till recently, commercial films in<br />
Tollywood would only boast of a<br />
Prosenjit, Dev, Koel, Jeet, Rahul,<br />
Priyanka and few others. While they<br />
still continue to enjoy stardom and produce<br />
super-hits, in the last couple of<br />
years a whole slew of films have intro-<br />
Rachita<br />
Fresh faces and unusual casting<br />
boost and making it<br />
duced the changing dynamics in the<br />
industry. From Autograph (Indraniel<br />
Sengupta-Nandana Dev Sen-Prosenjit<br />
Chatterjee), Pa Ma Ga Re Sa (Reshmi<br />
Ghosh-Rohit Roy-Gauri Karnik), Notobor<br />
Not Out (Raima Sen-Prakash Mustafa) to<br />
the newly released, Icche (Samadarshi-<br />
Sohini Sengupta), Ranjana Ami Ar<br />
Ashbona (Anjan Dutt-Parno Mitra), Iti<br />
Mrinalini (Aparna Sen-Priyanshu<br />
Chatterjee), Uro Chithi (Indraniel-<br />
Sreelekha Mitra-Tanusree) and Chaplin<br />
(Rudranil Ghosh-Rachita-Srijit<br />
Mukherjee) — Tollywood is experimenting<br />
with the starcast in lead roles like<br />
never before.<br />
Director Srijit Mukherjee of Autograph<br />
fame says, “A well-known pair has a settled<br />
chemistry. But after sometime, it<br />
becomes monotonous watching them.<br />
Since familiarity breeds contempt, we<br />
need to see other actors too. There is a<br />
risk involved in the sense there is no<br />
prior record of the chemistry, but that’s<br />
a challenge worth taking.”<br />
Rituparna
Payel<br />
is giving Tollywood a much-needed<br />
a force to reckon with<br />
Bengali SCREEN<br />
Thanks to a fresh crop of producers,<br />
directors and scriptwriters, Tollywood is<br />
pushing its boundary of the tried and the<br />
tested. For example, in films mentioned<br />
earlier, script was the king that determined<br />
who would be cast in which role.<br />
Manu Malhotra of Phoenix Cinemas Pvt<br />
Ltd whose Uro Chithi is a hit says, “We felt<br />
that the actors should fit the character<br />
and should not look like a forced arrangement.<br />
We needed someone to portray the<br />
character of a mature mother and wife<br />
who has had no time to look after herself.<br />
Sreelekha perfectly fitted the description.<br />
Even getting Sudipta-Rudranil and<br />
Locket-Biswanath together was a casting<br />
coup.”<br />
But this does not mean that Dev or Koel<br />
are losing popularity. It just shows that<br />
rather than banking on mere star value,<br />
author-backed roles are gaining more<br />
acceptance.<br />
Manu says, “I may cast Jeet and<br />
Srabonti in my film. That’s not the issue.<br />
But we we also want to churn out films<br />
for a different kind of audience too.”<br />
That is another factor of determining<br />
the change — the rise of multiplex crowd.<br />
While that category of audience always<br />
existed but specific films to please them<br />
were not made. Talking about changing<br />
trends, Arijit Dutta of Priya Entertainment<br />
says, “A typical commercial film requires<br />
good music, dance and good promotion.<br />
But we are now seeing a new genre of<br />
films that are more urban and sleek. It<br />
indicates that Tollywood has matured.<br />
Earlier, artistes who would feature as<br />
fourth or lower in the list are now up as<br />
the first or the second.”<br />
In the coming months, Tollywood will<br />
witness the release of more films with<br />
fresh casting. To name a handful, there is<br />
Sanghamitra Chowdhury’s Someday,<br />
Somewhere (Pauli Dam-Shaheb), Subrata<br />
Sen’s Nondinee (Mir-Swastika-Dibyendu),<br />
Birsa Dasgupta’s Jodi Bolo Hyan<br />
(Parambrata-Paayel), Agnidev Chatterjee’s<br />
Charulata 2011 (Rituparna-Samadarshi)<br />
and others.<br />
Parambrata<br />
Reshmi<br />
Sreelekha<br />
Parambrata<br />
K FACTOR 5<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
Parno<br />
Swastika
6 TELEVISION<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
It’s time to go the Balle Balle way<br />
9X Music Group recently launched 9X Tashan, superhit Punjabi music channel,<br />
which will feature interesting animated characters and a spate of superhit<br />
Punjabi songs. 9X Tashan is targeted at free-spirited Punjabi viewers who take<br />
pride in everything Punjabi — from food to culture, to clothes and of course music.<br />
The great Maratha on television<br />
Colors finally forays into the genre of historical drama with the launch of their<br />
bi-weekly weekend show Veer Shivaji, starting tonight. The show is not merely<br />
a chronological presentation of historiocal facts, but also promises to treat the<br />
viewers to many lesser known facets of Shivaji’s life and times.<br />
Beware! Pranksters on the loose<br />
Big CBS Love is all set to launch their crazy new show Benidorm Pranksters this month.<br />
Benidorm Pranksters is a hilarious hidden camera show starring seven senior citizens<br />
who roam around the streets with the sole motive to pull some fast ones on the young<br />
crowd. If you are game for the wacky and the bizzare, this is your show.<br />
Tap your feet with Imran and Katrina<br />
It was one special evening for the participants of Zee TV’s Sa re ga ma pa Lil Champs when<br />
the stars of the much awaited film Mere Brother ki Dulhan, Katrina Kaif, Imran Khan and<br />
Ali Zafar visited the sets. It got only better when the three chose to take the stage.<br />
Sonakshi’s life served on a platter<br />
This time it is Sonakshi Sinha’s life on offer on UTV Star’s Live my Life. Sonakshi’s die-hard<br />
fan Priyanka, will get to live her life for one whole day, from eating her special breakfast<br />
to meeting her first director to choosing the jewellery for her next shoot, she does it all.<br />
The icing on the cake in a sumptuous meal and conversation with the star herself.
Pics: Yogen Shah<br />
Aamir Khan Imran Khan<br />
General VK Singh<br />
We spotted General VK Singh and<br />
Parikshit Sahani at a party that was<br />
held in honour of General VK Singh<br />
who is the senior most infantry<br />
officer of the Indian Army.<br />
Parikshit Sahani<br />
Actors Aamir Khan and Imran Khan<br />
were seen coming back after reading<br />
Eid namaz. Aamir wished his fans<br />
and hoped everyone would be<br />
savouring biryani and sevai.<br />
Salman Khan<br />
Sreyas Talpade with wife Deepti<br />
Suhana Khan Shah Rukh Khan<br />
Superstar Shah Rukh Khan celebrated<br />
Eid-ul-Fitr lavishly at his Bandra<br />
residence Mannat. We caught a<br />
glimpse of his daughter Suhana and<br />
the superstar himself after Eid namaz.<br />
We met Salman Khan at the airport, completely guarded by his bodyguards.<br />
Looks like even the Bodyguard needs protection!<br />
Actor Sreyas Talpade and his wife Deepti posed for photographs as they returned<br />
home with their idol of Ganesha on the eve of Ganesh Chaturthi.<br />
MUMBAI WRAP 7<br />
Vinay Pathak and Sadia Siddiqui<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
Rajat Kapoor and Vinay Pathak<br />
team up together in Praveen<br />
Kumar's comedy Jo Dooba So Paar:<br />
It's Love In Bihaar. We snapped the<br />
two along with Sadia Siddiqui<br />
while shooting on the sets of the<br />
film.<br />
Rajat Kapoor
8 BUZZING NOW<br />
Friday September 2, 2011<br />
From simpleton to sexy<br />
siren, Vidya goes ooh la la!<br />
A still from The Dirty Picture<br />
The actress on playing Silk Smitha in The Dirty Picture<br />
She is at her boldest ever in The Dirty Picture,<br />
but actress Vidya Balan says she never felt<br />
uncomfortable while shooting for the film as<br />
she was in the trusted hands of director Milan<br />
Luthria. “I have never enjoyed being a woman<br />
more than I did while shooting for The Dirty<br />
Picture. Earlier on, I wasn't uncomfortable<br />
doing bold scenes because I wasn’t in trusted<br />
hands,” said Vidya. The actress, reprises the<br />
role of the late southern siren Silk Smitha’s<br />
rise and fall as a glamourous star. On asking<br />
her about her rapport with Naseeruddin Shah<br />
the actress who has teamed up with the veteran<br />
actor earlier in Ishqiya says, “I have<br />
worked with Naseer before but this time it<br />
was easier. I was less nervous.” On asking her<br />
about her experience on working with<br />
Bollywood’s serial kisser Emraan, with whom<br />
she has locked lips in the film also, she says, “I<br />
was wondering how it would be with Emraan.<br />
It was fun.”<br />
So forget the bespectacled Radhika of the<br />
Hum Paanch series, the demure Lalita of<br />
Parineeta or even the rustic Krishna of Ishqiya.<br />
An evolved Vidya Balan will be seen painting<br />
The Dirty Picture red with her killer pout, sultry<br />
dance, deep cleavage and her bold stance,<br />
leaving you singing and sighing ‘Ooh la la!’<br />
with Bappi Lahiri’s spicy rendition of ‘Tu Hai<br />
Meri Fantasy...’.<br />
Producer Ekta Kapoor says, “I would be surprised<br />
if I don't get unbelievable critical<br />
acclaim for Dirty Picture and a national award<br />
for my actress, Vidya Balan.”<br />
So now, the Munnis and the Sheilas of<br />
Bollywood can take a backseat because this<br />
sexy 33-year-old (even with her not so washboard<br />
abs) might just become every man's<br />
fantasy with her titillating moves, curvaceous<br />
frame, playfulness, and sensuous ways with<br />
Naseeruddin Shah, Tusshar Kapoor and<br />
Emraan Hashmi.<br />
With its in-the-face dialogues, the trailer<br />
itself might leave many gasping like when<br />
Vidya tells Tusshar, “Mujhe jo chahiye uska<br />
mazza raat ko hee aata hai.”<br />
It's been six years since Vidya made her<br />
Bollywood debut with Parineeta, but in the<br />
short period, the actress showed her fearless<br />
streak by doing roles that are as different as<br />
chalk and cheese like Krishna in Ishqiya and Dr<br />
Vidya in Paa.<br />
Her choice of unconventional scripts with<br />
experimental roles that challenge the actor in<br />
her has continued to set an example of what it<br />
takes to strike the right balance between commercial<br />
and parallel cinema.<br />
Her performance in Guru as a multiple sclerosis<br />
patient may have been short, but it didn't<br />
go unnoticed. Her films Salaam-e-Ishq, Heyy<br />
Babyy and Kismet Konnection may not have<br />
done much to boost her film career, but Vidya<br />
remained dauntless.<br />
She atunned the audience with her dancing<br />
skills in Bhool Bhulaiya’s Ami je tomar. For a<br />
brief period, her choice of dresses were the<br />
talk of the town. She was much criticised but<br />
Vidya kept to her work. She returned as the<br />
single mother in Paa and her high-voltage performance<br />
shut the wagging tongues.<br />
Then came No One Killed Jessica that saw her<br />
in a completely different avatar. Based on the<br />
real-life Jessica Lall murder case, the film saw<br />
her as a grieving sister who runs from pillar to<br />
post to get justice for her dead sister.<br />
After entertaining viewers with her plain<br />
Jane look, Vidya has now picked up a contrasting<br />
role in The Dirty Picture. She oozes oomph<br />
like never before and one wonders if the<br />
movie will be Vidya’s next stepping stone to<br />
her ever-rising success story.<br />
Directed by Milan Luthria, the film releases<br />
on December 2, Silk Smitha's birth anniversary.<br />
— IANS<br />
Weisz and Craig may try<br />
for a baby<br />
Actress Rachel Weisz,<br />
who tied the knot with<br />
‘James Bond’ actor Daniel<br />
Craig in a surprise low-key<br />
ceremony, says they may try<br />
for another baby in near<br />
future. The 41-year-old<br />
already has a five-year-old<br />
son with former partner<br />
Darren Aronofsky. “Oh, I<br />
wouldn’t make [a baby] just<br />
for the sake of giving my son<br />
a sibling. But ... You never<br />
know,” contactmusic.com<br />
quoted her as saying. The<br />
couple will be seen together<br />
in upcoming horror movie<br />
Dream House. — IANS<br />
The real Salman revealed<br />
What happens when<br />
two close friends<br />
from the industry sit down<br />
to chat about all the possible<br />
things under the roof?<br />
The two get chattier as<br />
Preity and Salman spoke<br />
their hearts out on Up Close<br />
and Personal with PZ.<br />
Salman got groovy on the<br />
episode and even posed for<br />
a make believe film poster<br />
titled Pyaar Mein Band<br />
Bajega Halu Halu where<br />
Salman was dressed a<br />
‘band baaja walah’ and she<br />
was dressed as a ‘Dulhan.’<br />
Shraddha Kapoor loves<br />
adventure<br />
When you think of<br />
Bollywood babes going<br />
on holiday, you imagine them<br />
sitting by the pool, sun bathing<br />
and just having a luxurious<br />
time. But hottie, Shraddha<br />
Kapoor, who gained fame with<br />
Luv ka the End and Teen Patti, is<br />
an adventurous type. We<br />
recently heard that<br />
Shraddha went off to<br />
Maldives for some scuba<br />
diving. The question<br />
does Shraddha have<br />
what it takes to take<br />
up adventure sports?<br />
“I feel like I was transported<br />
out of earth,<br />
seen crustaceans, fish,<br />
coral with colors and<br />
forms like I could<br />
never have imagined.<br />
It was an overwhelming<br />
sight,<br />
very hard to swallow<br />
and fully<br />
understand.<br />
Hmmm... we are<br />
sure there are<br />
more good things<br />
to be seen of you<br />
Shraddha.