Maya spent 86cr to renovate her house-- ToI-9.5.12

Arvind Singh Bisht TNN

Lucknow: Bahujan Samaj Party supreme Mayawati spent over Rs 86 crore of public money to renovate her sprawling 13, Mall Avenue bungalow — a house she became entitled to in 1995 when she first became the CM. The renovation work began after Mayawati took over as CM in 2007 but the bulk of the work was completed towards the end of her tenure.
    This came to light through an RTI application by Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Yadav, who had filed the query when he was the leader of the Opposition during Mayawati’s rule. Although the RTI query dates back a year, the estate department revealed the details recently.
    “We’re still assessing the total cost. There are indications that the money spent might even exceed Rs 100 crore,” said a senior estate department official. The five-acre prime land is guarded by 20-feet-tall walls of Rajasthan sandstone. Originally, the plot was over 2.5 acres, but Maya added the adjoining plot (during her last tenure as CM) which housed the cane commissioner’soffice.Thatbuilding hassince been demolished.
    The main structure is single-storied with six inter-connected rooms. These open on to a wide corridor, which contain rows of lockers. On one wall along this corridor hangs a large picture of Mayawati taking her first oath as UPC Min 1995.Outsidethecorridor is a verandahwithtwowindows, fitted with bullet-proof glass. Each windowcostRs15lakh.There’s a separate two-storied well-furnished guesthouse with 14 bedrooms in the premises. All rooms have pink Italian marble flooring, Maya’s favorite color. This building, too, has a conference hall, a security room, garages and drivers’ rooms. Outside, there are two 20-feet statues, one of Mayawati and the other of her mentor KanshiRam.
    The rooms were built and torn down several times, which partly explain the huge cost. “One bathroom in the main building was redone a dozen times because Behan ji did not like it,” said an official. Given her paranoia, the home department put up barbwire fence round the boundary wall. A close-circuit TV watched visitors.
    The bungalow’s renovation was clubbed with the building of parks and memorials in the memory of Dalit icons. The job was assigned to the Nirman Nigam,which gavetop priority to the bungalow’s renovation. Shivpal, who’s now PWD minister, said action will be taken against those found guilty of irregularities.
    Department officials said 80% of funds were provided by the estate department, the remaining by Nirman Nigam and other agencies. Nirman Nigam, sources said, refused to answer estate department’s repeated queries aboutits activities.
    The bungalow was earlier Speaker’s House and long occupied by Congress’s Baldev Singh Arya, who was minister in UP’s first assembly in 1952. In 2007, during her fourth stint as CM of one of India’s poorest states, she decided to expand the property and do it up in royal style.
UP govt  scraps Maya’s Jewar airport project
    The UP government has decided to scrap the ambitious Greenfield international airport at Jewar, infrastructure and industrial development commissioner Anil Kumar Gupta said on Tuesday. The airport was former chief minister Mayawati’s dream project and the SP government is planning to develop a new international airport between Agra and Mathura. As per the rules, no airport can be constructed within 150km of an existing one. Jewar is less than 100km away from New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport. “Central clearance for Jewar airport was pending for seven years. In the absence of this approval, UP government was left with no alternative. As a result, a decision was taken to scrap the project,” Gupta said. The decision, however, does not mean the end of the road for an international airport in the state. TNN

MAYAGHAR: Mayawati’s 13 Mall Avenue bungalow in Lucknow

Arvind Singh Bisht TNN

Lucknow: Bahujan Samaj Party supreme Mayawati spent over Rs 86 crore of public money to renovate her sprawling 13, Mall Avenue bungalow — a house she became entitled to in 1995 when she first became the CM. The renovation work began after Mayawati took over as CM in 2007 but the bulk of the work was completed towards the end of her tenure.
    This came to light through an RTI application by Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Yadav, who had filed the query when he was the leader of the Opposition during Mayawati’s rule. Although the RTI query dates back a year, the estate department revealed the details recently.
    “We’re still assessing the total cost. There are indications that the money spent might even exceed Rs 100 crore,” said a senior estate department official. The five-acre prime land is guarded by 20-feet-tall walls of Rajasthan sandstone. Originally, the plot was over 2.5 acres, but Maya added the adjoining plot (during her last tenure as CM) which housed the cane commissioner’soffice.Thatbuilding hassince been demolished.
    The main structure is single-storied with six inter-connected rooms. These open on to a wide corridor, which contain rows of lockers. On one wall along this corridor hangs a large picture of Mayawati taking her first oath as UPC Min 1995.Outsidethecorridor is a verandahwithtwowindows, fitted with bullet-proof glass. Each windowcostRs15lakh.There’s a separate two-storied well-furnished guesthouse with 14 bedrooms in the premises. All rooms have pink Italian marble flooring, Maya’s favorite color. This building, too, has a conference hall, a security room, garages and drivers’ rooms. Outside, there are two 20-feet statues, one of Mayawati and the other of her mentor KanshiRam.
    The rooms were built and torn down several times, which partly explain the huge cost. “One bathroom in the main building was redone a dozen times because Behan ji did not like it,” said an official. Given her paranoia, the home department put up barbwire fence round the boundary wall. A close-circuit TV watched visitors.
    The bungalow’s renovation was clubbed with the building of parks and memorials in the memory of Dalit icons. The job was assigned to the Nirman Nigam,which gavetop priority to the bungalow’s renovation. Shivpal, who’s now PWD minister, said action will be taken against those found guilty of irregularities.
    Department officials said 80% of funds were provided by the estate department, the remaining by Nirman Nigam and other agencies. Nirman Nigam, sources said, refused to answer estate department’s repeated queries aboutits activities.
    The bungalow was earlier Speaker’s House and long occupied by Congress’s Baldev Singh Arya, who was minister in UP’s first assembly in 1952. In 2007, during her fourth stint as CM of one of India’s poorest states, she decided to expand the property and do it up in royal style.
UP govt  scraps Maya’s Jewar airport project
    The UP government has decided to scrap the ambitious Greenfield international airport at Jewar, infrastructure and industrial development commissioner Anil Kumar Gupta said on Tuesday. The airport was former chief minister Mayawati’s dream project and the SP government is planning to develop a new international airport between Agra and Mathura. As per the rules, no airport can be constructed within 150km of an existing one. Jewar is less than 100km away from New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport. “Central clearance for Jewar airport was pending for seven years. In the absence of this approval, UP government was left with no alternative. As a result, a decision was taken to scrap the project,” Gupta said. The decision, however, does not mean the end of the road for an international airport in the state. TNN

MAYAGHAR: Mayawati’s 13 Mall Avenue bungalow in Lucknow

Abolish Haj subsidy in 10 years: SC -- ToI-9.5.12

Average Annual Subsidy 650Cr; Use Money For Education, Says Court  

Dhananjay Mahapatra TNN

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the Union government to gradually reduce and abolish Haj subsidy in 10 years and invest the amount — averaging over Rs 650 crore a year for last five years — in education and other measures for social development of the minority community.
    “We direct the central government to progressively reduce the amount of subsidy so as to completely eliminate it within a period of 10 years from today,” said a bench of Justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana P Desai in an order that reflected a resolve which successive governments had failed to muster in the last 60 years. That the apex court had earlier upheld the constitutional validity of Haj subsidy only adds to the significance of the order.
    “The subsidy money may be more profitably used for uplift of the community in education and other indices of social development,” said Justice Alam, who wrote the order. The court said it has no authority to speak on the minority community’s behalf and that it would be presumptuous to tell the Muslims what was a good or bad religious practice even though it cited the Quran to say that Haj pilgrimage was mandatory only for those who could afford the expenses for travelling, food and accommodation.
    “We have no doubt that a very large majority of Muslims applying to the Haj committee for going to Haj would not be aware of the economics of their pilgrimage and if all the facts are made known, a good many of the pilgrims would not be very comfortable in the knowledge that their Haj is funded to a substantial extent by the government,” the bench said while reminding the community about the Quran’s verse 97 in Surah 3, Al-e-Imran, which mandated that Muslims should undertake Haj only if they could afford it.
    The court said it was aware that in many other purely religious events there were direct and indirect deployment of state funds and resources. “Nevertheless, we are of the view that Haj subsidy is something that is best done away with,” the bench of Justices Alam and Desai said.
    BJP and other Hindutva outfits have traditionally attacked Haj subsidy on grounds that it was contrary to the principle of secularism and marked an appeasement of the minority community, before they sought to turn it into justification for subsidy for Hindu pilgrimages.
    The apex court also objected to the jumbo-size Prime Minister’s Goodwill Delegation that visits Saudi Arabia every year at the government’s expense. “The present practice of sending such a delegation must come to a stop,” the bench said.
    It asked the government to choose a maximum 10 among the Haj pilgrims who were in Saudi Arabia on their own expenses. They could coordinate with the Indian envoy there for conveying goodwill of Indians to Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, it said.
    “We fully appreciate the idea of the people of India extending their goodwill to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on the auspicious occasion of Haj but we completely fail to see how even that purpose can be served by sending such a large, unwieldy, amorphous and randomly selected delegation,” the bench said.
    The size of the delegation was only three between 1967 and 1973, after which it remained 10 till 1987. Subsequently, the delegation picked up flab and became 31 in 1997, 36 (2005), 30 (2010) and 27 (2011).
    The court also wanted to examine why the government kept a quota of 11,000 Haj pilgrims for itself of which over 3,000 were chosen on recommendation of VVIPs. It wanted to know how the special quota of 11,000 Haj pilgrims were allocated for this year, and also the details of procedure adopted by Haj Committee of India (HCOI) in distributing 1.25 lakh Haj quota among pilgrims.
Haj draw on May 10
Hyderabad: The Qurrah (draw of lots) for selection of Haj pilgrims for Haj 2012 will be held on May 10 from 10 am at Haj House, Nampally. This year the Haj Committee of India has allotted a quota of 5,764 for Andhra Pradesh out of which 1,418 pilgrims have already been declared selected under two reserve categories. The computerized district-wise Qurrah will be held for the remaining quota. TNN NO FREE PILGRIMAGE
Govt has been asked to phase out Haj subsidy within 10 years
Centre now foots 38,000 per Haji by giving subsidised airfare
1.25L pilgrims went for Haj last year
Bench says the subsidy
money may be more profitably used for uplift of the community in education and other indices of social development

Sakshi accounts frozen -- ToI-9.5.12

CBI Trying To Kill Freedom of Press: Jagan   

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Hyderabad:In a move that is likely to affect the operations of Sakshi newspaper and Sakshi television, the CBI on Tuesday got the authorities of State Bank of India and Oriental Bank of Commerce to freeze the accounts belonging to these companies owned by YSR Congress president Jaganmohan Reddy as part of its probe into the assets case.
    The accounts that were frozen were those of Jagatii Publications, publishers of Sakshi newspaper, Indira Television, which airs Sakshi TV news channel, and Janani Infrastructure Pvt Ltd, which provides logistics and infrastructure to Sakshi newspaper and TV. All operations of these accounts have been frozen until further notice and the banks were directed to confirm the action on the CBI notices including the details of the accounts and the amounts that are deposited in it and the transactions that they carried out.
    In the notices issued to the two banks under section 102 of the CrPC, CBI SP and chief investigating officer H Venkatesh charged that Jagan's firms, Jagathi, Indira and Janani have been maintaining accounts in these banks and parked the ‘ill-gotten’ proceeds of crime received from various sources under the guise of funds for conducting business.
    Swiftly reacting to the development, Jagan said: “I expected this move from the CBI long ago. Without proving anything against me, the CBI is trying to kill the freedom of the press and democratic values in the country. But it cannot stop Sakshi and Sakshi TV for doing its job. They have already secured public support in a big way. The people will teach a lesson to all the forces behind this act.”
    Sakshi newspaper and TV too condemned the CBI‘s action saying: “This is nothing but attack on the freedom of the press”. Sureedu made witness Hyderabad: The CBI did not even give us any notice or obtain permission from the court. They wrongly invoked the Prevention of Corruption Act and froze the bank accounts. We will challenge it in the court of law,” Sajjala Ramakrishna Reddy, managing director of Jagati Publications, told TOI after he received the notices from the banks. He vowed to continue the publication with the support of the people.
    Meanwhile, in another key development, the CBI could reign in YSR's aide E Suryanarayana Reddy (popularly known as Sureedu) and succeed in turning him as its witness in the case. The probe agency on Tuesday filed an application before the chief metropolitan magistrate court urging it to record his statement under section 164 of the Cr PC. Sureedu had reportedly deposed before the CBI earlier stating that it was YSR’s close aide K V P Ramachandra Rao who played an instrumental role in connecting Koneru Prasad, Matrix Prasad, Penna Pratap Reddy and others with the former chief minister. The CBI is seeking to record the statement of Suryudu in both the Jagan assets and Emaar scam cases.

Plastic bag threat worse than A-bomb: SC-- ToI-8.5.12

‘We Must Examine Ban Or Order Efficient Retrieval’  

Dhananjay Mahapatra TNN

New Delhi: Excessive use of plastic bags and their unregulated disposal has been choking lakes, ponds and urban sewerage systems, the Supreme Court said on Monday while warning that it posed a threat more serious than the atom bomb for the next generation.
    This observation from a bench of Justices G S Singhvi and S J Mukhopadhaya came on a PIL filed by two Andhra Pradesh-based NGOs drawing the court’s attention to 30-60 kg of plastic bags recovered from the stomachs of cows because of irresponsible disposal of plastic bags and defunct municipal waste collection system.
    The court issued notice to the Centre and state governments on the PIL seeking ban on use of plastic bags in municipal areas which did not have a prompt garbage collection, segregation and disposal system. The NGOs said absence of prompt garbage collection, segregation and disposal system allowed cows to rummage through garbage bins and eat foodstuff disposed of in plastic bags, which get stuck in their stomach.
    But the bench wanted to address the larger questions arising from indiscriminate use of plastic bags, which not only posed a grave threat to nature and environment but also to the human race itself. It suggested that the petitioner make the manufacturers and a television channel, which has been running a campaign against use of plastic, parties to the PIL for a wider scrutiny of the important issue.
    “All of us are watching how our lakes, ponds and urban sewerage systems are getting choked by plastic bags. We want to expand the scope of this petition. Unless we examine a total ban on plastic bags or put in place a system for manufacturers mandating them to collect back all plastic bags, the next generation will be threatened with something more serious than the atom bomb,” Justices Singhvi and Mukhopadhaya said.
    The court drew the petitioner’s attention to large quantities of water packed in plastic pouches, which were thrown around in undisciplined and uncivil manner across the country every day. “A rough estimate shows more than 100 million water pouches are thrown all over the cities and towns,” the bench said.
    Appearing for NGOs Karuna Society for Animal and Nature and Visakha Society for Protection and Care of Animals, senior advocate Shyam Divan said the problem was more acute in urban areas where people had a habit of disposing leftover food in plastic bags in municipal bins.
    “Due to government neglect across the country, animals particularly cows and bulls are ingesting plastic from garbage dumps and plastic bags are littered across the landscape and oceans. The ingestion of plastic bags chokes the stomach of cows and up to 60 kg of plastic bags were found in the stomachs of cows. What appears to be a healthy cow is in fact a plastic-choked cow or a cow full of plastic,” Divan said. “Apart from the plastic completely choking the digestive system of the cow and causing excruciating pain to the animal, plastic residues enter the human food chain through dairy and animal products,” he added.
    Divan said plastic bags were increasingly posing a grave threat to wildlife too. “Along India’s rivers and coastline, plastic waste and garbage is dumped from thousands of villages and towns into the water along with untreated sewage. The garbage including plastic waste is found by wild animals and is ingested by them,” he said.
    “Turtles are highly susceptible to swallowing plastic bags as they strongly resemble their target prey – jellyfish and squid. In the course of sea turtle protection work, Pradeep Nath, one of the petitioners along with the NGOs, found that post-mortem conducted on dead turtles showed plastic waste in their stomachs,” Divan added.
CASE AGAINST PLASTIC
Prohibit or phase out in a time-bound manner open garbage disposal system and remove open garbage receptacles
Implement door-to-door garbage collection and prevent animals from moving around garbage storage facilities
Municipalities must segregate all plastic waste from other waste
States must issue directions
prohibiting use, sale and disposal of plastic bags in all municipal areas
Provide animal shelters and treat cows and other animals suffering from stomach ailments due to ingestion of plastic

France votes in Hollande, boots out Sarkozy -- ToI-7.5.12

Gets First Socialist President After Mitterrand Left In 1995  

Paris: Francois Hollande was elected France’s first Socialist president in nearly two decades on Sunday, dealing a humiliating defeat to incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy and shaking up European politics.
    The result will have major implications for Europe as it struggles to emerge from a financial crisis and for France, the eurozone’s second-largest
economy and a nucleararmed permanent member of the UN Security Council.
    Hollande won the vote with about 52%, according to several estimates from polling firms based on ballot samples, becoming France’s first Socialist president since Francois Mitterrand left office in 1995. Joyful crowds gathered in Hollande’s adopted hometown of Tulle and in Paris to celebrate his victory.
    “We are rid of a poison that was blighting our society. A normal president! It gives us a lot to dream about,” said Didier Stephan, a 70-year-old artist who was among throngs of supporters at Paris’s Place de la Bastille. Even before polls closed and broadcasters released estimates, supporters were chanting “President Hollande!” and “We Won!” at the iconic square.
    Sarkozy urged leaders of his right-wing UMP party to remain united after his defeat, but warned he would not lead it into June’s parliamentary elections, according to political sources present at a meeting at his headquarters.
    Hollande led in opinion polls throughout the campaign and won the April 22 first round with 28.6% to Sarkozy’s 27.2% — making the right-winger the first-ever incumbent to lose in the first round. Grey skies and rain showers greeted voters across much of France, but turnout was high, hitting 71.96% at 5 pm (1500 GMT) according to interior ministry figures. More than 46 million people were eligible to vote.
    The election was marked by fears over EU-imposed austerity and economic globalization, and Hollande has said his first foreign meeting will be with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
    The 57-year-old Socialist has vowed to renegotiate the hard-fought fiscal austerity pact signed by EU leaders in March and to make it focus more on growth.