Today's Hot Stories - March 27, 2014
10 Headlines for Today(1) No question of Modi being replaced, says Jaitley
(2) Congress promises quotas, jobs
(3) 50 fishermen injured in Sri Lankan Navy attack
(4) Interim bail to Roy, directors if they deposit Rs.10,000 crore
(5) Portal to make business easy for traders
(6) Facebook to acquire virtual reality firm Oculus for $2b
(7) Vettel and Missy walk away with top honours
(8) Chennai boys head to Brazil to battle for soccer world cup
(9) Ranjeet puts out Poonacha
(10) Wrong posture can break your back!
5 Stories for Today
(1) Three ‘AKs’ enough to destabilise India: Modi
(2) Recep Tayyip Erdogan: Turkish strongman under corruption cloud
(3) CBI may probe Cement Corporation’s selection process
(4) WTO asks India to remove raw sugar export subsidy
(5) Congress puts on a business face to win back India Inc
(1) Three ‘AKs’ enough to destabilise India: Modi
AK-47, A.K. Antony and Arvind Kejriwal are “helping the country’s enemy”, BJP prime ministerial candidate tells an election meeting in Jammu
In sharp contrast to his December 1, 2013 Lalkar Rally in Jammu, BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi on Wednesday held Pakistan responsible for terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir and other parts of India, while slamming his detractors from the Union Defence Minister A.K. Antony to the Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal for “helping the country’s enemy”.
Addressing a massive gathering of the BJP supporters at an election campaign rally at Hiranagar, close to the India-Pakistan International Border, in Udhampur-Doda Lok Sabha constituency, Mr. Modi said that Pakistan’s AK-47 rifle, Mr. Antony and Mr. Kejriwal were enough to destabilise peace in Kashmir and rest of the country. “These three AKs are sustaining terrorism in Kashmir and other parts of India”, he told a fervent crowd.
The BJP leader said that when the Indian Army made unambiguously clear last year that Pakistani Army men had “butchered our eight jawans” in Poonch, none other than Mr. Antony came to Pakistan’s rescue by saying in Parliament that the assailants were the unidentified men in the Pakistani combat uniform. He alleged that Pakistan was directly and clearly responsible for different forms of terrorism, including the cross-border terrorism, in Kashmir and other parts of this country.
He asserted that Pakistan-backed terrorists had carried out hundreds of bloodbaths in Jammu and Kashmir including the one in September 2013 when nine soldiers and innocent civilians were killed in fidayeen attacks in Hiranagar and Samba. Mr. Modi said that the Congress and the UPA had changed Lal Bahadur Shastri’s slogan “Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan” slogan to “Mar Jawan, Mar Kisan”.
In a sarcastic reference to his brief term of 49 days as Chief Minister of Delhi, Mr. Modi called the AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal as ‘AK-49’, alleging that even the Jammu and Kashmir map was missing from his party’s official website. He also scolded the National Conference leader and the Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah for allegedly flying helicopters over the December rally and taking pictures of the gathering in an attempt to prove that there were empty spaces in Maulana Azad Stadium. “Today, I am afraid, he wont fly the choppers over this rally for fear of violating the Model Code of Conduct. But if he does, he will see through this crowded stadium which way the wind is blowing today,” Mr. Modi said.
In his frontal attacks on the arch rival Congress, Mr. Modi yet again called Rahul Gandhi a ‘Shehzada’ and claimed that the Lok Sabha elections would rout the party completely. “Their answer to our each and every question is secularism. When we ask about terrorism, they retort with secularism. When we talk of corruption, they speak secularism, when we talk of unemployment, their refrain is secularism. They have no answer to our questions, nor to those of the common man of this country,” Mr. Modi said.
Retired IGP and founder of the Jammu and Kashmir Police’s Special Operations Group Farooq Khan and a Kashmiri journalist Khalid Jehangir joined the BJP at Mr. Modi’s rally.
Source: The Hindu
(2) Recep Tayyip Erdogan: Turkish strongman under corruption cloud
Born in a blue-collar Istanbul neighbourhood, Recep Tayyip Erdogan became modern Turkey's most powerful prime minister but is now under fire over corruption claims and an autocratic leadership style.
After 11 years at the helm, the man dubbed the "Sultan" by his loyal followers has been accused of seeking "one-man rule" and erratically lashing out at critics, from former allies to street protesters and Twitter users.
Months of political turmoil have cast a shadow over Erdogan, who was long hailed as the leader of an emerging global player and a model Muslim democracy and oversaw a decade of unprecedented economic growth.
Ahead of key local elections Sunday, the 60-year-old has pushed his campaign motto, "Iron Will", on billboards blanketing the nation, even as he has endured scathing social media mockery from the tech-savvy children of the boom years.
As tales of official graft and sleaze have spread via smartphones and laptops, Erdogan has branded his critics "traitors" and "terrorists" and purged thousands in the police and judiciary.
Erdogan was born in 1954, the son of a coast guard officer in Istanbul's harbourside neighbourhood of Kasimpasa, where as a teenager he sold bread and lemons on the streets.
He joined Islamic youth groups that challenged the era's secular-nationalist regimes and the coup-happy generals who saw it as their duty to ensure a strict separation between mosque and state.
Erdogan, a one-time semi-professional football player and a business graduate, in 1994 became mayor of Istanbul, now a megacity of more than 15 million people, where he pragmatically tackled urban woes such as traffic gridlock and air pollution.
When a Muslim party was outlawed, he joined demonstrations and was briefly jailed for allegedly reciting an Islamist poem which the court regarded as incitement to religious hatred.
In 2001 Erdogan and now President Abdullah Gul co-founded the Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP), which scored a landslide win the following year and two more victories since.
Once in power, Erdogan eased restrictions on women wearing the veil and took other steps to Islamise the staunchly secular society, limiting alcohol sales and making efforts to ban mixed-sex dorms at state universities.
Erdogan took a big political risk when he launched peace talks in 2012 with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and became a popular figure on the Arab street for his staunch support of the Palestinian cause.
Erdogan has been credited with bringing stability after a history of once-a-decade coups and rocky coalitions, and clipping the wings of the powerful military.
A fan of new bridges, airports and other megaprojects, he has transformed what was once an economic basket-case into a robust market, tripling the income of ordinary Turks and reining in runaway inflation.
It was plans for another new development — an Ottoman-style shopping mall that would force the razing of Istanbul's Gezi park — that last June sparked unprecedented protests against the ruler, which police broke up with truncheons, plastic bullets and tear gas.
The unrest was followed in December by a wave of leaked phone recordings that spread on social media, with murky tales of ministerial bribe-taking, gold smuggling, illicit Iran deals and shoeboxes stuffed with cash.
Erdogan had to reshuffle his cabinet after three ministers resigned over the graft probe, and was forced to fend off allegations his own son was facing investigation.
His response was a massive purge of police and justice officials, as well as a ban of Twitter, which further alienated millions in the youthful country before it was overturned by a court this week.
The bellicose leader blames his woes on an erstwhile ally, powerful US-based preacher Fetullah Gulen, firing off almost daily tirades about coup plots and foreign conspiracies to bring down his AKP.
Opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu has accused Erdogan of wanting to establish "one-man rule in Turkey", an assessment shared by many political analysts.
"He is maintaining his power at the cost of dismantling much of the facade on which he built it: as a forward-looking, democratic leader," said US thinktank the Bipartisan Policy Center in a recent report.
"He has lost most of his international legitimacy, and even though he maintains a devoted base of followers, he has clearly lost the aura of an invincible leader that he commanded domestically only a year ago."
Source: The Times of India
(3) CBI may probe Cement Corporation’s selection process
The selection for the post of chief executive of the state-run Cement Corporation of India (CCI) has triggered a controversy with the Central Bureau of Investigation readying a probe into the issue.
Sources said the CBI has taken note of complaints and is likely to order a probe soon into the manner in which the list of candidates was prepared and the criteria for selection was allegedly changed to include some names at the last minute.
The Public Enterprises Selection Board (PESB) issued a list on March 11 with names of 15 candidates, who were shortlisted for the interview. After about a week, the PESB again released a list of 16 candidates, allegedly flouting its own guidelines on the upper limit on the number of candidates. In the second list an external candidate was added, without assigning any reason.
The candidate who was seventh on the first list issued by the PESB, suddenly managed to move to the number one position in the second list. And, the only internal candidate was allegedly downgraded to the second position in the second list after being put on top of the league in the first list.
"Question arises as to why there is such a clamour to get the CMD's job at CCIL which is a BIFR (Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction) company," asked an official of the company, who did not wish to be identified. The state-run company is under the heavy industries ministry.
PESB issued a list on March 11 with names of 15 candidates shortlisted for the interview. After about a week, it again released a list of 16 candidates, allegedly flouting its own guidelines on the upper limit on the number of candidates.
Source: Hindustan Times
(4) WTO asks India to remove raw sugar export subsidy
A few WTO members, including Australia, have asked India to remove immediately the export subsidy of Rs.3,300 a tonne on raw sugar, saying it distorts the global trade.
This demand was raised in the recent meeting of the Agriculture Committee of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Geneva.
“India’s new support programme for sugar sparked comment among a number of delegations with some urging India to remove immediately what they described as export subsidies that will potentially impact world trade,” the WTO said. On March 3, the Central Government notified export subsidy of Rs.3,300 a tonne on raw sugar shipments undertaken during the February-March of this year.
The WTO said that discussion was about one of 31 sets of questions and answers, a key part of the agenda of the committee, whose major responsibility was to oversee the present Agriculture Agreement and members’ commitment to agriculture.
“The largest number of comments from delegations was on India’s sugar programme. The topics that also aroused interest included...India’s domestic support for rice and wheat and its food security programme,” it added.
Australia, Colombia, Brazil and the EU asked India about a new policy announced in February, involving incentive payments to Indian sugar exporters. Members sought to know the legal basis for extending the export subsidy under the WTO regime. Several of the members also pointed out that India had agreed not to subsidise its exports.
In its reply, India said the policy was designed to encourage diversification away from white sugar to raw sugar and that no intervention payments had been paid yet.
“Export subsidies will be notified to the WTO,” India said. Australia claimed that the Rs.3,300 a tonne incentive payment was the equivalent of 14-16 per cent of the world price.
Since India is the third largest exporter of sugar, “this threatens to seriously distort trade”, Australia said, and asked India to “remove the export subsidies immediately’’.
Source: The Economic Times
(5) Congress puts on a business face to win back India Inc
While promising the usual slew of “rights” associated with the Congress — Right to Education, Right to Employment — the 130-year-old party sought, on Wednesday, to tell India Inc that Narendra Modi isn’t the only game in town. So, even among the “rights” for citizens, there is to be a Right to Entrepreneurship, to help those who wish to start businesses and India’s rank, when it comes to the Ease of Doing Business, is to be raised to 75 from 134 in five years.
The 15-point agenda is dominated by economic issues, an attempt to reassure India Inc that it will deliver on reforms. Flexible labour laws are on the agenda — although there’s no mention of the Industrial Disputes Act, the Apprentice Act, 1961, is to be reformed to encourage more firms to hire apprentices, which is a big positive. However, even as several measures to put the economy back on the rails have been listed, it’s evident the party is not about to abandon its numerous entitlement schemes.
Congress Manifesto
While the BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi has spoken of bullet trains, the Congress speaks of high-speed trains — all one-million-plus cities are to be covered.
Conscious of the fact that the Indian economy has nearly ground to a halt over the past year, the manifesto commits to restoring growth to 8% a year “within three years”, a rate to be sustained over two decades — GDP in the third quarter of FY14 came in at 4.7%. The party believes it can deliver manufacturing growth of 10% with special emphasis on small and medium enterprises.
There is also an effort to assuage the concerns of foreign investors; the drawn-out dispute with British telecom major Vodafone over taxes, it would appear, has prompted the party to promise it would “ensure that the unpredictable risk of retroactive taxation is avoided”. However, the manifesto asserts, at the same time, that the government will ensure foreign companies pay taxes where profits are earned.
The party ostensibly wants to win back the confidence of industry. Support will be given to “more transparent, competitive and better-regulated public-private partnerships”, the manifesto states, arguing the model must be widely used with new financing structures to access long-term funds. There is also mention of $1 trillion to be spent over the next decade on power, transport and infrastructure.
The Congress also seeks to give a push to planned urbanisation, creating inclusive cities and revamping urban governance; it hopes to achieve this by empowering mayors, increasing their tenures and allowing them as also chairpersons of municipalities to function much like CEOs of cities with executive powers.
There are measures aimed at increasing financial inclusion: The manifesto talks of every citizen having a bank account within the next five years; the Nachiket Mor commitee had recommended that by January 2016 every citizen above the age of 18 should have a fully-functional electronic bank account.
The manifesto talks of encouraging foreign direct investment in labour-intensive sectors — UPA II had thrown the open multi-brand retail space to FDI in September, 2012 albeit with a cap of 51%. There are also the expected noises on reining in inflation and improving productivity in agriculture.
The party hasn’t provided details on how it would promote a more open and competitive economy — for example, whether coal mining would be freed up — though it says it would open the economy to more global and domestic competition.
Source: The Indian Express
Disclaimer: All news stories and content sourced from freely available material on the internet. All sources are acknowledged.
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