Daily Times India

New Delhi, March 18 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Thursday declined to comment on party MP Shatrughan Sinha’s remarks on the composition of the new team of office-bearers announced Tuesday.

BJP vice-president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi refused to comment on Sinha’s remarks, in which he seemed to indicate his resentment over the new team’s composition.

“No comments,” Naqvi said.

Sinha Thursday recited lines of an old Hindi film song in answer to a question about the new team. “Uff na karenge, lab see lenge, aansu pee lenge (I will not sigh, will seal my lips and swallow my tears),” he told a TV news channel.

Sources close to Sinha said the actor-turned-politician felt that some deserving people had been left out and the team had not been able to give a message of dynamism.

Sinha became the first senior leader to be critical of the composition of new team. BJP sources said a few office-bearers were also not satisfied with the posts given to them but have decided against voicing their views to the media.

Lucknow, March 18 (IANS) Three men associated with an international wildlife poaching racket were arrested Thursday with three leopard skins in Uttar Pradesh’s Basti district, police said.

The three men were nabbed near the Kodri Ghat bridge in Basti, some 300 km from here.

“Two of those arrested hail from Nepal, while the third is a native of an Uttar Pradesh village. The three have admitted that they work for a Nepal-based racket involved in the illegal trade of wild animals’ hides, skin, antlers,” police inspector S.N. Singh told reporters in Basti.

“The three have also confessed that they have been involved in the illegal trade for the past five years,” he said.

According to another police officer, the three had their clients in Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand and parts of Uttar Pradesh.

“We are yet to ascertain the place from where the three killed the leopards. They are giving contradictory statements about the spot where the animals were killed,” he added.

Killing a leopard is a serious offence under the Indian Wildlife Act.

The offenders can get three to seven years’ rigorous imprisonment if they are proved guilty.

Kolkata, March 18 (IANS) Police fired in the air after a group of pro-Maoists tribals tried to force their way into a police outpost in West Midnapore district Thursday.

The tribals, owing allegiance to the Moist-backed People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCAPA), were agitating against police conducting combing operations at Manikpara. They also demanded immediate release of PCAPA leader Basudeb Mahato who was arrested early this month.

Police sources said about 2000 tribal – both men and women – assembled in the area and tried to storm the Manikpara outpost in the district’s Jhargram sub-division, 260 km west of Kolkata.

The police sources said fire was opened after a baton charge and lobbing of tear gas shells failed to disperse the mob. Ten people were detained afterwards.

Kolkata, March 18 (IANS) A fisherman, severely mauled by a tiger Thursday in the Sundarban forests of West Bengal, is now battling for life in a state-run hospital.

The big cat attacked the victim in the Chulkathi jungles, through which a group of fishermen was passing, a forest department official said.

Those accompanying the victim rescued him by beating the tiger with whatever they could lay their hands on.

He has now been admitted to the Patharpratima Hospital in South 24-Parganas district.

Sundarbans is the world’s largest mangrove forest criss-crossed by rivers and canals and covering 4,262 square km. Part of the Sundarbans is in Banlgadesh.

The alluvial archipelago, formed by nearly 56 islands, has been declared a World Heritage site by the Unesco for its rich bio-diversity. It is home to the famed Royal Bengal tiger.

Ghaziabad, March 18 (IANS) Armed robbers looted cash worth Rs.5 lakh from the manager of a petrol retail outlet here, police said Thursday.

The incident occurred Wednesday in Kavi Nagar’s Shastri Nagar locality.

According to police, manager Subhash Jha and Brij Mohan, an employee of Auto-Care, were robbed at 10 a.m. while they were going on a scooter to deposit Rs.6.6 lakh in cash at a bank. Two robbers on a black motorcycle hit their scooter from the side, snatched their scooter keys, looted Rs.5 lakh from scooter glove box and fled the spot.

“One criminal was wearing a dark glass helmet while his accomplice had covered his face with a cloth. They came near us and pushed me hard, due to which I lost control. Acting swiftly, the criminal who was wearing a helmet opened the scooter boot, grabbed money and fled the spot. They only took the cash kept in the boot. We saved Rs.1.6 lakh because it was in our pocket,” said Mohan.

“A case has been registered and a team has been assigned to work out the case at the earliest,” Senior Superintendent of Police Raghuvir Lal said.

Police have been given a 48-hour ultimatum to solve the case as the Petroleum Traders Association has threatened to go on an indefinite strike, Mohan said.

New Delhi, March 18 (IANS) A group of some 40 students from the Kashmir Valley, now on a tour to north India, met Home Minister P. Chidambaram here Thursday, and during interaction with them he reiterated the government’s commitment to bring peace and development to the terror-riven state.

“Peace is necessary for the developmental process to gain the required momentum in Jammu and Kashmir. If peace prevails in the state, everything that is available in other parts of the country in terms of development can be made available in Jammu and Kashmir,” the minister told them.

“Look at the entire country and not just at Jammu and Kashmir for job opportunities,” he urged the visiting students.

He said the central para-military forces were going to recruit about 2,000 youth in the state this year.

The group of 44 students is on a tour, sponsored by the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), and has visited Mathura, Agra, Jaipur and Ajmer. CRPF Director-General Vikram Srivastava was present during the interaction.

New Delhi, March 18 (IANS) Tihar jail inmate Rohit Rajinder Singh spoke to his mother over phone, something he had been yearning to do for months. Singh was the first Tihar inmate to use the jail phone calling system which was launched Thursday.

The ‘Tihar Inmates Phone Calling System’ has been launched to ensure that inmates keep in touch with their families. It was inaugurated by Justice Madan B. Lokur, the acting Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court.

After speaking to his mother, an elated Singh said: “I am very happy. My father and friends used to visit me, but today I had a word with my mother. Nothing can be compared to that.”

Expressing satisfaction on the inauguration of the system, Justice Lokur said: “The phone calling system is a progressive development and should be opened in jails all across the country.”

Stressing on the need to bridge the communication gap between inmates and their families, Justice Lokur said that even the Supreme Court has emphasised that inmates should not lose touch with their families.

Director General of Police (Jails) B.K. Gupta said: “The telephone facilities will be available to all the inmates once in a week and shall be of five minutes duration.”

“Two numbers of any close relative is allowed per prisoner. The inmates would be charged Rs.50 per month for local calls and Rs.100 for STD calls,” he added.

However, the inmates can only use the facility if they are not convicted in any anti-national activities or cases of murder. The scanned fingerprints of prisoners will be used as the identity card at the calling system which has a biometric scanner.

New Delhi, Mar 18 (ANI): President Pratibha Devisingh Patil on Thursday presented the prestigious Moortidevi Award of Bharatiya Jnanpith to Union Minister of Law and Justice Veerappa Moily for his outstanding work on Shri Ramayan Mahanveshanam.

An established writer in Kannada, Moily has authored, to date, four novels, three collections of poetry, three plays, collections of essays, besides his five-volume magnum opus ‘Shri Ramayana Mahanveshanam’.

Addressing the gathering after receiving the award, Moily described his work as a unique structure.

“My Sree Ramayana Mahanveshanam, I humbly state, is in such glorious tradition of texts with a unique structure and a fresh context,” Moily said. (more…)

New Delhi, Mar 18(ANI): Deputy Chief of Integrated Defence Staff, DCIDS (Operations) Air Marshal D. Kukreja on Thursday said the Armed Forces have taken a major initiative towards adopting energy efficiency and conservation in operations and cantonment complexes. (more…)

Lucknow, March 18 (IANS) Apparently upset at the bad press she received over the controversial currency note garland, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati Thursday gave marching orders to her close confidante and principal secretary (information and public relations) Vijay Shankar Pande.

Besides the key position as head of her media management team, Pande has also been stripped of the prime posts of additional cabinet secretary and principal secretary to the chief minister.

Pande has been made principal secretary (health), so far held by Pradeep Shukla, who has been appointed principal food secretary. Pande is known to be close to Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP)’s Brahmin mascot and general secretary Satish Chandra Misra.

Pande has been replaced by Shailesh Krishna, a one-time Mayawati blue-eyed boy, who was shunted out of the chief minister’s secretariat not very long ago.

Krishna, who has played a long innings in the information and PR wing of the Uttar Pradesh government – both under the Mulayam Singh Yadav as well as Mayawati government – enjoys tremendous goodwill with the media.

Pande shot to fame for spearheading a campaign launched by the state IAS Association 13 years ago to identify the “three most corrupt IAS officers”.