IAF woman officer placed in preventive custody

     Bangalore (Karnataka): Indian Air Force (IAF) has said that they have placed Anjali Gupta, the first woman officer to face a court marital, in preventive custody after she threatened to commit suicide. IAF spokesman Wing Commander V.M. Raghunath said Gupta was placed in preventive custody on April 8 after she wrote to the Karnataka Women's Commission that she was thinking of committing suicide because of the alleged harassment by the IAF authorities. "The Indian Air Force has taken Flying Officer Anjali Gupta in custody on April 8 based on reports she filed with the Karnataka Women Commission where she stated she was on the verge of taking her life for perceived harassment. So to prevent any harm to her, the Indian Air Force has taken her into custody," he told reporters here. Gupta has been charged with disobeying seniors and faking travel bills. She has in turn accused three male superiors of sexual harassment, but the air force has rejected her accusations. Her family also plans to go to the civil court if the military court finds her guilty. The Indian Air Force has also rejected calls for an independent investigation into Gupta's allegations, demanded by women's rights groups from across the country. The IAF has 500 women officers, but they do not fly fighter jets. Women officers, including 200 pilots flying helicopters and transport aircrafts, and are generally engaged in administrative duties. The first women officers were inducted into the IAF on June 12, 1993 while the first woman pilot was inducted a year later on December 17, 1994.

Koizumi meets captains of Indian industry, Kalam  (Go To Top)

     New Delhi: Japanese Prime Minister Juichiro Koizumi met President APJ Abdul Kalam on Friday at Rashtrapati Bhavan, the latter's official residence. Both leaders reportedly spent time discussing issues of international, regional and bilateral importance to both India and Japan. Koizumi's meeting with Kalam was preceded by visits to Rajghat, the memorial dedicated to Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi, the Delhi Public School and a luncheon interaction with captains of Indian industry. Koizumi, who arrived here on Thursday night, will be meeting Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh for one-to-one and delegation- level talks later this evening, during the course of which, both countries are likely to firm a pact for enhancing strategic dialogue. The pact is likely to be signed by India's National Security Advisor M.K.Narayanan and and diplomatic adviser to Japanese Government and former Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi.

     The delegation-level meetings are likely to end up with both sides announcing a Joint Statement on bilateral ties. Koizumi and Singh were expected to sign a joint document outlining strategic objectives to strengthen bilateral ties in the "dynamically changing region," a Japanese official said. Koizumi said that he is in India to better ties between the two nations. "Friendship between India and Japan is very good now. But my main aim being in India is to promote more friendship between the two countries," Koizumi told reporters after visiting Rajghat. His trip to India, only weeks after a landmark visit by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao to New Delhi, is part of Tokyo's "strategic diplomacy" to compete with Beijing that has emerged as a diplomatic and economic superpower. India's own growing economic and geopolitical clout is also not lost on Tokyo which, over the past few weeks, has been trying to cope with anti-Japanese sentiments in China. India-Japan bilateral trade was 4.35 billion dollars in the year ending March 2004, about one-third of New Delhi's two-way trade of 13 billion dollars plus with China. Japanese firms have begun to look to India as a promising window of opportunity for investment following anti-Japan demonstrations in China this month, analysts said. Other analysts said both China and Japan were waging a "tug-of- war" in the region, trying to get India on their side. A Japanese government official, noting that China has been approaching India aggressively to establish closer ties, said Tokyo should see New Delhi as a long-term partner.

      Japan is Asia's largest economy and India, the continent's fourth biggest. Japan, a close ally of Washington, could also play the role of a mediator to help the United States forge closer economic ties with India to counterbalance China, a Japanese official said. Japan is the fourth-biggest investor in India after the United States, Mauritius and Britain. Between 1991 and 2004, investments totalled about three billion dollars. Nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in 1998 prompted Japan to impose economic sanctions against the two South Asian nations. Japan lifted those sanctions in October 2001 in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and the government has gradually turned its attention to India in recent years. India has been the biggest recipient of development loans for the last two years, outranking Indonesia and China. Japan has reduced loans to China for four straight years, knocking it from the top spot. In Islamabad, Koizumi is likely to announce Tokyo's decision to resume yen loans to Pakistan, suspended after it conducted nuclear tests in 1998, Japanese officials said. Loans to India have already resumed, but fresh loans to Pakistan were put on hold while Islamabad worked out a deal to restructure its debt with international creditors.

Anti-VAT strike evokes mixed response (Go To Top)

     New Delhi: The one-day strike against Value Added Tax evoked a partial response in the Indian capital today with some of the wholesale markets remaining closed, but retailers carried out brisk business. "We have submitted a memorandum to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh asking for his intervention to defer VAT," Bhartiya Udyog Vyapar Mandal (BUVM) president Shyam Bihari Mishra said. The BUVM has also asked Singh to constitute a committee of central ministers to study the feasibility of VAT implemented in 21 states without the consent of traders, he said. The strike, which was called by BUVM, is supported by other trade bodies like the Confederation of All India Traders. "Traders had to go for strike to register their protest against VAT which would lead to corruption, inflation and help multi- national corporations at the expense of small traders and enterprises," Mishra said claiming the bandh was successful in nine states. "The strike is against the harsh VAT provisions, variations in tax rates and continuance of Central Sales Tax and other taxes," CAIT secretary Praveen Khandelwal said while claiming that wholesale markets in many parts of the capital remained closed today. Traders had earlier gone for three-day strike from March 30 which concluded with the introduction of VAT by majority of states from April 1. Empowered Committee Chairman Asim Dasgupta had recently said that the VAT panel would meet traders from the middle of next month to listen to their their grievances and simplify procedures.

NDA boycotts Somnath's second all-party meeting  (Go To Top)

     New Delhi: The deadlock in Parliament between the ruling UPA and the opposition NDA continued today. So far, all efforts by the government and Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee to try and break the deadlock, have met with no response from the Opposition. The NDA boycotted the all-party meeting called by the Speaker. They held a separate meeting instead, to discuss their strategy. On Thursday, the Opposition met President Kalam and accused the Prime Minister of tainting his cabinet by allowing minister like Lalu Yadav to continue. However, Yadav received some support from former West Bengal Chief Minister and CPI (ML) leaderJyoti Basu, who criticised the NDA for demanding the Railway Minister's resignation. Reacting to a question on the Opposition's demand, Basu said that Advani was also charge sheeted, but he continued to serve as the Home Minister.

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