No truck with Lalu's RJD ever: Paswan

     Patna/New Delhi: Lok Jan Shakti (LJP) President Ram Vilas Paswan on Wednesday once again ruled out the chances of having an electoral understanding with Lalu Yadav's Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), saying that a party that had mourned the demise of the LJP when it was in crisis, could never be termed a friend. "Where was RJD supremo and Railway minister Lalu Prasad when my MLAs were being poached by the NDA to cobble together a majority. Instead of playing a positive role, he tried to further aggravate the situation and even congratulated former Union minister Nagmani, after he parted company with us to stir a revolt," Paswan told a news agency before leaving for New Delhi. Nagmani had resigned from LJP a few days before the party MLAs had travelled to Jharkhand, sparking off a major controversy leading to dissolution of the state assembly on the charges of what Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Governor Buta Singh had dubbed as "the worst-kind of horse-trading taking place in Bihar". While commenting on desertion of the LJP MLAs, Lalu Prasad had said "What all we can do at present is that we can mourn the death of LJP which became defunct after its MLAs left Paswan alone". Paswan said he would also take up with Sonia Gandhi the issue of the failure of UPA to show unity in Jharkhand where RJD had played "mischief" by fielding its leader Mukti Nath Upadhyay against JMM nominee and son of Sibu Soren, Durga Soren leading to defeat of both and JD (U) leader Digvijay Singh romping to victory in the recent Rajya Sabha poll.

VHP to launch agitation against Advani (Go To Top)

     Haridwar/New Delhi: Stepping up their attack against BJP President L K Advani over his remarks on Pakistan's founder M A Jinnah, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) today said that it would launch an agitation against him till he resigns from his membership of Parliament. "In Gujarat, specially in Gandhinagar, an agitation will be launched against Advani. And the agitation will continue till Advani resigns from Lok Sabha . We have decided that we'll extend full support to the people in their agitation," VHP leader Avichal Das told reporters after a meeting of the VHP leaders and saints in Haridwar. The call for the agitation comes a day after the Parishad's central advisory board adopted a resolution asking Advani to retire from politics. Meanwhile, in a snub to VHP, BJP President L K Advani categorically refused to apologise for his controversial statements in Pakistan. He said that whatever he said was right and he has been saying so in the past also. "I had read Jinnah's August 11, 1947 speech during a book release function last year. Nobody raised any controversy regarding that. I repeated same things in Pakistan. There is nothing new in that," said Advani. Backing its chief, the BJP today launched a counter-attack on the VHP, seeking an apology from its leaders for calling party President L K Advani him a "traitor".

BJP tells VHP to mind its own business (Go To Top)

     Chennai: Senior BJP leader M.Venkaiah Naidu on Wednesday told the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) that there was need for it to set its own house in order first, before pointing fingers at other units of the Sangh Parivar. Rejecting ed the VHP's demand that BJP President L K Advani should quit politics, Naidu asked it to "mind its own business." Alleging that Advani's remark that Pakistan founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah was a secular man had been 'twisted' by the media, Naidu said Advani had only reproduced what Jinnah had told the Pakistan Constituent Assembly on August 11, 1947, only to create a public debate on the issue in that country. "It is a closed chapter now and there is no need to reopen it," Naidu said.

FDI yes, but on our terms: CPI (M) (Go To Top)

     New Delhi: Admitting that the flow of foreign capital is a reality under the new economic scenario, Sitaram Yerchury, General Secretary, Communist Party of India (Marxist) said here on Wednesday that his party welcomes the flow of foreign capital into the country provided they cater to the needs of social welfare. Yerchury informed mediapersons that CPI (M) in its Central Committee Meeting held on June 3-5, 2005 at Kolkata has put three conditions for the flow of foreign capital into the country. "Firstly such capital should augment the existing productive capacities in our economy, secondly, such foreign capital must upgrade the Indian economy technologically and such capital must lead to employment generation," he said. While foreign capital will seek to exploit our natural resources and labour to garner superprofits, the struggle for imposition of these conditions will, apart from making the resistance to the task of eroding national sovereignty more effective, render some benefit to the Indian economy and the people, he added.

Lakhimpur Kheri fire kills 15 (Go To Top)

     Lakhimpur Kheri (Uttar Pradesh): At least fifteen people, including children and women, are feared to be dead in a major fire incident which broke out in a village of Lakhimpur Kheri district on Tuesday. According to officials, the fire broke out when a woman was lighting some dry wood to cook a meal. The blaze spread from one house in Sujan Tanda village under Veera police station area and soon engulfed other huts, they added. "People don't know how the fire broke out. Atleast thirteen people have died out of which three were women and nine were children," said a villager. "All our huts have been damaged. Three of my kids and my daughter-in-law were burnt in the fire," said another villager. Altogether 54 huts, most of them made of straw and dry wood, were completely gutted. Two other women and six goats kept in a hut were also killed in the blaze. The district authorities claim to have distributed ex-gratia relief to victims' kin and those injured.

Sonia, Putin hold Indo-Russian strategic talks (Go To Top)

     Moscow: UPA Chairperson and Congress President Sonia Gandhi today met Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg and discussed ways to further enhance the Indo- Russian strategic partnership. Gandhi was accompanied by External Affairs Minister K. Natwar Singh and Indian Ambassador to Russia Kanwal Sibal. Both the leaders expressed satisfaction over the outcome of their discussions. "I'm happy to say that our relations keep developing in the best possible way," Putin said after the meeting. India is a major buyer of Russian military hardware, and Sonia Gandhi confirmed India's interest in retaining this status. "Cooperation in defence is very much there. Certainly there is a great potential in expanding cooperation in other areas, for instance information technology,...., energy, gas, oil," she said. This is Gandhi's fourth Russia visit and first after becoming UPA Chairperson. Earlier she had visited Soviet Russia with her husband late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. Her last visit to Moscow took place in February 1991, when Rajiv and she went over as the personal guests of then Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. She is currently on a four-day visit of Russia at the invitation of President Putin as his personal guest, visited ancient Russian twin-cities of Vladimir and Suzdal on Tuesday, world famous for their churches and monasteries. She also visited the grand golden domed cathedral of Christ the Saviour on Tuesday, near the Kremlin, which was blown up by Stalin in 1934 and rebuilt in mid-1990s after the collapse of Communism in Russia. On Tuesday, Gandhi, addressing the members of the Centre for National Glory here, had urged the international community to "rediscover the wellsprings of compassion, conciliation and cooperation," and said that scourges like extremism, separatism and terrorism needed to be dealt with "collectively, resolutely and consistently, without any double standards." Recalling the special relationship between Russia and India, she said it had and continues to be an interaction of "unusual resilience, stability and continuity despite great changes in the international and domestic environments." Closer to current times, Russian President Vladimir Putin had visited India thrice in the past four years.

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