Malda, 13 April : Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee today said the wrong policy and non-functional police of the Left Front government in West Bengal were responsible for the rise of Maoists in the state.
"Left Front government should be blamed for the rise of Maoists in West Bengal. Their wrong policy and non-functional police have allowed the Maoists to enter the state and strengthen their base in Junglemahal," the senior Congress leader told an election rally at Harishchandrapur. "It is a shame that policemen in the state flee from police stations when Maoists attack them. Nowhere in the country such a thing happens. The state government has weakened the morale of the police force which had once the pride of the nation," Mukherjee said. Things had come to such a pass that for every law and order problem, the state government seeks the help of central forces, be it in Darjeeling or elsewhere, he said.Referring to former chief minister Siddhartha Shankar Ray, Mukherjee said he contained naxal violence through the state police and did not ask for any central force. Ray had a political will to combat the naxalites!
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CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee for industrialisation of Bengal
Kolkata, 13 April : West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today said the Left Front would continue to focus on industrialisation by setting up more and more units in the state.
Kolkata, 13 April : West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today said the Left Front would continue to focus on industrialisation by setting up more and more units in the state.
"We had taken the initiative to set up industries. I had tried my best. If we fail to create jobs, the state will head for a dangerous situation. We will continue to focus on industrialisation. We want more industries," he told an election meeting here.
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Pranab's debt trap claim made to appease Trinamool: CPIM
Kolkata, 13 April : Union Minister Pranab Mukherjee's claim of West Bengal moving towards a debt trap was made to appease his party's ally Trinamool Congress and thereby gain mileage in the Assembly elections, the CPI(M) said today.
"Pranab Mukherjee knows very well that mere borrowing does not make a state financially bankrupt," CPI(M) mouthpiece 'Ganashakti' said in its editorial page today. It said that to give legitimacy to Trinamool's "absurd" claim of financial bankruptcy, the Union finance minister forgot to mention that the central government's total loan amount ran upto Rs 35.68 lakh crore. "If the West Bengal government has become financially bankrupt, the Centre has already turned so," the daily said claiming that Mukherjee made the statement on Monday here "knowing fully well as an economist that no economy can develop without loan or borrowing".... READ FULL STORY
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Our MLAs will quit once they win WB assembly polls : GJM
IANS, Darjeeling, 13 April : The Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM), spearheading the movement for a separate Gorkhaland state, is fighting the assembly elections in West Bengal, but its lawmakers will resign once they get elected, a senior party leader said. The GJM feels the victory of its candidates will give a boost to the statehood movement.
IANS, Darjeeling, 13 April : The Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM), spearheading the movement for a separate Gorkhaland state, is fighting the assembly elections in West Bengal, but its lawmakers will resign once they get elected, a senior party leader said. The GJM feels the victory of its candidates will give a boost to the statehood movement.
"GJM's target is not to participate in the West Bengal assembly proceedings, but to have a separate state carved out from the northern part of the state, including Darjeeling Hills. We have decided to resign as MLAs after we are elected. We have already informed the president of India about our decision,' GJM spokesperson Harka Bahadur Chhetri told IANS...... READ FULL STOR
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Email from Paresh Baruah came from Tiniali of Guwahati
Times of Assam, Guwahati, 13 April : In a press release signed by ULFA C-in-C Paresh Baruah and sent yesterday, the United Liberation Front of Assam today wished the people a happy and prosperous new Assamese year and Rongali Bihu.Through the press release, the hardliner outfit sought blessings of the elders and appealed to the fellow Assamese not to ignore their national interests for the Assamese Nation in the coming year.
The interesting part of this email press release is that it is traced to have sent from Guwahati itself. Investigating the trace route of this email, Times of Assam found evidence that the email from Paresh Baruah was sent from the Zoo Tiniali locality of Guwahati using Sify Broadband internet connection with the IP address 118.95.35.188. The email id used for this communication was rupa.sharma76@yahoo.com.
This clearly means that Paresh Baruah’s email communication is handled by someone close to him in Guwahati. But why the security agencies are unable to trace and catch hold of this person responsible for sending communications on behalf of the ULFA supremo is a question in itself.
This clearly means that Paresh Baruah’s email communication is handled by someone close to him in Guwahati. But why the security agencies are unable to trace and catch hold of this person responsible for sending communications on behalf of the ULFA supremo is a question in itself.
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Critical booths to be monitored by EC through "Webcast"
Kolkata, 13 April : The Election Commission will directly monitor critical polling booths in the coming assembly election through webcast, Chief Electoral Officer Sunil Gupta said today.
"The Commission had introduced the latest monitoring system during the Bihar election where it scored a success," Gupta told a meet-the-press programme here. The proceedings could be monitored directly from the sector office, CEO office and the Election Commission, he said. The EC has also decided to use digital and still cameras and live video cast to get a detailed picture of the polling all over the state.
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No cakewalk for GJM elections candidates in Darjeeling hills
Amitava Roy, Darjeeling, 13 April : Amidst the shrill demands for a separate state of Gorkhaland, the three constituencies in the Darjeeling Hills go to polls in the first phase of West Bengal Assembly elections on 18 April with three hill parties vying for space. Even though the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha has the dominant presence in the three seats of Darjeeling, Kurseong and Kalimpong, the presence of central forces and strict vigil by election observers has meant a level playing field for the other parties that have fielded candidates.
With the GNLF and the Akhil Bharatiya Gorkha League (ABGL) also campaigning in full force, it may not be a cakewalk for the Bimal Gurung-led GJM which is fighting the elections for the first time, poll watchers said.
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Property tax on cards, said BD National Board of Revenue
Dhaka, 13 April : Citizens of Bangladesh will have to pay taxes if their property prices go beyond Tk 50 lakh, the National Board of Revenue (NBR) said yesterday.
Dhaka, 13 April : Citizens of Bangladesh will have to pay taxes if their property prices go beyond Tk 50 lakh, the National Board of Revenue (NBR) said yesterday.
NBR will consider market prices of the properties while fixing the tax. A special unit will be formed to fix the market prices. The proposed tax provision, due to be passed through the finance bill during the upcoming budget session, will come into effect from July 2012. The proposed property tax policy evoked mixed reactions.
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Tripura seeks incense sticks' import duty reduction rollback
Agartala, 13 April : Tripura Industries and Commerce Minister Jitendra Chowdhury has urged India government to withdraw its decision to reduce import duty on bamboo-made incense sticks to 10% and restore original import duty of 30%, as it would put livelihood of lakhs of people at stake. In a letter to Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Monday, Chowdhury said, "Tripura exports 28,600 MT incense sticks per year and livelihood of lakhs of people depends on selling of these sticks".
He pointed out that the bamboo sticks from the North-East has a good market in Bangalore and Mysore, but the region has to compete with Vietnam and China to sell the sticks in Indian market. Transportation cost in the region ranges from Rs 7.50 to Rs 8.00 per kg stick as the region is landlocked, while China and Vietnam have better connectivity.
"In such a situation our bamboo-based artisans will not be able to survive profitably and the livelihood of more than five lakh people in the region will be at stake," Chowdhury said. Incense sticks are one of the most popular household income generation activities especially among the forest dependent communities in the state, he added in the letter.
North-East contributes around 90 percent to the incense stick requirement of the country, out of which Tripura alone contributes about 70 percent.The turnover of incense sticks sub-sector has risen from Rs 12.90 core in 2006-2007 to Rs 54.03 crore in 2010-11, due to value addition by the state government.
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3 Bangladeshi bloggers win DW global awards in Germany
Dhaka, 13 April : Three bloggers from Bangladesh have won prizes in a global blog writing contest, German news broadcaster Deutsche Welle has announced.Internet users elected Bangladesh’s Ami Rahman Pial’s blog in the Best Social Activism category and Arif Jebtik’s blog in the Best Bengali Blog category of the seventh annual Deutsche Welle Blog Award. The awards constituted by Deutsche Welle in six multilingual categories will be handed over at the Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum in Bonn 20 June.
Internet users around the world suggested some 2,100 sites in 11 languages for the contest this year, but the jury trimmed the list down to 187 finalists. More than 90,000 ballots were cast in an online vote. Another Bangladeshi blogger, Sabrina Sultana, secured the second position in the Best Blog category.
The blog ‘A Tunisian Girl’ won the first prize for blogging about repression and censorship in her country. Lina Ben Mhenni, a 27-year-old assistant professor at the University of Tunis, started writing since 2007, long before an uprising ousted president Ben Ali.
Facebook group ‘We are Khaled Said’ took the award for Best Social Activism Campaign while Bahrain website ‘Migrant Rights in the Middle East’ – www.migrant-rights.org – won the Special Topic Human Rights Award.
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