Confidence Vote payoff: Expelled TDP MP rewarded
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The reward came exactly a month later. Liquor baron and expelled Telugu Desam Party MP from Chittoor D K Adikesavalu Naidu was appointed chairman of Tirumala Tirupati Devesthanams, the world's richest Hindu shrine, for having shown his loyalty to the United Progressive Alliance government during the vote of confidence in the Lok Sabha on July 22.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
New Delhi (PTI): The next Parliament session, probably the last of the 14th Lok Sabha, will be held from October 17 to November 21, by which time the Indo-US nuclear deal is expected to go through all the processes. The delay in the schedule prompted a sharp reaction from the Left which said "this was a clear subversion of democracy...to dovetail our Parliamentary schedule to the time table of the US Congress".
A decision to convene the session was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs, chaired by External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday. The five-week session will be the second phase of the two-day session which saw the Manmohan Singh government winning the trust vote. It was dubbed as "tainted victory" by the opposition in the wake of alleged cash-for-vote scam. The government convened the two-day session of the Lok Sabha on July 21 after Left parties withdrew their support to it on the Indo-US nuclear deal issue.
"Lok Sabha is not prorogued and it will be the continuation of the earlier session," Parliamentary Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi told reporters after the meeting. He sidestepped questions whether it would be the last session of the 14th Lok Sabha.
The schedule for the session has apparently been fixed to accommodate Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit in September to UN for the General Assembly. The schedule has been arranged in such a way that there was no possibility of a winter session which normally begins in November.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->A decision to convene the session was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs, chaired by External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday. <b>The five-week session will be the second phase of the two-day session which saw the Manmohan Singh government winning the trust vote. </b>It was dubbed as "tainted victory" by the opposition in the wake of alleged cash-for-vote scam. The government convened the two-day session of the Lok Sabha on July 21 after Left parties withdrew their support to it on the Indo-US nuclear deal issue.
<b>"Lok Sabha is not prorogued and it will be the continuation of the earlier session," Parliamentary Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi told reporters after the meeting. </b>He sidestepped questions whether it would be the last session of the 14th Lok Sabha.
<b>The schedule for the session has apparently been fixed to accommodate Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit in September to UN </b>for the General Assembly. The schedule has been <b>arranged in such a way that there was no possibility of a winter session which normally begins in November.</b>
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Please note the bolded part. It is very critical to call this a continuation of the old session to preclude another vote of confidence. There are some arcane rules that say only one vote of confidence can be brought in one session. After the defections and cross votings and the consequent expulsions the Lok Sabha strength has been reduced and the Oppostion has fair chance of defeating the UPA. The scheme is to prevent the call of another vote of confidence. The reporter is ignorant of the rule.
And the Speaker is a willing accomplice in this game.
<b>SONIA CONG SCARED OF PARLIAMENT SESSION
POSTPONING PARLIAMENT TO SURVIVE IN GOVT</b>
SONIA TRIES TO KEEP DEAD MANMOHAN GOVT ALIVE
By P.R.SIDDHARTHA
31 JULY 2008
MANMOHAN GOVT HAS NO MAJORITY
The Manmohan Government is a Minority Government.
The Lok Sabha has a Total of 543 MPs.
1 MP from the Kerala Congress Thomas is on orders from the Supreme Court in an Election Petition and cannot vote.
25 MPs Cross-Voted, Abstained and thus Violated the Party Whip during the Confidence Vote on 22 July 2008 and have thus ceased to be MPs.
Thus the current Total Voting Strength of the Lok Sabha is:
543-1-25=517 MPs ONLY.
The Majority Figure is 259 MPs.
The Manmohan Government got 275 votes but out of that 20 MPs are now Disqualified.
The Manmohan government is now supported by a Total of just 255 MPs.
The Manmohan Government is thus short of 4 MPs.
The Manmohan Government is a Minority Government.
MANMOHAN GOVT WILL LOSE NO CONFIDENCE MOTION
If the Parliament Session is held then the Opposition will bring a No-Confidence Motion against the Manmohan Government.
The Combined Opposition has 256 MPs.
The No Confidence Motion is likely to be moved by Lok Dal president Ajit Singh or Telugu Desam Party. Then the Communists, Mayawatiâs BSP, Regional Opposition Parties, BJP and BJP Allies will all Vote against the Government.
The Manmohan Government will lose the No Confidence Motion.
Manmohan Singh will Resign.
SONIA POSTPONING PARLIAMENT SESSION
The Sonia Congress is sure of losing the Government if the Parliament Session is convened.
The Parliament must meet for a Monsoon Session in July-August.
The Manmohan Government is scared of being DROWNED DEAD in a Monsoon Session of Parliament.
Technically speaking the Lok Sabha Session must be convened every SIX Months. Now the Parliament must be convened before 21 January since it met on 22 July. The sonia Congress is using this Excuse to postpone the Parliament Session to survive in Power, as long as possible.
The Manmohan Government is therefore under the Temptation to postpone the Lok Sabha Session to the winter to avoid losing the Government just Now.
There will be Nationwide Shame for the Sonia Congress if the Parliament is Postponed to keep a Dead Manmohan Government Alive.
Try to find the strategy behind calling this an extension of previous session. I am sure wiser folks ahve thought about this point. In this session there wont be vote.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Invisible government
But, asks N.V.Subramanian, where is the PM?
26 August 2008: Do we have a government?
Apparently so. <b>Once in a while, a prime minister shows up, Manmohan Singh. Inaugurating some new course at an IIT in Assam, or launching a book, he mumbles something about preserving unity. His press advisors quickly work up the media to insert phoney muscularity into what he said, if he said anything at all. The press slavishly "reports" that the PM showed toughness hinting at whatever was the crisis of the day,</b> which since May has resided in Jammu and Kashmir.
<b>But is there any evidence that the PM has taken any initiative on the Amarnath land controversy, besides pleading with all the parties to do his job for him? And now, we are told by independent media reports that the government allowed the J and K situation to deteriorate to, in a sense, play off the Kashmiri separatists against the Jammu agitators, and put the blame for the erupting violence on the BJP and Sangha Parivar.</b> Now that that has boomeranged, a crackdown has been ordered, licence followed by police firing, resulting in unacceptable civilian deaths.
Meanwhile, Pakistan has been stepping up LoC ceasefire violations since May, and yesterday, the Pakistan army successfully covered for terrorist infiltrators in J and K. All the Centre has for response is "warnings" to Pakistan not to violate the ceasefire. Why isn't Pakistan taking the "warnings" seriously? One guess.<b> It perceives the Manmohan Singh government to be weak, weaker, in fact, after it won the trust vote by defections arranged by Amar Singh & Co.</b> True, the Pakistan army has never felt answerable to anyone in Pakistan save its own leadership. But it would embark on a course of LoC ceasefire violations and terrorist infiltrations based on its own cost-benefit analysis. It would certainly not squander an opportunity to up the ante against what it perceives to be a weak Indian government. And by allowing drift to uncontrolled violence in J and K, it has, after a fashion, invited small by growing Pakistani intervention. Unless the government orders a proportionate military response to Pakistani aggression, the Pakistan army will get bolder.
<b>But J and K and the LoC are not the only places where the government is missing. Manmohan Singh is missing on an area apparently dear to his heart, which is economic management. Inflation rate for the week ended 9 August has accelerated to 12.6 per cent, a sixteen-year-high, and the RBI's monetary measures have had no appreciable impact.</b> Earlier this month, the buzz was that C.Rangarajan, who had resigned from the PM's economic advisory council, and been nominated to the Rajya Sabha, was replacing P.Chidambaram as finance minister. But if there was any move to dump him, it was dropped. According to a senior business journalist, dropping Chidambaram would have proved that he had mismanaged the economy. And it would have appeared succumbing to pressure from Amar Singh, who had publicly wanted him gone for the inflation mess. In all this, the government seems scarily unperturbed about the crushing effect of inflation on people, and their certain show of wrath in the coming general elections.
Inflation, J and K, the bomb blasts in Jaipur, Ahmedabad and Bangalore⦠as neglectful as it has been on all this, <b>the government has focussed obsessively on the Indo-US nuclear deal, in which Americans and the rest of NSG are seeking far-reaching Indian concessions, concessions that would lead to closure of India's military nuclear programme. It is incredible that the government is selling out on national security as if it's never to face the nation and answer to it. </b>And even if it be true that the nuclear deal has no traction with a large majority of voters, surely high inflation hurts everybody, but especially the poor and the middle class, and nobody will give mandate to a government that is soft on terrorism. <b>General elections are months away, and unbelievably, no one in the government seems particularly worried at there being little to show. This is a government that not just not works. There is no government.</b>
N.V.Subramanian is Editor, NewsInsight.net. Har-Anand has published his new second novel, Courtesan of Storms.
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Vigilance Department has been asked to probe the corruption charges against him.
Amarinder Singh, who is facing graft charges, on Wednesday, said he feared arrest but will not seek anticipatory bail even as his party rival Rajinder Bhattal asked him to come clean on the allegations.
The Congress leader was indicted by a special committee of the Punjab Assembly for alleged irregularities in exempting 32.10 acres of land for private development in Amritsar during his tenure as chief minister.
<b>President, VP & Governors get 300 pc pay hike</b>
How nice? Get pay raise when Indians are dying with terrorist attack. Yes they deserve pay raise. They should also give some bonus to terrorist so that PM can have more pay raise.
This pay raise on top of Hafta payment.
The recent large scale transfers(25 high officials) in Andhra Pradesh are election related transfers to enable the 'right' kind of IAS officers are in the right locations and to ensure election funds. To force the transfer sums like Rs 11 Crore were given to High Command by those who benefit. It does not mean the officer coughed up but his backers- merchants and politicians came up with the money. In some cases the transfers were with Madam's approval. So its fundraising with a new twist.
Every Babus is thinking when he will PM if he keep her Highness happy. Most senile will get the PM job.
Current defense deal will bring lot of funds for madam. Plus Shame of India will be in US to collect hafta. Queen will be on custom duty. Why they are dragging poor state Babus, let them fill their banks and kids education in Aus, UK, Russia, USA.
New Delhi Sept. 18: The Centre, in a strong signal to states ruled by the BJP and its allies, issued a warning Thursday night to the Karnataka and Orissa governments over attacks on churches and the Christian community there. The rare caution, under Article 355 of the Constitution, could be an indication New Delhi is prepared to go a step further and invoke Article 356, imposing Presidentâs Rule.
The Bajrang Dal and other Sangh Parivar outfits have unleashed a series of violent attacks on Christians in both states. Under Article 355, the Centre can issue directions to all states to take measures to maintain law and order. The Karnataka government confirmed Thursday night it had got an advisory under Article 355.
<b>With elections approaching, this action is a signal to the Congressâ votebank among minorities as well as to the âfloating secular Hindu votebankâ, a party leader said</b>. The Left parties have been pressing for a ban on the Bajrang Dal. A BJP leader said, however, this was only a ploy by the Congress to âdivert attentionâ from the ârapid increase in terrorist attacks across the nation.â BJP leaders felt the Congress was unlikely to impose Presidentâs Rule in the two NDA-ruled states.
Modi attacks Sonia, Centre on advisory to Karnataka
âThe statement issued by the Government of India to Karnataka and Orissa is a part of votebank politics. Madam ko 355 candles ki aarti utaari gayi hai (It is an act to please Madam)â, he said in an obvious reference to Gandhi.
Modi also said the Centreâs action was an attempt to target non-Congress governments and deflect attention from the âsimmering anger across the country against terrorism.â
âThe Centre has used this political weapon in an attempt to save itself from the simmering anger across the country against terrorism,â he told reporters on the sidelines of an orientation programme on climate change.
Modi was replying to questions on reports that the Centre was planning to send advisories under Article 355 of the Constitution to Karntaka and Orissa. The advisory sent to Karnataka today was not issued under Article 355.
âI want to ask the Centre why it did not use Article 355 when Hindi-speaking people were massacred in Assam. Why did the Centre did not use Article 355 when blood continued to be spilled in Nandigram for months and why it never thought of using 355 in Jammu Kashmir where lot of terror attacks take place,â he said.
09-22-2008, 04:26 PM (This post was last modified: 09-22-2008, 04:27 PM by Bodhi.)
<span style='color:red'>Central Muslim Universities</span>
The Centre plans to launch three new central universities that will be classified âminorityâ educational institutions and could be allowed to reserve up to 50 per cent seats for Muslim students.
The human resource development ministry is set to approve a proposal by the minority affairs ministry to start the universities in <b>Bangalore, Ajmer (Rajasthan) and Kishanganj (Bihar)</b>, officials said.
âThe aim is to launch universities that would have central funding, and the autonomy required to cater to the needs of the Muslim community in particular,â a minority affairs ministry official said.
Only four per cent of undergraduate students are Muslims, when the communityâs population share is 13.4 per cent, the Rajinder Sachar committee has said.
The Supreme Court is examining a petition by the Centre against an earlier Allahabad High Court order striking down the minority character of Aligarh Muslim University.
No other central university is officially recognised as a minority institution under the legislation that created it, though sections of the faculty and students at Delhiâs Jamia Millia Islamia are demanding minority status.
They should not ahve any more sectarin utys as that leads to ghettoization of higher education.
Meanwhile, Pioneer Op-Ed, 22 Sept 2008
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Congress needs its fall guy
Sandeep B
<b>And Shivraj Patil is happy to play that role! It is hard to digest the mental make-up of a Home Minister who places his 'loyalty' to the dynasty above the security of the people</b>
Shivraj Patil's open admission of having "Sonia Gandhi's blessings" is yet another new low that the Congress has sunk to. What "Sonia Gandhi's blessings" mean is an open secret, nay, acknowledgment of dynastic sycophancy, which goes by the name of loyalty.
The picture is ugly. And cruel. <b>Ugly because we have the nation's Home Minister who is more worried about retaining power by any means than doing something about the relentless terror attacks on India. Cruel because it mocks at the very foundation of the concept of decency and the bounden duty of a Government to -- if not anything else -- at least ensure that its citizens' lives are safe. </b>
Let's make no mistake. India is in a state of war whose beginnings can be traced to the Varanasi blasts in March 2006. An astute observer in one of his columns on the Internet lists all the terror attacks since the Varanasi blasts till the recent blasts in Delhi. Accordingly, this works out to an average of one terrorist attack every six weeks.
Equally, Mr Patil's record has been consistent in uttering platitudes amounting to nothing, reminding us of Shakespeare's character, who is full of sound and fury. <b>The instance of the Indian Mujahideen is a good example. Its impunity is more a tribute to the Indian state's incompetence than its own 'achievements'. Investigating agencies believe that the Indian Mujahideen is simply SIMI in another garb, consisting of lower-level SIMI cadre because most of its top leaders are in custody. </b>
This phenomenon while new is more disturbing because it also indicates a change in tactics. <b>The focus now is on grooming local Muslims than recruiting terror talent from outside India. This script was authored in May at a meeting of Harkat-ul-Jihadi Islami and Lashkar-e-Tayyeba leaders in Kotli in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. </b>
Given that this information is in the public domain, the nation is amazed at Mr Patil's abject lack of decisive action considering that he has full command of the state's intelligence apparatus.
Some suggest that the solution lies in political will, the likes of which the Gujarat Government recently demonstrated by rounding up the Ahmedabad bombers in just three weeks. But in case of the Congress the picture differs.
<b>To understand, we need to quickly look at a little history. From Jawaharlal Nehru's time, the Congress has carefully cultivated the need for fall guys alias scapegoats. Nehru had Krishna Menon; Mrs Indira Gandhi had far too many fall guys than we can count, and Rajiv Gandhi had a few of his own. These fall guys are the aforementioned 'loyalists'. Hence, Mr Patil. Notice how in the aftermath of the Delhi attack, only Mr Patil has come out with egg on his face while the Prime Minister and Ms Sonia Gandhi are next to being absolved of their share of ignominy.</b>
The most vocal evidence of this is Mr Lalu Prasad Yadav, who singled out Mr Patil for a rather vicious attack for mouthing "parrot-like repetitions" after every terror attack. Other UPA Ministers, too, are worried about Mr Patil's disastrous image, especially in an election year.
Mr Patil's defence is, as always, that he has the blessings of "my leader". It is very hard to understand the mental make-up of a Home Minister who places his position and his loyalty to his party above the security of the people who put him in office. It is another matter that Mr Patil didn't win office electorally.
But the most tell-tale evidence comes from the silence of the Congress top brass. By not taking a position on Mr Patil, it lends credence to the truth in the proverb that silence is acquiescence.
X-Posted....
congress thinking of putting orissa under president's rule. going by the past actions of this upa govt in goa and nagaland of putting them under president rule and using the governor to rule the states this decision may come sooner than later. congress is politically in a precarious position with only four states govt under it's rule with the rest in opposition hand. if the action of putting orissa does not evoke any reaction then karnataka is next in line for president rule.
