Mayawati Draws Flak for Rs 5 Cr Garland, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati was Monday presented a giant garland of currency notes by her fans from Karnataka. Though the exact value of the garland is not known, onlookers put it in the region of a whopping Rs.5 crore!

In fact, no one noticed the Rs.1,000 currency notes with which the giant garland was created until these were identified by a local photographer when he zoomed in.

Earlier, while Mayawati was being garlanded, mediapersons could make out from a distance that it was not a run-of-the-mill garland. But beholders perceived it as one made of some exquisite imported flowers.

However, the mystery was unravelled no sooner than the still pictures were promptly lifted and beamed by TV channels.

Those present on the dais, however, feigned ignorance about the unique garland in which some 50,000 currency notes of Rs.1,000 each were believed to have been used.

The garland was specially crafted and brought by Mayawati’s party functionaries all the way from Bangalore for Monday’s mega rally organised by her to mark the Bahujan Samaj Party’s silver jubilee celebrations, which coincided with the 76th birth anniversary of party founder and her political mentor Kanshi Ram.

Baba Ramdev May Launch Political Party, Yoga guru Baba Ramdev plans to launch his own party though he says he won’t fight elections. Baba Ramdev said he wants to ‘cleanse’ the system. The yoga guru would field candidates in all Lok Sabha constituencies.

Ramdev, who was in Ghaziabad on March 15th to participate in a school function, targeted the UPA government for not keeping the prices of essential commodities in check and alleged: “The intention of the government is very much doubtful towards poors and farmers”.

“No doubt Manmohan Singh is a good economist and he understands perfectly the growth rate, but he does not understand the economics of Dal-Roti (cereals and bread),” he told reporters.

He said common men eats bread and not the growth rate, which has no role in the life of those who live below poverty line.

The yoga guru said that he will field candidates in the 2014 general elections but not yet decided on his own candidature. He advocated reforms in the administrative system of the country.

Ramdev has already launched Bharat Swabhiman campaign with an aim to end corrupt practices, bring back the Indian black money and use it for the development of the nation besides changing the system that has been continuing since the British period, among others.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry on Tuesday criticized Germany for releasing the leader of the terrorist group Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK).
Abdolrahman Haji Ahmadi was arrested at his apartment on Friday, but was released Monday, a website affiliated with the Movement for Change in the Iraqi Kurdistan region reported.
PJAK is an offshoot of the internationally-recognized terrorist group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which conducts deadly operations in Kurdish-populated regions of western Iran.
In reaction to the report, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast accused Western countries of not being sincere in fighting terrorism.
Mehmanparast said Tuesday that evidence at hand indicated that “Europe has been a safe haven for terrorists” and continues “to support terrorism despite chanting slogans in defense of human rights.”
According to a New York Times report in October 2007, PJAK has “direct or indirect discussions” with American officials. Its ringleader reportedly visited Washington in the summer of 2007. The group is branded as a terrorist group by the United States.

INDIA NEW DELHI: Socialist lawmakers forced India’s parliament to adjourn twice Tuesday as they tried for a second day to block passage of a historic bill to increase the number of female lawmakers across the country.

On Monday, angry legislators in the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of parliament, rushed to the chairman’s seat as he presided over the session, tore up copies of the bill and tried to grab his microphone.

The house suspended seven lawmakers on Tuesday because of their behavior the day before, but they refused to leave the chamber, again stalling debate on the proposal and forcing parliament to adjourn twice.

The bill to reserve one-third of legislative seats for women has faced strong opposition since it was first proposed more than a decade ago, with many political leaders worried that their male-dominated parties would lose seats.

The proposal is an attempt to correct some of the historical gender disparities in India, where women receive less education than men and are weighed down by illiteracy, poverty and low social status.

Mulayam Singh Yadav, the leader of a socialist group, said Tuesday a portion of the women’s quota should be set aside for minorities and lower castes, which have been socially and economically disadvantaged as well.

However, the main opposition parties, including right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party and communist groups, already have announced their support for the legislation proposed by the ruling Congress Party.

The bill would raise the number of female lawmakers in the 545-seat lower house to 181 from the current 59. It would nearly quadruple the number of women in the 250-seat upper house. The bill would also apply to state legislatures.

BERLIN: Egypt’s long-standing President Hosni Mubarak said Thursday former UN atomic watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei could run in the 2011 presidential election as long as he respected the constitution.

ElBaradei, emerging as Egypt’s most high-profile dissident, has called for an amendment of the constitution which includes rules that would make it difficult for him to challenge Mubarak at the ballot box.

“If he wants to join a party, he could choose whichever one he wants,” Mubarak told reporters during a visit to Germany, according to a translation of his comments in Arabic.

“If he wants to be a candidate for that party (at the presidential elections), he could do that. If he wants to stand as an independent candidate, he could do that,” he said.

“The only thing is that he must respect the constitution,” he said, adding the country “does not need a new hero”.

Under Egyptian law, a presidential candidate is required to have been a leading member of a party for at least one year and for the party to have existed for at least five years.

As an independent, ElBaradei would need the backing of at least 250 elected officials from parliament’s upper and lower houses and from municipal councils — all bodies dominated by Mubarak’s National Democratic Party.

ElBaradei last month he flew to Cairo to a rapturous welcome from supporters and formed the National Association for Change, before leaving Egypt again. He is due to return.

He has said he would run for president on condition that the constitution is amended.

The 67-year-old former chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency has also called for democratic reforms of the Egyptian regime which Mubarak, 81, has headed for nearly three decades.

Mubarak met journalists after talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

He is due to have medical tests in the city of Heidelberg Friday after suffering gall bladder pain, Egypt public television announced Thursday in a rare statement on the leader’s health, which is almost taboo.

The militant leader of Turkistani Islamic Party Abdul Haq al-Turkistani was killed in a drone strike at South Waziristan on February 15.
According to official sources, Turkistani was killed in a drone attack 8 km west of Miran Shah. Two missiles were fired on car in which three people were killed. An al Qaeda-linked militant who has called for attacks on China over its treatment of Muslims has been killed in a U.S. missile strike in Pakistan, Pakistani intelligence and Taliban officials said on Monday. ?

NEW DELHI: The Jammu Kashmir’s Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) today said Indian Home Minister has assured the party leadership of taking steps to streamline the cross Line of Control (LoC) trade and commerce in Jammu and Kashmir.

The assurance came during a meeting between Chidambaram and PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti in New Delhi. It was also assured that adequate banking facilities would be set up to facilitate trade, a PDP release said here.

Mehbooba brought to the notice of home minister the bottlenecks in trade on Srinagar-Muzaffarabad and Poonch-Rawlakote routes. The trade was begun in 2008 during the Congress-PDP government.

Chidambaram also said steps would be taken for creating infrastructure facilities at trade centers of Salamabad in Uri sector of Baramulla and Ranger in Poonch district of Jammu province, the release claimed.

“The PDP president and the home minister reviewed the over all situation in the state,” it said.

She said the divided families, whose plight had prompted the previous government to reopen the traditional routes, continued to suffer separation and the bus service, which had been started with lots of hope, was becoming less and less popular.

She told the home minister that many Kashmiris were being denied passports on flimsy grounds. “This issue needs to be addressed by the Home Ministry,” the release said quoting Mehbooba.

Earlier, speaking after the laying the foundation stone of Integrated Check Post (ICP) at Attari border on Saturday Chidambaram said: “We have not got a MFN (Most Favoured Nation) status that is a fact and that’s a complaint we make, it is a fact of life but because we do not have the MFN status that doesn’t not mean that all trade and commerce should come to an end.

We will continue the demand for the MFN status but we will also continue to encourage trade and commerce”.

To give boost to the trade between the two countries India has given MFN status to Pakistan in 1998 but Pakistan is still reluctant to reciprocate with the same gesture, he said

Union Home Minister Chidambaram along with Indian Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal laid foundation stone of Integrated Check Post (ICP) at Attari border, which aims at improving trade link between India and Pakistan.

The project, envisaged to boost the trade and commerce between India and Pakistan, is being constructed at a cost of Indian Rs. 150 crores to be developed on 130 acres of land acquired by the Indian Punjab Government.

THE HAGUE: The Dutch government collapsed Saturday, the prime minister said, after members of the coalition government disagreed on a NATO request to extend the Netherlands’ military mission in Afghanistan.

“Later today, I will offer to her majesty the Queen the resignations of the ministers and deputy ministers of the (Labour Party) PvdA,” premier Jan Peter Balkenende told journalists in the early hours.

He made the announcement after the cabinet held more than 16 hours of talks in The Hague to try to settle the dispute between the PvdA and Balkenende’s Christian Democratic Appeal, the senior partner in the governing coalition.

In the latest in a string of political rows, vice-premier Wouter Bos invoked the ire of his cabinet colleagues by stating this week that his PvdA would not support extending the Dutch deployment in Afghanistan beyond 2010.

NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen had asked the Netherlands earlier this month to take on a new training role and remain in Afghanistan until August 2011, a year later than originally planned.

Bos’ comments prompted Balkenende to respond that the matter was still under discussion, while the Christian Union (CU), the junior partner in the coalition, chided Bos for speaking out of turn.

The public spat resulted in a snap parliamentary debate Thursday, during which Bos was accused of using the issue for political gain as polls show his party lagging in the run-up to March 3 municipal elections.

The deployment of Dutch troops in Afghanistan was an unpopular move with voters from the outset.

“As the leader of the cabinet, I came to the conclusion that there is no common road for the CDA, PvdA and the Christian Union to take into the future,” Balkenende said.

“For days we have seen that unity has been affected by … statements that clash with recent cabinet decisions.”

This was Balkenende’s fourth government in a row in eight years. All have collapsed before their mandate expired.

Around 1,950 Dutch troops are deployed in Afghanistan under the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.

The Dutch mission, which started in 2006, has already once been extended by two years and has cost 21 soldiers’ lives.

Oscars nominees gathered for the annual nominees luncheon, an informal gathering of Academy Award contenders just three weeks ahead of the March 7 awards season extravaganza at Beverly Hills.
Meryl Streep, George Clooney, Morgan Freeman Carey Mulligan, Jeff Bridges and Sandra Bullock were among those stars who rendered shine to the event. Sandra Bullock spoke of maintaining a good work ethic for years to come. Bullock has been considered the front-runner to win best actress for the football drama “The Blind Side” but said didn’t take her nomination for granted.
“Does anybody expect a nomination? I certainly didn’t,” said Bullock, an enduring box-office draw who had never before been nominated for an Oscar. “I’m really very amazed and thankful to be here, because I’d like to work hard for another 10, 15 years. So if this is what that means, bring it.” Bullock, Mulligan and Gabourey Sidibe, a best-actress nominee for the Harlem drama “Precious: Based on the Novel `Push’ By Sapphire,” said they have barely started to consider what to wear to the Oscars, one of the world’s top fashion bashes.

BAGHDAD: A car bomb exploded Tuesday outside a police crime lab in northern Iraq, killing at least two people, Iraqi authorities said.

The bomb targeting the lab was the latest in a string of attacks against security forces in Mosul, an area where insurgents retain a foothold despite a sharp drop in violence across the rest of the country.

The car bomb was parked outside a side entrance to the lab in Mosul, 225 miles (360 kilometers) northwest of Baghdad, said Lt. Col. Salim Ibrahim, an area commander.

It wounded seven people, including five police officers, he said.

The explosion knocked over concrete blast walls and caused minor damage to the building, Ibrahim said.

In recent weeks in and around Mosul, security checkpoints have been attacked in drive-by shootings and the motorcade of the provincial governor was attacked.

Tuesday’s attack follows a suicide bombing last month that destroyed the Baghdad’s main crime lab and left at least 22 dead.

Gunmen also opened fire on two Christian college students waiting at a bus stop in Mosul, killing one and wounding the other, a police official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.

Christians have been routinely been the targets of sectarian violence since the U.S.-led 2003 invasion.

The attacks come at sensitive time for Iraqi security forces, who are under fire to shore up security after lapses that allowed for attacks against a number of government sites.

The U.S. military has warned of a possible escalation in violence ahead of Iraq’s March 7 parliamentary elections.

Political tensions between the Shiite-led government and minority Sunnis have been on the rise after a vetting committee barred hundreds of candidates from running because of ties to Saddam Hussein outlawed Baath Party.

An explosion late Monday targeted the Baghdad political office of al-Ahrar, a party that includes followers of anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, police said.

Punched-out round holes in the office walls indicate that at least two rockets were fired at the building, observers said. Officials blamed a roadside bomb for the explosion, which killed one person and wounded three, including Majid Hussein Taha — a director of the Ministry of Agriculture and a candidate running on the party’s ticket.