Gogoi to Girls: Marry After 20, Get Rs 10,000

G
uwahati, Jul 3 : Girls below poverty line in Assam now have a 10,000-rupee reason to withstand marriage until they turn 20.

Like most states across India, Assam has a dismal record of underage marriages. Official estimates say over 45 per cent of girls in backward, rural areas are married off soon after attaining puberty.

In a bid to reverse this trend, Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi announced a financial incentive to every BPL girl who ties the knot only after turning 20. “We hope this one-time award of Rs 10,000 serves its purpose,” he said while presenting a deficit budget of Rs 4615.11 crore on Monday.

Gogoi also announced a new scheme to ensure a decent living for every “unmarried and unemployed single woman and widow”. An initial fund of Rs 1 crore has been earmarked for this scheme that’s envisaged to take care of the beneficiaries’ monthly requirements.

If that were not enough, the “woman-friendly” annual fiscal plan saw gender budgeting being extended from 12 to 15 departments. Introduced last fiscal, gender budgeting entails setting aside a part of each department’s annual budget specifically for “100 per cent women-oriented” schemes.

TEA TAX RELIEF: The meltdown-mauled tea industry in Assam can now breathe easier with the Assam government announcing an agricultural income tax concession from the current fiscal. The relief, though, comes with a rider – the tea has to be exported through the Inland Container Deport at Amingaon, facing Guwahati across the river Brahmaputra.

“In order to boost export of Assam tea, the deduction from agricultural income on tea exported from ICD has been raised from Re 1 to Rs 5 per kg under the provisions of the Assam Agricultural Income Tax Act, 1934,” said Gogoi.

Assam accounts for 51 per cent of the total tea produced in India. It had recovered from a prolonged market slump before the global meltdown began hitting hard late last year. Scanty rainfall since October 2008 added to the industry’s misery with production in the first quarter this year falling by 65-75 per cent.

Share

Blogger Widgets

SKorea says North fires 6 missiles off east coast

S
EOUL, South Korea -North Korea fired six ballistic missiles off its eastern coast Saturday, South Korea said, a violation of U.N. resolutions and an apparent message of defiance to the United States on its Independence Day.
The launches, which came two days after North Korea fired four short-range cruise missiles, will likely further escalate tensions in the region as the U.S. tries to muster support for tough enforcement of the U.N. resolution imposed on the communist regime for its May nuclear test.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said three missiles were fired early Saturday, a fourth around noon and two more in the afternoon. The Defense Ministry said that the missiles were ballistic and are believed to have flown more than 250 miles (400 kilometers).
"Our military is fully ready to counter any North Korean threats and provocations based on strong South Korea-U.S. combined defense posture," the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement.
South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted military officials as saying the missiles appeared to be a type of Scud missile. North Korea's Scuds are considered short-range, the South's military said.
North Korea is not allowed to fire Scuds, medium-range missiles or long-range missiles under a resolution that bans any launch using ballistic missile technology. Thursday's launches, on the other hand, did not violate the resolution as they were cruise missiles rather than ballistic, according to South Korea's Foreign Ministry.
Ballistic missiles are guided during their ascent out of the atmosphere but fall freely when they descend. Cruise missiles are fired straight at a target.
The North has a record of timing missile tests for the U.S. national day, which fell on Saturday.
"The missiles were seen as part of military exercises, but North Korea also appeared to have sent a message to the U.S. through the missile launches," a senior official in South Korea's presidential said, without elaborating.
The official told The Associated Press that North Korea could fire more missiles in coming days, but said there was little possibility it could fire an intercontinental ballistic missile, as it threatened in April.
He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to media.
North Korea's state news agency carried no reports on the launches. But the North had warned ships to stay away from its east coast through July 10 for military exercises — an indication it was planning launches.
The chief of U.S. Naval operations, Adm. Gary Roughead, said Saturday the American military was ready for any North Korean missile tests.
"Our ships and forces here are prepared for the tracking of the missiles and observing the activities that are going on," Roughead said after meeting Japanese military officials in Tokyo before the news of the launches.
South Korea and Japan, which are within easy range of North Korean missiles, condemned the launches as a "provocative" act that violates the U.N. resolution.
South Korea "expressed deep regret over the North's continuous behavior that escalates tensions in Northeast Asia by repeatedly defying" the resolution, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
In Tokyo, Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura said in a statement that the launch of missiles "is a serious act of provocation against the security of neighboring countries, including Japan, and is against the resolution of the U.N Security Council."
In Beijing, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said he had no immediate comment. China is the North's closest ally.
During the U.S. Independence Day holiday in 2006, Pyongyang fired a barrage of missiles, including a long-range Taepodong-2 that broke apart and fell into the ocean less than a minute after liftoff. Those launches also came amid tensions with the U.S. over North Korea's nuclear program.
A long-range missile launch by North Korea toward the United States would further flout the U.N. sanctions resolution punishing Pyongyang for its May 25 nuclear test. The U.S. last month said it had positioned more missile defenses around Hawaii as a precaution.
But spy satellites have apparently not detected any of the preparations that would normally precede such a launch.
The North wants to show Washington that it is not yielding to pressure, and the regime is likely to save a long-range launch for later, Kim Yong-hyun, a professor at Seoul's Dongguk University and an expert on the country, said Friday.

Share

Blogger Widgets

The maid responded to my advances: Shiney Ahuja

M
umbai, Jul 4: After heaps of conflicting statement, the Bollywood actor Shiney Ahuja who is detained for allegedly raping his maid, on Friday, Jul 3 told the court for the first time that he had sex with his maid.The actor admitted that he had 'consensual' sex with the maid after she was responding to his advances. Shiney Ahuja's bail plea which reads that he belongs to a respectable family and that this case was a conspiracy against him was met with argument from the prosecution that being from a good family does not necessarily mean that he was good.


The prosecution also claimed that the Bollywood star would try to jump bail if released.

The DNA tests and medical reports that point at sexual assault has strengthened the case against Shiney Ahuja and the prosecution is using the same to frame the accused.

Share

Blogger Widgets

Mizoram Spends Rs 70 cr On Tobacco

A
izawl, Jul 3 : Mizoram Chief Secretary and chairman of the state Tobacco Control Society Vanhela Pachuau on Thursday said that Mizoram spent around Rs 70 crore on tobacco products per annum.

Pachuau, addressing a press conference, based his calculation on the basis of the study conducted by the Presbyterian Church in 2004 which said that 77 per cent of the church’s over five lakh members in the state consumed tobacco products and spent around Rs Nine lakh per day.

Dr Jane Ralte, head of the Tobacco Cessation Clinic said that 73.7 per cent of men in Mizoram smoked as against the national figure of 32.7 per cent while there are 16.1 per cent female smokers in the state as aginst the national figure of 1.4 per cent.

Ralte added that Mizoram topped inhypopharynx (throat cancer) and tongue cancer in the world and the two dreaded cancers were mainly caused by tobacco products.

The lone Lengpui Airport near here would be made the first ever smoke-free airport in the country, Pachuau said.

Share

Blogger Widgets