Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Raj Thackeray taken to court for Abu Azmi's slap


A writ petition was on Tuesday filed in the Supreme Court seeking registration of an FIR against MNS chief Raj Thackeray for assaulting SP MLA Abu Azmi in the Maharashtra Assembly for taking oath in Hindi instead of Marathi.

The petition filed by one Salek Chand Jain also sought a direction to the Election Commission to de-recognise the MNS for sparking violence "throughout the country" by whipping up parochial feelings.

Sugreve Dubey, counsel for the petitioner, made an impromptu mention of the petition before a Bench of Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan, Justices P Sathasivam and B Sudershan Reddy.

The Bench directed the petitioner to file the same through the registry.

Referring to the assault of SP Party MLA on the floor of the House by MNS MLAs, the petition claimed the incident has provoked country-wide violence in the name of language and regionalism, thus threatening national unity.

'Jessica Lall's killer not welcome in my club'

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I was very close to Jessica Lall...I don't want the guy who murdered her in my club," says actor Arjun Rampal, confirming that the man who killed Jessica Lall was at his nightclub, LAP, over the weekend.

Manu Sharma was sentenced to life in prison in 2006 for killing model Jessica Lall. He is now out on parole. His break from prison is being scrutinized closely after it was reported that he was seen at Rampal's Delhi club, LAP. Sharma was granted parole on the grounds that he needs to attend to his ageing mother, and his family business.

On Saturday, Sharma's mother addressed press conference in Chandigarh promoting a cricket match she helped organize. Many lawyers said this exposes Sharma's grounds for parole as flimsy.

However, Sharma's lawyer, Ram Jethmalani, points out that as a prisoner whose appeal against his sentence is pending in court, Sharma is entitled to parole. Critics retaliate that while the parole may be legal, it is offensive to see a prisoner using time off from jail to drop into a nightclub.

Rampal says that Sharma was allowed into LAP only because he was with a member of the club. According to Rampal, Sharma stayed for ten minutes at his club.

CCTV footage, handed over to the police, allegedly shows Manu Sharma at the nightclub. The Delhi police says it was alerted to Sharma's presence at the club after a fight broke out in the area. The police says Sharma was not involved in the fight.

Since Jessica Lall was shot dead in 1999, there have been repeated allegations, in court and outside, that Manu Sharma has benefited in the case from his father's political influence. Venod Sharma, a senior Congress leader from Haryana, just won his seat in the Haryana Assembly with a gigantic majority.

China creeps into Dalai Lama discourse

W
herever the 14th Dalai Lama is, China somehow manages to creep in. Even in religious discourses.

"People should have faith in their own religion, whether they are in Korea, China, Japan or anywhere else," he told a gathering of some 10,000 Buddhist lamas and devotees at an expansive ground adjoining the Yid-Gha-Choezin Gompa here on Monday.

This was virtually the opening line of the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader's first session of his three-day discourse. His teaching in Tibetan was translated in Hindi for the consumption of local tribal people in Tawang district adjoining China's Tibetan Autonomous Region.

The message, local lamas said, could very well have been a call to dissuade people from converting.

At least five small churches have come up in this town since 2002, two of them - Christian Revival Church (CRC) and Town Baptist Church - barely a kilometer from the Tawang Monastery. At Dirang, 120 km to the south in adjoining West Kameng district, the erection of a CRC church had led to complications in August last year. Another at Jang nearby also had to be uprooted following alleged local pressure.

The Monpa and Sherdukpen tribes inhabiting Tawang and West Kameng districts are Buddhists. Minus these two districts, over 40 per cent of people in Arunachal Pradesh have turned Christians over the last 20 years, claim the Catholic and various denominations of Protestant churches.

Buddhism is so strong in Tawang that government buildings either sport a statue of Buddha or Buddhist flags and motifs. Even the army's memorial dedicated to the martyrs of the 1962 Sino-Indian War is designed like a chhorten capped by an image of Buddha. Buddhist rituals also went into the inauguration of an OPD of Tawang District Hospital by the Dalai Lama prior to the religious discourse on Monday. The Dalai Lama partly funded this OPD.

According to Moti Ranpal, pastor of CRC Tawang, at least 30 Monpas have ceased to be Buddhists. "We did not ask them to; they accepted Christianity out of their own will. Pressure from local organizations, though, dissuade them coming out in the open. We have also been stoned out of places such as Lumla," he said.

Alleged animosity from Buddhist groups has also forced denominations such as Trumpet, Brothers and Believers, Hope Sharing Church and Fellowship with God to work from within private homes. A missionary school - Mt Ghasala English School - run by Baptist Kenny Kent from Nagaland is also reportedly victimized.

"The first Monpa Christian, Tashi Phuntso, has had to go to Assam to escape persecution," said a Baptist Church member. Phuntso is now an evangelist operating from a Fellowship with God church at Charduar in adjoining Assam.

Monks at Tawang Monastery refused to talk on the issue while local authorities denied religious persecution. "If this was so, churches would not have come up here," said an officer of the district administration, refusing to be quoted.

Earlier in the day, the Dalai Lama blessed over 1500 saplings for distribution to the locals as an exercise in initiating them for a save-Himalayan ecology campaign. "We chose three species of indigenous, high-altitude trees - blue pine (local name Sukpa), oak (Changba) and fir (froh) - for planting on barren patches around this town," said forest officer Abhijit Rajkhowa.

Blast accused nabbed in Assam's Sonitpur district

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DFB militant Mridul Goyari, an accused in last year's October 30 twin blast at Barpeta Road that claimed 21 lives, was apprehended by the police from Tezpur in Assam's Sonitpur district on Monday.

The militant was handed over to CBI officials here who had chargesheeted him for his alleged involvement in the incident and produced before the Kamrup Chief Judicial Magistrate Robin Phukan, the police said.

The CJM remanded him to judicial custody.

The banned outfit was behind the devastating serial blasts that rocked the state claiming 90 lives and leaving nearly 500 injured on the day.

The state government had handed over the inquiry to the CBI which chargesheeted 19 NDFB militants, including its chief Ranjan Daimary. Only six of them have been arrested so far.

12-hr Ulfa bandh cripples Assam

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UWAHATI: The 12-hour Ulfa-sponsored Assam bandh called in protest against the "arrest" of outfit's "foreign secretary" Sashadhar Choudhury and
"finance secretary" Chitraban Hazarika crippled life throughout the state on Monday.

Along with the rest of the state, the streets of the city wore a deserted look during the bandh. Vehicles were off the roads and business establishments downed shutters. School, colleges and government offices also registered a thin attendance during the day. But there were no reports of any untoward incidents.

However, the bandh did not affect the movement of trains and flights. An NFR spokesman said, "There is no affect of the bandh on the movement of trains. Both incoming and outgoing trains maintained their schedules. "

Sources in the Airports Authority of India (AAI) at Borjhar said the bandh failed to affect the movement of flights. "All the flights were on time," sources said.

On the other hand, senior Assam police officials who are grilling the two top Ulfa leaders said there are several cases registered against them. "Most cases against the duo are related to extortion," an official said.

He, however, refused to divulge much about the confession of the two Ulfa leaders and said some more cadres are likely to be arrested soon. He also hoped that some cadres of the organization are likely to surrender in the next few days as Bangladesh has intensified operations.

On the other hand, Manab Adhikar Sangram Samiti (Mass) has appealed to the state and the Centre to take it as an opportunity to start peace talks with the outfit.

"With the recent arrest of Choudhury and Hazarika, most of the senior cadres of the banned outfit are in judicial custody now. The government can utilize this as an opportunity to start peace talks again," said Mass adviser Lachit Bordoloi. "They (Hazarika and Choudhury) are among the seniormost cadres of the outfit now. If the government approaches them in a dignified manner, we hope the peace process can start again," he added.

According to Ulfa, the two senior leaders were "arrested" in Bangladesh and handed over to Indian security forces. The outfit termed this as a violation of human rights of the two leaders as the two countries don't have any extradition treaty.