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| President awards standard to aircrew examining board KANPUR, Nov 1: President A P J Abdul Kalam today awarded the President’s standard to the Aircrew Examining Board.....more Vajpayee
to present RAIPUR, Nov 1: Chhattisgarh Government today announced 28 names of eminent persons and organisations for 15......more The return
of Vilasrao MUMBAI, Nov 1: In a remarkable come-back, Vilasrao Deshmukh was today swornin as Maharashtra Chief Minister for....more Jaya’s
claim on excerpts CHENNAI, Nov 1: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa’s claim that she did not "tape" her telephonic conversation.....more |
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Kamal Nath places labour reforms job on states NEW DELHI, Nov 1: Conveying the non-commital stand of the UPA Government on inclusion of labour reforms in the......more George
Orwell’s house MOTIHARI, BIHAR, Nov 1: The tiny town of Motihari in Bihar awaits the ‘mason’s pick and shovel’ as the house of......more From
farmer’s son MUMBAI, Nov 1: From a poor farmer’s son to deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra, NCP leader R R Patil has had a.....more Railways
to set up NEW DELHI, Nov 1: Buoyed by the success of its own brand of mineral water ‘rail neer’, the railways have decided to......more |
President awards standard to aircrew examining board KANPUR, Nov 1: President A P J Abdul Kalam today awarded the President’s standard to the Aircrew Examining Board (AEB) — the premier quality assurance agency, responsible for enhancing operational efficiency and flight safety across the entire spectrum of the IAF’s flying operations. He also presented ‘colours’ to the no 1 Base Repair Depot (BRD), based at Kanpur. In his speech, Dr Kalam lauded both units saying they had been doing an excellent job, and recalled his one year service with the BRD in 1958. The colourful parade at the Kanpur Air Force Station was also attended by Minister of State for Home Prakash Jaiswal, Chief of Air Staff Air Chief Marshal S Krishnaswamy, Air Chief-designate Air Marshal S P Tyagi and AoC-NC Maintanence Command Air Marshal V A Patkar. There was flypast by various aircraft of the IAF, including the An-32, Dorniers, Sukhoi-30 and Jaguars. The Suryakiran aerobatics team also put up a show for the spectators. Today’s investiture was the first Presidential presentation to an IAF unit in the last four years. The Flying Instructors School (FIS) at Bareilly had been the last IAF formation to be awarded Presidential colours in 2000. The no 1 brd has done a commendable job in indigenising and rectifying various aircraft, especially the IAF’s workhorse — the an 32 — thus saving the country large amounts in foreign exchange, Dr Kalam said. The unit has overhauled more than fifty An-32s. The AEB, based at Hindan Air Force Station, is an examining authority charged with testing, categorisation and standardisation of all the pilots, navigators, flight engineers and flight gunners of the fighter, transport and helicopter units of the air force. The AEB could help in bringing down considerably the number of accidents in air force fleet, the President said. It is also specifically responsible for the assessment and quality of flying training being imparted to flight cadets at various ‘flying training establishments of the IAF.’ these tasks are achieved by ‘Air Force Examiners,’ who comprise experienced operational aircrew, handpicked from different backgrounds. The forerunner of AEB was set up in 1951, after the return of four IAF officers sent to UK to be trained in methods of categorising the aircrew. Initially termed the ‘aircrew training and testing team,’ and going on for some time as the ‘catboard,’ it was rechristened the ‘aircrew examining board’ on March 24, 1956. Wing CDR Masilamani took over as the first co on April 6. Based at Palam, the AEB moved to Hindan in March 1965. The AEB is presently an independent agency and is under the functional control of the Director-General (Inspection safety). Currently commanded by Group Captain N S Kadian, it is structured in a flight system. ‘A’ flight tests and categorises pilots flying transport aircraft, ‘B’ flight inspects and tests all fighter aircrew, while ‘C’ flight takes on the task of standardising and ensuring quality control amonst all aircrew and flight-cadets under the the IAF’s training command. ‘D’ flight handles all helicopter pilots. There are also three sub-flights — ‘Navigator’, ‘Engineer’ and ‘Gunner’ that examine aircrew from these respective branches, in conjunction with the ‘A’ and ‘D’ flights. (UNI) |
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Vajpayee to present C’garh
annual awards RAIPUR, Nov 1: Chhattisgarh Government today announced 28 names of eminent persons and organisations for 15 awards to be given away by former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee on the occasion of the state foundation day function this evening. Sanatan Sant Samaj-Gahira of Jashpur and Shivanand Ashram-Gumargunda of Dantewada have been selected for this year’s prestigious ‘Saheed Veer Narayan Singh Samman’ given for the upliftment of tribals and backward communities, official sources told PTI here. While Kamlesh Gogia has been selected for ‘Chandulal Chandrakar fellowship for journalist’, Jhumarlal Tawri and Ratan Lal Surana would receive the ‘Yati Yatanlal Samman’ for non-violence and protection of cows, they said. For sports, the ‘Gundadhur Samman’ went to senior handball team, Bhilai for achieving several awards, and to rifle shooter of the state Amardeep Singh Rai, who was second in March-April 2004 9th SAF games held at Islamabad, the sources said adding, Arvind Soni and Teklal Purre have been nominated for the ‘Maharaja Praveer Bhanjdeo Samman for archery’. For work in the women empowerment, ‘Mini Mata Samman’ went jointly to Mahila Manch, Raipur and Phulwasan Yadav, where as for social justice and social awareness Sakharam Baghel and Guru Monohar Das Nrusingh are selected for ‘Guru Ghasidas Samman’. Pritpal Belchandan and Brijbhushan Lal Dewangan are selected for the ‘Thakur Pyarelal Singh Samman’ for their excellent work in the field of cooperative, the sources added. Samual Danial Sheif Jalandhari and Sayad Rais Ahmed are selected for ‘Haji Hassan Ali Samman’ for contribution to Urdu language, the sources said. ‘Pandit Ravi Shankar Shukla Samman’ jointly went to the Mata Rukmini Seva Sasthan of Vinobha village of Bastar district and Avaduth Bhagwan Ram Kusth Seva Ashram of Aghorpit Wamdev Nagar of Jashpur district for exemplary works in social, economic and education field. ‘Pandit Sundarlal Sharma Samman’ jointly went to Lala Jagdalpuri and Pandit Shyamlal Chaturvedi for development of local literature while the ‘Chakradhar Samman’ given for contribution in the field of art and music went to Pandit P D Ashirvadam and Pandit Bimalendu Mukharjee. The ‘Dau Mandaraji Samman’ jointly went to Bhulwaram Yadav and Sonbai Rajwar for promotion of local artisans and folk arts whereas Kamlesh Singh and Upendra Kumar Choudhury have been nominated for the contribution in the field of agriculture, the sources said. The ‘Maharaja Agrasen Samman’ for social cohesiveness went to Bharatiya Kusth Niwarak Sangh of Katrenagar in Janjgir-Champa district, they added. (PTI) |
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The return of Vilasrao Deshmukh as CM MUMBAI, Nov 1: In a remarkable come-back, Vilasrao Deshmukh was today swornin as Maharashtra Chief Minister for the second time. Deshmukh, who was unceremoniously removed by the Congress high command in January last year after three-and-a-half years as Chief Minister in the Congress-NCP-led Democratic Front Coalition Government, was then replaced by Mr Sushilkumar Shinde, the first Dalit Chief Minister of the state. Known as a dynamic and a tough politician in state politics, Vilasraoji, as the Maratha leader from Latur is called, will help the Congress maintain the balance of power with the Sharad Pawar-led NCP, political observers say here. The 59-year-old Mr Deshmukh has come a long way from being a sarpanch of Bhabalgaon in Osmanabad district, Latur Zilla Parishad member and Panchayat Samiti deputy Chairman (from 1974 to 1980) to assume the top office in India’s second most populous state. Mr Deshmukh’s association with the party began in 1975 as Congress president of Osmanabad district. He was also member of the Latur agriculture produce market committee and Director of the Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank. Mr Deshmukh was first elected to the Legislative Assembly from Latur in 1980 and, since then, has held several important portfolios till his shock defeat in the 1995 Assembly elections. He went into a brief political hibernation after he unsuccessfully contested the Legislative Council election as an independent against Mr Chhagan Bhujbal who was the Congress candidate in 1995. However, Mr Deshmukh romped back home by winning the 1999 Assembly elections from Latur by the highest margin of over 80,000 votes. His three-and-a-half years tenure as Chief Minister was marked by several hurdles as he was running an eight-party coalition Government. The Congress and the NCP had fought the elections separately then. Apart from facing rivals within the party, he also had to tackle the allies besides running the day-to-day governance. The incident gave opportunity for Deshmukh baitors to step up their attack. He was accused of neglecting the interests of the DF alliance, and those of party MLAs as regards development work in their constituencies. Another surprise attack came when his opponents charged him of using the top post to further the Bollywood career of his son Ritesh. After being removed from the post, Deshmukh was appointed as the AICC observer for Gujarat, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka Assembly polls. Although Desmukh lost the key post, he determinedly waited for an opportunity to stage a comeback. The bickering between Congress-NCP over the CM’s issue after the Assembly polls, coupled with the aggressive stance of the NCP, came handy for him. Deshmukh and his supporters succeeded to convince the party high command that the NCP — with more ministerial berth in its kitty — was likely to assert itself in the next five years and therefore the state needed a leadership which can keep the NCP aspirations under check. The selection of state NCP unit chief R R Patil as the new deputy Chief Minister endorsed Deshmukh’s view and the opinion of a large number of Congress legislators’ in the CLP seeking a strong leadership, paved way for Deshmukh’s return. The oath-taking ceremony was held 15 days after results of the Assembly elections were announced on October 16. The Congress-NCP led alliance had bagged 141 seats in the 288-member Assembly to storm back to power. The ruling alliance has submitted a list of 165 legislators to the Governor while staking its claim to form Government. Though the alliance won the elections with Sushilkumar Shinde at the helm of affairs in the state, Congress MLAs voted for Deshmukh as the Chief Minister at a legislature party meeting on Friday. Shinde has been appointed the Governor of Andhra Pradesh. (PTI) Jaya’s claim on excerpts issue questioned CHENNAI, Nov 1: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa’s claim that she did not "tape" her telephonic conversation with Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil on the issue of shifting the state Governor has been questioned by the opposition leaders in the state. DMK president M Karunanidhi, disputing the claim, wrote in the party organ ‘Murasoli’ that if it was a "gist" of conversation "recollected from her memory", only the views expressed by Patil would have come out. "It is impossible to recollect the conversation word by word," he said. Even in her previous statement, she had not denied about tapping the conversation and had only denied that she had not breached the oath of secrecy, by making public the excerpts of the conversation, he said. "Nobody is prepared to believe her statement that she did not tape the conversation," he said adding the denial was only as "an after thought, because of the experience of former American president Nixon and former Karnataka Chief Minister Ramakrishna Hegde, who had to lay down office because they were caught in telephone tapping cases," he said. TNCC president G K Vasan said Jayalalithaa had issued the denial as the "illegal tapping has been proved beyond doubt." By releasing the excerpts of the conversation, she had breached the Oath of Secrecy, he said. On the Chief Secretary filing an affidavit in the Supreme Court on the Governor issue, Karunanidhi said he had high regard for Chief Secretary Lakshmi Pranesh as "she is a person of high integrity and honesty" but was surprised to see a change in her attitude, adding even persons, who were considered "iron bars", had to bend under AIADMK rule to "safeguard" their position. The Chief Secretary had filed a "false" affidavit in the Supreme Court, saying the DMK wanted a Governor, who was amenable to it, and that Karunanidhi had not met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his recent visit to Chennai only to `pressurise’ him on the issue, the DMK chief said. He released the copy of his letter to the Prime Minister, expressing his inability to meet him at Chennai and the Prime Minister’s reply that he looked forward to meeting the DMK chief at Delhi, as proof to dispute the Chief Secretary’s statement. (PTI) |
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Railways to set up two more ‘rail neer’ bottling plants NEW DELHI, Nov 1: Buoyed by the success of its own brand of mineral water ‘rail neer’, the railways have decided to set up two more water bottling plants to meet the burgeoning demand of the packaged product. While one plant is to be set up in Mumbai, the other plant is likely to come up in southern part of the country. These will be in addition to the two existing plants at Nangloi, Delhi and Danapur near Patna, which were set up at a cost of Rs 5.5 crore each. The two pilot plants are capable of producing 1.2 lakh bottles of one litre capacity a day, with tamper-proof seal. At a time when major mineral water companies are failing to adhere to the norms and causing persistent doubts in the minds of consumers, the Indian Railways are more than satisfied with the success of ‘rail neer’. "Presently, we are able to meet only 50 per cent of the requirements by the rail passengers and new plants will go a long way in bridging the gap between demand and supply, Railway Board Chairman R K Singh told UNI. The rail neer was launched by the then Railway Minister Nitish Kumar on May six last year on a rather low key note, but the positive feedback from the passengers have left the railways with a lot to cheer about. The project to provide quality drinking water at an affordable price (Rs 10 for one litre bottle) has been taken up in view of the fact that an estimated 20 per cent of the packaged drinking water consumed in the country is in trains and railway stations. The Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), the catering arm of the railways, is currently looking after the production and supply of rail neer. The plants are completely owned by the IRCTC and the equipment has been supplied by the Mumbai-based Ion Exchange Ltd. IRCTC Managing Director M N Chopra said the high norms of hygiene and cleanliness were being observed in its ‘state-of-the-art’ bottling plants at Nangloi and Patna. He said despite the international standard quality of rail neer, there was no plan at present to enter the commercial market. "The immediate objective is to meet the shortfall in supply for the railways," Mr Chopra said. Rail neer is available at railway stations only, and the railways ministry has imposed a ban on the sale of other brands of packaged water. The Government had informed the Lok Sabha last year that the quality of the packaged water conformed to the stringent norms set up by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) and also the European norms for pesticides residues. The water passes through various stages of processing, including softener, ultra-filtration membrane, reverse osmosis, micro-filter, ultra violet filter, ozonation and calcite marble media, before being packaged. The entire process is monitored by a micro-processor-controlled machine control centre, capable of halting production at any stage in case of deviation from pre-defined parameters. Former Minister of State for Railways Bandaru Dattatreya had asserted that the railways took up the project on a no-profit, no-loss basis and it was only aimed at improving catering services on board and at the stations. Asked about the non-availability of pantry cars in a number of long-distance trains, the Railway Board Chairman said the facility had been provided in 240 out of 680 such trains. The pantry car facility would be made available in 50 more trains by the end of the current fiscal, he informed. "The railways’ inability to provide pantry cars in all long-distance trains is because of various constraints like non-availability of rakes, cost factor and technical logistics," he pointed out. However, the requirement of catering on board was also being met by ‘train-side’ vending, he said. Mr Singh said new food plazas, restaurants and pantry cars would be augmented in the railway system to cater to the increasing passenger profile. At places where these facilities were lacking, the IRCTC would award licenses to the private operators. In order to further professionalise and improve the catering services, the entire catering arrangement of the railways was being transferred to the IRCTC, he added. (UNI) |
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CSWB should be allowed greater
autonomy: NEW DELHI, Nov 1: Outgoing Central Social Welfare Board Chairperson Mridula Sinha today recommended greater autonomy for the board and said it should explore raising resources from the public sector, business houses and also religious organisations that have shifted their work from preaching to social work. "First and foremost is that the board, an autonomous body under the Department of Women and Child Development, Human Resource Development Ministry, should be allowed greater autonomy in formulating and implementing programmes as it is the best equipped organisation with its outreach extending to the grassroots," Ms Sinha, who relinguished office after six years of distinguished service, told a press conference here. Regretting that several recommendations made by different groups for the welfare of women had not been implemented so far, she suggested setting up of a committee with the board as a nodal organisation coordinating with different government departments for all programmes related to women, children and other marginalised groups. "The committee should study how these recommendations could be put into practice," she said. In her recommendations to the Government, she also said border areas projects, such as those in Jammu and Kashmir, should be reviewed and used as counselling centres for trauma, vocational training and security training. She was, however, against setting up of old age homes in large numbers. "Though there is a need to have such homes, the Government should take steps to restrict their establishment. Wherever necessary, the old age homes should be integrated with creches. Voluntary organisations should create an atmosphere in which the new generation readily takes care of the elderly." Ms Sinha also recommended educational trips of adolescent girls combining 50 per cent each from villages and cities to fill the gap that was widening day by day because of the dual system of imparting education. She said members of the State Social Welfare Boards, numbering about 700. Should be given more responsibilites. Their services could be utilised to monitor functioniong of the voluntary organisations as well as act as a link between the Government and the villages. The role of each member should be to coordinate the activites of such organisations, promote voluntarism and take up local problems. She also suggested increasing the number of field officers of the board so that their services could be utilised by various Government departments to monitor the Government programmes and also to promote voluntarism. This could help in better implementation of the programmes as well as save a lot of money, she said. (UNI) |
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