THE HEADLINES:
- Former Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan quits Congress; Mounts scathing attack against Rahul Gandhi.
- Congress questions the timing of her resignation with serious allegations against her.
- CBI questions TMC MP Mukul Roy on his alleged involvement in Saradha scam.
- In Pakistan, at least 40 killed in powerful bomb attack in a Shia Mosque in Sindh province.
- Sensex tanks 500 points; GDP revised upward to 6.9 per cent with change in base year.
- In Cricket, England defeat India to seal place in tri-series final.
- Leander Paes and his partner Martina Hingis reach mixed doubles finals in Australian Tennis Open.
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Former Environment Minister Jayanathi Natarajan today quit the Congress party and mounted a scathing attack on Rahul Gandhi. She claimed that she followed his directions on clearing projects but was humiliated and sidelined by central leadership. Addressing the media in Chennai, she said that she is resigning from the party.
"The time has come now for me to rethink my association because what happened in the recent past that the Congress is no longer the Congress which I joined with such great hopes and ideals."
Ms. Natarajan said that she has no plans to join any other political party after such bitter experiences. She accused Rahul Gandhi's Office of planting stories to sully her reputation after she had resigned as Environment Minister on the direction of Sonia Gandhi. Suggesting that the Congress Vice-President had interfered in the decision making process, she said specific inputs were received from the office of Rahul Gandhi based on the representation by NGOs raising environment concerns on certain large projects. She said she had done no wrong and ready to go to jail if any concrete proof of my wrong doing is established. She also said that as a Minister in UPA-II, she did not want to attack Narendra Modi on snoop gate issue but was told that the party at the highest level wanted her to do so.
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The Congress has raised questions on the timing of the resignation of former Environment Minster Jayanti Natarajan. Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi told reporters in Delhi that Natarajan was acting at the behest of her new political masters, who may have got evidence against her. The Congress also rallied behind Rahul and dismissed as completely baseless the allegations of his interference in the work of Environment Ministry and accused her of having ulterior motives. He said Jayanthi Natrajan's letter to the party president is factually untrue and shows her opportunism.
"Its not once orally or in writing in all these long years, over four terms in Rajya Sabha over Ministeriship or over spokesprsonship has she ever articulatled any of these afterthoughts. Afterthoughts therefore, have to be opportunistic and Hippocratic . Unfortunately, I think this press conference and the letter is nothing more, nothing less than an "image bachao abhiyan".
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The NDA Government today indicated a fresh look at environmental clearances for projects granted or rejected by the previous UPA Government in the light of former Union Minister Jayanthi Natarajan's allegation of interference by Rahul Gandhi. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said the outbursts by the former Environment Minister against the Congress Vice President showed that the UPA Government was a practitioner of crony capitalism.
Terming Natarajan's charge of specific requests on green clearances as a serious issue, Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said he would review the files where allegations of extraneous influence have been mentioned.
"The facts brought before the people today by Jayanthi Natrajan and the letter that she has written are very serious in nature; and as I am Minister for Environment now, it becomes my duty to go through the files again and re-visit the episodes about which she has talked about".
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The CBI today interrogated the All India General Secretary of Trinamul Congress and former Railway Minister Mr. Mukul Roy on Sardha Chit Fund scam. It questioned him for over four hours at his office in Kolkata. The CBI had issued notice to him for questioning on 12th of this month. After the interrogation, Mr. Roy said he is ready to co-operate with the CBI to unearth the truth and appear before it again if situation demands an investigation. Earlier he said that he is not involved in any immoral activities and declined all charges leveled against him in the scam.
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Campaigning is in full swing for Delhi assembly elections with senior party leaders of BJP, Aam Aadmi Party and Congress making hectic efforts to woo the voters. The city is in the grip of roadshows, nukkad sabhas, motorcycle rallies and community meetings. The BJP is focusing on the work done by the NDA government at the center during the last eight months while Aam Aadmi Party is projecting its achievements in the 49 day rule and its plan for the city. Congress leaders are banking on the development work carried out during their rule.
"The national capital is witnessing vigorous election campaigning. Hoardings at bus stops, inside metro trains and other public places have been put up by three main contenders BJP, Congress and Aam Admi Party highlighting their works and promises. Traditional methods like loud speaker on autoricks haws are also being used. Social media platforms like twitter and facebook and FM radio Advertisement are also being used in a big way by the parties and their candidates for allegations and counter allegations against each other. The Election Commission is keeping a close watch on the violation of model code of conduct. It has registered 147 cases against various parties in this regard". With Sant Bahadur this is SHIELA AIR NEWS.
BJP leaders Amit Shah, Arun Jaitley, Smrti Irani, Navjot Singh Sidhu and Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan addressed public meetings in the city. Aam Aadmi Party leaders Arvind Kejriwal, Kumar Vishwash, Bhagwat Maan, Gul Panag and Yogendra Yadav and Congress leaders Ajay Maken, Arvinder Singh Lovely and Harun Yousuf also held rallies and roadshows. Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a rally tomorrow in the national capital.
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Thirty two fresh cases of swine flu were reported in the national capital today. With this, the total number of cases has gone up to 393 so far this year. Five people have died of the disease this year.
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The News Services Division of All India Radio in its weekly “Current Affairs” programme tonight will bring you a discussion on “Mahatma Gandhi and discourse on religious intolerance.
This can be heard on Rajdhani, FM Gold channels and additional frequencies from 9.30 p.m.
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Inspector General of BSF, Kashmir, P S Sandhu today said that a large number of militants are still present in training camps and launch pads in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. Assuring that counter infiltration grid is in full command to foil any attempt by militants to sneak into this side of Kashmir from across the border, he said BSF and Army have total coordination on the LoC to meet any challenge from across the border. He was talking to reporters on the sidelines of a passing out parade at Humhama in the central Kashmir district of Badgam.
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In Pakistan, at least 40 people have been killed and 50 others wounded in a powerful bomb blast at a Shia mosque after Friday prayers in the Shikarpur district of Sindh province today. Police said, death toll is expected to rise as many of the wounded are in a critical condition. Local media reports suggest that the blast could have been a suicide attack, but police are investigating. It is not yet clear who carried out the attack but Sunni militant groups have targeted the Shia minority in the past. A number of people were trapped after the roof of the mosque collapsed due to the force of the explosion.
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THE BUSINESS WORLD
"The Sensex at the Bombay Stock Exchange tumbled 499 points-- its second biggest single-day fall this year--to close at 29,183. The Nifty at the National Stock Exchange snapped a ten-day rally, plunging 143 points, to 8,809. But in early trade, both the Sensex and the Nifty had hit new intra-day record highs. We asked market expert, Puneet Jain about the market fall.
The rupee ended flat, at 61.86 against the dollar.Gold declined 200 rupees, to 28,100 rupees per ten grams in Delhi. Silver plummeted 1,550 rupees, to 37,550 rupees per kilo.And Brent crude oil futures hovered around 49 dollars a barrel, while U.S. crude climbed 25 cents, to 44.78 dollars a barrel". Pradeep Kumar, AIR News.
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A change in the base year for computing national accounts pushed up the economic growth rate for the 2013-14 fiscal to 6.9 per cent. The earlier estimate of GDP growth on the basis of the old series was 4.7 per cent. Similarly, the economic growth rate for the 2012-13 fiscal has been revised upwards to 5.1 per cent, from 4.5 per cent estimated earlier. This follow a revision in the base for calculating national accounts to 2011-12, from 2004-05 earlier. The base year was last revised in January 2010. We talked to Business Journalist Jayanto Roy Chaudhary on the issue.
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In the Government's biggest-ever disinvestment, its 10 per cent stake sale in public sector company, Coal India Limited was over-subscribed by 1.07 times. The share sale will fetch the government about 22,600 crore rupees, and make up over half of its budgeted disinvestment target. This is the biggest share sale by any private or public sector company in the country, and exceeds the previous stake sale record of over 15,000 crore rupees by Coal India itself, in 2010. General category investors, which include FIIs, mutual funds, banks, and insurance companies, bid for 1.2 times the shares reserved for them. The retail investor portion remained under-subscribed, at 44 per cent. But Disinvestment Secretary Aradhana Johri said that in value terms, retail investors bid for shares worth 1,929 crore rupees, which is still the largest for any divestment so far.
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India were knocked out of the tri-series cricket tournament after losing to England at Perth today. It was yet another spineless display from the Indian team as England recovered from a top-order collapse to record a three-wicket victory and secure a place in the final . In a do-or-die game, India's batsmen let the team down badly as they frittered away a good start to be bundled outfor 200 in 48.1 overs, losing as many as nine wickets for 97 runs from a relatively comfortable 103 for one. England were tottering at 66 for five at one stage but staged a gritty fightback through James Taylor (82) and Jos Buttler (67) as their stand steered the team home with 19 balls to spare . England will now take on Australia in the final on Sunday.
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The 35th National Games will roll out in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala tomorrow. Multiple delays,continued teething troubles and the absence of big stars has robbed it of significant sheen but the Games would nonetheless be a huge platform for new talent to make a mark at the national level. The Games are now being held a good three years later than originally planned. The iconic Sachin Tendulkar being the Games Good will ambassador has added a fair bit of glamour to the event but the small bunch of big Olympic stars in the country, who would have added sheen and value to the competition, decided to give it a miss. Shuttle queen Saina Nehwal boxing's pin-up boy Vijender Singh and top wrestlers Sushil Kumar and Yogeshwar Dutt will be missing out.
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In the Australian open Tennis, Leander Paes and his partner Martina Hingis have reached mixed doubles finals but Sania Mirza bowed out with Bruno Soares after losing the semifinal played at Melbourne today. The Indo Swiss duo, Paes and Hingis defeated Chinese Taipei's Su-Wei Hsieh and Uruguay's Pablo Cuevas 7-5, 6-4. The top seeded pair of Sania and Soares was knocked out by the third seed pair of Kristina Mladenovic and Daniel Nestor 3-6, 6-2,10-8 , thus preventing a summit clash featuring two Indians.
Leander Paes kept himself in line for his 15th Grand Slam title by reaching the season's first grand slam, Australian open. 41-year-old Paes has won eight men's doubles and six mixed doubles title in his glittering career. He has joined forces with Hingis for the first time in his career. The Swiss legend is also a winner of 14 Grand Slam titles, including five singles.
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