| National News |
1.05-Feb-12 : Manipur observes a passive re-poll on Feb 4: Over 75% voters turnout recorded ...more
2.03-Feb-12 : Canadian entrepreneur claims to have bribed Union Minister: Praful snubs charges, asks PM to ... ...more
3.02-Feb-12 : Congress scion calls to banish Mayawati Govt ...more
4.01-Feb-12 : Right to file a complaint against corrupt public servant is a statutory right ...more
5.01-Feb-12 : Indian Air Fore entails MMCRA; Government ready to negotiate with Dassault ...more
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| Regular Feature |
I dont want to be a Role Model to the young generation-Chetan Bhagat at Kolkata Book Fair
Kolkata | Avipsa Sengupta
Chetan Bhagat
The most popular Indian author, columnist and speaker Chetan Bhagat, who has been regarded as the biggest selling English Language novelist in India’s history enhanced the attraction of Kolkata Book Fair. Chetan Bhagat delivered his ... more
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| Special Column |
Kolkata Bookfair reveals love story of the Neo Realist
Kolkata | Avipsa Sengupta
Scape Photo
The hero of Italian Neo Realism, the pioneer of Neo Realist movies Roberto Rossellini’s love story got revealed in Kolkata Bookfair. Dileep Padgoankar, the former ... more
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| Guest Column |
Julian Barnes: Memories of Past
| Dr. Anushna Biswas
Julian Barnes, the Man Booker Prize winner, 2011, for his novella The Sense of An Ending, seems to have sparked off a great literary debate as to whether his vision about past and present, conceived in the work, do really stand as a social ... more
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| Lead News |
Nothing is well for Congress; SC snubs license distribution as ‘Unconstitutional’
Abhik Bhattacharya | New Delhi | 2nd February, 2012
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The move to circulate telecom licenses at the cost of colossal (presumptive) loss to the national exchequer was not only illegal; it was ‘unconstitutional and arbitrary’. Quashing the embattled United Progressive Alliance II Govt. further, the Supreme Court today annulled 122 licenses and ordered the respective lower court to probe the culpability of the former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram within two weeks. Manmohan Singh Govt probably never expected such stupendous onslaught on its face just ahead of the most crucial Uttar Pradesh assembly polls.
Listening to the plea of Janta Dal President Subramaniam Swami regarding the involvement of P. Chidambaram in the 2G spectrum allocation scam, SC pointed out that the total procedure was ‘unconstitutional’ and cancelling 122 licenses owned by eight litigants, held the respective departments culpable for the mishap. The licences affected include those held by Unitech Wireless, a joint venture of Norway's state-backed Telenor and Indian real estate firm Unitech, which has been the most aggressive of the newer operators and had more than 36 million subscribers in the country as of December.
The stakeholders, who have been made the victims of Govt policy and unawareness, expressed their severe disappointments over the verdict. One of the officials of Telenor reportedly alleged the Govt policies for which they were being penalized stated, “We have been unfairly treated as we simply followed the government process we were asked to”. “We are shocked to see that Uninor is being penalised for faults the court has found in the government process”, he added.
The Share market researchers have notably upheld the benefits of the big and popular brand owner like Bharti Airtel and Vodafone out of the judgment. The situation according to them definitely would boost their market and notably today itself both of the companies’ shares went up to 8% and 4% respectively whereas the Uninor faced a depression of 6%.
Being the second largest cellular market in the world, India welcomed major global players in its telecom industry and had few joint ventures. The decision of the court has also affected their interests. Thunughuntia, the head of the researchers in SMC department of Mumbai while portraying the benefits of the big players commented, “Players like Bharti Airtel and Idea Cellular, with popular brands and strong balance sheets, will be clear beneficiaries because they can take advantage of this situation and increase market share.” Questioning the justification of penalizing the foreign players who have already invested billions of dollars in Indian market, the director of Consultancy Cogence Advisors at New Delhi, Rishi Sahai stated, “For foreign investors, it is very bad news. What mistake did they do? They partnered with Indian companies, invested lots of money and followed the process of that time.”
Expectedly utilizing the verdict against the scam-torn UPA II, the Bharatiya Janta Party has commenced their duty to prepare the floor of political mileage out of the crises. Maintaining eyes on the crucial UP polls, the BJP this time is not actually ready to leave a single stone against Congress for any other plaintiff. Last time, the civil society members under the self-proclaimed Gandhian Anna Hazare ruled over the show and catered BJP meagre space to strengthen their lost political feet across the Nation. Within moments of the verdict the leader of the opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jeitley snubbed the Govt as ‘Shameless’ and claimed immediate responses from the Prime Minister and the UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi.
Indicting the Congress party and its leadership of that malicious effort Jeitley commented, “It can't be that the people who control the UPA and the Congress are not responsible. The UPA chairperson has a lot of answering to do. So does the Prime Minister's Office and the Congress party.” However, he has not yet reported his party’s next plan to force the Congress leaderships to answer.
Congress on the other hand has extracted out the portion of the verdict where the bench of Justice Sighvi ruled out order of investigation against P. Chidambaram and counselled the lower court to re-invigilate the matter. In a bid to remove smog from the image of Chidambaram, the Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal alleged the faulty telecom policy of National Democratic Alliance Govt in 2003 which introduced the first-come-first-serve method. Citing that the SC has severely disparaged the method of license distribution Sibal claimed that UPA had just followed the regulation. “This was set by the NDA. Its Cabinet passed it on October 31, 2003. We followed it. The court found the policy discriminatory, not the fact that we followed it”, Sibal depicted.
Batting in an effort to shield the Prime Minister and Home Minister, the second trouble-shooter of UPA II Govt, Kapil Sibal further added, “The Supreme Court has clearly said the then minister (Raja) did not heed to the good advice of both Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the Finance Ministry.” Mentioning that the subscribers of the brands with the annulled licenses would not suffer he avowed, “The Supreme Court by its order has also made sure that customers are not affected. Why? The order will not be operative for a period of four months. In the meantime, TRAI will give recommendations and we will auction spectrum. Customers will not be impacted.”
The verdict however has appeared as a bolt from the blue to the UPA II Govt as it never assumed such stringent action from Supreme Court just ahead of the Uttar Pradesh Polls. The secretary and the scion of the party Rahul Gandhi while addressing his rallies in UP, has consecutively condemned Mayawati Govt for its alleged involvement in corruption. He had always upheld the intention of his party to root out the menace from every state. Every endeavour seemed to be fine and fair - Congress was also surmounting the blows of swindles- at this juncture nothing could be a harsher strike to the party. The doubts over the integrity of the top brasses of Congress would definitely enhance after the decree, will it strengthen the hands of Mayawati to get re-installed in power?
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