In Leh at least 114 people were killed and over 200 injured when flash floods triggered by torrential rains struck the Himalayan town in northeast of Jammu and Kashmir. Over 100 people are missing due to the calamity.

State Police Chief Kuldeep Khoda told PTI over phone from Srinagar that 103 bodies have been recovered so far and the number of missing cannot be ascertained as yet. He said the toll may go up. 40 Army personnel are also missing.

The Police Chief said that Jammu and Kashmir Police has set up two camps and were providing food and shelter to nearly 2,000 people. He said that the camps would remain operational till alternate arrangements were being made. 50 CRPF jawans were rescued from the flooded areas.

Leh airport runway was affected but was made operational by afternoon to facilitate landing of aircraft carrying relief material and rescue teams. The communication equipment of BSNL was also washed away in the flash floods and rains that hit the town and adjoining villages in middle of night at around 2 AM. Various buildings and mud-houses in old Leh town were wiped out in the incessant rains. The All India Radio Transmeter tower also damaged.

Local journalist Ghulam Nabi Zia reports that State Chief Minister Omar Abdullah reached Leh to have an on-the-spot assessment of the situation. He visited the flood-hit areas and spoke to the affected families. Zia adds that weather is deterioting further and people of Leh town have been evacuated to safer places.

Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad will fly to Leh tomorrow with relief supplies and a team of 140 personnel of the National Disaster Relief Force alongwith eight doctors and paramedical staff in an IL76 IAF aircraft.

Massive rescue operations were underway involving the state police, paramilitary forces and the army in Leh town. Security personnel were also rushed from Kargil to assist the civil administration in rescue and relief operations.

The Armed Forces and the ITBP have launched massive rescue and relief operations for the victims of the devastating cloudburst in Leh. Thirty three columns of army personnel have already been deployed for the rescue operations. The Tri-Services Disaster Management met in New Delhi this evening to take stock of the situation.

An AN-32 plane with a team from National Disaster Management, Medical Specialists and equipment including generators, tents and other supplies including medicines will be leaving for Leh early tomorrow morning. A plane from Chandigarh will also leave tomorrow for Leh with 4000 packets of ready to eat meals. The Leh airfield has now become operational.

According to ITBP, more than 100 victims have been rescued from the debris. The ITBP is also providing medical aid to the injured in the unit hospitals opened in the sector. More than 260 homeless victims have also been accommodated in ITBP barracks and free food and medicines are being provided.

Earlier today the Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh directed the Ministry of Defence to provide all out rescue and relief assistance. Expressing shock and grief at the loss of life in the tragedy, Dr. Manmohan Singh sanctioned an ex-gratia of one lakh rupees each to the next of kin of those killed and fifty thousand rupees each to the seriously injured from the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund.

The President Mrs Pratibha Devisingh Patil, Vice President Mohammad Hamid Ansari and the UPA Chairpersons Mrs. Sonia Gandhi have also expressed deep sorrow and grief over the loss of life and wished speedy recovery for the injured.

New Delhi, Feb 2 (IANS) Human failure, lack of observance of safety guidelines, defunct devices and faulty safety audits seemed to be some of the reasons for the fire at the Indian Oil Corp terminal in Jaipur in October last year, an independent inquiry committee has found out.
“The basic or root cause is an absence of site specific, written operating procedures, absence of leak stopping devices from a remote location, and insufficient understanding of hazards, risks and consequences,” M.B. Lal, who chaired the independent inquiry committee, told reporters here Tuesday

The seven-member committee submitted its report to Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Murli Deora Monday.

The blaze that started Oct 29 raged on for 11 days killed 11 people. The total losses suffered by Indian Oil amounted to nearly Rs.280 crore (Rs. 2.8 billion). The total loss of petroleum products was about 60,000 kilolitres.

Read the full story

Davos, Feb 1 (THAINDIAN NEWS) The Gates Foundation headed by Bill and Melinda Gates announced on Friday, that they are going to pledge a sum of $10 billion over the next decade, to vaccinate the children of the developing world. They are doing this to prevent the deaths of over 8 million children, due to lack of vaccination. A decade ago, the Gates Foundation had used the Economic Forum in Davos to launch their sincere commitment to vaccines.

“We are redoubling our commitment. We spent USD 4.5 billion …and today we are announcing a commitment over the next decade, which we think of as the decade of vaccines. We will spend over USD 10 billion on vaccines,” said Bill Gates to reporters in Davos. “This is an amazing announcement. GAVI has saved some 5 million children and immunized 250 million in the world’s 72 poorest countries,” said Julian Lob-Levyt, the CEO of GAVI, a public-private mixed structure organization.

The vaccine group GAVI would receive a portion of the $10 billion. They would not get the full amount, as it is going to be divided between research and groups that deliver the end product. “We really believe vaccines are great miracle of our lifetime,” said Melinda, hoping that the new donation of $10 billion would help in saving the lives of eight million children in the developing world. Both Bill and Melinda hoped that the vaccine for malaria, would be developed in their lifetime.

NEW DELHI: Kuldip Singh, director, technical, of telecom PSU MTNL, has been appointed the new chairman and managing director with immediate

effect.

Singh would continue to hold the portfolio of director (technical).

Singh has been given the charge for a period of three months. His appointment came after his predecessor R S P Sinha’s tenure ended on January 9, this year.

When contacted, he confirmed receipt of an official communication in this regard.

MTNL offers the entire gamut of telecom services — basic, mobile, internet and long distance. It faces many big challenges in the midst of fierce competition from private telecom operators.

Set up by the government of India in 1986, MTNL is the leading telecom service provider in the metro cities of Delhi and Mumbai. The government holds 56.25 per cent stake in it.

With its operations in Delhi, Mumbai, Nepal and Mauritius, MTNL is the first service provider to launch 3G services in the country.

MTNL has continued to expand the footprints and make new offerings to maintain its leadership in telecom service space. The PSU has a customer base of over 8.2 million, including about 4.4 million GSM mobile connections.

The company has been facing severe pressure on its financials and had announced near 80 per cent decline in net profit for the second quarter ended September, 2009 and stood at Rs 20.58 crore compared to Rs 91.49 crore in the same period in 2008.

NEW DELHI: Taking a leaf out of its slogan ‘Athithi Devo Bhava’ , the tourism ministry is likely to waive off 50 per cent of the visa fee charged

from visitors of Commonwealth nations as an incentive to boost slagging foreign tourist arrivals.

This is part of its effort to incentivise tourism to India for the Commonwealth Games to be held in October.

“We are considering a proposal to waive off 50% of the visa fee. The expense will be borne by the tourism ministry,” a source said.

The move comes after the positive response to ‘Visit India 2009’ promotion where major stakeholders like hospitality partners, tour operators and others had offered schemes and promotions in addition to what the visitor paid for.

The visa fee waiver will supplement the promotions and the ministry is already in talks with hotels, travel agents and tour operators for extending these incentives for another year.

There are 54 members of the Commonwealth of nations of which visitors from UK, Australia and Canada form a large part of India’s tourist inflow. India received 5.11 million tourists of which 0.5 million come from Commonwealth nations.

source: TOI

NEW DELHI: Competition watchdog CCI may soon issue show-cause notices to leading DTH operators like Tata Sky, Reliance Big TV and ZEE’s Dish TV

for abusing their dominant market position and not allowing users to change the operator, while retaining the hardware cost at about Rs 4,000.

The subscribers get discouraged to change the operator as their Set Top Boxes (STBs) do not provide options of using another player’s card even as the STBs can technically be made inter-operable.

“DTH operators have been found guilty of violating Sections 3 and 4 of the CCI Act. We will soon send them a notice, which is kind of a show cause, to which they would have to respond in 15 days. After that the Commission will take decision on what action to take against the operators,” a senior official of the CCI said.

The move follows the Director General (Investigation) of the Competition Commission of India (CCI) having found DTH operators guilty of limiting consumer’s option to choose one network, while using another company’s set-top box by not making their STB’s technically inter-operable.

“Since a Conditional Access Module (CAM) — a card that facilitates feeds of one or more service provider to be read by STBs of another manufacturer — is absent, the STBs are not technically inter-operable,” the official said.

DTH operators did not respond to the queries sent by PTI.

The DG in his findings added that DTH operators are not following telecom regulator TRAI’s guidelines according to which subscribers should be able to rent, hire or buy STBs.

The CCI, sources said, would decide on the quantum of penalty, if needed, after receiving response from operators.

According to the Competition Commission Act, companies violating sections 3 and 4 could be penalised to the maximum of 10 per cent of the average turnover of the preceding three financial years.

Sections 3 and 4 pertain to anti-competitive agreements and abuse of dominance, respectively.

Last year, the Consumer Federation Online had filed a complaint against these DTH operators with the CCI, contending that the practice of not allowing interoperability of STBs is anti-competitive and against the interest of consumers.

VIJAYWADA: The consumers are already burdened with price rise and the state government’s present hike in VAT on a few important goods has put

more burden on them, said Gaddam Subba Rao, president, The Vijayawada Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

He feels that the hike is a punishment for honest trader and it also leads to more evasion of tax and corruption.

The Government of Andhra Pradesh issued orders to hike 2 per cent on VAT from 12.5 per cent to 14.5 per cent on certain goods like cosmetics, electrical goods and appliances, automobile spares and some other goods. Most of the entrepreneurs are now opposing the hike.

P Kameswara Sarma, president, The Vijayawada Electrical Dealers Association opposed the hike on VAT on electrical goods. He said that though some other states are now collecting only 4 per cent of VAT on electrical goods, why our state Government decided to hike the tax. He said that in this condition, the business from our state may divert to other states, particularly to Karnataka and Tamilnadu.

He said that Karnataka and Tamilandu are collecting only 4 per cent tax on electrical goods. He requested the Government to roll back the hike

A general goods dealer T Sivaramakrishna said that nowadays cosmetics have become essential goods and imposing higher tax on the goods is a burden on common man. Soaps, detergents and toilet powders are essential for common man, he said and government should reduce the tax on these cosmetics.

An electrical dealer Ramesh Jain said that why government had taken such a hasty decision when the Union Government is contemplating to bring Goods and Services Tax instead of VAT from the next financial year.

Gaddam Subba Rao said that all Chamber of Commerce and Industries committees from coastal districts will meet in Vijayawada on 19th of this month to decide the future course of action.

source: TOI

Former chief minister of West Bengal and veteran communist leader of India, Jyoti Basu, breathed his last on Sunday. Announcing his death, CPI (M) state secretary Biman Bose, said that Basu passed away at 11: 47 am. The 95-year-old communist leader was admitted at a private nursing home in Kolkata on January 1 with mildly severe pneumonia.

Jyoti Basu: 1914-2010

His condition deteriorated steadily and he was put on ventilation on January 6. His lungs stopped functioning a few days later. He developed multi organ dysfunction. Senior political leaders from all over the country, including the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, visited Basu during the last 17 days. His condition continued to deteriorate and dialysis was done since the last three days.

On Saturday night, Basu’s heart rate dropped abnormally and a temporary pace maker had to be placed to keep his heart functioning. Doctors had gathered at the hospital on Saturday night itself. Basu was to undergo dialysis on Sunday. But on Sunday morning, doctors decided that Basu was not in a condition to undergo dialysis. Basu’s body is being taken to Peace Haven where it would be kept for today. The CPI (M) state secretariat will meet at 6 pm today to decide about how to pay last homage to Basu on Monday and Tuesday.

All the national leaders of the CPI (M) including party secretary Prakash Karat, rushed to the hospital on Sunday morning. Basu had donated his eyes and body.

Earlier Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee visited the hospital where Basu was being treated. “I respect him as a senior polititian. We have stopped all party programs for the next three days. I demand three days of official mourning,” Mamata said.

Born on July 8, 1914, he was the chief minister of Bengal between June 21, 1977 to November 6, 2000.

Snehesh Alex Philip Haridwar, Jan 15 (PTI) The otherwise bustling Maha Kumbh Mela here has come almost to a complete standstill today due to the solar eclipse with doors of temples shut and the devout taking to meditation to ward off what they believe to be an inauspicious period. The ghats, which witnessed several thousands of people taking a holy dip on the occasion of ”Makar Sankranti” yesterday, are now playing host to people performing ”havans” or those meditating.

The enchanting spell of vedic hymns, bells and conch shells, which reverberated throughout the day on Thursday, when the Maha Kumbh began, can no longer be heard. The only sound that seems to echo at the main bathing ghat here ”Hari Ki Pauri” is the cold water of Ganga flowing strong and hitting against the stone steps.

The green coloured iron railing and chains with ”OM” signage above them, which provided the support to the devotees yesterday from being washed away from by the strong current, continues to rattle as they fight the mighty river.

PTI