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RBI directed to release Carbide’s Rs 1503 cr New Delhi, July 19 After a relentless wait for two decades by the Bhopal gas tragedy victims for the payment of compensation by US major Union Carbide, the Supreme Court today directed the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to release Rs 1503 crore deposited with it by the company for disbursement to them.
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50 killed as bus falls into pond
Teachers narrate their version
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Ex-minister on indefinite fast
Floods continue to ravage Bihar, Assam
Arjun Singh caught unprepared in RS
News Analysis by Satish Misra
Lodha moves court, Birlas too
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Relief after two decades for Bhopal gas
tragedy victims
New Delhi, July 19 A Bench comprising Mr Justice Shivaraj V. Patil and Mr Justice B. N. Srikrishna, directed the RBI to hand over the fund to the Bhopal Gas Victims’ Welfare Commissioner for payment to each of the victim on “pro-rata” basis. It was ironical that the compensation issue was decided after 20 years of the December 1984 tragedy because the Settlement Claim Commissioner, took such a long time to fix the claim of each affected person. The leakage of deadly methyl iso-cyante had claimed the lives of 15,000 persons and rendered about five lakh disease affected for whole life. Though the immediate death toll was nearly 4,000 the casualties had continued to rise under the severe impact of the gas that had leaked from the Union Carbide’s plant on the intervening night of December 2-3, 1984. The Union Carbide had paid a compensation of $ 470 million to the victims as per the settlement reached by it with the Indian Government when litigation on fixation of the compensation amount was pending in the Supreme Court in 1985. The court then had directed that the amount be deposited as a corpus with the Reserve Bank for disbursement to the victims as per the settlement claims fixed by the settlement commissioner. While the court was monitoring the progress of settlement and providing health care facilities to the victims through five specially set up hospitals in Bhopal, Rs 86 crore were disbursed to the affected people. Since the Settlement Commissioner has now finalised the claims of almost all victims, the apex court ordered the release of the entire amount today. The Commissioner was directed to submit the compliance report about the payment of the money within three months. |
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50 killed as bus falls into pond
Kolkata, July 19 Over 12 persons are battling for their lives at the Malda government hospital. The driver the bus jumped of out and fled before the bus slipped into the pond. As many as 42 bodies had been recovered so far. Efforts are on to take out people still trapped inside the bus. Rescue work was initially hampered due to incessant rain which continued till noon today. According to reports received here, the bus, which was carrying over 80 passengers, several on the roof-top, was on its way to English Bazaar, leaving Malda town around 9 am. As the bus approached Chachal, it started raining heavily. The speeding bus suddenly swerved and fell down into the wayside pond. People gathered near the Chachal bus stand rushed to the spot and tried to rescue the passengers. But since both doors of the bus were locked, the trapped passengers could not be rescued early. Most of them, particularly children, old men and women, were suffocated to death. Some passengers, however, got out by breaking open the glass windows and swam ashore. According to the IG (Law and Order), Mr Chayyan Mukherjee, the bus was dragged out of the pond with the help of a crane. Two passengers stuck under the seats were found dead. Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharya said the victims’ families would be given due compensation. The police had been asked to arrest the driver and owner of the bus immediately. |
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Teachers narrate their version
Kumbakonam, July 19 All schools in the entire state were closed today and prayer meetings held there to pay homage to the dead children. All shops and business establishments in this small temple town remained closed. The state Cabinet passed a resolution mourning the dead and ensuring safety measures in all schools to avoid such a tragedy. Meanwhile, some of the teachers of the ill-fated school who had been in hiding for the past three days to escape public fury today turned up to tell their side of the story. However, the police did not confirm whether the teachers were questioned. They claimed they had not “absconded” but were taking rest since they were also injured and shocked. Sankari and Kavitha have been admitted to a private hospital. Kavitha, who was five-months pregnant, had a miscarriage while trying to save children when the fire broke out. Sankari, who had inhaled fumes in the narrow staircase trying to get children to the ground floor, is suffering from a severe chest pain and acute depression. One of their colleagues, Geetha, who is living in a relative’s home near the school, fearing reprisals from the people here, made arrangements to get their version of the incident narrated to reporters. She said she too was in a state of shock and shedding tears for the little ones who perished in the fire. Refuting the allegations that the teachers escaped leaving the children to be roasted alive, Geetha said: “It is easy to level such charges. We only know what we went through trying to evacuate as many as 700 children in the middle of smoke and poor visibility in that narrow staircase.” Geetha said two teachers were entrusted with the task of helping the toddlers cross the street amidst speeding vehicles. “People on the street might have thought that they were running away but that was not the case,” she said. She said when the kitchen roof caught fire, the teachers immediately switched off the power supply and asked the children to flee and make way for those on the first floor. Geetha said: “By the time we helped many children to be out on the street, the thatched roof on the first floor collapsed and there were around 120 children there. Nobody is giving us the credit for saving the 700-odd children but painting us a villains who abandoned children to die.” “Had we not evacuated children, many more would have perished,” she claimed. While some of the teachers secretly met the police here today, three teachers who were taking classes on the first floor where the children died had left this town on the “advice of the police.” One of the teachers said: “We heard the police telling them to leave as they feared mob fury. They went to their relatives’ homes in Thanjavur. But now the police is saying teachers have absconded.” Most teachers felt that public fury should be directed against the school management and the administration, which let this kind of school run for so long.
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Ex-minister on indefinite fast
Dehradun, July 19 Mr Rawat, who had been accused by Jenny, alias Indira Deuri, an Assamese woman, of raping her and fathering her child, demanded public apologies from Chief Minister ND Tiwari, the then Leader of the Opposition, Mr Bhagat Singh Koshiyari, and Speaker Yashpaul Arya. Mr Rawat said he had suffered injustice and non-cooperation from the government and opposition in dealing with the matter which sought to strip him of his political hold and ruin his career. Speaking to The Tribune, Mr Rawat said he was not after a berth in the Cabinet but he wanted the Chief Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the Speaker to apologise to him in public at Rispana Bridge, near the Assembly, where he began an indefinite fast. He sought a probe into the matter and quick action against those who had hatched this conspiracy. This follows Jenny taking a U-turn yesterday, absolving Mr Rawat of all charges she had levelled against him. “Rawat is not the father of her child, he is not only innocent but also a great man,” she said. Refusing to clarify further, the woman said she had done everything under pressure and that she would name the people behind the conspiracy in the court. |
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Floods continue to ravage Bihar, Assam
Kolkata, July 19 The turbulent Bagmati, Burhi Gandak and Kareh rivers wreaked havoc in Samastipur and Khagaria districts in Bihar. Thousands of people have left their homes since yesterday. Major rivers were also flowing above the danger level. Tripura, southern parts of Assam, Mizoram and parts of Meghalaya were again cut off from the rest of the country following landslides triggered by incessant rainfall at Meghalaya's Sonapur on the National Highway No. 44. Border Road Task Force sources said they were working round-the-clock to clear the debris, mainly of huge rocks and slush of mud, stretched along about 300 m on the road. Sources said there was remote possibility of restoring the link soon. In Assam, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is due to visit the flood-affected areas tomorrow. The situation, which remained grim during the past few days claiming 66 lives and affecting about nine million people, is likely to worsen as the weather office here predicted more heavy to very heavy rainfall at some places in the next 24 hours. Director of the Meteorological Office here D. Sinha said the monsoon trough, which caused heavy rainfall in the state when the flood began during the first week of this month, had again turned active in the region.
— UNI |
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Arjun Singh caught unprepared in RS
New Delhi, July 19 As the minister remained mum for a few minutes on the query raised by TDP’s Vanga Geetha, Chairman Bhairon Singh Shekhawat asked Mr Arjun Singh to sit down and go through the documents before replying during question hour. In a move to calm down members, Mr Shekhawat said at times one could have difficulty locating papers and the House should not make an issue out of a non-issue. As Mr Arjun Singh started reading the answer, the Chairman said the minister was looking at wrong papers and he himself could read the reply from the written answer. Later, the Chairman postponed the question, which was objected to by the Opposition. |
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News Analysis by Satish Misra
New Delhi, July 19 Mr Tripathi, who has replaced former Bajrang Dal chief Vinay Katiyar, would find the seat too hot to handle it as he neither has the organisational experience nor he has the right temperament for it. Since the BJP high command, which primarily means former Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani these days, has taken the decision to bring the former Assembly Speaker to replace Mr Katiyar with an argument that replacing a backward with a Brahmin would help the party to retain high castes votes particularly those of Brahmins. “Does this simple logic works in politics”, a senior leader from Uttar Pradesh asked and added that the BJP high command is repeating a mistake which was committed by former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi who had brought in late Dinesh Singh in his Cabinet in place of V.P. Singh who had gone out of the party in protest. Substituting a Brahmin by a Brahmin and a Rajput by a Rajput may be correct in social dynamics but not in politics where person’s attitude and temperament is decisive, a former Minister in Rajnath Singh government said. Mr Tripathi has never held a position in the organisation and moreover his stint as the Speaker has turned him “elitist”, a BJP leader from the state pointed out and added that in organisational work a person has to always remain accessible to workers and public. He has a “dictatorial” approach to issues,
he observed. Another fallout of Mr Tripathi’s appointment is the resentment and disgruntlement being expressed by Mr Katiyar who has felt slighted and insulted over the manner in which his resignation was demanded by the party high command. Mr Tripathi, an MLA from Allahabad, has not very pleasant relationship with former Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi, who was also not consulted over the change of guards in Uttar Pradesh. Sources said Mr Advani on the specific recommendation and advise of former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Kalyan Singh asked BJP President M. Vankaiah Naidu to replace Mr Katiyar with Mr Tripathi. Earlier, the organisational posts, including that of the state president’s were decided through elections but apparently this democratic practise has been given a quite burial. Mr Advani apparently opted for this change with an eve on the next Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh which is BJP’s calculation can be held any time this year. The BJP feels that Chief Minister Mulyam Singh Yadav may catch his political opponents unaware by calling for snap poll and that is why the party must remain prepared for all eventualities. |
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Kolkata, July 19 Under the will, the entire property of M.P. Birla, worth nearly Rs 5,000 crore, has been handed over to Mr Lodha, who was the co-chairman of the M.P. Birla group while the widow, Priyamvada, was the chairman. The legal heir-apparent, the nephew of M.P.Birla and other members of the Birla family, however, have already filed petitions in the high court challenging the will. The family will be contesting the grant of probate of the purported will.
— OC |
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