The day AAP tried to intimidate me!

AAP Hidden Agenda on Kashmir Exposed

AAP Hidden Agenda on Kashmir Exposed: Anti national Prashant Bhushan is in favour of giving Kashmir to Pakistan

False secularism: Slay the myth

Minhaz Merchant
28 March 2014, 03:36 PM IST

As the communally-charged 2014 Lok Sabha election campaign enters its final stretch, it’s time to re-examine one of India’s most misunderstood concepts: secularism. The word has been subverted by political parties to create in Muslims a sense of permanent fear of “communal forces”. 

The objective is not to empower Muslims, educate Muslims or modernize Muslims. The objective is to keep them in segregated silos: poor, under-educated and at the mercy of medieval mullahs. Their vote though is thereby guaranteed. 

In Varanasi, AAP’s "secular" Arvind Kejriwal tells Muslims not to vote for "communal" Narendra Modi because they will not be safe under him. He does not tell Varanasi’s Muslims how they can better their lives through education, vocational training and social reform. 

Like the Congress, SP, NCP, NC and the Congress' rabidly communal allies AIMIM and IUML, Kejriwal does not address Muslim welfare. He addresses Muslim votes. Meanwhile, emboldened by a fraudulent secular discourse, Congress candidate Imran Masood, handpicked by Rahul Gandhi, threatens to cut Narendra Modi into pieces.

Parties that call themselves “secular” – but in the classical sense of the word are not – such as the Congress, SP, NCP, NC, JD(U), AAP and others, end up dividing communities. They accuse "communal forces" of hate-mongering and divisiveness but are guilty of both to a far greater degree. They hide them under a fabricated veil of secularism. 

Muslims must now rise above this perfidy and reject parties which regard them as Muslims first, Indians second. Both are parallel identities. One is not subservient to the other. By falling prey to the fear psychosis "secular" parties create in them, Muslims barter away their real freedom: the right to inclusive growth. 

There is, however, as I have written before, a history to communalism in the subcontinent. Rahul Gandhi, Nitish Kumar, Sharad Pawar, Omar Abdullah, Arvind Kejriwal and Mulayam Singh Yadav should understand this history before they damage any further the secular Muslim cause they cynically profess to advance.   

                                                  * * *   

The advent of British rule in the 1750s gave rise to modern communalism. After a century of military warfare, the British had conquered various bits of India: from Bengal, Madras and Bombay to Sind, Punjab and the Northeast. Following the First War of Independence in 1857 (wrongly termed by British historians as the Sepoy Mutiny), Indian sovereignty passed from the East India Company to the British Crown.

One of the first things the British government did as sovereign ruler of India was to plant the poisonous seed of communalism. That seed has germinated over the last 157 years and grown into a panoply of hatred and mistrust, leading to partition, rioting and suffering on a scale matched only by the Jewish holocaust in World War II.

How did the British set about this task? The army was the first target. Indians were strictly divided into regiments of Sikhs, Gurkhas, Pathans, Rajputs and Marathas. Meanwhile, the British ‘government’ in India removed all import duties on British-made cotton, destroying the infant industry in the subcontinent at a time of famine and widespread starvation-induced deaths in Maharashtra.

Thus while Britain was systematically eroding India’s future industrial and agricultural competitiveness, it was simultaneously injecting calculated doses of communal poison into India’s secular bloodstream.

                                                   * * *

The Congress, like the British, has played a double game. It has appeased Muslims (with promises of job and educational quotas) and at the same time kept them economically and socially backward.
Predominantly-Muslim Turkey and Indonesia have shown how progressively Islam can be interpreted. Iraq, despite its serious ethnic faultlines, has many reformist social laws as do Malaysia and Egypt. Only in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and West Asian Arab monarchies do Muslims remain prisoners of the past.

Double-speaking, double-dealing politicians are largely to blame for this problem. Few Muslims can forget that some of the worst Hindu-Muslim killings took place in cosmopolitan Mumbai (then Bombay) in 1992-93 because of an internal Congress power struggle between Sudhakar Naik, then Maharashtra chief minister, and Sharad Pawar, then union defence minister.

For four days, from 8 to 11 January 1993, as hundreds of Muslims were butchered by Hindu mobs, the Mumbai police stood by watching and (in some documented cases) even encouraging the rioters. The Congress government's commitment to real secularism was exposed: it did not punish the guilty in a riot which systematically targeted Muslims in India's financial capital.

And so the teeming cauldron of Indian Muslims, caught in a tight secular embrace, continue to live in abject poverty. They are under-represented in the IAS, in business and in the professions: law, medicine, accountancy, management, engineering. Politicians give them sermons on secularism, not jobs.

To bring themselves into the mainstream, Muslims must see themselves as Indians first. American Jews are an example. They are fiercely proud of their religion but they do not let their Jewishness supersede their Americanism.

Muslims cannot continue allow politicians to set a communal agenda, however secular its grammar.
As we ready ourselves to elect a new government, the message that should go out is this: the time for communal politics and appeasement of minorities is over. Give your vote to the party that will deliver on its promise to embrace the religion-neutral tradition of real, not fraudulent, secularism.

Follow @minhazmerchant on twitter

Source: http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/headon/entry/secularism-slay-the-myth

Which state created most manufacturing jobs? Goldman has the answer

By Firstbiz Editors

 

Manufacturing has been a hot topic of debate in recent months, with the government and opposition parties claiming they will make it their focus for growth and job creation if they come to power. Reuters 

Here's an interesting chart.

It’s from a Goldman Sachs Asia Economics Analyst report titled “Adding 110 million jobs” dated March 28,  and it highlights the states that have generated the maximum employment from manufacturing in urban areas.

According the report, Gujarat tops the list, with an average employment of a little more than 350 per 1,000 people employed in manufacturing, between financial year 2004-05 and financial year 2011-2012 (April-May).

Tamil Nadu and Haryana are other leading manufacturing job creating states, according to the chart. On the lower end of the job creation scale are Chattisgarh, Bihar and Jharkhand.

So what accounts for the differences in the job creation ability of states?

Which state created maximum manufacturing jobs?

Well, one reason could be how pro-worker or pro-employer a state is. According to Goldman Sachs, states that implemented pro-worker amendments to the Industrial Disputes Act (labour legislation) faced a decline in output, employment and productivity, while those that implemented pro-employer changes to the Act experienced increases in employment and output.

“Estimates using plant-level data suggest that firms in labor-intensive industries with flexible labor laws have 14 percent higher TFP than in states with more stringent labor laws,” the Goldman Sachs report stated. TFP refers to total factor productivity.

In addition, the financial firm believes young people tend to prefer flexible job markets, where it is easy to find a job – and lose one.

Now, here’s an explosive statement: “We estimate that if states were to increase their share of labor in manufacturing to the level of Gujarat currently, some 40 million jobs could be added in manufacturing over the next decade.”

So basically, Gujarat is the role model the rest of India should follow if it wants to increase jobs in the manufacturing sector.

Manufacturing has been a hot topic of debate in recent months, with the government and opposition parties claiming they will make it their focus for growth and job creation if they come to power.
One thing's for sure, this Goldman Sachs report will certainly make the BJP very happy.
Wonder how the UPA feels about that.

Source: http://www.firstbiz.com/economy/which-state-created-maximum-manufacturing-jobs-goldman-has-the-answer-80572.html

Conversation with Narendra Modi

Narendra Modi Interview: Watch unseen aspects of Modi's life Exclusive on NewsX

Al Qaeda finds base in India, Modi is on its radar

MADHAV NALAPAT  New Delhi | 29th Mar 2014

Ayman al Zawahiri l Qaeda al Hind (AQAH), the Indian arm of Osama bin Laden's terrorist organisation, has achieved viability, more than a decade after Laden included India in the list of priority targets for Al Qaeda, and after his successor Ayman al Zawahiri called for the setting up of a base in this country. Linked to the global organisation via couriers and sympathisers, AQAH has, in the estimate of intelligence professionals, more than 300 members scattered across the country, including in Chennai, Hyderabad, Kozhikode, Jaipur, Patna and Delhi. These are usually professionals below 40, some educated abroad. The number excludes AQAH volunteers presently working in other countries. "AQAH members are dispersed across a range of organisations, some illegal such as the Indian Mujahideen but many operate legally in the guise of NGOs and businesses such as recruitment agencies and travel bureaus." AQAH members function as the backbone of a cluster of extremist organisations, forming a network at the top that ensures the coordination necessary for operations and surveillance to get carried out. "Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), out of deference to the need to keep fooling the United States, provides assistance in the form of sophisticated communications equipment, training and the funnelling of money from private sources in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to groups infiltrated by AQAH, rather than to the organisation directly," a senior police officer revealed. A high-level source, now retired, warned that "the Intelligence Bureau has not been able to pay the establishment of Al Qaeda in India the attention it deserves", because "Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde has ordered the IB to focus primarily on uncovering what he calls Hindu terror networks". A considerable degree of IB attention and resources have since 2007 gone into "seeking to locate 'Hindu terror' cells, and to monitoring the activities of Hindu organisations across the country, to the neglect of focus on international terror organisations, including those spawned by the ISI", according to a senior intelligence analyst. However, a colleague disagreed, saying that "IB director Asif Ibrahim has been paying increasing attention to Al Qaeda and ISI, and this is why there has been so much success in rolling up several Indian Mujahideen networks". The IM was given strong covert backing by the ISI after the 2008 terror attack in Mumbai, so as to ensure deniability between future attacks and itself. The "reluctance of the authorities to pry into local support networks of the ISI in Mumbai after 26/11, including sympathisers within the state police at different levels, encouraged such groups to intensify their recruitment and to expand their safe houses", a senior intelligence professional claimed. "While Pakistan is the epicentre of Al Qaeda, the organisation has by now got secure bases in India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal and Afghanistan," he added. "Eliminating Narendra Modi is the key aim of AQAH," the source said, the calculation being that "taking out Modi would unleash a violent reaction across the country similar to that which took place in Gujarat after the 2002 Godhra train firebombing by a mob assembled close to the station." Such a calamity would poison communal relations in India for decades to come, and make it easier for Al Qaeda to fulfil the objective of their Pakistan Army allies, "which is to reverse India's economic gains and bring India to zero growth," an individual tracking the ISI pointed out. Apart from Modi, another focus of AQAH is Syria. "The war in that country between Wahhabis and the Assad administration requires tens of thousands of volunteers, and India has been targeted as a source for hundreds and eventually thousands of recruits for Al Qaeda operations in Syria," a country where the ongoing conflict has resulted in the creation of multiple safe zones for terror operatives to train and recuperate in. According to a senior intelligence operative, a section of Syrian and Yemeni students in universities in India are trying to recruit Indians to go to Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey to join the brigades being formed there. "While most Syrian students are apolitical, there are a few in Delhi and in Hyderabad who have been recruited by Qatari and Saudi sympathisers of the Syrian armed opposition to try and persuade other Arab students and also Indians to join in the fighting," a technical analyst claimed. He added that in his estimate, "more than 200 Indian citizens are already active in the Syrian conflict". These function from Qatar, Turkey, Saudi Arabia "and an estimated 40 in Syria". He was worried about the fact that "these recruits will have the capability to take on armed military formations after their training and experience, and these skills may get used on the side of insurgent groups" in India. According to a Syrian expert, there are more than 130,000 foreign fighters in various Qaeda-linked formations in Syria, including more than 6,000 from European Union states and about 400 from the US. The largest Arab contingent is from Libya (22,000), followed by Saudi Arabia (16,000) and Tunisia (13,000). There are also about 2,000 fighters from Chechnya in the Russian Federation. According to an official, "Thus far, Indian intelligence agencies have not paid much attention to the ongoing recruitment of their nationals for operations in Syria." This is unlike Germany, which has sent intelligence professionals several times to Damascus to get details of EU nationals killed or captured by the Syrian army and air force. He warned that "there is recruitment for operations in Syria in the guise of mobilising financial support for the groups fighting there". This, according to him, "is even taking place at centres in Delhi", including in a prominent university, besides Pune, Hyderabad, Kozhikode and Chennai. "The new government will have a major problem on its hands, as there will be a determined effort by AQAH to create chaos in India after the polls," adding that "tracking and neutralising this network has to become the priority for the IB." Source: http://www.sunday-guardian.com/news/al-qaeda-finds-base-in-india-modi-is-on-its-radar

Conspiracy Unfolds ; Kejriwal & others (Shocking revelations of Truth behind ’2nd Independence Movement’)

Strenuously researched and written by Birbal ; my colleague and friend…..

Hi Friends,

The story mentioned below depicts almost complete picture of anti-national Gang Kejriwal’s conspiracy, their sympathisers, media partners, crony capitalists and aides.

We don’t want to reveal his identity at this point because he (Birbal) and many others are involved in another mission of this kind.

I will come back to you with more very soon.

Adieu.
Raju Parulekar
raju.parulekar@gmail.com
(M) 9820124419
** Related Links & Evidences are given below this article.
Please click the links accordingly for details.**
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Conspiracy Unfolds ; Kejriwal & others 
(Shocking revelations of truth behind ’2nd Independence Movement’)

Strenuously researched and written by Birbal ; my colleague and friend…..

The case of False Affidavit:
Why is the Government of India trying to protect the NGO Kabir and its media initiative enabled through foreign funding?

On Wednesday, January 16, 2013 the Government of India misled its own judiciary. In an attempt to dupe its own institution, the centre had conceded before the Delhi High Court that it found nothing to warrant a criminal investigation in its inquiry into utilization of foreign funds by a few NGOs affiliated to anti-graft activist Anna Hazare’s civil society organization.’ (Network, 2013) This case was subsequently quashed by the high court believing the centre’s testimony. But the documents which are in possession of this reporter will show how justice was manipulated and then internalized by country’s own government.

In the matter of Advocate Manohar Lal Sharma versus the Union Of India, Central Bureau Of Investigation, Ford Foundation and Kisan Baburao Hazare, the counsels of GOI wrongly informed the court that the Ministry of Home Affairs has given a clean chit to NGO KABIR for its involvement in any political activity.  The actual report ‘Inspection of Foreign Contribution Records pertaining to an NGO KABIR (2005-06 to 2011-2012)’by the Controller of Accounts, MHA, New Delhi mentions in bold that “Involvement in Political Activities: As per the minutes of the meeting dated 24 Nov.

2006 of the association, KABIR has played an active role in the Jantar Mantar agitation held under the leadership of Mr.Anna Hazare in the year 2006.” (pls. see  point no. 25,page 10 of the report attached with this post) This is in violation to the constitution of India which does not allow any foreign sponsored agitation for any kind of object. It is an amount of wage war only which is liable to be further investigated for further prosecution in accordance of law.

KABIR or ‘Karmyogi Association for Bringing Indian Regeneration’ is an NGO run by Arvind Kejriwal and managed by his key aide Manish Sisodia. According to the president of this organization, this NGO has both national as well as international members. It was registered in the year 1999 under the ‘SOCIETIES REGISTRATION ACT, 1860’ with the registrar of societies Govt. of N.C.T of Delhi. Less is known about its operations untill 15th August 2005 when it officially started furthering the cause of Right to Information Act of India, 2005.  In an answer to a RTI petition filed by the website Beyond Headlines in 2009 , KABIR revealed that they had received funds from the Ford Foundation (Rs 86,61,742), PRIA (Rs 2,37,035), Manjunath Shanmugam Trust (Rs 3,70,000), Dutch Embassy (Rs 19,61,968), Association for India’s Development (Rs 15,00,000), India’s Friends Association (Rs 7,86,500), United Nationals Development Programme (Rs12,52,742) while Rs 11,35,857 were collected from individual donations between 2007 to 2010.

Among the many allegations made on KABIR is the funding made by Ford Foundation to the organization in the year 2011 when the Janlokpal movement started. According to various news paper reports and KABIR’s own testimony, it participated actively in the Janlokpal movement. The Foreign Control Regulation Act of India, 2010 prohibits any foreign funding to Indian political organization or the organizations with political nature. The law states that the following persons are prohibited from accepting any kind of foreign contribution:

(a) Candidate for election;
(b) Correspondent, columnist, cartoonist, editor, owner, printer or publisher of a registered newspaper;
(c) Judge, government servant or employee of any entity controlled or owned by the government;
(d) Member of any Legislature;
(e) Political party or its office bearers;
(f) Organisations of a political nature as may be specified;
(g) Associations or company engaged in the production or broadcast of audio news or audiovisual news or current affairs programmes through any electronic mode or form or any other mode of mass communication;
(h) Correspondent or columnist, cartoonist, editor, owner of the association or company referred to in (g) above.

When Kavitha N Ramdas, the present Indian representative of Ford Foundation was reached for an official comment she replied, “In 2010, the foundation reviewed a new grant proposal from KABIR for similar activities. We approved this second grant in February, 2011. However, KABIR notified the foundation in September 2011 that it was not capable of carrying out the planned activities due to an emerging campaign to mobilize the public around anti-corruption efforts. Based on this information from KABIR and the foundation’s own fiscal year schedule, the foundation amicably rescinded its second grant in February 2012, against which no funds had ever been distributed. The rescinded and unpaid grant was then removed from our web site.” She also thanked the writer for bringing this correction to foundation’s notice. When a more detailed answer was sought, the director of Communications, Ford Foundation, Newyork, took on the matter further. He is yet to reply with the details.

On foundation’s association with KABIR, she said, “The foundation’s first grant to KABIR was made in 2007 and was for $197,000 over three years. The grant supported the organization’s efforts to produce training materials on India’s Right-to-Information law, to disseminate information about the effective use of the law, and to help promote transparent and accountable governance. These efforts were carried out satisfactorily and the grant was closed on schedule.”

In her reply Mrs. Ramdas forgot to add the grant made to KABIR in the year 2005, for enabling a ‘media initiative’ to popularize the right to information act, 2005.

But it is very well documented in the foundation’s annual report of the year 2005-06 attached with this post. The president of KABIR has candidly or rather unknowingly confirmed the use of this grant in tying up with various media houses of the country. It is very surprising to see that the Home Ministry provided this NGO with a FCRA license even when the foreign funding to the Indian media is strictly banned under FCRA, 2010.

KABIR’s Annual Report of 2006-07 reveals that it started two media campaigns called Drive against Bribe (Ghoons ko Ghoonsa) and ‘Save the RTI campaign’ from the money given to it by the Ford Foundation:

The Drive Against Bribe Campaign (1st July to 15th July 2006)

Kabir in partnership with one of the highest TRP rated news channels NDTV, newspapers like Hindustan Times, Hindustan (Hindi) and The Hindu started planning for a campaign to promote the use of the RTI Act, 2005 amongst the masses. At the same time the print media at the regional level also joined the campaign. Consequently, 8 media houses publicized right to information in their news dailies and news channels. They are  The Successes received from the use of Right to Information were being telecast in the form of advertisements and news stories on various news channels from the first week of June itself. Kabir not only collected such success stories but also coordinated their reporting on various print and electronic media. (From Kabir’s Annual Report 2006-07)

Save the RTI campaign

“The Drive Against Bribe Campaign was still in its follow up stage and the success stories were still being recorded when the Cabinet gave a green signal to the amendments in the RTI Act, 2005. Kabir and Parivartan sensitized and mobilized both the conventional and the unconventional media across the country and called for a press conference in which Annaji announced that many more protest meetings and briefings will be organized on the issue. In the mean time protest demonstrations against the amendments began at Jantar Matar in Delhi. Kabir actively participated in the protest activities along with organizations like NCPRI, Parivartan and MKSS. (political agitation mentioned in the Home Ministry Report) Kabir zealously collected successful examples of RTI Act implementations and disseminated them to the masses through various media to explain that such achievements would not be possible if these amendments were implemented.” (from Kabir’s Annual Report 2006-07)

The nature of these media partnerships remains unclear because Kabir has lost its cashbook for the same period 2006-08. The MHA has reported in its investigation reports that ‘Cash Books w.e.f 2006-08 is not available with the association. As per statement of Mr. Manish Sisodia, the cashbook has been lost somewhere due to shifting of office. It is again questionable that vital documents like the cashbook have been lost. From the perusal of details in the years when the cashbook was maintained i.e 2008-09 to till date, it has been observed that most of the expenditure has been incurred in cash. In the absence of cashbook, the genuineness of the expenditure can’t be ascertained.’ (Home Ministry report, point no. 11, page 8 of 14) When some of the associated media organizations were reached for a comment, they chose not to respond.

RTI and ‘The Foreign Hand’ (From The Right to Information Act in India: The Turbid World of Transparency Reforms, A thesis submitted to the Department of International Development of the London School of Economics and Political Science for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, by Prashant Sharma)

“An issue that arose consistently in the critiques of the mainstream narrative of the RTI movement is the resources needed to finance such campaigns. The Ministry of Home Affairs also constituted an Inter-Ministerial Task Force to develop a draft bill on the right to information, which was also tasked inter alia to conduct a survey of the ‘foreign experience’. “It was a Joint Secretary level committee, only officials and non political figures. That committee went to a few countries and thereafter it gave its report in two volumes. Somehow that report came into my hands, one volume only, and I requested the Home Ministry to give me the other volume, and give me the files on which this committee was constituted, the recommendations they made, and what was the decision of the Home Ministry on those recommendations. They said they have no papers on the subject. I didn’t get anything except one volume, in which they only had copies of the legislations which they had collected from other countries.” Whether the ‘disappearance’ of the second volume was by design or simply a result of poor record management, the familiar trope of the political executive being stymied by the bureaucracy reappears here. “In conversations many years later, V.P.Singh revealed that though he had tried to get a suitable act drafted and introduced in Parliament, the bureaucracy had frustrated him at every step”. Eventually, V.P. Singh’s abilities to outmaneuver the bureaucracy on this issue remained untested, as his government did not last long enough.”

“In sum, the existing explanatory narrative around the RTI Act in India proposes that the Indian experience is particularly noteworthy as not only can its roots be traced to the dusty weather-beaten paths of rural India, but also because the process was divorced from any perceptible international influences or trends. It is this defining characteristic of the Indian ‘struggle’ for an RTI Act that accords it an almost mythical status within FoI-related advocacy, academic and activist spheres. Top-down, elite-led, externally influenced democratic ‘deepening’ after all, presents a far less attractive image compared to a bottom-up local struggle that succeeds in wresting power from above.”

This particular version of the ‘truth’ calls out for deeper examination, not least because of the timing of the enactment of the RTI Act in India. In 1990, only fourteen countries had some sort of a law that provided citizens with a formal and legal procedure to access government information. In 2010, this number stood at eighty four.441 In addition, another fifty countries seem to be on their way to enacting such legislation.442 Some international organisations, including the World Bank, have of late begun to draft disclosure policies somewhat on thelines of national FoI laws. Clearly, there seems to be a well-established global trend of adopting national (and international) FoI legislation and policies across the world, particularly over the last two decades.

An early clue in this direction can be discerned in the enactment of state level FoI laws in India that preceded the national FoI Act of 2002 and the RTI Act of 2005. The specific case relates to the southern state of Karnataka. “[The CHRI] had a major role to play in Karnataka, where there was no people’s movement for RTI, but ADB [Asian Development Bank] was giving a loan, and they said, ‘conditionality’ – have an RTI law. So B.K. Chandrashekhar who was the Information Minister, he knew CHRI was working [on this issue], and he called [them] over, and they sat and drafted the law, not a terribly good law, but definitely not as bad as the Tamil Nadu one.” As a result, the Karnataka Right to Information Act was enacted in 2000. Soon after, in 2001, the President of the Asian Development Bank recommended the grant of a loan of USD 200 million for “infrastructure projects in specified infrastructure sectors in four selected Indian states: Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, and Madhya Pradesh”

A similar logic also played out at the national level, albeit in less obvious ways. An important element that informs the allocation of World Bank funds (lent at preferential rates for low- income countries) under its International Development Association (IDA) programme is based on its Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) framework. The CPIA rating for India in 2003 included a section on “Transparency, Accountability and Corruption in the Public Sector” where it stated that “Corruption remains a significant problem. India ranked 71 out of 102 in the Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions index… With the passage of the Freedom of Information legislation in March 2003 [sic], the GoI has followed in the path of some leading states and taken a significant step forward in improving the legal framework for transparency and this increase in rating reflects that… The effective implementation of this act will remain a major challenge in the next several years…”501 With rewards such as ‘increased ratings’ in the CPIA framework on offer, it comes as no surprise that the Ministry of Finance sent several missives to the DoPT seeking its input on the status of the implementation of the FoI Act to be able to respond to the assessment exercise of the World Bank.

“I think perhaps around 30%-40% of the contribution for bringing the Act was the World Bank and the international community’s pressure on the government, which most of us normally don’t like to acknowledge. My own perception is that the Prime Minister of India unfortunately is fairly influenced by these factors. The World Bank and various international organisations were pressing to get in more transparency, less corruption. This is part of a worldwide agenda they have – they want to do business, they want these as essentials.” (for more read the thesis attached with this post)
In such a scenario Kabir’s activities related to the right to information act of India is heavily objectionable. Its Save the RTI campaign challenged the advice of the then president Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam to the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Incidentally, while giving his approval to the RTI Act in June 2005, President APJ Abdul Kalam, had emphasised that notings by bureaucrats on files should be privileged, otherwise it could affect the decision-making process. The logic being that the senior bureaucrats would be more interested in covering their backs rather than being forthright. In a communication to the Prime Minister, he had also suggested that the Act should not have a purview over communications between the Head of State and the Head of Government and that the documents emanating from the President’s secretariat were not not brought within the ambit of the Act. Accordingly, in December 2005 (only a month after the RTI Act came into force), Prime Minister Manmohan Singh instructed the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) that ‘file notings’ relating to identifiable individuals, group of individuals, organizations, appointments, matters relating to inquiries and departmental proceedings, should not be disclosed.

Similar objection were raised by the then Parliamentary Affairs Minister Priyaranjan Dasmunsi , “The Union Cabinet has decided to amend the RTI Act to correct “certain ambiguities” and it is based of the objections raised by some government organisations such as UPSC who had objected that while decisions taken could be conveyed, the details and the process as to how the decisions were arrived at could not be: “Decisions can be conveyed, not in terms of details about what the Under Secretary or Joint Secretary wrote or what the Secretary disapproved.” The minister had also claimed that such exemptions also exist in the systems followed by the US, UK and Australia as well.”
Effectively, KABIR’s campaign voiced against the proposed amendments in the RTI campaign which is a democratic right in this country. But it also enabled a media campaign in the country where it severely criticized its own government and democratic institutions using the foreign funding from an organization who is suspected to have links with the CIA. (Please refer to The Ford Foundation and the CIA: A documented case of philanthropic collaboration with the Secret Police by James Petras 15 December 2001) When this reporter sought a comment from the Ford Foundation for its suspected links with CIA, it’s Director of Communication, Newyork never responded back.

During the ‘Save the RTI’ media campaign a series of editorials were written across the newspapers in the country supporting Kabir’s stand on file notings in the RTI act. Kabir’s president says these editorials were written by its in house media team which was passed on the media houses. For a full list of editorials written on the RTI campaign please visit http://rti.aidindia.org/content/blogcategory/25/100/. While nothing can be proved in absence of cashbook for the same period, a detailed inquiry is a must sought to justify the intentions of these articles.

NDTV’s partnership with Kabir deserves a special mention. Starting with KABIR in 2006, they were involved in all its media campaigns. They also announced National RTI Awards in association with Public Cause Research Foundation (PCRF), an organization set up by Magsaysay awardee Arvind Kejriwal to acknowledge those who have displayed exemplary commitment to RTI Act. In 2011, NDTV went on to give Arvind Kejriwal and Anna Hazare the Indian of the year award.

Similarly a host of newspapers also borrowed news from Kabir, remembers an old time associate of Kejriwal. “He [Arvind Kejriwal] was directly involved with editors and proprietors of these newspapers. After the media campaign, members from Kabir became regular at newspaper offices. Specific RTI beats were created within newspapers which are now filing 30 RTI applications in a single day, less is known about the petitions which don’t make it to the newspapers.” This member was once part of Arvind Kejriwal’s movement Parivartan but he left the group in 2004 on the issue of foreign funding from the Ford Foundation. Parivartan then had a rule that no outside institutional funding will be accepted by the organization.

The Home Ministry report also notes that amount of Rs. 17,68,261/- has been paid to different RTI activists throughout the country between the years 2008 to 2011-12. However, no agreements between the individuals and association were made available to the inspection party. (Home Ministry Report, Point no. 8, page 8 of 14)

Less is known about centre’s motivation to rid KABIR of serious charges reported by the home ministry investigation. But the report itself falls short of mentioning anything about the organizations working during the Janlokpal movement, for which the inquiry was sought by the petitioner. There are also no references about Ford Foundation in the report. With just a month before the election, who is it that the Indian government trying to save?

What is it trying to save? – KABIR, Ford Foundation, its own media or the false sense of democracy in the country.

Please click the links mentioned below accordingly for details….
1 ) Inspection of Foreign Contribution Records pertaining to an NGO KABIR (2005-06 to 2011-2012)’
2) Kabir – Annual Report 2006-07
3) kabir – registration certificate
4) The Right to Information Act in India and The Turbid World of Transparency Reforms By Prashant Sharma
Thanx,
BIRBAL….

Source: http://rajuparulekar.wordpress.com/2014/03/11/conspiracy-unfolds-kejriwal-others-shocking-revelations/

HORROR OF GANG KEJRIWAL: SEDITION, NEXUS AND CO-EXISTENCE

Posted on March 29, 2014 by rajuparulekar

Following pages describe and expose a hidden conspiracy between RULING PARTY, GANG KEJRIWAL and MEDIA.


Gang Kejriwal formed an organization named Kabir and is acquiring foreign funding since 2005. Documentary evidences prove this fact. Kabir used those foreign funds for political purpose which is serious violation of FCRA (Foreign Contribution Regulation ACT). Kabir used foreign funding for media initiative as well. They almost bought most of the air time and print media through foreign funding. They called it as ‘MEDIA INITIATIVE FOR RTI’. Consistent appearance of Kejriwal and Gang kejriwal on television was actually born out of Kabir and Media partnership, which is one more serious FCRA violation.

From initial stages of Kabir, Parivartan (or any other Gang Kejriwal’s NGO), Home Ministry, Ministry of External Affairs was very lenient and soft as if they were partners in this conspiracy. At the height of it Government filed completely false affidavit in Delhi High Court (given below). This is exact contradictory to Kabir (Inspection of foreign contribution record’ (given below).
No government agency or opposition party or any person/organization is keen to take serious legal action against this biggest scam since independence by Kejriwal and his gang. In fact RULING PARTY misguided High Court in their affidavit to give Gang Kejriwal a safe passage from sedition.
Here our team member BIRBAL has contacted Ford Foundation and tried to trace the missing account books of Kabir Foundation for 2005-2007 (Though it is recorded elsewhere, we have solid documentary evidences). Ford Foundations answers were unsatisfactory and they too tried to carpet skeletons of Gang Kejriwal’s cupboard. The entire correspondence with Ford Foundation is given below. BIRBAL’S identity is under wraps hence the correspondents name doesn’t appear.
The whole jigsaw puzzle of Kejriwal’s conspiracy against people of India is conspired with cooperation of ruling party and part of ruling media. Now it is crystal clear that even opposition parties are not keen or interested in exploring the biggest anti-national scam of Gang Kejriwal.

The question arises WHY?

ANSWERS WILL FOLLOW SOON.

I will come back to you with more very soon.
Adieu.

Raju Parulekar
raju.parulekar@gmail.com
(M) 9820124419

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

1. Government Of India filed a wrong affidavit in the high court saying that the status report filed by the respondent i.e. Ministry of Home Affairs has given clean chit to Kabir in its involvement regarding any political agitation where as the point 25 clearly shows that Kabir was involved in political agitation.Congress led UPA government has the history of filing wrong affidavits. In the coal scam the Additional Solicitor-General Harin Raval had to resign for misleading the Supreme Court.

2. This political agitation was used to further world bank and ford foundation’s version of RTI act against the suggestion of the the  Indian president Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam.

3. This political agitation wages to fight against the sate as Kabir was being funded by Ford Foundation then.

4. Mysteriously the Home Ministry report stops short of giving any details of Kabir’s activities in 2011 for which the actual petition was filed.The report also doesn’t mention Ford’s name anywhere.
Are some people in the government conspiring with Gang Kejariwal’s Anti National Agenda ?

1) Snapshot of the Affidavit filled by the Government of India



For complete Affidavit kindly click the link given below

WP(C)34122012-Janlokpal

2) Snapshot of the Inspection of Foreign Contribution Records pertaining to an NGO Kabir.


For complete Report kindly click the link given below..
(PLS see page no 10 for the above point no 25)

Inspection of Foreign Contribution Records pertaining to an NGO KABIR (2005-06 to 2011-2012)’

3) What FCRA has to say about Gang Kejariwal’s Actions which was not at all considered in GOI’s Affidavit.





4) Correspondence and the Response from the Ford Foundation 


From:  xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Tue, Jan 7, 2014 at 8:16 PM
Subject: Re: FW: Response from the Ford Foundation
To: a.ironside@fordfoundation.org
Cc: “Ramdas, Kavita” <kn.ramdas@fordfoundation.org>, t.sunder@fordfoundation.org

Dear Alfred,
Thank you for showing interest.

As you’d know an Indian Supreme Court advocate Mr. ML Sharma has filed a PIL against the Ford Foundation in the Delhi High Court. The respondent has alleged foundation for promoting its charter via political agitation under the garb of public agitation namely Lokpal bill & others in India. The other respondents are Shashi Bhooshan, Shanti Bhooshan, Arvind kejriwal and Manish Sisodia(all of them members of Aam Aadmi Party) along with the Union Of India.   So please help me with following questions by specifically mentioning the details so that I can quote both the sides in my story:

1. In her reply Kavita has mentioned that first grant made to Kabir was in 2007 for $197,000 where as the website record shows a grant even two years back in 2005. Link(to you own records) : http://www.fordfoundation.org/pdfs/library/ar2005.pdf . What do you have to say about this?

2. All the records concerning Kabir, run by Manish Sisodia have been removed from the foundation’s website post 2005 where as there have been multiple instances of funding in 2005-06, 2006-07, 2008-09 ( website last accessed 19:36 IST 07/01/2014) (source : Kabir’s FCRA submission). Why has the foundation chosen to remove the records which were previously available? Why isn’t it available for public scrutiny?

3. How can be an organization of your integrity mistake and put records on the website without even making the funding? (for the 2011 funding which was taken back)

4. When, why and how was Kabir chosen for the grants? What was foundation’s vision in enabling a media campaign for Right to Information Act in India? Also, what did Kabir mean when they said enabling a media campaign? Did it include paying electronic media organizations?

5. In her response Kavita has mentioned ’efforts were carried out satisfactorily and the grant was closed on schedule.’ What do you mean by ‘satisfactorily’? What are the parameters to decide it? Kabir’s audit report shows that lot of their funds went underutilized and were carried forward for the next fiscal year. Are you aware of that?

6.  Kabir was fully involved in the Janlokpal movement. Given that your funds went underutilized and most of the times carried forward , do you suspect that your funds could’ve been used for the movement? If yes, do you know that you can be prosecuted under FCRA,2011,India?

7. The petitioner ML Sharma has also cited various works establishing Foundation’s link with Central Intelligency Agency, USA. What do you have to say about it? Also James Petras has written a book ‘The Ford Foundation and the CIA: A documented case of philanthropic collaboration with the Secret Police’, what is the official stance of foundation on this text?

Answers to these questions will certainly help me validate or discard various conjectures about the foundation. The nature of the story calls for such specific details. Please let me know if you received the mail and also a replying date. Accordingly, I’ll let my editor know my story submission date.

Thanks and regards
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
On Tue, Jan 7, 2014 at 5:38 PM, Sunder, Tuhina <T.Sunder@fordfoundation.org> wrote:
Dear xxxxxxxxx,

Thank you for your telephone call a short while ago requesting a meeting with Kavita.  I am sure you would have received the email from Alfred Ironside to you.  If not, I am forwarding it with this email – please see below.

With best wishes, Tuhina

                 Tuhina Sunder
Executive Assistant
Representative’s Office
India, Nepal and Sri Lanka
55, Lodi Estate
New Delhi 110 003 India
t: +91 11 47105350
f: +91 11 47105390
t.sunder@fordfoundation.org
www.fordfoundation.org



From: Ramdas, Kavita
Sent: Tuesday, January 07, 2014 5:33 PM
To: Sunder, Tuhina
Subject: FW: Response from the Ford Foundation




Kavita N. Ramdas
Representative, India/Nepal/Sri Lanka
The Ford Foundation
55 Lodi Estate
New Delhi 110003

www.fordfoundation.org
kn.ramdas@fordfoundation.org
O: +91 11 4710 5350
F: +91 11 4710 5380
C: +1 415 987 7640 (US cell)

And the sunset itself on such waves of ether
That I just can’t comprehend
Whether it is the end of the day, the end of the world,
Or the mystery of mysteries in me again.”
― Anna Akhmatova

From: Ironside, Alfred
Sent: Monday, January 06, 2014 11:51 PM
To: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: Cinelli, Joshua; Ramdas, Kavita
Subject: Re: Response from the Ford Foundation

Dear xxxxxxxxxxxx,

Thanks again for reaching out to the foundation.  Kavita has shared your inquiries and I would like to see how we can be helpful to your reporting beyond what Kavita has already set forward in her message to you earlier today.  I know Kavita’s schedule will not afford an opportunity for a meeting, but perhaps we can help with any further questions you have.

Please let me know what specific issues you’d like to explore further.  I’m sure this approach will be best in terms of helping you meet your deadlines.

Thanks and regards,
Alfred

Alfred Ironside
Director of Communications
Ford Foundation / New York
(+1) 212 573-5308
a.ironside@fordfoundation.org


From: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: January 6, 2014 at 5:26:47 PM GMT+5:30
To: ”Ramdas, Kavita” <kn.ramdas@fordfoundation.org>
Subject: Re: Response from the Ford Foundation

Thank you so much Kavita. I am much obliged. Please give me an appointment in person to discuss some specific issues further. I am already late on filing my article. Can we please meet tomorrow?

Regards
xxxxxxxxx

On Mon, Jan 6, 2014 at 11:41 AM, Ramdas, Kavita <kn.ramdas@fordfoundation.org> wrote:
Dear xxxxxxxxx,

Thank you for reaching out to the foundation. We are pleased to have an opportunity to offer a straightforward clarification of our grantmaking to Kabir.

The foundation’s first grant to Kabir was made in 2007 and was for $197,000 over three years.  The grant supported the organization’s efforts to produce training materials on India’s Right-to-Information law, to disseminate information about the effective use of the law, and to help promote transparent and accountable governance.  These efforts were carried out satisfactorily and the grant was closed on schedule.

In 2010, the foundation reviewed a new grant proposal from Kabir for similar activities. We approved this second grant in February, 2011.  However, Kabir notified the foundation in September 2011 that it was not capable of carrying out the planned activities due to an emerging campaign to mobilize the public around anti-corruption efforts.  Based on this information from Kabir and the foundation’s own fiscal year schedule, the foundation amicably rescinded its second grant in February 2012, against which no funds had ever been distributed.  The rescinded and unpaid grant was then removed from our web site.

The Ford Foundation is an independent, non-partisan, and global organization with a 60-year history of supporting both Government and NGO efforts in India.  Our first grant to the national Planning Commission was made in the 1950s, and over the years many key Indian institutions such as the IIMs and IITs have been grant recipients, as have key cultural organizations, NGOs, and think tanks.  Our work in India — just as in the United States, Brazil, Indonesia, and the many other countries in which we work — is committed to supporting civil society, government and the private sector to build more inclusive and just communities.  Our grants in India are driven by indigenous Indian priorities and the efforts and aspirations of Indian institutions and organizations.

Thanks again for the opportunity to correct the record regarding our support for Kabir, which ended in 2010 and was devoted to its public education work on freedom of information.

Sincerely,

Kavita


Kavita N. Ramdas
Representative, India/Nepal/Sri Lanka
The Ford Foundation
55 Lodi Estate
New Delhi 110003

www.fordfoundation.org
kn.ramdas@fordfoundation.org
O: +91 11 4710 5350
F: +91 11 4710 5380
C: +1 415 987 7640 (US cell)

And the sunset itself on such waves of ether
That I just can’t comprehend
Whether it is the end of the day, the end of the world,
Or the mystery of mysteries in me again.”
― Anna Akhmatova



From: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Thursday, January 02, 2014 4:48 PM
To: Sunder, Tuhina
Subject: Re: Seeking a Meeting

My story is about the funding of Janlokpal movement . Among the many allegations made on Kabir, run by Manish Sisodia,  is the funding made by Ford Foundation to the organization in 2011, the year when the anti graft movement started. There have been allegations that Foundation’s money was used in stirring the agitation. So I seek an official statement regarding Ford’s involvement with Kabir. I write to you also because the foundation has also removed all the records concerning Kabir from the website. So, please give me an appointment to clarify some of the facts.
Thanks
xxxxxxx

On Thu, Jan 2, 2014 at 4:36 PM, xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi Tuhina
I work for the xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.
Currently I am doing a story which also involves the Ford Foundation. So I seek Foundation’s official stance on the same story. For the same purpose Kavitha N Ramdas has asked me to get in touch with you as she is in Pakistan. Please give me sometime in the next few days as I am already running short on filing the story.

Thanks and regards
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
KINDLY CLICK THE LINK  BELOW TO VIEW THIS ENTIRE CORRESPONDENCE IN ORIGINAL.
Ford Correspondence

Source: https://rajuparulekar.wordpress.com/2014/03/29/horror-of-gang-kejriwal-sedition-nexus-and-co-existence/ 

Posted on March 29, 2014 by rajuparulekar

NEW DELHI: BJP would, if elected, roll out a programme to boost farm efficiency that its prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, has championed in his home state of Gujarat.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which opinion polls show winning the most seats in a general election, is pushing a range of market reforms to differentiate it from the Congress-led government's focus on subsidies.

"A market-centric policy would make the promotion of self-reliance a top priority," sai ..

Read more at:
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/32854012.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

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Did Adani get a sweetheart deal from Modi? You judge. Here are the facts

By Kartikeya Tanna

Earlier this month, Forbes Asia published a report hinting at alleged crony capitalism practised by Gujarat Chief Minister (and BJP’s prime ministerial candidate) Narendra Modi. That it received wide publicity was obvious given that Modi and his governance model are the central focus in the upcoming 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

Indeed, if Modi is staking a claim to ask India’s vast electorate to vote for him and his party this summer on the basis of his governance record, strict scrutiny on that record is obvious and must be welcomed.

However, the report scrutinising his record contains factual inaccuracies and half-truths. Among other things, the report claims that the Gujarat government gave the land seized from the village to Adani for a song - and that the Gujarat high court ordered the state to give the villagers alternate land for grazing. The facts, however, are quite different.

On the Gujarat HC “ordering” Gujarat government and Adani

To buttress one of the themes of the report, ie, that Adani Group has been the recipient of the Modi government’s generosity, it talks about a case filed in the Gujarat High Court by village residents of Zarpara, a village in Kutch where the Mundra port has been set up, when gauchar (grazing) land was allotted to the Adani Group by the government of Gujarat (GoG). The report says, “the court in the summer of 2011 ordered the government and Adani to replace that land for the villagers but nothing has happened so far.”

The fact is that the high court never ordered GoG or Adani to replace that land. In fact, the petition filed by residents was not even aimed at requesting the court to issue any such order. The court merely recommended (not “ordered”) GoG to examine whether an equivalent area out of wasteland available with GoG could be allotted to the village.

Check this excerpt from the Gujarat HC judgment dated 22.06.2011. The case number is SCA 7254/2008

The reason this is vital to point this out is to correct a likely impression readers may gather that GoG ignored the high court’s order for Adani’s benefit. Not only did the Gujarat High Court reject this challenge by the residents, even the Supreme Court rejected an appeal preferred by the residents via an order dated 30 October 2012 [SLP (Civil) 26888/2011].

Surprisingly, the Forbes report did not deem it necessary to mention that.

Law and policy regarding grazing land

It is useful to understand the totality of the law and GoG policy pertaining to allotment of grazing land, particularly in view of what the Forbes report states. The relevant points that emerge from a combined reading of Section 108 of the Gujarat Panchayat Act, 1993 (GPA), GoG resolutions (one, dated 30 December 1988 and another dated 27 January 1999) and the Supreme Court’s pronouncements are as under:

• The grazing land allotted to Adani Group in Zarpara village is one which was originally land belonging to GoG vested by it in the village panchayat for grazing use. Therefore, if that grazing land has to be allotted, Section 108(4) of GPA makes it lawful for GoG to ‘resume’ such land (ie, take it back) at any time, if required, for a public purpose.
• Notably, the Supreme Court has held that the setting up of a Special Economic Zone is “public purpose” since it benefits not only the village and adjoining areas but even the state and the country in terms of the business opportunities it generates [Shah Kantilal Depar v RIL, 2006].
• Further, the Supreme Court has clearly held that, if the land in question is one covered by Section 108(4) of the GPA, it is not obligatory for the state government to obtain consent of, or even consult, village residents or the panchayat. This is because the land in question belongs to the state government and is vested in the village panchayat with a legal understanding that the land can be resumed by the state government at any time [Panchayat Varga Shramjivi Samudaik Sahakari Khedut Co-op Society Ltd. vs Haribhai Mevabhai, 1996].
• The GoG resolution dated 30 December 1998 requires that a certain ratio (grazing land:cattle) be maintained as far as possible. That said, if GoG has to take over grazing land for a public purpose, it can do so in exceptional cases even if grazing land is not in excess. The resolution further states that, if there is opposition from local self-government bodies, then, as far as possible, the procedure for the resumption of such land should be avoided unless opposition is found to be baseless.
• It is useful to note here that, though the resolution asks GoG to be mindful of opposition from local self-bodies, the high court and the Supreme Court have confirmed that these are just guidelines and the law does not mandate the government to hold consultations with the village panchayat in cases of land covered by s. 108(4) of GPA.
• Yet, consent of village panchayat was voluntarily taken before allotting the grazing land at Zarpara village to Adani and the panchayat did give consent. Three years later, the newly elected panchayat did oppose the allotment, but the high court rejected that.
• Further, under GoG resolution dated 27 January 1999, every time a business is allotted grazing land, the state government must collect 30 percent premium in addition to the price of the land. GoG must, if possible, allot similar area of land out of government wasteland to village panchayats for grazing. Notably, however, if such wasteland is not available, the 30 percent premium should be given to the village panchayat as compensation.

(This is one more reason why the Forbes report is wrong about the Gujarat HC “ordering” GoG and Adani to replace the land allotted with more land. It is not the only option. In fact, the required 30 percent premium was already collected by GoG from the Adani Group back in 2007 when the land was allotted. It was only a question of GoG handing over that premium to the village panchayat.)
To sum up, the law does not mandate that grazing land can be allotted only if it is in excess of the ratio nor does it mandate permission of the village chief. The Forbes report, however, rather confidently states that under the law grazing land can be used for something else only if it’s “in excess” and that, even then, the village chief has to give permission to take the land.
Not only is this exposition of the law utterly simplistic, it is also inaccurate.

Environmental clearance to Adani SEZ

Adani Group offered to sublet at an amount based on what it estimated takers would be willing to pay. Reuters

The Forbes report also alludes to the lack of environmental clearance to the Adani SEZ (the ministry of environment and forests, MoEF) not having taken a decision for almost 18 months) and ends by stating that the fate of this project will likely be decided by the government in power next which could easily be a Modi-led government. Is this an insinuation that Modi, as PM, may easily grant clearance to his friend Adani? I will leave it to the readers.

At the outset, it must be stated that the Adani Group was ill-informed to commence construction in the SEZ without obtaining prior environmental clearance. That said, the Expert Appraisal Committee of the MoEF recommended environmental clearance to the SEZ way back in 2012 after which the MoEF is supposed to take a final call.

Notably, under Clause 8(iii) of the EIA (Environment Impact Assessment) Notification 2006, if the MoEF does not decide within 45 days of the EAC recommending grant of clearance, that recommendation is deemed to be the decision of MoEF. Therefore, legally, as of today, Adani Group has clearance for the SEZ.

What made the high court order a stay on further construction within the SEZ area is that construction had commenced prior to the deemed clearance, which made it unlawful. Deemed clearance only applied if construction was commenced after it was obtained. Therefore, the deemed clearance could not cure the illegality committed prior to obtaining it.

True, there continue to remain concerns about environmental violations by the group. A committee headed by Sunita Narain, constituted by MoEF, has recommended the imposition of penalties for violations, particularly around the North port area. But even the Narain committee recognises that large-scale development has been taken undertaken and it won’t be prudent to halt or cease operations in areas other than the North port.

Therefore, instead of obsessing over what Modi-led government will do, what’s truly condemnable is that the UPA Government (the MoEF) has been plagued with utter inaction. Worse, when the Gujarat high court was hearing this matter, it did not even bother to file a reply, as is evident from the insert below. 



Due to this inaction, the Gujarat high court, in its judgment in January this year, ordered MoEF to take a decision within 30 days of the date of the judgment “without fail”. The UPA sat on the file and, soon after the 30-day period, the Model Code of Conduct was imposed.

This background is vital to understand the insinuation made in the Forbes report. If a Modi-led government takes a decision as per the Narain Committee recommendations, would that government do so because Adani is Modi’s buddy? Or, would it do so because the EAC has already recommended granting clearance, the Narain Committee does not recommend cancelling clearance for the entire SEZ and MoEF under UPA has been sitting on the file since 2012?

On land allotment rates

The Forbes report makes much of GoG’s “bent” towards big businesses by juxtaposing the rate at which Adani got land from the GoG and the rate at which it sublets to businesses. It also states that none of the other companies in Gujarat “have received the kind of largesse on land rates as Adani.”
First, the GoG policy for determining land rates for industrial purposes.

Under GoG resolution dated 15 January 1998 and other circulars, the process is as under:
1)  Collector of the area typically receives application for allotment of government land. Collector informs Deputy Town Planner (DTP) of the location and condition of the land. The price of the land is determined at this initial level by the Collector's office.

2)  The DTP visits the land and (i) takes cognisance of sales that took place in adjoining areas in the past five years; and (ii) conducts an assessment of the technical aspects and determines a price at this level. In a sense, this entails considering the market price at the relevant time.

3)  If the price is below Rs 15 lakh, the collector has the authority to allot the land and prescribe conditions.

4) If price is above Rs 15 lakh, a file is put before a District Valuation Committee (DVC - consisting
of Collector and two other officials) which evaluates the file and pricing at the aforementioned levels.

5) If the DVC values land at a price greater than Rs 50 lakh, the entire file is sent to the Revenue Department which, in turn, sends file to the Chief Town Planner who evaluates it and suggests increase/decrease in price, if any.

6) The file is then presented before the State Pricing Committee (SPC - consisting of higher level bureaucrats of the revenue department, Urban Development & Urban Housing Department and the Finance Department). If the SPC also determines the value of the land to be above Rs 50 lakh, the file is sent to the state cabinet for a final decision.

In fact, in one instance, although the SPC determined rates of two of the three locations where Adani applied for tracts of land as Rs 4.25 and Rs 6 per square metre, the Council of Ministers (the one headed by Modi) determined that the price of those tracts (rather large) would be Rs 25 per square metre since that was the rate the SPC arrived at for the third location.

(Disclosure: The author represented Gujarat Government in the Justice MB Shah Commission of Inquiry where these allegations and GoG resolutions were addressed threadbare.)

Instead of making sweeping statements that none of the other companies received the kind of largesse on land rates as Adani, it may be useful for Forbes to dig out actual examples where this procedure was not followed by GoG.

Lastly, it is useful to bear in mind that this wasn’t the case of the Adani Group getting land at rate x, sitting on it, doing no improvements and then leasing it to Y for a handsome profit (10x or 20x). Adani wasn’t merely flipping land. The group constructed a port which entails heavy capital expenditure and huge risks. Moreover, any study of the economic history of India will indicate how critical a port is for the development of that region and state.

Since Forbes highlights the profit Adani made by subleasing land to Indian Oil, let us take the example of why Indian Oil set up shop in Adani port at a high sublease price. Back in 2002, it was particularly attracted to setting up its business of handling crude oil at Mundra because of, among other things, the single point mooring (SPM) system Mundra port provided. That SPM system offers significant marine freight savings.

Adani Group offered to sublet at an amount based on what it estimated takers would be willing to pay. IOC could have refused to agree to those terms. In that case, Adani wouldn’t have got business from IOC. It isn’t as if there weren’t other ports in India where IOC couldn’t set up shop. Indeed, Adani port wouldn’t have got business from anyone if all found the subletting rates too high on a cost-benefit analysis. But, IOC freely made a business decision looking at what benefits it would get as a company. So do many other entities.

What happens when a state has a port with competitive facilities? Trade and business increases. Both GoG and government of India (GoI) earn several types of revenues in the form of taxes and charges even if it offers concessions on some of them. That revenue can give governments the cash cushion to spend on welfare programmes to bridge the gap even further. Yes, Adani earns too and he has every right to.

Has Forbes even bothered to see what revenues GoG and GoI have got from the entire business which is generated in Mundra? Juxtaposing two rates at separate times offering different things under different conditions is not right.

The purpose of this column is not to say that Modi and Adani are beyond criticism. Certainly not. But it seems that the author has not read the very court judgment quoted in the report or studied the law to support its criticism. The report is thus misleading.

Source:  http://www.firstbiz.com/corporate/adani-get-sweetheart-deal-modi-judge-facts-79399.html

Rupee Gains of 35% Seen in Decisive Victory for Modi: Currencies

By Amit Prakash and Kristine Aquino Mar 18, 2014 4:54 PM GMT

A victory for India’s main opposition party in next month’s general elections is seen powering the rupee to highs last reached in 2008.

Polls show Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party is poised to oust the incumbent Congress party, a result that would be a “catalyst” for a long-term advance in the rupee toward 40 to 45 per dollar, from 61.19 on March 14, according to Adam Gilmour, Citigroup Inc.’s head of Asia-Pacific currency and derivatives sales. A weak coalition would be the “worst-case” outcome, he said, and might send the currency sliding beyond August’s record low of 68.845.

“The market view is that if Modi gets in, it will be a game-changer,” Gilmour, who has worked at the second-largest currency trader for two decades, said in a March 12 interview in Singapore. “We always take politics with a pinch of salt, with the rare exceptions like India, where it’s going to really make a difference.”

At stake is the pace of recovery in Asia’s third-largest economy, which is only now gaining traction six years after the start of the global financial crisis. While an improvement in India’s current account helped the rupee beat its regional peers over the past six months, the victor in next month’s poll will take on the task of steering a country whose economy is expanding at close to the slowest pace in a decade.

Opinion Surveys

Polls by Nielsen and the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies predict Modi’s BJP will win the most seats, while falling short of a majority in the lower house of parliament. The Congress party is projected to achieve its smallest-ever number of seats.

The BJP and its allies will win as many as 232 parliament seats, 40 short of a majority, according to a poll released on March 6 by the CSDS. Election results are due May 16.

The rupee lost about 28 percent of its value from the end of 2010 through last year, making it the worst performer among 12 Asian currencies tracked by Bloomberg.

The declines reversed when the biggest gold-consuming nation raised import tariffs on the precious metal, helping narrow the shortfall in the broadest measure of trade to a four-year low, and central bank Governor Raghuram Rajan increased interest rates to curb Asia’s fastest inflation. The rupee has rebounded about 13 percent from its Aug. 28 record, and remained little changed even during the rout in emerging-market assets earlier this year.

‘Material Impact’

“The positive sentiment really comes from the new central bank governor,” Andy Ji, a Singapore-based strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, said last week in a phone interview. “He’s had a more material impact on the rupee. Politics is just icing on the cake.”

For Citigroup’s Gilmour, politics, in the form of the elections that will be held across India from April to May, have the potential to affect the currency more than in most other countries.
Modi, the chief minister of the State of Gujarat in the northwest of the country, has the backing of business leaders and equity investors.

Billionaire Mukesh Ambani and Tata Group’s former Chairman Ratan Tata have praised the 63-year-old politician, who has pledged to bring more investment into the country should he succeed in ending Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s decade-long rule. Rahul Gandhi, the 43-year-old scion of India’s foremost political dynasty and Congress vice president, has become Modi’s main opponent after Singh said in January he won’t stand for a third term.

‘Sell Dollars’

A jump in the rupee to as high as 40 per dollar would represent a 35 percent rally in India’s currency from the end of last week, and send it to the strongest level since April 2008. Gilmour’s prediction, for which he didn’t give a timeframe, is 5 rupees higher than the most bullish forecaster in a Bloomberg survey of more than 30 strategists, whose median estimate foresees the currency at 63 on Dec. 31 and at 58.50 by the end of 2016.

The rupee was at 61.21 as of 12:52 p.m. in New York, little changed from March 14. Indian markets were shut yesterday for a holiday.

“These are good levels to sell dollars against the rupee,” said Gilmour, 40. “Waiting until after the election could be way too late.”

Stocks Surge

India’s main stock index soared to record levels last week and today after opinion polls showed the BJP gaining ground as voters seek to punish the Congress for the economic slump and a series of graft scandals. Elections could be a catalyst for policies to revive economic growth, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. analysts including Sunil Koul wrote in a March 14 report. The bank raised India to overweight from market weight, meaning investors should hold a higher proportion of the nation’s shares that are represented in benchmark indexes.

“Investors are seeing this as a market-friendly type of result,” Khoon Goh, a Singapore-based currency strategist at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd., said in a March 13 phone interview. “The question remains whether we’ll see any major changes in policy if the BJP were to get into the government. A lot will also rest on the make-up of the coalition and how big a mandate the BJP gets.”

ANZ predicts the rupee will weaken about 6 percent to 65 per dollar by year-end as the U.S. Federal Reserve reduces its unprecedented economic stimulus program. The currency may head back up toward 60 in the following 12 to 18 months should India continue to cut its trade shortfall and the central bank succeed in bringing down inflation, Goh said.

‘Feel-Good Factor’

The current-account deficit will shrink to $45 billion in the year ending March 31, from a record $88 billion in the preceding 12 months, Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram forecast last month. Overseas investors have added $1.14 billion to Indian stocks this year, the most among Asian markets tracked by Bloomberg after Indonesia and Taiwan, and pumped $6.18 billion into government bonds.
“There clearly is a feel-good factor in the markets,” Rohini Malkani and Anurag Jha, Mumbai-based analysts at Citigroup, wrote in a March 7 report. “Expectations are up, and so are equity and currency markets, which have also been buoyed by the real gains on deficit issues.”

While Gilmour sees a Modi victory as setting the stage for long-term gains in the rupee, Malkani and Jha estimate it will trade in a 60 to 64 per-dollar range over the next year. Singh’s administration, weakened by the departure of several allies, has passed the fewest bills for any Indian government to have completed a five-year term.

The government estimates gross domestic product will expand 4.9 percent in the 12 months ending March 31, near the previous year’s 4.5 percent, which was the weakest since 2003. The past decade’s annual average growth rate was about 8 percent.

“What everyone’s worried about is a quagmire of indecision,” Gilmour said. “A lot of hard decisions need to be made in India to fix it.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Amit Prakash in Singapore at aprakash1@bloomberg.net; Kristine Aquino in Singapore at kaquino1@bloomberg.net
 
To contact the editors responsible for this story: James Regan at jregan19@bloomberg.net Anil Varma, Paul Armstrong

Source:  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-18/rupee-gains-of-35-seen-in-decisive-victory-for-modi-currencies.html

Modi is India’s last best chance

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Shefali Vaidya19 Mar 2014

BJP’s PM candidate Narendra Modi

I was five, when I entered a voting booth for the first time. “You wait here”, Papa said as he let go of my hand gently to disappear behind a screen.

“Let her go with you. She needs to know about elections too”, smiled the polling officer. I ran behind the screen to watch my father carefully ink the symbol of his choice, fold the paper into precise origami folds and drop it inside the box.

Later, on our way back home, Papa explained the whole electoral process to me. Why and how elections are held? What is the need for campaigning and why every person should vote? I couldn’t wait to turn eighteen and cast my vote for the first time.

Since I have turned eighteen, I have never missed out on voting. Every single time I moved, I took the effort to register my name in the electoral rolls, just so I could vote. But voting was the extent of my political involvement.

I have never felt the need to get myself involved politically before. But this time, I feel the compelling need to act. If I don’t speak up now, I will never be able to forgive myself.

2014 Lok Sabha election will be watershed election in the history of India. If the Congress returns to power, we might as well say good-bye to any chance the country has of a decent future. It will be another five years of scams after scams, blatant minority appeasement, a non-performing robot as PM, the Queen with the caricatured heir quietly laughing behind the scenes, the devious son-in-law grabbing a few more square kilometres of farmland, a few fleshy inches added to the Agriculture Minister’s  paunch even as farmers continue to kill themselves in Maharashtra and an incompetent Home Minister attending music launches and movie premieres even as yet another Indian city is attacked by terrorists from across the border.

False idealism no longer moves India, Modi’s practical vision does

Then there is the ‘Third front’, a rag-tag bunch of jokers those who have nothing ‘right’ about them and nothing ‘left’ in them either. If we get a fractured mandate, be prepared to be governed by these idiots like the permanently shrieking Bangali Banshee, the odious Bag wali Behenji, Ishrat ke Abbajaan, Bhains-e-Azam, Skull Cap Junior and Senior. The mere thought makes my skin crawl!
And then there is His Honesty Saint Topival, illegitimate offspring of the unholy union between the Congress and the Media. The only agenda that the AAP seems to have is ‘LOOK AT ME, LOOK AT ME, PAY ME SOME ATTENTION’!

Do we really deserve to be ruled by these self-seekers?

India needs stability, governance and a sensible leader who has a proven track record. India needs a clear mandate. India needs Modi. Will team Modi solve all our problems at the touch of a Magic wand? No. However, Modi is clearly the best option that we have today and he deserves a chance.
India deserves a chance.

Modi-led BJP Government will boost economy, says Moody’s

What do you want? Good governance or scams, stability or anarchy, a Government that actually delivers or mere publicity stunts.

Choose, and choose wisely!



Source:  http://www.niticentral.com/2014/03/19/modi-is-indias-last-best-chance-201222.html