Rajasthan govt sets up 7 Member panel for Gujjar reservation issue

The Rajasthan government on Sunday appointed a seven-member committee headed by the former High Court judge, Justice I.S. Israni, to look into “all aspects” of the issue of providing reservation to Gujjars under a special category, even as fresh talks between Gujjar supremo Kirori Singh Bainsla and government emissaries remained inconclusive. The committee was constituted on the interim orders of a Division Bench of the Rajasthan High Court which heard a public interest litigation petition over the week-end. The panel will submit its report before May 3 when the case is scheduled to come up for further hearing. According to official sources here, the committee will look into all aspects of the issue of reservation to Gujjars in government jobs, hold wide-ranging talks with Gujjars representing a cross-section of opinions within the community and try to reduce the tension prevailing in the State on the vexed issue.
The members of the committee are Bharatpur MP Ratan Singh, Kotputli MLA Ramswarup Kasana, the former civil servant Satyanarain Singh, the former MP Karan Singh Yadav and lawyer Virendra Singh Gujjar. The State government has appointed Niranjan Arya as the committee's member-secretary. The talks between Col. Bainsla and State Energy Minister Jitendra Singh revolved around the modalities of giving 5 per cent quota — possibly from the share of Other Backward Classes — to Gujjars, but the State government expressed its inability to agree to the demand for suspending the ongoing process of recruitment of 80,000 personnel.

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Supreme court upholds conviction of Manu sharma in Jessica Lall murder case

The Supreme Court has upheld the conviction and life imprisonment awarded to Manu Sharma, son of senior Congress leader and former Union Minister Venod Sharma, in the 1999 Jessica Lall murder case. "The prosecution has proved beyond reasonable doubt the presence of Manu Sharma at the site of the offence," a Bench of Justices P Sathasivam and Swatanter Kumar said, upholding the Delhi High Court verdict on Monday. The apex court also upheld the conviction as well as sentence of four years jail term of Vikas Yadav, son of controversial Uttar Pradesh politician D P Yadav and, Amarjeet Singh Gill, an MNC executive, for the destruction of evidence. "The Delhi High Court has given cogent and adequate reasons for reversal of acquittal given by the trial court," the bench said. "The presence of accused is proved by ocular evidence of prosecution witnesses," the Bench said while pronouncing the verdict. The bench said that the conduct of Manu Sharma after the crime proved his guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
"The prosecution has established the evidence by recovering the Tata Safari car used by Manu Sharma on the day of offence from Noida. "An inference can be drawn about his guilt because accused did not lodge any FIR for the theft of his vehicle," the bench said in its over 250-page judgement. The apex court said that the high court had rightly convicted and given four years jail sentences to Yadav and Gill for destruction of evidence.The court also expunged the adverse remarks of the trial court against the prosecution and also the observations of the high court against the trial court order acquitting all the accused.

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President accepts shashi Tharoor's resignation

President Pratibha Patil on Sunday night accepted the resignation of Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor from the Council of Ministers on the recommendation of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. According to Rashtrapati Bhavan spokesperson, "The President on the recommendation of the Prime Minister has accepted the resignation of Shashi Tharoor, MoS in MEA from the council of ministers with immediate effect." The resignation of Tharoor was sent to the President in Pune where she is on an official visit.
Tharoor resigned as Minister of State for External Affairs in the wake of a raging controversy over IPL Kochi team, ending a week-long political drama. Tharoor becomes the first minister in UPA-II to go out under the cloud corruption in the wake of allegations that he misused office to get Rs.70 crore worth sweat equity for his friend Sunanda Pushkar from IPL Kochi team owners. Earlier, Tharoor met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for the second time late Sunday night soon after after Singh held a meeting of the Congress Core group including Sonia Gandhi.The meeting discussed continuance of the minister in the wake of the IPL controversy. First Sonia Gandhi met Singh one-on-one before the Core Group discussions. Tharoor, whose removal was demanded by the Opposition on grounds of corruption, had met Singh at noon to give his side of the story.

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Gujjar march toward jaipur, threaten to siege capital

Gujjar community members are inching towards Jaipur and threaten to lay siege to the desert state capital within the next few days. However, going by the dilly-dally approach of the government and also the rigid attitude of the community, the state seems to be heading for yet another impasse, despite the fact the Gujjar agitations in the past have witnessed loss of lives as well as property. However, under given circumstances, Gujjar community's latest demand of exclusive 5% quota, leaving aside their previous demand of scheduled tribe status, seems to be a remote possibility.
State government has already given special backward status to the community and accorded 5% quota and another 14% for the economically weaker sections. But it exceeded the 50% limit and now Rajasthan High Court has stayed its operations. As the quota given by the government has fallen in legal tangles, Gujjars have shifted from their previous strategy and now, they are seeking exclusive 50% quota by truncating the existing OBC category quota. Although Gujjars are listed in the OBC category, along with 67 other castes but they want specified and dedicated 5% quota for themselves, a demand that has put state government on a sticky wicket, mainly at a time when the quota given to the community is sub judice.
In 2007, the government of Andhra Pradesh had given 4% special reservation to Muslim community which was in legal tangles for quite some time. But a Supreme Court bench of Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan and Justices J M Panchal and Justice B S Chauhan, allowed the state to continue with it ad-interim, till the final verdict is pronounced by a constitution bench.

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Lalit Modi under IT officials scanner

IPL Commissioner Lalit Modi was quizzed by I-T officials over financial dealings and share holding patterns of the cricketing body and several places in the city were visited by tax sleuths to find out details of bidding process. Income Tax officials visited Indian Premier League headquarters at Wankhede Stadium as also Modi's office at Nirlon House in upmarket Worli, where they quizzed him from 7.15 pm Thursday till 3.20 am Friday.After the tax sleuths left, Modi told reporters, "They (the officials) were given documentation details, they verified the documents and went through the entire process of bidding. We fully cooperated with them and provided them with all they required."Modi said the officials saw the documents related to bidding by new franchisees owned by Sahara and Kochi consortium as well as those related to other IPL franchisees.
According to I-T sources, the agency, apart from probing the sources bankrolling the cash-flush league, is looking into whether ill-gotten money stashed away in tax havens like Mauritius has made its way into the IPL.On his quizzing, he said, "The questioning was over in a few minutes, but it took them longer as they had to go through the documents.""They were very much satisfied. We are a public body and if they have more queries, we will answer them," he said on whether I-T authorities sought more time to question him.The IPL chief rubbished media reports that his laptop was seized and unaccounted cash recovered from his office. "99 per cent of stories being put out by the media are untrue."

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Rajasthan temp above 45 degree cel

Rajasthan witness temperature crossing the 45-degree mark in diffrent parts of state. The weather office had issued severe heat warning in the state for the next two days as the maximum temperature in the state shot up to 45 degrees Celsius at many places. The Met office warned the heat wave conditions may persist for the next couple of days. Rajasthan is in the grip of a severe heat wave with the maximum temperature showing a sudden spurt. Ganganagar has been the hottest place in the state at 45.7 degrees Celsius. Maximum temperature in Churu and Barmer were reported at 45.3 degrees Celsius. According to Met office, "heat wave conditions will continue in parts of central and east India, Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan in the next 48 hours." Ajmer reported a maximum of 43 degrees Celsius, Dabok (Udaipur) was at 42.2, Jaisalmer and Jodhpur 43.9 , Kota 44.1, Bikaner 44.5 degrees Celsius on Wednesday.
In Jaipur also the day temperature had gone up to 43 degrees Celsius on Thursday. Schoolkids were the most suffering lot as they had no option but to return home in the hot summer noon as most of the schools have reopened after the annual break. Though northern states like Uttar Pradesh had announced closure of schools considering the severe heat wave conditions, the Rajasthan government had not taken any decision till now. The scorching heat forced the people to keep indoors. Market places wore a deserted look.

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Gujjars-Rajasthan govt talk fails

Talks between Gujjars and the Rajasthan government on the reservation issue failed tonight as neither side could agree on a formula to end the ongoing sit-in by the community and Gujjar leader Kirori Singh Bainsla threatened to intensify the agitation if the demand was not met by tomorrow. Two rounds of talks lasting nearly two hours between a Gujjar delegation and Rajasthan government emissaries -- Energy Minister Jitendra Singh and Home Minister Shanti Dhariwal -- failed to break the impasse and Gujjar leaders staged a walkout. Gujjar leaders Roop Singh and Harprasad who participated in talks with the government told reporters that the Gehlot government "had not done any homework" despite the Gujjars deferring their agitation by 12 days and did not even take legal advice from experts.

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Modi criticize RCA officials, RR may shift from Jaipur

IPL chairman and commissioner Lalit Modi has criticized state officials in Jaipur for harassing Rajasthan Royals' team management. On Twitter Modi says, "Top officials of RR were detained by authorities for most of the day yesterday. Why? Tickets -- they are quite shaken up. Very sad." Not surprisingly the IPL team has threatened to move out of Jaipur. The IPL franchise seems to have been caught in the cross fire between Modi and his not good relationship with the Rajasthan state government. "My team and RR officials harassed by state officials. Is this the way to hold matches in a state? That is why I have boycotted Jaipur matches," says Modi. He says that Jaipur as a venue will be reviewed once the current season gets over. He has also told Shane Warne that he should inform the press of what the team is going through and what the ground reality is. "Intimidation and threats have hampered us."

The state government had earlier ordered a ban on liquor and ‘no obscenity’ by cheergirls. Then the Rajasthan State Sports Council forced the franchise to shift their office from the Sawai Man Singh stadium to Rajasthan Cricket Association’s (RCA) academy. Modi, meanwhile, wants feedback from fans of the Rajasthan Royals regarding their experiences of going to the ground this time around. "Please email me on chairman@iplt20.com if you have been forced to buy tickets in the black market. And at what price."
Modi looks more like taking revenge from Rajasthan Cricket Association after loosing RCA President election here in Jaipur. Each time he blame management, facilities and other stuffs in Jaipur, which is known as one of best stadium of India. So i think we need to send him feedback so that he will know what Rajasthan Royals fan or Rajasthan people want from BCCI.. .Politics or Cricket.

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