Round The States
New Delhi, 23 July 2009
Drought Situation
“Serious”
CENTRE ASSURES AID
TO STATES
By Insaf
Acknowledging that the monsoon situation was “very serious”
in the food bowl of the country, the Centre has finally assured financial help to
drought-hit States. While the Finance Ministry is preparing a back-up plan,
affected States would need to start identifying pockets of distress and declare
“drought conditions” to get assistance. So far Punjab
has had a 60 per cent rain shortfall, with 40 of the 71 districts close to
drought. Bihar
has had only one-third normal rainfall with 38 districts mostly going dry. The
other States hit badly include Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, Orissa,
Uttarakhand and Chhattisgarh. There has been a critical delay in sowing of the
Kharif crops like rice, groundnut, soyabean and cereals and the power shortage
has added to the farmers’ woes.
Chances of monsoon revival look bleak and the rain clouds
may well pass through July too. In fact, even the North East has had a record
rainfall deficiency in three decades. Nagaland has had 67 per cent less
rainfall, Assam
34 per cent and Arunachal Pradesh 29 per cent. Incredibly, enough, Cherapunji,
the wettest place on earth, has had less than half its share of rainfall! While
the Government has already put a ban on export of foodgrains, it has assured the States of raising their respective allocations
under the National Food Security Mission and the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana.
Affected States have been advised to be flexible with the utilization of the
funds depending upon their plans.
* * * *
Poor Show of NREGS
In States
It’s now official. The much-touted National Rural Employment
Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) of the UPA Government is not delivering. A large
number of States have not been able to provide the near full employment for a
full 100 days. Figures given to the Lok Sabha by Minister for Rural Development
CP Joshi reveal that only nine districts in the North East provided the
requisite employment. Worse, States, including Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Orissa, Kerala and Manipur were defaulters
and had to pay compensation. Interestingly, the Left-ruled Bengal,
which swears by its pro-poor image, shows a dismal rating of an average 14 days
of employment in 2006-07, 25 in 2007-08 and 26 in 2008-09. Adjoining Bihar’s report card is similar with the average number of
days being 35, 22, and 26 for the same period. Has poverty declined or is it that
figures are fudged? Time for the States to answer.
* * * *
Modi Gets A
Drubbing
Gujarat’s Narendra Modi has reason to
worry. The BJP has suffered a major upset in the Junagadh Municipal Corporation
election, with its rival, the Congress winning 26 of the 51 seats. Its own
strength has slumped from 35 seats to 21. Modi had made the elections, the
first since his party’s poor performance in the Lok Sabha, a prestige issue.
Party Ministers, MPs and MLAs all camped there for the campaign. The BJP even
distributed booklets of the Sachar Committee report --- which is otherwise
criticized --- to highlight how the Muslims were doing well in Gujarat. The party even went in for its first-ever
experiment in Gujarat of fielding five Muslims
with an eye on the 15 per cent Muslim vote bank.
Apparently, Modi’s experiment of discarding the hardliner
hindutva image has failed to work. He even removed 29 of the 35 sitting BJP
councillors and put up new faces. Of these all the five Muslim candidates lost
badly. Nor did the fresh faces muster a majority. In fact, his calculated move
to woo the “nationalist Muslims” boomeranged and Junagadh with a traditional
hindutva votebank deserted the BJP. On hindsight, Modi also failed to see the
writing on the wall, after his party lost the Rajkot parliamentary seat, for the first time
in two decades. Is it the beginning of the end of the Modi era, as claimed by
Congress leaders. Guess, Modi will have to concentrate on State politics rather
than eye the national platform.
* * * *
New Incumbents In
Raj Bhavans
Last week saw a change of guard in five Raj Bhavans. Some
well-thought out planning appears to have gone into the appointments of the new
Governors. Retired civil servant B L Joshi, who was initially handpicked by 10
Janpath as Delhi’s
Lt Governor, was moved from Uttarakhand to politically-sensitive Uttar Pradesh.
Veteran Congress leader and a Constitutional lawyer Devendra Nath Dwivedi has
been sent to BJP-ruled Gujarat. Margaret Alva,
who lost the recent parliamentary elections, has been accommodated in
Uttarakhand. Congress veteran and former Rajasthan Chief Minister Jagannath
Pahadia, is the new governor of Haryana. Yet another Congress old hand Sibtey
Razi has been shifted from Jharkhand to Assam
and likewise, K Shankarnarayanan from Nagaland to Ranchi. With these posts taken, all eyes are
now on the prized Governorships of Maharashtra and Goa.
* * * *
BSP-Cong War In UP
Hots Up
The turf war in Uttar Pradesh between the Congress and
Mayawati’s BSP continues to get uglier. Back in her ransacked and burnt house
in Lucknow, State
Congress Chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi, who is out on bail has warned of launching a
statewide agitation against the “high-handedness” of the UP Government. Her and
Rahul Gandhi’s regret over the comment “Will Mayawati settle for a compensation
of Rs 1 crore if she were raped,” appears to be best forgotten. Importantly, she
has lodged a fresh petition in the Allahabad High Court seeking a CBI inquiry
into the arson at her residence. The move is obviously aimed at exposing
Mayawati’s wayward ways-- of rewarding a trusted worker, Lucknow BSP chief
Intezar Abidi Hussain, accused in the same case. On Sunday last, Behenji appointed him as Chairman of the Lal Bahadur
Shastri Ganna Kisan Sansthan, which entitles him to a Minister of State rank, a
monthly salary of 30,000, an official car with a red beacon and security guards!
Who will have the last laugh?
* * * *
Batla House Lie
Nailed
The communally-motivated controversy over the Batla House
encounter in Delhi
a week after the serial blasts in the Union Capital last September has
mercifully been laid to rest. The National Human Rights Commission has given a
clean chit to the Delhi Police, stating that “the police party engaged in the
encounter had fired at the alleged terrorists in self-defence.” Remember, two
Muslim youth, Ameen and Saijid, occupants of a flat in Batla House, were killed
in the encounter. The Commission conducted the probe on a complaint of NGO Real
Cause questioning the police vision and asserting that it was a plot to malign
the Muslim youth. The Commission has also held that Inspector Mohan Sharma, who
died leading the encounter, was killed by the terrorists’ bullets and not as a
result of inter-departmental rivalry. A mischievous lie has been nailed.
---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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