Flyover toll is 24, murder charges against construction company

Heart-wrenching cries of relatives taking custody of the dead and anguished kins waiting for the latest update on the grievously injured were the recurrent scenes in hospitals here as the toll in Kolkata’s worst flyover tragedy rose to 24 on Friday.

Among the dead were three women while one body was too mutilated to ascertain the gender. Sixteen of the 67 rescued battled for life in hospitals, a day after an under-construction flyover collapsed, crushing people and flattening vehicles in the congested Posta area.

Three of the deceased were 25 years old while six others were in their 30s. The ghastly tragedy left behind a trail of devastation and raised unanswered questions about a project that was on for seven years.

Asha Joshi, 65, was the oldest among the dead, the West Bengal government said.

Relatives of Sabana Bano, who perished at the Medical College and Hospital, were inconsolable.

“She had called us repeatedly from her mobile after she got trapped when the bridge collapsed. She pleaded that we rescue her but we could not do anything,” moaned a family member.

Three bodies were still to be identified.

Going into the reasons for the flyover crash, a government statement said: “It is apprehended that one cantilever pier no 40 has shifted due to which two spans covering three piers were affected.”

Meanwhile, the police filed murder charges against top officials of the joint venture company, Hyderabad-based IVRCL Infrastructure, which was executing the flyover project and detained at least 10 of its employees.

“The charges brought against the company include murder, attempt to murder and criminal conspiracy. So far 10 people, including R.K. Gopal Nanduri, regional business head, have been detained,” Joint Commissioner of Police Debashish Boral said.

Three of them – senior assistant general manager M. Mallikarjun, structural manager Pradip Kumar and assistant manager (administration) D. Majumdar – were subsequently arrested.

A 23-member special investigation team (SIT) has been set up to probe the disaster. A police team reached the company headquarters in Hyderabad to question its officials.

The chief engineer and an executive engineer of the Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority – the state government unit in charge of the JNNURM project – have been placed under suspension.

An IANS correspondent who visited the site found cranes busy clearing mounds of debris, dust rising from ongoing demolition and fear of eviction loomed large on those living in the vicinity.

The area is still littered with shattered glass and splinters of iron and steel. There were also plastic bottles, a slipper and a children’s notebook, strewn next to a truck.

With the government asking 62 families in houses close to the spot to vacate their premises for the removal of the collapsed span, the residents were frantically searching for new addresses.

Many of the residents of the sardine-packed multi-storeyed houses and numerous commercial establishments lining K.K. Tagore Street – right under the flyover – were still in a state of shock.

“I get goose-bumps every time there is a loud noise… This used to be a bustling route. I hope the authorities deal with the mess swiftly and avoid another disaster,” said Hari Shaw, caretaker of a small temple.

Army teams which had been carrying out rescue operations have returned to the barracks.

The KMDA has ordered the immediate inspection of the flyover to ascertain its safety and stability.

A petition was filed in the Calcutta High Court for a court-monitored probe into the tragedy.

Filed before the bench of Chief Justice Manjula Chellur, the PIL (public interest litigation) seeks a CBI investigation as well as a panel of experts from IIT Kharagpur to probe the causes for the flyover collapse.

With the ruling Trinamool Congress facing flak, it field its local MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay, who argued the project was flawed since its inception during the Left Front’s tenure but could not be discarded or remodelled due to financial implications.

The Bharatiya Janata Party sought a CBI probe, calling the incident an “act of fraud protected by the West Bengal government”.

Source : IndianMediaBook - Current Affairs

Pathankot mastermind doesn’t qualify as a terrorist: China reiterates at UN

China’s Permanent Representative Liu Jieyi has reiterated Beijing’s claim that Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohamed (JeM) chief Masood Azhar does not qualify as a terrorist who would have to face UN sanctions.

Speaking to reporters here Friday after assuming the rotating presidency of the Security Council, Liu asserted that Azhar did not meet “the Council’s requirements” to be considered a terrorist.

Asked about China exercising a virtual veto at the UN sanctions committee by putting a hold on Azhar being declared a terrorist subject to a range of punitive actions, Liu made a general statement: “Individuals and orgnisations on the sanctions list of the United Nations would have to meet the requirements. It is the responsibility of all the members of the Council to make sure that each requirement is followed.”

Pressed further about in what way Azhar fell short of being a terrorist, Liu only said: “The Council’s requirements.” Implying he did not meet them, Liu would not go into details.

Following the January attack on the Pathankot Air Force base, India had requested the sanctions committee in February to include Azhar in its list of terrorists. The action by the panel, popularly known as the 1267 committee after the Council’s resolution number setting it up, would have required Pakistan and other countries to freeze his assets and ban his travel.

At the committee’s meeting on Monday, all the other 14 members of the Council supported placing Azhar on the list, but China put a hold on it, which is in effect a veto. The exercise of veto through holds by permanent members in the sanctions committee falls into gray area as it appears to extend the right beyond the Council where the veto is recognised by the Charter. India has called it a “hidden veto”.

This is the second time that China has come to the aid of Pakistani terrorists in the sactions committee. Last June, China blocked India’s demand for taking action under the Council’s anti-terrorism resolutions against Pakistan for freeing Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, the Lashkar-e-Taiba mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attack in which 166 people were killed.

India has criticised Beijing’s latest action to prop up Pakistan-based terrorists. External Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Vikas Swarup said Friday it was “incomprehensible” that while JeM was listed by the sanctions committee as far back as 2001 “for its terror activities and links to the al-Qaeda, the designation of the group’s main leader, financier and motivator has been put on a technical hold”.

In the statement issued in Washington, where he is accompanying Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Swarup said the committee’s “working methods, based on the principles of unanimity and anonymity, is leading the Committee to adopt a selective approach to combating terrorism. This does not reflect well on the determination that the international community needs to display to decisively defeat the menace of terrorism”.

Source : IndianMediaBook - Current Affairs

Modi vows to deploy technology against nuclear terrorism

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed to develop and deploy technology to defend against nuclear terrorism as President Barack Obama called on global leaders to jointly confront the growing threat of the Islamic State.

He made the pledge Friday at the conclusion of a two-day Nuclear Security Summit that brought 50 world leaders to Washington to discuss how to prevent terrorists and other non state actors from gaining access to nuclear materials.

Modi had at a working dinner for the summiteers hosted by Obama Thursday night highlighted the global nature of terrorism and how state actors working with nuclear traffickers and terrorists presented the greatest risk.

India, he said at the plenary session Friday, will continue to accord a high national priority to nuclear security through strong institutional framework, independent regulatory agency and trained and specialised manpower.

He also asserted that India will counter nuclear smuggling and strengthen the national detection architecture for nuclear and radioactive material with a dedicated counter-nuclear smuggling team.

India will also host a meeting of the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism in 2017.

In a session on counter terrorism at the summit held under the shadow of Brussels and Lahore terror attacks, world leaders discussed ways to prevent militant groups from obtaining nuclear materials that could be used to make a “dirty bomb”.

“There is no doubt that if these madmen ever got their hands on a nuclear bomb or nuclear material, they would certainly use it to kill as many innocent people as possible,” said Obama hosting his fourth and last such summit.

“We need to do even more to prevent the flow of foreign terrorist fighters,” he told the world leaders discussing the ongoing fight against the Islamic State at Friday’s closing session.

“We all have a role to play. We’re all going to have to do more when it comes to intelligence-sharing,” said Obama. “We simply cannot afford to have critical intelligence not being shared as needed-whether between governments or within governments.”

“Looking around this room, I see nations that represent the overwhelming majority of humanity-from different regions, races, religions, cultures,” he said.

“The fight against ISIL will continue to be difficult, but, together, we are making real progress, and I’m absolutely confident that we will prevail and destroy this vile organization,” he said.

A Communiqué issued after the summit said “the threat of nuclear and radiological terrorism remains one of the greatest challenges to international security, and the threat is constantly evolving.”

The communiqué reaffirmed “that measures to strengthen nuclear security will not hamper the rights of States to develop and use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.”

“More work remains to be done to prevent non-state actors from obtaining nuclear and other radioactive materials, which could be used for malicious purposes,” it said.

The summit also resolved to implement several action plans “in our continued collective determination to ensure political momentum and to continuously strengthen nuclear security at national, regional, and global levels.”

A joint statement on strengthening global nuclear security said sustained action and ambition on nuclear security was needed to address continuing and evolving nuclear security challenges.

To this end the summit resolved to establish a Nuclear Security Contact Group asked with discussing a broad range of nuclear security-related issues, including identifying emerging trends that may require more focused attention.

It is also tasked with promoting and assessing implementation of nuclear security commitments, developing and maintaining linkages to nongovernmental experts and nuclear industry and determining any additional steps in support of these goals.

Source : IndianMediaBook - Current Affairs

Mobile app on Kerala polls launched

Ahead of the Kerala assembly election on May 16, a Kochi-based company on Saturday launched a mobile app that allows users to access a large amount of poll related information in Malayalam and English.

Designed for Android smart phones, ‘My Election’ is a free to download app and enables access to an encyclopaedic amount of election-related information, said Bobby Elanjickal, managing director, Lamda Media Solutions, the company that launched the app.

The app will allow users to access the details of candidates, specifically of their own constituency, and their past achievements irrespective of their political backgrounds.

The users can also access the history of all Kerala assembly elections since 1957 with the information available in both Malayalam and English.

Users can register on the app with personal details, including their district, when they first log in.

“The app is simple to use and acts as a knowledge-sharing platform for the voters. Moreover, elections in Kerala always generate nostalgic feelings among the expatriates. The diaspora can now get live updates of the polls on their handsets,” said Elanjickal.

The app will also serve as a campaign vehicle for the candidates who will be provided with specific IDs through which they can access the server and add details to their profiles.

This will allow them to upload videos and photos.

Subscribers of the app can ‘like’ candidate pages and feeds to receive priority notifications on any updates made by them.

“Every update related to the election can be accessed though a single touch. The language of application can be switched to either English or Malayalam,” said Elanjickal.

The ‘My Election’ app, which is an interactive platform, also offers users the chance to participate in a poll prediction contest with attractive gifts for winners.

“As an event management firm, we have done several campaign works for different candidates in the past elections. In the era of social media and its instant impact on voters, we chose this platform through which every candidate can competitively campaign,” he added.

The mobile app is available in the Google Play Store.

Apart from the application, Lamda Media Solutions has also launched a website, www.myelection.vote, with the same features as that of the mobile app.

Source : IndianMediaBook - Current Affairs

Bengal, Assam polls: EC bars ads by parties without pre-certification

The Election Commission on Saturday barred political parties and candidates in West Bengal and Assam from giving any print media advertisement on April 3 and April 4 for the first phase of the assembly polls, without pre-certification.

In a statement, the poll watchdog said instances of advertisements of “offending and misleading nature” published in the print media have been brought to the notice of the commission in the past.

“Such advertisements, in the last stage of the election, vitiates the election. The affected candidates and parties will not have opportunity of providing clarification/rebuttal in such cases.”

To prevent repetition of such instances and ensure “no untoward incident takes place because of any inflammatory, misleading or hate advertisements,” the commission issued a notice directing “no political party, candidate or any other organisation or person shall publish any advertisement in the print media on April 3 and April 4, in connection with the first phase in Bengal and Assam.”

“… unless the contents of the advertisements proposed to be published are pre-certified by political parties, candidates etc. from MCMC (Media certification and Monitoring Committee) at the state and district level as may be the case.”

Source : IndianMediaBook - Current Affairs