agencies
Paris, 2 June: Top seed Novak Djokovic inflicted a 6-2, 6-2, 6-3 defeat on Grigor Dimitrov to reach the second week of the French Open, while Rafael Nadal was bogged down in drama before securing his own hard-fought win on Saturday. 
Djokovic calmly destroyed his young Bulgarian opponent for the second time in four weeks on clay with the excitement factor barely moving the meter. He did need treatment on his right elbow late in the third set.  “I played well from the start. I came out aggressive,” Djokovic said. “I know from Madrid (last month) that Grigor is a tough opponent. I’m pleased with how it went for me.” It was totally the opposite story for Nadal, who struggled for nearly three hours to get a grip on the unpredictable, dangerous game of Fabio Fognini before finally salvaging a 7-6 (7-5), 6-4, 6-4 win. 
“If I want to have any chance, I really need to play better,” the Spaniard said. “It&’s always the same: when you win without playing your best, you have the chance to play better.” Nadal was made to work, with the first two sets lasting a combined two hours. Even in the third, with Nadal starting to take control, the result was not assured. The third seed was broken to love while serving for victory and needed to break Fognini for a fifth time to escape with the win.  “If I was playing the right way all the time, I wouldn’t have suffered as much as I did today. But that&’s the sport,” Nadal said.
“I didn’t play my best. I played for moments well, and in other moments I didn’t play well.” Nadal will face Kei Nishikori, who beat Frenchman Benoit Paire 6-3, 6-7 (3-7), 6-4, 6-1 to become the first Japanese man to reach the Paris fourth round since 1938. 
 The day&’s real excitement was generated in the marathon won by 35-year-old Tommy Haas over John Isner 7-5, 7-6 (6-4), 4-6, 6-7 (10-12), 10-8. The four-hour, 37-minute epic was highlighted by a Haas fightback after dropping the fourth set despite earning a dozen match points — all saved by Isner.
But Isner, whose serve is his strong point, ran out of fitness as the fifth set progressed and bowed out wearily with a lazy return wide. Isner played the longest match in history at Wimbledon 2010, which ended 70-68 in the fifth set to the American.French seventh seed Richard Gasquet advanced over Russian Nikolay Davydenko 6-4, 6-4, 6-3, while Mikhail Youzhny knocked out eighth seed Janko Tipsarevic 6-4, 6-4, 6-3. Swiss Stanislas Wawrinka, the number nine, beat Jerzy Janowicz 6-3, 6-7 (2-7), 6-3, 6-3. Women&’s holder Maria Sharapova dodged a bullet as she made a second-set comeback to hold off China&’s Jie Zheng 6-1, 7-5.  The second seed found herself in the danger zone against Jie, a 29-year-old ranked 43rd.  Sharapova stormed through the opening set but suddenly began making enough errors to find herself down 1-4 in the second. But the four-time Grand Slam winner engineered a storming fightback, overcoming another hiccup as she dropped serve again after breaking her opponent for 5-4.  But a final break assured Sharapova a place in the fourth round, where she faces Australian Open semi-finalist Sloane Stephens, a 6-4, 6-7 (5-7), 6-3 winner over New Zealand&’s Marina Erakovic.
“1-4 is not a score that I want to be in, but I am happy with the way I fought back, and I found a way to win that second set without having to go into a third.” There was a scare for third seed Victoria Azarenka, with the Belarus player defeating France&’s Alize Cornet 4-6, 6-3, 6-1.
Azarenka dropped the first set but began the second with a break, slowly turning the tide on the way to the third-round win.
Two seeds lost, with American Jamie Hampton beating number seven Petra Kvitova 6-1, 7-6 (9-7) and Serb Jelena Jankovic putting out former finalist and ninth seed Samantha Stosur 3-6, 6-3, 6-4.
Mirza advances
Indo-American pairing of Sania Mirza and Bethanie Mattek-Sands advanced to the women’s doubles second round at Roland Garros here Saturday.
Playing on Court No.1, the seventh seeds defeated French duo of Alize Cornet and Virginie Razzano in straight sets in the first round. Sania-Bethanie won 6-3, 6-4 in one hour and 28 minutes.
Serves were regularly broken in both the sets, with the seventh seeds breaking one more than their opponents.
Sania, who had earlier lost in the first round of mixed doubles, along with her American partner broke the French girls five times in the match.  The winners will next face unseeded American pairing Lauren Davis and Megan Moulton-Levy in the next round.

cong, CPM, jdu united in protest; BJP sees no wrong

statesman news service 
NEW DELHI, 4 JUNE: A day after the full Bench of the Central Information Commission (CIC) brought political parties under the ambit of the Right to Information Act (RTI), several leading parties, including the ruling Congress, the CPI-M and the JD-U, fiercely opposed the CIC’s ruling, making it clear that it would be “unacceptable” to them.  
The CPI-M asked the Congress-led UPA government to convene an all-party meeting to discuss the “serious” implications of the CIC order. 
JD-U chief and convener of the BJP-led NDA, Mr Sharad Yadav, asked the government to “scuttle” the CIC’s move, indicating that his party will raise the issue in the forthcoming monsoon session of Parliament.
The principal Opposition BJP, however, saw nothing wrong in the CIC’s order, saying it was not against anything that will bring transparency in public life. The BJP, however, refrained from clearly welcoming the CIC’s ruling.
The Congress camp sent out signals that it might not opt for challenging the CIC order in the High Court or the Supreme Court. Instead, the Congress is exploring the option of amending the RTI Act to put political parties explicitly on the list of organisations and bodies exempt from the purview of the Act. This might be done as early as during the monsoon session, due to begin next month.
In a detailed statement, the CPI-M said it “cannot accept” the CIC’s order. “This decision is based on a fundamental misconception about the role of political parties in a parliamentary democracy,” the CPM said, adding, “This will interfere with and hamper the functioning of a political party.”
The CPM described as “untrue” the CIC’s reasoning that “six national parties are substantially financed by the Central government and therefore they are held to be public authorities under the Act”.
The CIC had stated in its ruling that six national parties ~ Congress, BJP, NCP, CPI-M, CPI and BSP ~ have been substantially funded indirectly by the Central government and they have the character of public authority under the RTI Act as they discharge public functions.
The Union finance minister, Mr P Chidambaram, today said the Central Information Commission’s order declaring political parties as public authorities was “rather an unusual interpretation” of the Right to Information Act.
Answering questions after a Union Cabinet meeting, the minister told reporters the order describing political parties as public authorities “strains credulity”. He said, the “intention” of the Act was to cover public authorities and not political parties. The information and broadcasting minister, Mr Manish Tewari, said the Congress was not against transparency.

‘RTI objectives can’t be allowed to run riot’

External affairs minister, Mr Salman Khurshid, said it is important to “keep practical control of RTI objectives as they can’t be allowed to run riot”. Answering a query on the CIC’s ruling, Mr Khurshid said:

There is a logic of the RTI, which is periodically reflected in its orders. That logic of the RTI Act would be gradually tested at all levels, including at levels of the courts…But it is important to keep practical control of RTI objectives because they can’t be allowed to run riot as the purpose is that people who hold public offices must be accountable to the world and to ordinary citizens…There are other areas one can go and seek information, but for that one has to go through a procedure. It is an evolving process, a balance between public interest of one kind and of another kind must be maintained.

statesman news service 
KOLKATA, 10 JUNE: Indians separated from their partners and children because of harsh family visa rules instituted in the UK about a year ago, have been given a glimmer of hope, after a cross-party group of MPs and peers there recommended a review of the current restrictions. 
A report released today by the parliamentary group on migration’s inquiry committee shows that families are being torn apart because of a rule that British citizens, who want to sponsor a partner from outside the European Economic Area national to join them, have to earn at least £18,600 a year. 
The government should review this minimum income requirement and ensure that decisions are made keeping children’s best interests in mind, the group recommended in a report released today.  Mr Vishal Sharma, who lives in McCluskiegunj in Jharkhand, is one of those affected by the rules. He is married to a UK citizen and has a baby in the UK who he has only ever seen on Skype. He said the recommendations are “good news for everyone” but whether the government will follow them or not is unclear. His family is keeping their options open still, looking around the world for a country where they might be able to live and work together, he said.  
The committee heard more than 175 submissions from people affected by the rules, including a woman who had been separated from her husband and five-month-old baby, meaning she was no longer able to breast-feed the child.  It also heard from an Australian businessman with millions in assets, who couldn’t live with his unemployed British wife and children because his earnings don’t count under the rules.  Home Office data shows that of those granted non-EEA partner visas in 2010, 16 per cent were from Pakistan, 10 per cent from India, 6 per cent from the United States, 5 per cent from Nepal and 4 per cent from Bangladesh. During the inquiry, a number of organisations highlighted how Asian families were hard hit because they have lower earnings than the national average. A local government worker in the Northern city of Bradford said: “The income requirement had already had a disproportionate impact on the local Pakistani community,” the Committee’s report said.  The income threshold might have had a negative impact on integration in the UK, organisations also told the committee. “A representative of a Scottish organisation working with Asian women told the Committee that the new family migration rules had resulted in some people feeling ‘that this country doesn’t want them’,” the report said. An organisation working with a Bengali community in London, meanwhile, criticised the decision not to count pledges of support from sources other than the spouse as this could “disadvantage people from some Asian communities where family support for young couples is common.”

statesman news service
KOLKATA, 10 JUNE : The commissioner of  police, Howrah, Ajay Ranade has been directed by Mr Justice Sanjib Banerjee of  Calcutta High Court today to be present in the court tomorrow. The  commissioner of  police, Howrah is going to be asked to explain why police have not taken action against a local club occupying a plot of land owned by two petitioners in Salkia despite an instruction from the Chief Minister’s office to take steps in this matter and inform it .
"How can you submit that the club cannot be evicted as it is registered ?" the court asked the state counsel while hearing the matter during the day. "Are you not acting on behalf of the state" it further asked. 
Way back in 2001, the two cottah plot had been  purchased by Ms Kalyani  Mukherjee and Mr Asim Mukherjee while the club was locate on it, the petitioner’s counsel, Ramchandra Guchait submitted. When the owners of the  plot at 7/4 Jagadish Chandra Veda Vyas Lane had written to Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee seeking her intervention in getting possession, the CM had asked the commissioner of  police, Howrah to take steps.

agencies
ISLAMABAD/TEHERAN, 2 JUNE: Three Afghan Taliban interlocutors are on a fence-mending mission to Iran as part of an effort to remove misunderstandings, according to a media report today.
Two Afghan Taliban officials confirmed that three of the group’s leaders ~ believed to be drawn from a negotiating team based in Qatar ~ are holding talks with Iranian officials, The Express Tribune reported. “The Taliban will explain their policies and will allay the fears of Iran as it always had concerns about Taliban being Sunnis,” said one Taliban official who did not wish to be identified.
Syed Tayyeb Agha, Maulvi Shahabuddin Dilawar and Sher Muhammad Abbas Stanakzai are part of the delegation visiting Iran.
The Taliban officials said Teheran had invited the Afghan Taliban leaders for talks on future cooperation. They began the visit on Friday after approval by the top leadership of the Afghan Taliban. This is the first high-level and formal interaction between the two sides, the Taliban officials said. It is believed that Iran extended an invitation to the Afghan Taliban in order to have a role in any future process ahead of the 2014 endgame in Afghanistan.

Arrests at Iran presidential campaign rally
Security forces arrested several supporters of moderate presidential candidate Hassan Rowhani in Iran’s June 14 election after pictures of detained Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi were displayed at a meeting, websites reported today. Opposition website Kaleme.com reported seven arrests of participants in a ceremony in the Jamaran mosque in northern Teheran yesterday, with relatives saying “they were taken to Teheran’s Evin prison”.

press trust of india
MUMBAI, 2 JUNE: Troubles mounted for beleaguered Kingfisher Airlines with three more senior executives, including its chief information officer, quitting even as a section of its pilots threatened to restart their agitation over non-payment of salaries for last 10 months.
“The airlines’ chief information officer Saurav Sinha, flight operations head Capt. Ronald Nagar and cabin crew head Ajit Bhagchandani have put in their papers recently,” Kingfisher Airlines sources said.
Their resignations come close on the heels of Kingfisher’s executive vice-president Hitesh Patel and ground handling chief Murali Ramachandran reportedly parting ways with liquor baron Vijay Mallya’s grounded airline.
The private carrier, which has not paid its employees since August last year, has been grounded since October. Its air operations permit or the flying licence lapsed on 31 December last year, although it can be renewed within two years.
Last month, Kingfisher Airlines had submitted a fresh revival plan to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), seeking permission to resume operations. But it has not yet been accepted by the regulator. “Besides these executives, a few pilots and engineers have also quit the carrier in the last one month as they did not see any hope of its revival,” the sources said.
Meanwhile, Kingfisher Airlines’ Mumbai-based pilots are planning to revive their agitation over non-payment of salary and are likely to hold a meeting here tomorrow to chalk out their action plan, sources said.
“Our July 2012 salary was paid in March and since then we have not received any payment. The management is keeping quiet on when it will pay our dues. We have called an internal meeting on Monday to chart out our course of action,” an airline pilot said.
Saddled with an over Rs 7,000-crore bank debt, besides dues to various stakeholders, the airline reported net loss of Rs 2,141.80 crore for the March quarter of the previous fiscal. For the entire fiscal 2012-13, the net loss stood at Rs 4,001.12 crore.
Vijay Mallya, UB loss `225 cr commission
NEW DELHI, 2 JUNE: Industrialist Vijay Mallya and his UB Group’s holding company have failed to get commissions worth about Rs 225 crore for providing guarantees to the lenders of Kingfisher Airlines, as its lenders asked the carrier not to make any such payments. These commissions pertain to the aggregate payments for a period from 1 January 2011 to 31 March 2013.
The disclosure has been made by the grounded airline itself.
“The consortium bankers pursuant to the RBI’s guidelines directed the company (Kingfisher) not to make payment of commission and reverse all entries relating to commission to the guarantors for issuing guarantees at the request of the company to its bankers with effect from 1 January 2011,” Kingfisher said. pti
 

press trust of india
NEW DELHI, 2 JUNE: Drug major Sun Pharmaceutical Industries is said to be in talks to buy Sweden’s pharmaceutical firm Meda AB in a deal worth up to $5 billion, according to media reports.
Sun Pharma has been in talks with several banks to raise funds to buy out Meda for as much as $5 billion as part of its expansion plans, Wall Street Journal has reported.
A spokesperson of Sun Pharma refused to comment on the reports, while e-mailed queries to Meda remained unanswered.
The Mumbai-based firm had, however, last week termed the reports of a possible deal as “speculation”.
“We have absolutely no comment on market speculation. Please further note that since we have large cash and cash equivalents, we are constantly linked to rumours of international acquisitions,” the company had said in a filing to the Bombay Stock Exchange.
Meda is an international speciality pharmaceutical company with product portfolio in three main segments ~ speciality products, over the counter drugs and branded generics.
The Dilip Shanghvi-led pharmaceutical major has a history of acquisitions. In November 2012, Sun Pharma had inked a pact to acquire US-based DUSA Pharmaceuticals for around $230 million (around Rs 1,250 crore).
In December the same year, the company’s arm Caraco Pharma had entered into a definitive agreement with Japanese drug maker Takeda Pharmaceuticals’ to buy US-based generics subsidiary URL Pharma.
In 2010, after nearly four years of legal wrangling, Sun Pharma had acquired a controlling stake in Israeli firm Taro Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.
The Mumbai-based firm had signed a $454-million merger deal with Taro in 2007, which was terminated a year later by the Israeli firm unilaterally. After this, both the companies had filed various legal suits against each other.
In November last year, Sun Pharma had said it was looking forward to larger acquisitions as a part of its expansion plans.
“We continue to look for opportunities to expand our business in all the key geographies and markets we are focused on. We are looking at acquiring businesses hopefully larger then DUSA going forward,” Sun Pharma managing director Dilip Shanghvi had said during a conference call last year.
Mumbai-based drug major posted a consolidated net profit of Rs 3,008.06 crore for fiscal 2012-13 as against Rs 2,656.69 crore in the previous fiscal.

press trust of india
MUMBAI, 2 JUNE: As the Sebi deadline ends tomorrow for listed private sector entities to achieve minimum 25 per cent public shareholding, promoters of at least nine firms, including Tata Comm and Essar Ports, would offer to sell shares worth a cumulative amount of over Rs 700 crore to meet the norms.
The other companies slated for sale of promoter shares tomorrow to meet the guidelines include BGR Energy Systems, Omaxe, Kartik Investment Trust, Lords Chloro Alkali Ltd, Marathwada Refractories, Rama Phosphates and Balashri Commercial Ltd. Together, these nine companies are expected to offer to sell shares worth an estimated amount of more than Rs 700 crore tomorrow. Besides, some more companies are expected to announce their offers to meet the deadline.
While the offers for sale (OFS) of Tata Communications and BGR Energy would be conducted on the platforms of both the BSE and NSE, the remaining offers would be held on either of the two bourses.
As per the Sebi’s minimum public holding norms, all listed entities from the private sector are required to achieve 25 per cent or more public holding by 3 June 2013. For the public sector entities, the minimum public holding of 10 per cent is required to be achieved by 8 August 2013.
The norms were announced three years ago in 2010, but most of the non-compliant companies began working towards meeting these guidelines in the recent months only.

statesman news service
KOLKATA, 2 JUNE: Results of the Higher Secondary examination, in which 7,71,360 candidates appeared this year, will be declared tomorrow at 9.30 a.m.
Candidates will be able to check their results online after 11 am and mark-sheets will be distributed to schools through 51 distribution centres across the state.
A merit list of the top 100 candidates will be published by the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education; it will also publish a separate merit list of the top 10 minority candidates.
This year, candidates will also be able to check their percentile score. Individual subject scores and grades, as well as the total score and grade along with the percentile, will be available on websites. However, mark-sheets will not have percentile scores, as the latter may change if marks are revised during the review/scrutiny process.
Where to look up

Websites on which candidates can get  their results:
http://wbchse.nic.in
http://wbresults.nic.in
http://results.banglarmukh.gov.in
www.calcuttatelephones.com www.exametc.com,
www,examresults.india.com,
http://www.indiaresults.com,
http://www.examresults.net,
http://www.schools9.com,
www.clickcollegestreet.com,
www.educationgateway.co.in, www.manabadi.com,
www.westbengaleducation.net,
http://results.westbengaleducation.net,
www.kolkataeducation.net,
www.vidyavision.com,
www.myresultplus.com,
www.resultsout.com
To access results via sms,
type WB12<space>roll number and send it to 54242, 52070
(Airtel users), 58888700 ( Vodafone users), 58888 ( others); 5676750, 56263, 56767999, 56263 (all networks).
To access results through IVRS,
call 505101096 (all operators)
1255596 (BSNL)
Candidates can also pre-register on www.exametc.com with their roll number and mobile number to receive their marks via sms.
 

indo-asian news service
CHENNAI/NEW DELHI, 10 JUNE: Tamil Nadu Police today arrested city hotelier Vikram Aggarwal after questioning him for around seven hours in connection with betting during the Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket matches, said an official.
Crime Branch Criminal Investigation Department (CBCID) Deputy Superintendent of Police N Venkataraman said: "Mr Aggarwal had money dealings with Uttam C Jain alias Kitty, a bookie."
The bookie also used Mr Aggarwal’s hotel room for betting operations.
Police said Mr Aggarwal had information about pitch conditions and other details pertaining to IPL matches.
They decided to take Mr Aggarwal into custody as he had made numerous calls to many numbers whose ownership is questionable.
The CBCID issued summons on Friday to Mr Aggarwal to appear before them as bookies had operated out of his hotel room.
Known as Victor in betting circles, he had also used the phone connection in his wife’s name to get in touch with the bookies. The hotelier is said to have links with Bollywood actor Vindoo Dara Singh, arrested by Mumbai police for betting.
Mr Aggarwal is said to be a friend of Mr Gurunath Meiyappan, the son-in-law of Indian cricket board president N Srinivasan. 
 
Bail granted to Sreesanth, 17 others
A Delhi court today granted bail to suspended cricketer S Sreesanth and his Rajasthan Royals teammates Ankeet Chavan and Ajit Chandila who have been booked under the provisions of Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) in the IPL spot fixing scandal.
Additional Session Judge V K Khanna also granted bail to 15 bookies on personal bonds of Rs 50,000 each.

We can’t go on smelling foul in everything: SC 
NEW DELHI, 10 JUNE: Observing that it could not go on "smelling foul" in everything, the Supreme Court today asked a petitioner as to what proof he had that pharma major Ranbaxy was marketing in India the alleged adulterated drugs that it sold in the USA.
"What is the material to straight away allege that drugs being marketed (in India) were part of the same consignments which were sent to the USA," the apex court Bench of Mr Justice Gyan Sudha Misra and Mr Justice Madan B Lokur asked public interest litigation filer advocate Mr Manohar Lal Sharma.
Mr Sharma in his petition sought the closure of operations of Ranbaxy in India. The court asked Mr Sharma to give definite material that the same sub-standard drugs were being sold by the company in India. ians

poulomi ghosh
KOLKATA, 2 JUNE: The state government is yet to allot any college to the two new universities, one named after Kazi Nazrul in Asansol and another after Panchanan Barma in Cooch Behar, though both of them will start functioning from the coming academic session.
Since this has never happened with new universities that have come up in the recent past, it has made the position of the colleges, supposed to come under the predetermined jurisdiction of the new universities, uncertain.
For the time being, it has been decided that both the universities will start with post-graduate departments from this August. The matter of affiliation of colleges will be decided later.  According to the Kazi Nazrul University Act, 2012, the district of Birbhum and sub-division of Durgapur and Asansol in the district of Burdwan will come under its jurisdiction reducing the present academic overload on Burdwan University. A total of 34 colleges were supposed to be affiliated to it.
On the other hand, the Cooch Behar Panchanan Barma University will reduce the pressure of North Bengal University, taking care of the district of Cooch Behar and sub-division of Alipurduar in the district of Jalpaiguri. A total of 25 colleges were to be affiliated under it.
Meanwhile, the resentment that has cropped up among the colleges of Birbhum is that geographically Burdwan University is nearer to some of the Birbhum colleges than the new university at Asansol.
"The higher education department has not informed us anything about the transfer of our college from Burdwan University to Kazi Nazrul University. Hence, the colleges do not have any official reaction. But it is true that Burdwan University is of great repute while the new university will have to start from the scratch. But since we have no information,  it can be assumed that it will take time," said the principal of a Bolpur college.
Many colleges in Birbhum district, however, apprehend that the proposed transfer may affect admissions in the colleges from this year.
A similar situation took place when Bidhan Nagar Government college got affiliated to West Bengal State University from University of Calcutta (CU) in 2008.  The college authorities protested the decision and even wrote to the higher education department urging it to bring the college back under CU. But the plea went unheard.
Taking lessons from such complications, this time, the part of college allotment has been postponed and the Vice-Chancellors have been asked to start with the post-graduation as Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wants these two universities to start functioning immediately. 
"At present these two universities do not have any infrastructure though the Bills were passed in July 2012, a year ago. The situation is even worse than what Sidho-Kanho-Birsa University and West Bengal State University had initially. There would have been severe protests from the colleges if the colleges were identified to be transferred under the new universities immediately," said an academic.

Of all political journeys Pakistan has witnessed, Mian Mohammad Nawaz Sharif&’s must rank among the most remarkable, writes abbas nasir

Sharif was 29 when his family-owned industrial empire, nationalised by ousted leader ZA Bhutto, was returned to them by military ruler Gen Ziaul Haq in 1978. By 1981, the bond between the two had been cemented further as Nawaz Sharif had been drafted in as the finance minister in the Punjab administration by the military governor Lt-Gen Ghulam Jilani Khan.
Of course in the 1985 party-less elections, the Sharif family scion bagged the biggest provincial prize when he became the chief minister. First as a student, then as a Karachi-based journalist, I watched his steady ascent to power from a distance only to come face to face with him in 1988.
Soon after the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI) was created in September 1988 to unite all right of centre parties in order to block the march to power of Benazir Bhutto, and years before Gen Hamid Gul&’s confession that he was responsible for its formation as DG ISI, it was clear to many of us that this was the case.
So, after a meeting at Jamaat-i-Islami leader Prof Ghafoor Ahmad&’s Karachi home, I put the charge to Sharif that IJI had been formed by the ISI. His rosy cheeks acquired more colour. Visibly angry, he only said: “Mein iss sawal kaa jawab dena zaroori nahin samajhta (I don’t think it necessary to answer that question)." He was quickly ushered away.
Despite the machinations of Hamid Gul & Co, the national elections saw PPP emerging as the largest single party. Benazir Bhutto&’s political Achilles heel, her spouse, was yet to become a factor. Had the provincial elections been held simultaneously with the National Assembly polls, Pakistan&’s political landscape could perhaps have been different.
PPP won the most seats from Punjab and could have quickly enthroned itself in Lahore also. But the gap between the two elections witnessed a vicious campaign run on malicious ethnic lines with the slogan: ‘Jaag Punjabi jag, teri pagg noon laga daag’ (Awaken O Punjabi, your honour is at stake).
This was an obvious reference to the Sharif-led IJI&’s dismal showing in Sindh where all stalwarts who ran on IJI tickets lost the elections, with the MQM (Karachi and Hyderabad) and PPP taking all but one Sindh seat.
The campaign was effective. The IJI clawed back some of the ground lost in the national elections and then with a friendly, all-powerful president, army and intel chiefs was able to take power in the critical Punjab province and become a launch pad for most anti-PPP activity.
The next I was to see Nawaz Sharif was two years later during the reign of (then) caretaker Sindh chief minister Jam Sadiq Ali when he addressed a press conference at the CM House. Some of us asked questions that Sharif, with the colour in his ample cheeks turning several shades darker, steered towards Mushahid Husain and Asif Vardag.
With the press conference over, Sharif walked over to where some of us were seated several rows back, shook our hands and said something to the effect that he was pleased to meet ‘robust, educated’ journalists before walking away.
His DG, Punjab Information Department, didn’t seem to agree. After his boss walked away, he lingered long enough to tell us in a tone dripping with contempt: “Kamal hai aap loag kaise sawal karte hein. Lahore mein to kissi ki jurrat nahin hotee” (Amazing, you ask such questions; nobody would dare to in Lahore).
In a city which produced journalists such as IA Rehman, Nisar Osmani, Mazhar Ali Khan, Husain Naqi and Aziz Siddiqui to name just a few in no particular order, it was amazing to us that the DG was saying what he was.
Mian Sahib won the next election. And several months into his prime ministerial stint headed to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Somehow the invitation was passed from the chief editor down to me, and I boarded the VVIP flight for the first (and gratefully the last) government-funded junket of my professional life.
“Mian Saab saade bande hege nein. Take-off toon badd sirif ekko e request hondee ae una dee: keema te porauntha (Mian Sahib is a very simple man. After take-off he has just one request: qeema, paratha)"; this is how the man in charge of catering on board described his boss to me.
When we stopped for a day in Zurich on our return, I was to discover another side of the prime minister. No, he wasn’t singing one of his reportedly favourite Bollywood&’s songs: ‘Kon he jo sapnon mein aaya’; it was his love of cars.
I got up early and headed out for a walk. Just beyond the porch, Mian Sahib&’s former neighbour and close family friend Mujibur Rahman (yes, the infamous Senator Saifur Rahman&’s younger brother) and Pakistan&’s main BMW importer then (you would recall the SROs which allowed hundreds of duty-free beamers in) was holding open the door of a flame red, BMW coupe.
Appearing eager to sink into the plush leather-upholstered seat, the prime minister saw me ogling at the car but since he was in my line of vision, he must have thought I, a journalist, was stunned that a poor country&’s leader was admiring such an expensive car. So he hurriedly moved away.
Not long after his return home, he was to be pushed out of power, only to stage another comeback, this time with such a ‘heavy’ mandate that he all but proclaimed himself amirul momineen. But his handpicked army chief, a near-suicidal adventurist, exiled him after overthrowing and jailing him.
His latest comeback is the stuff dreams are made of. His supporters say his conduct since signing the Charter of Democracy with Benazir Bhutto is a testament to his new-found maturity; that the vindictive, intolerant, power-hungry man was buried in exile. In his place, has been born the democrat, the statesman. We wait with bated breath to find out if that&’s true.

The writer is a former editor
of Dawn.

dawn/ann

Parties back Centre on Maoists
NEW DELHI, 10 JUNE:
Political parties today favoured the use of all legitimate means to “quell” armed insurgency, underlining that they cannot accept the “pernicious Maoist doctrine”. Ruling out any compromise on the issue, the parties in a unanimous resolution backed the Centre’s strategy against Maoists. sns
Jiah&’s friend held
MUMBAI, 10 JUNE: A week after Bollywood actress Jiah Khan committed suicide, her boyfriend Suraj Pancholi, son of an actor couple, was today arrested on the charge of abetment to suicide, cops said. pti
Monsoon arrives;
life hit in Mumbai 
KOLKATA/MUMBAI, 10 JUNE: Bengal received moderate rainfall today. With this, monsoon has finally hit Gangetic West Bengal, said the Meteorological office. For the next 24 hours Kolkata will receive heavy rainfall along with thunderstorm," said the Met office.  Meanwhile, the season’s first heavy monsoon showers paralysed Mumbai today. sns
 Photographs, reports on pages 3, 13 and 15

Building collapse
MUMBAI, 10 JUNE: An elderly woman was killed and four others were injured when a portion of a four-storey building caved in, apparently due to rain, in Mahim, central Mumbai today, a municipal officer said. “People are feared to have been trapped under the debris,” the officer said, adding that rescue operations are on. pti

Some say the Maoist attack on Congress leaders in Chhattisgarh is a wake-up call and others say it is time to have another look at the strategy to deal with Maoists; however, the problem needs to be tackled with top priority as innocent people cannot be allowed to get killed. Almost one-third of the country is eclipsed by the ‘red corridor’, under the parallel rule of the Maoists. The sad part is that it is the poor innocent people and the tribals who suffer in the bargain, because they have to deal with the Maoists on one side and the security forces on the other, and they often have to compromise with one or the other.
The Maoists get away with these killings because they try to lure the tribals by whatever means they can ~ by force, incentives and what not. The politicians also have to be blamed because at the time of elections, they try to get the tacit support of the Maoists. Telugu Desam Party supremo N.T. Rama Rao did it, Congress leaders Saikia and Rajashekhara Reddy did it and in recent times even Mamata Banerjee did it, to name a few.
The UPA launched the integrated action plan in February 2009 aimed at coordinated efforts in Naxal-affected states but this is obviously not working in the desired manner. Otherwise, why should the Centre blame the states and the states complain of not getting adequate Central support for tackling the Naxal menace?
There has been a lull in some parts of the country for some time. Karnataka was removed from the list of Maoist-affected states in 2010. In July 2011, the number of Naxal-affected districts was reduced to 83. In December 2011, the Centre announced that the number of Naxal killings had come down by 50 per cent compared to 2010. Now, the Maoist problem has elicited international attention and national focus once again, after the incident in Chattisgarh’s Darbha Ghati, in which more than two-dozen Congress leaders and workers were killed.
Why did the Maoists become so emboldened so as to attempt such a horrific attack on the political leadership in Chhattisgarh? The first reason is that Chhattisgarh is going in for elections in a few months. The two main parties ~ the Congress and the ruling BJP ~ are in a no-holds-barred fight for power. The Congress is desperate as it has been out of power in the state for the past ten years. Pundits have predicted that the Raman Singh government will come back as any anti-incumbency is almost absent. Maoists chose this time to strike because they know that there may be some slackness with a lame duck government in power.
Secondly, going by the letter written by the Naxalite leaders, it appears that they are worried about the weakening of the movement itself as the youth are not attracted by it any more. They wanted to send a signal to create a fear psychosis.
Thirdly, they might be feeling that the UPA at the Centre itself is weakened by the series of scams and the alliance is reduced to a minority after the parting of ways with two big allies ~ the DMK and the Trinamool Congress ~ some time ago.
But what should be worrying is that Maoists are targeting the political leaders and also security forces more and more instead of participating in the democratic process. In addition, economist prime minister Manmohan Singh should worry about how investors would put in money in areas where neither money nor lives is safe? What happens to the dreams of India emerging as a big economic power if this continues? Despite having identified the problem, why is it that these affected regions continue to be backward and lack proper communication facilities, roads and other connections, while the Maoists are able to function with modern communication equipment and most modern arms and ammunition?  Economic growth also continues to be uneven in these regions; as a result, the youth go astray and come under the influence of the Maoists.
The time has come for the Centre and the states to review the Naxalite strategy. Mamata Banerjee has tackled it successfully; earlier, Rajashekhara Reddy had contained the Naxalites. The review should be undertaken on an urgent basis and the Centre should convene a meeting of all Naxal-affected states at the level of the chief ministers soon.
Secondly, there should be complete coordination between the Centre and the states. Neither should attempt to pass the buck as is being witnessed, particularly in states where the Congress is not ruling. How can any government ~ state or Centre ~ shy away from the responsibility, claiming it is the fault of the other? After all, it is a national problem affecting so many states.
Thirdly, there should be balance and coordination between the security forces and the state police. Using the army should be the last option.
At the social level, much more needs to be done. The tribals should feel integrated and protected by the state. The misguided youth have to be brought back and this can be done only by providing jobs and better living conditions for them.
The Prime Minister recognises the Naxal menace as the single most dangerous threat to the development of the country. He has also admitted that what is required is a multi-pronged strategy including social, economic and political initiatives. The top priority should be to implement this effectively and that is where we are lacking. Unless this is done on an urgent basis, the problem will continue to haunt the country.

What should be worrying is that Maoists are targeting political leaders and security forces more and more instead of participating in the democratic process

WASHINGTON, 1 JUNE: A molecular cousin of party drug Ketamine may act as a quick and effective way to relieve depression, a new study has claimed.
GLYX-13 induces similar antidepressant results without the street drug side effects, reported a study published in Neuropsychopharmacology. Despite the availability of several different classes of antidepressant drugs such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), 30 to 40 per cent of adults are unresponsive to these medications. Moreover, SSRIs typically take weeks to work, which increases the risk for suicide.
Human clinical studies demonstrated that ketamine can ward off major and bipolar depressive symptoms within 2 hours of administration and last for several days. Ketamine is fraught with serious side effects including excessive sleepiness, hallucinations, and substance abuse behaviour. “Ketamine lit the field back up,” said Joseph Moskal, a molecular neurobiologist at Northwestern University and senior study author.
“Our drug, GLYX-13, is very different. It does not block the receptor ion channel, which may account for why it doesn’t have the same side effects,” said Moskal. Moskal&’s journey with GLYX-13 came about from his earlier days as a Senior Staff Fellow in NIMH&’s Intramural Research Programme. He created specific molecules, monoclonal antibodies, to use as new probes to understand pathways of learning and memory.
Some of the antibodies he created were for NMDA receptors. When he moved to Northwestern University, Moskal converted the antibodies to small protein molecules. Composed of only four amino acids, GLYX-13 is one of these molecules.
Previous electrophysiological and conditioning studies had suggested that GLYX-13, unlike ketamine, enhanced memory and learning in rats, particularly in the brain&’s memory hub or hippocampus.
GLYX-13 also produced analgesic effects. Using several rat behavioural and molecular experiments, Moskal&’s research team tested four compounds: GLYX-13, an inactive “scrambled” version of GLYX-13 that had its amino acids rearranged, ketamine, and the SSRI fluoxetine.
GLYX-13 and ketamine produced rapid acting (1 hour) and long-lasting (24 hour) antidepressant-like effects in the rats. Fluoxetine, an SSRI that typically takes from 2-4 weeks to show efficacy in humans, did not produce a rapid antidepressant effect in this study. pti

agencies
Cardiff, 1 June: West Indies scored 256 for nine in their allotted 50 overs against Australia at Sophia Gardens, Cardiff in their first warm-up tie of the 2013 ICC Champions Trophy on Saturday. After winning the toss and electing to bat first, West Indies lost their opener Devon Smith early in the fifth over of the innings. However, Jonathan Charles, in company of Darren Bravo resurrected their innings adding 65 runs for the second wicket partnership.
Charles fell leg before wicket to Clint McKay, who ended up with figures of three for 45. However, Bravo continued to bat in the same vein in company of the experienced Ramnaresh Sarwan. Darren Bravo struck 10 boundaries and two huge sixes in his patient knock of 86. He continued to lose partners at regular intervals as Sarwan, Dwayne Bravo and Denesh Ramdin fell in their twenties. The lower order couldn’t contribute much to the team’s cause as West Indies were restricted to 256. For Australia Mitchell Starc was the pick of the bowlers as he accounted for four wickets for only 29 runs in his seven overs.

press trust of india
NEW DELHI, 2 JUNE: Illegal weapons manufactured in Munger, Bihar, have found their way to various terror groups and criminal gangs in several parts of the country, as well as Bangladesh, according to officials.
Easy accessibility and low cost are the unique selling points of Munger’s 9 mm pistols where buyers even get a heavy discount on bulk orders. This has led to the availability of the weapons in various parts of the country, especially Maharashtra, Delhi and Madhya Pradesh.
Available somewhere between Rs 15,000 and Rs 20,000 with a magazine free, the demand for Munger weapons is in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, New Delhi and adjoining areas and Bangladesh. After Delhi police cracked the botched-up Pune blasts of 1 August last year with the arrest of four people, the recovery of Munger pistols caught the eye of Police Commissioner Neeraj Kumar, who asked his Special Commissioner (Special Cell) S N Srivastava to conduct a study and plug the supply of these weapons.
“I tasked an inspector who did a study of the source of weapons with the help of Munger police,” Mr Srivastava told PTI here while explaining the easy availability of these weapons.
In the last one year, police have recovered 74 pistols in and around the National Capital from criminals and terror groups, he said, adding that during the interrogation of Feroz, an Indian Mujahideen terrorist, it was found that they had also purchased Munger weapons from Aurangabad in Maharashtra.
While the Bihar government announced closure of Munger’s factories, it failed to rehabilitate the karigars (manufacturers) from the district, which form part of the Bhagalpur range.
One such case is of Abdullah, a manufacturer who started selling pistols from 2005. After his arrest recently by Delhi police’s elite Special Cell, he said he had to get into the trade to make his ends meet.
With an elder brother (already arrested), a younger one and eight sisters, Abdullah said he did not know any other trade other than gun manufacturing and therefore, he had to rely on this trade only to look after his family.
There have been cases where gun runners have dressed like lawyers and smuggled the weapons to Bangladesh border. “Some have been caught but its difficult to hazard a guess as to how many may have slipped out to the neighbouring country,” a senior police official said.
The Police Commissioner had tasked the Special Cell to study the growing use of sophisticated firearms over the previous 4-5 years in the commission of violent crimes in Delhi. 
The study found that in most of the cases, it was illicit firearms manufactured in Munger, which were being smuggled into Delhi by organised criminal gangs based in Meerut, Kanpur, Allahabad and other places, had been used, police said.