The Morung Express

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The Morung Express

A Daily Publication of Morung for Indigenous Affairs & JustPeace

Dimapur VOL. III ISSUE 311

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2009: Historic Year of Change

www.morungexpress.com

All things change, and we change with them

Bonnie Konyak Dimapur | November 8

Shillong | November 8

continued on page 5

IN THE wake of the worst-ever attack in the northeast that rocked Assam on October 30, sensitive areas especially those close to the Assam border has come under the scanner. What will be worrying for the security establishment in Nagaland is the growing unease over reports of movement of suspicious elements in border areas—largely left unguarded.

According to latest reports, an army patrol party found a 2kg bomb packed with RDX planted under a concrete bridge on the Sonari-Sapekhati road in Sivasagar district, close to the Nagaland border. A huge quantity of RDX was used in the October 30 blasts — around 80kg — in Guwahati city alone. On November 5 (Wednesday), another 1.5kg of RDX was recovered from an arrested Ulfa militant in the same district. In this incident as well, the bus from which the explosives were recovered was bound for Mon district inside Nagaland.

Speaking to The Morung Express, several police and intelligence sources expressed concern about the state of preparedness of Nagaland in the event of an Assam-like disaster taking place in the state. It was acknowledged that “there was some kind of information sharing” with the neighbouring states on certain issues relating to movements and operation of various underground groups in the North Eastern states. It was pointed out that a full-fledged cell with greater coordination would be ideal in the present situation of vulnerability posed by

the war on terror. Serious concerns were also expressed over the porous nature of the border along Dimapur. “It is very easy for illegal immigrants and unwanted militant groups to enter into Dimapur and exit through Assam or towards Moreh on the Myanmar side”, disclosed

as anything could happen and “security arrangements cannot be foolproof.” With regard to sharing information and intelligence coordination among the North Eastern States, Changkija said it was already in operation under the Intelligence Bureau (IB) branch.

The DGP who returned from New Delhi after attending a security review meet convened by the Centre, informed, it was a “stock-taking meeting” of the NorthEastern sates following the Assam serial bomb blasts. He said that the Centre wanted to know of the security situation and the precautionary measures that are being employed by the states in order to prevent an Assam-like tragedy.

During this meeting held on November 6, and chaired by National Security Advisor, M. K. Narayanan, the DGPs and chief secretaries of the NE states were also sensitized on strategies and other issues.

Meanwhile, with regard to the high level security meet concluded recently in New Delhi, the Government of India has reportedly taken serious note of the growing linkages of north-east insurgent groups among themselves, as well as with Jihadi terror groups outside the region.

The Centre has embarked on an intelligence revamp plan that will involve streamlining the existing state-level intelligence set-up to enable better sharing of information on urban violence, with the local police. In addition, an inter-state intelligence coordination mechanism will be created for the north-eastern region to track linkages amongst local armed groups as well as their possible connections with outside terror groups.

Anti-terror action plan taking shape: DGP

Workers of Hinduja hospital act as bomb blast victims during a mock disaster management drill in Mumbai on Saturday. (AP Photo)

Media “sensationalized” terror blasts

Newmai News Network

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- Chinese Proverb

Nagaland borders under tight scrutiny

Thannganing Hungyo

WITH THE parliamentary elections fast approaching, Union Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar on Saturday toed the Obama line by assuring the North East that 2009 would be a “historic year of change”.

If and when Bangladesh places a democratic government in their parliament, after the dissolution of the present interim government, business between both countries can be injected with fresh air, he told a seminar on ‘Development of Border Trade in North East India to Enhance National Security’, organized by the Border Security Force and supported by the North Eastern Council.

Aiyar was audacious enough to urge the chief ministers of the seven sisters and one brother (Sikkim) to impress upon the Delhi ‘darbar’ to make him the “ambassador of the North East.” Even if he does not retain his portfolio next year he is hopeful that the “DoNER minister” of that future time will invite the chambers of commerce from Bangladesh to India and likewise send a delegation to the 37year-old Muslim- dominated country.

To illustrate his speech, imagine a line drawn through the middle of a page. On one side of the line are the problems facing trade with the region’s neighbouring countries and on the other, the solutions. Both sides of the page have to confront political and economic factors.

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Sunday, November 9, 2008 12 pages Rs. 3

Shillong | November 8

UNION MINISTER of DoNER Mani Shankar Aiyar has shockingly downplayed the recent serial blasts in Tripura and Assam by terming them as ‘episodic and not systematic’.

Virtually allaying fears with a view to assure ‘outside investors’ that ‘everything is well’ , the Union minister told newsmen today in Shillong, “The blasts were episodic and not systematic”. He also made an indirect diatribe on the media for ‘sensational’ portrayal of the blasts that had ‘made outside investors doubt the security scenario’ in the NE region.

“The North East is safe for any investor to come and invest in all spheres”, claimed Aiyar in his denunciation of media reports on the blasts in Tripura and Assam recently.

“Portrayal of the incidents has had its im-

pact but I can tell you that these episodic blasts that had also happened in the rest of the country should not be a deterrent to investors coming in the region.”

“Such blasts have happened in Kailshnagar in New Delhi, fancy bazaar in Guwahati and in other places. They have not been repeated because of security measures taken,” stated the Union minister, even as he criticized the media of portraying things ‘more than what had happened’. He said ‘such portrayal’ will do the North East more harm than good when investors are trying to help the 0.5 % of outside investment in the region. “Don’t portray in such a way that it is not a safe haven for investors to come into the region,” urged Aiyer and appealed to the people and the media to co-operate with the government in attracting investors into the NE region in order to bolster the economy.

an intelligence source.

It may be mentioned that following the Assam blasts on October 30, reports surfaced in the national media of the high possibility of NE armed groups receiving help from China. It was reported that the trade routes in the region are fluid, particularly where Myanmar and China’s borders meet. In recent months, intelligence sources say the Chinese have managed to increase the flow of funds into these groups, a report quoted.

When contacted, State Director General of Police (DGP) J. Changkija disclosed that for Dimapur, an action plan has been prepared already by dividing the city into eight sectors and sensitization among GBs, DBs and business communities carried out on precautionary measures that should be taken by them.

Police sources also disclosed that army sniffer dogs have been deployed already at vulnerable areas while another meeting of important district officials with the Dimapur DC, has also been lined up for Monday to strengthen disaster-management and its response. However, Changjika admitted that that there were no guarantees

Govt explores market for organic produce

KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): Deputy Chairman of the State Planning Board Neiba Kronu has said that the state government is trying to engage various buyers to market organic produce as well as improve the same.

“Towards this end the government is doing its best to improve the production of medicinal and aromatic plants and other organic agricultural and horticultural products as Nagaland has already been declared as organic state and the organic policy has already been framed,” said Kronu.

According to him, the DAN government is all set on an agenda to improve the economic condition of the state by various ways and means like the Externally Aided Projects (EAP) and Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in addition to centrally sponsored schemes.

“The state government shall try to explore these types of opportunities and invite outside entrepreneurs to invest in the state,” he said. Also saying that all aspects of development are to be covered and that the government is trying to bring in changes, he said, even in the planning pro-

cess, ‘we are trying to bring in changes. DAN government had declared 2008 as the Year of Capacity Building because although we may have so many programmes, we need to educate our people to tap the social capital for human resources development’.

There is much scope

for sanctions from different ministries provided there is proper coordination with the various ministries of the Government of India, he said.

The newly created monitoring cell shall monitor all the centrally-sponsored scheme programmes which are directly routed to districts

without passing through the planning department. The cell shall have the authority to collect information and data from the implementing departments, agencies and officials to guide the concern authorities implementing the CSS. continued on page 5

World renowned evangelist turns 90; ready to die

CHARLOTTE, NOVEMBER 8 (AP): Billy Graham has counseled every American president since Dwight Eisenhower. But the evangelist known for his globe-trotting crusades has no plans to mentor Barack Obama, though his did say his father would like to meet the president-elect and pray with him.

Graham turned 90 on Friday.

His son, the Rev. Franklin Graham, told The Associated Press that Billy Graham's mind remains sharp even as his body continues to fail.

Billy Graham still remains engaged in the planning and direction of the ministry he founded, but his days as a pastor to presidents have faded. "My father feels like his time and day for that is over," Franklin Graham said. "But he would certainly like to meet (Obama) and pray with him." About 160 of Billy Graham's family and friends celebrated his birthday Friday at his home in Montreat with fried chicken, barbecue and sweet tea. His ministry had received some 100,000 greetings, including a video from President Bush.

His health contrasts starkly with his days commanding a ministry that put him behind the pulpit to speak with 215 million people in more than 185 countries and placed him in the confidence of some of the world's most powerful people. Billy Gra-

Billy Graham would like to pray with Obama

Billy Graham arrives with his son, Franklin Graham for a memorial service for Ruth Graham in Montreat, Saturday, June 16, 2007. Billy Graham’s work as a pastor to presidents is coming to an end, but he is praying for Barack Obama as the nation’s next leader begins his work, Graham’s son said Friday, November 7, on the aging evangelist’s 90th birthday. (AP Photo)

ham's views are still respected in White House circles. Republican presidential candidate John McCain called on Graham at his mountainside home during the campaign, and Obama tried to meet him but was unable to due to the preacher's poor health.

Though never partisan in his preaching, Billy Graham is a registered Democrat.

His son expressed concern about Obama's views on abortion and gay marriage — an issue Franklin Graham raised in a meeting with the Illinois senator — saying that he and is father are conservatives who believe the Bible speaks clearly on those issues.

"President-electObamaheard our position," said Franklin Graham, who now heads the

Charlotte-based Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. "And I told him that this was very difficult for us and hard for us. It's a moral issue that we just can't back down on." Obama favors abortion rights, and does not support a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. He supports civil unions and believes states should decide their own

laws about marriage.

Meanwhile, Billy Graham's health remains a concern among family and friends, who note he still struggles with the loss of his wife, Ruth, who died last year. He was hospitalized last year for nearly two weeks after experiencing intestinal bleeding, and he has also had prostate cancer. Earlier this year, he had elective surgery to update a shunt that controls excess fluid on his brain.

The shunt was first installed in 2000 and drains fluid from through a small tube, relieving excess pressure that can cause symptoms similar to Parkinson's disease.

"He could catch a cold and his life could come to an end," Franklin Graham said. "At his age, any little thing could be a serious event. We realize that."

Despite his limitations he still has one thing: a booming voice. This weekend, that voice will once again cross borders when a message dubbed in Portuguese will be broadcast in Brazil in an effort to bring some 1 million new believers into the fold. And privately, he has been working on a book about aging, trying to put his late-life lessons into context for those soon to follow him.

"He's always been ready to die," Franklin Graham said.

"But nobody's prepared him for getting old."

By buying this Newspaper, you are contributing to the process of positive Social Change and supporting the non-profit activities of the Morung Foundation

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Dimapur

9 November 2008

The Morung Express

Impressive turnout at Kohima cleanliness drive

KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): As directed by the state government, a mass social work was carried out throughout the state capital on November 8 with the government employees as well as the common public participating in full force. The social work, which started by six in the morning in all the colonies, saw government employees also joining in the work according to the department-wise allocation (both Civil Secretariat and the Directorates).

The work was carried out under the supervision of Kohima Town MLA, Dr. Nicky Kire, DC Kohima Sachopra Vero, and the Kohima Municipal Council. The social work also saw active involvement of the elected members who were seen inspecting the work in various locations around the town.

Senior government officials and bureaucrats also joined the social work in full force.

Deputy Commissioner of Kohima, Sachopra Vero, expressed satisfaction at the huge turnout of people, the Municipal Council of Kohima, Chambers of Commerce, and the public within the jurisdiction of Kohima. Taking to mediapersons, Dr. Nicky expressed his happiness over the success of the social work,

Dimapur to hold social work on first day of every month

the awareness towards civic sense and the cooperation among the citizens of Kohima Town. He also expressed his heartfelt gratitude to the all departments, directorates, colony leaders, businessmen and concerned denizens of Kohima Town for their active participation in the mass social work.

Morung Express News Dimapur | November 8

DC Kma impressed by ‘exemplary level of cooperation’ DIPR: Sachopra Vero, Deputy Commissioner of Kohima, and Vipopal Kintso, Chairman of the Kohima Municipal Council, expressed profound gratitude to all the citizens of Kohima for actively participating in the mass social work on November 8.

The social work had been organised in the State Capital to prepare for the festivity of the forthcoming Hornbill Festival, Christmas and the New Year celebrations. The DC appealed to all the citizens of Kohima to continue doing the good work in their own respective places and the vicinity, as the State is expecting guests and tourists to join in the festivals.

Vero said that we should project ourselves in a good light, as people tend to judge

MEx File Johnian Spelling Master selected

KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The annual Johnian Spelling Championship 2008 was held on November 7 last at the school premises. Chuzusie Kajiri of Class IV was declared Spelling Master 2008. The winner was awarded with a certificate of citation of Johnian Spelling Master and scholarship for the year 2009.

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LOCAL

Sunday

Seminar on quality education KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Directorate of School Education, Kohima, has informed that all DEOs and DIS’ of all districts and two teachers each from government and private schools at Kohima and Dimapur, are to take part in the seminar on quality education. The seminar has been scheduled for November 10 at 10:00 am, while National Education Day will be observed on November 11 at the Zonal Council Hall, Kohima, in commemoration of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad’s birthday, the 1st union minister of education.

Divine healing services underway KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The annual convention and divine healing services under the aegis of the Pentecostal Mission, Kohima, got underway here at the Kohima local ground. The programme will end on November 9.

KMC bans use of polybags KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): In reiteration of its earlier notification, the Kohima Municipal Council (KMC), through a release issued by KMC chairperson, Vipopal Kintso, has informed the public and all shops and business establishments of Kohima city that it has completely banned the use of polythene bags, plastics and posters, in the interest of public health and safety.

Answering the call of the district administration, citizens of Kohima turned up in full force for the mass social work in the capital, on Saturday. (Morung Photo)

us by the environment we live. He further appealed for continued support and cooperation with the district administration and the civic body, especially requesting

the business community and building owners to comply with the notifications and directives given out by the office of the DC Kohima and the KMC.

The DC and the Chairman of KMC also expressed gratitude to all the officers and staff of various government departments who actively participated and also

detailed machineries to facilitate the works, further expressing confidence that this exemplary level of cooperation and enthusiasm would make Kohima stand out.

RAJYA SABHA MP from Nagaland, Khekiho Zhimomi, today praised the people of Dimapur, who came out positively in response to the mass social work called by the State Government today. The MP continued that the response of the people was very good in Dimapur. He said people can come together through such occasions and expressed appreciation to the people of Dimapur for slowly coming up for development and civic activities. Lauding Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio for creative ideas, Zhimomi said it needs somebody to drive the potential that is available. He asserted that the economic status of the state, particularly Dimapur, was improving very rapidly.

DC of Dimapur, Maongwati Aier, also lauded different departments for rendering various services for the social work. He also lauded the officials of the district administration and the DMC, ward chairmen and GBs. Appreciating the PWD (Road and Bridges) department, the DC said the department is carrying out repairing work to fill up the potholes and informed that the work would be completed by November 31 next. However, the DC expressed his disappointment over the absence of some DMC members adding, “This is not political but social work.”

Chairperson of DMC, Khekaho Assumi while sharing his view, said that the social work should be made a regular feature in the district of Dimapur, especially in the town. in this regard, the district administration and the Dimapur Municipal Council decided to hold social work on the 1st day of every month to keep the town clean and hygienic.

Assumi also assured the people of Dimapur that the DMC would give a facelift to Dimapur before this Christmas. The different departments who extended help to the social work were Works & Housing, PHED, NST, Supplies, Forest, Mechanical and Excise.

DCC Wokha refutes IGAR media report St. Thomas Montessori honours parents

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The District Congress Committee, Wokha, has strongly condemned the November 6 incident at the town’s Local Ground where some “errant Jawan of 41 Assam Rifle resorted to blank firing, perpetrated and scuffling with the public” near the AR gate while the evening’s Miss Tokhu programme was underway. The DCC Wokha, while expressing shock over the incident, refuted the report in local dailies by the IGAR media, that ‘the Commandant was

manhandled by some youths’, as totally false, since the “Commandant was accompanied by the organisers inside the camp.”

Zubemo Lotha, General Secretary (Admn) of DCC Wokha, through a press release, while wishing the injured persons a speedy recovery, urged the responsible authority to “dispense the aggrieved person(s).” The DCC also urged the higher authority to probe into the incident and book the culprits without delay.

Dermatologists converge in Dimapur for annual conference

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The 19th Annual Conference of IADVL (Indian Association of Dermatologists, Venereologists & Leprologists), northeast branch, was inaugurated today. The conference, being held in Dimapur for the first time, was graced by Health & Family Welfare Minister, Azo Neinu, and Dr. Chumben Murry, Minister for Agriculture.

Terming dermatology as a very important discipline in the field of medical sciences, Azo expressed sadness that the state fell short of doctors with speciality in the field. He expressed the need for more dermatological facility in the remote areas of Nagaland and said the role of dermatology could go a long way in solving skin problems and other STDs

(sexually transmitted diseases) which pose a greater risk to the AIDS epidemic. The minister also applauded the display of skincare products displayed at the venue and hoped the products would “make the world more beautiful.”

Dr. Chumben Murry, also the Chief Patron of the conference, hoped the conference would add to the already expansive knowledge of those taking part in the conference.

He applauded the doctors of the northeast saying they are no less than those outside, but urged them to keep updating their knowledge with the constant advances in medical sciences. Dr. Murry encouraged doctors to use the internet as a tool to keep updating their knowledge. He however lamented on the healthcare

system in Nagaland saying it is still in its “infancy.” He informed that rural Nagaland had lesser access to health services, and more so with dermatology, and pointed out the need for dermatologists according to the ratio of the needs of the area. He also encouraged the dermatologists to conduct awareness and educative programmes, and health camps on skin ailments especially in remote areas where STI cases are on the rise.

The ministers released newsletters and the IADVL souvenir respectively. A new team of office bearers was also installed. The conference is being held at the Zion Hospital & Research Centre, Dimapur, on November 8 and 9, under the theme ‘Dawning of dermatology in Nagaland’.

Healthy Dancing: Little Montessori students dancing to the tune of ‘why vegetables and fruits are good for health’. (Morung Photo)

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): St. Thomas Montessori School, Signal Nagagaon, celebrated its seventh parents’ day today amidst fun, cheer and sending out of strong social messages through skits and recitations.

The Montessori students, donning placards shaped in the forms of vegetables and fruits, danced to the tune of ‘why vegetables and fruits are good for health’, while parents and guests enjoyed the hip-shaking dance of the tiny tots. Also sending out a strong message on communal harmony, a skit entitled ‘God is one’ depicted the reality of communal discord occurring around the world.

S I Jamir, Dimapur- II MLA, who graced the occasion as chief guest expressed joy at being present at the celebration. He pointed out that for a healthy growth of an institution, financial sol-

‘Compete with the rest of the country’

Kiphire district short of Dr. Shürhozelie graces LSHSS silver jubilee celebrations administrative officers Lipichem

Seminar on career prospects

Kiphire | November 8

KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Rengma Officers’ Forum in collaboration with SCERT Nagaland is all set to organise a one-day seminar on career prospects for the students of secondary schools, both government and private, under Tseminyu Sub-Division, on November 11. In this connection, all secondary schools, both government and private, have been notified to send ten students of classes 9-10 along with one teacher to attend the forthcoming programme at the Town Hall, Tseminyu.

Vety dept warns land encroachers DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The District V&AH Officer has informed all concerned public, and the “land encroachers” in particular, that the land under Stockman centre at Medziphema is a veterinary department acquired land, purchased from the Medziphema villages for the development of the department, and not for private individual occupation. “All the documents related to the land are available with the department,” Dr. V H Shohe, District Veterinary & A.H officer, informed in a release. Therefore, Shohe cautioned, the public are not to encroach upon the land belonging to the department.

BEAUTIFUL BOOKS- CHENNAI Invites you to its

CHRiSTIAN BOOK FESTIVAL ‘08 Date & Time Venue 12-15 November, 2008 Town Baptist Church (Wednesday-Saturday) Near Christian Hr. Sec.School 9.00am- 5pm Dimapur

vency and academic adequacy is very essential, and expressed hope that the school would bear in mind these things as it grows. He also urged the school management and teachers to “focus more on quality rather than quantity” and expressed confidence that St. Thomas would produce men and women of good quality.

Laying stress on the role of teachers, Jamir said teaching should not be reduced only to a trade. It is a calling, a mission, he said, and reminded the teachers of their responsibility of making pupils good citizens of the society. The chief guest challenged the students of St. Thomas to progress, reminding them that in a country with a large populace, there is limited scope for mediocre people. The children also performed an array of entertainments like freestyle dancing, Ao cultural song, group songs and dances.

The LSHSS choir presenting a song at the silver jubilee celebrations of Little Star Higher Secondary School, at its premises, on Saturday. (Morung Photo)

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN):MINISTER FOR Urban Development and Higher Education, Dr. Shürhozelie, appealed to the private schools of the state to gear up and compete with the rest of the country, adding that the schools of the state still have much room for improvement and to reach greater heights. The Minister was speaking as the chief guest at the silver jubilee celebrations of the Little Star Higher Secondary School here today.

Stating about LSHSS, the Minister said it was a time to felicitate the pioneers for their farsightedness, initiation and contribution towards building the school. He continued that it was also a time to celebrate the achievements of the school in the last 25 years besides also planning for the future. Noting the results of the last HSLC examinations, he expressed pleasure at the school’s performance.

Dr. Shürhozelie also appealed to the parents, guard-

ians and public leaders to extend cooperation to improve the quality of education in the state. “From now on, we have to set up Parents’ Teachers’ Association,” he opined, while taking into account the role of parents and teachers in the overall development of the student and the school. He asserted that more chances should be given to the parents so that they could also contribute to the development of the school. He further highlighted the need to bring about quality education in the

state, especially in government schools. Despite the fact that the teachers of government schools are paid much higher than those in private schools, he said, the private schools were performing much better than the government schools.

Guest of honour, Nini Meru, Chairman of the Nagaland Board of School Education (NBSE), said that the board feels happy when schools do well, and feels pain when the schools do not produce good results.

THE NORMAL functioning of the Kiphire district administration has been hampered due to lack of an administrative officer in the district as well as the outpost, which is on the verge of collapsing. Some administrative officers have to work overtime, taking on extra burden to fill in the gaps created by the officer who was posted out, without a ‘reliever’.

The District Headquarter, with a required strength of 6 (six) administrative officers, has a lone EAC assisting the Deputy Commissioner. Interestingly, right after the general election in the month of March 2008, the EAC, SDO(C)-I, SDO(C)-II and the EAC Sitimi has been transferred out without a reliever. Talking with this correspondent, the Deputy Commissioner said that despite repeated appeals, the higher authorities seemed to have no interest to post an officer in this remotest part of the state. Due to the lack of an administrative officer, the district administration finds it difficult to perform ‘law and order duty’ and there is a huge backlog of our normal work, the DC added.

When asked about the irregularity of the DDO of various departments, the Deputy Commissioner replied, “When I am left alone with only 1 (one) EAC to assist me for 7-8 months, how can I check whether the officers are in the station or not?” The Deputy Commissioner expressed fear that in a sensitive place like Kiphire, inhabited by various tribes, there might be a breakdown in law and order in the district if administrative officers were not posted soon.

Kiphire, with a population of little over a lakh, has two SDO(C) and five EAC outposts. Surprisingly, at present none of the EAC’s have been posted at the outpost, some EAC outposts functioning without an officer for a couple of years. Presently, Kiusum is the only outpost with an EAC but the lone officer also has to be temporarily attached to the Kiphire headquarter due to lack of officers.

It may be mentioned here that Kiphire was upgraded to the status of district in 2004. However, its citizens feel that it is no better than an ADC HQ after witnessing the activities, or lack thereof, of the government.

LOCAL

The Morung Express

Sunday

9 November 2008

‘DAN formed govt through manipulation’ NPCC DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): In the light of the fractured mandate of 2003 and 2008 election, the Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee (NPCC) today accused the NPF party of forming the government through manipulation and unholy marriage with communal parties. Vice president Nillo Rengma alleged that the regional character of NPF had been diluted with the DAN government becoming a part and parcel of the NDA and BJP which was led by L. K Advani.

The press release written in response to NPF Chief, Dr. Shurhozalie’s statement on the President’s Rule stated that the regional party president should know that the NLA Speaker’s ruling on December 13, 2007 was declared as illegal and unconstitutional by the Guwahati High Court. Maintaining that the “learned man” should know the meaning of illegal and unconstitutional, NPCC said that if he is still confused of the term, Dr. Shurhozalie should seek clarification from the court.

NPCC maintains that President Rule was imposed in Nagaland because of the unconstitutional action of the speaker and nobody else who acted illegally on the petition filed by the NPF president seeking disqualification of 3 independent MLAs. He committee stated that the independent MLAs supported the DAN but had not joined any political par-

ty since it might incur disqualification law on their joining anf lose membership of the Assembly. Thus, NPCC questioned as to how the MLAs were not qualified when they, as alleged by Shurhozalie, joined NPF in 2003 but were disqualified when they supported Congress in the No Trust Vote. The release issued by vice president Nillo Rengma said that the Speaker had been compelled to issue the controversial interim o r d e r based on NPF president’s petition which was responsible for the PR in Nagaland.

Nillo further stated that the court gave clear justification for dismissing the writ petition still NPF felt that it was unjustified and against the spirit of the constitution therefore he questions the NPF president what in their opinion was higher and greater that the High Court order. Highlighting the fact that their working president, Dr. Kanito Chishi had already tendered apology to the Court and Bar Association, NPCC asked them what else the party might have to say now.

The Congress also express wonder at how the NPF could speak about people’s mandate

when in 2003 election the Regional party had secured only 19 seats as compared to the 21 seats secured by the Congress. He opined that the 2008 general election was the same 2003 with none of the partied being given a clear mandate to rule the state. Iterating that it was a fractured mandate with no pre-poll alliance among the political parties, the NPCC said that winning 26 seats out of 60 was not a mandate and instead the release opined that the NPF had formed the government through manipulation and by having an unholy marriage with communal party for the sake of power. Nillo sought to further strengthen the argument by pointing out that in the 2008 election, the Congress had “polled higher percentage than NPF” with 36.28% polled by Congress against NPF’s 33.62 %.

The release further stated that NPF president should know that MP or MLA who resigns for a cause could not be termed as a defector and therefore those MLAs who resigned from the seats in the ruling party in the 10th House of NLA had done so against the corrupted DAN Government. Nillo also

NPF lost regional identity; become part and parcel of NDA

demanded to know from Dr. Shurhozalie if there was any rule prohibiting MLAs from celebrating Christmas and New Year away from his house or away from Nagaland.

Saying that as Christians one could spend Christmas anywhere in the planet, the NPCC vice president added that NPF chief could not regulate the Congress MLAs on where to spend Christmas.

Moreover, in relation to Dr. Shurhozalie’s charges that regional parties in Nagaland, were never allowed to complete their term, the release reminded of the Congress’ term in 1998 and 1991 under Hokishe and S. C. Jamir which were pulled down, NPCC stated that as per the constitution, any party whether regional or national, had no option but to step down when it loses majority. It added that the 10th House of the NLA, DAN Government had been reduced to a helpless minority and so it could not complete its tenure and so it could not complete its term.

The Congress further attacked the NPF saying that the DAN Government was not a regional party government but an NDA Alliance Government led by BJP under the leadership of L. K Advani. Therefore, it stated that the NPF Chief talking about regional party made no sense and was not even relevant since NPF has lost its identity and become part and parcel of NDA.

Dimapur

3

STARTING LINE-UP Your daily Meetings, Appointments, Information and Reminder column

HRUD general meeting today

The Hoshepu Range Union Dimapur (HRUD) has called a general meeting at its banker’s residence at Thilixu village on November 9 next at 2 pm. K Vika Zhimomi has informed all the members to attend the meeting without fail.

Gorkha Community meeting today

This is to inform that a general meeting of the Gorkha Community is scheduled on November 9 at 11:00 am in the G.P.P. Hall, Chandmari, Kohima. Therefore, one member from every Gorkha family is requested to attend the said meeting without fail.

CYODD meeting on November 10

Chakhesang Youth Organization Dimapur District (CYODD) has convened an emergency meeting on November 10 at 11:00 am at Hoho Building Chakhesang Colony. The Organization has requested al office bearers and advisors to attend the meeting positively.

DP&DB Tsg meeting on November 12

Tuensang District Planning and Development Board has convened its meeting for the month of November on November 12 (Wednesday) at 11:00 am at the DC’s Conference Hall.

Therefore, all the DP&DB members of Tuensang District are requested to attend the meeting.

AG Church Fete Day on November 13

Assembly of God Church, Wokha town will be organizing Fete Day on November 13 at local ground. AG Church Wokha informed that varieties of food stalls and other things will be available and has, therefore, requested all to come and have fun at the fete day.

ABC to provide NYPC vice president responds to allegations Wangyuh releases psychosocial support ‘Angel of My Heart’ Dedication of Centre on November 12 KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Awakening Bells Centre at Kruoliezou, Kohima village, will be dedicated on November 12 at 3:00 pm. Rev. Neirielie Mechieo, Sr. Pastor of Baptist Revival Church Kohima, will invoke God’s blessings for the Centre, while Keduotuolie Mepfuo, the chairman of Kohima Village Council, will declare the ABC open. The Centre is located at L. Khel, Kohima village, near the TM Government High School.

The Awakening Bells Centre was set up with the aim of awakening the social, moral and spiritual consciousness of the people.

Hoping to help create a safe and enabling environment for affected children with a holistic approach, the ABC also hopes to “journey with them to heal their deep, hidden wounds,” thereby helping in building these children become responsible and conscientious persons of society.

The Awakening Bells Centre is a 20-bedded facility that will provide psychosocial support and community care for a period of 6 months to one year, depending on their needs and circumstances, a pamphlet received here said. The main objectives of the Centre is to provide a safe space and psychosocial support through the setting up of a short-term, childrenfriendly residential facility, which is community based.

It also aims to reduce the burden of childcare for affected extended families, and to empower them with life skills, social support and networks, to provide access to proper nutrition, informal education and healthcare. Besides these, the Centre will create public awareness on trauma and enhance community participation in sharing responsibilities towards healing for traumatised children to grow up with a sense of security and hope, the ABC stressed.

MIP/GPRN releases one on health grounds DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): A release issued by the MIP/GPRN has informed that one Khenelii, d/o Razouvoyi of Thevopisii village, has not been keeping well since 2007. She has, therefore, been “discharged from national service on medical ground.” The GPRN stated that they valued her service to the nation and wished her speedy recovery and good health.

13 arrested for liquor sale MOKOKCHUNG, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Excise department and the administration of Mokokchung jointly conducted checking and raiding of all liquor dens in the town on November 6. As a result, the team seized 34 bottles of (assorted) IMFL, 80 bottles of beer and 95kgs of C/L (R/Beer). In this connection, 13 persons have been arrested and booked under relevant section of the NLTP Act 1989. All seized articles were destroyed on the same day in the presence of DC, Magistrate, NGOs, DBs and the excise department. L Wati Jamir, Mokokchung Superintendent of Excise & Prohibition, in a release informed that such checks and raids would be conducted regularly in order to control the sale and inflow of liquor in the town.

SLB defers ‘Lucky Draw’

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Sumi Literature Board has informed that the ‘Lucky Draw’ in aid of ‘Sutsah Academy’ scheduled to be declared on November 14, on the occasion of Ahuna celebration could be conducted due to ‘certain circumstantial situations.’

H. S Rotokha, Secretary, SLB, Zunheboto in a release said that the ‘Lucy Draw’ will be scheduled as early as possible taking into consideration the convenience of all concerned. It further, requested all well wishers and also Sumi people to kindly bear with the inconvenience and wait for the early declaration of the result.

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The NPYC (Nagaland Pradesh Youth Congress), vice president, Dokiu Kecham responding to allegations regarding the withdrawal of a report sent to Union Minister, Mani Shankar Aier on the implementation of NREGA programme in two blocks of Shamatore and Chessore, has said that “the letter was withdrawn on request.” Under the aegis of ‘Aam Admi Ka Sipahi,” the NPYC is directed by the IYC (Indian Youth Congress) to impart training on RTI and NREGA programme and accordingly, the same was conducted in Shamatore RD block and Chessore RD block under Tuensang district, a press release form Dokiu Kecham stated and basing on feedbacks received from the

public of the area, a report was sent to the Union Minister for Panchayat Raj and DONER. Adding that the report was sent “so as the relevance of the reports were found to be inauspicious to the public,” Kecham claimed that he was however made to withdraw the letter to which he obliged thinking “that the programme officers concerned will restore to the beneficiaries whatever benefits are due to them.”

VDB secretaries and village council chairmen representing the two blocks also met with him, the release stated, “with the affirmation to stand and work together for the welfare of the common people,” and a joint declaration was made and a copy signed by them, it added.

The release further pointed out that despite the

passage of several months; the beneficiaries have still not received their benefits, while he has been accused of “having received kickback” for withdrawal of the report.

The NPYC vice president has therefore, due to failure of the concerned department to provide common people their employment guarantee benefits and also to substantiate his stand, stated that he has “cancelled the withdrawal of the report to the Union Ministry with immediate effect.” He has also declared that he “has never accepted any complimentary gifts from any source for favour of my withdrawal letter and that my service towards the common people is for the cause of their social justice.”

He has further brought to the attention of the party higher

ups in Delhi that “the report is based on public grievances and not on political lines,” as propagated by some people and stated that such irresponsible comments should be placed under scrutiny. The VP has also reiterated that NYPC is duty bound to see that the common people are not denied their due rights and NYPC is prepared to carry out their grievances report in person to New Delhi.

Questioning where the public money for the two blocks have evaporated, the note stating that NREGA being a national programme and “a gift to the common people by the government of India,” a thorough probe into the causes of any lapses/ delay in implementing the scheme for the year 2007-08 against the two said blocks.

November 11 declared as National Education Day DRR on official visit KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Central Government vide its Resolution No.17-35/2004-PN-I dated September 11, 2008 of the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India has decided to observe November 11, the birthday of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, the great freedom fighter, Eminent Educationist, and the first Union Minister of Education as the National Education Day. The NED will be observed in a befitting manner,

every year (commencing from 2008) throughout the country ‘without’ declaring it as a holiday. A letter to this effect vide D.O.No.17-9/2008-PN-I dt.

New Delhi the 30th September 2008 has been received by the Govt. of Nagaland.

Following the above directive, the Department of Higher Education, Govt of Nagaland, vide its letter No.HE/MHRD/4-2/2006 dt 23.10.2008, is directing the principals of all the government colleges and private col-

leges in Nagaland to observe the November 11. 2008 as the first National Education Day (and to be observed every year) in organizing Seminars, Symposia, Essay-writing, Elocution Competition, Workshops and Rallies with banners, cards and slogans on the importance of education and the nation’s commitment to all aspects of education. This was informed in a release issued by A.M. Toshi Jamir, Director, Higher Education Nagaland

DAN’s Centre committed Alemtemshi to address Kohima to HIV/AIDS care DPDB through teleconferencing DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Development Association of Nagaland has started a Positive Living Centre (PLC), which was formally inaugurated on November 5 and blessed by Rev. Fr. Chacko Kerinthayl, Parish Priest of the Holy Cross Parish.

The Centre was started keeping with the spirit of “Commitment to compassion and care, HIV/AIDS policy of the Catholic Church and part of DAN’s ongoing intervention in the prevention, care and support of people living with HIV/ AIDS in Nagaland,” stated a note from the centre. The centre will provide free health checkup on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm, health investigation (Clinical), free medicines, follow-ups, home visits, referrals, networking, home based care, special sessions on HIV/STI management/PPTCT, etc.

KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (DIPR): The monthly Kohima District Planning & Development Board meeting has been scheduled for November 17 at the Commissioner’s Office, Kohima, at 12:30 pm. Development Commissioner and Additional Chief Secretary, Alemtemshi, IAS, will address the meeting through teleconferencing from the NIC State Unit, New Secretariat, in Kohima. The meeting shall be held under the chairmanship of MLA Dr. Nicky Kire, Chairman of the Kohima DPDB. All the DPDB members have been notified regarding attendance at the meeting.

The special meeting will be part of the ‘Year of Capacity Building’ activities taken up by the Kohima DPDB.

Rio to inaugurate Englan EAC Hq KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (DIPR): Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio will inaugurate the Extra Assistant Commissioner HQ, Englan, under Wokha district, on November 10 at 10:30 am. Rio, who has consented to grace the function as the chief guest, will unveil the monolith and address the people of Englan. Minister for Agriculture, Dr. Chumben Murry, Parliamentary Secretary Y Patton, Commissioner of Nagaland, H K Khulu, Chairman of PAC and Co-convenor DAN, Dr. T M Lotha, and Chairman of Kyong Hoho, Nyanbemo Ngullie, will deliver short speeches. Other highlights of the day include cultural presentation and a community feast.

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The members of Rotaract Club Dimapur will be hosting the official visit of District Rotaract representatives Rtr. Sourav Bajoria at Dimapur on November 9, 2008. DRR will reach the station on November 8 for his official visit at Rotaract Club Dimapur and Rotaract Club, Chumukedima.

for taking much interest to encourage local artist by giving them a platform to record. Other highlights of the program included opening prayer by Naro from Prodigal’s Home and a word from the recording studio.

Meanwhile, in the sideline of releasing the album, Heilung while interacting with this correspondent revealed that the album started from the month of February which finally he could release it. He said that the idea of the album is “loving one another without bias, having no jealousy, be friend”.

Heilung also said that he has been in the music field for above 10 years now. And added that it is just a beginning for him to really understand every pulse of music as an industry. The music audio album is available in every music store.

The Entrepreneurs Associates (EA) in collaboration with the Government of Nagaland (GON) is providing a special Entrepreneurship Skills Training capsule to youths and first generation entrepreneurs under the “Year of Capacity Building 2008” Nagaland. The training is for 3 months/ 90 hours of motivational and shared learning inputs along-with hands on experience training.

EA intends to provide micro loans /financial support to trainees who exhibit excellent entrepreneurial skills to start up self employment activities/ business and also provide jobs to interested trainees. We believe this is a rare and great opportunity for our youth to get jobs and take up self employment activities under the “Year of Capacity Building 2008”.

There would be selection of candidates as seats are limited and only shortlisted will be called for interview. Applications must be submitted to Entrepreneurs Associates, Next to Traffic Police Point, NH 39, Kohima, on or before 17th of November 2008 with their bio-data, correspondence address, contact telephones and 3 passport photos.

Administrator Office of the Entrepreneurs Associates Next to traffic Police point, PWD Junction, NH 39, Kohima 91-370-2242665/2244606 eanaga@rediffmail.com

LOST NOTICE

LOST NOTICE

I, Mr Thupulhü Vero am applying for duplicate copy of HSSLC Marksheet as I have lost it.

Name : Thupulhü Vero F/Name : Sanetso Vero M/Name : Zavehülü Vero D.O.B : 11.06.1988 Name of Centre Exam : Phek College (Phek) Name of Exam : HSSLC Roll No : 0850105, Year: 2008, Result : Failed

I, Mr Nukhozo Chizoh am applying for duplicate copy of HSSLC Marksheet as I have lost it.

Name: Nukhozo Chizoh F/Name: Pusazo Chizoh M/Name: Sheveyilü Chizoh D.O.B: 07.09.1988 Name of Centre Exam: Phek College (Phek) Name of Exam: HSSLC Roll No: 0850097, Year: 2008, Result: Failed

Organized by Dimapur Christian Fellowship in collaboration with Child Evangelism Fellowship India

For Sunday School Teachers or parents who are interested to equip themselves in the knowledge and skills of leading children to Christ and nurturing them in the ways of the Lord Date: 13th – 16th November, 2008 Venue: Imliyanger Memorial Center, Circular Road, Dimapur Registration fee: Rs 250 per head (inclusive of simple lunch and resource materials) CONFIRM YOUR PARTICIPATION ASAP! LIMITED SEATS! FIRST COME FIRST! Contact: Mrs Sam Lalparlien -09862714663

W E LC O M E To

SpecialHandloomExpo At

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From 5th to 19th Nov. 2008 Time : 10:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. Come Celebrate !!! & Be a part of it!!!

Sponsored by : Year of Capacity Building 2008 Government of Nagaland

said there has yet to be any specialization even for the fact that there is the scourge of unemployment in the state and virtually no more room left for government employment. In this backdrop there is a need for specialization in whatever field, and “complete it” Konyak exhorted. He released the album “for the benefit of the Naga society”.

Among the ones who spoke was also Imchatoba Imchen, president of the Naga Students’ Federation. Earlier in the brief function, former Miss Northeast Tiarenla introduced the gathering to the album while Aren Changkiri anchored the function.

Children’s Ministers Training Workshop

‘One in Love’ audio album released ENTREPRENEURSHIP CAPACITY BUILDING FOR YOUTH BY EA & GON DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER applause the Recording team 8 (MExN): Heilung Zeliang, former Naga Idol Top Six finalist of 2007-2008, released his debut audio album, “One in Love” with Chugh’s Chishi, Project Director, Nagaland Music task Force as the chief guest of the function at Café Destination, Bank Colony on November 8.

Chugh’s Chishi expressed happiness for local talents like Hailung, who after much efforts brought out a pop album for public. He continued that a strong determination with lot of hard work is required to continue to stand oneself in this field as music. While appreciating Hailung for putting in original lyrics, Chishi appealed the general masses to come forward to be a part in music field, “as everyone got its own job to perform in different arenas though in the same field.” Chishi finally

DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 7 (MExN): A locally-produced VA album was today released

by Member of Parliament Wangyuh Konyak at a small function at Aroma Eatery at Khermahal. The album “Angel of my Heart” touting about seven “classic love songs” was produced by Imti Imchen of Springfield Music Network. Various artists have sung on the album including Naga Idol finalists.

In his speech MP Wangyuh Konyak lamented the average Naga’s penchant for starting a venture but never completing it. “Be it music, handicrafts, there is no completion” he lamented. He also

Office of the Development Commissioner for Handloom, Ministry of Textile, Govt of India, New Delhi.

Smt. N. Hushili Sema Managing Director

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BUSINESS

Sunday 9 November 2008

The Morung Express

Audi launches super sports car

Buying guide to cameras

NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): GERMAN luxury carmaker Audi on Friday launched ‘Audi R8’, its mid-engine super sports car, priced at Rs. 1.17 crore (ex-showroom Delhi with central sales tax, transportation and other charges). Audi R8 is equipped with an engine displacement of 4,163 cc and a power output of 420 hp and can attain a top speed of 301 km an hour with 0-100 km in impressive 4.6 seconds.

Brand “The Audi R8 is not only a strong statement about the brand but also about Audi’s direction for the future — to be the most successful premium brand by 2015.

“It will revolutionise the Indian automobile space and offer an experience of a lifetime to discerning customers in the country,” said Audi India Managing Director Benoit Tiers.

Dealer network “We decided to launch the Audi R8 in the Indian market based on the enthusiastic response received

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anting to buy a camera for long?

Bamboozled by the cameras around you? However, not sure how to go about hunting, what to look for? What features and how many megapixels? You need some help in choosing your perfect one. Take a shot...

Does brand matter?

With digital cameras, it does. The overall quality of the image depends mainly on three things; quality of lens, quality & size of image sensor and image processing circuitry. Stick to better known brands only; preferably Canon & Nikon. Both these companies do only imaging and they’re good at it too!

Megapixels Millions of dollars spent by companies on advertising the ‘megapixel myth’ have brainwashed many. The fact is megapixels have nothing to do with image quality. Cramming more megapixels into a smaller image sensor can even lead to reduced picture quality.

Check out features Before buying, check out the optical zoom (more the better), LCD (size, quality), optical viewfinder (useful to frame photos in bright sunlight) and video recording (should be at least VGA quality @ 30 fps). Also take note of the battery type, accessories (lens, flash, remote), optical viewfinder and manual modes.

Some smaller cameras have really tiny and hard-to-use buttons; see if the camera fits your hand before you buy. Cameras with touchscreen LCDs reduce the number of buttons, but attract a lot of fingerprints. Also check if the responsiveness of the screen is good enough for you.

Battery life and type Rechargeable batteries are convenient, but offer no means of recharging while on the move. If you’re worried about running out of power while travelling, you can go for a camera that uses standard AA size batteries. Use highpower Ni-MH batteries, but in a pinch, you can also switch to alkaline batteries.

Prosumer cameras Prosumer refers to a class of camera that is intermediate between basic pointand-shoot and digital SLRs. They offer features suited to the more advanced user like full manual control, high optical zoom, image stabilisation (usually), high quality video and ability to attach an external flash. But they are also usually more expensive and larger than their basic counterparts.

Jargon buster CCD/CMOS (charge coupled device/ complementary metal oxide semiconductor): The type of image sensor used in a digital camera. Digital zoom: This type of zoom digitally enlarges a portion of the image to make it appear bigger/ closer. Image stabiliser: A technology/ mechanism by which camera shake is automatically countered (to a certain degree). It can be electronic or optical. Electronic is cheaper, not as effective. ISO/ ASA (Industry Standards Organization or American Standards Association): Denotes sensitivity to light, assigned to a number. Higher ISO/ASA means greater sensitivity and vice versa. It can help reduce camera shake, and can also lead to increased image noise. Optical zoom: Refers to the use of movable lens elements to bring an object closer. Look for optical zoom figure, not the digital zoom.

Spice Mobiles latest eye dazzler

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Spice S-930

pice S-930 Phone Spice Mobiles latest innovation the Spice S-930 has left everyone gaping. This incredible technology can be put into action with just a finger swipe! Users no longer need to activate their cell phones via keypads.

Irrespective of a sleek metallic finish exterior, Spice S-930 has various incredible internal features as well, namely: 2 Mega Pixel Camera with Webcam facility, 2 GB Expandable memory, Complimentary 1 GB Memory Card, Video and MP3 player, FM Record and Play, and something new that steps in is the most awaited: The Finger Swipe Touch Screen Facility. Not to forget VAS’s new Opera Mini Browser and Thomson Reuters, for speedy browsing and keeping up abreast with the various worldly events.

With the help of this incredible technology, you can view your gallery images and even unlock your keypad with just a fingers swipe! Spice sure knows how to keep alive their Mantra of Innovation! Who would not want to own this latest technology, and that too just for a price of Rs. 7,999/-.

Indian car market suffers as economy sours

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thousand people, according to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers, an industry group. That compares to 18 in Indonesia, 57 in Thailand, 453 in the U.S. and 565 in Germany.

Global automakers see potential. Sales reached 1.5 million cars last year, and the middle class is projected to grow from 50 million people today to 583 million by 2025, according to McKinsey & Co. Toyota Motor Corp., Honda Motor Co., Renault SA, Daimler AG, and Volkswagen AG are all building new factories, and General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. are ramping up production. But the short-term may present more challenges than opportunites.

The International Monetary Fund downgraded its forecast for India’s 2009 economic growth to 6.3 percent on Thursday, a sharp drop from last year’s 9.3 percent. The benchmark Sensex stock market index has lost more than half its value since the beginning of the year. Analysts expect passenger car sales, which averaged 17.2 percent annual growth over the last five years, to grow just 6 to 8 percent this year.

The most recent quarter was a bleak one for India’s leading automakers, who reported double-digit declines in profits for the JulySeptember period. Tata said its profit fell 34.1 percent to

NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 8 (AP): October was supposed to herald a revolution for Indian automakers.

Tata Motors had planned to roll out the Nano, a 100,000 rupee ($2,000) snub-nosed auto that would bring car ownership to the masses.

But a major land dispute has delayed the Nano’s launch.

And more worrisome: After years of double-digit growth, Indian auto companies face falling sales.

India’s growing consumer base has not inoculated them from the global financial crisis. Battered by high interest rates and tight credit, auto sales began to shrink in the summer, falling 1.9 percent in July and August. After a mild comeback in September, reports from major automakers suggest they fell again in October. For Ganesh Dalvi, an eager young MahindraRenault salesman in a pink button-down shirt, that means it has been three months since he has sold enough cars to get a performance bonus.

Dalvi, who himself can only afford a motorbike, has resorted to cold calling. “I want to own a car,” he said. Fluorescent lighting bounced off the largely empty sales floor at the dealership on the northern outskirts of Mumbai. “That’s why I’m doing this cold calling. I want money because I want a car.” Few Indians own cars: There are just 7 per

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SUDOKU

The Morung Express number game

Sudoku # 1130

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W E R I A R M A D I L L O L H Simple Rules - There is just one simple rule: “Fill in the grid so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 through 9.”

Yesterdays answer Sudoku #1129

1. Schoolbag (7) 5. Subterranean chamber (4) 7. Apiece (4) 8. The - - --Steve Forrest TV series (5) 9. Curve (4) 10. Spur (4) 12. Fertile soil (4) 13. The - - - Strikes Back, film (6) 17. Part of the eye (4) 18. Pastry dish (3) 19. Compact (4) 20, Myth (6) 24. Small measure (4) 26. Ring of light (4) 27. Muffin the - - --’ TV puppet (4) 28. Religious doctrine (5) 29. Divorce decree (4) 30. Crooked (4) 31. Leaving a will (7)

Civil Hospital: Metro Hospital: Faith Hospital: Shamrock Hospital Zion Hospital: Fire Service: Police Control Room Police Traffic Control East Police Station West Police Station CIHSR (Referral Hospital)

STD CODE: 03862

232224; Emergency- 229529, 229474 227930, 231081 233044, 228846 228254 231864, 230889 232201 228400 232106 227607, 228400 232181 242555/ 242531

KOHIMA Police Control Room: North Police Station: South Police Station: Fire Brigade: Naga Hospital: Oking Hospital: Bethel Nursing Home:

STD CODE: 0370 2244279 2244923 2242897 2222952 2222916 2243339 2224202

CAR MODEL

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Lion Mole Mouse Owl Parrot Pig Rabbit Sheep Snake Squid Tiger Zebra

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age points, and Citibank said it would slash its key rate by half a point.

But some economists say rates are not likely to fall fast enough to give a big boost to consumption. “Bank lending rates are unlikely to fall substantially and immediately, as liquidity conditions remain tight and credit risk remains elevated,” Goldman Sachs economist Tushar Poddar wrote in a note to clients this week.

Raw materials prices are falling now, and Ashutosh Goel, an auto analyst at Mumbai’s Edelweiss Capital, believes that and lower interest rates will eventually help India’s automakers. “I don’t think the long-term trend has changed,” he said. “The auto industry is by nature cyclical.

While we expect the long-term trend to be 15 percent, passenger car growth can fluctuate.

Year to year it might go from zero to 25 percent.”

BEIJING, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): India’s state-owned oil company is not facing cash flow problems yet and is still looking for acquisition opportunities despite the global financial crisis and the drop-off in prices it helped precipitate, the firm’s chief said on Saturday. “As a national oil company liquidity is not a problem but the whole business is certainly facing difficulties.” Oil and Natural Gas Corp Chairman R.S. Sharma told reporters on the sidelines of a national oil company forum in Beijing.

“It is a good time to buy assets if you have the money,” he said, adding that ONGC was looking at possible acquisitions in Africa and Latin America. Like other executives at the forum Sharma dismissed the current price decline as a blip in a long-term trend of rising consumption. “I don’t see that there is falling demand. Its just a short term phenomenon, just a question of sentiment going down.” The national oil companies have warned that $60 crude could actually fuel another spike in prices further down the line if it leads to a suspension of more expensive projects needed to meet expected demand growth.

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39,729 vehicles last month, 20 percent less than last year, and Maruti Suzuki reported total sales of 64,490 vehicles, down 7 percent from last year.

In recent weeks, the Reserve Bank of India has cut its key interest rate and taken a host of other measures to ensure that banks have adequate cash to meet debt obligations and make loans. But commercial banks, stung by the global credit squeeze and growing portfolios of bad loans, have been reluctant to pass on lower rates to consumers.

Eighteen months ago, car loans cost 7 to 9 percent a year; now they are running 17 to 18 percent, according to the Indian automakers group. In recent days, state run banks, responding to government pressure, have pledged to lower lending rates. On Thursday, the nation’s largest bank, the State Bank of India, said it would cut its prime lending rate by 0.75 percent-

ONGC still in quest for acquisitions: chief

CROSSWORD # 1147 1

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Armadillo Bird Cat Cow Deer Dog Dolphinwhale Fox Hammster Hippo Horse Kangaroo

3.47 billion rupees ($70.1 million). Nearly two-thirds of Tata’s earnings come from sales of commercial vehicles, which have been hit by slower growth in industrial production.

Farmer protests also forced the company to halt construction of a $350 million Nano factory and find another site. The company still aims for a modest launch by year-end using existing factories, but says it will take 6 to 12 months to ramp up production to 250,000 vehicles at the new location. Maruti Suzuki, which sells almost half of all passenger vehicles in India, said net profit plunged 36.5 percent to 2.96 billion rupees ($60 million), because of rising materials costs and a falling rupee.

Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd., India’s largest SUV and tractor maker, said net profit fell 20.6 percent to 1.86 billion rupees ($37.6 million) for similar reasons. Tata sold

DAILY CROSS WORD

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from our select customers.

India is a very crucial market for Audi and we are very keen to expand our presence in the country through expansion of the dealership network and bringing in our international range of models,” Mr. Tiers added. The super sports car comes with a drive-train combination of quattro permanent all-wheel drive with manual six-speed transmission or six-speed Rtronic and an all-aluminium space frame body.

Customised options It has distinctive exterior and interior styling that offers the feel of a luxurious sports car with exclusive equipment coupled with a wide variety of customised interior options.

Tiers said Audi R8 would be available along with the Audi model range consisting of the new Audi A4, Audi A6, Audi A8, Audi Q7 and Audi TT at 12 dealerships in Delhi, Gurgaon, Chandigarh, Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Ludhiana, Chennai, Kochi and Kolkata.

DOWN 1. Sly (6) 2. Root vegetable (6) 3. Aircraft shed (6) 4. Lawful (5) 5. Captivating (8) 6. Holiday (8) 11. Wooden pin (5) 14. .Wetness (8) 15. Impending (8) 16. Milestone (5) 21. Otto Preminger film of 1960 (6) 22. Mystery (6) 23. Break (6) 25. Mannerism (6)

Answers to CROSSWORD #1146 Across: 1. Citrus, 4. Psalm, 7. Wash, 8. marc, 10. Inert, 11. Olympia, 12. Late, 14.

Latch, 16. Mauve, 18. Tree, 19. Cold, 21. Teeth, 22. Wrath, 25. Item, 28. Achieve, 29.

Anger, 30. Emit, 31. Dish, 32. Holly, 33. Tartar.

Down:1. Thieve, 2. Chance, 3. Total, 4. Reliant, 6. Newsprint, 7. Assorted, 8. Dispense, 11. Peel, 15. Accordant, 17. Spruce up, 18. Sundhill, 20. Drum,21.Ant Hill, 22.

Polish, 23. Stakes, 26. Resin

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PRICE

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LOCAL|REGIONAL

The Morung Express

Sunday 9 November 2008

Naga rights body condemns victimizing innocent people

Newmai News Network Imphal | November 8

THE NAGA Peoples Movement for Human Rights (NPMHRSouth Sector) has expressed deep concern over the prevailing situation in Manipur ‘where democratic rights of the people are being curtailed’ by the state and held it a disturbing trend in the region.

The NPMHR -South Sector also expressed concern over the ‘high handedness’ on the people meted out by the state forces and asserted that it was increasingly becoming the order of the day.

Phamhring Sengul, convenor NPMHR (South) on Saturday while expressing concern over many innocent persons been victimized, pointed out that there was a sense of insecurity and anxiety everywhere in the region.

Condemning the alleged excesses committed by the Indian Reserved Battalion (IRB) and Manipur State police commandos on the poor villagers who marched to the Mapithel dam site to express their concern and plight, wherein about 45 were reportedly injured, the NPMHR stated that every-

one in a democratic society has the right to freely voice their concerns. NPMHR also pointed out that the affected people have the right to express their view in the matter of Mapithel dam as it is an issue of survival for them added Phamhring in the press statement.

The convenor of the human rights movement also pointed out that with the construction of the dam, the land of the people in the upstream would be submerged making them ‘migrants’ in their own land while the people downstream will live in permanent fear as the threat and danger from the dam is real and extremely vulnerable.

With the interest and concern of the affected people been neglected, the affected people have organised themselves and rightly asserted for justice added Phamhring. Pointing out some of the demands of the affected people, the NPMHR informed that the affected people of the area had demanded a review of the terms of reference which is discriminatory and moreover the government could only partially meet the term and condition of the earlier agreement arrived at with the upstream

ZSU Senapati condemns DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (MEXN): With reference to application submitted to SP, Senapati and a copy endure to office of Zeliangrong Students’ Union (ZSU) by W. Ranchong Ex-MDC Sadar Hills ADC against Hari Prasad Nepal and his anti-social activities, ZSU “observed that this is his notorious misadventure.”

L. Stephen Makuimai, ZSU (Spt. Zone) stated in a press release that, “In the early 1980s he had been creating havoc to the community by feeding wrong information to the security forces including underground elements resulting to ugly outcome. In 2000, he spearheaded in submitting a memorandum to the Convener Steering Committee, NSCN, expressing the desire of the Nepali community to pay allegiance to the Shepoumaramth Region although they settled within the Zelian-

grong territory. This is a serious matter and the authority concern should deal it accordingly,” the press note stated.

ZSU also added that “not realizing his dubious role creating enmity among different peace loving people, further accused W Ranchong, Ex-MDC of Thonglang Atongba and to other unnamed persons of hatching a conspiracy to eliminate him. This is purely ridiculous as it is absolutely baseless and without substance. However, it may be concluded that Hari Prasad Nepal should provide his detail statement to the office of SP Senapati within 7 days time with effect from this day, failing to which, he shall be deemed mentally unfit and action will be initiated against him without any further notice or information,” ZSU added further.

affected people. The affected people also demanded a contingency plan for the downstream affected people in the event of any untoward accident.

In this regards, NPMHR has appealed to all the people who believe in peaceful and democratic struggle to intervene and support the cause of the affected people. Stating that the affected people of the Mapithel dam should not suffer gross injustice of this magnitude, the human rights movement further appealed to the people of the state to help and guide each others in such situation.

Expressing deep and heartfelt sympathy to those who were reportedly brutalized and abused during the November 3, 2008 rally, the NPMHR has appealed to all to lend their support to save AS Lungmila, a mother of seven children, who is in critical condition from head injury sustained in the assault by the so called security forces. “We are sad to inform you that she has very less chance to survive”, lamented Phamhring in the press statement.

Meanwhile, demanding a judicial enquiry into the November 3 incident wherein at least 43 were injured when the security forces felt upon the womenfolk that were rallying towards the Mapithel dam site against it construction, a sitin-protest was held at the Dingko road in Chingmeirong, Imphal East on November 8.

The sit-in-protest was organised under the aegis of Mapithel Dam Affected Villages Organisation (MDAVO), Mapithel Dam Affected ChingTam Organisation (MDACTO) and Thoubal Multipurpose Project (Mapithel Dam) Downstream Affected Area Committee and was supported human rights, students and civil organisations such as Human Rights Initiative (HRI), United People’s Front (UPF), All Manipur United Club Organisation (AMUCO), All Manipur Tribal Students’ Union, Manipur (ATSUM), etc.

The committee has demanded punishment for the security forces involved and also compensation for Lumilla Devi, who is lying in Shija hospital in critical condition. The protest

further demanded that no construction should be undertaken against the interest of the public until and unless the dam site was reviewed and called upon the government to stop militarization at the dam site.

Aron Panmei, a participant of the protest stated that women, instead of being respected and protected, were attacked by the security forces. Condemning the use of force by the security forces, Panmei said that the construction of the dam should continue only after an agreement with the people and further warned the government of any use of force to construct the dam. She also condemned the Lamlai police station in Imphal East for refusing to register a First Information Registration (FIR) of the incident on November 3 when the affected had come to register on Friday, November 7.

A secretary of the downstream affected area committee also warned the government of more severe form of agitation if the government failed to meet the demands of the affected people.

Dimapur

5

7 Manipuri ‘militants’ detained in Kolkata KOLKATA, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): Acting on a tip-off from Military Intelligence (MI), the Special Task Force of Kolkata Police detained seven suspected members of the People’s Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak (Prepak), a militant outfit of Manipur, from central Kolkata, on Friday afternoon. While senior police officers refused to reveal much, MI sources said the seven had arrived in Kolkata eight days ago, with plans to extort businessmen participating in auctions.

The Army identified the seven as self-styled Lieutenant Kanta Singh, finance secretary M Chittaranjan Singh, Ibioyoma Singh Chiron, A Jagat Singh, L C Deben Singh, S Tomba Singh and Koijam Imbocha Singh. The last five are reportedly mid-level and lower-rung cadres of the banned outfit. “All of them are wanted in Manipur. While two of them had been staying in Madhyamgram, the rest put up at Manipur House and a lodge in Esplanade. MI was keeping tabs on them and tipped off the STF when they were at Lenin Sarani, where a number of auction houses are located.

Scrap from Manipur was being auctioned at one of these places and the militants were after the participants. Nearly Rs 15 lakh was recovered from them,”

a senior army officer said. Police, however, refused to comment on whether any money had been recovered from the suspected militants. DC DD Jawed Shamim said his department is awaiting a confirmation from the Manipur Police before ‘arresting’ the seven.

In December, 2007, seven persons, including three women — suspected to have link with Prepak — were arrested from a flat near Jadavpur University.

The army had claimed that one of those arrested was a well-known Manipuri cine star. This claim was not substantiated though. On April 8, 2007, army and CID officers arrested two ‘fighting’ cadres of Prepak (Shanti Faction) from the southern suburbs of Kolkata.

They were identified as self-styled Captain Leishmba alias Rakesh Singh and self-styled Lt R K Dhaneswar alias Changlamba.

Investigations had revealed that the former was a hard-core terrorist, who had undergone arms training in Myanmar.

The activities of Prepak are largely confined to the Manipur valley. The group is also suspected to have carried out attacks in Mizoram and north Tripura. One of its camps is in Sajik Tampak in the Chandel district in Manipur and also operates from Tizit in Nagaland’s Mon district.

Tokhu Emong celebrated at Bayavu 2009: Historic Year of Change KOHIMA, NOVEMBER 8 (MExN): The Lotha community residing in and around Bayavu Hill Colony, Kohima celebrated Tokhu Emong at the New High Court Complex Site. The celebration was sprinkled with cultural songs and dances from the Cuckoo Cultural Club, Kohima. Resplendent in traditional attires, over 200 people attended the festival. Some prominent political leaders of the Lotha community, like A Y Odyuo (president NPF Wokha Division), Ekyimo Lotha (exCandidate) and Mmhonlumo Kikon (Secretary, NCP, Northeast Coordination Committee) also attended the celebrations besides a host of dignitaries.

In his short speech, Y Ekyimo Lotha challenged the gathering to respect and preserve the positive aspect of the Lotha Naga Culture. He also

From page 1

urged upon the Lotha Hoho to request the State Government to grant two-day holiday for the government servants belonging to the Lotha

tribe, given the nature of the Tokhu Emong celebrations.

The celebration also witnessed special number by Y Nchumbemo Patton and

exhortation by Dr. T Odyuo (Retired Director of Veterinary and Animal Husbandry). The celebrations ended with the Tokhu feast.

With China, the problem is, it still persists that trade with Arunachal Pradesh is internal Chinese trade and not foreign trade (a critical political dialogue can set the business wheels rolling).

Myanmar has to be more accommodative in setting up infrastructural facilities (a joint effort can be initiated) and Bangladesh has to hold up its hand for India to clap.

He asked the state governments in Mizoram, Nagaland, Arunachal, Assam and Manipur to think up projects with Myanmar which can be facilitated by the Centre.

The North East governments themselves have not been active in promoting trade activities, Aiyar said. “The North East is a prisoner within its own frontiers.”

“The region has a commitment from the chief min-

isters and Prime Minister to attain Vision 2020,” he added. He also rued that the private sector has invested less than 0.5 % in the region and called for the melting of frontiers to encourage setting up of industrial units. In following years, Aiyar said, the Central government’s expenditure on the NE will be 10% of public expenditure even if the region has only 4% of the country’s population.

Meghalaya Chief Minister Donkupar Roy emphasized on re-opening of the age-old border ‘haats’ along the Indo-Bangla border even as he insisted that with proper monitoring, cross-border infiltration could also be checked. ‘’We need to be in close contact with Bangladesh and there should be more co-ordination between the border people and the BSF,’’ Dr Roy said.

‘North east states prisoner Govt explores market for organic produce Meghalaya: Coal mining Vs Paddy cultivation within its own frontiers’ From page 1

SHILLONG, NOVEMBER 8 (UNI): Terming the land locked North Eastern Region as ‘’prisoner within its own frontiers,’’ Union DoNER Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar today urged the sister states to develop trade relations with its neighbouring countries including Bangladesh, China and Myanmar.

However, by 2009, the North Eastern states could actively get involved in trade collaboration with Bangladesh after both New Delhi and Dhaka come out of the era of protectionism, Mr Aiyar said, addressing a seminar on ‘Development of Border Trade in North East India to enhance National Security’ organised by the Border Security Force. ‘’Once the general elections are held and a democratically elected government is installed in the neighbouring country, the DoNER ministry would depute a delegation comprising all eight Chief Ministers and local entrepreneurs of the North Eastern states to Dhaka,’’ he

said. ‘’The Chief Ministers of the region should be actively involved in formulation of the foreign policy of the country vis-à-vis Bangladesh,’’ Aiyar added.

Underscoring the need of a ‘’very dynamic’’ economic relationship between the North Eastern states and its ‘’natural economic hinterland Bangladesh,’’ the Union Minister said, ‘’Put into the right perspective, the nature of the problem is partly political and partly economic.’’

Pointing out that Dhaka too needed to positively respond to the idea of reopening border trade, Aiyar said, ‘’So long as the other hand is unwilling to clap it’s impossible to applaud!’’ ‘’The Look East Policy has only benefitted the Western and Southern India and has brought zero dividends for the NE,’’ he said, expressing optimism that the Centre now appeared to be ready to allow the NE States and the DoNER to take steps in reviving the age-old trade relations with Bangladesh.

The programmes to be monitored are only the listed projects in the government but include many other projects being implemented in the districts where the Union Ministry issue cheques directly to respective districts. In the connection, the chief minister has emphasized setting up a monitoring cell in the planning and coordination department under the direct supervision of the deputy chairman of the State Planning Board for effective implementation. The rationale is that, even if funds are directly routed to the districts and NGOs, the state government is accountable and answerable under the RTI Act for all such programmes under implementation in the state, Kronu said.

Also quoting the chief minister that “roads are the face of the state” and improvement of the road sector formed one top priority, Kronu said the minister for Roads and Bridges Kaito Aye “is really taking initiative and under his charge, changes for the better in the road sector will definitely come.” Besides, the Cabinet has already approved the appointment of a new chief engineer to look after the national highways. Saying that an industry cannot be dis-

cussed without the power sector “since we cannot put the cart before the horse”, Kronu stressed on the need to improve the power sector in the state. Under the power minister Doshehe Y. Sema, Kronu added, revenue collections have improved tremendously.

“Now, we have identified some power projects to take up in the state and we may also take up these power projects on Public Private Partnership mode with investment from government and private sectors,” the deputy chairman said. Kronu also pointed to the border trade centers in the MollenAvangkhu area in Phek district, Lungwa in Mon district and Pangsha in Tuensang to improve the economic condition of the state.

“For this we also require the cooperation and support of the Myanmar government,” he said adding that the chief minister has invited the Myanmarese ambassador to Nagaland as the state’s guest at the forthcoming Hornbill Festival. Also stating that the present ministry consists of “very good team work and cooperation” among the ministers, parliamentary secretaries, MLAs as well as officers in charge of various department, Kronu hoped that the economic condition of the state will surely improve in due course of time.

Newmai News Network Shillong | November 8

COAL MINING has taken its toll on paddy cultivation in Meghalaya the state that is still known as agricultural state. The toll taken by the surge in unscientific coal mining is apparent from the statistics provided by the Meghalaya Minister of Agriculture on the floor of the assembly today. Overall, cultivation of the staple food of the people showed a serious decline in the past few years, but it is in Jaintia Hills that the huge fall is evident.

Meghalaya agriculture Minister E.C.B. Bamon said, the total decline of areas under paddy cultivation stands at 5479 hectares in 2004-2005 to 2005-2007 and another 1746 hectares in 2006-2007. As per the statistics provided by the minister , the total area under paddy cultivation in the state stands at 111550 hectares in 2004-2005, it came down to 106071 hectares in 2005-2006 and 1104325 hectares in 2006-2007. However, it is

Jaintia Hills district which has faced the worst brunt and all attributes goes to coal mining and the ongoing power projects.

In between 204 and 2006, the slum of areas under paddy cultivation is 4633 hectares. As per statistics the area under paddy cultivation in jaintia hills was 16926 hectares in 2004-2005 and it dips to 12293 hectares in 2005-2006. Admitting the huge decline, Bamon however stated, “The extensive reduction in respect of paddy cultivation of paddy cultivation in Jaintia Hills is due the shift of economic pursuits of the rural people from cultivation to coal mining which renders quick buck as against the traditional culture of paddy cultivation whose economic benefit is relatively insignificant”.

While expressing the government helplessness to the people shift from cultivation to coal mining, the Agriculture minister however said that steps are being taken by the government to maintain paddy cultivation in the entire state.

‘Bangladesh biggest problem in fighting terrorism’: Gogoi

Students and teachers of Cotton Collegiate H. S. School took out a silent protest rally against the October 30 Assam bomb blast on November 8 in Guwahati. (UB PHOTOS)

GUWAHATI, NOVEMBER 8 (UNI): With 30/10 serial blasts exposing glaringly the vulnerability of Assam to ‘imported’ terror-attacks, the chief minister today named Bangladesh as the ‘biggest problem’.

Tarun Gogoi also cautioned against growing religious fundamentalism, hinting covertly that religious terrorism was being sponsored from Bangladeshi soil.

He announced a stringent vigil along the international as well as inter-state

borders, including sealing of international borders.

Conceding that terrorism was being imported from neighbouring countries, Gogoi told reporters here, ‘’Assam is the most vulnerable place, with militants taking shelter in its bordering countries like Bangladesh, Nepal and Myanmar.’’ Terming Bangladesh as the ‘biggest concern’ for the state by far, he said, ‘’Bangladesh is most problematic. It has large number of terrorists of its own and these groups in turn support North East militant outfits, who reciprocate by assisting in carrying out subversive activities in NE. ‘’We have to now fight two sets of terrorists, our home-grown ones as well as those in Bangladesh,’’ he added.

Stopping short of confirming that local groups were used by suspected outside terror outfits in carrying out serial blasts in the state, the chief minister said, ‘’It is evident that no outside group can carry out the blasts without local logistical support.’’ Branding religious terrorism as the most dangerous form of terror, Gogoi said, ‘’Religious fundamentalists give rise to religious terrorism and it can be handled only through consultations with all religious communities and civil society.’’

Also, taking into consideration the

ineffectiveness of the government machinery in handling the aftermath, Gogoi today announced setting up of a state Disaster Management Authority.

He also announced a slew of measures to strengthen the vigilance scenario as terror strikes had increased manifold. ‘’A disaster management authority would be constituted soon to assist during such times of crisis. Retired Army personnel of the rank of Major General will head it,’’ Gogoi told newspersons here. ‘’Civil defence has to be strengthened and the government will enlist help from all quarters, especially from the public,’’ he added. The alleged delay in reaching of fire engines and ambulances after the blasts had come under criticism. It had led to mob frenzy in Ganeshguri blast site here, resulting in massive vandalism, forcing police to clamp curfew to control the situation.

The Chief Minister informed that vulnerable points, especially crowded places, have been identified and more vigil would be kept at those points.

Informing that civilian deaths had gone up in the last eight years, he said, ‘’The militants have changed strategy. They are striking at soft target with bombs for maximum devastation. Their eroding mass support has led the terrorists to do this.’’ Against

Assam blasts continue to take traumatic toll

GUWAHATI, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): Assam’s deadly serial blasts that claimed 77 lives last month continue to take traumatic toll, with a woman being admitted to a hospital for trauma treatment after losing her husband and daughter, while two others claiming a body as that of their dead son. Sunita, who lost her husband, was hoping to take her daughter Moromi back home from hospital. But Moromi succumbed to her burn injuries after battling for life for four days.

Moromi (4) was returning home from her Junior Basic School at Dispur on October 30 when her father Sagar Sarma was struck down and she was injured by an explosion at Ganeshguri. Sunita is now being treated for acute trauma at the psychiatry ward of the

same hospital where her daughter died. Meanwhile, at the Guahati Medical College and Hospital, a woman two days ago identified the charred remains of a young man as those of her son Santosh. But another lady also claimed the body as that of her missing son.

Both have now to await the result of the DNA test, which the police subsequently ordered. In the Uzan Bazar area here, a bomb at the compound of the district deputy commissioner’s office left a young woman, her child and mother-in-law shattered. The wife of the victim, Rana, has a vacant look as she hugs her husband’s shirt while her mother-in-law’s tears have not dried up as yet. Another mother in Barpeta, has not reconciled to her son Manik Saha’s death in the blast there.

1536 civilian deaths between 19962001, there had been 1517 deaths between 2001-2008, with 605 blasts in the last eight years against 173 between 1996-2001.

Stressing on the need for

stringent laws to fight terrorism, he also highlighted the need for greater coordination among North East states, with the Centre already directing the states to work in tandem.

6 E X P R E S S Review India has reneged on all its promises to adivasis SUNDAY

THE MORUNG EXPRESS

9 NOVEMBER 2008

Mari Marcel Thekaekara

A

t 84 million, India has the largest number of indigenous people. Why are the adivasis still so marginalized? Why are they displaced from their lands and forests, and reduced to migrant labour?

Did you know that India boasts the largest indigenous population in the world? This is not a common quiz question so it’s a fact hardly anyone knows. But our 8% adivasi population works out to 84.15 million people, according to the 2001 census.

Another fact that we don’t go around broadcasting is that our adivasi areas are at the bottom of every poverty index in the country. Adivasis remain amongst our poorest, most deprived people because the billions that are sanctioned for their welfare continue to be siphoned off by corrupt politicians or bureaucrats. Anthropologists and activists have often been accused of romanticising tribals -- their way of life, their “symbiotic relationship” with nature, their sense of community, their world vision.

Like indigenous people all over the world, adivasis share a unique worldview. They are largely an egalitarian people who for thousands of years have kept intact their culture of sharing, community living, generosity of spirit, veneration for the earth and all it provides. This attitude to life rendered them particularly vulnerable to marauding invaders who exploited their collective trusting, generous spirit.

It’s difficult to define an adivasi. Or to highlight the injustices meted out to them as a people. Unlike dalits, injustices against adivasis are less easy to pinpoint as they constitute a diverse group with hundreds of different clans, tribes, languages and customs scattered all over the country.

Bureaucrats and officials often maintain that no amount of aid can ever lift adivasis out of their abject poverty. “It is their own fault that they are so indebted and poor,” government officials complain. Meanwhile, the local non-tribal population views them as lazy and good-for-nothing. At a meeting in Germany, my husband Stan had just delivered a talk on adivasi values and way of life, and how much we all have to learn from them. A German member of the audience stood up and said: “You are speaking nonsense. I have been a missionary in adivasi areas and they know nothing other than to eat, hunt, and procreate.” A tea planter in the Nilgiris once asked us: “Is it true that these adivasis have sub-normal intelligence?” And a former chief secretary was convinced that a group of adivasis who met her to present a memorandum were not adivasis because “they wore blue jeans and sneakers,” and when she visited their village she found they were eating rice and sambar “just like us”, not tubers and dried meat. The media mostly portrays adivasis as exotic creatures dancing with feathers in their hair, or wearing colourful, ethnic clothes. Indira Gandhi danced with them in adivasi villages. The cameras loved the footage. But no one ever took them seriously.

India’s adivasis are on the verge of being wiped out. Not physically, but their way of life and their culture which is thousands of years old and has fascinated anthropologists for over a hundred years. But anthropologists tend to focus more on their socio-cultural norms and practices which appear so exotic, different and alien from the dominant culture and therefore so interesting. Very little has been written about the adi-

vasi economy, the general attitude being that they are so poor what can they possibly contribute to economic thinking?

In this period of economic meltdown on the one hand, and the reality of climate change on the other, we must look to lesser-known economies like those of the adivasis for sustainable solutions. Now more than ever before in history we need to study this way of life, as it is the nomads and huntergatherers who held the key to a sustainable lifestyle.

At the risk of oversimplifying, and cutting through all the hype about their symbiotic relationship with nature, I would say there are two guiding principles to the adivasi way of life. They were the only people who did not hoard and accumulate. And they venerated the earth, considered it sacred and not a mere resource to be exploited.

History teaches children that the greatest civilisations on earth were those of the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans. Pyramids and temples are extolled as marvels of architecture. In India, we are proud of Mohenjodaro and Harappa. We can boast about Susrutha performing surgery while most people still ran around in skins! But what we don’t spell out is the fact that all these wealthy, progressive civilisations were based on slavery and exploitation of human labour. The greater glory of civilisation somehow exonerates the darker underbelly of these societies. Indigenous people were the only ones in history who believed in complete equality. Their societies did not hoard. Wealth was distributed equitably. The spoils of the hunt were shared with those who stayed at home. People worked together rather than in competition. It was a society without greed.

People who understood adivasis recognised their values and culture as infinitely superior to the non-adivasis who proposed to “civilise” the savages. Verrier Elwin wrote about them and became an advisor to the government on tribal affairs. Pandit Nehru, as the first prime minister, was lyrical about governance for adivasis in his Tribal Panchsheel. His solemn promise to adivasi communities was that: • People should develop along the lines of their own genius, and the State should avoid imposition but encourage their own local traditions and culture.

• Tribal rights in land and forests should be respected.

• The State should work through and not in rivalry with their own social and cultural institutions.

• The government should judge results by the quality of human character that is evolved.

Yet, if we look at history, we have reneged on all our promises. Everywhere, the government and unscrupulous, exploitative non-tribal neighbours have tricked, cheated and ousted adivasis off their homesteads; marginalised them on land that was once theirs.

To expect the average bureaucrat to understand the Nehruvian Tribal Panchsheel is being unrealistically optimistic. For the government to be capable of “judging results by the quality of human character that is evolved” presupposes that the officials designated to tribal regions have the “soul” to appreciate tribal values. The non-acquisitive, inherently trusting, community-based approach to life of the tribal is dismissed as being unambitious, stupid, jungli or downright lazy by the average non-tribal. Yet it is universally acknowledged, even by people who denigrate them, that adivasis are truthful, honest and sincere, not shrewd.

Exploiters reign supreme in most tribal areas. For centuries, traders and moneylenders have sucked the blood of the adivasi people unfettered by law enforcers of any kind.

Twenty-five years ago, Stan talked of traders exchanging linseed worth Rs 200 per kg for a year’s supply of salt worth Rs 5. The tribals reasoned that they’d got the linseed free from the forest; they never ever considered the cost of collecting it. They thought of the trader who exchanged it for a year’s supply of salt as being generous and kind, even as the trader laughed all the way to the bank. A number of books, notably Paraja, and films have been made on the extortion and exploitation rampant in India’s tribal belts.

Sixty years after Nehru exhorted our policymakers to treat adivasis with special care, state governments are perpetrating a new kind of injustice, depriving adivasis of the little they have managed to hold onto. In Orissa, in the Narmada region, in West Bengal, in Chhattisgarh, in unnamed pockets all over the country, adivasis are being pushed off their lands in the name of development and progress, ostensibly for the general good. Chhattisgarh abounds in horror stories. The devastating effect of the Salwa Judum has been written about extensively. Yet, they continues to wreak havoc on the local adivasis, cutting at the very core of their culture and turning a peaceable, gentle people into armed, marauding murderers who spill the blood of their own clanspeople.

A brief understanding of history is necessary here.

Adivasis were culturally distinct from dominant, mainstream populations. They protected their identity fiercely, with taboos on marriage with outsiders. In pre-colonial history, adivasis enjoyed self-rule and fought anyone who threatened their freedom. Local rulers respected this, and the adivasis were seen as an independent, distinct people.

They were part of the unknown frontier even after the British subjugated the smaller states, one by one. The areas they dominated were perceived as unknown territory, dangerous even. The adivasis fought the British tenaciously, though their role in India’s independence remains largely

unrecognised.

Life changed drastically for adivasi communities with the British Permanent Land Settlement in 1793 and the establishment of the ‘zamindari’ system that conferred control over vast territories, including adivasi homelands, on designated feudal lords for the purpose of collecting revenue. Relationships with the surrounding dominant communities and the rulers changed forever.

But even the British Crown’s dominions in India were forced to accede independence to adivasis politically. The agency (tribal) areas, where the agent governed in the name of the Crown, left the local self-governing institutions untouched. It also recognised tribal supremacy in the excluded areas (northeast) where representatives of the Crown were figureheads and tribal chieftains ruled their people.

The Land Acquisition Act of 1894 proclaimed the supremacy of the sovereign. It introduced the concept of total colonisation of any territory in the name of ‘public interest’, a precedent followed even today, forcing on local populations an outside definition of the notion of ‘common good’. This is particularly evident in adivasi regions.

The colonial concept of rex nullius (that which has not been conferred by the sovereign belongs to the sovereign) and terra nullius (land that belongs to no one) bulldozed traditional political and social entities, spelling the death knell for traditional forms of self-governance.

In the name of development Over 10 million adivasis have been displaced to make way for development projects such as dams, mining, industries, roads, protected areas, etc. Though most of the dams (over 3,000) are located in adivasi areas, only 19.9% (1980-81) of adivasi landholdings are irrigated, compared to 45.9% of holdings of the general population. India produces as many as 52 principal minerals. Of these, 45 major minerals (coal, iron ore, magnetite, manganese, bauxite, graphite, limestone, dolomite, uranium, etc) are found in adivasi areas, contributing around 56% of the national total mineral earnings in terms of value. Of the 4,175 working mines reported by the Indian Bureau of Mines in 199192, approximately 3,500 can be assumed to be in adivasi areas. Income to the government from forests rose from Rs 5.6 million in 1869-70 to more than Rs 13 billion in the 1970s. The bulk of the nation’s productive wealth lies in the adivasi territories. This was the reason adivasis were not allowed to form their own states. Instead, their land was parcelled out to the states of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa and Andhra Pradesh.

Promises made to adivasis before Independence were broken by dominant community politicians. Most Indian states were formed primarily on the basis of language groups. But for the adivasis all principles were ignored. Adivasi territories were divided and distributed, ignoring the validity of applying the same principle of language in the formation of states. Jharkhand was divided between Bihar, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh and Orissa. After several decades of struggle, the Bihar part of Jharkhand is now a separate state. The Gond region has been divided amongst Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh.

Similarly, the Bhil region has been divided between Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Rajasthan.

In the northeast, the Nagas are divided into Nagaland,

Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. Further administrative sub-divisions within states, into districts, talukas and panchayats have been organised in such a way that tribal concentrations are broken up, marginalising them further both physically and politically. India, the new nation-state that proudly proclaimed its hard-won freedom from the colonial raj, promptly embarked on a process of colonising its own adivasi population. Adivasis have been driven out, marginalised and deprived of dignity in the process of ‘national development’.

The supposed development of adivasi areas brought in waves of aggressive, exploitative non-tribal immigrants in search of opportunities and employment. They usurped jobs ostensibly meant for adivasis. They impoverished the local tribal population, introduced hard liquor, sexually exploited adivasi women, and cheated the naïve, non-materialistic adivasis. In the rich mineral belt of Jharkhand, the adivasi population has dropped from around 60% in 1911 to 27.67% in 1991. Large numbers of adivasis have been forced to eke out a living in cities and urban centres. According to a rough estimate, there are over 40,000 tribal domestic working women in Delhi alone! In some places, development-induced migration of adivasis to other adivasi areas has led to fierce conflicts, as between the Santhali and the Bodo in Assam.

India’s total forest cover is reportedly 765.21 thousand sq km. Of this, 71% is in adivasi areas. The logical conclusion would be that only adivasis have succeeded in preserving forests. Of this, 416.52 and 223.30 thousand sq km are categorised as ‘reserved’ and ‘protected’ forests respectively.

About 23% of these have been declared wildlife sanctuaries and national parks, a move that alone has displaced around half-a-million adivasis. By the process of colonisation of forests, that began formally with the Forest Act of 1864 and finally the Indian Forest Act of 1927, the rights of adivasis were reduced to mere privileges conferred by the State.

Adivasis won certain concessions because of their persistent battles against the British. The Forest Policy of 1952, the Wild Life Protection Act of 1972 and the Forest Conservation Act of 1980 cut back more and more privileges in the post-colonial period. Traditional forest rights were slowly forbidden or usurped. From the Forest Bill of 1980 to 2005, we have come a long way.

The 2005 Forest Bill, together with the Common Minimum Programme of the Congress Party, promises new hope for adivasis, though this is still only on paper. At the very least it forms the basis for adivasis to fight for their rights, with declared policy on their side. But in order for adivasi communities to come into their own, in order for the spirit of the law to succeed, we need a taskforce comprising experts on adivasi culture and traditions. People who believe in adivasis, work in adivasi areas and can ensure that adivasis are involved in their own governance and can take control of their own destinies. They should be people who respect and truly appreciate the depth, wisdom and superior values of adivasi culture.

This may be dismissed as romantic nonsense by a lot of people. But for those who know the real adivasi world -- more so as we watch India’s descent into crass commercialism where progress is defined by vulgar materialism and values, and culture is sacrificed on the high altar of economic growth regardless of the consequences to the earth or its people -- hope lies in a return to community, to a reverence for the earth and to old sustainable ways.

World Leaders Seek Culture of Peace Thalif Deen

Inter Press Service

W

hen more than a dozen world leaders meet in New York next week to discuss "the culture of peace", the primary focus will be the growing misperception of religion, specifically Islam, and the increase in racism, xenophobia and intolerance worldwide. An overwhelming majority of heads of state who will participate in the highlevel meeting are from Muslim countries: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Pakistan, Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Morocco, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates.

U.S. President George W. Bush is also expected to address the two-day meeting of the 192member General Assembly, his second visit to the world body this year, after September. "This is going to be a very important conference," SecretaryGeneral Ban Ki-moon told reporters early this week. Ban said the United Nations is the centre of the world's efforts to advance mutual respect, understanding and dialogue. The initiative for the meeting came from King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia, the custodian of the Two Holy Mosques in that country. With this, and with other initiatives, to promote understanding and appreciation between religions, as well as faiths and cultures, the whole international community will be able to promote more dialogue and harmony and reconciliation, Ban said. "I am sure this will provide a very good momentum," he added.

The high-level meeting on culture of peace is scheduled to take place Nov. 12-13 and is a follow-up to a meeting held in Madrid last July.

The U.N. meeting will take place amidst rising Islamophobia, particularly in Europe, aggravated by the publication of blasphemous caricatures

of the Prophet Muhammad by a Danish newspaper, and the rise in suicide bombings in Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan. "Islam had nothing to do with suicide bombings -- either on the basis of religion or jurisprudence," says Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, secretary-general of the 57-member Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC). Why would a young man or woman commit suicide?

What objective was more valuable than life itself? And what psychological, political and social reasons prompt such actions? he asked.

Until such questions were asked, answered and addressed, terrorism and suicide bombings would increase, Ihsanoglu told reporters at a recent U.N press conference. Last March Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned "in

the strongest terms" the airing of an "offensively anti-Islamic film" in the Netherlands. "There is no justification for hate speech or incitement to violence," he said. "The right to free expression is not at stake here. Freedom must always be accompanied by social responsibility."

"We must also recognise that the real fault line is not between Muslim and Western societies, as

some would have us believe, but between small minorities of extremists, on different sides, with a vested interest in stirring hostility and conflict."

Still, the president of the General Assembly Father Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann says this is not a meeting about religions. It is a meeting to discuss the common values in different cultures -- whether they are from religions, civilisations, ethics or philosophies, he added. Meanwhile a U.N. report released last week summarises the views of member states on 'Combating Defamation of Religions.'

According to the United States, the concept of 'defamation of religions' is not supported by international law and efforts to combat defamation of religions typically result in restrictions on the freedoms of thought, conscience, religion and expression. The United States asserts that from a legal perspective, the concept of 'defamation of religions' is "deeply problematic since under existing human rights law, individuals -- not religions, ideologies or beliefs -- are the holders of human rights and are protected by law.

"However, the concept of defamation of religions seeks to convey the idea that a religion itself can be subject of protection under human rights law, thereby potentially undermining protection for individuals." Regarding freedom of expression, the United States has also expressed the view that governments should not prohibit or punish speech, even offensive or hateful speech, because of an underlying confidence that in a free society such hateful ideas will fail because of their own intrinsic lack of merit. The United States, however, agrees that more should be done to promote inter-religious understanding and believes concrete action supporting tolerance and individual rights is the best way to combat abusive actions and hateful ideologies.

SUNDAY

THE MORUNG EXPRESS

9 NOVEMBER 2008

7

FAITH LEAF

INSPIRATIONAL STORIES, MESSAGES, POEMS & SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCES

Christ the Truth

After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together; with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be the Lord forever.

1 Thessalonians 4:17 Rev. Billy Graham

Many people today say there is no such thing as absolute truth. The folly of such a statement, of course, is that if one believes it to be true, that very belief contradicts the statement itself! In this message, Billy Graham shows that the Bible has much to say about truth and that, as the Word of God, it can bring order to our tangled thinking and lead us to the One who claimed to be the truth Himself Pilate asked the question, “What is truth?” (John 18:38). And many people today are asking, “What is truth?” Inside the Bible are stories of lust and hate and war and crime equal to anything else we read about in history. The Bible tells the truth—it tells the truth about God, about people and about the devil.

Jesus wasn’t afraid to call Satan what he is: a liar and the father of lies. Jesus said, “There is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it” (John 8:44).

The first time man had to make a choice between God’s truth and the devil’s lie, he chose the devil’s lie. The moment that Adam and Eve rejected God’s truth and accepted the devil’s lie, all of

the world’s troubles began. Our sinful nature often sides with the devil’s lie instead of God’s truth, because we are sinners.

We’d rather believe the devil’s lie than God’s truth. Sin is a disease that runs all through the human race. The disease of sin is at the heart of the troubles of the world.

To those involved in this dying world, Satan will come with evil’s undiluted power to deceive, for they have refused the truth that could have saved them.

God sends upon them, therefore, the full force of evil’s delusion, so that they put their faith in an utter fraud and meet the inevitable judgment of all who have refused to believe the truth and who have made evil their playfellow (2 Thessalonians 2:9-12).

God says these people deliberately forfeited the truth of God and accepted a lie. God, therefore, handed them over to disgraceful passions (Romans 1:24-26).

They see truth as a lie and the lie as the truth. They accept the lies of the devil.

What are some of these lies?

First, there is the lie about sex. In Proverbs we read, “Can a man take fire to his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?

Can one walk on hot coals, and his feet not be seared?” (Proverbs 6:27-28). That Scripture refers to lust. Lust means if you had the opportunity, you would commit immorality. Many people fantasize in their thinking, and lust that way.

Second, the devil lies about drugs.

And it’s interesting that the words drugsandwitchcraftcome from the same root word in Greek——pharmakeia. Drugs are one of Satan’s great lies. He tells you that you will soar to heaven and have great, wonderful experiences. And every time you listen, you end up in trouble.

Third, there is the lie about religious hypocrisy. Millions of people attend church services without having a personal relationship with Christ. I used to be taken to church by my parents, and I hated church. But when I was a teenager, I received Christ as my Savior.

When I went back to church, I said to

my parents, “The pastor certainly is preaching wonderful sermons.” They replied, “He’s preaching the same type of sermons, but you’re listening with different ears.”

Fourth, there’s the delusion that peace is just around the corner. It is not! There will not be peace in the world until the Prince of Peace comes. We find deception, delusion and lies on every hand. What is the answer? What can people do?

Turn to the truth—turn to Christ. Jesus said, ‘You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32). He said, “I am … the truth” (John 14:6). Jesus did not say, “You shall know a truth” or “anytruth” but “thetruth.” He’s the embodiment of all truth.

Jesus said, “If you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins” (John 8:24). If you don’t believe that and don’t accept Christ, you will die in your sins and you’ll be lost. Jesus Christ claimed to be ultimate truth. Are you willing to face the truth?

Jesus Christ told the truth about sin.

He said, “Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, and adulteries, and all other sins that we commit” (Cf. Matthew 15:19). War comes from the human heart.

Family tensions and problems come from the human heart. Rebellion comes from the human heart.

He told the truth about love. God loves you. And He loves you with a love that you don’t know anything about, because there is no human love comparable to divine love. God’s love sent His Son to the cross to die and shed His blood for you. Then God raised Him from the dead, and He’s alive.

Jesus told the truth about judgment.

He warned people to “flee the wrath of God” (Cf. Matthew 3:7). Yes, God is angry with the wicked. Jesus said, “Every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment” (Matthew 12:36). Every idle word, all your thoughts, all your words, everything you have ever done, will be at the judgment.

And you will be condemned by your own

words.

Jesus told the truth about repentance.

He said, “Unless you repent, you will perish” (Cf. Luke 13:3). Have you repented? repentancemeans change. I change my mind about God, about myself, about my fellow man. I change my way of living.

But on my own I don’t have strength to change. I can’t change. I can’t become a Christian. Why? Because I’m “dead in trespasses and sins” (Ephesians 2:1).

God has to help me change. He has to help me repent. And I have to say, “O God, help me to repent.” Not only do we have to repent; by faith we must also receive Christ into our hearts as Savior and Lord.

Jesus told the truth about conversion.

He said we have to be born from above, born again (John 3:3). The process is called conversion. Jesus said, “Unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3).

He’s not telling people to become like adults. He’s telling us to become like little children and have childlike faith. We come by simple faith, like a little child who trusts his mother and father. We put our total confidence in Jesus Christ by faith. Have you done that?

We also must obey Him. Live the life. Follow Him, serve Him, whatever the cost. And it is costly. In the world in which we live, if we hold on to Christian values and live up to the moral standards laid down by Christ, it will cost us. Obedience means following Christ, even to death. Are you willing to do that?

Before you come to Christ, you are a slave of sin. Christ’s truth makes you free—free from the penalty of sin. No other truth can free you so that you’ll never go to hell. Christ’s truth provides freedom someday from the presence of sin, freedom now from the power of sin.

Sin shall no longer have dominion over you, if you come to Christ and let Him change you. You can be free, right now, by coming to Christ.

Who Is in Charge of Our Pulpits?

Ron Johnson Jr.

Pulpit Freedom Sunday was about bringing kingdom principles to bear on contemporary social problems, not seizing political power As a pastor who proudly participated in the Alliance Defense Fund's Pulpit Freedom Sunday on September 28, I am not amazed when members of the mainstream media and groups that routinely oppose Christians in various circles fail to understand what the day was about.

Really, that's not surprising. But as a pastor, I am certainly troubled when Christians and the pastors who lead them misunderstand or believe the misnomers and mischaracterizations that abound on this issue. So my hope is to say something that will lead to greater thought-

fulness with regard to free speech from the pulpit.

I wish to be clear from the outset: I have no desire to turn my pulpit into a Christian version of the Chicago political machine. My church will not be writing large checks to candidates, or to anyone else for that matter. We have plenty to do educating Christians about tithing to support the church, let alone political campaigns.

I have no intention of selecting my sermon topics by watching CNN or Fox News. I have no secret dream of becoming President or even running for dog catcher. To suggest, as some have, that somehow we are being seduced by political power or that we are looking to government to be America's "savior" is silliness. And no, the Pulpit Initiative, of which Pulpit Freedom Sunday was a part, is not about encouraging pastors to endorse candidates from the pulpit.

The purpose of the Pulpit Initiative is to restore the right of pastors to speak freely from the pulpit without fear of punishment by the government for doing what pastors do: speak on any num-

ber of cultural and societal issues from a biblical perspective. Christians believe that civil government owes its existence to God and is therefore accountable to him to behave righteously in serving the common good. The role of the pastor is and always has been to declare the good news that "our God reigns" (Isa. 52:7).

Currently, the Internal Revenue Service has placed itself in the role of evaluating the content of a pastor's sermon to determine if the message is "political."

We need to ask: Where did this authority come from? And more importantly, why should Americans be willing to submit to this unconstitutional power grab without even a whimper? Why are pastors the only people who have allowed the IRS to censor their First Amendment rights to a tax exemption they have enjoyed since the founding of our nation?

Churches are tax-exempt because they are churches, not because the government decided to bless them with a "subsidy." The church is not a profitmaking business or individual. It is not getting a pass on taxes; it is simply outside the government's appropriate tax

base.

It's time we exploded the false sacred/secular dichotomy that the secularists have conveniently created to silence our message. It's time we stop letting others tell us to keep Jesus inside of the church and out of the world he died to redeem. This is not about promoting political parties or agendas or establishing a "theocracy." It's about our right to bring kingdom principles and solutions to bear on contemporary social problems if we so choose. But it's our choice, not the choice of the IRS. If we cannot discuss any and all topics, including those the IRS may deem "political," even within our communities of faith, we will become what Martin Luther King, Jr., called an "irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority." Does this not describe the condition of the American church today?

It's time to defend our first liberty, the freedom to preach the Good News of the whole gospel, without fear of IRS censorship or sanction, to a world desperately searching for answers. Simply put, it's time for the church to be the church.

STEWARDSHIP Rev. K. Luruo

oncise dictionary defines “stewardship” a person who manages another property or financial affairs. He is a trustee of another person. He is the agent of another person.Christian stewardship is the practice of systematic and proportionate giving of time, abilities and material possessions, based on the conviction that these are a trust from God. Jesus parable of talents in Mt. 25:14 reminds us of four principles of stewardship. The story reflects the principle of ownership, trusteeship, productivity, and accountability. The word steward is a very common, popular and familiar word in Israel. Because success or failure of either management of homes or society depends on how one is sincere, faithful, honest in that he is placed with vested responsibility and authority. He is called for and with intension that he faithfully render his best service for the cause of home or society.

The story of a faithful steward in the life of Joseph remind us as to how a steward should discharge his duties and responsibility.

People who are placed under him felt secured, protected even in time of severest testing period of seven years of famine in Egypt.

I wish the people of Nagas also be familiar with the word stewardship. Because every one of us whoever is placed in one position or the other whether in the field of religion, politics, schools, offices and any profession each one is a steward in the vine yard of the master. Each one should be mindful of the fact that we are placed in different positions with grave responsibility. We are all steward of the Lord. The Bible records that men is given responsibility to be caretaker of His creation (Gen.2:15). To our surprise the Nagas of today’s generation instead of being caretaker we are on the verge of destroying all our preserved forests of our forefathers. Instead of protecting, preserving those beautiful natural vegetations through out Nagaland, we have completely ruined our land through burning jungles and killing all sorts of animals in the forest. Very soon different species of animals, birds and insects are now going to be extinct. Most of the river streams below hills and mountain are getting dried due to absence of big trees. Are we as Nagas who claims 90% Christians proved to be good steward of our natural resources. Consider the desert land of Palestine in Israel and Californian state in USA. All the desert land are now watered and grown thick forests out of dust and desert. Who are these people- God’s fearing people. They are aware of their position as God’s children who care for master’s property or ownership of God. Steward also requires trusteeship. Any steward appointed should be reminded of trust. Without trust no one will appoint stewardship. Whatever position one may be placed the master has trust in him. With this trust he is given responsibility and authority. The position you hold or the status you attained is not because of you but because of the one who cares for you. The Bible records that promotion does not comes neither from north nor south, west or east but from the Lord. (Ps. 75:6). So the Lord has placed into whatever position you are holding now with confidence and trust in you. So let us not betray this trust.

No profession is isolated from God’s purview whether religion, polities, bureaucrats, NGO’s business or peasants. We are all stewards of God at different levels with different abilities and capacities.

Looking at church leaders in Nagaland, we need to check ourselves as to how far we are true, honest and sincere to our call especially in soul winning which is our priority. It appears that many of our church leaders are being traped with many calls these days with social and political forces around. But reasons of our call is well known by ourselves to be a steward of the Gospel each one should be reminded that this a very special call to stewards mysterious of God. All people whether low or high look up to our ministers and MLAs. Success or failure of our future lies mostly in the hand of our ministers and MLAs. It is therefore, expected that leaders of our state should have vision, goals and have master plan for our next generation. The Bible warns a leader who has no vision the society will perish. God has placed them in such strategic position.

If they fail to be faithful to their call, they are also accountable to God with higher degrees. Looking at the activities of some of the so-called national workers we are at a lost to see their dedication and sacrifice for the cause of our nation. We can not generalize them but majority of our so called national workers instead of promoting our people the public are suffering in many areas.

Looking at the prevailing environment especially in schools, offices, Hospitals where is our stewardship? Looking at our roads conditions, communications, it seems no one cares for it. Buildings fitted with pipes but without water. Building spoiled with spits of chewed pans, spoiled with blood- like stains all over. Financial accountability of Govt/Officials are in question. Industries, factories, empowerment of human resources need to be re-built and re-enforced. The Bible says where there is no vision people perish”.

This does not only apply to spiritual growth but it also implies common vision set by the leaders of society.

Steward requires accountability. The story of the rich noble man reminds us that the Lord will require each one whoever is holding responsibility at all levels to give account to the master one day. Your loyalty, faithfulness to your call, your productivity in your profession, your sincerity and honesty will be accounted one day. Each one whether high or low, big or small are required to give our account before the Lord. (Romans 12:14). Just as a farmer must exercise faithful stewardship to benefit from God’s gifts in the area of nature, so the businessman must exercise faithful stewardship to benefit from God in the area of commerce. A steward must be sensitive and obedient to the will of God in the area of managing God’s resources including his time, abilities, responsibilities and the gift of life . That is true stewardship.

Happy 1st Birthday Moatola (Fiona) As you celebrate your birthday today, may you be blessed with all the love and blessings by all those around you and may you always shine to brighten us all. Happy birthday once again.

With best wishes, Parents and all loved ones.

DABA English Service today Welcome to United Praise evening service Message: Maongwati Aier, DC Dimapur Exhortation: Geoffrey Yaden, Editor Nagaland Post Time: 3:00 pm Venue: Ao Baptist Church Dimapur, Duncan

Readers may please note that, the contents of the articles published on this page do not reflect the outlook of this paper nor of the Editor in any form.

C M Y K

8

Dimapur

9 November 2008

NEWS FILE 3 militants killed in Poonch district

POONCH, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): Three militants were killed when security forces on Saturday foiled an infiltration bid along the Line of Control in Sabjian area of Poonch district in Jammu and Kashmir, defence sources said here. Troops noticed a group of militants sneaking into Indian side via CRP Dhok area of Sabjian sub-sector in Poonch district in wee hours, they said.

Border Security Force and army deployed in the area challenged the militants who opened fire, the sources said, adding the troops also retaliated. Three militants have been killed in the exchange of fire, they said. Meanwhile, a naib subedar was injured in the encounter and hospitalised.

98 rusted grenades recovered in Samba JAMMU, NOVEMBER 8 (PTI): Ninety eight rusted grenades were recovered by the police near the International Border in Supwal area of Samba district in Jammu and Kashmir, a senior police officer said today. The locals of the area during construction work of a bridge spotted the grenades in a bag, which was partly buried in sand in Supwal area of the district yesterday, Senior Superintendent of Police Samba Rabhubir Singh said today. Police rushed to the site after being informed by the locals, he said, adding the area was cordoned off and bomb disposal squad was called in which recovered the bag containing 98 grenades. These rusted grenades are mostly dead and are believed to have been dumped at the site about two and a half years back, Singh said.

Court reserves order on gay rights NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): The Delhi High Court on Friday reserved its order on petitions filed by gay rights activists seeking de-criminalisation of homosexual relations among consenting adults in private. A bench comprising Chief Justice Ajit Prakash Shah and Justice S Muralidhar asked the government and anti-gay rights activists, including senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader BP Singhal, to file their response by November 10. The petitioners, including voluntary organisation Naz foundation, pleaded that the criminal provision against homosexual behaviour should be scrapped for consenting adults who indulge in such acts in private. They contended that Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which provides punishment up to life imprisonment is violative of their fundamental right. The government, however, opposed the petition, saying that such behaviour is immoral and cannot be allowed in Indian society.

Orissa docs to go on strike

C M Y K

NATIONAL

Sunday

BHUBANESWAR, NOVEMBER 8 (NDTV): Two thousand five hundred doctors in Orissa have decided to go ahead with a strike despite the government imposing the Essential Services Maintenance Act or ESMA. They are protesting against the sacking by the government of three of their colleagues, who carried out postmortem of victims of the Kalinga Nagar violence in January 2006. The three doctors had been dismissed on grounds that they had committed an inhuman and barbaric act by removing palms of the bodies during autopsy, something that invited nationwide condemnation and public outrage. However, the medical fraternity in Orissa says, their colleagues are being made scapegoats, for decisions taken by the administration and the police. Clearly, it will be the ordinary people who will be most affected by the tussle between the government and doctors. The strike begins on Sunday.

LS Speaker Chatterjee discharged from hospital NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, who was admitted to the Army Research and Referral Hospital here after he complained of chest congestion and fatigue, was discharged Saturday, officials said. Chatterjee, 79 was taken to hospital Wednesday night and was diagnosed as suffering from a bout of bronchopneumonia. “Doctors have advised him complete rest for a week. All the scheduled engagements for the coming week stand cancelled,” a statement from his office said.

5 killed, 3 injured in explosion in Meerut Meerut (UP), November 8 (PTI): Five persons were killed and three others injured today when a mortar shell exploded in a waste dump in Bengali Basti area here, police said ruling it out as a terrorist act. “Some ragpickers found an army mortar shell in the scrap and were fiddling with it when it exploded,” Senior Superintendent of Police Raghuveer Lal said. The five killed have been have been identified Omar Dutt, 10, Nizamul Hasan, 12, Sudhiyan, 18, Razakh Ali, 16, and 17-year-old Musharraf. Three other injured were admitted to hospital, he said. Police have seized other shells from the site located in a slum where mostly Bangladeshi immigrants are residing. Lal said it was an “accident” and not related to any terror activities.

Police will, however, investigate as to how the mortar shells landed in a garbage heap, officials said.

Three charred to death in Delhi NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (PTI): Three persons were charred to death when the car they were travelling in caught fire after being hit by another vehicle in Southwest Delhi early this morning, police said. The incident took place at Bijwasan Road in the Southwest district at 1.15 a.m. Three occupants of the car died in the accident when the car caught fire after it was hit by a dumper, they said. Pawan Kumar from Mahendragarh in Haryana is one of the victims while the other two could not be identified as their bodies were charred beyond recognition. A cyclist also suffered minor injuries in the accident.

UN appreciates India’s USD 12mn contribution to Afghanistan NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has welcomed a USD 12 million contribution from New Delhi that will be used to provide fortified biscuits made from Indian wheat for 1.2 million schoolchildren in Afghanistan. “Thanks to this generous donation from India, more than one and a half million school children in Afghanistan will be receiving these fortified biscuits at school. We already provide more than two million children with food assistance in schools and also take rations for more than a million girls in Afghan schools,” Emilia Casella WFP spokesperson said. The biscuits, which were produced in India, will be shipped to Afghanistan through Pakistan. This marks a major transportation breakthrough, opening a new route for humanitarian aid from India to Afghanistan, the food agency said.

The Morung Express

More Armymen under terror scanner?

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI, NOVEMBER 8 (NDTV): After Retired Major Upadhyaya and Lt Colonel Purohit involvement, Maharashtra's Anti Terror Squad (ATS) is busy building its case of the possibility of more Army officers being associated with the Malegaon blast. The Union Defence Minister A K Antony said it's a matter of serious concern, and that his ministry will fully cooperate in the probe.

"It's a matter of serious concern. We are taking this very seriously. The IB and the Intelligence Bureau are investigating it. We are waiting for a report. The Army will extend full and all cooperation," said A K Antony, Union Defence Minister.

NDTV has learnt that Maharashtra's Anti-Terror Squad is likely to request the Army to ques-

ATS hunts for Lt Col Purohit’s laptop

claimed the lives of six people.

The 37-year-old officer has confessed to providing the logistics and explosives to a radical Hindu outfit ‘Abhinav Bharat’, who carried out the blast. Lt Col Purohit was arrested by the ATS on November 5 in connection with the September 29 blast. The Army officer was stationed at the Army Education Corps Training College and Centre at Pachmarhi in Madhya Pradesh.

According to reports, the blast conspiracy was hatched at a meeting in Bhopal.

MUMBAI, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): Maharashtra AntiTerror Squad (ATS) on Saturday arrested two more persons in connection with the September 29 Malegaon blast. The arrests were made by the ATS from Pune and Vapi.

The ATS is also on the lookout for the missing laptop of Lt Colonel Srikant Purohit, who has been arrested by the ATS and is on police remand. ATS officials believe that the laptop could provide them with vital clues.

Earlier on Friday, a Colonel

posted in Deolali and a Major came under ATS scanner for interrogation in connection with the probe into the blast. A Lt Colonel in Madhya Pradesh was reportedly picked up for questioning but there was no official word on it. The arrests followed Lt Colonel Srikant Purohit’s ‘confession’ about his role in the Malegaon blast.

According to reports, Purohit told the ATS that he prepared the blue print of the conspiracy and provided ammunitions for the September 29 'revenge' attack in Malegaon, which

tion more serving officers in connection with the Malegaon blasts case. Among those who could be questioned were two Colonels and

an Army Major. Sources sid this is has denied that there is any official based on interrogation of Retired request.

Major Ramesh Upadhyaya who is The likely involvement of more already in custody. But the Army Army officials is only raising the

worry of the extent of men in uniform being influenced by extremist right wing propaganda. Retired Major Upadhyaya had led the ATS to Lt Colonel Purohit, and now there are concerns of whether Col Purohit came in contact with, or influenced any more officers in his time with military intelligence in Maharashtra.

The ATS is checking military intelligence records in Pune, Aurangabad, Ahmadnagar, Parbhani and Nashik. It is also checking records of all those associated with Lieutenant Colonel Purohit.

The Army has promised full cooperation to the ATS in its investigations. But the bigger challenge is on how it will attempt to conduct an interval scan to identify any other officers who have been influenced

by Hindutva groups.

KPCC demands high-level enquiry President Patil concludes Bhutan visit into Alva’s allegation of ‘ticket sale’ PARO (BHUTAN), NOVEMBER 8 (PTI): President Pratibha Patil today wrapped up on a positive note her four-day visit to Bhutan, where she attended the coronation of the world’s youngest monarch Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wanchuck, giving a fresh momentum to close bilateral ties.

Patil, who left for New Delhi, said the Indo-Bhutan relations have reached a “new high” this year and hoped the ties between the world’s largest and newest democracies would become “deeper and more fruitful” in future. In a special gesture, Bhutan’s 4th King Jigme Singye Wangchuck escorted the President to the VVIP aircraft at the airport here and had a brief chat with her inside the plane.

The King, the new monarch’s father, told the President that he found her to be “such a wonderful person”.

President Patil appreciated his concept of Gross Na-

In this handout photograph provided by the Indian Presidential Palace, Indian President Pratibha Patil, center, looks on with the fifth King of Bhutan's Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck, right, and the fourth King of Jigme Singye Wangchuck at the royal banquet hall in Thimpu, Bhutan, November 7. (AP Photo)

tional Happiness for the Himalayan state and greeted him for his birthday on November 11. During her stay in Bhutan, Patil along with UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi attended the coronation ceremony of the Himalayan nation’s fifth King, 28-year old Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck. Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi, sister Priyanka and her husband Robert Vadra were also present on the occasion.

President Patil was seen off at her Thimpu hotel by the Bhutanese Prime Minister Jigme Y Thinley when she left for Paro airport, 60 kms from the capital of the Himalayan nation. The last high-level visit to Bhutan was made by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in May after Druk Phuensum Tshogpa (DPT) party leader Thinley was elected to head the first democratically elected government.

NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): Senior Congress leader and a confidant of party chief Sonia Gandhi, Margaret Alva’s allegation of party tickets being sold in Kerala has landed her into trouble.

The Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee has termed it is a serious issue and demanded a high command enquiry into the matter.

Further, reports suggest that KPCC has mounted huge pressure on Alva and directed AICC to decide what action should be taken against her. Earlier, Congress had referred AICC general secretary Margaret Alva’s allegation of “sale” of nomination for Karnataka Assembly polls to the party’s Disciplinary Action Committee (DAC).

The DAC headed by senior leader and Defence Minister A K Antony has been asked to inquire into Alva’s outburst which had caused a major embarrassment to Congress. Meanwhile, BJP

sought to exploit Alva’s accusations to the full dubbing her remarks as “cash-for-tickets scam” in the ruling party.

AICC spokesman Abhishek Manu Singhvi told reporters that Alva as a seasoned and senior leader of the party should not have gone public with her remarks. For all her grievances, there are established and ample foray within the party, he added. On Alva’s son being denied party nomination in Karnataka, the spokesman said there was no “blanket rule” in the party to give tickets to relatives of leaders or deny tickets to them.

Meanwhile, a section in Congress believes that Sonia Gandhi will have to take a call on Alva’s outbursts which have come in the thick of election in six states. Another section in the party said Alva could be let off the hook on the ground of it being an “emotional outburst”.

Alva is out of Delhi and is expected to return on Monday.

India to US: We don’t need a J&K envoy PM embarks on 3-day Oman, Qatar visit NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): As the Obama administration considers appointing Bill Clinton as envoy to Jammu and Kashmir, political parties in India have very clearly said that there is no need for a third party intervention in the issue.

Hillary Clinton was the biggest hurdle in his road to the Presidential nomination, but Barack Obama seems to have cast away the vicious attacks against him by the Clintons during the primaries.

This especially after this resounding endorsement when Bill Clinton said, “The next President of the United States should be – and with your help, will be – Senator Barack Obama.” Just days after his historic win, Obama has chosen Clinton as the man who will lead his administration in resolving the Kashmir conflict. In an interview

to Time Magazine – Obama has hinted that he may appoint former US President Bill Clinton as a special envoy on Jammu and Kashmir to make best use of his experience in the Indian sub continent.

However, New Delhi – both the Government and the opposition are standing firm and have said that Kashmir is not negotiable.

Congress Spokesperson, Abishek Manu Singhvi said, “Kashmir is an integral part of India.” Reiterating the same view CPI (M) Politburo Member, Sitaram Yechury said, “As far as Kashmir is concerned, we remain committed to our understanding and that of the Government of India that Kashmir is an integral part of India and there is neither scope nor necessity for 3rd party intervention.”

But for the separatists in the Valley Clinton’s appointment is a

welcome news and Sajjad Lone, chairman of the Peoples Conference said, “We welcome the news because it would mean establishment of peace in the region.”

Predictably, Pakistan, who has been saying it wants intervention in the Jammu and Kashmir issue, is likely to welcome news of Bill Clinton as mediator. US President Clinton was one of the first US Presidents to take an open stand on the Kashmir issue – holding parleys with both PM Vajpayee and Nawaz Sharif, the diplomacy that Americans believe was a stepping stone to solving the Kargil crisis. Obama has earlier asserted that he is willing to dangle Kashmir as a carrot to gain Pakistan’s cooperation in the war on terror in neighbouring Afghanistan and with Bill Clinton by his side – this may be just the strategy his administration will adopt.

NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (ANI): Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh left for a three-day visit to Oman and Qatar on Saturday afternoon. The Prime Minister is accompanied by a high level delegation. On the first leg of his visit, Dr Singh will hold talks with the Sultan of Oman, Qaboos Bin Al-Sayed, and other leaders on various issues.

This is the first visit of an Indian Prime Minister to Qatar. Energy security and welfare of Indian citizens in the Gulf region will be high on the agenda of talks between Dr Singh and leaders of Oman and Qatar. During the visit, expansion of economic partnership, co-operation in the transport sector and joint ventures will figure prominently in the discussions. Some memorandums of understanding (MoU) are also expected to be signed relating to cultural exchanges between the two countries besides standardizing the commerce guidelines.

In the second leg of his visit, Dr Singh will meet the Amir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani, and other representatives on Sunday and the day after. They will discuss strengthening the mutually beneficial co-operative frame work to realize the special vision for the bilateral relationship. On the eve of his departure to Muscat, Dr Singh suggested that India can leverage vast surplus funds in the Gulf region for its development needs in the back drop of current global financial crisis.

Dr Singh in a statement said he will be discussing issues related to the safety and welfare of Indian citizens working in Oman and Qatar with the leadership there. He will also have detailed discussions on the bilateral relations with the leadership of Oman. Dr Singh said New Delhi attaches great importance to its ties with it and Doha is one of the largest and most reliable suppliers of India’s energy needs from the region.

‘Let Centre take control of disturbed states’ NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (CNN-IBN): The violence against Christians in Kandhamal in Orissa and also to parts of Karnataka over the last two months became an international embarrassment for Manmohan Singh government.

TheUS,theEuorpeanUnion and even the Pope condemned it and PM’s own Cabinet ministers like Lalu Prasad and Ram Vilas Paswan demanded the dismissal of Naveen Patnaik government in Orissa. However, the Union Government had to limit itself to sending missives to the state government under Article 355. Now another Cabinet minister, Congressman Vylar Ravi, has written to the Prime Minister and the Law Minister suggesting an amendment to Article 355 be seriously considered. He has proAn Indian United Nations soldier looks on at a makeshift camp for displaced persons, outside the MONUC base in the village of Kiwanja, 90 kilometers (56 miles) north of Goma, eastern Congo, November 7.

The French aid group Doctors Without Borders reported fighting in the Gomaarea towns of Rutshuru and Kiwanja, where the charity tried to send staff who had to turn back. (AP Photo)

posed Article 355 be amended to include a sub clause, allowing the Central Government to take complete control over disturbed areas in a state and deploy its own forces till the time normalcy is restored.

The Centre increasingly finds itself constrained to use of Article 356 or President’s rule with many parties, especially the southern allies vehemently opposed to it as it is an extreme step. Also, misadventures like that of Bihar in the past have shown it may not stand legal scrutiny “There has to be nothing in between. There has to be a letter and then dismissal.

Dismissal should be checked by the SC by the Bommai case,” says Ravi. The Communal Violence Bill, which is now with the Standing Committee

in Parliament, had originally envisaged some Central intervention in communally disturbed areas of a state.

But many political parties had pointed out that it could lend itself to misuse by the Union Government. “In the Communal Violence Bill, we had said refer to communal tension. Whereas now, the reference is any sort of communal disturbance. Trade union disturbance can also be used to invoke the Bill,” says CPM politiburo member Sitaram Yechury. Sources in the Prime Minister’s Office say a Constitutional amendment may not be possible in the near future because of the difficulty of securing a two-third majority in both Houses of Parliament-But the issue is certain to trigger a fresh de- A tractor carries construction material as a pool of garbage is seen in the forebate on Centre-state relations. ground, on the banks of river Tawi in Jammu, November 7. (AP Photo)

UN urges India to decriminalise homosexuality

NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 8 (AFP): The United Nations has urged India to decriminalise homosexuality, saying it would help the fight against HIV/AIDS by allowing intervention programmes like the successful ones in China and Brazil.

Jeffrey O’Malley, director of the United Nations Development Programme on HIV/AIDS, told AFP Friday that countries protecting homosexuals from discrimination had far better records of protecting them from infection.

India, which has an estimated 2.5 million people living with HIV, has seen a drop in new infections contracted through unprotected commercial sex. But “unfortunately in India, the rates of new infections among men who have

sex with men continue to go up,” O’Malley said.

“Until we acknowledge these behaviours and work with people involved with these behaviours, we are not going to halt and reverse the HIV epidemic,” he said. “Countries which protect men who have sex with men... have double the rate of coverage of HIV prevention services – as much as 60 percent.”

O’Malley’s remarks come amid a stormy debate in India over homosexuality – which is punishable by a fine and a 10-year prison term.

The Delhi High Court is currently considering a suit brought by gay rights activists to decriminalise homosexuality in a case that has generated intense media interest.

The statute in question is a British colonial-era law prohibiting “car-

nal intercourse against the order of nature.” Those seeking a change, including Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss, argue that allowing homosexual sex between consenting adults would bring India’s largely closeted gay community into the open.

O’Malley said countries where homosexuality was not legally proscribed had more success in preventing new infections among sexual minorities. “In China, male homosexuality has never been illegal. So there aren’t any of these legal barriers to HIV prevention work,” he said, “It’s easier to do this (prevention) work in China.”

Brazil, he added, had taken another step forward by combining legal status for gays and lesbians with anti-homophobia campaigns.

INTERNATIONAL

The Morung Express

Sunday 9 November 2008

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Crisis summit urges Congo ceasefire amidst new fighting UN warns Congo against genocide

UNITED NATIONS, NOVEMBER 8 (AP): A key U.N. adviser warned combatants in eastern Congo Friday against any actions that might encourage genocide, saying anyone promoting ethnic killings will be held accountable. Francis Deng, the special adviser on genocide to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, said he has been “especially alarmed by the escalation of violence in the past few weeks.”

The conflict in eastern Congo is fueled by ethnic hatred left over from genocide in 1994 the claimed half-million Tutsis in neighboring Rwanda. Rebel leader Laurent Nkunda, who went on the offensive Aug. 28, claims he is fighting to protect minority Tutsis from Rwandan Hutu rebels who participated in the genocide and fled to Congo afterward. In a statement released at U.N. headquarters, Deng emphasized “that the belligerents in eastern Congo must refrain from actions that might encourage genocide and that they, and any actors who provide material support, will be held accountable if they fail to do so.” He said that under international law “the intention to destroy an ethnic population group, in whole or in part, is a grave crime” and that the international community is obligated to punish violators. Alan Doss, the top U.N. envoy to Congo, has warned repeatedly of heightened ethnic tensions as a result of the upsurge in fighting. Among the dozens of militia groups operating in eastern Congo’s remote terraced valleys and hills are Nkunda’s Tutsi fighters, the anti-Tutsi Mai Mai, and ethnic Hutu insurgents who fled from Rwanda after helping carry out Rwanda’s bloody genocide. Deng, a human rights expert and former Sudanese diplomat, is responsible for determining from existing sources of information whether there is a risk of genocide in any part of the world and to alert the international community to such risks.

A child runs past a U.N. helicopter that landed near a makeshift displaced persons camp outside the MONUC base in Kiwanja, 90 kilometers north of Goma, eastern Congo on November 7. (AP Photo)

NAIROBI, NOVEMBER 8 (AFP): A crisis summit on eastern DR Congo called for an immediate ceasefire and the creation of humanitarian corridors amid fresh fighting on the ground and a warning by UN chief Ban Ki-moon that the conflict could spread. But rebels at the centre of the conflict who did not attend rubbished Friday’s one-day summit held in the Kenyan capital Nairobi, saying the Congolese people’s problems would only be settled by direct talks with the Kinshasa government.

Diplomacy was “without hope after this summit,” rebel spokesman Bertrand Bisimwa told AFP, adding

that the participants were just going “round and round.”

“There should be an immediate ceasefire by all the armed groups and militias in NordKivu,” said the emergency meeting’s final declaration.

It urged the implementation of the disarmament of rebel groups in the region and the beefing-up of the UN peacekeeping force’s mandate.

The main protagonists, feuding presidents Paul Kagame of Rwanda and Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of Congo, turned up but held no direct talks. The United Nations said late Friday that troops loyal to Laurent Nkunda’s rebels and pro-

Britain revokes visa of ousted Thaksin

BANGKOK, NOVEMBER 8 (AFP): British authorities have revoked the visas of ousted Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his wife, an airline official told AFP Saturday.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the British embassy had informed all airlines in an email on Friday not to allow the couple to board flights to Britain. "The British embassy sent an email message to all airlines... It's general practice for all airlines, so no airline can take them on board to England from any port," he said. Embassy officials refused to confirm or deny the report, but in the email seen by AFP, Bangkok-based immigration liaison manager Andy Gray, from the UK Border Agency wrote: "The United Kingdom Border Agency has revoked the UK visas held by the following Thai nationals: Thaksin Shinawatra... Potjaman Shinawatra," listing the pair's passport numbers. "The UK visas contained in the passports of the individuals listed above are no longer valid for travel. Airlines are advised not to carry these passengers to the UK," the email said. Thaksin, ousted in a 2006 coup, fled to Britain in early August after his wife was convicted on tax evasion charges, saying he would not receive a fair trial in Thailand. He has since been sentenced in absentia to two years in prison for conflict of interest after helping his wife buy stateowned land when he was prime minister. Four other corruption cases are outstanding against him. His exact whereabouts on Saturday were unknown, but local media reported he was travelling from China to the Philippines.

Thaksin's Thailand-based spokesman said he could not confirm the report. "What I can verify is that Thaksin has not received any document from the British authorities concerning this issue.... But if it's true Thaksin can clarify the matter," said Phonthep Thepkanjana. In October a British Home Office spokesman said Thaksin and his wife had applied for political asylum, but people close to Thaksin were later quoted in Thai media as saying that report was incorrect.

At least 50 dead in Haitian school collapse PORT-AU-PRINCE, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): A ramshackle church school collapsed in a shanty town on the outskirts of Haiti’s capital on Friday, burying dozens in rubble and killing at least 50, many of them children, rescue workers said. The three-story La Promesse school caved in while class was in session, and some of the walls and debris crushed neighbouring residences in the Nerettes community near Port-auPrince, injuring still more, civil protection service official Nadia Blachard told Haitian radio. “There are 50 killed and 124 wounded, including 20 in serious condition,” Blachard said. Crowds of screaming and crying parents swarmed the ruins in the aftermath searching for their children. The work continued after nightfall with the help of U.N. peacekeepers, relatives and rescue services. President Rene Preval said the poorly constructed building did not meet building standards, but the priority of authorities was to continue to hunt for those trapped under debris but still alive. At the scene, crying and screaming parents searched desperately for their children while bodies of students lay crushed under blocks of concrete.

“It’s like an earthquake,” said Brazilian Maj. Gen. Carlos dos Santos Cruz, the commander for U.N. troops in Haiti. One boy was trapped by debris that pinned his legs. He begged the rescuers to “please cut my feet off,” a firefighter told Reuters.

The roads around the school were so jammed with people looking for loved ones that some of the rescuers had to be brought in by helicopter. “My son who is 15 years old, he’s dead. He’s my only son,” sobbed 40-year-old Josiane Dandin. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.” Another woman screamed for her missing 12-year-old daughter. “I don’t know if she is dead or alive,” she said.

government Mai-Mai militia fighters had been fingered over the murder of civilians in the DRC this week.

Following an inspection team’s visit, the UN Mission in DR Congo, MONUC, said that “serious violations of human rights” had been confirmed in Kiwanja, 80 kilometres (50 miles) north of the eastern city of Goma.

“Witnesses have described incidents during which civilians lost their lives” on Tuesday, as pro-government Mai-Mai militia fighters attempted to seize the town from renegade general Nkunda’s rebel National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) forces.

The UN statement said it had also received “credible reports” of civilian deaths in reprisal attacks “just after” the Mai-Mai left Kiwanja. The investigators “visited 11 communal grave sites, containing at least 26 bodies, fighters and civilians,” it said, adding that reports of further loss of life were still being checked out. Immediately prior to the statement’s release, Nkunda had issued a “categorical denial” that his men were behind civilian killings in Kiwanja this week.

Renewed clashes broke out between Congolese troops and Nkunda’s CNDP around 15 kilometres from the regional capital Goma, scattering thou-

sands of displaced people from a nearby camp. MONUC, which deployed helicopters to try to contain the flare-up, said the Congolese army had given assurances it had not launched a counter-offensive as initially feared, but had merely responded to rebel fire.

By then, it was too late for thousands who had fled a displaced people’s camp at Kibati, near the front line. They headed towards Goma and the UN refugee agency said they did not return once the firing had subsided. In Nairobi, Ban used the summit to urge African leaders to stop the rot in eastern DR Congo or face a regional crisis.

“The recent military offensives by the CNDP have radically compounded the situation, led to severe humanitarianconsequencesandthrust the eastern DRC once more into a phase of heightened crisis. This crisis could engulf the broader sub-region,” Ban said.

“As leaders of Africa, you have a historic responsibility, it is a critical moment for the Great Lakes region, and for Africa as a whole. We must put the cycle of violence behind us.”

The United Nations and aid groups said the latest round of fighting had displaced 253,000 civilians since September and killed at least 100.

The most concrete devel-

opment was the creation of a mechanism tasked with facilitating the implementation of existing peace agreements.

The new body will be based in Nairobi and report to the UN and African Union. At a meeting in Nairobi a year ago almost to the day, DRC and Rwanda committed to a plan aimed at stabilising the Kivus but both sides have failed to deliver. Under that agreement, Kinshasa was supposed to disarm Rwandan Hutu rebels wanted over the 1994 genocide and operating in eastern Congo while Kigali was to stop supporting armed groups, including Nkunda’s forces.

Kabila’s spokesman ac-

cused UN peacekeepers of doing nothing to stop killings by rebels. “People are being slaughtered and MONUC did nothing,” Kudura Kasongo said. MONUC is the UN’s largest peacekeeping force with 17,000 troops but it has only a few hundred in the areas affected by the latest violence.

Amending its mandate requires the UN Security Council’s intervention. In New York meanwhile, the Committee to Protect Journalists welcomed the release of a Belgian journalist, his interpreter, and his driver, who were kidnapped on Tuesday while reporting on the war in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

‘Time for Americans to work together’

CHICAGO, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): Barack Obama said on Saturday that now with the long presidential election season behind the nation, it is time for Americans to put aside political differences and work together to solve the economic crisis. Obama, who won a decisive victory against Republican John McCain in Tuesday's presidential election and will become the first black American president on Jan. 20, vowed to seek unity.

He noted that Republican President George W. Bush and first lady Laura Bush had invited Obama and his wife Michelle to the White House on Monday and that the Bushes offered to do all they could to help with Obama's transition to the White House. "This speaks to a fundamental recognition that here in America we can compete vigorously in elections and challenge each other's ideas, yet come together in service of a common purpose once

the voting is done," Obama said in the Democratic Party's weekly radio address.

"And that is particularly important at a moment when we face the most serious challenges of our lifetime," he said. Obama noted that jobless figures released on Friday showed a 10th straight month of decline, bringing the total number of unemployed Americans to about 10 million.

"Tens of millions of families are struggling to figure out how to pay the bills and stay in their homes," Obama said. "Their stories are an urgent reminder that we are facing the greatest economic challenge of our lifetime, and we must act swiftly to resolve them."

Obama said he and his transition economic advisory board -- a well-regarded group of America business leaders, former top Washington officials and economic experts -- discussed the economic challenges at a meeting on Friday

and started developing a series of policies to address the crisis.

"While we must recognize that we only have one president at a time and that President Bush is the leader of our government, I want to ensure that we hit the ground running on January 20th because we don't have a moment to lose," said Obama.

He said the country "can't afford to wait" on moving forward with his priorities like clean energy, reforming health care, improving education and tax relief for middle class families. "I do not underestimate the enormity of the task that lies ahead," said Obama. "We've taken some major actions to date, and we will need further actions during this transition and subsequent months." "Some of those choices will be difficult, but America is a strong and resilient country. I know that we will succeed if we put aside partisanship and work together as one nation. And that is what I intend to do."

Hamas says ready to talk LONDON, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): Hamas is ready to talk to U.S. President-elect Barack Obama but he must respect the Palestinian Islamist group's "rights and options", its leader Khaled Meshaal said in an interview on Saturday.

In a visit to Israel in July, Obama played down the chances of negotiating with Hamas unless the group renounced violence and recognised Israel's right to exist. Under the outgoing U.S. President George Bush, the United States refused to talk to Hamas."It's a big change -- political and psy chological -- and it is noteworthy and I congratulate President Obama," Meshaal said in the interview with Sky News website from the Syrian capital Damascus. "But as a result of the election and the change, he should know he has duties to the United States and in the whole world and in hotspots, especially in the Middle East." "...we are ready for dialogue with President Obama and with the new American administration with an open mind, on the basis that the American administration respects our rights and our options," Meshaal told Sky. He said the new U.S. administration would have no choice but to deal with Hamas if it was going to help resolve problems in the region.

"The American administration, if they want to deal with the region, Palestine and the ArabIsraeli conflict, they have no other option than deal with Hamas because we are a real force on the ground, effective," he said. "And we are a movement that won a majority of votes in the election.

Second of all, it's not right that Hamas poses any danger to anyone." Palestinians are split between President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah and Hamas, which won a 2006 parliamentary election. During his visit to Israel in July, Obama urged support for President Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, who support a two-state solution to the conflict. He had dismayed Palestinian leaders the previous month when he said Jerusalem should be Israel's "undivided" capital.

Palestinians want Arab East Jerusalem, captured by Israel in 1967, as the capital of a future state. Obama later said he used "poor phrasing" when he made the remarks. Hamas leaders have offered a long-term truce with Israel in return for a viable Palestinian state in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The Islamist group continues to say it will not formally recognise Israel and its 1988 founding charter calls for the destruction of the Jewish state.

Dragon King shows he is man of the people THIMPHU, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): He was supposed to look on regally from on high as warriors, monks and masked dancers celebrated his coronation, but Bhutan’s new Dragon King instead showed royal star quality by descending to mingle with the crowds on Friday. The 28-year-old Oxford educated Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, who assumed the Raven Crown on Thursday, spent most of the afternoon among the 20,000 spectators, chatting, joking, and greeting old friends, ordinary people, and tourists.

“He is very gracious and he has amazing charisma,” said 36-year-old Patty Wu from San Francisco, after the king stopped to jokingly enquire if her friends were wearing suncream, and to talk about California. “We felt like we were the only people in the stadium,” added 37-yearold photographer Jay Hu at her side. A few steps on, the Druk Gyalpo or Dragon King picked out a 70-year-old man from several rows back in the crowd. Phuentsho had spent most of his life working for the royal household.

“He joked that I had nev-

Bhutan’s fifth King Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuk prepares to take aim while participating in the traditional sport of archery during celebrations following the coronation ceremony in Thimpu, Bhutan on November 8. The tiny Himalayan nation of Bhutan crowned its fifth king Thursday after a two-year wait for the precise moment deemed most favorable by court astrologers for a successful reign. (AP Photo)

er made the pilgrimage I had promised to, but told me I had worked very hard,” said the laughing old man, dressed in a Bhutanese gho, the national knee-length gown, and a woolly Nike hat. This is the style of Bhutan’s new “People’s King”, as he has inevitably been nicknamed, a young man who has also been educated in the United States and India and now wants to help shepherd his ancient Himalayan kingdom into the modern world.

With his slicked-back black hair, sideburns and winning smile he has the kind of star quality royal families dream of, looking a bit like a cross between a Hong Kong movie star and a young Elvis Presley. As the entertainment continued, Wangchuck moved through the crowd dressed in a red and gold gho with the bright yellow scarf of the highest office worn across his left shoulder, stooping to talk and pick up or kiss young children.

This is a land perhaps best known for its philosophy of Gross National Happiness, the idea that mental and spiritual well-being matter as much as material gain, that

the environment, culture and quality of life also count. Fifty years ago there were no cars or roads in Bhutan, and television and the internet only arrived in 1999. But slowly Bhutan is entering the modern globalised world, with its young people taking cultural cues from places like the United States and India.

“My deepest concern is that as the world changes we may lose these fundamental values on which we rest our character as a nation and people,” Wangchuck said in a national address inside the stadium in the capital Thimphu in the morning. But the king said he was hopeful his people would continue to “pursue the simple and timeless goal of being good human beings” and that if they did, his country would stay under the “sun of peace and happiness” for many more centuries.

Wangchuck’s 52-year-old father introduced democracy to Bhutan and abdicated in favour of his son. Neither move was taken particularly well by his largely adoring subjects but both are now looking like masterstrokes. The new young king

is already enormously popular, especially among the young, and he appealed to them to help him build a better future for Bhutan, a country of just 635,000 people sandwiched precariously between billions of Indians and Chinese.

At the start of the second day of three days of national celebrations, Wangchuck inspected a military parade from the back of a jeep. Soldiers in modern uniforms marched to bagpipes, brass and drums, before the grass stage was given to Bhutan’s ancient culture and brand of Buddhism. Monks in black hats decored with peacock feathers, in flowing robes, dipped and twirled to the blare of long trumpets and the beat of drums, in a sacred dance designed to subdue evil.

Painted elephants, horses with gold and silver saddles, mules, cows, yaks and sheep trooped past. Then masked dancers dressed as spirits or mythical animals pranced on the turf. Warriors in ghos, cloth helmets and carrying round black shields brandished swords and whooped to ask the gods to bring them victory in battle. But somehow it was the king who stole the show.

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Sunday 9 November 2008

The Morung Express

Hamilton invited to join Schumacher at Wembley

The world's top tennis players pose as they were introduced on the stage during an opening ceremony for the 2008 Tennis Masters Cup in Shanghai, China on November 8. From left, Nikolai Davydenko of Russia, Roger Federer of Switzerland, Andy Murray of Great Britain, Gilles Simon of France, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France, Andy Roddick of the United States, Novak Djokovic of Serbia and Juan Martin del Potro of Argentina. Federer is favored to win among the line up of the world's top eight tennis players following the withdrawal of the world's No.1 Rafael Nadal due to knee injury. (AP Photo)

Pistons fall to Nets in Iverson’s debut

Detroit Pistons' Allen Iverson, right, puts up a shot as he is fouled by New Jersey Nets' Vince Carter during the fourth quarter of an NBA basketball game Friday night in East Rutherford, N.J. Iverson scored 24 points but the Nets beat the Pistons 103-96. (AP Photo)

NEW JERSEY, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): Allen Iverson’s first game with Detroit turned into the best night of Devin Harris’s career.

Harris scored a careerhigh 38 points last night, outplaying Iverson in the second half and leading the New Jersey Nets to a 103-96

victory over the Pistons in East Rutherford, N.J. New Jersey, which trailed by as many as 14 points in the first half, played some of its best basketball of the season in the final two quarters to hand the Pistons their first loss after four wins to open the season. Vince Carter and Josh Boone each scored 18 for New Jersey, which got its first home win after two losses. Boone also pulled down 14 rebounds.

Iverson had 24 points and six assists after finally getting to suit up. Detroit played twice since the trade Monday with Denver that sent Chauncey Billups, Antonio McDyess, and Cheick Samb to the Nuggets for the nine-time All-Star.

Iverson stepped right in, joining Richard Hamilton in Detroit’s starting backcourt, replacing Rodney Stuckey.

Iverson immediately took over the game, factoring in the Pistons’ first three scores.

He dished off to Hamilton for the game’s first basket, scored on a finger-roll layup, and kicked the ball out to Tayshaun Prince for a 3-pointer as Detroit took a 9-6 lead.

Iverson played the entire opening quarter, scoring 11 points, making all three shots from the field, including a 3-pointer, while going 4 for 4 from the free throw line.

Harris turned the tables in

the third. He scored 19 points in the period, going 13 for 15 from the foul line while forcing Iverson into four fouls.

Ron Artest leads Rockets over winless Clippers 92-83 While in Los Angeles, Ron Artest netted 23 points and brought down eight boards to help the Houston Rockets to a 92-83 victory over the winless Los Angeles Clippers at the Staples Center.

Carl Landry scored 20 points and grabbed nine rebounds while Yao Ming blocked five shots, with 16 points and nine rebounds for the Rockets, who snapped a modest two-game skid after starting the season 3-0.

Chris Kaman and Baron Davis each collected 23 points for the Clips, who have started the campaign with an 0-6 ledger. LA began a fivegame homestand Friday and next hosts Dallas on Sunday.

Marcus Camby logged 13 rebounds while Kaman had 11 and two blocks but it wasn’t enough for a Clippers squad that shot just 57.1 percent (8-of-14) from the foul line. Making things worse, Tim Thomas Houston held an eightpoint lead at the half but LA made a game of it in the third.

Both teams came out firing to start the second half and the Clips cut it to one, 59-58, on Kaman’s third layup of the quar-

Van Nistelrooy out with old knee injury MADRID, NOVEMBER 8 (AP): Real Madrid striker Ruud van Nistelrooy could reportedly be sidelined until January due to a right knee injury. Van Nistelrooy was substituted during Madrid’s 2-0 Champions League defeat against Juventus on Wednesday after damaging an external meniscus, on which he underwent an operation in 2000 as a PSV Eindhoven player. Madrid said it will seek

advice from Dr. Richard Steadman, the American surgeon who performed the surgery on the striker eight years ago.

The club is keen for Van Nistelrooy to avoid another operation, sports daily Marca said Saturday.

The Dutchman, who was making his return on Wednesday after missing three games due to a blow on the same knee, has already been ruled out for the de-

fending champion’s league match with Malaga later Saturday. Madrid has 10 games to play in all competitions before the end of 2008, including a league encounter against leaders Barcelona on Dec. 14 and important Champions League matches against BATE Borisov and Zenit St. Petersburg.

The absence of the 32year-old striker would be a fresh blow to Madrid, which has won only once in its past

five matches. Madrid is third in the league, two points behind Barcelona after nine matches.Van Nistelrooy’s compatriot, winger Arjen Robben, will be sidelined for six weeks after tearing a muscle in th e warm-up before Wednesday’s game.

Midfielder Ruben De La Red has not played since collapsing during Madrid’s Copa del Rey defeat against third-division Real Union on Oct. 30.

Button wants Honda to keep Barrichello

Houston Rockets center Yao Ming (11), of China, rejects a shot

by Los Angeles Clippers guard Baron Davis during the first half of their NBA basketball game in Los Angeles. (AP Photo)

ter. A jumper from Davis kept the deficit within reach, 66-64, with under three minutes left before Houston pulled ahead by five entering the fourth.

The Rockets opened the final quarter with a 9-3 run to

make it a nine-point margin.

A pair of buckets from Camby with a little over three minutes to play cut the lead to five but the Clips managed just one more basket down the stretch on their way to an 0-6 start.

Arsene Wenger dismisses speculation he might quit

cricketer tried convincing him about the futility of pursuing the long legal battle that would come with pressing such a serious charge.

“Why do we need to keep it quiet?” I asked. “His reply had nothing to do with Harbhajan’s guilt or innocence; this fellow was more concerned with how events were going to transpire and tried to convince me it might not be worth the stress of going ahead with what might well be a prolonged legal process.”

Ponting alleges that once he ignored the call, he witnessed heightened activity in the Indian camp to get the charges downgraded.

The Indians had threatened to pull out of the acrimonious tour at one stage.

“I was determined to see that justice would be done, but I knew from the moment I put my mobile back in my pocket that the investigation might not be as straightforward as the authorities hearing the evidence, making the right decision and then we all move on,” he said.

“It would not look good for Indian cricket for one of their senior players to be

convicted of racial abuse, and from the time their officials realised we were not going to give ground - which was probably the moment this brief conversation ended - they set out to make sure that did not happen,” he added.

Ponting rued that the ugly episode ended up taking the sheen off the Australian team’s record-equalling 16th straight Test win. “One of the great frustrations of this affair was that the quality of our victory in this Sydney Test, and the excitement it generated, was largely lost in the angst that engulfed cricket in the days immediately after the game.

“That it extended our winning streak in Test cricket to 16 games; that the victory came after a roller-coaster five days, in which we’d shared and suffered so many emotions, on and off the field; that during that final day we’d anguished over when to declare, not wanting to be too reckless or too cautious, thought we were going to win, resigned ourselves to a draw, then come from nowhere to get up on the line all these

things added to our exhilaration.

Ponting once again disputed the then Indian skipper Anil Kumble’s postmatch remarks that only the visiting side played the game in the right spirit.

“Around half an hour after the final wicket fell, after I left the room under the Bradman Stand in which the post-match media conference was held, Anil Kumble slid into the hot seat and -- as I learned later -- quickly he made the accusations that would generate headlines over the next couple of days.

“I think only one team was playing within the spirit of the game,” he began. “We like to play hard on the field and we expect that from Australia as well. I have played my cricket very sincerely and very honestly, and that’s the approach my team takes on the field. I expect that from the Australians as well,” he said.

“From what I understand, his comments were met with rousing cheers by the Indian press corps. No one, Indian or Australian, challenged his view. They had their story,” he added.

LONDON, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): Jenson Button urged Honda on Friday to retain Brazilian Rubens Barrichello rather than replacing the Formula One veteran with a rookie like Bruno Senna. Honda have yet to announce their 2009 lineup and have said they will test Senna, 25-year-old nephew of the late triple champion Ayrton, along with compatriot Lucas di Grassi in Barcelona this month. Neither has raced before in Formula One, although Di Grassi was Renault’s test and reserve driver this year.

Barrichello, 36, said last weekend his career was on hold while Honda tried out new talent but made clear he wanted to add to his record tally of 270 grand prix starts. Britain’s Button told reporters at a news conference for next month’s Race of Champions at Wembley it was important to have two experienced drivers next season, given the major rule changes. “They (the team) need a lot of feedback from us and having a new boy in the car, I don’t feel that you get as much feedback. But it’s not my decision,” he said.

“I personally like a team mate who is experienced because he can give good feedback and next year there are a lot of changes and not a lot of testing,” added the 28-yearold, who said he had yet to agree a new contract but is widely expected to stay at Honda. “The test drivers aren’t going to be doing much at all and we are very limited in mileage.” Barrichello has said he is driving better than ever, despite being in an uncompetitive car, and Button saw no reason to disagree with that.

“I don’t think Rubens lies,” he said. “I think he tells the truth which is always good in a team mate and he has put in some very good performances.” Honda had been courting Renault’s double world champion Fernando Alonso but the Spaniard decided this week to stay with his team. Button, who was replaced by the Spaniard at Renault in 2003, said he would have relished the chance to take him on in the same machinery. “It would have been great, I think I would have worked well with Alonso,” he said. “When you are team mates it might have been a different story but I get on with him very well.

“But for him I think it (Renault) is probably the best option. It was difficult because there are no seats available at Ferrari and McLaren. He wants to go to Ferrari, obviously, and that’s where he thinks he needs to be to win the world championship again.” Button scored only three of Honda’s 14 points this season, struggling with an ill-handling car he was delighted to see the back of.

Obligingly, it burst into flames in the final race in Brazil.

“It was a fitting end to a great season,” he said ironically, his season poles apart from that of compatriot and new world champion Lewis Hamilton at McLaren. “Hopefully we will have a competitive car (in 2009),” he said.

“But we don’t know how quick we are going to be yet, it’s still November.”

Mallya takes the helm at Force India

I was asked to drop racism charges: Ponting MELBOURNE, NOVEMBER 8 (PTI): Australian skipper Ricky Ponting is all set to kick up a fresh storm with claims that a senior member of the Indian team asked him to drop the charges of racial abuse against Harbhajan Singh during the bitter Sydney Test row earlier this year.

“On the night after we made our on-field report about Harbhajan, I had a phone conversation with a senior member of the Indian touring party, who asked me straight to drop the complaint,” Ponting reveals in his just-released book ‘Captain’s Diary 2008’, extracts of which came out in ‘The Australian’ on Saturday.

Harbhajan was accused of racially abusing Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds by calling him a ‘monkey’ during the infamous Sydney Test, a charge that was downgraded after the Indian off-spinner claimed that he had used a Hindi abuse that sounded similar to ‘monkey’.

Ponting, without revealing the name of the player who called him, goes on to say that the senior Indian

LONDON, NOVEMBER 8(REUTERS): Formula One's new world champion Lewis Hamilton has been invited to compete against Michael Schumacher at Wembley Stadium next month in the annual Race of Champions.

Event organiser Fredrik Johnsson told a news conference on Friday that the 23-year-old McLaren driver had an open invitation. "Lewis has said that he wants to do it," he said. "It's a question of whether the team will let him and whether it is possible with his obviously very busy schedule at the moment. "The invitation is open. We've got a second space on Team F1 Racing Great Britain next to David Coulthard," he added.

Hamilton arrived in Formula One after Ferrari's Schumacher had retired with seven world championships and 91 race wins. The Briton, who became the youngest champion in last weekend's Brazilian Grand Prix, has said that he regrets never having the chance to test himself against the German. "It would certainly help me a great deal if Lewis would come along," said Coulthard.

"I'd love to ride on his coat-tails and win something."

The Race of Champions, with tons of asphalt laid out over Wembley's turf to create a two-lane track, pits competitors from various branches of motorsport against each other in a range of machinery on Dec. 14. The event, founded in 1988 by Johnsson and France's former rally driver Michele Mouton, includes a nations cup with drivers paired in teams based on nationality. Germany, with Schumacher and Formula One driver Sebastian Vettel, won last year.

Other Formula One drivers confirmed for this year's event include Australian Mark Webber, Britain's Jenson Button and newly retired compatriot Coulthard.

Five times world rally champion Sebastien Loeb will also be competing along with Australia's triple superbike world champion Troy Bayliss, outgoing world touring car champion Andy Priaulx and Le Mans winner Tom Kristensen.

Arsene Wenger during the Champions League Group G, soccer match Arsenal vs. Fenerbahce at the Emirates Stadium, London. (AP Photo/File)

LONDON, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger dismissed Friday speculation that he was thinking of quitting after a grim week for his fledgling side. “No, I love it here,” Wenger told a news conference. “In my decisions always what is first is the interest of the club, not what the media will think. I cannot influence what people say but I can influence the future of the club.”

“I am proud of the decisions that I have made.” Despite three loss in the league this season, Wenger is Arsenal’s most successful manager with three Premier League titles and four FA Cups, his critics have accused the Frenchman of becoming obsessed with playing beautiful football at the expense of results.

They have also called for him

to bolster the team with some more overtly physical players.

Friday, Wenger launched a spirited defence of his young team and they way they play the game. “I personally believe in my team, I’m very proud of what they do,” he said. “Our results are not as good as we want them to be.”

He also said if experience was all that counted in top-grade soccer, Arsenal would be relegated at the end of the season. “Every single team has more experience than we have,” Wenger said.

“I don’t believe strength is linked with experience. It is linked with desire, with talent, with intelligence. You can be intelligent at 18 or 20 and be stupid at 30. “Every club and every player gives us a different problem and we have to be strong enough to find a solution.”

LONDON, NOVEMBER 8 (REUTERS): Force India owner Vijay Mallya terminated his Formula One team’s Ferrari engine contract a year early on Friday while ousting Colin Kolles as principal and Mike Gascoyne as technical head. In a major management shake-up, after the team failed to score a point and finished 10th in the constructors’ championship this year, Force India paved the way for the arrival of Mercedes engines and closer links with McLaren.

“Force India’s senior management structure will be streamlined with immediate effect,” the team said. “Dr Vijay Mallya will assume the responsibilities of team principal in addition to his position as chairman. “As a result of the restructure, Colin Kolles, Mike Gascoyne and Patrick Missling, formerly corporate and business director, will no longer form a direct part of the team’s design, manufacture, race and test operations.”

Mallya, who bought the Spyker team last year and renamed it, said he had been forced to act. “Force India is my most difficult project to date and it has become clear that it requires more direct input from my side and greater performance accountability,” said the aviation and drinks billionaire. “We have come a long way this season, but we need more and that requires some radical reorganisation of the management structure to ensure the maximum productivity.”

Mallya said the team would announce the new technical direction on Monday as well as the appointment of a new chief operating officer. Mark Smith, the design director, and technical director James Key will share responsibility for the design of next year’s VJM02. The team, who said that the Ferrari deal had been terminated at their request, are also expected to announce a deal with Mercedes-McLaren.

They gave no details about a new supplier but Mallya has been negotiating with McLaren for an entire drivetrain package as well as the new kinetic energy recovery system (KERS) to be introduced next year. He offered to compensate Ferrari for any development costs incurred on Force India’s behalf for 2009. Ferrari, who clinched a record 16th constructors’ championship in the Interlagos season-ender, also supply engines to the Toro Rosso team.

C M Y K

Ent/Tabloid

The Morung Express

11 PRIME TIME Sunday

9 November 2008

The intimate backstage scenes of Obama’s election night vigil

06:00 - Hope And Faith; 06:30 - Friends; 09:00 - Koffee With Karan; 11:00 - Seinfeld; 13:00 - Friends; 15:30 - Life With Bonnie; 16:00 According To Jim; 16:30 - My Name Is Earl; 17:30 - Stacked; 18:00 - How I Met Your Mother; 18:30 - Hope And Faith; 19:00 - Ghost Whisperer; 20:00 - Ugly Betty; 21:00 - Private Practice; 22:00 - Barbara Walters Special; 00:00 - Blood Ties; 01:00 - Ghost Whisperer; 02:00 Ugly Betty; 03:00 - Private Practice; 04:00 - Blood Ties; 05:00 - The Simpsons; 05:30 - Kenneth CopelaNd

Fateful viewing: Barack Obama leans forward and wrings his hands as he watches John McCain speaking on television during election night

A

Mr Obama and his vice president Joe Biden shake hands as they romp to victory

s one man prepares to fulfil his destiny, the tension is overwhelming, the sense of expectation immense. These fascinating behind-the- scenes pictures show the historic moment Barack Obama learned he had been elected as America's first black president.

Cloistered in a stark Chicago hotel room, and living up to his nickname 'No Drama Obama', he appears contemplative and often serious as he watches a giant TV screen showing John McCain delivering his concession speech.

With his feet up on the coffee table and clearly exhausted, Mr Obama is shown watching with his family as the results rolled in during the last hours of a 22-month campaign journey that was on the

brink of triumphant conclusion.

Wringing his hands and his brow creased in a frown, some nerves are still visible to see on Mr Obama, 47, and his whole family.

There's little sign of jubilation - just a sober realisation of the challenge ahead. Marian Robinson, Obama’s mother –in-law tells PEOPLE. "We all had our little laugh, our little enjoyment when he said it. It was like, OK, that means it’s true."

By the time CNN made it official, Robinson adds, "Everybody was quiet. I can't tell you how subdued it was. We weren’t like the people in the stands – you know, yelling and screaming."

Past presidents had their election night vigils charted in powerful photo essays in journalism heavyweights such as Life magazine or Time. But, true to his mes-

sage of change, Mr Obama simply posted his pictures - taken by his official photographer David Katz, and entitled simple Scenes on Election Night - on Flickr, a popular website mostly used by families to post their holiday snaps.

The photos - some showing daughters Malia, ten, and sevenyear-old Sasha looking tired and slightly bored at being up way past their bedtimes - give an extraordinary glimpse into the private life of Mr Obama on the most momentous night of his life. There is also a shot of him having a quiet word with his vice president-elect Joe Biden. Mrs Obama, 44, is pictured wearing her red and black dress by designer Narciso Rodriguez. It was later criticised by one fashionista as looking like a 'lava lamp'.

Meg Ryan’s Carries Around A Magical Daisy

Pamela Anderson: 'My Kids Get Teased About my Past'

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P

amela Anderson says her wild past is starting to come back to haunt her and her children. The former Baywatch babe - who has two sons with ex-husband Tommy Lee - says her boys are being teased by their classmates over her colorful past and her sex tape shame with their father.

She says, "They're starting to get to that age where they are defending mommy. Brandon was upset yesterday because some kids said some things at school. Kids can be so mean but I knew this would come. I just explained that we are good people and we've never done anything to hurt anyone. I just want them to enjoy school and enjoy life. They've seen a lot in their little lives but they're great kids."

eg Ryan has her hands full as she drops her three-year-old daughter, Daisy True, at preschool in Los Angeles on Friday morning. The 46-year-old actress recently told InStyle that adopting Daisy was magical. She said, “As mysterious and magical as it is to have a baby you gave birth to, I have that exact same thing with Daisy. I feel like we made some agreement, long ago and far away, to meet in the way we did.”

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06:00 - Seva Ganga; 06:30 Vignan Shashwat Sukh Ka; 07:00 - Sangam; 07:30 - Raja Ki Ayegi; 08:00 - Kyunki Saas Bhi; 08:30 Baa Bahoo Aur Baby; 09:00 Krishna Kathaiyen; 10:00 - Jai Maa Durga; 11:00 - Star Voice Of India; 14:00 - Aaja Mahi Ve; 16:00 - Plus Superhit; 19:30 - Ab Tak Ka Safar; 20:00 - Saibaba; 21:00 - Prithviraj; 21:30 - Baa Bahoo Aur Baby; 22:00 - Plus Superhit; 00:00 - Kasturi; 00:30 - Kumkum; 01:00 - Bidaai; 01:30 - Kis Desh Mein; 02:00 - Grihasti; 02:30 - Kayamath; 03:00 - Hamari DevranI; 03:30 - Kahaani Ghar; 04:00 - Kyunki Saas Bhi; 04:30 - Raja Ki Ayegi; 05:00 - Disney Time

06:00 - Gift Of Jesus; 06:30 - Bhagwat Katha; 07:00 - Hillsong; 07:25 - Exposure Ek Nazar; 07:30 - Enjoying Everyday Life; 07:55 - Exposure Jhalak; 08:00 - Ek Ke Baad Ek; 08:25 - Exposure Ek Nazar; 08:30 - Jai Jai Tridev; 09:00 - Namaste Cinema; 09:30 - Shabhash India - Childrens Special; 10:00 - Khana Khazana; 10:30 Kahani Ab Tak; 11:00 - Movie; 13:00 - Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2009; 16:00 - Movie; 20:00 - Ek Se Badhkar Ek Chota Packet Bada Dhamaka; 21:00 - Naaginn; 21:30 Aladdin; 22:00 - Events; 23:55 - Exposure Ek Nazar; 00:00 Asian Sky Shop; 00:55 - Exposure; 01:00 - Asian Sky Shop; 02:00 - Teen Bahuraaniyaan; 02:30 - Kasamh Se; 03:00 - Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2009; 04:00 - Vivaah; 04:30 - Urja; 05:00 - Parrivaar; 05:30 - Narseva Narayan Seva

T H

06:00 - Telebrands; 07:00 - Body Story Ii; 08:00 - Planet Earth; 09:00 - Discover India; 10:00 Jeremy Piven’s Journey Of A Lifetime; 11:00 - When We Left Earth: The Nasa Missions; 12:00 - Mega Builders 2; 13:00 - Wild Africa; 14:00 - Planet Food; 15:00 - Fight Quest; 16:00 - Planet Earth; 17:00 - Man Vs. Wild; 18:00 - Futurecar; 19:00 - Planet Earth; 20:00 - Untamed Earth; 21:00 - Discovery’s Biggest Shows; 23:00 - Futureweapons; 00:00 - Planet Earth; 01:00 Telebrands; 02:00 - Futureweapons; 03:00 - MaN Vs. Wild; 04:00 - Into Alaska With Jeff Corwin; 05:00 - Futureweapons

06:00 - Trespass; 07:30 - Curious George; 09:15 - Homie Spumoni; 11:00 - Black Beauty; 12:45 - Evan Almighty; 14:45 Mumbai Calling; 15:15 - The House Next Door; 17:00 - Varsity Blues; 19:00 - Norbit; 21:00 - The Mummy; 23:15 - Edtv; 01:30 - Get Rich Or Die Tryin’; 03:45 - The Making Of Norbit; 04:00 - Longford

Oprah introduces the shoulder she cried on

cancer made her change her point of view in many ways.

"I started looking for a beach house the day I found out I had this little disease, you just kind of go, ''what are you waiting for to get the things that you want and the things you dream of?” she said.

"I don't own tomorrow or yesterday - today is all I've got, and if I don't make today good, then I'm only gonna' be p--ssed off tomorrow!" she added. Christina took time to grieve, as weeks before having both her breasts removed, two of her cats died and her ex-beau, Lee Grivas, was also found dead of an apparent drug overdose.

04:45 - Dum; 08:00 - My Lucky Star; 10:20 - Bal Ganesh; 13:00 - Bhagam Bhag; 16:45 - Deewana Mastana; 20:00 - Men In Black; 22:20 - Project A - 2; 01:30 - Deedar; 04:30 - Dil Vil Pyar Vyar

0:00 - Winning Post; 0:30 Uefa Champions League H/L’s:; 1:30 - Us Pgatournament -Children’s Miracle Network-Day 3; 3:30 - Icl Hls - Hydrabad V Kolkatta; 4:30 - Winning Post; 5:00 - Icl Hls - Hydrabad V Kolkatta; 6:00 - Hong Kong 6’S; 13:00 - Icl 20-20 - Preview: Chandigarh V Ahmedabad; 14:00 - Icl 20-20 : Chandigarh V Ahmedabad; 17:00 - Icl 20-20 - Review: Chandigarh V Ahmedabad; 17:30 - Wwe Experience; 18:00 - Uefa Champions League Magazine Show 08; 18:30 - Icl 20-20 Preview: Chennai V Lahore; 19:30 - Icl 20-20 : Chennai V Lahore; 22:30 - Icl 20-20 - Review: Chennai V Lahore; 23:00 - Wwe:experience

upermodel Padma Lakshmi, who was once married to acclaimed novelist Salman Rushdie, is apparently on a "man-search" for a filthy rich boyfriend.

After her divorce from Rushdie, Lakshmi has been linked to many rich men; she even had a brief romance with millionaire Ted Forstmann and Russell Simmons.

The Top Chef host was recently spotted canoodling Russell Simmons at Madonna's Filth and Wisdom premiere. "Russell had his hand on her upper thigh," The New York post quoted a snitch, as saying. However, it didn''t work out between them.

The stunner was seen last week at a showcase for Matt White and Sissy Spacek''s daughter, Schuyler Fisk, at Bowery Ballroom, "grinding on the dance floor with some tall, young guy with a shaved head." Lakshmi, apparently, continued her man-search on election night at the Comedy Central bash at The Park.

eary-eyed Oprah Winfrey is caught on camera with "mystery man" - aka Sam Perry - at huge Election Night rally for Barack Obama in Chicago's Grant Park. Oprah and her human hanky met face-to-face Friday for the first time since she treated the stranger's shoulder as her personal Kleenex during Barack Obama's Election Night rally.

Winfrey hugged the former mystery man - Sam Perry, a Silicon Valley businessman and the communications director for the Obama campaign in California - on the set of her show before apologizing for never asking his name the night she sobbed all over him. "We were there in the moment," Perry, 49, assured her. "What a night to share."

Perry and his shoulder gained sudden fame after TV cameras captured a weepy Winfrey draped on him during Obama's victory speech in Chicago Tuesday night. The next day, Winfrey admitted the man whose shoulder she had cried on was a complete stranger. As images of Oprah hanging onto Perry shot around the globe, reporters scrambled to discover the identity of the bespectacled man with thinning brown hair. During the rally in Grant Park on Tuesday, networks repeatedly beamed live footage of Winfrey leaning forward and resting her chin on Perry's shoulder. Immediately, the world wondered: Who is that man Oprah Winfrey is crying on?

The mystery ended only after one of

06:00 - Animal Planet Safari; 07:00 Teleshopping; 08:00 - Baby Planet; 09:00 Incredible Journeys With Steve Leonard; 10:00 - Lords Of The Animals; 10:30 - All New Planet’s Funniest Animals; 11:00 Groomer Has It; 12:00 - Eye Of The Hunter; 13:00 - Corwin’s Quest; 14:00 - Animal Planet Safari; 15:00 - Planet Wild; 15:30 - Up Close And Dangerous; 16:00 - Wild Africa; 17:00 - Incredible Journeys With Steve Leonard; 18:00 - Baby Planet; 19:00 - Groomer Has It; 20:00 - Eye Of The Hunter; 21:00 - Planet WilD; 21:30 - Up Close And Dangerous; 22:00 - Caught In The Moment; 23:00 - Wild Africa; 00:00 - Baby Planet; 01:00 - Teleshopping; 02:00 Petsburgh Usa; 03:00 - Monkey Business; 04:00 - Petsburgh Usa; 05:00 - Monkey Business

04:35 - Fx Ii; 06:25 - Miss Potter; 08:20 - The Invincible Iron Man; 10:05 - Stolen Summer; 12:00 The Brothers Grimm; 14:20 Ladder 49; 16:35 - Little Fish; 18:45 - War Of The Worlds; 21:00 - Antonia And Jane; 22:30 - The Shipping News; 00:45 - Stolen Summer; 02:25 - The Brothers Grimm; 04:30 - Little Fish

Padma on a ‘billionaire manhunt’

Fighting breast cancer ‘sucks’

ollywood actress Christina Applegate, who had undergone a double mastectomy in July, has said that fighting breast cancer "sucks." However, the Samantha Who? actress is bravely fighting the disease, and does not want to be termed a victim.

"I still have quite a process until this is done," US magazine quoted Christina, as telling the new issue of TV Guide.

"Yes, it's hard. It sucks. But I'm not a victim,” she added.

She will undergo reconstructive surgery near her 37th birthday, at the end of November. Christina, who is a workaholic, revealed the

Dimapur

06:00 - Mann Mein Hai Visshwas; 07:00 Telebrands; 07:30 - Jai Hanuman; 08:00 Teleshopping; 08:50 - Box Office Muzic Hitz; 09:00 - Boogie Woogie; 10:00 Comedy Circus; 11:00 - Indian Idol 4; 15:00 - Kaho Naa... Pyaar Hai; 19:00 - Cid; 20:00 - Hum Tum; 00:00 - Telebrands; 00:30 Teleshopping; 01:00 - Comedy Circus; 02:00 - Cid; 03:00 - Aahat - 3; 04:00 - Boogie Woogie 6:00 - Csi: Crime Scene Investigation; 7:00 - 2007 Lg Action Sports Championships; 8:00 - Csi: Ny; 9:00 So You Think You Can Dance; 11:00 - Afterworld; 11:30 - Ebuzz; 12:00 - Csi: Crime Scene Investigation; 1:00 - Csi: Miami; 2:00 - Csi: Ny; 3:00 - A Knight’s Tale; 5:30 - Ebuzz; 6:00 - So You Think You Can Dance; 7:00 - The Amazing Race Asia; 8:00 The Bourne Supremacy; 10:30 - Ebuzz; 11:00 - Buffy The Vampire Slayer; 1:00 - Csi: Crime Scene Investigation; 2:00 Csi: Miami; 3:00 - Csi: Ny; 4:00 - Buffy The Vampire Slayer 04:30 - Under Suspicion; 06:10 - Jill Rips; 07:30 - Infomercial; 08:00 Lords Of Dogtown; 10:30 - The Hunchback Of Notre Dame; 12:30 The Matrix Reloaded; 15:20 - Tarzan Ii; 17:00 - Epk; 17:15 - Howards End; 20:30 - Connie And Carla; 22:30 101 Dalmatians; 00:45 - Epk; 01:00 - The Defender; 02:30 The In-Laws; 04:00 - Wake Of Death; 05:30 - Arahan

Perry's colleagues wrote in to Oprah.com.

"I never even saw his full face," Winfrey said Friday. "I only saw him from the side, so if I had to identify him from a lineup, I couldn't." Before introducing Perry, Winfrey said the crowd at Grant Park was packed so tightly that if she had let her arms fall, "I would have been in this guy's butt." "We were feeling the love," Winfrey said.

Perry, after bounding toward the stage, told Winfrey she didn't have to worry about whether her runny mascara stained his clothes. "You were so

kind to express concern over my jacket.

But this is the jacket," Perry said, pointing to the brown blazer he was wearing.

"And you'll see there is no mascara."

Perry noted that his phone never stopped vibrating at the rally as friends and family members caught his image on TV beside one of the world's most recognizable women. "It's very good, actually, that the cameras were there," said Perry, a former Reuters correspondent. "It was a lot easier to go home to my wife and say, 'It really was Oprah.'"

06:00 - A Matter Of Taste With Vi r S anghvi ; 06: 30 Uttaranchal; 07:00 - Highlife Unlimited; 08:00 - Seven Wonders; 09:00 - Madhur Jaffrey’s Flavours Of India; 09:30 - Dream Hotels; 10:00 Beautification With Ruby And Millie; 10:30 - Cover Shot; 11:00 - While You Were Out 3; 12:00 - Overhaulin’ 5; 13:00 - I Do, Let’s Eat!; 13:30 - Indian Food Made Easy; 14:00 Adventures Of The Ladies Tailor; 14:30 - Feast India; 15:00 - Nigella Feasts; 15:30 - British Biker Build Off; 16:00 - Jet Set; 17:00 - Anthony BoUrdain: No Reservations; 18:00 - La Ink; 19:00 - Finest Hotels In The World; 19:30 - Indian Rendezvous; 20:00 - Getaway 2006; 20:30 - Hotel By The Bay; 21:00 - Food Paradise; 22:00 - American Chopper; 23:00 - Ballroom Bootcamp; 00:00 - Vegas Vegas; 01:00 Food Paradise; 02:00 - Around The World; 03:00 - Kylie Kwong: My China; 03:30 - I Do, Let’s Eat!; 04:00 - Cover Shot; 04:30 - Beautification With Ruby And Millie; 05:00 Amazing Vacation Homes; 05:30 - Superhomes 2

C M Y K

C M Y K

The

Morung

SPORTS

P 12

Aussies shackled by patient India

Indian bowler Harbhajan Singh, third left, celebrates after he dismissed Australian batsman Shane Watson, foreground left, as Indian players run in to congratulate him during the third day of the fourth and ďŹ nal cricket test match between India and Australia in Nagpur on Saturday. (AP Photo)

NAGPUR, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): India lead the final Test at Nagpur by 86 runs after Australia were all out for a ponderous 355 late on day three.

Simon Katich, resuming on 92 with his side 189-2, was dropped at slip but hit a second Test century before Zaheer Khan trapped him for 102 before lunch. The tourists took 354 balls to go from 200-300 and lost three wickets for 11. Mike Hussey

dle

was run-out for 90 and Cameron White hit a Test-best 46, but India look set to protect a 1-0 series lead at 0-0 in the second innings.

India would be content with a draw, having won the second Test, but with Australia needing a victory to level the series, their tactics were a little harder to fathom on a day in which both sides appeared content to let the match drift rather aimlessly.

However, runs were not easy to come by for obdurate left-handers Katich and Hussey, given that all but one of the fielders were placed on the off-side and seamers Ishant Sharma and Zaheer made the batsmen reach for the ball wide of the off-stump.

There was little to entice any newcomers in the first session, but India should have given those present an early wicket when Katich

fished at the impressive Sharma, only for Rahul Dravid to fumble a regulation chance to his left at wide first slip.

Katich, dismissed on 99 on the last tour, guided Sharma to the third man boundary to complete his first century in India. He was on 102 when Sharma had another slice of bad luck, an edge falling fractionally short of VVS Laxman at the second of the two wide slips.

Spin was introduced for

the first time half an hour before lunch, but it was a piece of brilliance from Zaheer that made the breakthrough 10 minutes before the interval. The combative left-arm seamer produced a stunning yorker that swung in to Katich and umpire Aleem Dar decided the ball was so full that it would have gone on to hit.

That session saw only 42 runs from 24 overs but the afternoon was more event-

ful as two magical moments gave India encouragement that victory is possible as three wickets fell in seven overs. Sharma bowled an absolute beauty that pitched in the perfect area and moved away to square up Michael Clarke, taking his edge.

Hussey seemed to be booked in for the day, but 10 short of his 10th Test hundred he thought he could safely set off for a run after pushing Harbhajan Singh off the back foot. Murali Vijay at silly point grabbed the ball one-handed, however, and returned to Mahendra Dhoni, who smartly deflected on to the stumps.

At the start of the evening session, after 102 overs, the ball was changed, but not for a new one, as India were happy to use a weatherbeaten object. Brad Haddin finally showed some intent with consecutive boundaries and an all-run four, but his innings ended on 28 in tame fashion. Trying to kick away a sharply spinning delivery from Amit Mishra out of the rough from around the wicket, the ball missed the pad, caught the edge of a horizontal bat and was gleefully snaffled at slip by Dravid.

The new ball was finally taken 44 overs after it first became available and Sharma immediately threatened with some sharp inswing to the right-handers.

Jason Krejza was beaten for pace and movement as the ball thudded into his pad, and two balls later an unsettled Mitchell Johnson was dropped at second slip

by Laxman.

Finally there was a directive to hit out, but it merely resulted in White and Johnson being caught in the deep and only one over left to

bowl at the Indian batsmen.

The Australians will know that wickets are urgently

needed on day four if they are to have any hope of salvaging the series.

Super Samir sinks Reds at Emirates

Arsenal's Samir Nasri, centre left, turns to celebrate after soring a second goal against Manchester United during their English Premier League soccer match at Arsenal's Emirates Stadium in London on Saturday. (AP Photo)

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LONDON, NOVEMBER 8 (AGENCIES): An exciting encounter saw the Gunners leapfrog United after Nasri struck midway through the first half and just after the break while Rafael pulled a goal back for the visitors late on. The Gunners could have conceded within 90 seconds after Gael Clichy's back-pass was picked up by Manuel Almunia 12 yards out on the right side of the box.

But Anderson's effort from the free-kick was blocked to Michael Carrick on the edge of the area and the midfielder's mis-hit drive flew a couple of yards wide. An excellent move involving Cristiano Ronaldo and Ji-Sung Park allowed Wayne Rooney to force Almunia into a smart stop and although Dimitar Berbatov fired home the rebound the Bulgarian was in an offside position. Nicklas Bendtner squandered two chances in as many minutes as Arsenal began to find their feet .

Sir Alex Ferguson's men should have taken the lead, however, in the 19th minute when an excellent move involving Anderson, Berbatov and Ronaldo found Rooney unmarked on the pen-

alty spot but the England striker blazed over the bar.

United were made to pay for that miss three minutes later when United failed to properly clear Cesc Fabregas' centre and Nasri's halfvolley from the edge of the area took a touch off Gary Neville's knee and flew past Edwin van der Sar. The Gunners doubled their advantage three min-

utes after the restart when a sustained spell of passing eventually led to Nasri being found on the edge of the area in acres of space and the Frenchman smashed past van der Sar. Ronaldo then squandered a great opportunity to hand United a lifeline when he volleyed wide from close range a minute later while Rooney headed

staight at Almunia from Berbatov's cross.

Ryan Giggs and Carlos Tevez were introduced by Ferguson as United desperately pushed to pull a goal back - and they did just that in the final minute when young Brazilian Rafael lashed an unstoppable volley past substitute goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski from the edge of the area.

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