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State’s set up a bank account for drought relief

Donating to the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund for drought? Deposit your money in a dedicated State Bank of India account.
by The Editors | editor@themetrognome.in

By now, everybody knows that Maharashtra is in the grip of a severe drought, the likes of which have not been seen in years. In a heartening development, however, even as the State Government looks for ways to ease the situation, citizens of the State are coming forward daily to contribute money for those affected by the drought.

Seeing the response to the the Government’s call for help, the State has gone a step further from merely collecting money for drought – today, the Government announced a specially set up bank account where citizens can now directly deposit the money they wish to donate.

The account is a State Bank of India account, whose number is 32860305777. The account has been set up at the State Bank of India’s Fort, Mumbai branch. As per a release from the Chief Minister’s office this afternoon, citizens can now directly deposit their cheques or demand drafts at SBI outlets and address it to the ‘Chief Minister’s Relief Fund (Drought 2013). The bank will give the person a rough receipt, which he/she can then write to the Chief Minister’s Accounts Officer at the Mantralaya with a copy of the rough receipt and request an original one.

(Picture courtesy vickynanjapa.wordpress.com)

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A ‘pass’able attempt at extortion

Group of five pose as Income Tax officers to extort Rs 1,00,000 by telling firm to buy 1,000 programme passes.
by The Editors | editor@themetrognome.in

Did you think that posing as Income Tax officials, as shown in the film Special 26, was a bit of a clever idea for extortion and stealing? So did a group of five men recently arrested by the RAK Marg police station.

Three days ago, the office of Ashapura Garment Ltd. at Navyug Industrial Estate, Sewri, received a phone call from a person who identified himself as SK Mishra, an Income Tax officer. “He said that the Income Tax department had organised a programme at Ravindra Natya Mandir on March 22, and for which our company would have to purchase 100 passes of Rs 1,000 each,” said Pravin Bheda, the company’s marketing manager who received the call. Pravin told his boss, Bharatbhai, about the call and the latter inquired with Ravindra Natya Mandir about the supposed programme.

No such programme was listed in Ravindra Natya Mandir’s schedule. Meanwhile, Bharatbhai instructed Pravin to buy some time from the Income Tax ‘officer’ by telling him that they would buy 11 passes. “But when he (Mishra) called again and when I told him that we would buy 11 passes, he got really angry and said that we would have to buy all 100 passes or our company could face action from the Income Tax department,” Pravin told the RAK Marg cops.

Bharatbhai lodged a complaint with the RAK Marg police station when two men, posing as Income Tax officers, barged into the firm’s office and demanded that they buy 100 passes in cash immediately. “I was scared, but I fobbed them off saying that my boss was not in office and that I had only Rs 6,000 with me, from which I bought six passes,” Pravin said. Meanwhile, RAK Marg cops decided to be present at the premises the next day.

About five plainclothesmen were stationed inside and outside the company’s office the next day, when the duo visited again with two more accomplices to collect payment for the remaining 94 passes. When told that the company could not afford to buy more than 11 passes in all, they got abusive and threatened the company with serious consequences, such as an Income Tax raid. On a signal from Bharatbhai, the cops entered the office and nabbed the four men.

Their ‘senior officer’ was also nabbed from a taxi waiting outside. The programme passes were also seized from them.

The five men have been identified as Chandrakant Bhat (age 43 years), Narendra Soni (48), Harshad Bhat (38), Nayanbhai Shah (55) and Bharatbhai Shah (58). The police are questioning them on their modus operandi and looking into possible past cases of extortion linked to this gang.

(Picture courtesy centralchronicle.com)

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Governor’s wife wants all-women police stations

After the Government’s announcement of an all-women nationalised bank in the country, the State Governor’s wife wants all-women police stations.

This is getting serious. In the Budget announced last month by Finance Minister P Chidambaram, there was an announcement for an all-woman nationalised bank to be launched later this year. Apart from that announcement, Chidambaram had laid heavy emphasis on women’s safety and security in the light of growing crimes against them.

Today, on the occasion of Women’s Day, a prominent woman – in fact, the wife of the State’s First Citizen, the Governor – expressed a desire for all-women police stations in Maharashtra and the country. Radha Sankaranarayan wished for a more sensitised police force and Courts, and in this connection, she said, “Opening of all-women police stations will give confidence to women to come forward and report crimes against them.”

She was speaking at a seminar on ‘Time for action to end violence against women’ organised by the United Nations Population Fund in association with the Department of Public Health, Government of Maharashtra, at Sahyadri State Guest House in Mumbai. She said, “As a woman, as a mother and as a grandmother, I feel sad, angry and at the same time helpless when I read reports of incidents of violence against women, sexual assault on small girls and even on toddlers. In some cases, the trauma of the victim ends with death. I feel benumbed.”

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The heat is on

Temperatures to touch almost 40 Degrees Celsius today. Seesaw weather pattern continues, with 20 Degrees deflection in minimum, maximum temperatures.

You are right in thinking that the current weather has breached all levels of crazy. It’s very hot in the day and unexpectedly cool in the night. Today is just the fourth day of March 2013, and in these four days, the city’s experienced some terrific highs and lows in temperature.

Just yesterday, the maximum temperature touched the 39 Degrees Celsius mark – making it the third consecutive hottest March day for Mumbai ever – and dipped to 16.2 Degrees Celsius in the night. Today, too, the same pattern is expected to continue. In fact, the Indian Meteorological Centre (IMD) Mumbai anticipates that the maximum temperature may touch 40 Degrees while the minimum may dip to 14 Degrees, both large departures from the normal March temperatures of 33 Degrees Celsius (maximum) and 20 Degrees Celsius (minimum).

According to VK Rajeev, Director, IMD (Western region), the temperatures have risen because of an ‘anti-cyclone’ formation over the North-East Arabian Sea. For the uninitiated, an anti-cyclone is an area where high pressure winds flow in clockwise direction in the Northern hemisphere and in the anti-clockwise direction in the Southern hemisphere, thus causing temperatures to rise. Humidity levels are also affected.

(Picture courtesy green-4-u.com)

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International Committee of Red Cross turns 150

Humra Quraishi tracks the journey of the ICRC, whose first mission to India had landed in Bombay 96 years ago.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) turned 150 years old on February 17, 2013. It is now more than 30 years old in India. In fact, ICRC’s first mission to India was on February 12, 1917, some 95 years ago, to restore contact between people separated by war.

To give you a background on this:  The International Prisoners-of-War Agency was formed on August 21, 1914. And from December 1914, ICRC delegates began obtaining permission from the different states to visit POW camps not just to check on conditions of detention but also to let the prisoners know that they had not been forgotten by the outside world or reconnect them with their loved ones. On January 25, 1917 in Cairo, the delegates of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) had just finished a camp visit of Ottoman Prisoner of War (POWs), that they received a cable from their headquarters in Geneva.

The cable directed them to inspect camps of POWs and civilian internees in Asian countries of India and Burma. The delegates got on to a ship and sailed through the Suez Canal to reach Bombay on February 12, 1917. The arrival of delegates that day
marked the beginning of ICRC’s journey on Indian soil. The mission in India began with the delegates meeting Viscount Chelmsford, Viceroy of India (the head of the British administration in India) in Delhi. In the province of Rajputana, the ICRC delegates visited the first camp in Sumerpur on March 3 to 4, 1917.

Explaining the concrete work of the delegates during such camp visits, Mary Werntz, currently the head of the regional delegation of the ICRC in Delhi, said, “The delegates would dive deep to see if the detainees were treated with dignity. From checking the barrack premises, sleeping, clothing and sanitation facilities, access to exercise and fresh air, medical services,
quantity of food received per person, to mapping the application of order and discipline on inmates by the detaining authority, every small details were observed and noted.

Efforts would also be made to ensure that the detainees had the right to practise their religion, had access to letters and parcels, and could avail the financial support from their own Government.”

Reading these details of ICRC’s work, one thought struck me: there are no formal and full-fledged wars being fought these days, so can’t the ICRC men and women look into the current state of our lockups and prisons, and what the current state of those languishing there is. In the times we are living in, there must be watchdog organisations to monitor and bring about interventions.

(Picture courtesy itu.int)

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Iran wants to do business with India

Speaker of the Iranian Parliament, Ali Ardashir Lajirani, wants India to throw its doors open for Iranian students and businesses.

The Speaker of the Iranian Parliament, Ali Ardashir Larijani visited the Governor of Maharashtra K Sankarnarayanan at Raj Bhavan, Mumbai, today. During the visit, he said that business leaders from Iran were keen to further develop business and trade contacts with India, and expressed the hope that India would provide opportunities for Iranian business leaders to explore its business potential.

Stressing the need for greater academic collaboration between the two countries, he said that addressing small issues like expediting issuance of student visas by India would help more students from Iran to study in India.

Complimenting India for achieving significant progress in various areas during the last few years, Larijani said, “The Parliament of Iran is determined to enhance and facilitate relations with India so that the trade between the two nations will further increase from the current $15 billion.” He said that trade can be enhanced by increasing cooperation in areas like energy resources and industries.

The Speaker was accompanied by a large delegation of Parliamentarians and Ministers and is currently on a visit to India.

He added, “Social, cultural, educational and trade relations between Iran and India are deeply rooted in history and both the nations have influenced the cultures of each other during these contacts.” He said that the people of the East such as Iran and India have a lot of commonalities such as morality, ethics and family values.

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