Stressing that there is nothing secretive about the Indo-US nuclear deal, a senior Congress leader said the prime minister is ready to face Parliament before the deal is operationalised.
Minister for Rural Development Raghuvansh Prasad Singh on Monday declared that the United Progressive Alliance combination would return to power despite the Bharatiya Janata Party's claim that it was going to come to power. He blamed the media for creating differences between the Left parties and the UPA. He was addressing mediapersons on the eve of three day ministerial conference on rural development to be held in New Delhi beginning from Tuesday.
Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati has withdrawn her party's support to the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre. Mayawati has accused the UPA of neglecting Uttar Pradesh and meting out step-motherly treatment to her party and the UP government.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh continues to be unwell, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee has postponed his visit to Australia by a day and Communist Party of India-Marxist General Secretary Prakash Karat has warned that the Left will withdraw support to the United Progressive Alliance government by Wednesday if the UPA continues to pursue the India-US nuclear deal.
The UPA government came under the mat for the 13-year-high in inflation with both its outside supporter Left and opposition Bharatiya Janata Party saying it was a "direct result" of hiking fuel prices steeply and "faulty" policies.
CPI-M has rejected all arguments of the government so far to sign the IAEA safeguards agreement. The party has firmly said that it believes once the IAEA phase is over, the deal will be on an 'auto-pilot' and even if India, a non-member of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), does not approach the forum, the US would pressurise it to approve the deal.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Vaundhara Raje -- who is expected to meet Gujjar leader Karori Singh Bainsla later today -- will reach an agreement over the community's demand for a Scheduled Tribe status, according to Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Prakash Javadekar.
M Venkaiah Naidu launched a scathing attack on the Congress for calling statements of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi anti-national and saying he should be tried for treason. "What else can you expect from the Congress government but to launch treason proceedings against Modi and confer the Bharat Ratna on Mohammad Afzal Guru who was awarded death sentence for attacking Parliament in December 2001," he told rediff.com.
N N Vohra, the first bureaucrat to be appointed as the governor of Jammu and Kashmir in 18 years, told rediff.com that he expected the Centre to formally announce his appointment by Thursday.The government has asked Vohra to hold talks with all the political parties and prepare a comprehensive report on the steps that need to be taken to improve the situation in the troubled state. Vohra will succeed Lieutenant General S K Sinha, whose term expired last week.