Office of Profit: BJP against diluting spirit of statute
Trinamul Congress chief Mamata Bannerjee's ultimatum of "48 hours" to finalise sharing of seats in West Bengal worked. Without asking for more seats, the Congress on Thursday talked of "larger perspective of defeating the Communist Party of India-Marxist" in deciding to contest only 14 Lok Sabha seats, leaving the remaining 26 seats in the state for her party.
The 10-member GoM headed by external affairs minister and finance minister Pranab Mukherjee will include defence minister A K Antony, Home Minister P Chidambaram, agriculture minister Sharad Pawar, communications minister A Raja, railway minister Lalu Prasad, chemical and fertilisers minister Ram Vilas Paswan, law and justice minister H R Bhardwaj, minister of state for external affairs Anand Sharma and planning commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia.
The government on Wednesday admitted in the Lok Sabha that Pakistan had clandestinely acquired know-how on nuclear weapons technology. In a written reply, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said New Delhi has consistently shared its concerns regarding the adverse effects of such developments on India's security with the international community.
Presenting the Interim Budget in Lok Sabha, the minister said the enactment of the Act by the Centre and many states has 'bridged a critical gap in the public decision-making process and ushered in greater accountability of public servants.'
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge used poetry and humour to take swipes at the government on Monday, saying nothing will be accomplished by changing names, and went on to recall how first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru's 'inclusive' approach of involving opposition parties had led to the laying of a strong foundation for the Constitution.
Sonia, Sumitra Mahajan share a laugh at the event
Nanaji joined the RSS in 1928 as a 12-year-old and later remained a member of Bhartiya Jan Sangh.
President Pranab Mukherjee has given his nod to the Telangana Bill, which is likely to be tabled in Parliament on Tuesday.
Pranab Mukherjee said India will undertake the civil nuclear cooperation with the US and any other country on the basis of bilateral agreements only and that the government has "no doubt" that Washington will fulfil its "commitments and obligations" specified in the agreement.
The Youth Affairs and Sports Ministry has been allocated Rs 1,121 crore (Rs 11.21 billion) in the annual budget for 2011-12, which is nearly one-third of last year's Rs 3,315.67 crore (Rs 33.15 billion).
The hike in service tax on air travel would be effective from April one. From then on, the tax on economy class domestic travel would stand at Rs 150 instead of the current Rs 100 and Rs 750, as against Rs 500, for international travel.
"The bank strike is expected to be called off today. I am being told that talks are on between the bank associations and worker unions," he said replying to supplementaries during the Question Hour.
The retraction was preceded by a shouting match between Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Railway Minister Mamata Banerji, who had threatened to walk out of a Cabinet meeting protesting some provisions in the Bill earlier this month.
Rediff.com brings to you Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee's Budget Speech Live from Parliament at 11.00 a.m. on February 26.
The Economic Survey tabled today in the Lok Sabha by the Finance Minister Shri Pranab Mukherjee, says that the whole sale price index (WPI) of food inflation rose to 13.6 per cent in December 2010 on account of unfavourable agricultural supply conditions coupled with the waning of base effects.
All components showed improvement with the exception of FDI and banking capital in the first half of 2010-11.
Minister of Finance Pranab Mukherjee while pressing the Budget 2009-10 in Lok Sabha on Monday has said that the government has taken several measures to counter the negative fall -out of the global slow down on the Indian economy.
Presenting the Union Budget for the year 2009-10 in the Lok Sabha, Mukherjee said that the United Progressive Alliance government is committed to ensuring that the Sri Lankan Tamils enjoy their rights and legitimate aspirations within the territorial sovereignty and framework of the country's constitution.
Meeting a long-pending demand of over a crore defence veterans and 12 lakh serving jawans, the government on Monday substantially increased the pension of ex-servicemen.
"To enable students from economically weaker sections to access higher education, it is proposed to introduce a scheme to provide them full interest subsidy during the period of moratorium," he said. However, only those students whose family income is less than Rs 4.5 lakh per annum will be eligible under the scheme. These students will avail the benefit for a moratorium period which is one year from completion of the course or six months from joining a job.
Making a strong defence of the nuclear deal during the debate on confidence motion, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee rejected the Left parties' allegations of betrayal and took potshots at leader of opposition Lal Kishenchand Advani, saying he should not "distort" facts in "over enthusiasm" to score political points.
An announcement to this effect could be made in the Budget scheduled to be unveiled by finance minister Pranab Mukherjee in the Lok Sabha on July 6. The decision to permit SEZ developers to raise ECBs, sources said, would promote development of the special economic zones, besides helping the government in arresting decline in the foreign exchange reserves.
The Budget refers to the 'Annual Financial Statement', laid before both the Houses of Parliament.
The Samajwadi Party and the Rashtriya Janata Dal on Monday said they would oppose the Women's Reservation Bill in its present form at an all-party meeting convened by the government and stick to their demand for separate quotas for women from the minority community, scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and other backward classes. the meeting has been convened by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, who is Leader of Lok Sabha, to find a way out of the impasse on the bill.
In the first objection from within Congress, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Sunday said he is not in favour of Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh appearing before the Public Accounts Committee on the 2G spectrum issue as he was accountable to the Lok Sabha and "not to any committee".
The government has given the Yadavs opposing the Women's Reservation Bill a face saver by which they can withdraw their agitation in the Lok Sabha and allow the House to function, and in return, the government has promised them nothing more than a dialogue and time to discuss the bill with Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, not even promising them an all party meeting.
Just 6.4% of branches owned by new private sector banks are in the rural areas
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee presented his 5th Budget in Parliament on Friday.
The entire Opposition walked out of the Lok Sabha during the presentation of budget by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, dubbing it 'highly inflationary' as he partially rolled back the stimulus by hiking the ad velorum component of excise duty on large cars and multi-utility vehicles by two per cent to 22 per cent.
In a bid to end the impasse inParliament, the government reached out to the Bharatiya Janata Party saying it was ready for a discussion on 2-G spectrum issue and a Supreme Court-monitored CBI probe but rejected the demand for a JPC, which failed to cut ice with the main opposition.
As the tenth consecutive working day of Parliament was lost amid its standoff with the Opposition on the controversial 2G scam issue, government on Thursday said it did not know how to end the impasse but was trying to find a solution.
The Trinamul Congress on Sunday night formed an alliance with the Congress in West Bengal to fight the Left Front in the Lok Sabha elections in a significant development that gave the UPA one more ally weaning Mamata Banerjee's party away from the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance.
It was a spectacle of bonhomie in the Central Hall of Parliament as Prime Minister Narendra Modi greeted his political adversary Rahul Gandhi warmly grabbing his hand, while Congress President Sonia Gandhi chatted intermittently with BJP veteran L K Advani.
"The Hyde Act is an enabling provision that is between the executive and the legislative organs of the US government," External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said in a suo motu statement on foreign policy-related developments in the Lok Sabha. "India's rights and obligations regarding civil nuclear cooperation with the US arise only from the bilateral 123 Agreement that we have agreed upon with the US," he said.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam has done much damage to the Tamil community in Sri Lanka, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee told the Lok Sabha on Wednesday.
The United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government has launched many new schemes to provide steady monetary assistance to weak and downtrodden people in the society.
India's foreign direct investment inflow between April and November 2008 was $23.3 billion, a growth of 45 per cent compared with that during the same period in 2007, said union Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee, who is holding additional charge of the finance portfolio while presenting the Interim Budget for 2009-10 on Monday in parliament.
Welcoming Pakistan's response to the Mumbai dossier, India today said it will monitor further actions by Islamabad in ending cross-border terror and underlined that the neighbour has to choose what kind of ties it wants with New Delhi.
PM taken out of ICU, likely to attend the last day of the Parliament session.
