Deal

The 2G scam – Internal fighting within the Congress refuses to die …

It seems so funny now. During the first 5 years of its reign, the UPA – 1 seemed very weak, buckling down to its allies for so many issues, until the Government finally developed some spine and withstood the left parties over the nuclear deal with the United States. It managed to get a majority for this purpose through some fine tuned voting in Parliament, with a lot of suspicion that some of the vote was bought. So, there was some relief when the Congress came into power with an enhanced majority in the form of the UPA2, and less dependence on allies. In this new form, the Congress promised to make things much better, starting with a 100 day plan to do much more. What is funny is, that after this increased number of seats, the Government seems to be in more of crisis situations, almost during the whole time of its existence.
The 2G scandal was simmering ever since Raja distributed a new seats of telecom license, and after the CAG report and the admonishment by the Supreme Court, the Government has been choking on the 2G scam ever since, sinking lower and lower in public opinion. Till some time back, the Government seemed to believe that it was able to get over the impact of the scandal, by getting Raja sent to jail, and by pretending that it was all a matter of the DMK and the Congress had nothing to do with the criminality committed by an alliance partner.
The first shock to the Congress came from the PAC report (headed by Murli Manohar Joshi), which severely castigated the Prime Minister and the then Finance Minister for letting the 2G scam happen. The Congress managed to get a majority on the PAC which put the report in a limbo.
Read more…

High Court strikes down more land acquisition deals by the Noida administration

For many years now, the areas of Noida, Greater Noida, and Noida Extension near the capital city have been the center of a building boom. The many Governments of Uttar Pradesh in the past (run by different political parties such as the BJP, SP, BSP) have all played a part in this building boom, leveraging their closeness to Delhi and meeting the needs of a huge number of people who were bound for the national capital but could not afford to buy homes in Delhi. So, the Government would acquire land and give this to society and builders, who in turn would build a variety of residential units and sell these to an eager crowd of buyers.
Now, one would argue that this is part of development. After all, agriculture is seen as the starting point of economic activity, and in order to progress further, you need to build industry and residential units, and those need land. So, acquiring land for this purpose is necessary, and it would seem that the Government would be in the best position to get into the role of acquiring land and then handing this over to the people doing the building.
However, the recent past in India has been hit by a number of issues related to this very purpose, with land acquisition coming under dispute in a number of states, and the situation seems to scream out for a land acquisition act that promised to be equitable to all. The Congress has not been able to come up with such an Act because of its political issues with its allies, most notably Mamta Banerjee; and it would also seem that the Congress may be delaying such an Act so that it can apply political pressure in the prime state of Uttar Pradesh.
Read more…

The stand-off between the Congress and the DMK, DMK buckled down

The DMK is right now caught in some major drama. The whole issue around the 2G scam and the involvement of the DMK Minister A Raja (still defended by the DMK and by Karunanidhi) has brought a lot of unwanted attention to the DMK. The DMK has been angry that the Congress Government in the center has not controlled the CBI, and is worried about the attention that the CBI is now paying to the transactions by Kalaignar TV, and the impending questioning of Karunanidhi’s daughter, Kanimozhi. However, with all the media attention and the direct attention of the Supreme Court, the Congress cannot take any action that would seem to be impeding the progress of the probes being made by the CBI (along with the Enforcement Directorate) (further, after the setbacks over the CVC and case of black money, the Congress is hesitant about being further tarred by any corruption problems).
The DMK is being pushed further due to the rivalry between the family members of Karunanidhi, with Alagiri fighting with Stalin over who will be the heir, and both of them pushing against Kanimozhi because of the Raja connection. This succession battle and rivalry also has a bearing on the pressures within the party. Further, the DMK feels that the AIADMK is getting in a strong position, especially with the tie-ups that Jayalalitha has made. It in this position that the DMK is now weaker.
Read more…