Daily News Notes

· Both the Houses of Parliament were adjourned till tomorrow over the issue of FDI in retail sector, Telangana and Mullaperiyar dam. Government is likely to hold an all party meeting tomorrow to end the logjam in Parliament. Many key legislations like seed bill, Judicial Accountability bill are in the pipeline.
· The government has undertaken a long-term Action Plan to modernise and upgrade the artillery as projected by the Army. Modernization of artillery entailing replacement of equipment based on older technology is an on-going process.
· The National Ganga River Basin Authority is to ensure that by the year 2020, no untreated municipal sewage and industrial effluents flow into the Ganga. This work will be done under the mission, Clean Ganga (2600 cr project, assisted by World Bank). Besides the government has also prepared the Yamuna Action Plan with Japanese assistance. The Plan envisages recycling raw sewage by setting up treatment plans and creation of better sanitation facilities in Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Delhi.
· Government has constituted a Group of Ministers, GoM to examine Press Council of India, PCI’s report on paid news which will give its views to form a comprehensive policy and institutional mechanism to address this phenomenon. It also recommends amending the Press Council Act to make its recommendations binding and bringing electronic media under its purview.
· The Government is taking various measures to attract back home eminent Indian professionals working abroad. It have initiated programmes like Ramanujan Fellowship (given to 100 such citizens) and Innovation in Science Pursuit for Inspired Research (INSPIRE) for the same. Under the Ramalingaswamy Re-entry Fellowship programme, 97 Indian scientists working abroad have been selected and 70 of them have already relocated to Indian host institutions.
· The Lok Sabha today welcomed a Bulgarian Parliamentary Delegation, now on a visit to India. Earlier Bhutanese delegation had visited the same institution.
· In Kerala, mass agitation on the Mullapperiyar dam safety issue has further intensified. MP’s from all political parties from Kerala have also staged a demonstration in the Parliament complex and demanded immediate intervention of the Prime Minister to sort out the issue. Hunger strike by CPI MLA Bijimol entered the second day today. Geologists point out that a series of recent tremors and over flowing water have further weakened the dam built in 1895. Idukki District Collector has declared a high state of alert and steps are being taken to shift people from the banks of Periyar river in case of an emergency.
· Today PM meets President to discuss the ongoing Session of the Parliament. The Prime Minister briefed the President about his recent visits to attend multi-lateral Summits like G-20 in France, SAARC in Maldives and the India-ASEAN and East Asia Summit in Bali and also his bi-lateral visit to Singapore. They also discussed various other issues of national and international importance.
· In Egypt, amidst public protest and political uncertainty, voting is being held today for the first round of parliamentary elections.
· The Pakistan Army while expressing its disgust over NATO attacks has said that it does not accept NATO apology and that this action can lead to serious consequences as in past also such incidents have happened that killed 72 soldiers and injured more than 250 troops in three years.
· In Vietnam, floods in central and Central Highlands regions over the past 5 days killed at least 3 people.
· The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) summit (representing more than 190 countries) begins today in Durban South Africa to start the new round of talks in an effort to slash greenhouse gas emissions and is likely to seal the fate of the Kyoto Protocol - the only legal regime that calls for emission cut by developed countries which will expire in 2012. Deepening Euro zone crisis is also expected to cloud the talks as developed countries have failed to provide promised climate funding to poor countries to take measures to combat climate change. The bone of contention between developed and developing countries remains on climate financing, transfer of energy efficiency technology, the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol and legally binding emission cuts.
· In Bihar, a farmer from Nalanda district, Sumanta Kumar, has reaped a harvest of 224 quintals of paddy in a hectare by using different method of rice cultivation known as the System of Rice Intensification and set a world record. China was earlier the world record holder.
· In Madhya Pradesh, the state legislative assembly witnessed heated debate over the issue of inclusion of cases related to earlier BJP government and the proceeding for no-confidence motion. But the State Legislative Affairs Minister objected the debate by raising point of order as 90% of allegations in the no-trust motion belonged to earlier BJP government, thus there is no reason to discuss it now. In his ruling, Speaker of the house said that cases related to earlier government could not be discussed.
· The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has condoled the sudden demise of Brazilian filmmaker Oscar Maron Filho, who was in Goa to with his film 'Mario Filho": The Creator of Crowds' in the International Film Festival of India (IFFI). Filho was speaking at the open forum when he suffered a heart attack and died.