Daily News Notes: 3rd March, 2012

· To ensure free and fair polling all over the state, the Election Commission is making use of the innovative Poll Monitoring System (PMS) in all the 40 Assembly Constituencies of Goa for the Assembly polls. This is the first such occasion in the electoral history of the country.
· Andhra Pradesh Assembly Speaker has disqualified 17 MLAs including 16 belonging to the Congress for voting against the government during a No Confidence motion in December last year.
· While addressing the Parliamentary Consultative Committee Meeting of the Ministry of Mines in New Delhi, Minister of State for Mines has underlined the need for quality exploration of raw materials to meet the urgent requirement of various industries. The Minister informed that the lignite deposits established by MECL in Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu have been developed for setting-up power plants in coal deficient regions of the country.
· The Bombay High Court questioned the Maharashtra government for the delay in implementation of the amended Human Organ Transplant Act to reduce wastage of corneas. Recent amendments to the Act state that a trained technician can remove cornea from bodies that have come for post-mortem after taking the consent of the relatives and there is no need for a medical practitioner. The amendment also made it mandatory for all hospitals to request the relatives of the deceased for eye donations.
· The Supreme Court has ‘encroached' on the executive domain by pronouncing the first come, first served policy for allocation of 2G spectrum flawed and by cancelling 122 licences, the Department of Telecommunications said in a presentation to the Joint Parliamentary Committee. The DoT maintained that policy formulation was the prerogative of the executive and not a judicial function. However, member of JPC said “When the executive fails in discharging its responsibilities, how can anyone argue that the judiciary cannot step in?” The JPC has been set up to probe telecom policies followed from 1998 to 2009, including the 2G scam
· The First Bench of the Madras High Court made the observation that the pleasure of dismissing or removing a State Minister has to be that of the Governor and not that of the High Court. The High Court, therefore, cannot issue a writ of quo warranto for removing a Minister.
· In Assam, Sualkuchi is poised to take a more vigorous role to uplift the rural economy of the state. Sualkuchi (Known as the Manchester of the East) which is a weaving village that produces some of the best silk (comprises 3 major types-golden era, white pat and warm eri silk) in the country provides employment to more than 25 thousand people. In a bid to expedite the development process, the Assam government has recently inaugurated a textile park in Sualkuchi.
· Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) has begun process to buy nearly 500 train coaches for the phase-III. It has floated global tenders to buy trains that would have several new features and will be faster and less noisy than the existing ones. A total of 81 six-coach trains will be assembled from 486 carts. Delhi Metro's Phase-III envisages bringing another 103 kms under the Metro map and is expected to be completed by 2016. The coaches will start arriving from the latter half of 2014 and will be put in service after commissioning.
· The Ministry of External Affairs and the Defence Ministry denied a top Pentagon general's statement that crack U.S. military troops were based in India besides Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and the Maldives to counter threats from organisations such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba. The Ministry of External Affairs said both countries occasionally conduct short duration special forces exercises in India and the U.S. while the Defence Ministry asserted that neither has the U.S. sought nor had India approved stationing of U.S. special forces in “any capacity'' in India. This question opens a debate that whether a component of Pentagon's special forces, who conduct operations of hazardous nature such as snatches, sabotage behind enemy lines or liquidation, were secretly stationed in the embassy or one of the consulates – as they do in neighboring Pakistan and Afghanistan – to track, kill or assist in killing militants.
· China rejected reports in India suggesting that the Zangmu dam (work on which began in 2010 and which is a run-of-the-river project) it is building upstream on the Brahmaputra river was causing its lower reaches to dry up, and reiterated its commitment to Indian officials that it had neither embarked on any diversion projects nor built any large dams in Tibet. It also rejected suggestions from officials in Arunachal Pradesh that the drying up of the Siang River, as it is known in the State, was the result of a Chinese diversion project. Zangmu dam was the only project that China had built on the Yarlung Tsangpo, as the Brahmaputra is known in Tibet.
· For the first time polling was held in Kerala to elect the next Russian President. Fifty Russian citizens, most of them tourists voted to elect their next president two days ahead of their fellow citizens in Russia. All of them were excited by the unique practice and tremendous media attention. Russia is one of the very few countries providing voting facilities for its citizens in other parts of the world. At the same time, 30 Russian scientists attached to Kudankulam nuclear project casted their vote. The ballots would reach Russia through diplomatic bags from Chennai.
· India and Iran have agreed to accept payment in rupee term through UCO Bank, a move that could unlock huge sums pending on both sides. The problem with Iran began after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), in December 2010, withdrew the Asian Clearing Union (ACU) mechanism under which payments were made to Iran. After the scrapping of the ACU mechanism, Iran, which makes up for over 12 per cent of India's oil needs, had continued to supply oil on credit despite the outstanding amount crossing $3 billion. India is also one of the biggest importer of crude oil from Iran after Saudi Arabia.
· Fiji's Prime Minister Commodore Bainimarama will announce the procedures for public consultations for the formulation of the constitution. The constitutional process is moving ahead on schedule. With the goal to make it clear to Fijians that everyone can and should participate in the writing of the new constitution for the nation, the Citizens Constitutional Forum held educational meetings in the last two months and received feedback from Fijians in all parts of the island nation, says the release.