Category: ACORN India

ACORN India came into existence when in March 2005 the stage was set by the work ACORN International was doing in partnership with the FDI Watch campaign in India. ACORN India FDI Watch seeks to scrutinize and challenge Foreign Direct Investment in the retail sector in India. ACORN India seeks to prevent large multi-national companies like Wal-Mart from entering Indian markets unless they guarantee protection of communities they affect; ensure stability of the existing small businesses and ensure livelihoods of small traders; guarantee fair wages, just working conditions and a right to unionize to all their employees; and ensure that a significant portion of the supplies comes from the Indian markets. LEARN MORE>>>

  • Coalition Releases Charter of Demands of Communities Affected by The 2010 Commonwealth Games; Calls For Justice

    Tuesday, 7 December 2010

    PRESS NOTE

    New Delhi, December 7, 2010

    ‘The Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games’ organised a public meeting and media consultation with the communities affected by the Commonwealth Games (CWG). The coalition also released a charter of demands to Members of Parliament, Members of the Legislative Assembly, and the media.

    ‘The Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games’ consists of a number of organisations, civil society groups, and social movements that have been working on the human rights impacts of the CWG. Although the members work in diverse areas and have opposed the Games for different reasons, they unanimously condemn the large-scale human rights violations in the city, the financial irregularities inherent in the CWG process, and the continued lack of redressal for the grievances of the poor and marginalised citizens of Delhi.

    Members from affected communities spoke about a range of human rights violations that they have had to face due to the CWG. These include:
    * The forced eviction and displacement of approximately 250,000 people for the Games, including in the ‘beautification’, ‘cleaning’ and ‘security’ drives in Delhi.

    * The arrests, detention and forced removal of ‘beggars’ and homeless citizens from Delhi for the duration of the Games. The Bombay Prevention of Begging Act 1959 was used to arrest and detain ‘beggars’ as well as gainfully employed homeless citizens. Several people were threatened to leave Delhi and forcefully sent back to their homes.

    * The violation of the rights of construction workers, most of them migrants, who were denied adequate wages and safe working and living conditions. In many instances even children were made to work at the sites.

    * The eviction of domestic workers, drivers, plumbers, and other informal sector workers and labour groups.

    * The trafficking of women and young girls from other states for CWG visitors and participants.

    * The loss of livelihoods for over 300,000 street vendors (according to the National Association of Street Vendors of India – NASVI). Cart-pullers, vegetable sellers, waste-pickers, balloon sellers, cobblers, street-food vendors and others were prevented from working on the streets, and thus denied their right to work and livelihood. Many of them were forced into starvation since they had no money to buy food. Eateries and weekly markets were also forcibly shut down. (Estimation from various sources put the figure at a daily income loss of Rs.10,70,00,000 (10 crore and 70 lakh rupees) for the above-mentioned groups)

    * The diversion of Rs. 678.91 crore for Scheduled Castes in Delhi from the Special Component Plan to cover CWG-related costs. This was in violation of the 2006 Planning Commission Guidelines.


    The socio-economic middle class of Delhi has also been affected by the Commonwealth Games. Apart from the inconveniences and restrictions imposed on them during the Games, they will also have to pay for the huge economic deficit of the Games for many years.

    Dharam Halder from Bengali Camp highlighted the manner in which evictions had been carried out and stressed the fact that no compensation had been paid to them. “There is no one for us poor people. The government threw us out and the media has also abandoned us. We trust no one.” Sri Ram, who was displaced from Prabhu Market, Lodi Road, said, “Not only have we been robbed of our houses but attempts have been made to reduce our lives to nothingness. We are not allowed to sell vegetables and other wares on the road and face constant harassment from the police. How do we earn our living and feed our children?”

    Sakkoo Bai, a woman from the Motia Khan shelter who had been evicted from the Rachna Golchakkar night shelter spoke about the suffering they faced due to the CWG. They were forced to stop working during the Games and had to rely on civil society support to survive. Mansur Khan from Beghar Mazdoor Sangharsh Samiti highlighted the plight of homeless citizens, many of whom faced forceful expulsion from Delhi during the Games.

    The Charter released by the Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games makes several demands, including calling on the government to oblige with its legal commitments and to ensure justice for the affected communities.

    The concerned authorities need to urgently:
    * Ensure that the ongoing investigations by multiple agencies, including the Shunglu Committee, the Central Bureau of Investigation, the Enforcement

    * Directorate, the Central Vigilance Commission, and the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, include human rights violations in their ambit;

    * Provide just and adequate compensation for livelihoods and homes lost due to the Games;

    * Provide adequate rehabilitation, including housing and basic services, for all displaced families;

    * Improve living conditions in resettlement sites, according to international human rights standards;

    * Provide a moratorium on the proposed eviction of 44 listed JJ clusters;

    * Ensure payment of adequate wages and benefits to all construction workers;

    * Formulate a comprehensive post-Games legacy plan based on principles of social justice, equity and environmental sustainability;

    * Investigate all concerned public officials for the misappropriation of public funds and corruption charges;

    * Return funds diverted from the Special Component Plan in a manner best suited to the community, as also reiterated by Home Minister Mr. P. Chidambaram in the Rajya Sabha; and,

    * Ensure that guilty officials are prosecuted according to the law.

    The following organisations are members of ‘The Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games’ and support the communities in their demands:
    Indo-Global Social Service Society
    Jhuggi Jhopdi Ekta Manch
    Hazards Centre
    Housing and Land Rights Network
    National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights
    Praxis

    For more details, contact: Indu Prakash: 99113 62925, Dunu Roy: 9910687627 Dinesh: 8800731751, Mansur Khan: 92119 79454; Paul Divakar: 99100 46813; Shivani Chaudhry: 9818 205 234; Sowmyaa: 95606 59595

    ——————————————————————————————————————————————————-
    A CHARTER OF DEMANDS OF COMMUNITIES AFFECTED BY THE COMMONWEALTH GAMES

    The Coalition against Exclusions and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games1 (CWG), presents this charter of demands on behalf of communities affected by the CWG.

    India hosted the Commonwealth Games 2010 from 3rd to 14th October 2010 in New Delhi despite scathing criticism and embarrassing evidence of misappropriation of funds and human rights violations exposed by the media and researchers. What overshadows the ostensible successful accomplishment of hosting the mega sports event is arguably the issue of violation of citizenship and human rights and social justice that has been the direct consequence of the Commonwealth Games. In the name of security and in order to ‘beautify’ the city for the Games, thousands of citizens were denied their fundamental rights of freedom of movement, adequate housing, food, and of engaging in trade and occupations of their choice. Street vendors and rickshaw pullers were barred from carrying on their businesses, weekly markets were not permitted, roadside shops and jhuggis (slums/temporary shelters) were demolished, homeless citizens and beggars were arrested and forcefully removed from the city, and construction workers were denied wages and adequate living conditions and forcefully sent back home. The significant issue that emerges is that these rights were selectively denied to certain sections of society.

    Members of the Coalition against Exclusions and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games work closely with several of the above-mentioned groups and present below a charter of demands, which emerged from discussions with them.

    1. Immediate and Just Compensation to:
    a. Construction workers on all CWG sites;
    b. Rehabilitation and adequate compensation to slum dwellers who were evicted during the Commonwealth Games, and moratorium on eviction of the 44 listed JJ clusters;
    c. Daily wage labourers, homeless citizens, ‘beggars’, and other informal sector workers who were not permitted to carry out business in the run-up to as well as during the CWG.

    2. A clear legacy plan for the CWG, which explains how the well-being of the citizens will be ensured, how the infrastructure created for the Games will be equitably used, and how benefits will be distributed to disadvantaged and marginalised groups.

    3. Immediate return of Rs. 678.91 crore diverted from the Special Component Plan (Scheduled Caste Sub Plan) for the purpose of Commonwealth Games by the end of the financial year 2010-11.
    a. SCP fund should be kept aside before allocating to the line departments / ministries.
    b. Entire SCP fund should be spent on programmes directly benefiting individuals, families and hamlets. Programmes related to education and employment should be focused on individuals and families, and civic amenities related programmes should be focused on hamlets.

    4. All investigation agencies must include human rights violations in the ambit of their enquiry. The investigations should also probe all relevant senior government officials.

    5. The perpetrators of these crimes must be identified and suitable action must be taken against the guilty, in accordance with the law.

    1 The Coalition comprises representatives and partners of Housing and Land Rights Network, Indo Global Social Service Society, Jhuggi Jhopadi Ekta Manch, National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights, Hazards Centre and Praxis (as secretariat of Social Equity Watch)

    ======================

    To link to this article and get a PDF of the Charter of Demands, visit the South Asia Citizens Web at
    http://www.sacw.net/spip.php?page=imprimer&id_article=1732

  • Citizen”s initiative demands justice for urban poor

    From MSN news:

    New Delhi, Dec 7 (PTI) A coalition of civil society groups today demanded “justice” for victims of alleged large- scale human rights violations” of rickshaw pullers, street vendors and pavement dwellers during the Commonwealth Games.

    The demands include immediate compensation to construction workers who had worked at the Games venues and daily wage earners who were not allowed to do business during the time as well as rehabilitation of those evicted from their homes.

    The ”Coalition against Exclusion and Violations caused by the Commonwealth Games” by Social Equity Watch has released a community charter to counter “continued lack of redressal” of the grievances of the marginalised arising out of the preparations for the mega-event.

    “Corruption is one major aspect, but alongwith corruption accountability of the government to the welfare of the people which has been violated…,” Paul Divakar of National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) said on the charter”s purpose.

    The return of Rs 678.91 crore diverted from the Special Component Plan (Scheduled Caste Sub Plan) for CWG by the government by end of this year has also been demanded.

    A third demand is the probe of human rights violations in inquiries being conducted into the Games by investigating agencies.

    Narrating his experience during the its release, Bhuvan Das, a hawker who resided in Bengali camp, claimed families in the area were given only an hour”s notice before the demolition of the clusters began as part of preparations.

    Sri Ram, who was displaced from Prabhu Market near Lodhi Road, alleged “harassment” by the police and claimed he still has not got permission to start selling his wares as a street vendor there. “Nobody”s listening to us,” he claimed.

    The 19th Commonwealth Games were held in the national capital from October 3 to 14.

     

  • CVC asks ED to probe FEMA violations in CWG projects

    Press Trust Of India
    New Delhi, November 26, 2010

    ==============

    The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), probing alleged financial bungling in the Commonwealth Games-related projects, has referred certain cases to the Enforcement Directorate to check whether there was violation of foreign exchange laws. Official sources said that projects like construction of Commonwealth Games Village near Akshardham temple and flyovers, hiring and procurement of medical and fitness equipment and conduct of outdoor publicity campaign by the Organising Committee may come under the ED scanner.

    They said a decision to hand over cases to ED for a “logical conclusion” was taken recently during a meeting Central Vigilance Commissioner P J Thomas had with senior officials.

    Sources said the Chief Technical Examination (CTE) wing of the Commission, which has scrutinised all the documents related to bidding and grant of tender worth crore of rupees to various firms, has found substantive evidence that these private companies might have routed money through illegal means and bypassing laws.

    They said the Chief Vigilance Officers (CVOs) of government agencies like Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC), Public Works Department (PWD) and Delhi Development Authority (DDA) have been specifically directed to pursue all matters related to violation of Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) with the ED.

    A CVC team has seized documents from the Games OC office here to avoid any tampering of evidence. “There has been some cases where the Commission has noticed alleged violations of forex laws.

    We will be giving those cases to ED for interrogation and report,”a CVC official said requesting anonymity. Sources in the anti-corruption watchdog said that the officials working in its “special cell” – exclusively made to deal with cases of Games corruption – will meet ED officials early next month in this regard.

  • SAD to launch mass campaign against scams involving UPA

    Press Trust Of India / New Delhi/ Chandigarh November 19, 2010, 0:42 IST
    ===========================
    The ruling Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) in Punjab today said it will launch a ‘mass awareness campaign’ to mobilise people against what the party termed as unprecedented scams involving the bigwigs of the Congress-led UPA at the Centre.

    A resolution to this effect was passed at the party’s Core Committee meeting here, a SAD spokesman said here today.

    Describing the 2-G spectrum scam allegedly involving the UPA big shots as “mother of all scams” the committee said its magnitude along with that of Commonwealth Games and Adarsh Housing Society scandals had shocked the world and lowered the country’s image abroad.

    The movement would also aim to educate masses on the conspiracy of the rich corporate world to defame the pro-poor and social welfare policies of the Punjab government in order to perpetuate their exploitation of the poor, the spokesman said.

    The Core Committee lashed out at the opponents of pro-poor policies of the Punjab government, especially those aimed at providing help and relief to the deprived sections of society through the desperately needed subsidies.

    “Those opposing the subsidies are backed by the rich tycoons of the corporate world who wanted to exploit the poor masses and swell their coffers through unethical means. The party is proud of the SAD-BJP government’s clear and firm stance on subsidies,” said the resolution.

    A resolution passed at two-and-half-hour meeting of the Core Committee declared that the party would “fully expose the Centre resorting to hypocritical means to confuse the people on the issue of debt-waiver to Punjab.”

    “The Centre is still refusing to categorically state whether an offer to waive Rs 35000 crore out of the total debt was ever made to Punjab but was instead resorting diversionary replies,” the resolution said.

    The committee fully endorsed the continuance of subsidies being given by the Punjab government to farmers, pensioners, dalits and other poor and deprived segments of society in rural and urban areas.

  • BJP to intensify campaign for parliamentary probe

    BS Reporter / New Delhi November 18, 2010, 0:50 IST
    ==========================================
    The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will continue with its demand for a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) on the corruption in the telecom and other scams. It has now demanded Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to clear his stand on the issue.

    Senior members of the party confirmed that they had not heard anything from the government on their demand for setting up JPC on corruption surrounding 2G spectrum allocation, Adarsh society scandal and Commonwealth Games scam.

    BJP alleged that PM Manmohan Singh was guilty of a “conspiracy of silence” and he should at least make his stand clear on the floor of the house. The BJP also questioned the role of Congress Party and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, while attacking the government on issues of corruptions.

    “We were expecting a reply from the government on our demand but we have not received any till now,” said a senior BJP leader.

    Taking the attack on the government a little further, BJP said an investigation by parliamentarians would not only help in eradicating corruption but also reform the system.

    “JPC is needed to eradicate corruption, better administration and also to reform the system. The government is so far stonewalling any investigation by parliamentarians on the issue. We want to know why telecom minister A Raja resigned. There are more people involved in the 2G spectrum allocation scam and not just Raja. A JPC probe is also needed for better understanding of legislatures,” said Nirmala Sitharaman, BJP spokesperson.

    “The Congress Party and UPA leader Sonia Gandhi also have a lot to explain,” Sitharaman added.

    Sitharaman also said it was not only the Opposition parties who were asking for a JPC on the issue of corruption surrounding 2G spectrum, Adarsh Society and corruption in the Commonwealth Games but for the first time the Supreme Court has also asked PM to clear his stand.

    “If we do not demand for a JPC on these issues, then we would not be fulfilling our responsibility as an opposition party. The government has so far not taken us into confidence and hasn’t discussed any issues with the opposition parties,” added Sitharaman.

  • BCGEU Supports ACORN India

    From the BCGEU’s latest newsletter BCGEU Supports ACORN India

  • Politico: ACORN razzes President Obama in New Delhi

    The original version of this article is available from: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1110/44840.html

    Had President Barack Obama stopped to survey the crowd of Indian leftists protesting in the heart of New Delhi on Monday, he might have seen a familiar name on some placards: ACORN.

    The group, a pioneering organizing force on the left and leading boogeyman on the right, remains alive in the American political imagination, with Republicans darkly warning last week of its role in various local elections. In reality, ACORN entered Chapter 7 liquidation last week, leaving behind a handful of big-city chapters under new names but no national political organization.

    So what’s it doing in India, where it joined a protest against proposed liberalization of the retail industry, which could bring chains such as Wal-Mart to the country at the expense of its millions of small vendors?

    As befits an organization torn apart in the end by internal chaos, ACORN International has grown out of a schism between ACORN founder Wade Rathke and a group of leaders who ousted him in 2008 amid criticism of his governance. Even before his ouster, Rathke had quietly shifted his focus to setting up groups along the ACORN model in nine countries, largely focused on organizing to demand government help in giant slums in the developing world.

     


    “We run a much more self-sufficient organization — much closer to the ground and much more indigenous” than the U.S. Acorn, Rathke said Monday of the new group, which he said has between 50,000 and 60,000 members. “That’s one of the lessons I’ve learned since the demise of ACORN.”

     

    Rathke created ACORN — short for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — in 1970 as a membership organization of poor people who paid modest dues to a professional staff to help press governments and corporations for tangible concessions. As the group grew, however, it became increasingly dependent on liberal donors and foundations and on government work — most of which vanished after the conservative videographer James O’Keefe produced videos of employees of ACORN’s housing unit appearing to offer him tax advice in setting up a prostitution business. The group was never charged, but the damage to its fundraising was devastating.

     

    And Rathke said he’s determined not to build an organization that vulnerable again.

    “You can imagine what it’s like to run a membership organization in India on 15 rupees a month,” he said.

    He’s proudest, he said, of the work the group has done in San Juan de Lurigancho, a megaslum in Lima, Peru.

    “It’s just amazing — there’s potable water there now, roads are being paved, there’s stairways being built, two parks are built and one school. We feel great about that,” he said. “But once again these are extremely poor places — stairs and roads going to shacks.”

    In India, the group has set up shop in three cities and has been a member of a coalition called FDI Watch, which favors strict regulation on foreign direct investment.

    ACORN “definitely has a future” in India, said Dhamendra Kumar, who heads up ACORN’s India office. “The rate of growth is really amazing.”

    Obama, who as a lawyer represented ACORN in a 1993 voting rights case, had Republican operatives dressed as squirrels following him on the campaign trail in 2008. But now he’s firmly on the other side of the barricades from the radical group, trying to open Indian markets to American corporations.

    “He’s in sales and promotion right now,” Rathke said dismissively of Obama’s focus on American jobs while in India. “I just wish the president had been a little more on message about what’s happening in India and a little less a corporate huckster. I really think the guy has a lot to give, and it would have been a message well-received if he’s going to speak to equity and injustice around the world.”

    Rathke’s old internal critics weren’t thrilled to see ACORN resurface. Rathke had agreed to stop using the group’s name domestically when he left — he called it “Community Organizations International” for domestic fundraising purposes — but had irritated his old colleague by using the brand abroad. He’s now free to use it in the U.S. again as well.

    “We had an agreement about him not using it here in the states, and the next thing we know the bastard goes and now he’s international,” said Bertha Lewis, ACORN’s final president. “He just stretches stuff.”

    “I’m quite proud of the name and history of ACORN and ACORN International, so we have never considered changing the name in any country where we are working,” Rathke said.

    And those who have followed Rathke’s career expect ACORN International to make its mark.

    “He is the most important organizing strategist and tactician, since the father of community organizing, Saul Alinsky,” said John Atlas, author of a recent history of ACORN, Seeds of Change. “He has succeeded in building effective groups in India and Peru. I believe he will succeed in building others, and they will get stronger over time.”

  • Christian Science Monitor: How ACORN could intrude on President Obama’s India visit

    The original version of this article is available from: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2010/1107/How-ACORN-could-intrude-on-President-Obama-s-India-visit

    On his trip to India’s commercial capital, Mumbai (Bombay), President Obama addressed entrepreneurs, university students, and Asia’s richest man, who just built himself a 27-story house.

    But he stayed far away from Dharavi, one of Asia’s largest slums, which was made famous worldwide by the hit 2008 movie “Slumdog Millionaire.”

    Inside the slum lies an impolitic connection from Obama’s past that – like Shakespeare’s Falstaff – could have helped balance the president’s view into the lives of citizens here.

    The ACORN Foundation India works to organize the slum’s trash collectors and sorters known as “ragpickers.” The group was set up separately by the founder of the ACORN community organization that Obama once worked with in America. Opponents assailed Obama’s ties to ACORN after some of its workers falsified voter registrations during the 2008 presidential contest.

    In India, the model does not involve widespread voter registration of the poor – partly because groups like the ragpickers are disenfranchised in the world’s largest democracy. Many of them are migrants or homeless who lack the proof of residence papers needed to vote, says Vinod Shetty, the Mumbai head of the ACORN India Foundation.

    “At every stage they are asked for proof of identity, proof of residence. So if you don’t have [that] you are treated as a criminal in the city. So then they have to bribe someone to get something all the time,” says Mr. Shetty. “They are in fact lining the pockets of all these authorities, who have a vested interest in keeping them either informal or without papers.”

    ID cards for ragpickers

    ACORN India issues the ragpickers identification cards that help cut down harassment by police and neighborhood watch groups.

    But since the group cannot be turned easily into a vote bank or organized against a single employer – most are self-employed – they have been ignored by politicians and labor unions.

    ACORN India is working with the ragpickers to form a cooperative that helps the adults bargain collectively for better prices and social standing, while providing their kids educational scholarships and enrichment.

    “In a city like [Mumbai] you need to be from a powerful section of the poor to grab land or even squat. If you are not protected by a political party, or by a community, or by any kind of gangsters or slumlord, you may not even get that space,” says Shetty.

    Life in the slum

    Instead, some of the 150,000 to 200,000 ragpickers in Mumbai live on top of the garbage they sort on the fringes of Dharavi.

    One such colony lives under a highway overpass around a trash heap hemmed in by two massive water pipes. The pipes have become sidewalks connecting hovels where ragpickers skillfully squeeze profit from the 10,000 tons of trash discarded daily in the metropolis.

    Some are cutting large cardboard boxes into smaller panels that are cut and pressed together to form new, smaller boxes with their old logos cleverly flipped inside. Even the old staples are recycled.

    Others are sorting for specific detritus like car headlamps or bicycle handlebar grips; such items take on value in bulk.

    A man named Syed Sheikh sits under a canopy sorting through a sack of plastic junk he bought for 50 cents. He pulls an item out, taps it against a rock, then tosses it into one of the many bags and piles around him.

    “I tap the rock to understand: Different plastic makes different sounds,” he says.

    Plastic that’s sorted by color and by grade sells for $3.50 to $23 per sack. Even with his fast pace, the work nets less than 67 cents an hour for him. Still, after three hours of work a day he will earn more than 75 percent of Indians do, according to World Bank data from 2005.

    While he lives in a very expensive city and Indian wages have grown in the past five years, his economic reality remains closer to the majority of Indians than the elite Obama met.

    ‘Green-collar’ workforce?

    Shetty says roughly 40 percent of all Mumbai’s waste gets recycled, meaning ragpickers are part of the “green-collar” workforce that politicians and industrialists tout as a “win-win” between environmental and business concerns. ACORN India is resisting efforts to commercialize the sector unless the ragpickers are the ones chosen for the formalized jobs.

    Standing in the foot-deep sea of worthless tiny plastic pieces outside Mr. Sheikh’s tent, one can see the tall buildings of Mumbai’s most expensive offices, including Indian Oil, Citibank, and Reliance Industries, the company owned by Asia’s richest man.

    The distance, in many ways, is far greater than the gap between the Chicago streets of Obama’s early career and the halls of power in Washington.

    “I think President Obama is a long way away from community organizing now,” says Wade Rathke, the founder of ACORN. While he says Obama carries lessons from his community work, “he’s playing a different game.”

    Indeed, Obama has used his trip to bring together the heads of multinational corporations to argue for free trade as a means of job creation and economic growth in both countries.

    ACORN International’s focus on world’s mega-slums

    Mr. Rathke, who left the US ACORN group in 2008, focuses now on a separate organization he founded named ACORN International. The group has members in nine countries, including India, and focuses on the billion or so people who live in mega-slums.

    Activists tied to ACORN International will protest outside Obama’s speech to Parliament Monday to pressure Indian lawmakers not to allow foreign companies like Wal-Mart into retail.

    “We’re trying to organize a vast base in order to push on all political parties,” Rathke says. “The vision is that people should have the power and they should be able to push governments and corporations to do the right things.”

  • Anti-Corruption Activists Call Shunglu Committee a Farce

    From the Times of India:

    Activists seek setting up of SIT on Games

    TNN, Oct 30, 2010, 04.44am IST

    NEW DELHI: Civil society activists under the banner of ” India against corruption” accused the Prime Minister of “misleading” the nation by setting up the Shunglu Committee to probe corruption charges in the recently concluded Commonwealth Games. Activists, led by Magsaysay award winner Arvind Kejriwal and former IPS officer Kiran Bedi, demanded formation of a Special Investigation Team (SIT), and called the Shunglu committee a farce.

    Claiming that the committee did not have powers to either summon or investigate corruption, Kejriwal said there was sufficient evidence to lodge an FIR.

    “When agencies like the Central Vigilance Commission ( CVC) and the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) find it difficult to get their orders implemented, how would the Shunglu Committee get its orders implemented?” he asked.

    The activists urged concerned citizens to join them in filing an FIR at the Parliament Street police station on November 12 against corruption in the Commonwealth Games. Other activists, who are supporting this campaign, include Prashant Bhushan, Swami Ramdev, Madhu Trehan and S C Agrawal.

    The Shunglu Committee was appointed by the PM to look into the allegations of corruption in the Commonwealth Games, which was held between October 3 and 14. It has been asked to submit its report within three months.

    # # #

    Copyright © 2010 Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd. All rights reserved.

  • No Money for Mosquito Spraying after CWG

    Funds go up in smoke, MCD gets Rs 35 crore for fogging

    From the Times of India –TNN, Oct 26, 2010, 12.53am IST

    NEW DELHI: If dengue and malaria have come back with a vengeance, you can blame the Commonwealth Games for it. Having ensured a relatively dengue-free Games — there was only one case from the Games Village — MCD, it seems now wants Delhiites to pay the price for it.

    According to health minister Kiran Walia, the civic agency has told the government that after the intensive fogging in and around the Games Village before and during the Commonwealth Games, it has no resources left to do fogging for the rest of the year. There has been no fogging since the end of the Games. The situation has come to such a pass that in an emergency meeting on Monday, the state government had to sanction an additional Rs 35 crore for fogging purposes to the civic agency.

    MCD originally had a budget of Rs 11 crore for fogging and later the Delhi government gave it an extra grant of Rs 22 crore for the purpose of intensifying the exercise around the Village and Games venues. This was in addition to the Rs 5 crore the MCD had from last year that was given to it for the Games. “I personally supervised fogging then so as to prevent any national embarrassment but now they have said that they have run out of kerosene, etc, and the money. That is a cause for great concern and I am trying to see if there can be some extra money sanctioned for this purpose,” health minister Kiran Walia said.

    MCD had been doing fogging twice a day in the Games Village, she added. “We had covered a radius of 1-1.5km around the Village too so that there was no scope for breeding at all,” said the minister. Areas like Pandavnagar and Shakkarpur had seen the kind of presence of MCD fogging staff as it had never ever seen.

    MCD sources say the “on-demand” fogging during the Games was a drain on resources but had been done because it was a “unique situation”. “But it is not possible to sustain that kind of tempo for that long a time without impacting our overall means. That is exactly what has happened now,” said a MCD official.

    Finance minister A K Walia said, “I was told that the medicine that they are using now for fogging is three times more expensive than the earlier one. Moreover, the Games have been a drain, so we have sanctioned additional money and we have asked them to resume fogging as soon as possible.”