Kartik Lokhande's blog

* Government to table Action Taken Report on Kelkar Committee report during budget session of State Legislature * Guardian Ministers of various districts to be announced in a couple of days * 11 important Bills cleared during winter session By Kartik Lokhande  Returning the Opposition fire, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said that his Government was ‘alert, positive, and sensitive’ but the Opposition parties were ‘divided, lacking in policy or vision, and scatterbrain’ during the winter session of State Legislature. Further, he said, the Government would table Action Taken Report on Kelkar Committee report during budget session of the State Legislature. Addressing a press conference after prorogation of the winter session of State Legislature on Wednesday evening, Fadnavis said that his Government was willing to discuss Kelkar Committee report. “The previous Government led by the parties that are in Opposition now, did not table Kelkar Committee report for three sess...

NEWS ANALYSIS By Kartik Lokhande  Thursday, the first day of auspicious festivities of Navratri, proved to be unauspicious as far as two major political alliances in Maharashtra were concerned. While Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Shiv Sena bid farewell to each other after a long association for 25 years, the present-day ruling allies Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) also said ‘au revoir’ to each other after 15 years. As per the statements made by leaders of national parties BJP and Congress, the alliances had to be broken mainly because of adamance of regional parties Shiv Sena and NCP respectively over seat-sharing formula. However, there appears to be a pattern in the breaking of long-term alliances. The snapping of ties is aimed more at drubbing the regional parties Shiv Sena and NCP, by national parties BJP and Congress. There are a variety of reasons behind this. Of course, these reasons are not stated directly. As far as BJP-Sena alliance is ...

  * State Government to effect amendment to the MMC Act to pave way for the change By Kartik Lokhande  Though the trading community was hopeful about scrapping of Local Body Tax (LBT), Maharashtra Government has not given them respite. Instead of scrapping LBT or replacing it with some other option, the Government has decided to relieve the municipal corporation of the responsibility of collecting LBT. As per the Government’s decision, now the employees of Sales Tax Department will collect LBT instead of municipal corporation employees. The announcement in this regard was made in Mumbai on Saturday by Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, while replying to a call attention motion in Legislative Council. Chief Minister also assured to make amendment to Maharashtra Municipal Corporation (MMC) Act, if required. Giving a message that the State Government was not in a mood to scrap LBT, Chief Minister said that the revenue of 25 municipal corporations where LBT was ...

By Kartik Lokhande  At the inaugural ceremony of the country’s biggest-ever agricultural exposition ‘Krishi Vasant’, Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar predicted a record production of foodgrains this year. “The country is likely to achieve a record 263.3 million tonnes of foodgrain production. India is surely marching towards becoming a major foodgrain exporter,” he said. Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar (left) interacting with President of India Pranab Mukherjee (right) as Maharashtra Governor K Sankaranarayanan looks on, at inaugural session of 'Krishi Vasant' expo at Nagpur. Pawar, whose ministry is co-organiser of the five-day mega expo, said that foodgrain production in the country was 258 million tonnes the last year. Thanks to the efforts of farmers and scientists, he said, the production is likely to register an increase by 5.3 million tonnes. His prediction about record production of foodgrains holds significance, especially against t...

Industry, agriculture must join hands: President * President of India Pranab Mukherjee inaugurates the country’s biggest-ever agriculture fair-cum-exposition ‘Krishi Vasant’ * The five-day exposition will continue till February 13 By Kartik Lokhande NAGPUR, Feb 9: President of India Pranab Mukherjee, on Sunday, called for industry and agriculture working hand-in-hand to achieve the desired growth rate of economy. He also advocated investment in research, food processing, and other sectors related to agriculture to provide a boost to economy. Mukherjee was addressing a gathering of farmers from various parts of the country, after inaugurating ‘Krishi Vasant’ agriculture fair-cum-exhibition at CICR campus here on Sunday. Union Ministry of Agriculture and Government of Maharashtra have organised the five-day exposition, in strategic partnership with Confederation of Indian Industry (CII). Referring to Food Security Act, Mukherjee said that sceptics were questioning how was it possib...

NaMo, RaGa prelude to 2014 battle for ballot * Chiefs of major parties including Sonia Gandhi (Congress), Rajnath Singh (BJP), Sharad Pawar (NCP) and Uddhav Thackeray (Shiv Sena) made it a point to visit Nagpur charging up political atmosphere ahead of elections scheduled in 2014 * BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, and Congress’ likely Prime Ministerial candidate Rahul Gandhi also made sure that their visit generated positive whiff of air for respective parties By Kartik Lokhande As the nation gears up for Lok Sabha election and Maharashtra for Legislative Assembly polls scheduled in 2014, Nagpur is attracting a lot of attention from all major parties that would matter in these ‘battles for ballot’. The year 2013 saw top politicians from these parties making it a point to visit Nagpur, the focal point of Vidarbha’s politics. In the process, the Orange City also saw the prelude to 2014 polls in visits of BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi...

15-09-13 Nagpur Division requires Rs 1565 cr to repair damage to infrastructure * This damage to infrastructure is other than the damage caused to agriculture and personal properties Staff Reporter Everyone has agreed that floods and high-intensity rainfall between June and August have caused widespread damage to agriculture and resulted in loss of life and property. However, there is one more major aspect -- damage to infrastructure. As per the administration’s latest report, which was presented before Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar as well as the Central team that visited Vidarbha region recently, the damage to infrastructure in Nagpur Division has been assessed to be worth Rs 1,564.8775 crore. In almost every city and village in six districts of Nagpur Division, roads are in poor shape. There are places where bridges and culverts have been washed away. Many buildings of schools/colleges and healthcare centres, power transmission and distribution lines, i...

Political activities in Vid hot up, Pawar to tour region from 14th Staff Reporter Vidarbha region appears to have assumed centre-stage of political activities these days. After the Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan addressing public meetings aimed at kick-starting their campaign, it is now the turn of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar to visit the region. Though Pawar is visiting rain-hit parts of Vidarbha region in the capacity of Union Agriculture Minister, political observers say that he will also take stock of the party position during the tour. Interestingly, this will be second visit of Pawar to the region that has got five MLAs of his party. The region has two ministers of NCP namely Food and Civil Supplies Minister Anil Deshmukh and Food and Drugs Administration Minister Manoharrao Naik. More interesting is the fact that Sharad Pawar’s visit to the region comes ahead of Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandh...