Radical Sikhs Score A Major Point, Sukhbir Cancels Canada Visit

[Jonny101]

The worst thing about the Badals is how they have made the once great Sikh party into a personal family property. Before the Badals, leadership of Akali Dal was always based on seniority. After the leader steps down or dies, then next senior leader would take over. But now they have done what the Gandhi family does where only the children of the leader are allowed to succeed him. Even after the current MLAs and MPs die, they will be succeeded by their good for nothing children or daughter in laws. With such a system in place it is Punjab which will suffer. Congress is no different from Akali Dal because they are doing the same thing. Today the Hara.mzada grandson of Beanta is an MP. He has no qualification of his own but since he is the grandson of the former CM he got the party ticket. Whether it is Akali Dal or Congress but with such retards in position of power, Punjab which was formerly the number 1 state in all of India is now lagging behind other states.

[lsingh]

No need for foreign visits if they cleaned up corruption from all Indias politicians.

India's 'black money': 'Hoodwinking' the people?

Soutik Biswas | 03:19 UK time, Friday, 28 January 2011

One analyst calls "black money" or illicit money India's curse. He's not off the mark - I have been hearing of and reading about this scourge ever since I was in junior school. Several decades later, the problem has only worsened. The government reckons there are no reliable estimates of "black money" inside and outside the country - a "study" by the main opposition BJP in 2009 put it at anything between $500bn to $1.4 trillion. A recent conservative estimate by the US-based group Global Financial Integrity Index pegs illicit capital flows between 1948, a year after Independence, and 2008, at $462bn - an amount that is twice India's external debt. India's underground economy today is estimated to account for half of the country's GDP.

Thanks to opposition and public ire over a series of corruption scandals, "black money" is back in the spotlight. The Supreme Court has been chiding the beleaguered government for not doing enough to unearth illicit money. "Is there no basis to figure out black money?" the court wondered on Thursday. "What is the source of black money, which has been stashed away in foreign banks? Is it from arms dealing, drug peddling or smuggling?"

Strong words indeed. But they may not be enough to uncover India's biggest and longest-running scandal. This week, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee unveiled what critics said was a laundry list of tedious platitudes and obscure, non time-bound plans to check the "menace of black money". This includes joining a "global crusade" against it, creating appropriate legislation and institutions to deal with such funds and imparting skills to officers tasked with detecting such funds. In effect, what the government is saying is that after 63 years of independence, India has no institutions or trained people available to curb a brazen and thriving underground economy which rewards tax evaders, humiliates tax payers and widens inequity.

There is enough evidence to show that there is little political or administrative will to curb "black money". India has double taxation treaties with 79 countries. But 74 of these treaties need to be tweaked significantly to include exchange of banking information between the countries. (Letters have been issued to 65 of these countries to initiate negotiation, says the minister.) India has apparently chosen 22 countries and tax havens for negotiating and signing exchanging tax information. Last year, a law to prevent money laundering was given more teeth - but laws are often flouted with impunity in the world's largest democracy. The government says it plans to hone direct tax laws further to begin taxing deposits in foreign banks and interests in foreign trusts.

It also talks about a new amnesty scheme for "black money", which is really a slap in the face of the honest tax payer. Since Independence, the government has offered the "voluntary disclosure scheme" six times, most recently in 1997. Less than $1bn was declared, which most experts believe was a fraction of the black money in the market at that time. India's autonomous federal auditors once remarked that the disclosure schemes encourage people to become "habitual tax offenders", knowing full well that they can hoard money without paying income taxes.

Independent economists believe that despite the government's recent noises, "black money" will continue to blight India and its economy. For one, it is a systemic problem. Those who don't pay taxes or stash away illicit money overseas comprise the political and professional creme de la creme - politicians, bureaucrats, businessmen, doctors, lawyers, chartered accountants, judges. That the government is not keen upon cracking down on illicit capital flows was evident, analysts say, when, in 2008, it refused to accept a compact disc from Germany containing names of account holders in a Liechtenstein bank. Last year, under opposition pressure, the government accepted the CD, but refused to disclose the 26 names of Indian account holders in it. Many believe that a year is enough for the account holders to move their money out of the bank. "Unless there is political will to dig out black money, nothing will happen," says Arun Kumar of Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University, who has investigated India's underground economy in detail. And the humiliation of the honest citizen will continue.

[VanHelsingh]

The worst thing about the Badals is how they have made the once great Sikh party into a personal family property. Before the Badals, leadership of Akali Dal was always based on seniority. After the leader steps down or dies, then next senior leader would take over. But now they have done what the Gandhi family does where only the children of the leader are allowed to succeed him. Even after the current MLAs and MPs die, they will be succeeded by their good for nothing children or daughter in laws. With such a system in place it is Punjab which will suffer. Congress is no different from Akali Dal because they are doing the same thing. Today the Hara.mzada grandson of Beanta is an MP. He has no qualification of his own but since he is the grandson of the former CM he got the party ticket. Whether it is Akali Dal or Congress but with such retards in position of power, Punjab which was formerly the number 1 state in all of India is now lagging behind other states.

Exactly, and as long as that kind of dynastic nepotism continues, nothing will ever change in Panjab.

[PSingh13]

What a stupid article. We're radical for preventing someone corrupted coming to our beautiful country and causing drama? We're radical for asking for justice for our families who have suffer under Hindustani government and Punjab police?

This " Jagtar Singh" must work for Indian government to write such articles. I can't believe a Sikh writes such articles to hurt his own community to please his Indian masters. What a Uncle Tom!

[Singh559]

The repercussions to this is only disunity. What do you think Sukhbir is going to do when he goes back to Punjab? Get revenge in different ways.

Jagtar puppet is probably just SAD(B), not an Indian gov sympathizer.

[lsingh]

The West are pulling money out of India, fed up with Govt corruption and mismanagement. Indian politicians are under the scanner.

India in uproar over rupee's fall

By Rama Lakshmi,August 20, 2013

The Indian rupee is in a free fall, and the nation is aflutter.

Almost every day, Indians are waking up to alarming headlines about their currency hitting a “historic low” or a “lifetime low.” Last week, on what was dubbed “Black Friday,” the currency sank to a record level, and Indian media carried pictures of workers in Mumbai’s financial district clutching their heads in dismay.

With the country’s stock market tumbling, the rupee fell further Tuesday. It is down about 15 percent against the U.S. dollar since May — from more than 53 rupees to the dollar to more than 63.

The currency has become a powerful metaphor for India’s rapidly sliding economy. The rupee has triggered countless jokes and political mudslinging, and, like everything in India, it

has generated astrological speculation, too.

Some superstitious Indians have blamed the slump on the new symbol for the rupee, unveiled last year. Experts on vastu shastra, an ancient Indian design practice similar to feng shui, say that the symbol debuted on a day inauspicious for the stars and that the horizontal line across the symbol appears to “slit the throat” of the currency.

Some economists, meanwhile, blame the rupee’s recent misfortune on plans by the U.S. Federal Reserve to begin scaling back its massive effort to stimulate the U.S. economy, which has tended to keep the dollar weak compared with other currencies.

And some blame the Indian government’s mismanagement of the economy.

India is grappling with a huge budget deficit, and the country has foreign exchange reserves to pay for only seven months of imports. Economic growth slowed to a dismal 5 percent last year, the lowest in a decade. Prices are spiraling. Foreign investors are no longer lining up; some are even packing up.

To stem the decline in the rupee, the government raised short-term interest rates, capped overseas investment by Indian companies and announced a weekly auction of government bonds, worth about $3.6 billion.

But the government, which is nearing the end of its term, appears to have woken up only after about two years of what critics have called “policy paralysis.” Even the appointment of a high-profile economist from the University of Chicago, Raghuram Rajan, as the chief of the Reserve Bank of India this month did not help calm the rupee.

Powerless so far to rein in the wayward rupee, the government even pleaded with gold-obsessed Indians to stop buying the metal, because it drains foreign exchange reserves.

“If I have one wish which the people of India can fulfill, it is ‘Don’t buy gold,’ ” Finance Minister P. Chidambaram told reporters in June. “Every ounce of gold is imported. You pay in rupees. We have to provide dollars.”

Five years ago, the rupee’s value was rising as never before, propelled by a soaring economy. What was described in the media here as the “roaring rupee” became a symbol of a nation’s proud march toward its economic ambition of becoming a global powerhouse.

The rupee’s fall might be harming the country’s collective psyche, but the greatest impact has been felt at the street level, with the country’s poor and middle class struggling with the inflation in food and fuel prices as imports become more expensive.

Shankkar Aiyar, an economic commentator, said the government’s pursuit of policies that are politically popular but fiscally irresponsible has “wrecked the script of the India story and crippled the potential of what was once touted at Davos [the World Economic Forum] as the ‘fastest-growing free market democracy.’ ”

In the run-up to national elections, scheduled for next year, the rupee has also become a campaign issue. “When India got independence, the rupee was at par with the dollar, one for one,” opposition politician Narendra Modi said at a public meeting last week, launching an attack on the government. “Sixty-seven years down the line, where is the rupee now? . . . Today, India’s finance minister’s age is equal to one dollar.”

Rajdeep Sardesai, the host of a prime-time news debate on CNN-IBN, was equally gloomy Friday. “It is increasingly apparent that the falling rupee now mirrors the state of our republic, graying before its time,” he said.

[Ranjeet01]

It is well known in Punjab that Sukhbir Badal wants to be known as the World's Richest Sikh.., he is only looking out for his own interest.

[lsingh]

Shiromani Akali Dal, Congress at receiving end of Sikhs abroad

IP Singh, TNN Aug 24, 2013, 12.23PM IST

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-08-24/india/41443679_1_punjab-cm-indian-overseas-congress-kamal-nath

Sukhbir Singh Badal|

Shiromani Akali Dal|

Punjab Police|

Kamal Nath|

Indian National Congress|

Diaspora

JALANDHAR: While Congress and ShiromaniAkaliDal (SAD) have differed sharply over the human rights violations during the dark days of terrorism in Punjab, both parties are being targeted by the Sikh organisations in North America.

The human rights groups are blaming both parties for failing to protect many Sikh citizens of US and Canada, who were either killed or subjected to inhuman torture by Punjab police and other security forces. Leaders of both parties have faced embarrassment with rights bodies trying to put them in dock over serious violations of human rights and for protecting perpetrators of serious human rights violation.

If Congress has faced heat due to November 1984 anti-Sikh riots, SAD leaders and Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh badal and his deputy CM son Sukhbir Singh Badal have faced piquant situation for protecting and promoting police officers, who were facing serious cases of human rights violations in Punjab including extra-judicial killings. This is happening even as SAD claims to be championing the cause of Sikhs.

Just two days ago, Sukhbir had to cancel his proposed visit to Canada after Sikhs for Justice (SFJ) and Canadian Sikh Coalition (CSC) threatened to file a criminal case against him under the Canadian law for torture of Canadian citizen Sikhs by Punjab police officers. Sukhbir cancelled his visit after weighing the legal risks.

Earlier, a case was filed against Union minister Kamal Nath in 2010 in a US Federal Court by SFJ and there were strong protests against him by people in Canada and US for his alleged involvement in November 1984 riots. However, Kamal Nath got some reprieve after the judge held that there was not effective service of summons - issued by the US court - on him. Another criminal complaint, filed in December 2012, is pending against Kamal Nath in Switzerland.

A case was also filed in a US court against the Indian National Congress in March 2011 and summons has been served in India through UN Convention on Hague.

"Judge has already held that summons has been served and SFJ has been given time till September 2013 to amend complaint and include Indian Overseas Congress and show its relationship with Congress party in India," said SFJ legal advisor Gurpatwant Singh Pannun.

A case was also filed against Punjab CM in August 2012 when he was visiting Wisconsin in US for commanding and protecting the police force responsible for torture and extra-judicial killings. Punjab government sent a senior law officer and a deputy inspector general (DIG) of Punjab police to follow and contest the case. There was a reprieve for the CM after it was decided by the US federal court judge that that summons was not served on him. However, an appeal in the matter is pending before US Circuit Court.