Mani Kumar Subba, Nalini Chidambaram and now Abhishek Manu Singhvi

Congress party spokesman Abhishek Manu Singhvi appeared before the Kerala High Court today (29^th September 2010) for Megha Distributors owned by Santiago Martin against the recent state governments ordinance to amend the Paper Lotteries Act, with provisions including hiking the tax on lotteries. This is a big setback to the Congress in Kerala, which has been vigorously campaigning against the "illegal" Sikkim and Bhutan lotteries, alleging that the CPI-M-led government in the state was helping Megha Distributors.

Inside the court, Singhvi lashed out at the state government for bringing an ordinance that is against the Lotteries (Regulation) rules, 2010 passed by the central government this year and pointed out that it was a clear violation of the constitution by the state government. Singhvi is expected to appear in court again Tomorrow - this time for Bhutan Lotteries.

The Lotteries (Regulation) rules, 2010, issued under subsection (1) of section 11 of the Lotteries (Regulation) Act, 1998 were hurried through after P. Chidambaram became the Union Home Minister. His wife Nalini Chidambaram was the counsel of the lottery agencies in the cases against Kerala government.

LDF government stopped accepting tax advance from promoters of Bhutan and Sikkim lotteries, citing violation of rules, resulting in virtual stoppage of sales of other state lottery tickets. The state government had also brought in an ordinance amending the Kerala Tax on Paper Lottery Act, making the tax provisions more stringent.

The Governments ruled in Kerala had failed to control other state lotteries for the last 12 years because of the unholy nexus between central congress leaders and lottery mafia.

Mani Kumar Subba, the ex-Congress MP from Tezpur, Assam

His family owns MS Associates, a major player in the lottery business, which came under the scanner after the Comptroller and Auditor General detected a massive scam in the conduct of the Nagaland State Lottery in 1999.

The CAG report dealt exclusively with the running of the Nagaland State Lottery, of which MS Associates had been appointed the 'state sole distributor' in 1994.
Apparently, the state government earned only minuscule revenue from the lottery, which ran for four years and had a turnover of thousands of crores of rupees.
While 91 percent of the face value of tickets was to be paid as prize money, only 78 percent was actually given away. The winners were thus cheated of Rs 5,000 crore or Rs 50 billion.
'In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, it can be assumed that this amount was not paid as prize money and was retained by the distributor,' the CAG report said.
The audit began in 1997, a marathon exercise that scrutinised the running of the Nagaland State Lottery from 1993 through 1997. In these years, 83,254 lottery draws were conducted, of which the CAG examined 42,459.
The CAG has calculated that of the Rs 38,297 crore (Rs 382.97 billion) worth of tickets printed, even a mere 2 percent profit for the distributor, agents, and state government would work out to Rs 766 crore or Rs 7.6 billion.
Even if the state government were to get half the profit, it should have been entitled to Rs 383 crore or Rs 3.83 billion. But it received only Rs 40.2 crore or Rs 400.2 million.

Software Freedom Day

Advocates of software freedom in India joined hundreds of their counterparts all over the world in organising various programmes and events to celebrate Software Freedom Day on 18th September 2010.

The day is aimed at promoting awareness of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in general. It celebrates software freedom and the people behind it try to promote public awareness of software freedom and encourage the adoption of free software and open standards, among other things.

The first formal definition of free software was published by FSF in February 1986.That definition, written by Richard Stallman, states that a user of a free software has the following freedoms:

• Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program for any purpose.
• Freedom 1: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it to make it do what you wish.
• Freedom 2: The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor.
• Freedom 3: The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements (and modified versions in general) to the public, so that the whole community benefits.

Happy SFD all! Celebrate the freedom, and if you cannot contribute by any means, encourage and adopt free software.

Celebrations of 'Human Gods' in Kerala

The contemporary events in Kerala, some fake Human Gods  and their Celebrations, like Birthday celebrations of Amritanandamayi, ‘Parnashala’ at the Santhigiri Ashram, etc are in headlines of news papers. President of India and our Ministers are also showing great interest in attending these functions and queuing up for blessings of these fake gods. Despite our people are educated, every year such personalities and their devotees are increasing only. People are blindly following these kind of fake citizens. These devotees fall in their traps due to their personal problems and they think that they can survive it by believing them and following their rituals. 
People are ready to spend enough money for their problem solving. Not only in Kerala, but in almost all states of India too, these fake Human Gods are cheating lot of people. People easily fall under the trap of these renowned personalities. 
Some of the news items are listed below. Just go through them.....

1. Amritapuri is gearing up for the 57th  birthday celebrations of Mata Amritanandamayi. The birthday celebrations will be held on the premises of the Amritapuri campus of the Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham.

• More than three lakh devotees are expected to attend the celebrations. A 70-foot-long and 40-foot-wide stage has been erected for the celebrations. The main hall sprawls over an area of more than 200,000 square feet.

• Arrangements have been made for drinking water to be delivered to the devotees, right where they are seated. More than 200 temporary bathrooms have also been erected in close proximity.

• More than 100 food counters have been arranged to cater to the devotees’ needs. These counters will be run by students from the various Amrita educational institutions. The students will also lead the team responsible for getting rid of food waste and litter. The 200-plus students from the engineering, biotechnology, MBA and ayurveda schools will be joined by more than 200 devotees from abroad.

• The Union Ministers of State Sriprakash Jaiswal, Gurudas Kamat and KV Thomas, and Opposition Leader Oommen Chandy are among the dignitaries attending the jayanthi function

2. President Prathiba Patil dedicated the lotus-shaped ‘Parnashala’ at the  Santhigiri Ashram, on August 13, 2010 and it is open for the public by September 12.

• This imposing construction has a height of about 91 ft. The superstructure has a radius of about 84 ft and an inner diameter of about 64 ft. The structure has 21 lotus petals, of which 12 petals (41 ft. each) face upward and nine petals (31 ft. each) face downward.

• Pristine white marbles sourced from Rajsthan and black granite from Karnataka have been used for construction. Twenty-one pillars, embellished with carvings, support the monument. The edifice has a ‘Baalalayam’, an elevated platform for conducting ceremonies. It has exquisite wood-carvings. The structure holds ‘Sarakoodam’ - a 27 ft.-high enclosure made of teak.

• A life-size gold sculpture of the Guru is installed atop the cask. Floodlights will reflect different colours on the superstructure during night. 
• The cost of the project is estimated at Rs. 30 crore.

Can any Government (State/Central) enquire about the source of fund for such huge waste of money by the Human Gods?????

Bank failures continue in the US - Touched 125 in 2010.........

The count of bank failures in the US has reached 125 in 2010 and as many as 7 entities have folded up so far this month. This year’s bank closures are occurring at a faster pace than in 2009 when the 100 mark was not reached until October.

Mostly small and medium banks are bearing the brunt of the collapse, as they continue to wobble under the prolonged sluggishness in financial conditions. On an average, nearly 15 banks have bit the dust every month so far this year.

According to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), which insures deposits at over 8,000 banks, as many as 125 entities have gone out of business so far this year. In 2009, a staggering 140 banks were shut down.

On September 17 alone, authorities seized six banks. The six entities that failed were Maritime Savings Bank, Bramble Savings Bank, The Peoples Bank, First Commerce Community Bank, Bank of Ellijay,  and ISN Bank.

As per the FDIC, the number of 'problem' banks -- those at risk of failing -- climbed to 775, the highest in nearly 17 years, in the first three months of 2010. The count stood at 702 at the end of 2009.

Even as the US economy is on the recovery path, high unemployment levels are resulting in higher defaults at small and medium banks. The jobless rate touched 9.5% in June.