Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who presented his government’s ‘report card’ here on Monday, has said that the state is moving towards the path of development and there is growth in every sector.

“We have decided the agenda for governance and implemented it. We succeeded in implementing the agenda for governance that we decided. Not only this, we also launched the schemes which were not mentioned in the agenda and implemented it,” Kumar told the media here.

“In 2005, before we came into power we promised the people of Bihar that we would truly move towards the path of development .That was our leadership agenda….Bihar is moving towards development. Growth can be seen in every sector,” he added.

The Chief Minister further announced that presenting his government’s ‘report card’ had been an annual tradition since 2005.

A Security alert has been sounded in the Parliament premises, with security forces deployed at the site, in the wake of the Gurdaspur terror attack.

Security has also been tightened at the North Block after the terror incident, which has so far claimed the lives of 10 people, including six civilians.

Meanwhile, security measures have also been enhanced in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier held a high-level meeting in Parliament with Union Ministers Manohar Parrikar, Arun Jaitley and Venkaiah Naidu.

Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi has condemned the attack, saying his prayers were with the families of those of who lost their lives in the attack.

IG Border Zone, Ishwar Chander, said there is no hostage situation till now while Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar stated that Special Forces have been deployed in Gurdaspur and the counter insurgency forces are already there.

Defence ties between India and Japan are set to grow stronger with both coming together for Malabar naval exercises in October and exploring possibility of having joint air exercises.

Japanese defence sources expressed satisfaction at the growth trajectory in the defence ties saying, “the direction is right.

We need to work on it more”.”

Japan is happy to be invited for the Indo-US naval exercise ‘Malabar’ slated for October in the Bay of Bengal,” the sources told PTI, adding that the next step hopefully will be joint air exercise.

It is not just the cooperation at the level of forces that both countries are looking at.”

There is a huge opportunity present in the defence manufacturing too especially in the context of Make in India,” Indian defence sources said.

The importance that Japan puts on defence ties with India can be seen from the fact that the Japanese Embassy has added two more defence attaches here – one each from the Air Force and Coast Guard — this year.”

At present, there are only four countries other than India to which Japan sends its attaches from the three services and the Coast Guard.

This shows how much importance we attach to the defence and maritime cooperation between Japan and India,” Japanese Ambassador to India Takeshi Yagi said.

Amid increasing Chinese assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region, Japan had in March during the visit of Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar sought enhanced cooperation with India in defence and security sector including in the field of maritime security.

Japan has been witnessing conflict with China over control of private islands in South China Sea.

A territorial dispute even exists between China and Japan over the Senkaku Islands, which Beijing refers to as the Diaoyu Islands.

India considers relations with Japan very important, which is evident from the fact that Parrikar chose Japan as the first country to visit after assuming office of Defence Minister.

Source from India Defence News.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid his respects to the martyrs to Kargil on the 16th Kargil Diwas. “The Kargil battle was not just fought on borders, India’s every village, city and town has made a contribution to that,” the PM said during his address to the nation on his monthly radio programme Mann ki Baat.

The PM also sought suggestions for his speech on August 15.

He thanked the people for making the initiative MyGov, “a forum for people’s participation in the process of governance,” a success.The forum, the Prime Minister said, completes a year on July 26. Over the last year, the forum over 2 crore people have visited the site. Over 50,000 people have given their suggestions on the PMO website, he added.

Referring to an accident in Delhi sometime ago, in which the scooter driver lay on the road with no one to help him, the PM said he had received many suggestions to speak on road safety.

“One is shocked to see the statistics of road accidents in the country – every four minutes a person dies in road accident,” the Prime Minister said.

The government, he said, has taken many initiatives regarding road safety. “We are soon going to introduce Road Transport and Safety Bill,” he said, which will have provisions on holding awareness programmes, road engineering and emergency care after accidents.

“Apart from the Government, it is the duty of every family to inform the youngsters in their family about importance of road safety rules,” he said.

Source from India Defence News.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will share his thoughts with the nation on ‘Mann ki baat’ program at 11 am today.

The 10th edition of the programme will be aired on All India Radio.

In ‘Mann Ki Baat’, Prime Minister Modi shares his thoughts with the nation. The programme aims to deliver the Prime Minister’s voice to the general masses of the country since television connection is still not available everywhere, especially in the rural regions of remote locations.

In order to turn Bengaluru into a top manufacturing hub for aerospace and defence components and products, the State government has requested the Centre to establish an exclusive ‘Defence and Aerospace Cluster’ near Tumakuru, in line with the Make in India theme.

Speaking at the inauguration of the Second Aerospace and Defence Manufacturing Summit 2015 here on Wednesday, Gaurav Gupta, Commissioner, Industries and Commerce, Karnataka, said: “The land required for the cluster can be accommodated in the National Investments and Manufacturing Zones (NIMZ) near Tumakuru where 4,000 acres of land is ready for allotment and another 8,000 acres at an advanced stage of acquisition. Smaller land parcels of about 100-200 acres can be made available in the Aerospace Park adjacent to BIAL.”

Tumakuru is one of the four regions in the State and 16 in the country marked as NIMZ in 2014 as part of the Centre’s plan to boost manufacturing.

Besides manufacturing components, systems and sub-systems, the cluster will also export finished products and provide a range of auxiliary units across avionics, forging and other sectors, he added.

Gupta also highlighted the interest shown by many companies to invest in the State and Bengaluru, following the success of Aero India 2015. “Many companies participated in the G2B (government to businesses) and have expressed their interest to invest around Rs 12,000 crore… These proposals are, however, yet to materialise and a lot of incubation is still needed.”

Besides, 80 MSEs and SMEs have shown interest to invest Rs 15,000 crore in Bengaluru, he added. An Aerospace Technology Innovation Centre to provide R&D support to the SME sector is also set to come up at the Aerospace Park. The State has requested the Centre to set up an Aerospace Common Finishing Facility at Rs 96 crore, of which 50 per cent will be as Central grants. Despite the efforts to boost aerospace manufacturing, many hurdles remain.

A member of Society of Indian Aerospace Technologies and Industries pointed out the difficulty of an MSE or SME to invest heavily on land.

Speaking on the bigger subject of indigenisation of aerospace production, Dr Tamilmani, DG (Aero) cited the absence of even wind tunnels for intensive aerospace research hindering research on UAVs, (Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft), etc.

Speaking on the sidelines of the programme, V Uday Bhaskar, director, Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL), said the Akash Mk2 missile would be developed within three years.

Source from India Defence News.

A three-day operation along on the Line of Control (LoC) near Tangdhar, culminated in an ambush in a cave where the Army killed two militants. An officer and two jawans sustained injuries in the operation. The Army has so far killed 12 Pakistani militants and foiled all seven infiltration attempts along the LoC since the counter-infiltration operation began on July 22.

The newest counter-infiltration operation began in the early hours of July 22 at Tangdhar when an Army surveillance unit picked up movement near the fence at the Line of Control near Tangdhar, over 100 kilometres north of the state capital Srinagar.

Army officials said two militants walked into an ambush at a post around 14,000 feet at around 10.30 am on July 22. They breached the fence using wire-cutters using a cover of low-hanging clouds, when they ran into the Army ambush. The infiltrators hid behind rocks and fired with AK-47s and under-barrel grenade launchers with troops of the 26 Rajput Regiment.

Major Akash and Sepoy Ranjit Kumar and Sepoy Balbir Kumar were injured in the firefight and evacuated to the base hospital Srinagar. When the search operations ended on Friday at 3 pm, the Army recovered two bodies of the militants in a cave under a large boulder. They also recovered two AK-47s, ten magazines and 250 rounds. Also recovered were one UBGL, three hand grenades, one sophisticated navigation device, one nightvision goggle and five days of dry rations.

This is the third infiltration attempt foiled at Tangdhar this year. On May 25th one militant was killed while infiltrating in Tangdhar while two militants were killed in an ambush at Tangdhar sector. Tangdhar, a rugged mountainous region is one of the infiltration routes like Machchil and Naugaum, favoured by militants. “It’s a story of desperation versus determination, ” says Lieutenant General Subrata Saha, General Officer Commanding the Srinagar-based 15 Corps. “Our determination, their desperation.”

Multiple attempts to break in have failed thus far because the army says it has strengthened its counter-infiltration grid by plugging gaps along ridge lines along the traditional infiltration routes.

Source from India Defence News.

‘Sadda haq ethe rakh’, this was the chant of ex-servicemen who staged a protest here on Saturday over the implementation of the One Rank One Pension (OROP) policy.

The protestors wore black bands around their forehead and shouted slogans denouncing the government.

“We want to express our anger today by wearing black bands. The OROP implementation is pending for the last 40 years….It has been 18 months since this government came to power and they have not done anything,” said Brigadier Harwant Singh, All India Defence Brotherhood president.

The OROP scheme has been a long-standing demand of ex-servicemen’s associations and relates to payment of uniform pension to defence forces personnel retiring in the same rank with the same length of service, irrespective of their date of retirement.

As Prime Minister Narendra Modi landed in Bihar to kick-start his party’s poll campaign, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today launched an attack on him, posing seven questions to him on retrieval of blackmoney, farmers’ issues and the promises he had made to the state during Lok Sabha polls.

“I am raising 7 critical issues-2 specific to Bihar and 5 that in my view people across India want to hear from the Prime Minister,” Kumar said in a tweet.

Taking a dig at the Prime Minister, he said, “We’re grateful after 14 months Modiji finds time to visit Bihar as we get ready to hear more promises what about the old ones?”

“You promised special status for Bihar. 14 months and people are still waiting,” the chief minister said in his posers to the PM.

“With 14th Finance Commission report and withdrawal of BRGF (Backward Regional Grant Fund), Bihar to lose Rs 50,000 crore in five years. Is this your cooperative federalism?” he asked.

“People are awaiting to get their Rs 15-20 lakh from the blackmoney you promised to bring back from abroad. Could we hear something on this?” he asked.

“First U-turn on MSP, then your apathy towards farmers’s distress and finally your new land bill. Is this what you promised to farmers?” he asked.

“By 2022 you have promised house for everybody with facility of electricity and water. How would be fulfilled without allocation of fund or any plan so far?” he asked.

“You started Jan Dhan scheme in the way to make people believe that it’s not only a bank account, but it’s opening peoples fortune. Today more than 70 per cent accounts are ineffective. Nobody knows how poor would be benefited from such bank accounts?” he asked.

Kumar also alleged that a few capitalists had benefited from the central government and asked when ‘achehe din’ would come for the common man.

With PM visit to Bihar coming ahead of crucial Assembly elections, Kumar, whose hostility towards him is well known, has set the stage for political fireworks by posing the questions.

US lawmakers and officials have highlighted the importance of India-US relationship, with the administration’s pointsperson for South Asia saying India’s rise is in US’ interest and a strong US is in India’s interest.

The officials made the comments at a Congressional Reception organised by Senate Caucus on India and Indian Americans at the Capitol Hill on Wednesday to welcome Arun K. Singh on his taking over as India’s ambassador to the US.The event was hosted by senators Mark Warner and John Cornyn, Democratic and Republican co-chairs respectively of the Caucus.Speaking at the event, Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs, Nisha Biswal, noted that India’s rise is in US’ interest and a strong US is in India’s interest.Praising the leadership of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, she recapitulated the successful bilateral summits.

She reiterated Modi’s remarks that the strong, bipartisan India-US relationship benefits not only its citizens but also the world.Welcoming Singh, who previously served as deputy chief of mission here, back to Washington, both Warner and Cornyn spoke warmly of Singh’s contributions in promoting India-US relations.

Warner reiterated his commitment to promoting India-US ties. Cornyn highlighted the strong relationship between India and US being ‘world’s largest’ and ‘world’s oldest’ democracies which are bound by common values.Thanking Warner and Cornyn for their leadership at the Senate Caucus on India and Indian Americans, Singh noted the important contributions made by the Caucus to bring the people and governments of the two countries closer.

He described the bipartisan support for India-US relations in the US Congress as a source of strength for the India-US strategic partnership that now spans almost all dimensions of human endeavor. The event was attended by a number of US senators, senior officials of US administration, leaders of the Indian American community from across the US, as well as by members of the media, the think tank community and academia.Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans is a bipartisan group of Senators founded in 2004 by Cornyn and the then Senator from New York and former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.

Source from India Defence News.