By Kriti Gupta
Whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal, shall be punished with imprisonment for life, or with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.”
Section 377, Indian Penal Code
The acts “against the order of nature” according to this definition are anal sex and masturbation. While this law applies to everyone; in practice, it generally implies homosexuality. This renders homosexuals vulnerable and is often used as means for blackmail and extortion. Though efforts are underway to change this law, the case is still pending in the Supreme Court.
This poses a problem as India has a thriving underground gay community. Kinsey Study, the most comprehensive research about sexual orientation, states that ten per cent of men and seven per cent of women between the ages of 16-55 are predominantly homosexual. This community has become more and more vocal, in the recent years. A phenomenon clearly exhibited by the recent gay pride parades held all over the country (like Delhi, Mumbai, and so on)
Jonathan Luther, a 20 something active homosexual man living in Delhi believes that India is suffering from a colonial hangover. “The Britishers introduced this law into the Indian Constitution. India itself has a history of accepting homosexuality. We need to get over this colonial hangover. Bharat chhodo 377!”
While discovering his alternate sexuality, Jonathan had a hard time. Continued on Page 4
“Being a Christian, I had major religious guilt. Christianity had been fed to me ever since I was a little boy. I had to go through five years of misery and torture. Then one day I realized – you cannot turn to God for everything. God is a construct that humanity needs to survive. To explain things that cannot be explained. Back then, I used to cry myself to sleep every night. Now, I have come to terms with who I am.” This is evident, as he is the only person who did not request a name change for this article.
Suhail Agarwal* has a different perspective.
As a Hindu, he did not face the religious guilt that Jonathan had to go through. In fact, he has not been subject to negative reactions from his friends and family. Despite that, he still prefers to stay in the closet. He believes that homosexuality is not a badge to be worn on your shoulder. “If straight guys don’t go around proclaiming that they are heterosexual, why should I have to do it?”
His take on Section 377 is that people need to be sensitized about the issue. Gay bashing still carries on in various parts of the country and vigilantes need to be suppressed. The police needs to be made aware of the problem. While attempting to explain 377, he said, “It kept going back and forth between the High court and Supreme Court. But I’m guessing as everything with the Indian law, the case is still pending.” He further added that if it were to become legal, at least it would no longer be a crime thereby reducing the stigma attached to it.
While on the one hand, Facebook type networking sites like www.guys4men.com ,a rage in India. On the other, there is still an alarmingly large number of cases reported where people kill themselves because they are forced to marry people of the opposite sex. In a study conducted recently, it was found that 45 gay couples committed suicide between 2001-2006. NAZ Foundation Co-ordinator Anuradha Mukherjee says that the figures are higher in reality, “It is hard to estimate the actual figure as families prefer saying that the girl committed suicide due to harassment rather than homosexuality.”
“Repealing 377 would make it easier for homosexuals in the lower classes to assert themselves. People in higher classes are insulated to a large degree. Parents bashing and friends ostracizing is a more prominent phenomenon with the lower classes,” remarks Jonathan. Suhail agrees, “There aren’t enough resources available with the poor to find out or even understand what they are going through.”
Rohit Kakkar*, a typical straight guy, comments on the community and his views on the same – “The class differences causes disparity in every field. So, to single out homosexuality is not justified. While I do not understand it, I know it happens. The best thing to do is to accept it and try and integrate it with society. There should be no judgement on you based on who you like.”
Perhaps the biggest challenge the Indian community faces today is to integrate homosexuality into the Indian society and culture. Hetero-normativity as a social construct is a farce that needs to be shattered. When asked about why he hasn’t come out to his parents, Suhail narrates the time his mother (who has a vague idea about his sexual orientation) said to him warningly, “Different people are not accepted in society. So you should think before you go down an unlikely path.”
Revoking Section 377 would be a step towards that.
* Names have been changed on request.
Every momentous event nowadays is tracked by live blogs, posts and messages.
There are minute-to-minute updates as events unfold, from the earthquake in China, to the cyclone in Burma. The terror attack in Mumbai was no different, as eyewitnesses and citizen journalists communicated with millions around the world.
But is all of that good, does it help? Is it reliable or can it also be abused?
For media commentators, two events have really led to the coming of age of live blogs. Firstly, the recent election in the US, which saw a massive number of news websites and individual bloggers cover the events minute by minute all over the globe. They were not only from the US, but also from the UK and around the Arab world.
The terror attacks in Mumbai has cemented the position of micro-blogging and live blogging as an invaluable medium to share information.
The first tweets about the attacks appeared early, and subsequently gave a tremendous amount of information, about a highly complex and rapidly changing series of events. But there are questions about verification and clarity.
According to the British Broadcasting Corporation's tech blogger Rory Cellan Jones, a story that kept popping up was of the Indian government trying to ban twitter, because it was aiding the attackers.
However, there was no confirmation of the ban from any government source.
Jones also says that the story appeared on the BBC's own Mumbai live event page. The event page had pulled together all kinds of sources, official and unofficial, to give readers a picture of the developing story. The pages are designed to allow readers to keep up with all the latest information circulating about the story in real time. So, to some extent it's up to the reader to decide how much credence to give them.
Thus, it may be prudent to treat everything one hears on a social network with a degree of skepticism. It throws open the discussion on the relevance of the mainstream media. There, some say that, because of the volume of information on those networks and the number of users, the mainstream media is increasingly irrelevant.
Sites claim to have full stories out before the television networks got out of bed. But the fact is that, while thousands post on twitter, and it may have alerted many people to the attacks, as time went on, the posts made the story more confusing.
Finally during the Mumbai attacks, many people had to switch back to the TV and newspapers to get a full sense of the story.
So, what twitter has done is to provide instant information to millions. No one doubts the fact that it's one of the best things to have happened to the internet. But as Cellan Jones says, that what it doesn't do is, tell us what is true, and what isn't. That makes the work of mainstream media outlets and professional reporters all the more relevant.
India Tuesday indicated it was keeping all options open, including a military strike against terrorist camps in Pakistan and suspension of bilateral dialogue, and underlined that it will take "appropriate action" to protect its territory from terror attacks emanating from the neighbouring country.
"We will await the response from Pakistan to the demarche (formal protest note)," External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters here on the sidelines of a function to inaugurate the India-Arab Forum Tuesday morning.
"We have in our demarche asked for the arrests and handing over of those persons who are settled in Pakistan and who are fugitives under the Indian law," he added.
"There are lists (containing the names) of about 20 persons. (These) lists are sometimes altered and this exercise is going on and we have reviewed it in our demarche," Mukherjee said.
"What I am saying is every sovereign country has its right to protect its territorial integrity and take appropriate action as and when it feels it is necessary to take that appropriate action," Mukherjee later told the NDTV news channel in an interview.
"As and when it takes place you will get to know. Nobody publicises or advertises it. I am not making any comment on military option," he replied when asked whether he would rule out military option against terrorist groups like the Lashker-e-Toiba (LeT) which are suspected to have engineered the Mumbai terror strikes.
"What will be done, time will show and you will come to know," Mukherjee said.
India's "most wanted 20" list includes known terror masterminds like mob boss Dawood Ibrahim, Maulana Masood Azhar, the founder of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) which was suspected behind the Dec 13, 2001 attack on the Indian parliament, and LeT chief Hafez Mohammed Sayeed.
New Delhi has suspected these fugitives to be behind major terror strikes in India over the years.
India has, however, not set a time-frame for Pakistan to the demarche it issued Monday that included the return of India's 20 most wanted men, the dismantling of terrorist camps and the proscription of anti-India militant outfits.
"We have not set a time-frame for Pakistan's response to our demarche. We will give them a reasonable amount of time," a senior official said on condition of anonymity.
"All options are open. Nothing has been decided as yet," he replied when asked what steps India will take in case Pakistan refuses to concede to its demands.
Pakistan has responded by offering India a joint team to probe the Mumbai attacks and underlined it will "frame a response" to New Delhi's demand for handing over 20 of India's most wanted men.
But India has cold-shouldered what it sees a diversionary ploy by Pakistan to impress the international community about its sincerity. "We want action on the ground," the official said.
The bilateral composite dialogue process has not been stalled yet, but if Pakistan fails to address India's concerns, New Delhi may decide to suspend the talks on the remaining items in the ongoing fifth round, said reliable sources, privy to the government's thinking on the subject.
"There is a stress on the dialogue process. The atmosphere has been vitiated by the Mumbai attacks," the official admitted.
The menu of likely actions by India in case of Pakistan's refusal to act on the ground could include military action. But this last resort action is not being considered yet. "You can't rule out anything. We will cross the bridge when it comes to it," the official said.
Investigations have disclosed that the Nov 26 Mumbai terror strikes bore the imprint of LeT, a banned militant outfit.
The probe has produced enough damning evidence that led New Delhi to officially tell Islamabad Tuesday that it holds elements in Pakistan responsible for the Mumbai terror strikes.
Pakistan has denied any link with the Mumbai blasts.
"The government of Pakistan has offered a joint investigating mechanism and a joint commission to India," Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said in a nationwide telecast in Islamabad.
At the same time, India and Pakistan should not allow their composite dialogue to get derailed in the wake of the Mumbai killings, he said.
"We want better relations... and it is in the larger interest of the two countries to continue the composite dialogue process.
With Pakistan in the denial mode, India Tuesday briefed envoys of those countries whose nationals were killed in the NOv 26 terror carnage about the investigation and underlined that New Delhi expected Islamabad to act against militants based in its territory who engineered it.
Vivek Katju, special secretary (Political and International Organisations), held a meeting with the envoys and expressed India's deepest condolences to them.
The heads of missions from Germany, Canada, Japan, Singapore, Australia, Italy, Thailand, Israel and Mauritius were present at the meeting, official sources told IANS.
India's diplomatic offensive comes in response to repeated denials by Pakistan and Islamabad's frenzied calls to world capitals to convince the international community of its claimed innocence.
US Senator John McCain, the Republican candidate who lost the presidential race to Barack Obama, Tuesday said he was hopeful of Pakistan's cooperation with India in the Mumbai terrorist attack probe and opposed a military strike against Islamabad.
Underlining solidarity with India in the wake of the Nov 26 terror attacks, he said the US would not allow terrorists to provoke a confrontation between India and Pakistan.
"I assume the government of Pakistan will cooperate. They realise that this act of terror is not something that affects India but all the civilised nations," McCain said.
"No," he replied when asked whether the Mumbai attacks were a "fit case" for India to launch military action against Pakistan.
"We do not have hard evidence yet. Obviously, there are allegations that this organisation, this individual or this group were trained or operated or had some training in Pakistan," said McCain.
"This government is committed to better relations between India and Pakistan. They (those behind the Mumbai carnage) tried to provoke a confrontation between India and Pakistan," McCain told reporters here.
"This government will not allow it to happen," he said, indicating a pro-active US role in thwarting any breakdown of dialogue between India and Pakistan in the wake of the Nov 26 terror strikes.
"Relations between India and Pakistan were on an improving path. That was one of the objectives of terrorists (to strain ties between the two countries)," McCain said.
He, however, hoped that Pakistan will cooperate in addressing India's concerns over the terror strikes and show "transparency" in this connection.
"It is in the national interests of Pakistan to weaken these elements," he replied when asked whether the US will put pressure on Islamabad to act against those elements in Pakistan whom India suspect to be behind the Mumbai attacks.
McCain, the Republican senator from Arizona, was on his way to Bangladesh and Bhutan but decided to make a brief stopover here in the wake of the Mumbai strikes that has killed 183 people, including six Americans, and left 239 people injured.
McCain was echoing anxieties in Washington about the repercussions of potential India-Pakistan confrontation on the US war against fundamentalists in Afghanistan.
If such a situation arises, Pakistan is likely to move its troops from the Afghan border to its border with India - a move which could damage the US hopes of defeating the Taliban in Afghanistan.
McCain's trip to India comes a day before US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrives here in a bid to arrest the drift in fraying India-Pakistan ties in the wake of the terror attacks.
McCain, along with two other senators, Democrat Jospeh Lieberman and Lindsey O. Graham, called on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh here and underlined the US' solidarity with India in the fight against terrorism.
In their conversation with the prime minister, they offered to share the US' experiences in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, Lieberman said.
They also told the prime minister about the counter-terror steps he US has taken, including the creation of the department of homeland security and a national counter-terrorism centre, said Lieberman.
President George W. Bush and president-elect Obama are acting in close coordination over the Mumbai terror strikes, the Republican senator said while underlining bipartisan support in the US to India in the aftermath of the terror strikes.
"We would be meeting Pakistan General (Ashfaq) Kiyani over the weekend and raise some questions with him," Liebermann told reporters here.
Indo-Asian News Service
Twenty-four years have passed since the world's worst man-made disaster - Bhopal gas tragedy - occurred. But despite the passage of time the trauma continues for the survivors of that fateful night of Dec 2-3, 1984, when over 40 tonnes of methyl isocyanate (MIC) spewed out of the now defunct Union Carbide's pesticide plant here.
Having borne the brunt of neurological, hormonal and mental health problems - besides the economic hardships - the survivors are now faced with the problem of deformed children being born.
Children of affected parents conceived and born after the disaster were significantly different from children of the same age born to unexposed parents, says a study carried out by Sambhavna Trust that runs a clinic to treat the gas-affected people.
"Such children were shorter, thinner, lighter and had smaller heads. Also, children of exposed parents showed abnormal growth of upper part of their bodies - disproportionately smaller than their lower bodies," says the study.
Medical research is desperately needed specially into the possible genetic and reproductive after-effects of the lethal gas leak that killed over 3,000 people instantly and thousands more over years later.
But the genetic damage to the children - born to survivors - has been severely under-studied, allege rights activists. This has led to "unsystematic treatment of gas victims already faced with neurological, hormonal and mental health problems", they say.
Lack of research - into the possible genetic and reproductive ramifications of exposure to lethal gasses and now to contaminated water - has seriously marred efforts to check the effects of poisonous gases on the next generation of the affected.
The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) initiated 18 studies in the aftermath of the Bhopal disaster. However, despite findings of long-term damage, these studies were all prematurely ended within 10 years, that too at a time when the evidence of damage on the offspring of survivors was beginning to show.
ICMR studies, though terminated prematurely, did show that children of exposed mothers had delayed physical and mental development.
"Most studies done by the ICMR were terminated as early as 1989 and the rest by 1994 without reviewing the collected data, and pleas for continuing the studies were ignored. The ICMR's full report on Bhopal too has not been released till date," said Satinath Sarangi, who runs Sambhavna Trust.
There have been no large-scale official studies on the effects of this chemical exposure on children born to exposed parents despite the children facing very high rates of serious congenital health problems.
The Fact Finding Mission on Bhopal found high levels of chemicals in the breast milk of the affected women. Studies conducted by the Sambhavna Trust Clinic indicated that about half of the people living in the contaminated area were suffering from multiple symptoms.
"Children suffering congenital deformities continue to be denied medical attention. Only 14 children received official assistance for heart surgery and 13 assistance in diagnosis for congenital brain anomalies between 1992 and 1997, under the programme SPARC (Special Assistance to At-Risk Children). But it was suddenly withdrawn in 1997 citing financial constraints," said Rashida Bi of the Chingari Trust that is working for gas survivors.
"There are an unusually large numbers of children with cerebral palsy too in the communities affected by gas or contaminated groundwater," she claimed, lamenting that between 1984 and 2000, the government spent just Rs.3,761 per year per child orphaned by the disaster.
And this despite the fact that an amount of Rs.497 million was allocated for social rehabilitation of victims of the disaster in 1986, she said.
Esha News Monitoring Services Private Limited with their research and analysis television monitoring team has found out TEZ TV was the first to break the news through ticker at 2202hrs and IBN 7 gave the first visual of the Mumbai Terrorist Attack on the Taj Hotel at 2228 hrs.
Top 5 Channels broadcasting the news flash of Mumbai Terrorists Attacks
Time News Channel
22:02 TEJ TV
22:03 AAJ TAK
22:04 SAHARA SAMAY
22:06 ZEE NEWS
22:06 IBN 7
Top 5 Channels broadcasting the first visuals of Mumbai Terrorists Attacks
Time News Channel Location
22:28 IBN 7 Taj Hotel
22:30 BBC Firing at Oberoi
22:31 AAJ TAK Oberoi
22:32 HEADLINES TODAY Leopold
22:32 IBN LOKMAT CST
Source: Esha News
Esha News has compiled this Television Monitoring Intelligence Report on Mumbai Terrorist Attacks after carefully 24x7 tracking and monitoring of the television coverage across 130 television channels. Television Monitoring Intelligence Report highlights the brand visibility on the numerous television networks.
Facts about Mumbai Terrorist Attack news coverage
2202hrs TEJ TV first to flash the news
2228hrs IBN 7 gave the first visual of Taj under attack
BBC first (International News Broadcast) to telecast the news
Something has bothered me as I have been watching the TV channels. Everyone is stationed outside Taj and a little bit the Oberoi but we hardly get a glimpse of the VT station and the victims there. The first 51 victims were there.I spoke to someone who has not been able to get his relatives body out for 15 hours. His relative was a bhelpuriwallah.
Our media is making invisible the poor once again. I wish someone had spoken of the terror of monetary superiority in a city that puts on display plenty of it. It is intimidating to even watch the Bombay people invited to comment on TV-they know each others names, the all speak fluent English, they all were lunching and dining on a regular basis at these places, they say they want all politicians to stay out. That is very dangerous, because the politicians are the only link that the poor have with governance and if politicians are weakened , so is our democracy. It seems that the trend in thinking among the bold and beautifil is that if uniformed people have to protect the lifestyles of the elite, so be it.
There was absolutely no introspection of why these targets.As always, the intelligence of the terrorists is ignored, their will to counter the hegemony of wealth and power.There are many factors at play and it would be too patronizing to write off the terrorists as any one simple thing and to reduce the dynamic of the bombings to money and by implication envy, blind instinct, poverty, etc? .
More backlash is expected and the promise of vendettas will deafen the ears of calm and peace.
--
Ruchira Gupta,
President, Apne Aap Women Worldwide
www.apneaap.org,
D-56 Anand Niketan,
New Delhi-21,
India-110021
Global economic recession will have an adverse impact on funding to fight HIV and AIDS, but India with its "robust" banking system should not worry too much on this count, says a top UNAIDS official.
"So far the funds provided by donors have not been impacted. They are providing us funds. But it may go down in the future," UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot told IANS during a visit to India.
The country is home to 2.5 million HIV-positive patients, including 70,000 children below the age of 14.
But Piot said India has nothing to worry about as far as generating funds for prevention and treatment of HIV and AIDS is concerned. "Your banks are robust and doing well."
"If the economic situation of a country is bad, it affects its social structure too. The result is poverty, which means an indirect spread of HIV and AIDS," said Piot.
He said he was basing his observations on past experience when global funding for the fight against HIV and AIDS had gone down when Japan and Nordic countries like Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden faced financial trouble in the 1990s.
"I have seen it happening when countries experience economic downturn. In Japan, after their financial crisis in 1990, they cut development assistance by 60 percent.
"Japan is still recovering, though the Nordic countries have recovered and they have started giving aid," said Piot, who is also an under secretary general of the UN.
His greatest worry is that governments will cut social sector spending first, which will have a strong impact on HIV and AIDS. "The cut would impact the poorest countries who would not be able to run their otherwise sponsored AIDS programmes," he said.
Piot, who will complete his term in December after having led the organisation since 1994, said in developing countries, governments may have less income due to recession, which will mean their people will become more vulnerable.
"There could be an increase in sex work and the subsequent fear then is an increase in HIV and AIDS. Usually, in such situations, women are the most vulnerable," he said.
There are an estimated 33 million people living with HIV worldwide, while 2.7 million people were newly infected in 2007. About two million people died of AIDS last year. Monday is observed as World AIDS Day.
UNAIDS gets funds from a number of countries, Holland and Sweden being the biggest contributors. Various foundations, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and various development agencies are the other donors.
Twenty seven countries, including the Netherlands, Britain, the US, Sweden, Norway and Ireland, were the biggest donors to UNAIDS in 2007.
Said Piot: "Funding is saving lives. Also, it has shown a high return on investments. Fewer people would be impacted with it, which means good investment.
"If they interrupt the treatment and prevention of HIV and AIDS (by cutting down on funds) there would be many people dying of it and obviously it would mean higher bills to pay. They have to act now otherwise they will have to pay later," Piot said.
At the moment, close to four million people all over the world are on anti-retrovirals, but about eight million more need it, he said.
The sight of fire leaping out of Taj hotel and its gutted rooms - as terrorists ravaged the grand heritage building in Mumbai - made Anilbhai Bhatt, 65, feel that his childhood had been consigned to flames.
"As a child, I always used to go there in the evening with my friends to play on the large courtyard in front of the hotel. We stayed clear of the hotel because it was out of bounds for us," Bhatt told IANS.
Every Mumbaikar, rich or poor, has a kind of affinity with the Taj. It is a hotel unmatched in India in terms of its regal opulence, sophisticated grandeur and discreet grace.
Every one of them is saddened today that the hotel that stood unsullied for 105 years has been made to crumble by terrorists who struck Wednesday at severalprominent places in the city and carried on the assault for 60 hours.
"Though I was born in Fort in south Mumbai and lived there till I got married, I never had an opportunity to go inside the Taj Hotel," rued Bhatt, a retired employee of a jewellery firm in Mumbai's popular jewellery market at Zaveri Bazar.
For countless people who visit Mumbai everyday, Taj is on their must-see list, though they cannot afford a simple cup of tea there. Even these visitors are pained to see the devastation wreaked by terrorists on the 105-year-old building.
Said Pradyut Sarkar from Silchar in Assam: "I first visited Mumbai two years ago. Like all visitors to the city, I had gone to the Gateway of India and the Taj Mahal Hotel at the Colaba sea front.
"I have seen many heritage buildings in Kolkata, but I was awestruck by the imposing structure of the Taj and the old world charm it exuded. I feel sad that the magnificent hotel has now been defaced and damaged so badly."
The Taj hotel was one of the city's most famous and photographed buildings.
Scores of people in Mumbai and many living elsewhere in the country, who have never set foot in the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower Hotel, and Hotel Trident-Oberoi, are now upset that these two landmark luxury hotels facing the Arabian Sea should be the target of terrorists.
As inveterate party-goers Anil Dharker and Prahlad Kakkar said it is as if "a beautiful, charming virgin has been raped at gun-point by brutes".
Taj regulars are upset that the beautiful carpets laid all around the hotel's interiors and on the floors of each one of its 565 rooms are now blood stained, and damaged.
Actor-activist Rahul Bose said he could not bear to see the draperies of the hotel being stained with blood, the carefully arranged crockery strewn around the floors.
"The priceless antique paintings that adorned the walls are now either hanging in skewed angles or splotched with ugly gun-shot marks," he sighed.
"I wonder if I would be able to go to the Taj to cover any entertainment event there with the same happy feeling as I used to do until now. I will be haunted by memories of the fierce gun battle that raged continuously for three days," said entertainment journalist Indramohan Pannu.
The feeling is echoed by others who visited the heritage Taj regularly.
Stanley Fernandes, an employee of a now-defunct automobile publication, who lives at Mahim in central Mumbai, woke up with a jolt in the morning of Nov 27.
Until a few years ago, he used to regularly visit one of the second floor rooms in the Taj to take briefs from his employer, Kishu Gidwani.
Gidwani had migrated to India after the partition in 1947 and since then had been living in the Taj till 1983. After making the Taj his abode for 36 long years as a 'permanent guest', he later shifted to the National Sports Club of India at Worli in south-central Mumbai.
"Although Gidwani passed away some years ago, somehow I dreamt that he was lying in one of the rooms in a pool of blood," Fernandes said.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Sunday announced the setting up of a Federal Investigating Agency and measures to strengthen maritime and air security in the wake of the terrorist savagery in the country's financial capital Mumbai.
"In the face of this national threat and in the aftermath of this national tragedy, all of us from different political parties must rise above narrow political considerations and stand united. We should work together in the interest of the country at this critical juncture," he said in his opening remarks at an all-party meeting here.
Manmohan Singh convened the meeting to take stock of the security situation and ways to strengthen the intelligence machinery in the country following three days and three nights of Mumbai terror that killed 183 lives and injured over 300.
While noting that "several measures are already in place to deal with the situation", he underlined that much more needed to be done "and we are determined to take all necessary measures to overhaul the system".
"We are further strengthening maritime and air security for which measures have been initiated. This will involve the navy, the Coast Guard and the coastal police, as well as the air force and the civil aviation ministry.
"The anti-terrorist forces of the country will be further strengthened and streamlined. The National Security Guard (NSG), the principal anti-terrorist force of the country, will be given additional facilities and the size of the force is being augmented. Steps have also been initiated to establish another four NSG hubs in different parts of the country. Additionally, the special forces at the disposal of the centre would be appropriately utilised in counter-insurgency operations."
NSG commandos fought pitched battles against the terrorists, who India says came from Pakistan, after the heavily armed gunmen took control of two luxury hotels and a Jewish centre, killed many in cold blood and took many more hostages. Two NSG commandos died in the operation.
The government has also finalised a set of legal measures based on the recommendations of the Administrative Reforms Commission which includes the setting up of a Federal Investigating Agency, the prime minister told some 20 political leaders from the treasury and opposition benches.
Manmohan Singh said that unlike the recent terrorist attacks across the country, the Mumbai nightmare was different in several aspects.
"It was an attack by highly trained and well-armed terrorists targeting our largest city. They came with the explicit aim of killing large numbers of innocent civilians, including foreign visitors. They sought to destroy some of the best known symbols of our commercial capital.
"The ordeal at Mumbai, which occupied the attention of the entire nation, has finally come to an end. All of us share the grief of those who have lost their loved ones in this dastardly and brutal attack and also the pain and anguish of those grievously wounded.
"We cannot lessen their grief. But we will do all we can to alleviate their suffering. I give you my solemn assurance that we will look after the needs of those who survive this horrible tragedy."
Saluting the bravery of the security forces who fought the terrorists in "exceptionally difficult circumstances" and freed hostages from three places, Manmohan Singh noted: "They tried their utmost to save innocent lives at great personal risk. Twenty officers and men made the ultimate sacrifice by laying down their lives. The entire nation owes a debt of gratitude to these men that we can never repay."
He hoped that the discussions at the meeting would lead to a consensus on steps required to be taken.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Home Minister P. Chidambaram, Defence Minister A.K. Antony, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Railway Minister Lalu Prasad and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders V.K. Malhotra and Jaswant Singh were among those attending the meeting at the prime minister's residence.
Samajwadi Party leaders Mulayam Singh Yadav and Amar Singh, Communist Party of India-Marxist general secretary Prakash Karat, and D. Raja and A.B. Bardhan of the Communist Party of India also attended the meeting.
The meeting took place barely hours after Shivraj Patil resigned as home minister taking moral responsibility for the terrorist attack.
Setting up a Federal Investigating Agency is among the steps the government has finalised to prevent a repeat of the Mumbai terrorist attack, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced at an all-party meeting here Sunday evening.
Here's a list of the measures:
# Setting up a Federal Investigating Agency;
# Tightening the maritime and air security, which will involve the navy, Coast Guard and the coastal police, as well as the Air Force and the civil aviation ministry;
# Anti-terrorist forces of the country will be further strengthened and streamlined;
# The National Security Guard (NSG) will be given additional facilities and the size of the force to be augmented;
# Steps taken to establish another four NSG hubs in different parts of the country;
# Special forces at the disposal of the central government to be used in counter insurgency operations.
The Delhi operations of the Sakaal Times, an English daily brought out by Maharashtra's leading Sakal media group, were closed down Sunday allegedly without informing the employees in advance. The group's management has denied the charge.
Many staffers who came in to work Sunday morning found the office closed with a terse notice pasted on the main door stating: "The editorial work carried out at Delhi is no longer required to be continued."
"As a result, the operations are stopped forthwith and the staff is being released. They need not attend office from today."
Sakaal Times is published from Pune while the group also runs a popular Marathi daily, Sakal.
Confirming the closure, editorial director of Sakal Papers Anand Agashe told IANS in Pune: "The operations of the Sakaal Times' Delhi bureau have been suspended for now."
He said: "The overall market crash has entailed drastic cut-downs." Agashe said he could not comment on the decision to close the Delhi operations since "the decision was administrative".
There were around 70 employees in Delhi, including editorial staff, who camped at the gate for several hours, angry over the management's decision to close down the Delhi operations a mere six months since Sakaal Times was launched May 7.
Sakal Papers' Director, Human Resources and Operations, Pradip Khire denied the charge of the staff that they had not been informed about the impending closure.
"It was communicated to them that their services are no more required and their dues are being settled," Khire told IANS in Pune.
He said: "Some pages of Sakaal Times were being produced in Delhi and those operations have been shifted to Pune. Since we are also reducing the number of pages, we won't require the staff that we had engaged in Delhi."
The employees in Delhi, meanwhile, instantly constituted an action committee to protest the lock-out.
K.K. Laskar, the photo editor who has now become the convenor of the action committee of Sakal Times staff, told IANS: "The closure is illegal and unethical. We will take legal action. This is a test case for all workers in the print industry to fight."
A senior editorial staff said: "None of us knew the edition will be closed down like this. We were neither informed nor given the option to relocate to the head office in Pune."
An initial few were laid off some time ago and 12 people were told their services were no longer required. "The rest of the editorial team, including photographers, editors, reporters and designers, was all in the dark," he said.
A reporter with the paper said: "I was in the office till Saturday midnight. Till then, there was no intimation by the management. Everything was functioning normally and when I reached office today afternoon, it was all locked."
"We may not get even this month's salary," she said.
Indo-Asian News Service
Home minister Shivraj Patil, under tremendous criticism over a spate of terrorist attacks in the country since last year, has resigned
Home minister Shivraj Patil gestures as he addresses mediapersons after a cabinet meeting in New Delhi on Thursday. (AFP Photo)
in the wake of the Mumbai terror strikes. Patil has said that he felt obliged to take "moral responsibility" for the brutal attacks in Mumbai, an official government source said.
Finance minister P Chidambaram will take over as the new home minister and the finance ministry will now be under the direct charge of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The CWC, which met here on Saturday night, gave the marching orders to Shivraj Patil.
There was unanimity in the CWC that the political face of the government can be saved only with a drastic overhaul.
Chidambaram, who had an earlier stint in the internal security department, was the obvious choice to succeed Patil and the PM's charge of the economy is expected to bolster confidence in the country's economic management.
The massive collateral damage of the commando operation at Taj, Trident and Nariman House is being blamed on the delay and inadequacy of the response of the MHA in pressing the NSG into service.
Patil, who had offered to step down at the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting on Saturday night, sent his resignation to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Sunday morning, sources said.
The 74-year-old Patil was inducted into the Union Cabinet despite his defeat from Latur in Maharashtra in the 2004 Lok Sabha polls. He has been a target of the opposition as also the detractors within the party over his handling of the internal security situation in the country.