The torrent of water unleashed in a deadly Laos dam collapse has drained into Cambodia, forcing thousands to evacuate, as rescuers on Thursday battled monsoon rains to find scores of Laotians still missing after entire villages were washed away.
Twenty-seven people have been confirmed dead, with 131 still missing, after the Xe-Namnoy dam collapsed on Monday in a remote southern corner of Laos, leaving villagers with little time to escape.
It is an unprecedented accident to strike the hydropower industry in Laos, where the Communist government has dammed large sections of its myriad waterways to generate electricity that is mostly sold to its neighbours.
The search and rescue effort entered a third day Thursday, with China, Vietnam and Thailand sending in specialists, while villagers picked through their wrecked, mud-caked homes for possessions as the flood waters receded.
Carcasses of livestock floated in the knee-deep waters in a devastated village visited by AFP, as heavy rain pounded the area.
Thousands of villagers downstream in Cambodia have also been forced to flee as the water once held back by the dam flowed south.
“Water is still rising, so more people will be evacuated,” Men Kong, a government spokesman in Cambodia’s Stung Streng province, told AFP.
Cambodian soldiers ferried villagers and motorbikes from flooded zones on wooden boats, while supplies were handed out to some who found refuge on dry land.
In Laos, Chinese rescuers in life jackets and helmets joined local soldiers searching for the missing Thursday, according to an AFP reporter at the scene, while community volunteers pitched in with private boats to return to villages still submerged.
New Delhi, Jul 26: The proposal to induct private sector specialists via lateral entry was made not because the bureaucracy was inefficient but to augment manpower availability and to bring in fresh ideas in governance, the government said today.
To a question in Rajya Sabha whether the government had undertaken any survey to ascertain the inefficiency of bureaucracy, Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh said no such survey was undertaken.
“The decision for lateral entry at joint secretary- level is based on the recommendations of the sectoral group of secretaries (SGoS) on governance, in view of the need for bringing in fresh ideas, new approaches to governance and to augment the availability of personnel at JS level and not because of any conclusion that Indian bureaucracy is inefficient,” he said in a written reply.
Singh said the government had decided to recruit talented and motivated Indian nationals willing to contribute towards nation building to join the government at the level of joint secretary on contract.
“The individuals working at comparable levels in private sector companies, consultancy organisations, international/multinational organisations are inter-alia eligible to apply,” the minister said.
Replying to a question on the matter in Lok Sabha yesterday, the government had cited the names of former prime minister Manmohan Singh and the then deputy chairman of Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia as being appointed through the lateral recruitment route.
The term lateral entry relates to appointment of specialists, mainly those from private sector, in government organisations.
On whether this practice had been followed earlier as well, the minister said there was lateral recruitment of some prominent persons to man specific assignments from time to time.
“This includes, among others, appointment of Manmohan Singh, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Vijay Kelkar, Bimal Jalan, Shankar Acharya, Rakesh Mohan, Arvind Virmani, Arvind Panagariya, Arvind Subramanian, Vaidya Rajesh Kotecha, Parameswaran Iyer and Ram Vinay Shahi. No adverse effect on the morale of the civil servants has resulted from lateral recruitments,” Singh had said.
Kelkar was former finance secretary, Jalan was former RBI governor, Mohan was former deputy governor of RBI, and Acharya, Virmani and Subramanian, former chief economic advisers.
Panagriya had been the vice chairman of Niti Ayog (formerly Planning Commission) and Kotecha was secretary in the Ayush Ministry. Iyer, a former IAS officer and sanitation expert, was secretary in the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation. Shahi was former power secretary.
New Delhi, July 26: Outgoing Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian exuded confidence that the highest slab of 28 per cent tax under GST would be “virtually a hollow shell” over the next year or so.
The all powerful GST Council comprising state finance ministers and headed by Union Finance Minister has pruned the highest 28 per cent slab by cutting tax rates on 191 goods over the last one year, including ACs, digital cameras, video recorders, dish-washing machines and automobiles.
There are just 35 items left in the highest tax bracket.
When the 28 per cent tax rate was imposed on certain items under GST, there was a political reaction against it, and the GST Council responded by “really whittling down…quite substantially” the number of products in that slab, Subramanian said in an interview to Rajya Sabha TV’s ‘To The Point’ programme.
“I am very confident that over the next year so that 28 per cent hopefully will be virtually a shell hollow shell,” he said.
The CEA also said that a lot of effort and time was devoted to the simplifying the burden on small and medium enterprises.
To a question regarding lateral entry into government, he said: “I am lateral entrant myself. So how can I argue against that?”
He stressed on the need to get talent from everywhere outside the government or outside the country as well.
“You need specific expertise. I think the lateral entry is a good thing. Govt needs more talent than silicon valley,” said Subramanian, who would be leaving the finance ministry on July 30. He had joined the ministry in October 2014.
Bhubaneswar, Jul 26: More than three lakh people in 20 districts of Odisha have been affected, while at least 20 people died due to heavy rains and flood in the state.
Sources in the Special Relief Commissioner’s (SRC) office said a total of 20 people died during two spells of rains and subsequent floods.
While five people died due to heavy to very rains, 15 others reportedly died in flood-related incidents.
The district administrations are verifying whether the deaths were due to floods, deputy SRC Pravat Ranjan Mohapatra said, adding, that four people were reported to have been killed in Kalahandi district.
A preliminary assessment indicated that 8,286 houses have been partially or fully damaged in the deluge that lasted for around four days, beginning on July 20.
While the first spell of rain continued for two days on July 15 and 16, the second one caused more damage from July 20 to July 23. The maximum damage due to rains and floods was reported on July 21 and July 22, they said.
Special Relief Commissioner (SRC) B P Sethi stated that the district authorities have been asked to complete the assessment of damages to private properties in two weeks and furnish a report for allotment of funds in the affected areas.
The situation has, however, changed for better in the past two days in the rain-affected districts and all people living in relief shelters have left for their houses today, officials said.
Sources in the Meteorological department today said the state recorded just 1.4 mm average rainfall in the past 24 hours.
Karachi/Peshawar, Jul 25 : At least 34 people were killed today, including 31 in a deadly suicide blast outside a polling station in Pakistan’s Quetta city and 36 others injured as several incidents of violence were reported as the country went to polls.
In Pakistan’s restive Balochistan province, a suicide blast targeting a police van killed at least 31 people, including five policemen and two minors outside the polling station, and nearly 30 other were injured in a blast near Quetta’s Eastern Bypass, The Express Tribune reported.
Quetta is the provincial capital of Balochistan province.
A suicide bomber wanted to enter the polling station near Quetta’s Eastern Bypass but failed due to heavy presence of the Frontier Corps and the Police in and outside the polling station, Ejaz Goraya, senior police official, said.
“He than went and detonated close to a police van near the station. I can confirm that the suicide attack has left 31 people dead and around 32 have been shifted to the Civil Hospital,” Goraya said.
The Pakistan Army has stationed over 3,70,000 personnel across the country to ensure security for the election, bolstered by an additional 450,000 police.
DIG Abdul Razzak Cheema’s convoy was attacked. He is reported to be safe, according to sources.
In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa’s Swabi district, supporters of two rival parties exchanged fire outside a polling station, killing a worker of former cricketer Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and injuring two others, police said.
The PTI worker was killed as party activists clashed with Awami National Party (ANP) workers outside a polling station for NA- 19 (Swabi II) and PK-47 (Swabi V) in Nawan Kali area.
Another person was killed in firing outside a Mirpurkhas polling station in NA-219 Dighri area, the report said.
In a separate incident, four people were injured in a cracker blast outside a political camp in Larkana.
Meanwhile, PML-N leader Shahbaz Sharif has condemned the deadly suicide attack in Quetta.
“Heart broken to learn of martyrdom of innocent people including police officials & injuries sustained by others in a terrorist attack in Quetta at a time when the people are exercising their democratic right of vote. My profound condolences to the bereaved families,” he added.
PTI-chief Imran Khan also condemned the terrorist attack.
“Condemnable terrorist attack in Quetta by enemies of Pak seeking to disrupt our democratic process. Saddened by the loss of innocent lives. Pakistanis must defeat the terrorists’ design by coming out in strength to cast their vote,” Khan tweeted.
The attack in the troubled province of Balochistan is the second major attack this month after nearly 150 people were killed and some 200 injured when a suicide bomber attacked an election corner meeting of the Baluchistan Awami Party in Mastung district.
The voting in Pakistan started at 8 AM local time on more than 85,000 polling stations. The counting of votes will be done on the spot soon after the conclusion of the polling process at 6 PM and results will be announced within 24 hours.
More than 30 political parties have fielded their candidates for the elections.
Pakistanis are voting to choose a new government in the second democratic transition of power in the nation’s 70-year history amid accusations of manipulation by the powerful army and concerns over the participation of Islamic hardliners in large numbers.
Mumbai: More than 20 Indian lenders on Monday signed a pact aimed at faster resolution of bad loans, officials said, while more could join by the end of the week in what is the latest bid to cut record levels of soured assets in Asia’s third-biggest economy.
A government-appointed panel this month proposed the so-called inter-creditor agreement among other measures after criticism that at times smaller lenders in a lending consortium were creating roadblocks for speedier resolution.
The agreement gives a bigger say to the lead lender in a consortium and allows a resolution plan to be approved if 66 percent of the banks in the group agree to it. Dissenting lenders have the option to sell their stressed loans to a company at a discount, or buy out loans to that entity from all other lenders at a premium.
“The objective is to use this inter-creditor agreement for faster facilitation of the stressed assets resolution,” said Sunil Mehta, the non-executive chairman of second-biggest state-run lender Punjab National Bank, who also headed the panel.
“One of the major issues was consensus among lending banks on what should have been a common resolution plan.”
Top lender State Bank of India was among banks which signed the agreement.
India’s banks had 12.5 percent of their total loans categorised as non-performing or restructured at the end of March, according to central bank data.