Refusing to accept the state government’s “paltry” `2,000-crore aid package, some farmers in Maharashtra’s Vidarbha region have threatened to donate the amount, averaging `1,700 per head, to Maoists active in the state’s eastern districts, an activist said here on Sunday.
The decision was taken Saturday, December 17, by nearly 20,000 farmers of five villages in the Arni sub-district of Yavatmal, around 175 km from here. Yavatmal is notorious for being the country’s worst suicide-hit farmland district.
“The villagers of Bellora, Mangrul, Sakur, Borgosavi and Brahmanwada have formed an action committee and an unanimous decision was taken on the issue. Whenever we get this `1,700 aid, we shall donate it to the Maoists,” Raju Raut, the committee’s representative from Bellora said.
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Sino-indo war: no record nehru asked israel help
New Delhi, Dec. 18: The external affairs ministry has said it has no records of any “purported” letter written in 1962 by then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to his Israeli counterpart David Ben Gurion seeking help during the Sino-India war.
Responding to an RTI application filed by activist Subhash Agrawal, the MEA said diplomatic relations with Israel were established only in 1992 and therefore the ministry has no information on the same.
The issue had come before the Central Information Commission following an appeal filed by Mr Agrawal, who demanded a copy of the letter along with the file notings which went into drafting it.
Information commissioner Shailesh Gandhi agreed with the response given by the external affairs ministry saying since “information sought is not available and hence cannot be provided”. — PTI