US Ambassador to India Nancy Powell resigns

April 1, 2014

New Delhi, Apr 1: US ambassador to India Nancy Powell has resigned and will return to the United States, an embassy statement said on Monday, following a diplomatic row that strained relations between the world's biggest democracies.

"US Ambassador to India Nancy J Powell announced in a US Mission Town Hall meeting March 31 that she has submitted her resignation to President Obama and, as planned for some time, will retire to her home in Delaware before the end of May," an announcement in the US Embassy website said tonight.

Nancy_Powell_resigns There was media speculation a week ago that Ms Powell would be replaced with a political appointment by the Obama administration. The report had said Ms Powell had dragged her heels on meeting Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and was perceived as being "too close" to the UPA's foreign policy establishment.

However, when Washington decided to warm upto Mr Modi, perceived as one of the frontrunners for the Prime Minister's post, Ms Powell met Mr Modi on February 13, ending a nine-year-old boycott of the Gujarat leader on the issue of 2002 riots. The US move marked a U-turn in its earlier stand of having nothing to do with Mr Modi, whose visa it cancelled in 2005.

The US embassy statement did not give a reason why Ambassador Nancy Powell had resigned, saying only that she would retire from the foreign service after a 37 year career. Embassy sources did not want to hazard a guess on the decision of the 67-year-old career service officer to quit her post at a time when India is in an election process and Washington is also deeply interested in its outcome.

The Obama Administration, however, refuted reports that Ms Powell has resigned because of differences with it and instead said she is ending a distinguished thirty-seven year career. "Not any truth to your question about differences - she is retiring after 37 years of service," State Department Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf.

"She (Powell) is ending a distinguished thirty-seven year career that has included postings as US Ambassador to Uganda, Ghana, Pakistan, Nepal and India as well as service in Canada, Togo, Bangladesh, and Washington, where she was most recently Director General of the Foreign Service," Ms Harf added.

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17-yr-old Jammu boy Ashfaq Mehmood develops file-sharing app after ban on Chinese apps

Agencies

August 3,2020

Rajouri, Aug 3: Ashfaq Mehmood Choudhary, a 17-year-old boy from Chattyear of Jammu and Kashmir's Rajouri district, has developed a file-sharing app 'Dodo Drop' which would enable users to share audios, videos, images, and texts between two devices without Internet access.

While speaking to media persons, Ashfaq Mehmood said that the 'Dodo Drop' application is an alternative to the Chinese 'SHAREit' app. "The Indian government has banned several Chinese apps due to data breaching, and among those apps was SHAREit which was used for sharing files.

Users faced a lot of problems due to the ban, and so I decided to make this file-sharing app. With 'Dodo Drop', users can share audios, videos, images, and even texts," he said.

Ashfaq said that it took him four weeks to develop the application, and it was launched on August 1 this year. The 'Dodo Drop' application has a transfer rate of up to 480 mbps, which is faster than the SHAREit app and is "quite easy" to use.

"Users can transfer data comprising photos, videos, audios, apps, texts, etc. between two devices with no Internet access. The transfers are fully encrypted and secure," he added.

"Our Prime Minister has always asserted the need for decreasing the dependency on foreign products and apps and to focus on the development of India-based apps. I tried to be part of the initiative of 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' by developing an India-based file-sharing app. I want to develop global-standard apps for India," he added.

"We support and cooperate with him. He generates his own income by working on some projects and utilises it. We will continue to support him," said Parvez Ahmed Choudhary, Ashfaq's father.

In July, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) banned 47 apps, which were variants and cloned copies of the 59 apps banned earlier in June. These banned clones included SHAREit Lite, Tiktok Lite, Helo Lite, BIGO LIVE Lite, and VFY Lite.

The 59 apps had been banned by the Centre in June in view of the information available that they were engaged in activities which were "prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity and defence" of the country.

Almost all the apps banned had some preferential Chinese interest and the majority had parent Chinese companies.

The ban came amid border tensions with China in the Eastern Ladakh region.

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Rajasthan Assembly passes resolution against CAA

Agencies

January 26,2020

Jaipur, Jan 26: Rajasthan on Saturday on Saturday became the third state in the country to pass a resolution urging the Centre to repeal the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).

he resolution was passed in the state Assembly amid opposition by the BJP which accused the ruling Congress of pursuing appeasement politics.

It is the second Congress-ruled state to pass such a resolution after Punjab. The Kerala Assembly too had passed such a resolution against the CAA moved jointly by the ruling Left Front alliance and the opposition Congress-led UDF.

The Rajasthan Assembly resolution, passed by voice vote, also asked the Centre to withdraw the new fields of information that have been sought for updation of the National Population Register (NPR) 2020.

"It is evident that the CAA violates the provisions of the Constitution. Therefore, the House resolves to urge upon the government of India to repeal the CAA to avoid any discrimination on the basis of religion in granting citizenship and to ensure equality before law for all religious groups of India," the state's parliamentary affairs minister Shanti Dhariwal said, moving the resolution.

Leader of the opposition Gulab Chand Kataria of the BJP questioned the state's right to challenge the Act.

"Granting citizenship is a matter for the Centre. In such a situation do we have the right to challenge the CAA? The Congress should stop doing appeasement and vote bank politics," he said.

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Salute to Rajasthan Govt for rejecting communal and black CAA bill. This bill is agaisnt the teach of our Constitution and bjp has never done anything as per our constitutin. Its trying its best to scrap the constitution and restore it with RSS agenda. We should oppose any move by bjp against the value of constitution. As bjp has no respect to our constitution, it has no right to be in power. Many of bjp leaders are giving statemetns against the value of constitution and such leaders should be treated as anti indians and action be taken on them.

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Kerala CM wants Centre to press Nepal for probe on death of Malayali tourists

Agencies

January 25,2020

Thiruvananthapuram, Jan 25: Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Friday asked the state's MPs to take up the matter of deaths of eight Keralites at a resort in Nepal early this week, with the Centre to pursue the matter with the neighbouring country's government.

He was speaking to the MPs at the customary meeting that the Chief Minister has with all MPs ahead of every session of the parliament.

"The demand has come from the families of the victims for a fair probe on what happened and adequate compensation. For this, you (MPs) should take it up with the Centre. A probe has to be done by the Nepal authorities and the Centre should pursue this with them," Pinarayi reportedly stated.

"We (the state government) have already taken the issue with the Centre and will now send a detailed letter on the need for a fair probe by the Nepal authorities," he added.

The eight dead include Praveen Krishnan Nair, who worked in the UAE and was on a short vacation here, when the tragedy struck the family. His wife Saranya, a second year M.Pharma student, and their three children, were also killed.

On Friday morning, it was a goodbye that Thiruvananthapuram has perhaps not seen before, as hundreds of people, many of them strangers, came to pay last respects to the five members of the Nair family.

The family of Praveen Nair decided to bury the bodies of the three children and cremate the bodies of Praveen and Saranya. It was also decided to bury the ashes of the couple alongside their three children in the compound of their house.

The second family hailed from Kozhikode and the bodies of Ranjith, an IT professional, his wife, who works in a cooperative bank and their younger child, who slept in the same room as that of Praveen, arrived at the Kozhikode airport on Friday morning.

State Transport Minister A.K. Saseendran and many others were there to receive the bodies, which were first taken to Ranjith's new home that is almost complete.

From there it was taken to a hall for all to pay their last respects and then to the family home of Ranjith where the cremation took place.

Watching everything happening was Ranjith's elder son, seven-year-old Madhav, who escaped that night in Nepal as he was sleeping in another room.

Madhav had arrived from Delhi on Thursday and was unaware of the tragedy as he was busy moving around in a new bicycle, which his relatives had bought to keep him busy.

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