Three AIIMS doctors killed in accident on Yamuna Expressway near Mathura

AGRA: Two people were killed in a road accident on Yamuna Expressway early on Tuesday morning. The victims Dharmendar Singh and Vijendar residents of Lukhriya village in Kannauj district worked as drivers of an ambulance owned by a private hospital. They were heading to Noida from Agra when their vehicle hit the rear of a trailer truck carrying a defunct electric pole. According to officials the accident took place around 5.30 am near milestone number 75 at Palkheda village http://programmermeetdesigner.com/user/profile/kkdigital/ under Naujheel police jurisdiction in Mathura district. Station in-charge of Naujheel Durgesh Kumar said It seems that Dharmendar who was driving the ambulance fell asleep and the speeding vehicle rammed into the truck. The victims were rushed to a nearby hospital but doctors there declared them brought dead. The bodies have been sent for postmortem and will be handed over to their families Kumar added. Police said that at the time of the accident the truck was being driven in the third lane. The impact of the accident was such that the front of the ambulance was torn apart. The rescuers took 20 minutes to pull out the two victims.
GREATER NOIDA: Commuters breaking the speed limit along the 165km-long stretch of Yamuna expressway will no longer get away scot-free. The concessionaire of the expressway has been directed by Yeida to integrate a traffic violation challan system which will issue a traffic violation detail included in the toll fee slip. In case a commuter violates a traffic rule the violation slip will be handed over to her/him at the next toll plaza before he exits the expressway. The expressway sees nearly 4 500 violations daily. Most of these challans remain pending as the traffic police are unable to get them received by the offender. According to officials about 4 lakh challans are pending till date and are yet to be served to errant motorists. The latest move comes following a meeting convened by Yeida CEO Arun Vir Singh SP (traffic) AK Jha and concessionaire of expressway Jaypee group on Wednesday. According to Yeida officials the system will be implemented with effect from March 10 2018. We have directed the concessionaire to have the system in place by the stipulated time Singh told TOI. The aim is to enforce traffic norms and deter commuters from speeding. Inability to serve the challans has led to a lack of enforcement by the traffic police he explained. The aim is to deter speeding by motorists and thereby to lessen the accidents on the high-speed stretch he added. Officials of the concessionaire said they will comply with the directions of YEIDA. We hope motorists will comply with the traffic norms and drive according to speed limits an official said. We see daily violations of speed limits totalling about 4 500. Details of these are shared with respective state RTOs every day. We hope the new integrated system will help us in further deterring speeding he added.
GREATER NOIDA: Nearly three weeks after the Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (YEIDA) issued notices to eight builders for allegedly diverting Rs 840 crore meant for completing housing units in its area the authority has ordered action against at least two builders. While one of the builders has been directed not to sell any http://www.divephotoguide.com/user/d4int/ more units in its project another builder s temporary completion certificate has been cancelled. Both builders together have alleged to have diverted funds to the tune of Rs 355 crore. The move follows audit of accounts of 28 builder projects involving nearly 13 000 flats and plots in YEIDA. YEIDA chairman Prabhat Kumar who is also the divisional commissioner on Monday said they would soon issue a notice for cancellation of the project by SDS Infracon Pvt Ltd in Sector 26A of YEIDA. We had given the builder six months to complete the project after taking nod from the YEIDA board which has not been done said Arun Vir Singh CEO YEIDA. Both builders could not be contacted despite repeated attempts.

Disillusioned, divided cadre behind BJP bypoll loss

NEW DELHI: Though BJP leaders tried to play down the defeat in Gorakhpur and Phulpur bypolls many accept that it has come as a huge embarrassment and the reason for the loss is not just the SP-BSP tie-up but a host of factors including intraparty equations that have led to this outcome. The Brahmin-Thakur rivalry in the Gorakhpur region unit of BJP is said to be a big reason for the party not fighting the bypoll unitedly. While the candidate Upendra Shukla was chosen by the central leadership the onus of ensuring his victory was on both Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and the other faction. The CM held almost two dozen rallies in the constituency but the party cadre did not participate actively in these campaigns. Sources said since BJP chief Amit Shah and his core team were not involved in the campaign the workers at the state and the constituency levels took it easy. Over confidence and complacency seem to have played a key role in the defeat. The low turnout in both the constituencies was the first indication for BJP leaders that it has done badly in the elections. The party has done badly even in the urban assembly segments which are a stronghold of the BJP. The BJP workers had high expectations but are now getting somewhat disillusioned as the ministers in the UP government are not accessible and their grievances are not addressed a party office bearer said. Though Yogi Adityanath has announced several sops for his Lok Sabha constituency over the last one year his failure to ensure victory on his turf has been a bigger embarrassment for him. He accepted that local factors were responsible for the disappointing outcome which has been read by the party as an indication of the party office-bearers working at cross https://able2know.org/user/kkarf/ purpose during the campaign. The party is now concerned about cadre disenchantment costing it dear in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The SP-BSP tie-up (with Congress also likely to join in) would mean consolidation of around 45-50% of the votes. In a threecornered contest a candidate needs only around 30%votes to win. With the opposition having drawn lessons from the 2014 elections it is unlikely that it will play into the hands of the BJP. It would suit the opposition to take the elections to the caste equation and not let BJP polarise it. BJP will have to take the outcome seriously and not dismiss it as a mere defeat in a bypoll that would have no bearing on the Lok Sabha seats in UP.
Mumbai: The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party s tally may drop by 100-110 seats in the next Lok Sabha polls in 2019 if the current trends and the results of the recent bypolls are an indicator its ally Shiv Sena said in a gloomy prediction on Friday. The twin wins by the Samajwadi Party in BJP bastions like Gorakhpur and Phulpur has created panic in the BJP camp even as they were busy celebrating the party s victory in a small state like Tripura last week the Sena said in a tough edit in the party mouthpieces Saamana (Marathi) and Dopahar Ka Saamana (Hindi).Though the BJP claims that by-elections do not reflect the mood of the country ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi took over the party has lost nearly nine seats in Lok Sabha by-polls slashing its tally from 282 to around 272 - the half-way mark in the 543-strong Lower House the editorial said. It was barely a year ago that the BJP won the Uttar Pradesh assembly polls creating a record by winning 325 seats. The saffron-clad Yogi Adityanath who has never lost the Gorakhpur seat since 1991 became the state Chief Minister. So despite the huge popularity they enjoyed why was their citadel shattered the Sena wondered.It could be said that in 2014 there was a huge wave of popularity and water had blocked the eyes and ears of the masses leading to BJP s victory but now the wave has receded and people can see everything clearly the edit said.The BJP is now blaming poor voter turnout lack of enthusiasm or a deal between the Samajwadi Party with Bahujan Samaj Party for its rout in the two critical seats in Uttar Pradesh. Since 2014 how many deals has the BJP entered into for power... What about Naresh Agrawal who was inducted in BJP with such fanfare? In Tripura the BJP could win only after the entire Congress and Trinamool Congress merged with it the Sena pointed out.Referring to the polls the Sena said the SP candidates secured big margins in both Gorakhpur and Phulpur indicating that the people went out of the way to defeat the BJP in both seats which were won with huge margins of two-three lakh votes in 2014.On the winning spree of the Rashtriya Janata Dal in Bihar s Jehanabad and Araria the Sena said some BJP leaders were living in a fool s paradise as they attributed it to a sympathy wave for the jailed RJD President Lalu Prasad Yadav. Comments Lalu is in jail for corruption... and that could be a politics of vendetta. Despite that if he can get sympathy then it s a big blow to both Nitish Kumar and Modi... The outcome has thrown down the BJP from the sky to the ground the Sena said. Amidst all this it is clear now that in 2019 the BJP s numbers will not be 280 but it will plummet by at least 100-110 seats. The elections are not being fought in Russia America Canada France or Israel but in India. So they (BJP) should keep their feet on the ground here the Sena warned.
ALSO READ We ve waited enough: AP IT minister on alliance with BJP Andhra Congress approaches CEC against BJP TDP TDP decides to pull out of Narendra Modi government Even partial opposition unity enough to beat BJP: Sharad BJP stages walkout from K taka assembly over CM s remarks span.p-content div id = div-gpt line-height:0;font-size:0 The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday asserted that the party was ready to do more than just give special status to Andhra Pradesh.The BJP s statement comes a day after Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu pulled out Telugu Desam Party (TDP) from the NDA alliance. We will explain to the people of Andhra Pradesh the things that we have done for them in last four years and things we will do. We are ready to do more than the special status BJP National General Secretary Ram Madhav told reporters. We will pass a resolution in which we will explain to the people of Andhra Pradesh our stand on the issue raised by Andhra chief minister. We are as much committed to the people as him. We have done so much in the last four years Madhav added.On being questioned if TDP would come back to the NDA Madhav stated that You will have to ask that to the Telugu Desam Party. Madhav was speaking to media here after the meeting of Andhra leaders with BJP president Amit Shah.The meeting was held a day after TDP quit the alliance and initiated a motion of no-confidence against the NDA-led government in the Parliament.The tensions between the two parties have been brewing over non-issuance of the special category status to the state.Finance Minister Arun Jaitley yesterday said the Centre was committed on giving Andhra Pradesh a special package equivalent to a special category state and that it had been endlessly waiting for the state government to revert on a mechanism of receiving it.(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
NEW DELHI: The victory of regional parties in the recent bypolls in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar has rung alarm bells for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). However it isn t a very good news for the Congress either. Though the party cheered the defeat of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) hopeful of the NDA slowly losing ground before the next Lok Sabha elections the results bring little for it to celebrate. The surprise sweep by the alliance between Samajwadi Party (SP) and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in Gorakhpur and Phulpur bypolls no doubt indicates viability of a joint front of opposition parties against the NDA. The Congress has already been trying to cobble up such a front. A day before the results United Progressive Alliance (UPA) chairperson Sonia Gandhi hosted leaders of 20 opposition parties to mull over a joint front against the BJP in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections next year. But the dismal showing by the Congress and resurgence of regional parties in these elections will increase bargaining power of these parties in a joint front. The revival of regional parties means the Congress will lose its predominant position in the opposition space. The results will boost confidence of the SP BSP and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). These parties will set their own terms for the joint front. The Congress has projected its president Rahul Gandhi as an alternative to Prime Minister Narendra Modi with some success. Rahul emerged as a serious challenger in the Gujarat assembly elections in which the BJP saw erosion of its voter base. The Congress would want other opposition leaders to defer to Rahul in a joint alliance. However encouraged by the bypoll results Akhilesh Yadav Mayawati and Tejaswi Yadav may not allow projection of Rahul as the prime-ministerial candidate. Nor will an ambitious Mamata Banerjee like that prospect. The Gujarat elections had boosted Rahul s image and he was expected to be a dominant leader of an opposition alliance. With the resurgence of regional parties Rahul may get reduced to being just one of the many opposition leaders in a joint front against NDA. Telangana Rashtra Samithi head K Chandrashekhar Rao and Mamata Banerjee have even talked about a non-Congress front of opposition parties against the NDA indicating that these leaders do not want to play a second fiddle to the Congress. Even if the Congress is able to cobble up an opposition alliance it can no longer expect to be the chief arbiter. Assertive regional parties will not just set the terms of a joint front with the Congress but will also have more bargaining power for seat-sharing arrangements with it. If the opposition front defeats the ruling NDA in the next Lok Sabha elections and the Congress wins fewer seats than main opposition parties such as the BSP SP or Trinamool Congress Rahul Gandhi s dream of becoming the prime minister might get deferred indefinitely. That prize can go to the largest opposition party. The victory of SP-BSP alliance and the RJD has come just when Rahul s projection as the main opposition leader was steadily growing through his public speeches and statements on social media. That exercise boosted by the Congress performance in the Gujarat elections may now run out of steam.
The BJP is pulling out all the stops to deny Mayawati s Bahujan Samaj Party a seat in the Rajya Sabha turning the upcoming elections in Uttar Pradesh into a big political battle reminiscent of the Rajya Sabha election of Congress leader Ahmed Patel from Gujarat last year. With 324 MLAs of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance and 37 needed to win one seat the party can secure eight Rajya Sabha seats from the state with 28 votes to spare. However UP BJP spokesman Rakesh Tripathi said the BJP is extremely determined to win the ninth Rajya Sabha seat . UP BJP spokesman Chandra Mohan said MLAs across party lines will vote for development and considering people s mood for BJP. The BJP s strategy involves bringing all three independent MLAs on its side including Raja Bhaiyya (a known adversary of Mayawati) and Amanmani Tripathi opening talks with Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Yadav and his loyal MLAs to ensure they don t vote for the BSP and getting an MLA of the NISHAD party and one of Rashtriya Lok Dal parties which backed SP or BSP during the recent bypolls on its side as well. All three independents Shivpal Yadav some SP MLAs and the NISHAD MLA had voted for the BJP during last year s presidential polls. Instead of 324 votes of the NDA MLAs Ram Nath Kovind had got 335 votes due to the cross-voting. The same is expected to be the case in the ninth seat of the Rajya Sabha polls too a senior BJP functionary in the state told ET on condition of anonymity. He said this strategy is expected to ensure that the BSP candidate Bhimrao Ambedkar will stop short of getting 37 MLA votes that would guarantee him a Rajya Sabha seat. He is presently at 36 MLA votes after the son of Naresh Agarwal an SP MLA yesterday (Monday) decided to vote for our candidate. The count will go down further as voting day nears. Second preference votes will then come into the picture and our candidate will sail through the senior BJP functionary said. SP can get its candidate Jaya Bachchan elected with 37 out of its 47 MLAs and shift 10 of its votes to the BSP which has 19 MLAs. The Congress has also pledged support of its seven MLAs to the BSP. That will take the BSP tally to 36 votes and it is expected to get the vote of the RLD MLA as well to sail through with a figure of 37. But on Monday SP leader Naresh Agarwal joined the BJP and his son an SP MLA declared he would vote for the BJP bringing down the BSP figure to 36. Vijay Mishra the Nishad MLA will vote for BJP so will the three independents. The RLD MLA from Chaprauli may also shift to the BJP camp a BJP leader said. Tripathi said that the SP MLAs of the Shivpal Yadav camp might also vote for the BJP. BSP votes did not get transferred to the SP during the bypolls and the results will show that on March 14. SP MLAs enthusiasm to vote for the BSP will hence wane while voting for Rajya Sabha seats. SP would also like to keep some spare votes for its candidate Jaya Bachchan and not transfer all its nine spare MLA votes to the BSP he said.
In a blow to the Opposition in Uttar Pradesh senior Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Naresh Agarwal joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Agarwal addressed a press conference on Monday along with Union minister Piyush Goyal and announced his entry into the BJP. Agarwal in his address to media persons said he is influenced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath. India is on the path to development under Narendra Modi he added. His son Nitin has also joined the BJP. File image of Naresh Agarwal. PTI Speaking about the SP Agarwal said that the party has lost its way in recent times. He also added I have no preconditions for joining the BJP. Please do not say that I am joining the party as I am hopeful of a Rajya Sabha seat or something of that nature. Piyush Goyal said that under the chief ministership of Yogi Adityanath Uttar Pradesh has seen a new era of development. The BJP has emerged as the only alternative for the people and the party is changing the face of the country. I held discussions with Agarwal about his joining the BJP and so did (party president) Amit Shah. Last week the SP named Jaya Bachchan as its Rajya Sabha nominee overlooking Agarwal according to a report in Financial Express. In January 2017 Agarwal refuted reports of his joining the BJP alleging that the party was spreading rumours due to its fear of losing voters among traders as per a PTI report carried by Economic Times Before the 2014 Lok Sabha elections Agarwal in a controversial dig at Narendra Modi said that someone who had worked at a tea shop can never have a national perspective The Times of India reported.
NEW DELHI: The stellar performance of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the recent state elections in Tripura Nagaland and Meghalaya is a landmark for a party which had little traction in the region except in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. The party never had any significant connect with the masses and was seen as an outsider. What changed the situation? BJP president Amit Shah in his first press conference after the results credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi s Act East policy for the upsurge in fortunes. Modi s Act East policy included a big push for road and railway infrastructure and various steps to boost the regional economy. While most of the infrastructural projects are at various stages of completion Modi s northeast agenda created a rhetoric of inclusiveness that helped bring the masses closer to the BJP. Below are a few important initiatives by the Modi government that may have made the BJP acceptable to the northeast voters: The railways push Before a metre-gauge line started in 2008 Tripura didn t have any railway link with the rest of the country. The Modi government converted it into broad gauge. All over the region the government has converted 900 km of tracks to broad gauge. It also launched a Rajdhani Express and the Tripura Sundari Express between Agartala and Delhi. In 2016 then railways minister Suresh Prabhu laid the foundation stone for the Rs 2 315 crore 88-km Dhansiri-Kohima railway track connecting Kohima to the national railway network. The government also began railway projects to connect Imphal Aizawl and Shillong. It has introduced more than two dozen new trains in the region. It also signed a deal with Bangladesh to develop a rail link between Tripura and Chittagong which would speed up flow of products especially grains to the region. Roads and highways Modi has branded his policy to build infrastructure in northeast as Transformation by Transportation . Lack of connectivity has been a major roadblock in the economic progress on the region. Modi s promise of connectivity resonates with the masses. More than 3 800 km of national highways with an investment of Rs. 32 000 crore have been sanctioned in the region in the past three years while nearly 1 200 km of roads have been constructed according to the government. In a public announcement in December last year Modi said the centre would invest another Rs. 60 000 crore under the Special Accelerated Road Development Programme in the northeast and Rs. 30 000 crore under the Bharatmala project over three years. Modi also dedicated to the nation a 271-km two-lane national highway connecting Tura in western Meghalaya to the state capital Shillong last year. Air connectivity The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has allocated Rs 3 400 crore for the upgradation of airports in the North East region. According to the government projects worth Rs 934 crore have already been completed while the rest would be over in the next two or three years. The aviation projects in the northeast include re-carpeting of the runway at Silchar and Lilabari airport and an aviation manpower training institute; development of Rupsi airport; a new integrated airport and an engineering workshop at Agartala; expansion and revamp of existing terminal building and runway at Dimapur; installation of an instrument landing system (ILS) at the Shillong airport; and operationalisation and development of the Tura airport. Other projects and policies Last year Modi dedicated the 60-MW Tuirial hydropower power project which made Mizoram the third power-surplus state in the northeast to Sikkim and Tripura. The project is expected to produce 251 million units of electricity annually. Announced in 1998 by the then Atal Bihari Vajpayee government it was the first major central government project to be successfully commissioned in Mizoram. Recently the government decided to fully fund various Central projects being implemented in the northeast instead of the previous practice of sharing 90 per cent of the cost. The Modi government has also made the 1360-km long India-Myanmar-Thailand trilateral highway which is to be completed in 2020 a centerpiece of its Act East policy. Opening the northeast to the ASEAN countries the highway will boost the regional economy. In Budget 2018-19 the government re-classified bamboo from tree to grass which would enable easier cultivation for commercial purposes. Bamboo is central to the rural economy of the northeast. Its classification as tree meant various restrictions on its produce transport and sale.
.story-content span .story-content p .story-content div color:#000!important;font-family: open sans Arial!important;font-size:15px!important ALSO READ East turns Right? 10 takeaways of Tripura Meghalaya Nagaland poll results Poll Results LIVE: Hung Assembly in Meghalaya Cong single largest party Meghalaya saves Congress the blushes party may now try political courtship Northeast Assembly election results 2018: BJP read the tea leaves right span.p-content div id = div-gpt line-height:0;font-size:0 The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday expanded its footprint further in India s ethnically and religiously diverse Northeast by ousting the Left Front government in Tripura and was on its way to forming a coalition government in Nagaland. But Meghalaya threw up a hung Assembly with the incumbent Congress emerging as the single-largest party. With the BJP s improved performance in the Northeast it now runs governments in Manipur and Assam as well the Narendra Modi government will now need to face the challenge of delivering on the contentious Naga Accord. In Nagaland the BJP had contested the polls with the Neiphiu Rio-led Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP). On its own the BJP won a creditable 11 seats and 14.6 per cent if the votes. With its ally NDPP winning 15 seats the alliance fell short of the halfway mark. However Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju said his party would form a coalition government with the Naga Peoples Front which won 27 seats four short of a majority in the 60-member Assembly. In Meghalaya the incumbent Congress won 21 seats. The National People s Party a BJP ally won 19 and the BJP won 2. The BJP improved its vote share to 9.6 per cent. However Congress leaders Kamal Nath and Ahmed Patel landed in Shillong to reach out to smaller parties to explore the possibility of forming the government and prevent a repeat of Goa and Manipur where the party had emerged the single-largest party but was beaten by a fleet-footed BJP in government formation. Until 2016 the BJP never had a government in any of the northeastern states. Efficient election management and electoral tie-ups made the BJP win the Assam Assembly polls in 2016. By the end of that year behind-the-scenes work helped it form the government in Arunachal Pradesh. While the Congress emerged the single-largest party in Manipur in the 2017 Assembly polls the BJP had reached out to smaller parties to form the government in that state. As the results trickled in on Saturday the Tripura verdict brought much cheer to the BJP leadership. It had defeated its ideological enemy the CPI (M) which has won elections successively in the state since 1993. The Congress vote share collapsed from 36.53 per cent in 2013 to 1.8 per cent. The alliance of the BJP and Indigenous People s Front of Tripura (IPFT) was on course to win 43 of the 60 seats. The BJP along with its allies will now have governments in 21 states. But a jubilant party chief Amit Shah said the BJP s golden era would be when its wrested West Bengal http://www.threadsmagazine.com/profile/d4ints Odisha and Karnataka from rival parties. The Karnataka Assembly polls are scheduled for April-May. Aware that the BJP and its ally the National People s Party might struggle to cobble a coalition Shah ruled out the possibility of his party engaging in horse-trading in Meghalaya. Where is the question of tod-phod (horse-trading). The Congress does not have a majority there he said. Shah said the wins were an endorsement of Prime Minister Narendra Modi s leadership. Assam minister and BJP leader Himanta Biswa Sarma said Tripura s outgoing chief minister Manik Sarkar could take shelter in West Bengal Kerala or neighbouring Bangladesh. In a statement the CPI (M) said the BJP utilised massive deployment of money and other resources to influence the elections . It said the BJP was able to consolidate all the anti-Left votes and virtually appropriated the erstwhile main opposition party the Congress. The CPI (M) politburo thanked the 45 per cent of Tripura voters who voted for the Left parties. The defeat for the CPI (M) comes at a time of an internal battle between former party chief Prakash Karat and current chief Sitaram Yechury. The party conclave in Hyderabad in the later part of April is set to discuss the party s attitude towards electoral understandings with other secular democratic parties for the Lok Sabha polls. The BJP s wins in the Northeast tie well with its plans to compensate any losses it might suffer in northern India by winning seats in some of its electorally weaker areas.