GUWAHATI, July 24

Dhananjay Mahapatra TIMES NEWS NETWORK

New Delhi: A day after it won the trust vote, the UPA government on Tuesday acquiesced in the DMK's position in the Sethusamudram case to a question in the Supreme Court about the existence of Ram Sethu by citing the scriptures and Puranas.

GANDHINAGAR: Four years after it was launched, the state government has got a "post-feasibility study" of the controversial Sujalam Sufalam project prepared to silence its critics. Prepared jointly by the Institute of Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Bangalore and Water Resources Engineering and Management Institute (WREMI), Vadodara, it comes even as a Planning Commission document on the 11th Five-Year Plan (2007-12) refuses to include it in the list of projects it has approved.

A high-power committee to be set up for the same

NEW DELHI: The Union Government is evolving out-of-the-box rehabilitation packages for people displaced on account of new hydel projects in the country.

This was stated by Union Power Secretary Anil Razdan at the conclusion of a State Power Secretaries' Conference organised by the PHD Chamber on Tuesday.

Mr. Razdan said the Government was seriously considering evolving a viable and friendly rehabilitation package for people who had been displaced because of the upcoming hydel projects.

Dehra Dun: The Uttarakhand Government on Monday decided to handover 35-year-old hydro power projects to private companies in order to renovate and modernise them.As many as, 19 power projects which are still generating power and four closed ones are being given to private players on a PPP model, Chief Secretary S. K. Das told reporters here after a Cabinet meet.

Bs Reporter / Mumbai July 22, 2008, 0:12 IST

Tata Power Company (TPC) has agreed to pick up a 26 per cent stake in the Royal Government of Bhutan (RGoB) promoted 114 mw hydro electric power project over river Dagachhu through Druk Green Power Corporation (DGPC).

The project will be executed by a special purpose vehicle Dagachhu Hydro Power Corporation (DHPC). "This partnership consists of equity participation and off-take of power by the company and Tata Power Trading Company," said Prasad R Menon, managing director, Tata Power.

The farmers of Khairpur Gamboh sub-division of Naseer Canal on Monday threatened to besiege the offices of senior officials of Irrigation Department if water was not released immediately into the channels of their area.

Tando Jan Mohammad union council nazim Mir Zafarullah Talpur, former nazim of Digri taluka Kazi Fazlullah and others said at a news conference at the press club that water had not been released for past six months into the 16 water channels of Khairpur Gamboh, the largest sub-division of Rohri Canal, which irrigated more than 400,000 acres of land.

Despite increased flow in River Indus, several waterways of Sindh are still facing water shortage, leading to protests by farmers in different parts of the province.

Growers took out a rally and held a demonstration in Nawabshah on Monday to protest against acute water shortage in Dholu Minor canal. The rally started from Daur town and terminated at the Nawabshah Press Club. Growers carrying banners and placards raised slogans against the Irrigation Department.

Sindh Home Minister Dr Zulfiqar Ali Mirza on Monday warned the officials of irrigation department of severe action if they failed to supply water to the tail-end of all the canals of Badin district within a week.

The minister said at a meeting with irrigation and revenue officers at Darbar Hall that the negligence of irrigation officials had caused water shortage in tail-end areas.

He said that the irrigation officials who still harboured sympathies with former rulers had created artificial scarcity of water in the district. They would not be spared, he warned.

TINSUKIA, July 21