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"What has happened in Parliament is unethical. I bow my head in shame. Lot of immoral things were done to secure votes," Banerjee told newspersons after the United Progressive Alliance government won the trust vote in the Lok Sabha.

Mamata, the sole Lok Sabha member from Trinamool, did not take part in the two-day special session convened for the confidence motion, and stayed rooted in Kolkata.

"What has happened in Parliament is unethical. I bow my head in shame. Lot of immoral things were done to secure votes," Banerjee told newspersons after the United Progressive Alliance government won the trust vote in the Lok Sabha.

Mamata, the sole Lok Sabha member from Trinamool, did not take part in the two-day special session convened for the confidence motion, and stayed rooted in Kolkata.

Images: MPs flash bribe money

She said the UPA could remain in power for the next six months, but it would be proper for the government to go for elections immediately.

She criticised Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee for "clinging" to his post.

"Why did he stick to his post? He should have resigned earlier," she said.

With the latest addition, the number of judges at the High Court will rise to 58.

The minister also said the government was going to appoint 73 new judges to the district and sub-divisional courts.

He added that the state government had asked the Centre to set up a National Judicial Commission on the lines of the National Vigilance Commission.

In his reply to the debate on the budget of the fisheries department, the minister in-charge Kiranmoy Nanda told the house that this season there would be less hilsa in the market, as shoals of hilsa that comes to Hooghly river or in the Bay of Bengal near Digha has this time gone to Myanmar. "It's a natural phenomenon. We can't do anything in this regard," the minister said.

He said importing fish from Bangladesh would be difficult as the country was charging Rs 1,000 per piece of hilsa.

Though the KMC has marked some portions of the market including the vegetable, fish and potato market as unsafe, repair work is yet to be carried out.

The KMC has withheld the revamping of the SS Hogg market after the stalemate over the Park Circus Market development project that got tangled due to the rehabilitation issues of the local hawkers.

"Earlier, we were told that the market will be revamped since the civic body has declared several of its portions unsafe that can collapse any time," said Pradip Charaborty, general secretary, SS Hogg Market Shopkeepers' Welfare Association.

Notably, the civic body earns huge revenue from the market but no repair work has been carried out in the complex for decades.

"The Hogg market generates nearly Rs 6 crore per year as revenue, hence this market is very important for the civic body. Besides, the market is a heritage building owned by the KMC," said a senior official of the KMC.

It goes like this. A Rs 10,000 subsidy for each auto driver, Rs 8,000 to be procured against the scrap value of old autos, a down payment of Rs 12,000 and a soft loan of Rs 96,000 repayable at fixed instalments of Rs 2,000 each.

"The package is being worked out in such a manner that the autorickshaw owners will not refuse it. But we are keeping our fingers crossed," said state transport secretary Sumantra Chowdhury.

And, auto owners are cringing at the thought of getting new vehicles, costing them Rs 1.26 lakh with or without the sops even as their union leader Kishore Ghosh (president of Kolkata Autorickshaw Operators' Union) said: "We'll have to study the package carefully before agreeing to it."

The EGoM in April 2007 had said that state governments cannot acquire land for SEZs, in the backdrop of protests in places like Nandigram in West Bengal, and Maharashtra.

"Many zones, which are procuring land, are not able to have a contiguous area, because some owners are unwilling to sell land to the developers," said a Delhi-based SEZ expert.

Some developers claim that as many as 90 per cent of the SEZs, which have got in-principle approval, are stuck. There are 135 zones with in-principle approvals that are yet to have the proposed land area under possession. In fact, the Kerala government had written to the Centre to let it acquire land for SEZs. The matter is pending with the EGoM.

Reliance Industry's proposed 5,000-hectare zone in Jhajjar, Haryana, is also facing a similar problem with many farmers demanding higher price for their plots.

"Land owners do not want to sell their plots to developers, even at market prices. Even if the state governments are given permission to acquire up to 25 per cent of the land for a zone to serve contiguity purposes, it will be of great help.

The developers are ready to pay market rates to the land owners for the land acquired by the state governments," said Navin M Raheja, chief managing director, Raheja Developers, which has a notified 255-acre zone in Gurgaon.

The district education office is preparing the list of rented buildings in Lucknow, which are in a dilapidated condition.

The list along with the photographs of the buildings will be forwarded to the state headquarters for a final ratification.

Around 40 such schools in Lucknow are said to be in a dilapidated condition, which were operational from rented buildings.

Thirteen schools were shifted or merged with the neighbouring schools in the last few years, as their building were on the verge of collapsing. Twenty-seven such schools are still operational from rented buildings.

All the Block Resource Centres in Lucknow have been given one week time to submit the list of such buildings in their areas along with the photographs of the concerning schools.

Reports of around 16 such schools have already been submitted.

Moreover, the rule applies not only to hoardings built on the bus shelters, but also to those located on the streets and on the rooftop of buildings.

According to the order issued by the civic body, advertising agencies will henceforth display the unit code number of the hoarding, the name of the advertising agency, the approved size of the hoarding and the contact number of the concerned agency.

The unit code number of a hoarding is its identification mark and distinguishes it from unauthorised or illegal ones. A letter in this regard has already been forwarded by the advertising department of the KMC to several advertising agencies of the city.

The decision was taken at a meeting of Higher Education Council attended by the Vice-Chancellors of all universities with the higher education minister, Sudarshan Ray Chowdhury.

"The modalities and parameters are being finalised and a final decision will be taken in the next meeting," said Subimal Sen, the Chairman of Higher Education Council West Bengal. The universities have already posts like Inspector of Colleges and need to provide enough manpower for proper inspection.

The government has initiated a provision so that monitoring can be brought into the purview of the inspector of the colleges. This was done at the current Assembly session modification of the existing West Bengal University of Technology Act. "The inspections will help us realise where the colleges are lagging and where is the infrastructure gap, so steps can be taken to remedy it," Sen said.

So far, only the revenue earned by sale of firewood used to be shared with the dwellers, represented by forest protection committees (FPCs) and eco development committees (EDCs) in the north Bengal forests.

“These committees here used to get 25 per cent of the revenue earned from firewood sale. But in south Bengal, villagers, or the committees, also receive 25 per cent of the timber sale proceeds,” said S.B. Patel, the chief conservator of forests (north Bengal), today.

At a meeting held in Cooch Behar yesterday, the proposal to extend the same benefit to the forest dwellers of north Bengal was discussed. The move would enhance the income of each family associated with the committees and could discourage illegal felling and smuggling of timber, Patel said. “The proposal has been forwarded to the state finance department. We are awaiting approval now.”

The cyanide kills trees slowly, turning them black as the roots, trunk, and branches literally burn up from inside. When the tree shrivels and the skeleton only stands, the builder or ad firm cheerfully sends an application to the authorities to cut down the "dead tree" and allow hoardings or high-rises in the area.

One such outdoor ad agency, one of the most well known in the city, has been blacklisted after it was found to have killed 25 full-grown debdaru trees on EM Bypass to clear prominent sites for hoardings.

Environmentalists have also wisened up to the new ways of killing trees and have intensified their vigil. But the tree-killers have exacted a terrible toll. Large swathes of land on either side of the Bypass -- which is seeing an unprecedented real estate boom -- have been shorn of greenery.

Earlier, some builders and ad agencies would chop down trees in the dead of night. Under pressure from green activists, they had to dump the axe. But they took up vials of poison -- the same kind that Hitler took to commit suicide -- and acid.

An ad agency first tried out this horrific method on some trees near Parama Island on Park Circus connector a couple of months ago, said an official of Kolkata Municipal Corporation's advertisement department. Around 25 debdaru trees were poisoned to set up a billboard. However, a furore was created when municipal commissioner Alapan Bandopadhyay noticed these blackened trees and ordered a probe. The firm has been barred from participating in KMC tenders.

The innovative initiative would be first introduced for Central Ministries and then expanded to include all Government organisations and bodies that come under the ambit of the RTI Act. Not only the applications but also the first and second appeals would be filed over phone. The facility would first begin for only applications and then expanded to appeals.

A call centre to be set up would be given a unique telephone number. The helpline is likely to be started within this financial year. It would have trained executives who would be well-versed with framing RTI applications. All that an applicant would have to do is just call that number and pose his questions. The executive would take down the questions and give the applicant a reference number to follow up his case. This application would then be forwarded to the concerned Ministry. A RTI application fee of Rs 10 would come on the telephone bill of the applicant. Apart from this, the applicant would just have to pay normal call charges for the time he has spoken over the phone to the executive.

The purpose of the module will be to equip the community so that it is ready to tackle the situation when natural calamities, in this case landslides, strike.

The NDMA, which is considered to be the apex body on disaster management in the country, has invited experts from various fields and representatives from Bengal and Sikkim to an interactive session in Calcutta on July 16 to formulate the module.

The meeting is the fallout of a sustained campaign carried out by the Kalimpong-based Save The Hills (STH), an informal organisation of citizens, to highlight the problem of landslides in the hills. Its convener Praful Rao is slated to make a powerpoint presentation at the meeting.

Oil and Natural Gas Corp. Ltd (ONGC) and Calcutta Compressions and Liquefaction Engineering Pvt. Ltd (CCL)--a private company--signed a memorandum of understanding on Thursday for distribution of coal bed methane, or CBM, in Kolkata and adjoining areas, starting January.

It is too early to predict how CBM would be received but, if embraced widely, it could help reduce pollution in Kolkata, where almost all commercial vehicles still run on diesel. Three-wheeled auto rickshaws run on petrol and liquefied petroleum gas, or LPG, in Kolkata but, they too are a major pollutant because most of them end up using adulterated fuel.

In major cities, such as Delhi and Mumbai, introduction of compressed natural gas, or CNG, has led to substantial reduction in pollution. CNG is not available in Kolkata.

CBM, which has a high calorific value of around 8,000kcal per cubic metre, can be used as an automotive fuel with the help of a converter.

This converter, which CCL will get from a French firm and distribute in India, is going to cost around Rs19,000 for auto rickshaws, Rs30,000 for petrol cars and up to Rs45,000 for diesel cars. Some diesel engines might, however, need minor modifications.

CCL is looking to tie up with Greater Calcutta Gas Supply Corp. Ltd (GCGSC), a West Bengal government-owned gas distribution firm, which owns an underground network of pipelines in Kolkata and adjoining areas. Though the two firms have not yet reached an agreement, the plan is to initially distribute 60-70% of the gas sourced from ONGC through GCGSC's pipelines to industrial establishments in Kolkata and two neighbouring districts--Howrah and Hooghly--according to CCL's director U.K. Bagaria.

Metro ventured on Thursday into the empire of the Shyambazar Traffic Guard for a taste of how it's being ruled by Tapan Mitra, the officer-in-charge lately in the news for being accused by a sergeant of trying to stop him from performing his duty.

In the picture No 2, at Cossipore crossing a driver is seen sticking his right arm out towards one of the two constables positioned there with a Rs 10 note crumpled in his fist. But the constable does not approach the driver because he had noted the presence of a camera nearby. Maity had booked a driver at the next crossing on Monday and on the next day around 20 youths had heckled him at the spot as his OC watched, according to the general diary he had registered.:-

Sudip Maity, the 26-year-old sergeant, was shunted out of the traffic guard on Wednesday, a day after he made the allegation, but Mitra was keeping an eye on his backyard from a Tata Sumo parked at the Shyambazar five-point crossing when Metro caught up with him around 12.30pm.

More about what was happening around the OC later but first the point close to where Maity had on Monday booked a lorry driver for violating a signal and allegedly received a mouthful from his boss, Mitra, for his action.

Cossipore crossing, noon: Trucks are allowed to ply in the city between 10pm and 8am (only Posta-bound vehicles coming from Second Hooghly bridge are permitted between 12 and 4pm) and the fine for flouting this rule is Rs 2,000.

A signboard, "No entry for goods vehicles", is planted smack in the middle of the intersection. But lorries loaded with cement and other goods (in picture No. 1 two such vehicles are seen passing the sign) travel both ways -- towards and away from the city.

The drivers were dropping folded currency notes into the extended hands of the two constables deployed at the crossing. At times, it seems they are shaking hands. Not a single driver passed without paying respect to the policemen until they noticed our camera. From them on, the sight turned funny: the drivers are putting their hands out with the money but the constables waved them on with their batons.

It's not that the constables themselves are pocketing the money. So where does the day's collection go? Your guess is as good as ours.

Chitpore police station, noon: Around 10 cement-laden lorries are parked illegally on Cossipore Road close to the police station. The road space is squeezed by the parked vehicles, which obviously cannot remain there unless they are allowed to.

A driver, ferrying cement and on his way to deliver at Cossipore, says: "We enter the city only to unload goods and drive back. The entry fee (read bribe) for a lorry is Rs 150 for a day."

Shyambazar Traffic Guard, 11.30am: Lorries have a free run in the restricted zone on Bidhan Sarani right under the nose of the traffic guard which has its office there. The driver of a fruit-loaded vehicle, which is passing through, says: "The owner pays the traffic guard, so there is no hassle. We take this route every day."

Another lorry driver says most truck owners pay a fixed amount to the traffic guard. In the picture No. 3 , a goods vehicle is caught passing by the traffic guard office with the signboard in the background.

Shyambazar 5-point crossing, 12.30pm: This is where Mitra (in picture No. 4), the OC, is camping. Also a restricted zone, but lorries are entering the city from the north. Other than the OC, who is sitting in his vehicle talking to a youth who sidles away as we approach, a couple of sergeants and eight constables are posted at the crossing to manage the traffic.

Asked why heavy vehicles are being allowed into a restricted a zone, Mitra said: "All the lorries are carrying gas and fuel, which are essential commodities and there is no curb on their movement."

He refuses comment when it is pointed out that lorries carrying other goods are also running.

Land and land reforms minister and chairman of the committee, Abdur Rezzak Mollah, said he would request Speaker Hashim Abdul Halim to put off the West Bengal Land Reforms (Amendment) Bill, 2006 till the next budget session.

The decision came after the panel’s failure to reach a consensus on the ceiling relaxation because of stiff opposition from the CPM’s partners in the Left Front and the Opposition.

“A lack of consensus in the all-party panel has prevented the government from pushing the bill through. But the panel today unanimously gave its nod to defer the bill till the next budget session,” Mollah said at Writers’ Buildings.

According to CPM insiders, the party leadership had directed Mollah to request the Speaker to defer the legislation till they convinced the allies.

The bill, lying with the committee for two years, had sparked a furore when it proposed relaxation of the rural land ceiling for industry, commerce and infrastructure projects.

It did not explicitly mention that the aim was to facilitate special economic zones or industrial parks but the Left partners claimed it would reverse the effect of land reforms and lead to “corporate zamindari”. The bill was then referred to the select committee for “thorough scrutiny”.

The present law does not allow a person to hold more than 12 acres of irrigated land and 17 acres of non-irrigated land. The objective of the amendment was to allot more land to industry and infrastructure plans.