Ramanisblog

Tag: Sonia Gandhi

  • Sonia Gandhi suffering from Cervical Cancer?

    Cancer of the Cervixis common India.The recovery rate is good.

    English: Sonia Gandhi, Indian politician, pres...
    English: Sonia Gandhi, Indian politician, president of the Indian National Congress and the widow of former Prime Minister of India, Rajiv Gandhi. Français : Sonia Gandhi, une femme politique indienne, présidente du parti du congrès indien, et veuve de Rajiv Gandhi, ancien premier ministre de l’Inde. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
    Hope she recovers permanently and regains to her normal health.
    The rumours of Sonia Gandhi having been operated for a cancer surgery have proved to be true.  A report in Deccan Herald  has said that Sonia Gandhi has been operated upon for cervical cancer at Memorial Sloan—Kettering Cancer Centre (MSKCC) —in New York on Thursday. 
    “The surgery, lasting about one hour was conducted by a team of doctors led by leading Indian-American physician Dr Dattatreyudu Nori and  Sonia Gandhi is likely to spend up to a month’s time for post-surgery follow-up treatment,  the report said. Cervix cancer is a very common disease among the Indian as well as European women. Worldwide, cervical cancer is the fifth most deadly cancer in women. There are an estimated 470,000 new cases of cervical cancer, and 233,000 deaths per year.
    Dr Dattatreyudu Nori is Professor and Executive Vice Chairman of the Radiation Oncology Department at The New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City.   Dr. Nori completed his undergraduate training at Kurnool Medical College and received his postgraduate medical degree from Osmania University in India. He then joined the staff of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre in New York City, where he became Chief of the Brachytherapy Service before accepting the current position as Chairman of Radiation Oncology at Cornell.
    It is Dr Nori’s expertise in Brachytherapy, a special form of Radiotherapy used in cancer treatment that might have made him the first choice to lead the team of cancer specialists treating Sonia Gandhi. Dr. Nori has an international reputation as a pioneer and authority in radiation oncology and Brachytherapy. He was instrumental in introducing the current techniques and clinical concepts of High Dose Rate Brachytherapy for gynaecological & genitourinary tumours. Dr Nori has been past President of the American Brachytherapy Society.
    It could be possible that Sonia Gandhi might be getting treatment for Cervix cancer for some time in the form of external beam radiation therapy (EBRT), a treatment of choice in early cervical cancers. Getting a recurrence, even after completion of EBRT treatment in India, could have been a reason for her to fly to the world’s beat cancer hospital for further treatment at such a short notice. The surgery done in such recurrences is called Radical Hysterectomy. Dr Nori’s involvement in this case, despite not being a surgeon, could be in the form of providing High Dose Rate Intra operative Radiation Therapy (HDR-IORT) , of which he is a world renowned expert. This treatment is very effective to treat any residual malignant cell in the surgical field after hysterectomy or if local invasion of surrounding structures like urinary bladder is there.
    Brachytherapy, also known as internal radiotherapy, sealed source radiotherapy, curietherapy or endocurietherapy, is a form of radiotherapy where a radiation source is placed inside or next to the area requiring treatment. Brachytherapy is commonly used as an effective treatment for cervical and Breast cancer in women. In contrast to EBRT in which high-energy x-rays are directed at the tumour from outside the body, brachytherapy involves the precise placement of radiation sources directly at the site of the cancerous tumour.
    It could be possible that Sonia Gandhi might be getting treatment for Cervix cancer for some time in the form of external beam radiation therapy (EBRT), a treatment of choice in early cervical cancers. Getting a recurrence, even after completion of EBRT treatment in India, could have been a reason for her to fly to the world’s beat cancer hospital for further treatment at such a short notice. The surgery done in such recurrences is called Radical Hysterectomy. Dr Nori’s involvement in this case, despite not being a surgeon, could be in the form of providing High Dose Rate Intra operative Radiation Therapy (HDR-IORT) , of which he is a world renowned expert. This treatment is very effective to treat any residual malignant cell in the surgical field after hysterectomy or if local invasion of surrounding structures like urinary bladder is there.
    Blood Test Ok.
    ‘Fears that Congress president Sonia Gandhi could be battling cancer have been put to rest by tests conducted at a hospital in New York, a source close to her family has told The Hindu.

    “The tests are clear,” the source said, adding that Ms. Gandhi now expects to return to work on Monday after returning from New York.

    Ms. Gandhi had travelled to the United States earlier this month, for the latest in a series of check-ups following surgery for an undisclosed illness in August 2011. Party spokesperson Janardhan Dwivedi had said at the time that the surgery had been successful, but did not disclose where she had gone for treatment.

    http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article3875073.ece

    Related articles.

    The Gandhi family and the Congress party have dealt with Ms Gandhi’s illness as a “personal matter” that requires no public explanation. True, politicians are entitled to privacy in matters of health. But this right to privacy cannot hold if it impacts on their work. Ms Gandhi has led the Congress for more than a decade; her party’s election victories are credited to her leadership. The argument that Ms Gandhi does not hold high office, is not the head of the government, and therefore her illness is not a matter of public importance, hardly holds. Since 2004, she has been seen universally as the main power centre in the UPA. Clearly, several matters of national importance ride on her health, including her ability to lead the party into the next election, and the issue of succession in the Congress leadership, should this become necessary. These are not private matters.

    The hush-hush is reminiscent of the secrecy that surrounded the condition of Leonid Brezhnev as the Soviet leader’s health deteriorated through 1982. While the official line was that he was suffering from only a minor ailment, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union had already worked out a line of succession.

    On the other hand, we have the openness of former New York Mayor Rudy Guiliani’s battle with prostate cancer, whose let’s-talk-about-it attitude helped the cancer awareness campaign in the U.S. turn him into an iconic survivor of the disease. More recently, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez spoke publicly about his battle with cancer.

    That the Congress should be secretive about Ms Gandhi’s health is not surprising. What is surprising, though, is the omertà being observed by the news media, usually described by international writers as feisty and raucous. On this particular issue, reverential is the more fitting description. Barring editorials in the Business Standard and MailToday, no other media organisation has thought it fit to question the secrecy surrounding the health of the government’s de facto Number One.

    http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/article2473752.ece

     

  • Readers Shape the News-The Guardian,UK.

    As a fall out of News of The World, which crashed because of illegal tapping of phones/messages,the Guardian of UK has come out with a new project where the Readers can see and assess news.A list called NewsLists is provided and Readers can participate in the dissemination of News.

    Of course conditions apply.

    One wishes Indian electronic media follows this.

    One often sees manipulated versions ,look at Anna Hazare tamasha, being aired Live,no mention is made of Sonia Gandhi in any of the scams,not even a murmur on the Genocide of Tamils ,of Tamil Fishermen being killed on  daily basis by Sri Lanka.

    Considering the stock holding pattern of the Media Companies in India ( please read my blog under Media), this is necessary as the Editors’ Guild seems to be doing nothing on warped and  planted stories.

    Look at the case where TIMES NOW published a picture of a Judge  who was innocent because his name sounded like the suspect in a scam.

    The Supreme Court on Monday declined to relax a Bombay high court order asking Times Now TV channel to deposit Rs 100 crore – Rs 20 crore in cash and the rest as bank guarantee – before taking up its appeal against a trial court verdict in a defamation case.

    Former Supreme Court Judge, Justice P B Sawant, had sued Times Now for mistakenly displaying his photograph in a report on September 10, 2008, about a person (with a phonetically similar sounding name) allegedly involved in the multi-crore Provident Fund scam. A Pune trial court had decreed the suit for Rs100 crore against the TV channel. Times Now had appealed against the trial court verdict, but the Mumbai HC in September this year had asked the TV channel to first deposit Rs 20 crore and provide Rs 80 crore as bank guarantee as a pre-condition for hearing the appeal. Appearing for the TV channel, senior advocate Harish Salve said the channel had apologized for the mistake and had run an apology for five continuous days and requested the apex court to relax the stiff condition of depositing Rs 100 crore as a pre-condition for appeal.

    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/SC-asks-Times-Now-to-deposit-Rs-100-crore-before-HC-takes-up-its-appeal-in-defamation-case/articleshow/10734614.cms

    We often report big breaking stories as they happen, but have you ever wondered what stories we’re working on – and what’s about to drop? To help you find out, the Guardian newsdesk is opening its doors.

    Few documents are more carefully guarded in newspaper offices than the newslist. The mixture of what’s coming up and what the editors are hoping for can be so valuable that rivals have even been known to pay for a sneaky look. Some newsrooms I’ve worked in have relied on code words to describe really juicy stories. Often, it can be an embarrassingly blank sheet of paper – best kept hidden, even from the boss.

    The idea of giving this information away before publication might therefore seem to be putting digital dogma before common sense. Just because the internet theoretically allows journalists to give readers a peek behind the curtain by sharing the list with them does not make it a good idea.

    We suspect otherwise though at the Guardian. What if readers were able to help newsdesks work out which stories were worth investing precious reporting resources in? What if all those experts who delight in telling us what’s wrong with our stories after they’ve been published could be enlisted into giving us more clues beforehand? What if the process of working out what to investigate actually becomes part of the news itself?

    A Reader participating in the preparation of News
    Harold Evans shares his views at the Guardian news conference – and now you can too. Photograph: Felix Clay for the Guardian

    It might seem a minority pursuit, but the experience of covering breaking news already suggests otherwise. Like many websites, we are discovering some of our best-read stories are the live blogs that report events as they unfold, often with brutal honesty about what we don’t know or hope to find out.

    With this in mind, the newsdesk at the Guardian is planning an experiment in opening its doors. The idea is to publish a carefully-selected portion of the national, international and business newslists onthis daily blog and encourage people to get in touch with reporters and editors via Twitter if they have ideas.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/insideguardian/2011/oct/10/guardian-newslist

  • 2G-BJP eyeing DMK.

    BJP, despite its wish to think otherwise, has been very soft on 2 G scam, when compared to its vociferous soundbites on CWG and vote -for-money scam.

    Earlier Advani declared that the DMK is being made a scapegoat in the 2G issue.

    At best he could have said that Congress is more accountable in 2G scam than DMK.

    Now Gadkari says,,with his legal acumen that Kanimozhi should be granted bail because the charge sheet has been framed.

    He does not seem to have read the reasons cited by the Magistrate O.P.Saini that Kanimozhi is being denied bail on the ground that

    -Kanimozhi is not being discriminated against her being a woman(Kanimozhi in her bail application has stated that she is a woman!) as she is an MP and she is influential.

    -She holds political power and as such can tamper with the evidence) which is a correct observation considering the fact that her father Karunanidhi, who never found time to meet up with Sonia Gandhi on the State’s problems or on the issue of Tamils being killed in Sri Lanka,met up with Sonia Gandhi and revealed that he got her assurance in this case;predictably the CBI leaked out the information that it will not oppose Kanimozhi’s bail.

    -She could tamper with the evidence,(One might recall that Sadiq Pasha was murdered -he was reportedly close to SUN group and was expected to spill the beans and the case has been closed as suicide!)

    -Why the CBI wants to apply different yardsticks on bail applications for different people?

    One can not, under the circumstances , as the BJP is expecting a break of ties between Congress and DMK , BJP is not getting the response as it should form Advani’s Rath Yatra,BJP does not have an agenda to fight the elections right now,and that too many squabbles with in the BJP, escape the conclusion that the BJP is cozying up with the DMK to bring into its fold to fight the election.

    But the Corruption ties  of the DMK and the Congress are too intricate and intertwined to allow either the Congress  or the DMK to leave the other.

     

    New Delhi, Nov 12: BJP president Nitin Gadkari has said that DMK leader M Karunanidhi‘s daughter Kanimozhi should now be released on bail.

    Replying to questions on Rajat Sharma‘s Aap Ki Adalat show, Gadkari said now that a chargesheet has been filed in the 2G scam, Kanimozhi surely deserved bail.

    “I am not making a political point. But as far as my legal knowledge goes, once a chargesheet has been filed, the accused should have been granted bail.

    “I can assure you even our party would not allege that the Congress connived to get Kanimozhi bail.”

    The BJP president went on to allege that the Congress was targeting its alliance partners and political opponents by misusing the CBI.

    “Except Suresh Kalmadi, not a single Congress leader has been indicted so far. Don’t you think Chidambaram is responsible for the 2G scam? The Congress is targeting its alliance partners like DMK, NCP and other political opponents.

    “I have seen the Commonwealth Games files. There were signatures of the PM, Cabinet Secretary, Group of Ministers and pre-qualification norms were changed. Is Kalmadi alone responsible?

    “Why was no action taken on V K Shunglu Committee report against Sheila Dikshit? Why was the Lokayukta report against the Delhi minister rejected?”, asked Gadkari.

    http://www.indiatvnews.com/news/India/Nitin_Gadkari_Says_Kanimozhi_Should_Get_Bail-12026.html

  • 2G, Misinformation on CAG has Begun- To weaken the Spectrum Case?

    Sonia Gandhi, Indian politician, president of ...
    Image via Wikipedia, Sonia Gandhi

    For the information of those who are not familiar with the working of Auditing ,it may be mentioned that correspondence and difference of approaches are routine and this does not mean that ‘there is a split”.

    One may note that no where in the communication divulged in the news item does it appear that there is a divergence of opinion on the Scam or the magnitude involved. Earlier statement by the CAG office might indicate that the loss is notional  and hence it is difficult to quantify it.Common sense says that had the licenses been issued as per the market value, the Government should have received more money than what it has received now.You do not require an Auditor to say this.This is plain common sense.

    If the licenses issued were according to market price and mechanism, then how come other Companies paid unheard of premium to buy these Licenses from the original Allottees? For Charity or as a Social Service?

    If the transactions are above-board, how is it that people are paid money and why the maze of Transactions to hide the companies?

    And why impossible terms were laid to exclude certain companies and  favor some?

    Long and short of it is that a scam of mammoth proportions has been perpetrated.

    Now that the Special Court has framed charges under tough sections, effort is on to discredit the basis on which the case rests,that is CAG Report.

    Casting aspersions and professional ethics will water down the Report, thus enble the accused to go scot-free.

    The Misinformation on CAG has begun by a group of Media.

    Note, all this,after Sonia Gandhi‘s active return to Politics after her illness and the timing of the leakage of this communication is after Karunanidhi met her recently at Delhi!

    Please read my blog on Media in India,filed under media.

    New Delhi: A split in the CAG over the 2G loss figure has come to the fore. CNN-IBN has accessed copies of confidential notes that show the lead auditor was forced to take the Comptroller Auditor General’s line.

    The confidential notes were exchanged between Deputy CAG Rekha Gupta and Director General for Audits R P Singh. According to them, R P Singh was coerced into toeing Gupta and CAG Vinod Rai line.

    The high and mighty of India’s political and corporate world have been cooling their heels in Tihar Jail for months for their involvement in the 2G scam, largely on the basis of a report prepared by the CAG. However, now there are questions being raised about the report itself.

    The letters accessed by CNN-IBN raise a fundamental question – Why was a consensus difficult to reach in the CAG on this report?…

    A letter dated February 26, 2010, as the CAG report was in its final stages of auditing, was almost an accusation against RP Singh, one of the main auditors who prepared the report. Singh is the one who recorded his dissent with the loss figure of Rs 1.76 lakh crore in the scam.

    Written on behalf of Deputy CAG Rekha Gupta and addressed to Singh, the letter says, “It appears that there is no strategy planned for auditing the private service providers. Valuable time has been lost since October and work is yet to begin. A report may be sent every Friday, which will be put up before the CAG.”

    http://ibnlive.in.com/news/2g-cag-split-out-in-open-ahead-of-pac-hearing/197124-37-64.html

  • 2G, Irresponsible explanation by Pronob Mukherjee.

    Is the Finance Ministry engaged in mock exercises in running the Government?
    If a Note ‘has no life’ why prepare it?
    Dangerous precedent.
    Any Policy decision can be dismissed on this ground.
    The fact is that the Note says ‘The Minister has seen it’
    It is also a fact that Chidambaram was present in the ‘No papers’ meet with PM and A.Raja as per the note by the Finance Ministry.
    Is this also of no consequence?
    Opening a can of worms,Pronob?
    Finally Pronob has not denied the fact that the ‘Minister has seen the Document’
    Original document showing the Note.
    Original Note.
    Please see my blog ‘The original Document’ filed under Corruption.
    NEW DELHI: In what could add to the discomfiture of the government, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee has formally told Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress President Sonia Gandhi that the ‘Office Memorandum’ from the Finance Ministry to the PMOon the 2G spectrum allocation was not the product of MoF’s solo effort but an inter-departmental exercise.In a four-page letter to Singh, delivered at the prime minister’s residence just when he landed in Delhi from Frankfurt on Tuesday night, Mukherjee said the document was drafted after detailed confabulations between his ministry, PMO, the Law Ministry, DoT and Cabinet Secretariat.

    The minister recalled that the note was essentially a backgrounder on the spectrum issue for helping the government put up a coherent defence on the matter. He also noted that it was prepared in the backdrop of demands from the Public Accounts Committee to summon Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister and the Cabinet Secretary for explaining the role of the PMO in spectrum allocation.

    The letter noted that 22 meetings were held between various departments and that Vini Mahajan, joint secretary in the PMO, participated in many of these deliberations. Through his letter, Mukherjee appears to be trying to blunt the claim that the Office Memorandum (OM) was prepared by the Finance Ministry to embarrass Home Minister P Chidambaram.

    The OM had suggested that some decisive interventions by Chidambaram could have averted the 2G scandal. Mukherjee’s letter contradicts Congress’ and Law Minister Salman Khurshid‘s line that it was the handiwork of a junior official and that it had “no life”.