ULFA strikes weekly market, kills six in Assam

Guwahati, Jun 29 (DNS) At least six people were killed and 75 injured when ULFA rebels detonated a powerful bomb at a Kumarikata weekly market, adjacent to the Indo-Bhutan boundary this afternoon.

Police said the ULFA engineered the blast, the second in three days after a faction of the outfit offered ceasefire and was ready to talk with the government.

Today's bombing that occurred at around 1340 hrs in a crowded weekly market killed four people on the spot. The other two died on way to Guwahati Medical College.

About 75 people in cluding two Assam police constables were injured in the blast.

Police recovered one unexploded bomb from the site.

Sources close to the ULFA said the attack was the handiwork of ULFA's 709 battalion and chose the Baska district as Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi had visited the district on the previous day and announced that more units of the outift were for ceasefire agreement.

On Friday the proscribed outfit triggered a bomb at Nagaon injuring four.

The explosives were strapped to a bicycle at the weekly market that sells pigs, goats, vegetables and clothes at Kumarikata in western Assam, near Bhutan border.

The area, falling under the Bodoland Territorial Autonomous Districts (BTAD), is a bastion of Bodo militants.

Private operators allege harassment, seek concessions

Hyderabad, Jun 29 (DNS) Private Bus Operators Association of Andhra Pradesh today alleged that officials of the transport department were harassing them and appealed to the state government to intervene.

Addressing a press conference here the Association's President H S C Bose alleged that though private bus operators were running their buses with valid permits, the transport authorities were terming them 'illegal' and imposing penalties.

He claimd that private bus operators were providing more facilities to passengers compared to the government owned Road Transport Corproation.

He said there were 1000 private buses in the state and they were providing direct employment to nearly two lakh people and indirect employment to another three lakh.

They also urged the state government to provide concessions and facilities to private bus operators on par with the Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation(APSRTC).

J&K govt not to go ahead with order on land transfer to SASB

Srinagar, June 29 (DNS) In a highly significant step to defuse the volatile situation in the Kashmir valley, the state government today announced that it was not going ahead with the decision of handing over 40 hectares of land to the Board handling the Amarnath Yatra, a move that has plunged the state into a political crisis.

After a week-long street protests that had nearly paralysed the valley, Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad told a press conference here that the state government had assured Governor N N Vohra, who is chairman of Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB), that the state was in a better position to provide better facilities to pilgrims on a large scale than the board. This was accepted by the Governor who gave up SASB's claim on the forest land.

Azad's decision came less than 24 hours after Congress party's coalition partner in government PDP had pulled out of the state government with all its nine ministers resigning over the issue.

Azad, who has accused PDP of backtracking on the controversial cabinet decision to divert the land to SASB, left no one in doubt that he does not want PDP back in the government by getting the resignation of the ministers accepted by the Governor although his government has been reduced to a minority.

Azad clearly expects to continue in power even as a minority government in the four months to the assembly elections due before mid-November. He is unlikely to get support of the other major party National Conference to regain his majority, nor does he require it. More DNS

Impasse over Indo-US nuclear deal deepens

New Delhi, Jun 29 (DNS) The stand off over the Indo-US nuclear deal worsened today with CPI(M) threatening to withdraw support to the UPA government if it pushed ahead with the "harmful" agreement.

"In case the government decides to go ahead with such a harmful agreement, which has no support in Parliament, the CPI(M) will withdraw support to the UPA government in concert with other Left parties," a statement of the CPI(M) Politburo said after a meeting here.

However, Congress, which heads the UPA that survives on the outside support of 59 MPs of the Left parties, sought to downplay the threat saying there was nothing new in the warning.

RJD, an important constituent of the UPA with 24 MPs, expressed confidence that the government will not not fall on the deal, which will also go through.

The first public declaration of withdrawal of support by CPI(M) General Secretary, Prakash Karat, came at a press conference in the midst of a deepening stand off with the government, which is keen on going ahead with the deal.

While the other Left parties, like the CPI, have already declared their intention to withdraw support if the government went ahead with the deal, the CPI(M) had so far only given strong indications that it would withdraw its support.

The UPA government is now now said to be involved in efforts to woo the Samajawadi Party, which has 39 MPs, and some other smaller groups, to make up for the numbers in Lok Sabha in case the Left carries out its threat.

SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav, who is being watched with keen interest, maintained suspense over his party's stand saying it would be decided on July 3 when the UNPA will meet. However, the arrival of his lieutenant Amar Singh from the US is expected to set in motion moves for a tie up between the Congress and the SP. DNS