‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ chants reverberate at US National Day in India
The US embassy celebrated the National Day on 6 June — although it falls on 4 July — at the Hyatt hotel in New Delhi. The celebrations were advanced keeping in view secretary of state Mike Pompeo’s visit to India towards the end of this month. Though the event was the US National Day, it was the display of nationalistic fervour by Indians which became the highlight. After the US national anthem was played, the Indians presented there shouted “Bharat Mata Ki Jai”.
Nirmala Sitharaman has a lot of homework to do before Union budget
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is coming to terms with her new portfolio. Grapevine has it that at the pre-budget consultations in the finance ministry Thursday where many stakeholders, including officials from infrastructure ministries, were invited, Sitharaman gave a standard reply to every second or third suggestion that she did not understand it and would meet the economic affairs secretary for a briefing.
When somebody suggested that the Vijay Kelkar committee recommendations should be implemented, Sitharaman said she did not know about the committee or its recommendations.
Modi to chair Niti Aayog meet today, but Mamata Banerjee is not interested
After the Lok Sabha elections saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi tear apart opposition leaders such as West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee over alleged acts of omission and commission, the Prime Minister’s Office is now seeking to ensure that election-time bitterness does not spill over to vitiate the Centre’s equations with opposition-ruled states. At the fifth meeting of the Niti Aayog governing council Saturday that Modi will be chairing, the delegate-card made for all Union ministers and state chief ministers says “Team India”. This has been done at the insistence of PMO that wanted to convey Modi’s message of “cooperative federalism” at the function.
A majority of the chief ministers have confirmed their participation in the meeting. Among the notable absentees will be Mamata Banerjee who has called it a “fruitless meeting”.
Also read: Nirmala Sitharaman’s first budget should tell the truth about India’s economic crisis