Kanimozhi vacates room in Tamil Nadu guesthouse

Published: Monday, May 16, 2011, 1:06 IST
By DNA Correspondent | Place: New Delhi | Agency: DNA

http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_kanimozhi-vacates-room-in-tamil-nadu-guesthouse_1543695

Kanimozhi, a Rajya Sabha MP and daughter DMK chief M Karunanidhi vacated her room in Tamil Nadu guesthouse in Delhi on Saturday.
The state government had made a special provision and allotted her a room.
As a first-term MP, she was entitled to an MPs flat which was allotted to her in a multi-storeyed building. The 43-year-old DMK MP took her luggage and drove to her Swarnajayanthi apartment meant for MPs.
Since she got a temporary reprieve from court on Saturday and the case is listed for judgment on May 20, she may have been apprehensive about a possible ransack of her room by the new government in Tamil Nadu.
She was seen walking alone as no state government employee assisted her. Earlier, at least eight to 10 officials rendered all support. Those courtesies were missing.

As cyber attacks rise, India sets up central command to fight back

Published: Sunday, May 15, 2011, 0:15 IST
By Harish Gupta | Place: New Delhi | Agency: DNA
http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_as-cyber-attacks-rise-india-sets-up-central-command-to-fight-back_1543352


Alarmed over rising cyber attacks from “White hats” in Pakistan and the Chinese “Honker Union” on Indian websites and computer networks, the Manmohan Singh government is in the process of establishing a Cyber Command & Control Authority.
The recent efforts of hackers from mafia groups in erstwhile Soviet Union countries to penetrate even the well-protected defence network prompted the government to set up a central command rather than leave it to each ministry and department to handle the problem.
A senior official involved with the cyber command programme told DNA that despite intelligence agencies issuing “regular warnings against possible hacking”, there had been little success in countering the attacks, forcing the change in approach from the government. However, the minister for communications and IT, Sachin Pilot, won’t go beyond saying that “the government has formulated a crisis management plan for countering cyber attacks and cyber terrorism”.
A crucial aspect of fighting a cyber attack is to launch a counter-attack, with the help of private IT experts if required. These experts are known as “white hats” if they work for state agencies. For example, when Delhi police recently arrested a software engineer Bhupinder Singh in a hacking case, it discovered that the person had once hacked some key computer networks in Pakistan. Bhupinder Singh is in fact considered amongst theworld’s ace cyber hackers and worked for a fee.
The white hats may work for the government without being directly on the rolls. The “black hats”, on the other hand, are hackers who obtain sensitive data for criminal activities. The Chinese hackers, known as Honker Union, who succeeded in penetrating Google servers last year and even broke the source code of Microsoft, are believed to have state patronage.
The need to establish a unified cyber Command is considered vital because cyber attacks are going to be part of future warfare.
There was some debate over whether this command should be under one of the ministries or directly under the prime minister, but now it has been placed under the National Security Adviser who reports to the PM.
It is learnt that officials in the national security apparatus have already interacted with the US, whose CYBYERCOMM works as a central command. The need for it was felt when websites of NASA, the state department and commerce department were hacked in 2007. The hackers disabled 2000 computers of theUS Army and also penetrated the networks of VISA, MasterCard and Paypal. In Britain, the parliament’s website faced the same fate, following which a cyber command on the lines of the US system was established at a cost of 650 million pounds. The US is also believed to have carried out cyber warfare by infecting the Iranian nuclear network with the Stuxnet computer worm.
In a confidential dossier, the US informed India that more than 100 attacks take place every day from all over the world to break its security network. It is in this backdrop that India is now establishing its own central cyber command authority under the PMO.

Assam win a personal triumph for the PM

The Congress may be rejoicing UPA’s win in Assembly polls in three out of five states. But it was a matter of rather personal triumph for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh when Tarun Gogoi returned to power third time in a row.

The hat-trick to Gogoi in crucial polls gladdened Prime Minister’s heart as he represents Assam in the Rajya Sabha. He had been representing Assam ever since he came into politics and takes personal interest in its affairs with regard to development and related issues. He has a personal rapport with the Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi as well.  The third significant factor in Assam was that he had actively campaigned in the state during the Assembly polls. He participated in both the phases of campaign and went out of his way to appeal to the people to defeat the divisive BJP style of campaigning.

The Prime Minister was in Kabul when the counting of votes was underway and the moment it surfaced that Congress is nearing two-third majority in the state, he rang up Tarun Gogoi to congratulated him. Of course, he congratulated TMC chief Mamata Bannerjee also who dislodged the Left from West Bengal after 34 years.

The Assam victory is also a message to those who think that Dr manmohan Singh is no star campaigner. In fact, the campaigning style of Tarun Gogoi was in such a low-key that almost all pre-poll surveys had predicted that the Congress is on a weak wicket. But it was the development plank of the Congress, liberal aid from the UPA government and failure of almost all groupings to connect with the masses that led to this massive mandate.

Meanwhile, speculation is on about who will replace Mamata Bannerjee in the Railway Ministry. Since there is no Cabinet Minister or Minister of State with Independent charge belonging to the TMC is in the Union Cabinet, it would impossible for the PM to give this portfolio to a Minister of State. A reshuffle of the Union Council of Minister is on the cards within the next fortnight will enable the TMC to induct new faces.

Do we need Navy SEALs type commandos ?

It seems we are becoming wiser after what happened in Abbotabad where Osama was bumped off and buried in the sea by the US Navy SEALs. There is a clamour why India can't undertake similar operations against those operating from Pakistan's soil. Good Question. None has answered except Union Home Secretary G K Pillai who explained that India is a neighbour of Pakistan and will have to see the consequences of such an adventure. He seems to be right. After all, Pakistan's non-state actors raided Kargil and country lost hundreds of our Jawans in 1999, then the same non-state actors hijacked Indian Airlines aircraft to Kandhar in and succeeded in getting dreaded militants released, in 2001 they raided Indian Parliament and in 2008 what happened in Mumbai is known to all. Don't we have non-state actors who can do the same in Pakistan ? Perhaps no. The top IB, RAW and other intelligence agencies tell us that I K Gujral ordered the destruction of all such modules working in Pakistan for India when he was PM and Vajpayee was busy hugging Pakis for a Nobel prize. So, the big question is - Do we need Navy SEALs commandos to kill Dawood or other 50 dreaded terrorists wanted by India. The government is singing in three different tunes -- Home Minister P Chidambaram talks something, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna speaks something else and the PM singing the Vajpayee tune. Of course, Advani may blame UPA without realsing what happened when he was Home Minister in the NDA regime for 6 years himself. The pro-active policy was buried deep under.

Why so much noise over Osama ?

I was in Africa for more than a week and the news of Osama bin laden's killing by the US Navy SEALs broke when in Nigeria. Africa's 53 countries have around 45% of Muslim population and they are gradually returning to stable political regime, coming of the shell, emerging from the wood. I interacted with the foreign ministry officials and a whole lot of people there, got a sense of what's happening in the African continent. But the news was taken as if nothing had happened. While the world will keep debating the definition of terror and religion, the issue that baffles me most is the reaction of certain elements in Jammu and Kashmir. Why should Indian citizens, belonging to any community and religion, react differently. If Pakistan is a victim of terrorism too like India, as it claims, surely both should join hands to eliminate "this terror". Will somebody answer this question ?