‘We will protect our borders and cross if needed’ Govt considering new regulatory framework for DETERMINED web content: Irani
Rajnath Singh said the government was serious about finding a solution to the Kashmir problem
NEW DELHI: Union home minister Rajnath Singh said on Saturday that the government will not only protect India’s borders from inside the country, but was ready to go beyond.
Singh’s remarks at the News18 Rising India summit came in the backdrop of rising friction between India and Pakistan, which have accused each other of harassing their diplomats.
“When it comes to the security of our borders, we will make all efforts to protect the country. We will protect our borders from inside, and if the need arises, we will also protect our borders from outside the country,” he said.
Singh said he was making the statement based on the ability of India’s paramilitary and armed forces.
India would prefer good relations with its neighbours but Pakistan seems more interested in supporting the Haqqani network, an Afghan guerrilla group, and giving political legitimacy to Hafiz Saeed, a United Nationsdesignated terrorist, he said.
Singh mentioned steps taken by the Bharatiya Janata Party government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to combat terrorism.
“Terrorism is not only India’s issue but a global problem,” he said.
“Earlier prime ministers might have tried, but Prime Minister Modi was able to bring everyone on board on the issue of terrorism. Earlier there were some (countries) which wouldn’t speak about terrorism, but today the strongest country in the world, the United States, is at least condemning Pakistan. They have stopped (financial) assistance to Pakistan,” Singh said.
The minister also spoke at length on Kashmir and said the government was serious about finding a solution to the problem. He noted that a special representative on Kashmir, former Intelligence Bureau chief Dineshwar Sharma, has been chosen by the government and his mandate is to speak to everyone in Kashmir.
But no “power in the world can take Kashmir away” from India, Singh said.
“Kashmir was ours, is ours and will be ours,” he said.
The minister said he had directed Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti to offer amnesty to stone pelters targeting security forces in Kashmir, especially the children.
”Children of Kashmir are also ours. Hence, I asked the Jammu and Kashmir chief minister to remove all stone-pelting cases against those children. They must have been brainwashed,” he added.
Responding to a question about BJP’s defeat in the Gorakhpur Lok Sabha by-poll in Uttar Pradesh, Singh responded jokingly.
“Now we have come to know such things also happen. They will not happen again,” he said.
Gorakhpur was the parliamentary constituency of Yogi Adityanath, who vacated the seat after becoming chief minister of Uttar Pradesh last year. NEWDELHI: The Union government is considering new regulatory framework for online content, including on social media and websites, Union minister for information and broadcasting Smriti Irani said on Saturday.
The minister said a line of ethics and code of conduct had to be put in place to ensure that customers do not get affected by vested views in news, broadcasting and advertorial content. “That is something the ministry is considering in terms of putting it in those words that now reflect on broadcasting and advertorials, having a similar line on ethics or code of conduct in a free society that is incumbent upon the agencies to abide to,” she said at the News18 Rising India Summit.
Irani said just as there was a Press Council of India for newspapers — which was distinct from the government but still self regulatory enough to awaken its own conscience — and a broadcasters association for TV, she was hopeful a similar body would emerge for social media, at least for news and entertainment content.
On the steps being taken by her ministry to strengthen the outreach and communication of government’s programmes, she said the recent consolidation of three media units under the Bureau of Outreach Communication was the need of the hour.
On whether she would contest the 2019 general election from Amethi against Congress president Rahul Gandhi, Irani said: “… It began as a political battle, but turned into a personal journey.”
CBFC chairperson Prasoon Joshi, who also spoke at the event, regretted that misinformation about cuts in the film Padmaavat were reported in the media but not enough was said about the changes. NEWDELHI: India should strive for South Asian economic integration without Pakistan, the BJP’s foreign policy cell chief Vijay Chauthaiwale said on Saturday, adding that the ruling party was under no ideological compulsion to mend ways with the neighbour which uses terrorism as an instrument of state policy.
Shyam Saran, former foreign secretary responded by saying that keeping Pakistan out of South Asian integration plans would amount to accepting defeat that “we don’t know how to deal with a neighbour”.
Chauthaiwale, Saran along with former foreign secretary
HT Correspondent
NEW DELHI: India is an “economic superpower” already but needs to watch out for inequality, unemployment and “so much visible poverty”, economist Paul Krugman, winner of the 2008 Nobel prize, said here on Saturday.
“India is now, adjusted for PPP (purchasing power parity), the world’s third-largest economy. It’s an economic superpower in the normal sense which doesn’t get captured. But it is still poor,” Krugman said at the News18 Rising India Summit. Krugman is at present distinguished professor in the City University of New York. The concern is whether India can crawl out of the so-called “middle-income trap”, he said. “It’s a privilege to be able to talk of it because it takes a lot of work to get there (middle-income level). But we see that developing countries can’t close that last gap to reach the level (of development) of western Europe.”
Artificial intelligence poses a threat to globalisation, therefore, to India, he said. “For instance, the interpretation of medical data. Now, that can either be outsourced to India or to the cyberspace. So, some of these opportunities will be foreclosed by artificial intelligence,” he said.
The country had to find a way to employ its large working-age Nirupama Rao and Shaurya Doval, a director of India Foundation, was participating in a panel discussion on India’s Place in the World: Opportunities and Challenges’, at a conclave organised by Network 18.
To a question from chair of the session Zakka Jacob on regional economic integration of South population and also tackle corruption. “You can’t be Denmark with Chinese levels of corruption.” As it rises up the ladder, India will need more credible institutions, he said.
The economist identified himself on the centre-left side of the equation, but said he didn’t believe the “government should have a heavy hand on the economy”. “What is the incredible story about India in global economic history? It’s the trebling of GDP per capita that’s transformational. That still 12% of the US’s level, India is still poor but it’s not at that level it used to be.”
Krugman then turned to what caused India to leap and if the country could continue growing.
“Clearly, the dramatic change in policy and exports,” he said, answering the first question of the two questions he posed. “The country reduced tariffs…and also a great of liberalisation within the domestic economy.” He said the country should also diversify its manufacturing sector to keep growing.
PAUL KRUGMAN SAID THE COUNTRY HAD TO FIND A WAY TO EMPLOY ITS WORKINGAGE POPULATION AND ALSO TACKLE CORRUPTION