News on Agra & Current Affairs

Vishal Sharma New Delhi/ Agra At a time when all major integrated township projects launched during the past couple of years in Uttar Pradesh are being re-examined, Ansal Properties & Infrastructure Ltd announced the launch of its project Sushant Taj City, in Agra on Wednesday. At the launch ceremony, Sushil Ansal, Chairman, Ansal API, said the housing project was located on the Agra-Delhi national highway on the Agra ring road. Spread over 460 acres, he said, the project would have close to 3,000 dwelling units, of which about 1,200 would be independent villas, making it one of the biggest township projects in Agra. According to Ansal, the Sushant Taj City shall have all modern amenities like educational institutions, clubs etc, surrounded by about 75 acres of greenery. He said that the company was in process of tying up with some leading hospital chains to develop a modern multi-specialty hospital in the township. Also, the development of a star-category hotel was also on the ca...

Vishal Sharma New Delhi/ Agra JP Cement, one of the major cement brands in the Agra region, is now planning to increase its market share which is currently pegged at 30 per cent. Jaiprakash Associates Ltd Vice-President Prem Prakash said after the recent acquisition of three plants from UP State Cement Corporation Ltd, the cement production capacity of the company had increased by 2.2 million tonne in Uttar Pradesh and the state was being surveyed to market this surplus production. He said at present the company was producing about 7 million tonne of cement every year and the projected target for 2010 was 20 million tonne for which the company would increase its production capacity by new acquisitions and by building larger cement plants. According to Prakash, in the Agra region, where Jaypee group had launched its cement brands in October last year, the company saw a lot of potential and expected the market share to grow significantly within three years with the increased supply of c...

Vijay Upadhyay Agra The Braj region of Uttar Pradesh, comprising of Agra, Mathura and some parts of Rajasthan, brimming with milk and milk products, has been known as the land of cows since the era of Lord Krishna. Most influential politicians here are also associated with the milk business, earning several crores each year through this trade . But with the number of dairy cattle dying each year because of the unavailability of green fodder, affecting the milk production, the region is now forced to import milk from Gujarat, the land where Lord Krishna reigned in his last years . Cashing in on the milk crisis in the Braj region, Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), marketing its milk with the renowned brand name Amul, entered the Agra region last week, in a tie-up with Kwality Dairy India Pvt Ltd. Arriving raw from the Sabar dairy, run by the Sabarkantha District Milk Producers Union functioning under GCMMF, the milk will be soon made available in the entire Northern ...

Better known as the ancestral village of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Bateshwar near Agra was once home to over a 100 temples. But today, a few remain with most of them getting destroyed due to floods. Vijay Upadhyay reports on a town that lives and draws from its rich past Once known as the village of 101 temples, Bateshwar in Agra has lost this identity to time. Now, better known as the ancestral village of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, out of the 400-year-old series of 101 temples, barely 48 remain standing owing to the three great floods that wrecked majority of these temples. The rest of the temples are likely to have disastrous effects if yet another flood hits the Yamuna in the near future. Situated on the bank of the river Yamuna, about 75 km away from Agra, Bateshwar also marks the important site of the conjunction of the Yamuna with the Chambal, filling up the Yamuna yet again with water which then carries on to Allahabad, finally merging into t...

y Vijay Upadhyay Agra Refusing to marry a neighbour proved to be a fatal for a girl in the land of Lord Krishna. The neighbour, along with some of his friends, broke into the girl's house and set her on fire after pouring kerosene on her on Wednesday. Startled by this incident, the Mathura Police immediately arrested one of the culprits while the others are still absconding. According to Mathura Police sources, Rafaq, the brother of the deceased girl, arrived in the police station on Wednesday afternoon and reported the murder of his sister Hingo by his neighbour Kalua and five of his accomplices, after forcibly entering his house on Tuesday night. Kalua wanted to marry Hingo and when she refused to do so, the culprits again broke into the house on Wednesday morning and murdered her by setting her on fire while she was asleep. Police sources claimed that there was a significant margin of doubt in the veracity of the incident but still, one of the accused had been arrested while a h...

Vijay Upadhyay Agra Having the distinction of being the unofficial Dalit capital of North India due to its large Dalit population, Agra has been rejoicing since Saturday, celebrating Mayawati's astounding victory in the Assembly elections. With five BSP MLAs out of a total of nineteen elected from the Agra division being chosen to Mayawati's Cabinet, the celebratory mood has been spilling on to the city streets, where Blue has suddenly become the pre-eminent colour. People can be seen spraying each other with blue colour and carnivals displaying Mayawati with BSP pioneer Kanshiram and BR Ambedkar have become common. But though the general mood in the town is that of joy, BSP supporters are busy 'inspecting' the Government offices and police stations to oversee the placing of portraits of Dr BR Ambedkar at prominent places in the chambers of the senior officials, a fact that the officials had been conveniently ignoring so far. A group of BSP supporters surrounded the Ac...

Vijay Upadhyay Agra. It was a result no one had expected in the Bah constituency of Agra. For the first time since Independence, the people of Bah have rejected the dominance of the royal family of Bhadawar in Chambal, seeking a ride on the Blue Elephant. Ever since Uttar Pradesh became a separate State under Independent India, the royal family of Bhadawar, which had ruled the region for nearly 400 years, was the first choice of the people, sending their "King" into the State Assembly every year. When the King himself abstained from elections, a candidate of his recommendation was elected. But this time, the magic of Mayawati's social engineering completely overthrew the "Raja's dynasty" with the royal family suffering the first defeat on this seat since Independence. Former UP Health Minister and sitting MLA from Bah, Raja Mahendra Aridaman Singh was defeated by Madhusudan Sharma.

Vijay Upadhyay Agra. When BSP supremo Mayawati resigned as Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister on August 25, 2003, it was the city of Taj that had almost destroyed her political career. In just under four years, the "Taj" of UP is back on Mayawati's head, with the people of Agra whole-heartedly welcoming her to lead the State. The Taj Heritage Corridor issue, which still haunts Mayawati after the CBI took over the case in August 2003, arose from a simple desolate strip of sand on the bank of Yamuna and became the highlight of UP politics in a whirlwind that ultimately forced Mayawati to concede her throne to Mulayam Singh Yadav. Yadav, taking over the reins of the State, plunged it into a quagmire of corruption and lawlessness, a factor that became the primary issue for anti-Mulayam gimmicks played by the Opposition parties. Mayawati sought to silently ease her way out of the corruption charges pressed against her in the Corridor issue, mustering su...

Vijay Upadhyay Agra. The Indian Air Force on Friday phased out its Canberra Recon aircraft after fifty years of service. The phasing out ceremony was held at the Agra Air Force Station and was presided over by Chief of Air Staff Air Chief Marshal FH Major. The ceremony included the final salute by the mighty bombers and concluded with the handing over of 'form 700' to the Air chief by Wing Cdr Mathur, the CO of Canberra Squadron. Designed in 1944, the Canberra PR57 had joined the Indian Air Force as a bomber in 1957 and soon eight PR-57s were being operated by the 106 SR Squadron for reconnaissance. The Canberras were mostly based at Agra. It was the only bomber of the Indian Air Force until late seventies and could carry the war beyond the frontiers, deep into the enemy territory, flying at an altitude of upto 40,000 feet. The first operation that the aircraft took part was in 1961, accurately bombing the Dabolim airfield against the Por...

Vishal Sharma New Delhi/ Agra Iffco Kisan Sanchar Ltd (IKSL), an Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Ltd (Iffco) venture, in technical collaboration with Airtel, will link the farmers, in 10 village cooperatives of Agra by the first week of June, by its “Green” mobile network. According to Company CEO MG Banga, the network was in process of being established in eastern UP and soon, it would be extended to the 10 village cooperatives of Agra encompassing about 50,000 villagers. This mobile network will be established in villages where the conventional landline or mobile networks are non-existent and for this the company has already tied up with Airtel to construct Base Transceiver Stations (BTSs) at the cooperative committee office buildings for which, they will be paid rental and maintenance charges.

Vijay Upadhyay   AGRA.          Indicating a major shift of its policy from riding piggyback major international space programmes to becoming an independent commercial establishment, ISRO chairman G Madhavan Nair has said the organisation was on its way towards developing a low-earth orbit 'Micro-gravity' experimental platform in space. Addressing a seminar on the Indian Space Programme held on the occasion of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of Radhaswami Educational Institute in Agra recently, Nair said that the Indian Space Programme was no longer a fledgling operation and with the successful launch of the Italian satellite last week on the PSLV, it had made its debut in the commercial use of its satellite launch vehicles, whose apex shall arrive in the year 2009 with the launch of GSLV Mark-III. By 2020, ISRO has a target to put 48 Indian satellites in orbit with 11 launches of the PSLV, he informed. Elaborating on the use of space towards conducting experiments in micro-gr...

Vishal Sharma   New Delhi/ Agra.            Footwear manufacturers of Agra have been opposing the export of leather to the other competing countries by the tanneries in India. This has deprived the local footwear industry of good quality raw leather. The issue has even been raised by the local exporters in various industry forums, demanding an immediate ban on the export of leather from India to countries like China that were giving a tough competition to the Indian footwear industry. To end this dispute between footwear manufacturers and tannery owners, a delegation of tannery owners from the Chennai Leather Association will be arriving in Agra tomorrow and will hold discussions with the local exporters to bring about an amicable solution of the situation. According to the industry sources, the Agra footwear industry alone feeds 25 per cent of the national footwear exports and out of the $7 billion target set by the Council for Leather Exports (CLE) for footwear exports from the count...

Vishal Sharma   New Delhi/ Agra.          Adlabs Cinemas, the entertainment infrastructure offshoot of Anil Ambani-controlled Adlabs Films Ltd, in collaboration with Israel-based Cinema Park Network, is set to introduce the country’s first six-dimensional movie theater in Agra. According to company sources, the 6-D movie theater will come up in the multiplex, being constructed by Adlabs, on the Fatehabad Road. While the company is already running IMAX theater set-ups in Mumbai and Delhi, this the first time it has ventured into the innovative 6-D concept which will provide special effects like moving seats, breeze, water spray, bass shakers and multiple ticklers apart from the usual 3-D IMAX experience. According to the company sources at Mumbai, it would be the first time when movie-goers in India will be able to not only view a movie in three-dimensions but also see, smell, feel and interact with the movie in a four-screen multiplex which would come up in Agra by the end of this year...