Ministry denies info on land allotment for new BJP HQ in Delhi: Activist
Lucknow, June 12: Information sought under the RTI Act about the allotment of land to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for it's new headquarters at 6, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Marg in New Delhi has been denied by the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, an activist said on Tuesday.
City based activist Nutan Thakur had in February this year sought a copy of the file related to the land allotment, to which the ministry's CPIO Rajanish Kumar Jha said that the information sought was by third party and has not provided any stake in the property, hence it cannot be provided.
The activist, in a statement to the media, however claims that allotment of government land was not third party information and should have been provided.
The 70-room new office space, inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in February this year was a modern, multi-storeyed building with three blocks, spread over a sprawling two acres equipped with latest state-of-the-art gadgets.
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Tahawwur Rana being brought to India in special flight: Sources
New Delhi, Apr 9 (PTI): Mumbai terror attack accused Tahawwur Rana is likely to be brought to India in a special flight on Thursday after all hurdles for his extradition were removed by the US, people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.
Rana, 64, a Canadian national of Pakistani origin, was lodged in the Metropolitan Detention Centre in Los Angeles.
A multi-agency team has gone to the US and all paperwork and legal issues are being completed with US authorities to bring him to India, they said.
Rana is being brought to India after his last-ditch attempt to evade extradition failed as the US Supreme Court justices rejected his application.
"You are all aware that the US Supreme Court has rejected his plea. As far as extradition of Rana is concerned, at this point, I do not have an update," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said.
"We will provide you an update at an appropriate time," he said while replying to a question during his weekly media briefing.
Rana is known to be associated with Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley, one of the main conspirators of the 26/11 attacks.
On November 26, 2008, a group of 10 Pakistani terrorists went into a rampage, carrying out a coordinated attack on a railway station, two luxury hotels and a Jewish centre, after they sneaked into India's financial capital using the sea route in the Arabian Sea.
As many as 166 people were killed in the nearly 60-hour assault that sent shockwaves across the country and even brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war.
In November 2012, Ajmal Amir Kasab, the lone surviving gunman among the Pakistani group, was hanged to death in Yerawada Jail in Pune.
At a joint press conference with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the White House in February, President Donald Trump announced that his administration has approved the extradition of a "very evil" man "to face justice" in India.
In his emergency application, Rana had sought a "stay of his extradition and surrender to India pending litigation (including exhaustion of all appeals) on the merits of his February 13 petition."
In that petition, Rana argued that his extradition to India violates United States law and the United Nations Convention Against Torture "because there are substantial grounds for believing that, if extradited to India, the petitioner will be in danger of being subjected to torture."
