Aman Sharma
An SBI bank account will be opened with Re 1 donated by the Centre to the trust and fixed deposits worth Rs 11 crore from donations made to the temple so far will be transferred to this, Rai told ET. SBI offered to open a new branch in the temple complex at a meeting with Rai and other trustees who also surveyed the entire 67.7-acre plot.
The UTs of J&K and Ladakh clubbed together got the number eight spot among 36 states and UTs, reporting DBT payouts worth Rs 1,190 crore through over 80 lakh transactions. Many states like West Bengal do not implement several central schemes in which subsidies are involved. Hence, Trinamool Congress-ruled state was the worst at 36th spot.
Four of the trustees met the PM at his residence on Thursday. The PM had invited the trustees for a courtesy meeting after the trust held its first meeting in Delhi a day earlier. “We have given the PM an invitation to come for the ceremony in Ayodhya,” Das told ET.
Agra city and the Taj Mahal are being spruced up ahead of the US President's visit, with the tombs of Mumtaz and Shah Jahan in the Taj Mahal being given a fresh mud-cake cleaning treatment for the first time in many years.
Former principal secretary to Prime Minister Narendra Modi Nripendra Misra has been chosen as the chairman of the Ram Temple Complex Development Committee on Wednesday.
The invite comes amid discontent among saints of Ayodhya, who say the trust does not have adequate representation from those who led the Ram Janmabhoomi movement. At least two trustees told ET that they will be proposing Das’ name for inclusion in the trust.
ET was the first to report on Sunday that UP government had been informed by the Centre to be prepared for a visit by US President Donald Trump and his wife Melania to the Taj Mahal in Agra on February 24 or 25.
Work on the first project of 203 km started in 2015 and was scheduled to be completed in 2018. Now Modi has fixed December 2020 as the new deadline for this. Both these highways are the main routes to Varanasi, an official said, and the double-lane roads are choc-a-block with traffic.
Paswan told ET that the government should bring a bill when Parliament reopens to enact a law which specifies that all Acts pertaining to “reservation should be put in the ninth schedule of Constitution so that it (reservation) goes out of the court’s jurisdiction”. He said this was the demand of the SC/ST MPs he had recently hosted at his residence.
The Centre has asked the UP government to prepare for a visit by US President Donald Trump and his wife Melania to the Taj Mahal in Agra on February 24 or 25.
Copyright © 2020 Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd. All rights reserved. For reprint rights: Times Syndication Service
