FAQs on cricket betting: Absence of action tells the real tale

A senior government officer, who was dealing with Pakistan on sensitive and strategic issues, tells Sheela Bhatt that Pakistan never wanted Sarabit Singh to return to India and share all that he knew. He says the the killing of the Indian convict in a Lahore jail was a planned murder. “How could have India got back Sarabjit Singh from a bunch of barbarians?” was the response of a senior government officer when asked why India could not do enough to bring back the injured Indian ...

Sheela Bhatt spoke to various members of Parliament to elicit their opinion about Finance Minister P Chidambaram's last Budget before the general elections, and found them lukewarm in their reaction. 'Political nuksaan nahi, lekin faida bhi nahin. Bach nikle,' about sums it upAs soon as the Union Budget was presented on Thursday afternoon, most members of Parliament rushed out of Parliament to catch the television cameras as fast as they could to give their sound bytes on P Chidambaram’s ...

Who ordered the search against DMK leader M K Stalin or did the CBI really act of its own? Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt breaks down the events leading up to the raid and explains why claims by the government and the CBI are unconvincing. When you sit in a sleazy beer bar not even a fool will believe that you are drinking badam-pista masala milk. The Central Bureau of Investigation’s raid at the residence of Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam leader M K Stalin in Chennai, just two days ...

In an exclusive interview with rediff.com’s Sheela Bhatt, Bharatiya Janata Party MP Harin Pathak, a member of the Joint Parliamentary Committee probing the 2G scam, says without mincing words that panel chief P C Chacko cannot decide exclusively whether to summon prime accused former Telecom Minister A Raja or not. “Who is P C Chacko to decide whether former Raja should be allowed to appear before the JPC or not? It is the JPC’s prerogative and not the exclusive right of the ...

Sheela Bhatt speaks to BJP insiders and those privy to Modi's thinking, to piece together the Gujarat strongman's plan/journey that aims for the biggest prize in Indian politics. Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi's last two speeches in New Delhi have pushed political speculation to fever pitch. His speech before students of Sri Ram Commerce College and his fiery and focused political speech in which he indulged in Gandhi family bashing before the top 5,000 district and state leaders of the ...

But it's nice to see the CBI telling the truth overtly and exposing the government that it serves covertly, says Sheela Bhatt. "Vahanvati (Goolam Essaji Vahanvati, attorney general) was lying when earlier he told court that the government has not vetted the status report on the allocation of coal. Now, the Central Bureau of Investigation has told the court on record that the government has seen the draft report before the final report was drafted. It's proven beyond doubt that Vahanvati ...

BJP leaders argue that there is a serious argument against Cyriac Joseph's appointment because one of his “acts of omission” in not delivering a sensitive judgment within a reasonable time-frame has helped the first United Progressive Alliance government by bailing out Mulayam Singh Yadav and his family, reports Sheela Bhatt Former Supreme Court judge Justice Cyriac Joseph’s proposed appointment as a member of the National Human Rights Commission is being strongly opposed ...

'The court would like to make the CBI politically neutral so that they behave as professionals and they are not influenced by somebody in power,' constitutional expert Anil Divan tells Sheela Bhatt Anil Divan, senior lawyer and an expert on Constitution-related issues, has a distinguished track record of fighting against corruption in the highest court in the land. In the 1990s he gave assistance, as amicus curiae, to the Justice J S Verma-led bench in the Vineet Narain case, also known as ...

Digvijaya Singh's provocative comments are the first political steps taken by the Congress to handle the coal scam and its fall-out, says Sheela Bhatt Whenever Digvijaya Singh makes wild comments, senior leaders of Congress tell journalists and critics not to take him seriously. They claim that Singh is only speaking for himself. The Congress insists that neither is he the voice of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government, neither is it the proxy talk of 10, Janpath.