Rent Act amendment under SC scanner

Allows NRIs to take immediate possession of their property

Chandigarh, October 12
The amendment in the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction (Amendment) Act, 2001, empowering non-resident Indians (NRIs) to take immediate possession of rented residential and non-residential property, has come under the scanner of the Supreme Court.
A Bench comprising Justice Cyriac Joseph and Justice Tirath Singh Thakar recently issued notice to the parties concerned, including the Union Government and the UT Administration, on a special leave petition (SLP) filed by the Chandigarh-based Commercial Tenants Association (CTA).
Challenging the jurisdiction of the Punjab legislature in amending the Act, the petitioners had termed it a violation of Article 14 of the Constitution.
The notification, extending the amended Act to Chandigarh, was in exercise of essential legislative functions of the executive, which was not permissible under Section 87 of the Reorganisation Act, the SLP contended.
The amendment in the Act and its extension to Chandigarh had created panic among tenants as a large number of NRI landlords who had property in Chandigarh and Punjab had shot off notices to commercial tenants for summary vacation of their property.
An amendment, 13-B, had been added after Section 13-A in the notification of the Act, which provided that NRIs could get immediate possession of their property by applying to the relevant authority.
Meanwhile, CTA president Arvind Jain appealed to aggrieved tenants from Chandigarh and Punjab to join hands for a united fight against the amendment.
On the other hand, NRIs had been claiming that tenants had been paying them peanuts by way of rent for property worth crores despite raking in big money.
There was nothing wrong in getting property vacated for personal use, NRIs had contended. Earlier, the CTA had filed a petition in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which did not find merit in the plea and rejected it.

RIM says BlackBerry outages started in Europe

A technical failure in Europe is suspected of causing a huge backlog of messages worldwide for BlackBerry users, who have experienced three days of outages, Research In Motion said Wednesday.
RIM's chief technology officer, David Yach, said messages coming into Europe from Asia and the Americas to BlackBerry users got backed up and started affecting BlackBerry users globally.
Outages for RIM's instant messaging service, email and internet browsing started at the beginning of the week in Europe and spread to the Middle East and Africa and to Canada as the company worked to restore service.
Areas of South America, as well as Asian markets including Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and India were also affected.
It's in overseas markets where RIM has had its fastest growth in the last two years.
Shares in the Waterloo, Ont.-based firm closed down more than three per cent Wednesday as investors worried that the problem would undermine its reputation for reliability.
RIM shares fell 87 cents, or 3.46 per cent, at $24.27 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
Yach told a media briefing that the firm was throttling traffic to order to "stabilize service" and clear the backlog. RIM promised that all messages will be delivered.
Yach said the company believes it has found the cause and has found no evidence of hacking.
The BlackBerry outage even reached Prime Minister Stephen Harper's office.
Andrew MacDougall, spokesman for the prime minister, took to social networking site Twitter and tweeted: "Am being impacted by RIM/Berry service outage — please call if you need to reach me."
On Tuesday, the firm announced the problems were caused by a core switch failure within the company's infrastructure. RIM said a transition to a backup switch did not function as tested, causing a large backlog of data.
"The resolution of this service issue is our No. 1 priority right now and we are working night and day to restore all BlackBerry services to normal levels," the company said in a statement Wednesday.
RIM also apologized.
"We are working to resolve the situation as quickly as possible and we apologize to our customers for any inconvenience," RIM said.
However, an apology didn't seem to be good enough for the government of Colombia, which reportedly asked RIM to compensate users affected by the glitches.
RIM's last outage was in December 2009 and it also experienced an outage in 2008.
"It's a huge embarrassment for a company that has built its reputation on notion of service and reliability and when all else fails your BlackBerry will still work," said Michael Gartenberg, director of research at U.S.-based Gartner Inc.
The outage doesn't help the company's perception with consumers or businesses, Gartenberg said.
"It's coming at a time when RIM is facing increasing competition from companies like Google and Apple and Microsoft, all launching new products," Gartenberg said from New York.
Apple's iPhone 4S, announced last week, is set to hit stores Friday.
Technology analyst Troy Crandall said he expects the outages to have more of an effect in the corporate market.
"That's the bread and butter still for RIM," said Crandall of Montreal-based MacDougall, MacDougall & MacTier. "It just kind of puts the thought in people's heads — might it be time for a switch?"
RIM has about 70 million BlackBerry subscribers around the world.
RIM earns revenue from both the sale of its smartphone devices and a monthly fee subscribers pay to use its secure email services and instant messaging capabilities, which means users switching to other phones could eat away at its profits.

BlackBerry has outages in Europe, Africa, India

LONDON - BlackBerry users in Europe, the Middle East, Africa and India suffered email outages for several hours on Monday, adding to the woes of struggling manufacturer Research in Motion, increasingly seen as a takeover target.

Twitter users and Reuters correspondents from Britain to Dubai to New Delhi reported disruptions or complete outages of their email and BlackBerry Messenger services.

RIM said in an email sent to Reuters New Delhi: "We are working to resolve an issue currently impacting some BlackBerry subscribers in Europe, Middle East and Africa and India."

In Europe and Canada, it put out an identical statement but omitted the reference to India.

"We are investigating, and we apologise to our customers for any inconvenience caused whilst this is resolved," RIM said, declining to provide further detail.

RIM, which once owned the corporate mobile email market, has been losing share to smartphone rivals led by Apple’s iPhone as employees from the boardroom down demanded more choice.

A poor reception for its Playbook tablet computer has increased pressure on RIM’s top management, while a string of senior staff have left.

Monday’s outage follows last month’s BlackBerry Messenger disruption in the Americas.

Last month, investors drove RIM stock down by 20 percent, or $3 billion in value, after dismal quarterly results, raising prospects of a break-up, sale or new leadership.

RIM scrambles to end global BlackBerry outage

LONDON/TORONTO - Research In Motion said Wednesday it was working frantically to end a three-day global disruption of BlackBerry services that has frustrated millions of smartphone users and put more pressure on the company for sweeping changes.

The Canadian company, in a hastily announced conference call, vowed to deliver all email and instant messages to the tens of millions of customers who have been affected by the outage. It later told some clients the huge backlog may not clear until Thursday morning on the U.S. East Coast.

"Think of it like a dam and the water is the data," said Jefferies analyst Peter Misek. "Once the dam bursts it's really difficult to get the water back behind the dam. That's what they're attempting to do right now."

Shares of RIM dropped 3.9 per cent in Toronto trade after the late-afternoon call, which RIM arranged days after the disruptions began in Europe, the Middle East, Africa and India. The outage later spread to the Americas.

BREAKINGVIEWS: Hastening BlackBerry's slide: 1/8ID:nN1E79B0FM 3/8 Q+A: RIM's secretive BlackBerry network 1/8ID:nN1E79B1PJ 3/8 BlackBerry outage frustrates bankers 1/8ID:nnN1E79B0CV 3/8

Even though the drop in RIM's share price was relatively modest, the stock has already tumbled more than 50 per cent since the beginning of the year after a series of profit warnings, product missteps and little hope of an early turnaround.

This week's disruption, the worst since an outage swept North America two years ago, is likely to fuel calls for a management shake-up and a possible sale or split of the company, which has failed to keep pace with Apple and other rivals in a rapidly changing market.

The troubles could damage RIM's once-sterling reputation for secure and reliable message delivery and risks a further devaluation of its proprietary BlackBerry offering.

"Our priority is to get the service up and running, because at the end of the day what's going to make our customers happy is to have their BlackBerrys working again," David Yach, RIM's chief technology officer for software, said during the call.

UNIQUE SYSTEM

RIM is unique among handset makers, as it compresses and encrypts data before pushing it to BlackBerry devices via carrier networks. Apple and others rely on the carrier networks to handle all routing and delivery of content.

But even before this week's disruptions, many companies had started to balk at paying a premium to be locked into RIM's secure email service. Some are allowing employees to use alternative smartphones, particularly Apple's iPhone, for corporate mail.

"It's a blow upon a bruise. It comes at a bad time," said Richard Windsor, global technology specialist at Nomura.

"One possibility could be that it encourages client companies to look more at other options such as allowing users to connect their own devices to the corporate server and save themselves the cost of buying everyone a BlackBerry."

At the same time, RIM is getting ready to shift its line of BlackBerry smartphones to new software first used in the poorly received PlayBook tablet. A successful transition is considered crucial for its efforts to regain market share as the iPhone and devices powered by Google's Andriod become ever more popular with consumers.

The service disruptions prompted BlackBerry users to vent their frustration at the company and what they said was its failure to keep its customers informed.

"Totally appalled at the lack of communication from RIM," wrote Lynn Murdoch on RIM's BlackBerry Facebook page. "Love my Berry, but furious at the fact that no one can actually give a time frame of how long its going to take to fix. Utterly disappointed!"

"I'm right at the edge where I might be saying goodbye to my BlackBerry," said Tony Vitali, a BlackBerry user in New York. "The device freezes twice a day. . . . It's a very frustrating device."

BAD TIMING

From a marketing standpoint, the timing could hardly have been worse for RIM.

Apple on Wednesday launched an major upgrade to its iOS operating system that includes iMessage, an instant messaging service for users of Apple's iPhones, iPads and some iPods that is a direct competitor to RIM's BlackBerry Messenger, or BBM.

The service, which allows BlackBerry users to send free text messages to other BlackBerry users, has made the devices a popular choices with young consumers. That has partially compensated for its losses in the corporate market in North America and Western Europe.

RBC Capital Markets analysts Mike Abramsky and Paul Treiber said the latest crisis could hurt RIM's reputation in these key markets, particularly after high-profile tussles with jurisdictions whose governments demanded access to encrypted communications for security reasons.

On Wednesday RIM's shares closed down 3.46 per cent at C$24.27 on the Toronto Stock Exchange and down 2.17 per cent at $23.88 on the Nasdaq.

Air Canada strike averted

An Air Canada Boeing 777 sits at the international departure gate of Vancouver International Airport in May 2010.

The union representing 6,800 Air Canada flight attendants says it has cancelled its planned strike for Thursday at midnight, after the Canada Industrial Relations Board said employees must remain on the job while their contract dispute is being reviewed.
"Flight attendants represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), will not be going on strike tonight, as previously planned, following a notice by the Canadian Industrial Relations Board," the union said in a statement.
"The minister’s intervention with the labour board, as it stands, postpones the calling of a strike until the question of essential services has been ruled on."
Earlier, Ginette Brazeau, executive director of CIRB, the quasi-judicial tribunal that is responsible for interpreting parts of Canada Labour Code, told CBC News that the issue centres on essential services and "that suspends job action until the board renders a decision."
The Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents the flight attendants, received formal notice Wednesday that Labour Minister Lisa Raitt has referred the contract dispute to the CIRB.
Her referrals ask the tribunal to decide whether the union membership's rejection of two tentative deals has "created conditions that are unfavourable" to settling the dispute, whether communities might be cut off from service to urban centres and what effect that would have on Canadians' health and safety.

Earlier in the day, CUPE had insisted it was in a "legal strike position, and has to date received no order to the contrary," while adding it remains available to resume negotiations with Air Canada.
In a statement Wednesday, Raitt said the Conservative government had been given a "strong mandate to protect the Canadian economy and Canadian jobs, so we have been closely following the negotiations between Air Canada and CUPE."
"I have asked the CIRB to review the situation at Air Canada to ensure that the health and safety of the public will not be impacted, and to determine how best to maintain and secure industrial peace and promote conditions that are favourable to the settlement of industrial disputes," the minister said.
But CUPE national president Paul Moist called Raitt's decision to go to the CIRB "outrageous."
"Her rationale for this is disingenuous, and the use of the Canada Labour Code and the CIRB in this way is indefensible," Moist said in a statement.
Whether the union is indeed in a legal strike position could be in question.
Air Canada issued a statement saying it believed a strike by the 6,800 flight attendants had been avoided because Raitt had indicated no strike or lockout action can take place while the CIRB is considering the matter.
"It is our understanding that a strike or lockout cannot take place while the matter is before the CIRB and we are puzzled by the position currently being taken by CUPE," a spokesperson for the airline said.
CUPE spokesman Robert Lamoureux said the union would "react accordingly" if the CIRB says a strike is not permitted.
"It's something fundamental to us — the right to withhold labour if we cannot reach a settlement," he said. "If we lose that right, employers will be able to have the upper hand in every situation."
Labour lawyer Paul Cavalluzzo told CBC News he firmly believes the CIRB cannot suspend the legal right to strike.

Illegal strike

Cavalluzzo pointed out that the CIRB was brought in to prevent an illegal strike by security screeners at Toronto's Pearson airport last week. He said the board only intervenes in legal strikes if there is illegal activity, and, even then, the board cannot stop the strike entirely. "I don't think the CIRB has the authority to stop [a strike]," he said.
The flight attendants served a 72-hour strike notice on the airline on Sunday after 65 per cent of the votes cast were against the latest tentative collective agreement.
It marked the second time in recent months that the flight attendants have turned down a tentative deal with the airline.
They voted 87.8 per cent against ratifying the previous agreement in August.
Raitt has said a work stoppage would be unacceptable, and has indicated the federal government was prepared to use back-to-work legislation to end a strike by the flight attendants. However, Parliament is not due to resume sitting until Oct. 17, meaning a strike could last a few days before legislation goes into effect.

Board rules Air Canada flight attendants cannot strike



Air Canada had one message Wednesday morning to passengers: Labour strife won't delay any takeoffs or landing.



OTTAWA — Air Canada's flight attendants apparently won't be walking off the job after all.

The Canadian Industrial Relations Board says that the union cannot strike as of 12:01 a.m. ET Thursday — as it planned — after the federal labour minister referred the dispute to the board for review.

Labour Minister Lisa Raitt asked the board to determine whether a disruption of service would pose a health and safety risk to the public.

While the board is reviewing the matter, no strike or lockout can take place, according to the Canada Labour Code.

"In this regard, the Code is clear that this referral suspends the right to strike or lockout until the Board renders a decision on this matter," the board said in a statement posted on its website.

The union representing flight attendants was reviewing the notice sent to the board, but had earlier in the day said that its members planned to walk off the job.

That announcement came after Air Canada told passengers that it will remain business as usual Thursday and all flights would operate as scheduled.

The federal government's intervention came despite a renewed call from the union representing Air Canada's flight attendants for the government to stay out of the contract dispute.

"Minister Raitt's attempt to use the Canadian Industrial Relations Board to circumvent the rights of our members is outrageous," said Paul Moist, national president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees.

"The first excuse from the federal government for its unnecessary intervention was a supposed fear of harm to the Canadian economy. Now, out of the blue, Minister Raitt suspects a strike will endanger the health and safety of Canadians. These excuses strain the credibility of the Harper Conservatives, and are a transparent attack on flight attendants and every other worker in Canada."

Frustrated flight attendants vented their feelings about the labour dispute and federal government involvement in online videos posted to YouTube. In one video, two masked people hold signs showing the salaries of top Air Canada executives, and other signs with messages about having worked 167.5 hours one month, but only being paid for 82 hours while Twisted Sister's song We're Not Gonna Take It plays in the background.

"Respect our right to strike, Ms. Raitt," reads the last sign held up during the video.

Wages, pensions, crew rest time, working conditions and work rules are all issues in the negotiations. Flight attendants have twice voted down tentative agreements reached between its bargaining team and Air Canada management.

Sikh temple a labour of love in northeast Edmonton

Construction carries on 22 years after it started as volunteers continue to expand the Nanaksar Gurdwara

Edmonton's Nanaksar Gurdwara temple has been built with volunteer labour from as far away as England and India.

EDMONTON - Weather-worn sheets of plywood shield a makeshift cement plant in back corner behind the Nanaksar Gurdwara.

It says everything about this hands-on labour of love still growing as it enters its third decade in the northeast corner of Edmonton. The Sikh temple has been built with the coins and small bills dropped in the prayer room collection box, and with volunteer labour from as far away as England and India. University students spend their summers laying tile. They don’t hire contractors.

“It’s love, that’s what it is,” said Sehejpal Athwal, a 24-year-old customer sales rep for HSBC from England. He’s spending most of his 11-day vacation visiting his brother and volunteering on-site last week.

They come because they work beside their Baba Ji, or religious leader, he said. “They give us love, we love them and they teach us to love one another. You all learn to love and become one. It makes a better world.”

The dome of the temple now towers 10 storeys above the surrounding fields, but though they started in 1989, the Sikhs are not done building. Construction started on a new north wing designed to house a language school. Community leaders also have plans for a student residence, and perhaps a funeral home and a seniors residence, on the 36-hectare site.

But even though the spot is alone in the middle of a field off Manning Drive, it’s the centre of a fast-growing Punjabi community in the north end. A crowd of more than 1,000 is expected to drive out for the full-moon celebrations Tuesday night, and more than 2,000 for the fireworks on Oct. 26 marking Diwali, the festival of lights.

The hub of this community is tucked in the back, in a kitchen where 80-year-old hands roll the corn roti, strip mint leaves and wash spinach. Especially on weekends and full-moon days, the big main floor kitchen, with its six gas burners and pots the size of wine barrels, will be a hive of busy activity.

The Sikh community celebrates every full moon to remember their founder, Guru Nanak Devji, who was born on a full-moon day in 1469. He founded the Sikh religion to counter the strict focus on caste in the Hindu religion at the time, and started the practice of eating together.

“Anyone from any cast or religion, no matter how poor or rich, everybody sat together and had langar, which is food,” said Jas Sekhon, a retired small-business owner who volunteers in the kitchen at least once a week.

“He was trying to bring equality,” she said. “They can never stop anyone from coming in to have langar here.”

The Nanaksar Gurdwara is the largest of four temples in Edmonton serving a community of about 12,000 Sikhs. It’s the only one that has food seven days a week, Sekhon said.

The temple opens at 3 a.m., when the first priest comes in to start reading from the holy book in the upstairs prayer room. The first kitchen volunteers come in at 5:30 to prepare breakfast. Others arrive later to make lunch and keep food available through the day. They serve community members, construction volunteers, school groups and anyone who stops in to learn about the Sikh faith, said Zora Grewal, vice-president of the Edmonton branch.

The dining hall is a 10,000-square-foot room with a floor made of marble and granite, all salvaged from demolished Edmonton-area buildings, donated or bought from sale bins no one else wanted. The second floor holds a carpeted prayer room, where volunteers take turns reading the scriptures. On a full-moon day, both these rooms will be full as worshippers pray, then come downstairs to eat, talk and work, then return upstairs to pray again.

“You should come here, if you come only for an hour. The atmosphere is so energizing you find strength here,” Sekhon said. “I love it here. I find so much peace.”

Click here for more photos from the Nanaksar Gurdwara.

Check out food writer Liane Faulder’s blog Eat my Words for a recipe from the gurdwara kitchen.