Need surgery? Good luck getting hospital cost info

CHICAGO (AP) — Want to know how much a hip replacement will cost? Many hospitals won't be able to tell you, at least not right away — if at all. And if you shop around and find centers that can quote a price, the amounts could vary astronomically, a study found.

Routine hip replacement surgery on a healthy patient without insurance may cost as little as $11,000 — or up to nearly $126,000.

That's what researchers found after calling hospitals in every state, 122 in all, asking what a healthy 62-year-old woman would have to pay to get an artificial hip. Hospitals were told the made-up patient was the caller's grandmother, had no insurance but could afford to pay out of pocket — that's why knowing the cost information ahead of time was so important.

About 15 percent of hospitals did not provide any price estimate, even after a researcher called back as many as five times.

The researchers were able to obtain a complete price estimate including physician fees from close to half the hospitals. But in most cases, that took contacting the hospital and doctor separately.

"Our calls to hospitals were often greeted by uncertainty and confusion," the researchers wrote. "We were frequently transferred between departments, asked to leave messages that were rarely returned, and told that prices could not be estimated without an office visit."

Many hospitals "are just completely unprepared" for cost questions, said Jaime Rosenthal, a Washington University student who co-authored the report.

Most hospitals aren't intentionally hiding costs, they're just not used to patients asking. That's particularly true for patients with health insurance who "don't bother to ask because they know insurance will cover it," said co-author Dr. Peter Cram, a researcher at the University of Iowa's medical school.

But he said that's likely to change as employers increasingly force workers to share more health care costs by paying higher co-payments and deductibles, making patients more motivated to ask about costs.

The study was published online Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine. A California study published last year about surgery to remove an appendix found similar cost disparities.

Commenting on the study, American Hospital Association spokeswoman Marie Watteau said hospitals "have a uniform set of charges. Sharing meaningful information, however, is challenging because hospital care is unique and based on each individual patient's needs."

She said states and local hospital associations are the best source for pricing data, and that many states already require or encourage hospitals to report pricing information and make that data available to the public.

U.S. insurance companies typically negotiate to pay less than the billing price. Insured patients' health plans determine what they pay, while uninsured patients may end up paying the full amount.

The study authors noted that Medicare and other large insurers frequently pay between $10,000 and $25,000 for hip replacement surgery.

Sean Toohey, a grains broker at the Chicago Board of Trade, had hip replacement surgery last summer at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, Ill. An old sports injury had worn out his left hip, causing "horrendous" pain on the job, where he's on his feet all day filling orders.

Toohey, 54, said his health insurance covered most of the costs, and it didn't occur to him to ask about price beforehand. He was back at work two weeks later and is pain free. That's what matters most to him.

"I never really looked or paid attention" to the cost, he said.

He paid about $7,900, but wasn't sure what the total bill amounted to.

The average charge for hip replacement surgery at Loyola is about $42,000, before the negotiated insurance rates. The most expensive items on a typical hip replacement bill include about $11,000 for the hip implant, said Richard Kudia, Loyola's vice president of patient financial services

Kudia said some patients do ask in advance about costs of surgery and other medical procedures, and those questions require "a little bit of research" to come up with an average estimate. Costs vary from center to center because "there is no standard pricing among hospitals across the country. Each hospital develops its own pricing depending on its market," he said.

An editorial accompanying the hip replacement study said "there is no justification" for the huge cost variation the researchers found.

A few online sites provide price comparisons for common medical procedures, but the editorial said that kind of information "is of almost no value" without information on hospital quality.

A proposed federal measure that would have required states to force hospitals to make their charges public failed to advance in Congress last year but could be revived this year, the editorial says.

"It is time we stopped forcing people to buy health care services blindfolded," the editorial said.

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Online:

Journal: http://www.jamainternalmed.com

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Benedict's Legacy Marred by Sex Abuse Scandal

When Pope Benedict XVI resigns at the end of this month, he leaves behind a Church grappling with a global fallout from sex abuse and a personal legacy marred by allegations that he was instrumental in covering up that abuse.

As the sex abuse scandal spread from North America to Europe, Benedict became the first pope to meet personally with victims, and offered repeated public apologies for the Vatican's decades of inaction against priests who abused their congregants.

"No words of mine could describe the pain and harm inflicted by such abuse," the pope said in a 2008 homily in Washington, D.C., before meeting with victims of abuse for the first time. "It is important that those who have suffered be given loving pastoral attention." During the same trip to the U.S., he met with victims for the first time.

For some of the victims, however, Benedict's actions were "lip service and a public relations campaign," said Jeff Anderson, a Minnesota lawyer who represents victims of sex abuse. For 25 years, Benedict, then known as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, headed the Vatican office responsible for investigating claims of sex abuse, but he did not act until he received an explicit order from Pope John Paul II.

In 1980, as Archbishop of Munich, Ratzinger approved plans for a priest to move to a different German parish and return to pastoral work only days after the priest began therapy for pedophilia. The priest was later convicted of sexually abusing boys.

Vincenzo Pinto/AFP/Getty Images

PHOTOS: Church Sex Scandals

In 1981, Cardinal Ratzinger became head of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith – the office once known as the Inquisition -- making him responsible for upholding church doctrine, and for investigating claims of sexual abuse against clergy. Thousands of letters detailing allegations of abuse were forwarded to Ratzinger's office.

A lawsuit filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights on behalf of the Survivors' Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), a victims' rights group, charges that as head of the church body Ratzinger participated in a cover-up of abuse. In an 84-page complaint, the suit alleges that investigators of sex abuse cases in several countries found "intentional cover-ups and affirmative steps taken that serve to perpetuate the violence and exacerbate the harm."

"Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, either knew and/or some cases consciously disregarded information that showed subordinates were committing or about to commit such crimes," the complaint says.

Jeffrey Lena, the Vatican's lawyer in the U.S., told the AP the complaint was a "ludicrous publicity stunt and a misuse of international judicial processes."

In the 1990s, former members of the Legion of Christ sent a letter to Ratzinger alleging that the founder and head of the Catholic order, Father Marcial Maciel, had molested them while they were teen seminarians. Maciel was allowed to continue as head of the order.

In 1996, Ratzinger didn't respond to letters from Milwaukee's archbishop about a priest accused of abusing students at a Wisconsin school for the deaf. An assistant to Ratzinger began a secret trial of the priest, Father Lawrence Murphy, but halted the process after Murphy wrote a personal appeal to Ratzinger complaining of ill health.

In 2001, Pope John Paul II issued a letter urging the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith to pursue allegations of child abuse in response to calls from bishops around the world.

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Gunbattle rocks Gao after rebels surprise French, Malians

GAO, Mali (Reuters) - Islamist insurgents launched a surprise raid in the heart of the Malian town of Gao on Sunday, battling French and local troops in a blow to efforts to secure Mali's recaptured north.

Local residents hid in their homes or crouched behind walls as the crackle of gunfire from running street battles resounded through the sandy streets and mud-brick houses of the ancient Niger River town, retaken from Islamist rebels last month by a French-led offensive.

French helicopters clattered overhead and fired on al Qaeda-allied rebels armed with AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades who had infiltrated the central market area and holed up in a police station, Malian and French officers said.

The fighting inside Gao was certain to raise fears that pockets of determined Islamists who have escaped the lightning four-week-old French intervention in Mali will strike back with guerrilla attacks and suicide bombings.

After driving the bulk of the insurgents from major northern towns such as Timbuktu and Gao, French forces are trying to search out their bases in the remote and rugged Adrar des Ifoghas mountains, far up in the northeast.

But with Mali's weak army unable to secure recaptured zones, and the deployment of a larger African security force slowed by delays and kit shortages, vast areas to the rear of the French forward lines now look vulnerable to guerrilla activity.

"They infiltrated the town via the river. We think there were about 10 of them. They were identified by the population and they went into the police station," said General Bernard Barrera, commander of French ground operations in Mali.

He told reporters in Gao that French helicopters had intervened to help Malian troops pinned down by the rebels, who threw grenades from rooftops.

Malian gendarme Colonel Saliou Maiga told Reuters the insurgents intended to carry out suicide attacks in the town.

SUICIDE BOMBERS

No casualty toll was immediately available. But a Reuters reporter in Gao saw one body crumpled over a motorcycle. Malian soldiers said some of the raiders may have come on motorbikes.

The gunfire in Gao erupted hours after French and Malian forces reinforced a checkpoint on the northern outskirts that had been attacked for the second time in two days by a suicide bomber.

Abdoul Abdoulaye Sidibe, a Malian parliamentarian from Gao, said the rebel infiltrators were from the MUJWA group that had held the town until French forces liberated it late last month.

MUJWA is a splinter faction of al Qaeda's North African wing AQIM which, in loose alliance with the home-grown Malian Islamist group Ansar Dine, held Mali's main northern urban areas for 10 months until the French offensive drove them out.

Late on Saturday, an army checkpoint in Gao's northern outskirts came under attack by a group of Islamist rebels who fired from a road and bridge that lead north through the desert scrub by the Niger River to Bourem, 80 km (50 miles) away.

"Our soldiers came under heavy gunfire from jihadists from the bridge ... At the same time, another one flanked round and jumped over the wall. He was able to set off his suicide belt," Malian Captain Sidiki Diarra told reporters.

The bomber died and one Malian soldier was lightly wounded, he added. In Friday's motorbike suicide bomber attack, a Malian soldier was also injured.

Diarra described Saturday's bomber as a bearded Arab.

Since Gao and the UNESCO World Heritage city of Timbuktu were retaken last month, several Malian soldiers have been killed in landmine explosions on a main road leading north.

French and Malian officers say pockets of rebels are still in the bush and desert between major towns and pose a threat of hit-and-run guerrilla raids and bombings.

"We are in a dangerous zone... we can't be everywhere," a French officer told reporters, asking not to be named.

One local resident reported seeing a group of 10 armed Islamist fighters at Batel, just 10 km (6 miles) from Gao.

OPERATIONS IN NORTHEAST

The French, who have around 4,000 troops in Mali, are now focusing their offensive operations several hundred kilometers (miles) north of Gao in a hunt for the Islamist insurgents.

On Friday, French special forces paratroopers seized the airstrip and town of Tessalit, near the Algerian border.

From here, the French, aided by around 1,000 Chadian troops in the northeast Kidal region, are expected to conduct combat patrols into the Adrar des Ifoghas mountains.

The remaining Islamists are believed to have hideouts and supply depots in a rugged, sun-blasted range of rocky gullies and caves, and are also thought to be holding at least seven French hostages previously seized in the Sahel.

The U.S. and European governments back the French-led operation as a defense against Islamist jihadists threatening wider attacks, but rule out sending their own combat troops.

To accompany the military offensive, France and its allies are urging Mali authorities to open a national reconciliation dialogue that addresses the pro-autonomy grievances of northern communities like the Tuaregs, and to hold democratic elections.

Interim President Dioncounda Traore, appointed after a military coup last year that plunged the West African state into chaos and led to the Islamist occupation of the north, has said he intends to hold elections by July 31.

But he faces splits within the divided Malian army, where rival units are still at loggerheads.

(Additional reporting by Tiemoko Diallo and Adama Diarra in Bamako; Writing by Joe Bavier and Pascal Fletcher; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

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Colombia quake damaged 100 houses, injured 15

BOGOTA: A strong earthquake that shook Colombia over the weekend destroyed 100 houses and damaged nearly 2,000 others, authorities said Sunday. Only 15 people were injured, none seriously, they said.

The National Risk Management Unit said all areas affected by Saturday's quake had been reached, and the toll was definitive.

"A total of 15 people injured, 100 houses destroyed, 1,896 houses damaged," the agency said via Twitter.

Twenty-four schools and a clinic also were among the structures damaged by the quake, which registered 7.0 on the moment magnitude scale and 6.9 on the Richter scale.

Its epicentre was near Pasto, Colombia, a city of 400,000 that lies in the shadow of the Galeras volcano in the southwestern province of Narino.

The quake was felt as far away as Bogota and Quito, Ecuador.

- AFP/jc

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Decision on Kurien likely before budget session: Chacko

NEW DELHI: Congress's dilemma over the controversy surrounding Rajya Sabha deputy chairman P J Kurien is becoming pronounced ahead of Parliament's budget session as the opposition, mainly the Left bloc, is bound to ramp up its demand for the Kerala leader's removal.

As demands for Kurien's sacking get louder, the ruling party has indicated that a decision will be taken before the coming budget session of Parliament.

The issue is haunting the party's top leadership as it will be awkward for the Congress to let Kurien preside over the upper House when it debates a legislation relating to women's safety and security.

"The high command is seized of the matter and a decision will be taken before the coming budget session of Parliament," AICC spokesman P C Chacko told reporters.

The party leadership is keeping a close watch on how the 17-year-old Suryanelli rape case unfolds in the public domain in the coming days before taking a call on the demand.

"We will be taking decision on all issues, including this, before the Parliament session begins (on February 21). The high command will not be closing its eyes to any issue coming before the party," Chacko said.

Opposition parties led by the Left Front have been demanding Kurien's sacking as Rajya Sabha deputy chairman in the wake of the victim of the 1996 Suryanelli case recently reiterating her charge against him.

However, Kurien has claimed innocence and blamed the renewed controversy on political motivation of his rivals.

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After early start, worst of flu season may be over

NEW YORK (AP) — The worst of the flu season appears to be over.

The number of states reporting intense or widespread illnesses dropped again last week, and in a few states there was very little flu going around, U.S. health officials said Friday.

The season started earlier than normal, first in the Southeast and then spreading. But now, by some measures, flu activity has been ebbing for at least four weeks in much of the country. Flu and pneumonia deaths also dropped the last two weeks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

"It's likely that the worst of the current flu season is over," CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said.

But flu is hard to predict, he and others stressed, and there have been spikes late in the season in the past.

For now, states like Georgia and New York — where doctor's offices were jammed a few weeks ago — are reporting low flu activity. The hot spots are now the West Coast and the Southwest.

Among the places that have seen a drop: Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest in Allentown, Pa., which put up a tent outside its emergency room last month to help deal with the steady stream of patients. There were about 100 patients each day back then. Now it's down to 25 and the hospital may pack up its tent next week, said Terry Burger, director of infection control and prevention for the hospital.

"There's no question that we're seeing a decline," she said.

In early December, CDC officials announced flu season had arrived, a month earlier than usual. They were worried, saying it had been nine years since a winter flu season started like this one. That was 2003-04 — one of the deadliest seasons in the past 35 years, with more than 48,000 deaths.

Like this year, the major flu strain was one that tends to make people sicker, especially the elderly, who are most vulnerable to flu and its complications

But back then, that year's flu vaccine wasn't made to protect against that bug, and fewer people got flu shots. The vaccine is reformulated almost every year, and the CDC has said this year's vaccine is a good match to the types that are circulating. A preliminary CDC study showed it is about 60 percent effective, which is close to the average.

So far, the season has been labeled moderately severe.

Like others, Lehigh Valley's Burger was cautious about making predictions. "I'm not certain we're completely out of the woods," with more wintry weather ahead and people likely to be packed indoors where flu can spread around, she said.

The government does not keep a running tally of flu-related deaths in adults, but has received reports of 59 deaths in children. The most — nine — were in Texas, where flu activity was still high last week. Roughly 100 children die in an average flu season, the CDC says

On average, about 24,000 Americans die each flu season, according to the CDC.

According to the CDC report, the number of states with intense activity is down to 19, from 24 the previous week, and flu is widespread in 38 states, down from 42.

Flu is now minimal in Florida, Kentucky, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

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Online:

CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/

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$1M Reward for Capture of Fugitive Ex-Cop Dorner

A $1 million reward was offered today for information leading to the arrest of Christopher Dorner, as authorities in Big Bear, Calif., scaled back their search for the disgruntled ex-cop, who is suspected in three revenge killings.

"This is the largest local reward ever offered, to our knowledge," Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck said at a news conference today. "This is an act of domestic terrorism. This is a man who has targeted those that we entrust to protect the public. His actions cannot go unanswered."

The money for the reward was pooled by businesses, government, local law enforcement leaders and individual donors, Beck said.

PHOTOS: Former LAPD Officer Suspected in Shootings

The reward comes on the fourth day of a manhunt for Dorner, who has left Southern California on edge after he allegedly went on a killing spree last week to avenge his firing from the police force. Dorner outlined his grievances in a 6,000 word so-called "manifesto" and said he will keep killing until the truth is known about his case.

Dorner's threats have prompted the LAPD to provide more than 50 law enforcement families with security and surveillance detail, Beck said.

Authorities are chasing leads, however they declined to say where in order to not impede the investigation.

Dorner's burned-out truck was found Thursday near Big Bear Lake, a popular skiing destination located 80 miles northeast of Los Angeles.

Irvine Police Department/AP Photo

Manhunt for Alleged Cop Killer Heads to California Mountains Watch Video

Christopher Dorner Search: Officials Search for Ex-officer in the Mountains Watch Video

Hundreds of Officers on Hunt for Alleged Cop Killer Watch Video

Investigators found two AR-15 assault rifles in the burned-out truck Dorner abandoned, sources told ABC News.

The truck had a broken axle, which may be the reason he decided to set fire to it, the police sources said.

Full Coverage: Christopher Jordan Dorner

Officers have spent the past couple of days going door-to-door and searching vacant cabins. The manhunt was scaled back to 25 officers and one helicopter in the resort town today, according to the San Bernadino Sheriff's Office.

On Saturday, Beck announced he would reopen the investigation into Dorner's firing but said the decision was not made to "appease" the fugitive ex-cop.

"I feel we need to also publicly address Dorner's allegations regarding his termination of employment, and to do so I have directed our Professionals Standards Bureau and my Special Assistant for Constitutional Policing to completely review the Dorner complaint of 2007; To include a re-examination of all evidence and a re-interview of witnesses," Beck said. "We will also investigate any allegations made in his manifesto which were not included in his original complaint."

Dorner is suspected of killing Monica Quan and her fiancé Keith Lawrence last Sunday in their car in the parking lot of their Irvine, Calif., condominium complex. Both were struck with multiple gunshot wounds.

Quan's father, Randall Quan, was a retired captain with the LAPD and attorney who represented Dorner before a police review board that led to Dorner's dismissal from the force in 2008.

On Wednesday, after Dorner was identified as a suspect in the double murder, police believe he ambushed two Riverside police officers, killing one and wounding the other.

The next day, Randall Quan reported he received a taunting call from a man claiming to be Dorner who told him that he "should have done a better job of protecting his daughter," according to court documents documents.

Anyone with information leading to the arrest of Christopher Dorner is asked to call the LAPD task force at 213-486-6860.

ABC News' Dean Schabner, Jack Date, Pierre Thomas, Jason Ryan and Clayton Sandell contributed to this report.

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Israel's Lieberman says Palestinian peace accord impossible

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel has no chance of signing a permanent peace accord with the Palestinians and should instead seek a long-term interim deal, the most powerful political partner of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday.

The remarks by Avigdor Lieberman, an ultranationalist whose joint party list with Netanyahu narrowly won a January 22 election while centrist challengers made surprise gains, seemed designed to dampen expectations at home and abroad of fresh peacemaking.

A spring visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories by U.S. President Barack Obama, announced this week, has stirred speculation that foreign pressure for a diplomatic breakthrough could build - though Washington played down that possibility.

In a television interview, ex-foreign minister Lieberman linked the more than two-year-old impasse to pan-Arab political upheaval that has boosted Islamists hostile to the Jewish state.

These include Hamas, rivals of U.S.-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who control the Gaza Strip and spurn coexistence with Israel though they have mooted extended truces.

"Anyone who thinks that in the center of this socio-diplomatic ocean, this tsunami which is jarring the Arab world, it is possible to arrive at the magic solution of a comprehensive peace with the Palestinians does not understand," Lieberman told Israel's Channel Two.

"This is impossible. It is not possible to solve the conflict here. The conflict can be managed and it is important to manage the conflict ... to negotiate on a long-term interim agreement."

Abbas broke off talks in late 2010 in protest at Israel's settlement of the occupied West Bank. He angered Israel and the United States in November by securing a U.N. status upgrade that implicitly recognized Palestinian independence in all the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza.

Israel insists it will keep East Jerusalem and swathes of West Bank settlements under any eventual peace deal. Most world powers consider the settlements illegal because they take up land seized in the 1967 Middle East war.

Lieberman, himself a West Bank settler, said the ball was "in Abu Mazen's (Abbas') court" to revive diplomacy.

Abbas has demanded Israel first freeze all settlement construction. With two decades gone since Palestinians signed their first interim deal with Israel, he has ruled out any new negotiations that do not solemnize Palestinian statehood.

Netanyahu's spokesman Mark Regev noted that Lieberman, in the Channel Two interview, had said he was expressing his own opinion.

Asked how Netanyahu saw peace prospects for an accord with the Palestinians, Regev referred to a speech on Tuesday in which the conservative prime minister said that Israel, while addressing threats by its enemies, "must also pursue secure, stable and realistic peace with our neighbors".

Netanyahu has previously spoken in favor of a Palestinian state, though he has been cagey on its borders and whether he would be prepared to dismantle Israeli settlements.

Lieberman's role in the next coalition government is unclear as he faces trial for corruption. If convicted, he could be barred from the cabinet. Lieberman denies wrongdoing and has said he would like to regain the foreign portfolio, which he surrendered after his indictment was announced last year.

(Writing by Dan Williams; Editing by Stephen Powell)

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6.5-magnitude quake strikes off Solomon Islands

HONIARA: A 6.5-magnitude earthquake hit off the Solomon Islands on Sunday, the latest powerful aftershock following a 8.0-magnitude quake that sparked a tsunami four days ago, US seismologists said.

The US Geological Survey said the quake struck at 8:02 am, 2102 GMT Saturday, 29 kilometres south-southwest of Lata, the main town on remote Ndende Island in the Santa Cruz Islands, which are part of the Solomons, at a depth of 18 kilometres.

It was the latest in a series of powerful aftershocks to hit the remote region since a deadly 8.0-magnitude earthquake Wednesday triggered a tsunami, killing at least 13 people, destroying villages and leaving thousands homeless.

The tremor was not expected to generate a widespread tsunami, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre said.

Geoscience Australia also measured it at 6.5 but centred at a greater depth of 36 kilometres.

A further 12 houses were reported destroyed following a 6.8 magnitude tremor Friday and another measuring 7.0, which sent villagers fleeing to higher ground in fear of another tsunami.

The Solomon Islands government has declared the outlying Santa Cruz Islands a disaster area as the aftershocks continue to hamper relief efforts.

Because of a fragile communications system, officials in the capital Honiara were struggling to get a clear picture of the extent of damage, but the Red Cross said food, water and shelter were a priority for quake-hit villages.

- AFP/jc

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After Afzal Guru's hanging, focus now on Rajoana

CHANDIGARH: With the hanging of Afzal Guru on Saturday, the focus is now on Balwant Singh Rajoana, sentenced to death in the assassination of former Punjab CM Beant Singh. The Akalis had virtually pulled Rajoana out of the jaws of death when Punjab CM Parkash Singh Badal and his son and SAD president Sukhbir Badal had pleaded with the then President to defer the hanging, just two days before he was to be executed on March 31 last year. Rajoana had, however, refused to challenge the death sentence.

On Saturday, as the BJP upped its attack on the UPA for the "delay in hanging Guru," its ally, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), maintained silence. Both the Badals and the SAD spokesperson avoided queries from TOI on their stand regarding Rajoana.

The Congress, meanwhile, accused the BJP of "doublespeak" and dared SAD to clarify its stand on Rajoana. This Babbar Khalsa International terrorist who conspired to kill Beant Singh was awarded the death sentence by a CBI special court in July 2007 along with another terrorist, Jagtar Singh Hawara. The Punjab and Haryana high court had in October 2010 upheld Rajoana's death sentence, while changing the capital punishment meted out to Hawara to life imprisonment.

While Sukhbir Badal, who is also deputy CM, parried queries from TOI, Gagandeep Brar, special principal secretary to the CM said that he was indisposed and would not be able to comment. However, the CM did find time to meet a 21-member delegation from Iowa, US, on Saturday morning.

The Punjab Congress attacked the BJP, saying that its ally, SAD, was only trying to put roadblocks to a legal and constitutional process. "Rajoana should be meted out the justice due to him. The central government only agreed to have a look at his appeal but law must take its course. While sharing the stage at a function in Punjab, I had asked LK Advani the question on double standards. He refused to answer then as well," said Sunil Jakhar, leader of opposition in Punjab Assembly.

Other Congress leaders also attacked the BJP, saying it was during its rule that Parliament was attacked and that they were using a different yardstick for the assassination of Beant Singh who was a Congress CM.

Beant Singh was largely credited with wiping out terrorism from Punjab by dealing with terrorists with an iron hand along with supercop KPS Gill. He was assassinated by a human bomb, Dilawar Singh, at the high security Punjab civil secretariat here August 31, 1995. While Hawara was the mastermind of the assassination, Rajoana was the second human bomb to be used in case the first one failed.

There is also another militant, Devinder Pal Bhullar, who is on death row. He was found guilty of killing nine bystanders in a 1993 car bombing which was intended to kill Maninderjeet Singh Bitta, chairman of the All India Anti-Terrorist Front, and sentenced to death. He is also a suspect in two other terrorist attacks. His appeal against the conviction was dismissed by the Supreme Court on December 27, 2006, and his plea for clemency was rejected by President Pratibha Patil in May 2011.

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