Featured News

Coded references to passages about Jesus Christ in the New Testament have been inscribed on high-powered rifle sights provided to the American military by a Michigan company for years, a media report said.

The sights are used by US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and in the training of Iraqi and Afghan soldiers. The maker of the sights, Trijicon, has a $660 million multi-year contract to provide up to 800,000 sights to the Marine Corps, and additional contracts to provide sights to the US army, the ABC News reported.

On December 28th 2008 mid-term examinations had been scheduled to take place at the University College of Applied Sciences (UCAS) in Gaza. When the day arrived, however, the University College’s rooms, which usually cater for 8000 students, were void of any life. This was the second day of operation Cast Lead.

(Seema Mustafa) When leading Pakistan lawyer Aitzaz Ahsan who had led the movement for the restoration of the judiciary said at a recent peace conference held in New Delhi that there were at least 40,50,60 locals who had helped a handful of Pakistanis execute the Mumbai terror attack, there was quite a stir amongst the audience. Indian Muslims in particular were concerned enough for some of them to approach Ahsan later and ask him if he had evidence to substantiate what he had said.

The cost to U.S. taxpayers of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001 has topped $1 trillion, and President Barack Obama is expected to request another $33 billion to fund more troops this year.

Over two-thirds of the money has been spent on the conflict in Iraq since 2003. This year is the first in which more funds are being spent in Afghanistan than Iraq, as the pace of U.S. military operations slows in Iraq and quickens in Afghanistan.

HOW MUCH HAS BEEN SPENT ALREADY?

An American millionaire, Mark Shaffer declared his Islam in Saudi Arabia on Saturday, 17th October 2009. Mark was at that time on a holiday in Saudi Arabia to visit some famous cities like Riyadh , Abha and Jeddah for 10 days.

Mark is a well-known millionaire and also a practiced lawyer in Los Angeles , specializing in cases of civil laws. The last big case he handled was the case of the famous American pop singer, Michael Jackson, a week before he passed away.

The Poor class: At Independence there were around 25 crores poor in India, now their population has increased up to 100 crores. The congress tried to control their population by preaching them, but they never listened. Now the congress is spending lakhs of crores on their employment with the scheme like NREGS. As they have the majority of vote bank, they are to be pleased.

The World Bank today launched the fourth book in the critically acclaimed Moving Out of Poverty series, which provides bottom up perspectives on poverty and local realities by over 60,000 people living in 500 communities in 15 countries.

The latest publication focuses on seven conflict-affected countries and urges a rethinking of post-conflict strategies to rebuild states from below.

BADLY in need of a facelift, the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) and some in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to have taken a leaf out of the Congress’s book. Uncharacteristic of the RSS, its sarsanghchalak Mohan Bhagwat’s three-day visit to Lucknow was publicised through two dozen hoardings across the city.

If the doting father could have had his way, Velupillai Prabhakaran would have never founded the Tamil Tigers or died so brutally along with his family and dreams. Thiruvendran Velupillai, who died in Sri Lankan military custody last week, tried his utmost to persuade his youngest child, Prabhakaran, to concentrate on studies and not be swayed byTamil nationalism.

Velupillai, who fathered four children, had more than one reason to worry.

They say, “Insurance is the subject matter of solicitation”; but you will be shocked to know the bitter truth behind those fancy lines.

Recenty there have been a flood of companies in insurance sector, even wondered what caused them to do this social service as they pretend? In simple term Insurance may be thought to be an agreement among different parties who contribute to a joint fund for protecting them from any possible future loss to any of them. It’s a noble idea, but the way it is practiced in India is not so noble. For example:

Labyrinthine lanes, a clock tower, hundreds of shops, thousands of people and burnt buildings in the backdrop – this is Srinagar’s Lal Chowk that Thursday faced more terror violence, just as it repeatedly has in Jammu and Kashmir’s 20-year insurgency.

Perhaps most of us don’t know the fact that Jawahar Lal Nehru, the first prime minister of India was an atheist. His views on religion were:

‘The spectacle of what is called religion, or at any rate organized religion, in India and elsewhere, has filled us with horror, and I have frequently condemned it and wished to make a clean sweep of it.’

An acclaimed writer digs into the story of Afzal Guru, who’s on death row

THE reason I had come to Kashmir was to meet Tabassum Guru, the wife of Mohammad Afzal Guru, who is on death row for his role in the attack on the Indian Parliament.

However, when I reached her in Sopore, north of Srinagar, she waved me away saying she had no desire to meet with journalists.

Mohammad Afzal Guru was the main accused in the attack on the Parliament.

On 4th January, 1916, Niloufer was born in the Goztepe Palace in Istanbul in Turkey.  Her mother was Adile Sultan, a grand-daughter of Sultan Murad V, who had been deposed on the grounds of purported mental illness. 

Adile herself was married and divorced and it was with her second husband, Salahuddin Morali, that she gave birth to Niloufer. 

More Qadiyanis serve in the Israeli Armed Forces than Pakistan according to a book, ‘Israel: A Profile’, by a respected Jewish Professor I.T Naomi. He stated: ‘… and the Ahmadi sect of some 600 people from Pakistan can also serve in the (Israeli) army…’ To many analysts Qadiaynis are a political issue and have always been a security problem? In India Qadiyanis have collected and donated thousands to the Indian Army fund after Kargil.

A December 2009 report prepared by Oxfam International, Amnesty International UK, United Civilians for Peace, Christian Aid, and a dozen other international NGOs (called NGOs below) titled, “Failing Gaza: No rebuilding, no recovery, no more excuses” is hard-hitting and to the point.

THE Telangana tussle seems to be affecting industrial investments in Andhra Pradesh. Some industrialists from the state have claimed the ongoing agitation has caused severe damage to Brand Hyderabad.

The industrialists, representing a powerful lobby from coastal Andhra, met chief minister K. Rosaiah and governor ESL Narasimhan on Tuesday evening and submitted a report. (Narasimhan has been given the additional charge of Andhra Pradesh after N.D. Tiwari resigned from the post on ‘health grounds’).

Since 9/11 2001, it started being propagated that Madrassas are the training dens for terrorists. This went on becoming part of social psyche. This has added to the prevalent communal propaganda against Muslims. Recently in a (October 2009) meeting of EKAL school teachers, Mohan Bhagawat, the RSS Sarsanghchalak, while speaking to the teachers of EKAL schools (single teacher schools set up by RSS affiliates, mainly in Adivasi areas), said that Madrassas are the breeding ground for terrorism. He also contrasted Madrassas with the work of EKAL schools.

Sex scandals are not new to Indian politics. Veteran Congress politician Narayan Dutt Tiwari, who resigned Saturday as the Andhra Pradesh governor after a sex tape purportedly showed him with three women, is a new entry in a list of such sleaze that has littered the political landscape.

Barely a week back, a general secretary of the Congress party in Kerala, Rajmohan Unnithan, 57, was granted bail after he was held on charges of immoral trafficking for being found in the company of a woman under suspicious circumstances.

Mehmood Khan quit his high-flying global career to focus fully on transforming his poor village in Haryana.

Lucknow, Dec 25: The next time you go to a nikah (Muslim wedding) or walima (reception), chances are you might find the DJ missing, the dastarkhwan (food) less elaborate and the overall arrangement rather austere. That is if Muslims follow the guidelines laid out by the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB).

The Indian press is abuzz with news that Indian Home Ministry officials are investigating whether a terror

suspect in the Mumbai attacks, David Headley from Chicago, was working as a ‘double agent’ with the US.

In this courtroom drawing David Coleman Headley, left, pleads not guilty before U.S. District Judge Harry

Leinenweber on December 9 in Chicago to charges that accuse him of conspiring in the deadly 2008 terrorist

attacks in Mumbai.

The Indian press is abuzz with news that Indian Home Ministry officials have said they are investigating

Al Qaeda’s media wing as-Sahab released an Internet statement from the wife of Ayman al-Zawahri, the group’s deputy commander, the first known recruitment appeal by a prominent female on behalf of the terrorist group.

The statement from Umaima Hassan Ahmad Muhammad Hassan was titled: “A Letter to the Muslim Sisters.” In it, Mrs. Zawahri appealed to Muslim women around the world to support the Mujahideen, calling it “an obligation on all Muslims, men and women.”

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) is an “independent legal body dedicated to the protection of human rights, the promotion of the rule of law, and the upholding of democratic principles in the Occupied Territories.” It issues frequent press releases, statistics, fact sheets, documents, and reports like its October 22, 2009 English version of “Targeted Civilians: A PCHR Report on the Israeli Offensive against the Gaza Strip (27 December 2008 – 18 January 2009).”

European Union foreign ministers have agreed on the recognition of Jerusalem Al-Quds as the “joint capital” of both Israelis and the Palestinians.

The foreign minister meeting for a second day of talks in Brussels adopted a text agreeing that Jerusalem should provide “the future capital of the two states,” as part of a negotiated settlement, AFP reported.

“If there is to be a genuine peace, a way must be found through negotiations to resolve the status of Jerusalem as the future capital of two states,” said a statement released by the foreign ministers Tuesday.