Month: March 2010

Naidu seeks Rs. 15 lakh ex gratia for mine victims

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Hyderabad, March 01: Telugu Desam president N. Chandrababu Naidu on Sunday demanded sanction, as a special case, of Rs.15 lakh as ex gratia to each Cheemakurthi mine accident victim’s family.

In a letter to Chief Minister K. Rosaiah, he said the accident was primarily due to the failure of authorities who allowed the management to carry on mining without following the safety protocol. He expressed shock that during a visit on Saturday, mining was on without leaving buffer zones.

‘Majority facing exclusion’

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Hyderabad, March 01: Former Speaker of Lok Sabha P.A. Sangma has stated that the Constitution of the country has not failed, but those who have been implementing it have failed. Political, social and economic empowerment of the majority — dalits, tribals, backward classes, minorities and women — can only ensure its proper implementation, he felt.

CM opens Langer Houz flyover, lays stone for ORR

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Hyderabad, March 01: Chief Minister K Rosaiah on Sunday laid the foundation for the Phase-II of the Nehru Outer Ring Road (NORR) and inaugurated the Langer Houz Flyover.

Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Minister said because of population growth and inadequate investment flow, many cities are getting crippled. Lack of infrastructure to meet the exponentially growing traffic needs was leading to utter chaos and hampering of development.

Moula Ali Kaman gets heritage tag

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Hyderabad, March 01: The historic `Moula Ali Kaman’ belonging to 1812 A.D has at last been declared a State-protected monument. The Tourism department has recently included it in the list of heritage structures following a High Court direction to protect it.

The decision came at a time when the structure has come close to crumbling under the pressure of relentless vehicular movement. Unless restoration works are taken up at the earliest, the authorities found, the monument can collapse anytime.

Chile quake toll hits 708, emergency declared

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Santiago, March 01: Searchers scoured the rubble of collapsed buildings for survivors Sunday as the toll from the devastating earthquake that hit Chile reached 708.

President Michelle Bachelet released the new figure, and the country was bracing for reports of even more deaths from the 8.8-magnitude earthquake that hit Saturday morning.

Five militants killed in Pakistan

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Islamabad, Narch 01: Five militants, including Taliban commanders Muhammad Alim Binori and Maulvi Shamsul Haq, were killed in a clash with Pakistani security forces in the restive Swat valley on Monday.

The militants were killed during an exchange of fire with troops in Madyan area of Swat early this morning, official sources were quoted as saying by TV news channels.

Binori was earlier a member of the banned Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariah Muhammadi and the government had offered a reward of Rs 1 crore for him.

5,000 pose nude at Sydney’s Opera House

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Melbourne, March 01: Australia’s landmark Sydney Opera house was not the same today as more than 5000 naked Sydneysiders gathered on its steps to be the subjects of an art installation.

People disrobed for Spencer Tunick’s work called The Base, which is part of Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Festival, according to ABC report.

Tunick is famous for shooting images of people massed together sharing one common element – nakedness.

Those taking part included rugby league players, doctors, teachers and a woman pregnant with twins who will be
induced later today.

Obama may retain Bush’s nuclear policy

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Washington, March 01: US President Barack Obama has reportedly rejected proposals to exclude pre-emptive atomic strikes from the country’s new nuclear strategy.

Obama is making his final decisions on America’s new nuclear strategy, called the ‘Nuclear Posture Review’, which is expected to permanently downsize the US nuclear arsenal.

But fears are growing that the president might follow in his predecessor Gorge W. Bush’s tracks.

Pamela Anderson’s commercial banned in Australia

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Melbourne, Mar 01: A commercial featuring Hollywood bombshell Pamela Anderson has been banned from Australian television as it has ”crossed the line” of decency.

The ad shows the ‘Baywatch’ star in a gold bikini rubbing against another scantily clad woman while being sprayed with a white liquid, reported The Age. The Advertising Standards Bureau has upheld complaints about the ad after receiving more than 40 submissions, saying it went too far in objectifying women.

India signs Extradition treaty with Saudi

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Riyadh, March 01: A pathbreaking extradition treaty was among five agreements signed between India and Saudi Arabia in the presence of visiting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz in Riyadh late Sunday night.

“Both sides signed five agreements in the presence of Prime Minister (Manmohan Singh) and King Abdullah,” Latha Reddy, secretary (east) in the external affairs ministry, told journalists from India.

Sunday was the second day of the three-day trip by Manmohan Singh, the first by an Indian prime minister after 1982.

Dinosaur fossil found in a garden

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Norfolk, March 01: After it turned up in his rockery he moved it around his garden as an ornament for nine years, before eventually settling on a place for it in the greenhouse.

But the rock nagged away at his curiosity until eventually he gave in and sent it to experts at his local museum to be identified.

Their reply left him staggered — his lump of stone turned out to be a dinosaur fossil from 135million years ago.

Pakistan must act against terrorism, says PM

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Riyadh, March 01: Pakistan needs to ‘act decisively against terrorism’ if it seeks to benefit from trade and commerce with India, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said Monday.

‘If there is cooperation between India and Pakistan, vast opportunities will open up for trade, travel and development that will create prosperity in both countries and in South Asia,’ he told the Majlis-ash-Shura, the Saudi parliament.

Four Afghan civilians killed in suicide attack

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Kabul, March 01:A suicide bomber attacked a convoy of NATO forces in southern province of Kandahar Monday, killing four civilians, officials said.

The bomber rammed his explosive-laden vehicle into one of the vehicles of a NATO convoy in Daman district Monday morning, said Fazel Ahmad Sherzad, the deputy provincial police chief.

The attack resulted in death of “four of our innocent civilians”, the interior ministry said in a statement. One civilian was wounded.

‘Milk drops’ under the tongue can treat milk allergies

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Washington, March 01:Is your child allergic to milk? Here’s a simple but effective way to cure it. Just put a few drops of milk protein under the tongue and it will help the child overcome the problem.

The approach, known as SLIT (sublingual immune therapy), involves giving children small but increasingly higher doses of the food they are allergic to until their immune systems learn to tolerate the food without triggering allergic reactions or symptoms.

India to grow 9-10 percent for 25 years, says PM

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Riyadh, March 01:India will grow at the rate of 9 to 10 percent for the next 25 years, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said here Monday.

“Despite the economic slowdown, we hope to achieve a growth rate of 7.5 percent in the current financial year,” the economist-turned-prime minister told the Majlis-ash-Shura, the Saudi parliament.

“In the next 25 years, we aspire to (having) growth rates of between 9 and 10 percent annually. This will enable us to lift millions of our people out of poverty so as to transform India into one of the largest economies of the world.”

I feel so proud that I exist in Sachin’s era: Priyanka

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Mumbai, March 01: Yesterday, the Union Minister of Railways, Mamata Banerjee, had announced the Indian railway budget but no one seemed to be interested in talking about it.

The whole nation was celebrating the crossing of another awe -inspiring milestone by the master blaster, Sachin Tendulkar, who scored an amazing 200 runs in the one-day international (ODI) against South Africa yesterday.

It is the highest individual score by a batsman in the history of ODI cricket.

Two Sundarban tigers radio-collared

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Sundarbans (WB), March 01: Two tigers at Pirkhali forests have been fitted with radio collars to study their behaviour and to keep track of their whereabouts in Sundarbans, the world’s only mangrove eco-system which has big cats.

Eight more felines would be trapped and radio-collared, Field Director of Sundarbans Tiger Reserve (STR) Subrat Mukherjee told PTI.

“A tigress was caught on Saturday night in Pirkhali-5 jungle near Dobanki-Naubanki river in a trapping cage,” he said.

Pakistan must act against terrorism, says PM

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Riyadh, March 01:Pakistan needs to “act decisively against terrorism” if it seeks to benefit from trade and commerce with India, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said Monday.

“If there is cooperation between India and Pakistan, vast opportunities will open up for trade, travel and development that will create prosperity in both countries and in South Asia,” he told the Majlis-ash-Shura, the Saudi parliament.

No intention to pull down UPA govt: BJP

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Chennai, March 01: BJP, which has sought to corner the Congress-led UPA government at the Centre on the price-rise issue by announcing that it would move cut motions on the budget in Parliament, today said it had no intention to pull it down.

“We do not want this government, which is a few months old, to fall; that is not our intention. We want to make Congress realise the sufferings of poor people on the price rise issue and the fuel price hike which could further spur prices of essential commodities,” party’s senior leader M Venkaiah Naidu told reporters here.

Sunny’s ‘Dhai Kilo Ka Haath’ still going strong!

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Mumbai, March 01: The dialogue ‘dhai kilo ka haath’, unofficially ‘patented’ by Sunny Deol, is still fresh in the memories of many of us. In fact, the dialogue even today gives goose bumps the moment one watches Rajkumar Santoshi’s well-liked and powerful ‘Damini’.

We wonder whether Sunny’s hands still weigh the same. Let us hear from the horse’s mouth.

“I am not sure if it is ‘dhai kilo’ or a few grams less or more, ” exclaims Sunny smilingly. The Punjabi Puttar literally went ‘pani pani’ i.e. shied away while answering to that.

Vehicular strike against fuel price hike in Tripura Tuesday

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Agartala, March 01:The frontal organisations of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Monday called for a one-day vehicular shutdown in Tripura Tuesday to denounce the hike in prices of transport fuel.

“The union budget had raised central excise duty on fuel,” Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) Tripura unit general secretary Pijush Nag told reporters.

The rise in prices of petrol and diesel will lead to an increase in fares of passenger and goods transport, he said.

—————–IANS

Mobile tariff may go up

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New Delhi, March 01: Mobile phone tariffs are likely to go up in the coming months with the government announcing in the budget a steep hike in spectrum charges for all service providers based on global system for mobile (GSM) and code division multiple access (CDMA) technologies.

As per the latest notification issued by the Department of Telecom (DoT), the new charges vary between 3 per cent and 8 per cent depending upon the quantum of airwaves held by mobile operators. The new spectrum charges will come into force from April this year.

Clinton to meet with Uruguay’s incoming president

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San Juan, March 01: Troops from Uruguay are regularly among U.N. peacekeeping forces deployed around the world, and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is hoping to persuade that country’s new president to continue the support.

Jose Mujica, a former guerrilla leader, is the latest leftist president to be elected to a Latin American country. Clinton is scheduled to arrive Monday in Montevideo, Uruguay, as she begins a tour of the region and will meet with Mujica just hours before he’s sworn in.

Iran releases 6 journalists, opposition activists

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Tehran, March 01: Iranian media say six journalists and opposition activists held for suspected involvement in the country’s postelection turmoil have been released on bail.

Hundreds were arrested following the disputed June presidential election and in the ensuing crackdown on opposition supporters claiming President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won by fraud.

Reports on Monday in the Bahar daily and other newspapers said the released included journalists Mashallah Shamsolvaezin, Abdolreza Tajik and Mohammad Javad Mozaffar.