Month: July 2010

18-yr-old Indian American gets 40-year term for rape

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New York, July 29: Harpreet Singh, a resident of Queens, New York, has been sentenced to 40 years in prison for raping a 16-year-old girl who he befriended on a social networking site and induced her to send him her nude photographs.

Besides 18-year-old Singh, four others — Noman Gondal, 18, Anjam Shahzad, 24, Vikram Harpreet, 18, and a juvenile offender — had earlier pleaded guilty to first-degree rape. The sentencing of the remaining four is pending.

Arsalan Gondal, 22, who was also indicted, is presently being sought after failing to appear for a scheduled court appearance.

Building collapses in Mumbai

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Mumbai, July 29: A 6-year-old boy died and ten others were seriously injured when a four-storeyed building collapsed in suburban Kurla late Wednesday night.

According to reports, many are still feared trapped inside the debris, However, the relief and rescue work has started in full swing.

“Rafiq Estate, a residential building in Qureshi Nagar area of Kurla, caved in at around 12.30 am,” a fire-brigade official said.

Ten people were said to be critically injured in the incident and all have been rushed to nearby hospitals.

5 held with AK-47, ammo in Amritsar

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Amritsar, July 29: The State Special Operation Cell (SSOC), an intelligence wing of the Punjab Police, arrested five people on Wednesday and recovered two AK-47 rifles and a huge quantity of ammunition from them. The police said all five had links with the Babbar Khalsa International (BKI), a banned terror outfit.

Those arrested are Kulwant Singh, a resident of Varpal village, Gurmukh Singh alias Gana of Pandori Mehma and Jagtar Singh of Thoba village in Amritsar district, Darshan Singh Dhadi of Dhaliwal and Pal Singh of Dhandowal village in Jalandhar.

Price rise: LS Speaker rules out voting, Oppn to fight on

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New Delhi, July 29: Parliament remained disrupted for the second day on Wednesday on the issue of prices with Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar rejecting the demand for adjournement motion on the issue and more trouble appeared in store as the BJP vowed to be “more aggressive” in demanding a vote.

The Speaker said price rise is a matter of concern and may be discussed in any form other than the Adjournment Motion.

Flash floods kill 40 in Afghanistan

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Kabul, July 29: Torrential rains in eastern Afghanistan have caused flash floods, killing at least 40 people and leaving hundreds more homeless, a report says.

The incident also left 15 more Afghans injured on Wednesday, the country’s Tolo television channel reported.

“Floods left 40 persons including women and children dead in Kapisa and Laghman provinces of Afghanistan,” said the report.

It further added that hundreds of acres of lands and houses were washed away or damaged in the natural disaster.

DGCA to audit all aviation training institutes: Patel

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New Delhi, July 28: To enhance safety standards in the aviation sector, DGCA will audit all aviation training institutes and take punitive action against the airlines and airports if they were found not adhering to safety measures.

The aviation regulatory body, Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) would audit all aviation training institutes, including all aviation engineering training institutes, flight training institutes, crew training institutes to enhance safety standards in the aviation sector, Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel said today.

Madras University signs 10 MoUs with US varsities

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Chennai July 28: The Madras University had signed MoUs with 10 universities in the US as part of its plan to internationalise higher education, its Vice Chancellor G Thiruvasagam said here today.

Inaugurating ‘Experience America’ expo, organised by the US Consulate here as part of its plan to showcase educational opportunities in that country, he said international exchange in education should be a “two-way process where students, faculty and knowledge were exchanged and not merely received by us”.

Telangana bypolls: EC to video record counting of votes

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Hyderabad, July 28: Aiming at ensuring transparency in the counting votes in the by-elections to 12 assembly seats in Telangana region, election authorities in Andhra Pradesh will video record the whole process.

“We will be installing CCTV cameras at the strong rooms where EVMs and ballot boxes are kept. The counting process will also be recorded in the cameras which will be shown outside the counting halls,” state Chief Electoral Officer (CE0) I V Subba Rao told reporters here.

Armed men rob marble shop owner at gun point

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New Delhi, July 28: Four unidentified armed men robbed a marble shop owner and decamped with cash Rs 3.5 lakh and ornaments he was wearing, police said today.

The incident took place in Rohini at around 9.30 pm yesterday.

The youths, wearing helmets, came to his shop and after greeting him, suddenly took out their weapons and threatened him.

“They threatened him and took away Rs 3.5 lakh and two gold rings and a chain.

A case has been registered.

–Agencies

Five bus passengers still missing

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Shimla, July 28: Five people, including two women, travelling in an HP roadways bus that plunged into a swollen river on Shimla-Kupvi road yesterday, were still missing.

SP (Shimla) R M Sharma, who visited the scene, said the bus was yet to be pulled out of the river, adding some bodies might be trapped in it.

He said the information about missing persons was being gathered on the basis of reports filed by those whose relatives were travelling in the bus.

The SP said 29 passengers were rescued yesterday.

Vikas Yadav out of Tihar 66 times for treatment

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New Delhi, July 28: Vikas Yadav, serving a life term for the murder of Nitish Katara, had been out of Tihar Jail as many as 66 times since his conviction by a trial court in 2008, according to an RTI reply.

As per the reply filed by the Tihar Jail authorities, Yadav was taken to hospital 66 times for treatment following court orders.

The information was revealed on an RTI application filed by advocate Kaushik Dey, who has been representing Neelam Katara, the mother of the victim.

American woman found dead in Ghaziabad

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Ghaziabad, July 28: A 73-year-old American woman was found dead in her rented home in Ghaziabad Wednesday, police said.

The woman, identified as Arma Graham, was found dead in the morning by the house owners, an official said.

The house owner, Ranjit Sharma, told the police that Graham was not keeping well and she had taken some medicines from a local doctor Tuesday night.

“We found her dead in her room in the morning,” Sharma said.

–Agencies

Plea to release Rajiv Gandhi’s assassin dismissed

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New Delhi, July 28: The Supreme Court has dismissed a suit seeking the release of Nalini Sriharan, her husband Murugan and five others awarded death or life sentences in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.

The apex court bench of Justice V.S. Sirpurkar and Justice Mukundakam Sharma dismissed as withdrawn a petition filed by E. Veluchamy challenging the Madras High Court order which also dismissed the plea but with a cost of Rs.One lakh.

Tendulkar, Sehwag keep India’s hopes alive

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Colombo, July 28: Sachin Tendulkar struck his 48th century and Virender Sehwag fell one short of his 21st to keep alive India’s hopes of avoiding their second consecutive Test defeat against Sri Lanka after the end of the third day’s play in the second cricket test here Wednesday.

Tendulkar was batting on 108 and test debutant Suresh Raina on 66 as India made 382 for four when the stumps were drawn at the Sinhalese Sports Club. India still trail by 260 runs and need 61 more runs to avoid the follow on. Sri Lanka declared their first innings at 642 for four.

Natwar Singh seeks papers linked to his clean chit in scam

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New Delhi, July 28: Former external affairs minister Natwar Singh Wednesday claimed in the Supreme Court that he was entitled to inspect documents placed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) before a committee that exonerated him in a scam related to the UN’s oil-for-food programme in Iraq.

He sought access to documents placed before Justice R.S. Pathak committee in connection with the oil-for-food scam.

Telecom licence guidelines tightened

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New Delhi, July 28: The government has tightened the guidelines for telecom licences, making it mandatory for equipment suppliers to share the software source code and the design details to address security-related concerns, an official statement said Wednesday.

According to the statement, vendors may have to pay penalty of 100 percent of the contract value in case any security breach is detected at a later stage after the equipment is deployed.

Bedi was an ordinary bowler: Muralitharan

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Colombo, July 28: Sri Lanka’s legendary spinner Muttiah Muralitharan Wednesday hit back at his most vocal critic Bishan Singh Bedi for the first time, terming the former India captain an “ordinary” bowler.

Muralitharan, who retired from Test cricket earlier this month with a record 800 wickets, said Bedi had no right to comment on him.

Gang involved in trafficking fake currency notes busted

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New Delhi, July 28: Delhi police Wednesday claimed to have busted a gang involved in trafficking of fake currency notes with the arrest of three people in the capital.

The trio, identified as Surender Singh (25), Shiv Kumar Giri (26) and Jaiprakash (22), was arrested July 26 and fake notes in Rs.100 and Rs.20 denomination amounting to Rs.52,960 recovered from them, police said.

The gang used to circulate low denomination fake notes at crowded places in Delhi, particularly to the uneducated and economically backward, they said.

Need to control Hindu terror groups: Yechury

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New Delhi, July 28: Warning against the growing network of Hindutva terror groups, Communist party of India-Marxist leader Sitaram Yechury Wednesday said the government and security agencies must take firm action against such groups.

“The government will have to take firm action against these groups which are promoting Hindutva terror,” Yechury said on the sidelines of a symposium on Hindutva terror groups organised by the Safdar Hashmi Memorial Trust here.

2 convicted in China for indulging in gay prostitution

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Beijing, July 28: Two men in China have been sentenced to jail and fined thousands of yuan for organising homosexual prostitution.

The men, surnamed Xiao and Liu, had hired eight young men to offer sexual services to gay men from October to November 2008 in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, said Sun Xia, a spokeswoman for the Pingjiang District People’s Court in Suzhou.

Xiao was sentenced to seven years in jail and fined 30,000 yuan and Liu was sentenced to two years and nine months and fined 10,000 yuan, she said. Xiao and Liu had drawn customers through the Internet, Sun said.

Failing to get campus placement, student ends life

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Indore, July 28: After failing to get campus placement, a 22-year-old student of an engineering college today committed suicide by consuming poison here, police said.

Gaurav Saluja, living at Green Park Colony, was taken to a hospital in a critical state where doctors pronounced him brought dead, police added.

Some companies were picking up students from the private engineering college for the last two days but Gaurav failed to get a placement, they said.

After this, Gaurav was upset, police said.

–Agencies

Rupee falls by 9 against dollar on strong dollar demand

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Mumbai, July 28: In a see-saw trade, the rupee today lost nine paise against the US currency due to month-end dollar demand amid weak equity markets.

At the Interbank Foreign Exchange (Forex) market, local currency closed at 46.75/76 a dollar, down by 9 paise over the yesterday’s close.

The rupee moved erratically in a range of 46.55 to 46.80 a dollar on alternate bouts of buying and selling.

Dealers attributed higher levels of 46.55 in afternoon deals to dollar selling by exporters.

Late dollar selling by exporters and corporates weighed on the rupee in the last session.