Stressing that it is important to get rid of criminals in the electoral process, Chief Election Commissioner S.Y. Quraishi Tuesday said the law must bar such a candidate from contesting.
“People ask me, why can’t you debar a candidate from contesting. We cannot do that. The law must debar them,” Quraishi said at a lecture organised by Moneylife Foundation and V Citizens Action Network (VCAN).
While many of us may cherish remembering the school days as the happiest period of our life, a study has suggested that people are most content at the age of 33.
According to a survey conducted by a website Friends Reunited, seven out of 10 people over the age of 40 picked the year they turned 33 as their happiest period of life, the Daily Mail reported.
Over half of those surveyed — 53 percent — said life was more fun and 42 percent said they felt more optimistic about the future.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani met here Tuesday and said the two countries had charted the right path to resolve their issues and decided to intensify dialogue.
The two leaders, who met on the sidelines of the Nuclear Security Summit here in an unscheduled informal meeting, reviewed their improving bilateral relations, said sources.
This was the first meeting between the two leaders since they met in the idyllic Addu resort in the Maldives where they had vowed to script “a new chapter” in their bilateral ties.
Around 350 employees of Ford India Pvt Ltd held a protest outside the company’s plant at Maraimalai Nagar near here Tuesday demanding the reinstatement of nine dismissed employees, said a union official.
Speaking to IANS, Ford India Employees Union General Secretary A. Satish Kumar said: “The company dismissed nine people today (Tuesday) and we want them to be reinstated. The company is targeting one category of employees.”
Employees of Ford India can claim reimbursement of medicine charges on submission of pharmacy bills.
Kingfisher Airlines Tuesday suspended operations to several cities as per a new holding plan and asked the staff to stay home till the time it manages fresh funding.
“We are in a ‘holding’ pattern right now and are waiting for various decisions from the government and our Consortium of Bankers on FDI (foreign direct investment) policy, working capital funding, etc.
“All of these will have a major impact on the staffing decisions we will have to make,” Kingfisher said in a statement, responding to speculations that the airline was going to lay off a large number of its staff.
Defence Minister A.K. Antony Tuesday admitted that army chief Gen. V.K. Singh informed him about Lt. Gen. (retd) Tejinder Singh offering a bribe of Rs.14 crore, but said there was no written complaint, as he did not want to pursue the matter.
However, after the bribe offer was reported by the media, Antony said he ordered a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe.
Antony told parliament he would investigate the army chief’s allegations and was ready to cancel any contract if there was corruption.
After a lull of over three years, Maoists struck again Tuesday killing 12 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) troopers and injuring 28 others in a remote-triggered landmine blast in this Maharashtra district, police said.
The incident occurred just before noon when 40 troopers were travelling in a CRPF bus from Phustola to Gatta village in Dhanora, around 50 km from the Gadchiroli district headquarters.
Babbar Khalsa terrorist Balwant Singh Rajoana, sentenced to death in the 1995 assassination of then Punjab chief minister Beant Singh, is to hang as scheduled on March 31, a Chandigarh court ruled Tuesday as opposition began building up in some places in Punjab to protest the hanging.
As per the court’s orders, Rajoana has to be hanged Saturday (March 31) at 9 a.m. in the Patiala jail premises.
Anita and her two sisters, all below 10 years, wake up at 5 am daily, complete their household chores and pick up either a school bag or an aluminum bowl depending on which day it is. If it’s a Thursday, Saturday or Sunday, these little children take a bowl in their hands and sit outside Sai Baba or Amba mata temples in Vapi begging for alms.
“My father is a daily-wage laborer. I have to support my family financially if I want to continue studies,” says Anita, who studies in a government school. She lives in a thatched hutment parallel to the railway tracks.
Human noises, such as the rumble of traffic or the hum of machines, do affect birds and animals which change their behaviour accordingly, indicates a new study.
As many animals also pollinate plants or eat or disperse their seeds, human noise can have ripple effects on plants, too, says the study led by Clinton Francis of the National Evolutionary Synthesis Centre, North Carolina (US).
Aspirin can prevent heart attacks, both in high and low doses, says a new study.
The World Health Organisation`s latest figures show that 17 million people die every year from cardiovascular diseases. Nearly all patients are prescribed a daily aspirin and an antiplatelet medication during recovery.
“We observed no difference between patients taking a high dose versus a low of aspirin as it relates to cardiovascular death, heart attack, stroke or stent thrombosis,” said Payal Kohli, cardiology fellow at the Brigham and Women`s Hospital, who led the study.
England narrowly beat Ukraine 1-0 while hosts Georgia forced a 1-1 draw against Spain in their Group three qualification for the 2012 UEFA European Under-17 football Championships.
The qualification is known as the elite round which is actually the second round of preliminaries with seven groups of four teams each, Xinhua reported.
Calum Chambers scored the lone winner for England in the 56th minute.
Chiaber Chechelashvili of Georgia converted a second-minute penalty to give the hosts a early lead which was annulled in the 59th minute when Ivan Saez scored the equalizer.
A non-Muslim family has been protecting a 400-year-old dargah here at Raheempura, Puranapul, which has been facing threats of encroachment. Munni Bai and her family renovated the dargah that was in a dilapidated condition and with the help of local Muslims, they also organise Urs.
With a Karnataka government- appointed panel unearthing an alleged scam with regard to Wakf land, Minority Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid on Tuesday said it is a state level issue and they would have to take a decision on it.
However, if the state government wanted, it could refer the matter to the Union Government, he said.
Khurshid said, “This (wakf scam) is actually a state level issue, state level entitlement, so they will have to look at it,” he told reporters outside Parliament.
In what amounts to a virtual change of guard in Uttar Pradesh’s top police establishment, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav Tuesday reshuffled 112 officers, including four directors general of police (DGPs) and 65 of the state’s 75 superintendents of police (SPs).
The large scale transfers also include eight additional directors general (ADG), 16 inspectors general (IG) and 19 deputy inspectors general.
This means that 65 of the 75 districts in the state now have new police chiefs. The remaining were changed earlier.
Computer scientists, taking inspiration from the human face, are exploring whether machines can detect lies.
In a study of 40 videotaped conversations, an automated system that analyzed eye movements correctly identified whether subjects were lying or telling the truth 82.5 percent of the time.
That’s a better accuracy rate than expert human interrogators typically achieve in lie-detection experiments, said Ifeoma Nwogu, research assistant professor at University of Buffalo’s Centre for Unified Biometrics and Sensors (CUBS) who helped develop the system.
Beijing, March 27: A top-tier high school in China is considering equipping its seniors with iPads, the first in China to do so, China Daily reported Tuesday.
Starting in September, Nanjing’s Jinling High School will provide the popular Apple tablets to seniors involved in a project between the school and the University of California.
Under the project, those students will take Advancement Placement classes and parts of UCLA’s classes in addition to their own academic studies.
If the pilot project goes well, the school will extend the iPad plan to all grades.
Named as the man who offered army chief V.K. Singh a bribe, Lt Gen (retd) Tejinder Khanna said Tuesday that if that had indeed happened then the matter should have been investigated at that time itself.
“If army chief had reported the matter to (the defence minister) and if this had happened, then he should have definitely at that time investigated the matter under the law,” Tejinder Singh, who filed a defamation case against the army chief in a Delhi court, told NDTV.
Life across Andhra Pradesh’s Telangana region was affected Tuesday due to the shutdown called by the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) to protest the central government’s insensitivity towards the demand for a separate Telangana state, which is driving youth to commit suicide.
The shutdown had little impact in Hyderabad but was total in the nine other districts of the region. Barring attacks on a few shops in Khammam, the shutdown remained peaceful.
In a gruesome murder an Egyptian child was killed for a gold earring worth just (Egyptian) £200 (Dh122) and her remains hidden in a washing machine.
According to ‘Sabea’a’ daily, one of the neighbours has confessed to the crime.
Nadia Jamil Al-Sayed Bayoumi, a 21-year-old housewife was in desperate need of £200, when she hit upon the idea of stealing Mayada’s gold earring. She confessed to picking up the child who was playing in front of her house.
At the funeral of Boney Kapoor’s deceased ex wife Mona Kapoor, a lot of Bollywood celebrities had turned up to offer their condolences. Some of them were mutually incompatible, it seems.
We hear that Salman Khan, a star with many friends and a few foes in the industry, went out of his way at the meet to avoid bumping into Abhishek Bachchan. The reason for that shouldn’t be a mystery for any Bollywood fan, but the fact that the two stars still continue to avoid each other beggars belief.
He calls himself a bathroom singer, yet Bollywood star Akshay Kumar didn’t think twice before singing romantic number “Bheege honth tere” for the leading ladies of his forthcoming film “Housefull 2”.
Akshay was here Monday for the launch of the new issue of Stardust magazine with co-stars Jacqueline Fernandes, Asin Thottumkal, Zarine Khan and Shazahn Padamsee and he sang for them at the event.
“Please dim the lights,” he said before he started singing, to set the mood for “Bheege honth tere”, which happens to be one of his favourite romantic numbers.
In what amounts to a virtual change of guard in Uttar Pradesh’s top police establishment, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav Tuesday reshuffled 112 officers, including four directors general of police (DGPs) and 65 of the state’s 75 superintendents of police (SPs).
The large scale transfers also include eight additional directors general (ADG), 16 inspectors general (IG) and 19 deputy inspectors general.
This means that 65 of the 75 districts in the state now have new police chiefs. The remaining were changed earlier.
The Supreme Court Monday issued notice to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on a plea by Nupur Talwar, seeking review of its order, rejecting their plea challenging the Special CBI court decision of not accepting the investigating agency’s closure report, and to take cognizance against the dentist couple in their daughter Aarushi Talwar’s murder.
An apex court bench headed by Justic A.K. Patnaik issued notice after senior counsel Harish Salve appearing for Nupur Talwar pointed to several infirmities in the CBI investigation.
The Israeli foreign ministry decided on Monday to cut contact with the United Nations Human Rights Council after it said last week it would investigate Israeli settlements, a spokesman said.
“There was a decision by the foreign ministry to sever work contacts with the organization,” ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told AFP, adding that Israel had yet to formally inform the council of its decision.
Israel also decided to bar a U.N. team from entering Israel or the West Bank for a planned investigation of Jewish settlements, the Foreign Ministry said.