The ongoing protest against blasphemy of Prophet (pbuh) is but natural. Opposing protest against blasphemy of Prophet (pbuh) is unwarranted. President Jamat-e-Islami Hind Andhra Pradesh and Orissa Mr. Mohammed Khaja Arifuddin told this during a press conference.
The Spanish government authorized Friday the signing of a pact with the US that will allow elements of the NATO anti-missile shield to be deployed at a naval base in southern Spain.
The authorization was approved at the Council of Ministers’ weekly meeting and comes a year after Spain announced it would take part in the project.
It was then-prime minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero who offered Spain’s participation during a meeting in Brussels in October 2011.
Highlighting the “grim” situation in Cauvery basin, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna today appealed to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to stop further release of water to Tamil Nadu and to seek a report from the team that has been deputed to assess the water situation.
“I would kindly urge upon you to explore possibilities of stopping further release of water from dams in Karnataka and also call for an interim report of the team of experts”, Krishna, now on an official visit to the U.S., said in a letter to Singh, a copy of which was released here.
The dawn-to-dusk ‘Karnataka bandh’ called by Kannada outfits to protest release of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu today disrupted normal life in the city and river basin districts even as window-panes of some buses were damaged in stone-pelting incidents.
In Bangalore city, some persons pelted stones on some Bangalore metropolitan transport Corporation buses and damaged its window panes, police said. As per initial reports, the bandh has evoked good response with normal life affected in Bangalore, and Cauvery basin districts of Mandya, Mysore, Hassan and Chamarajanagar.
President Barack Obama has said the US is moving forward and the unemployment rate has fallen to its lowest level since he took office four years ago.
His remarks came hours after latest figures revealed that America’s unemployment rate has dropped to 7.8 percent in the month of September, the lowest since 2009.
“Today I believe that as a nation we’re moving forward again,” he said during an election campaign meeting in Ohio.
Noting that terrorism cannot be justified by any cause or grievance, India has asked UN-member states to expand enforcement efforts to destroy safe havens and terrorists’ support networks besides evolving a counter-narrative to combat radicalisation.
The state government is likely to unveil on AP Formation Day on November 1 the new statues of historical figures from the Andhra region on Tank Bund in place of those vandalised by protesters during the Million March in 2010.
Four of the 12 statues were installed on the pedestals by the department of culture on Friday. These statues are those of icons such as Annamaya, Guruzada Appa Rao, Kandakuri Veeresalingam and Katam Dora.
Interestingly, the authorities have separately installed the statue of Telangana tribal leader Komaram Bheem in front of Viceroy Hotel on Tank Bund.
The city is all set to usher in New Year 2013 with a major drinking water crisis. Worried over the lack of inflows into the reservoirs despite heavy rains during the last few weeks, Hyderabad water board officials said by January next year, they may be forced to resort to supplying drinking water once in five days. At present, the supply is every alternate day. Normally, the city faces a crisis only with the onset of summer.
Proud mom Sharmila Tagore is leaving no stone unturned to make her son’s wedding an affair worth remembering. As Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor’s D-day approaches and arrangements for the royal wedding get final touches, Sharmila’s busy preparing the list of elite guests who would be attending the function that is to be held at the Pataudi Palace on Oct 16.
Pakistan needs to decide whether “they want to persist with the old horses or opt for young blood”, said a daily after the country failed to reach the finals of the cricket World Twenty20 final.
An editorial in the News International Saturday said that Pakistan did it again – “snatching defeat from the jaws of victory” after Sri Lanka beat them in the semifinals.
“What else can you say about a team that was steered to 91-4 by its captain…only to lose the plot and crash to a 16-run loss while chasing 140 to reach the final.
A woman allegedly committed suicide by setting herself on fire after a family quarrel at Tarun Dal Club area here, police sources said Saturday.
Debjani Maitra (32) had a quarrel with family members and then allegedly poured kerosene and set herself on fire late last night, the sources said.
Debajani’s husband tried to save her by dousing the fire but he too suffered burn injuries.
Both the couple were rushed to hospital where Debjani succumbed to her burn injuries while her husband has been admitted the sources said.
Leading sitar exponent Imrat Khan of the Etawah gharana, who is one of the few surviving players of surbahar, a variation of veena, says that India should put clamps on “sleazy songs and movies” as Bollywood and mass entertainment was “killing the culture of Hindustan.”
“The whole world looks up to India for art and culture, but we are following Bollywood and Afro-American culture. Russians are censoring their culture and the Chinese culture too has censorship…,” Khan told IANS in a chat.
Setting an example, a gram panchayat here has announced to award a fixed deposit of certain amount on the birth of every girl child.
A gram panchayat in Behror last month has awarded FD (for 20 years) of Rs 1,100 each in the names of five girl children.
“We decided to award Rs 1,100 on the birth of first girl child and Rs 2,100 on second girl’s birth to create a favourable environment for girl child in the form of the FD,” village head Rama Bharadwaj told reporters here today.
Congress is expected to finalise on Saturday its candidates for Himachal Pradesh Assembly Elections.
A meeting of the party’s Central Election Committee headed by Sonia Gandhi is likely to be held today to decide on the nominations for the 68-member Assembly in the state.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has described the NATO as a throwback to the Cold War era, and said it should be transformed into a political organisation as soon as possible.
“It is incomprehensible why it’s still around,” Putin said. He said Russia would like the NATO to stay within the bounds of its statutory activity and not strive for global status.
Russia has been and will continue to be concerned by NATO expansion, Putin said.
“Talk is one thing, but the deployment of some attack systems or missile defence systems near our borders is quite a different matter,” he said.
At least seven people were killed and three others injured in a nine-vehicle pile-up in China on Friday.
The accident happened after midnight, when a heavy semi-trailer hit six cars and another two trucks waiting in lines along a section of the Beijing-Hong Kong-Macao Expressway in Ruyuan County, Shaoguan City, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
Some vehicles caught fire, state television reported.
China is currently experiencing heavy rush on its main highways due to seven-day National Day holidays.
–PTI
A special court here on Friday awarded 31 years rigorous imprisonment to a convict of the 2002 Naroda Patiya massacre case, who was produced in the court after he jumped his bail.
Terming Suresh alias Shehzad Netalkar as one of the main conspirators, special judge Jyotsana Yagnik sentenced him to 21 years life imprisonment after serving 10 years under section 326 (voluntary causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons or means) of the IPC.
A private school in Kazakhstan has expelled two girl pupils who were found to be HIV-positive, local TV outlets reported.
The school is in Shymkent in southern Kazakhstan.
School doctors were the first to hear about the children’s HIV status during a BCG vaccination campaign.
The girls’ parents wrote to explain why their children should not be vaccinated.
Violating the law on patient confidentiality, the doctors reported this to the school principal. The parents were given 10 days to take their children out of the school.
A group of American anti-war activists are in Pakistan to join a march into the country’s tribal belt to protest US drone strikes in the rugged Northwest Territory.
Their presence has energised organizers behind the protest but also added to concerns that Islamist militants will target the weekend event.
The two-day march, in reality a long convoy , is to be led by Imran Khan, the former cricket star-turned-politician who has become a top critic of the American drone strikes in Pakistan.
Turkish police have arrested two Tunisian nationals at the Istanbul airport for their alleged involvement in the killing of the US ambassador to Libya, Xinhua reported.
The Shems FM report quoted Turkish Kanal D channel as saying that both Tunisians were trying to enter Turkey with fake passports.
They were arrested Friday at the Ataturk International Airport.
Wrestling legend Hulk Hogan is preparing to launch a legal battle over his leaked sex tape.
Editors at gossip website Gawker.com posted a 90-second preview clip of the footage, which reportedly shows him getting intimate with a mystery woman.
But Hogan has moved swiftly to shut down publication of the tape, instructing his lawyers to draft a cease and desist letter demanding bosses of the website to remove the footage, reports Tmz.com.
The unemployment rate in the US dropped to 7.8 percent in September, the lowest since January 2009, when President Barack Obama took office, according to a report by the Labor Department.
The unemployment rate fell 0.3 percent in September, as employers added 114,000 new jobs.
The government also revised previous numbers to show the economy created 86,000 more jobs in July and August than first estimated.
The health care industry added the most jobs at 44,000, and for the third month in a row jobs within the government grew, but manufacturing jobs fell for the second straight month.
Law enforcement officers have found around 300 illegal migrants living in an apartment building in western Russia, the interior ministry said.
The migrants, living in an unfinished building in Tver region, are from Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, police said.
They have been charged with violating Russian migration law, an interior ministry source said.
Russia has long battled with illegal migration, especially from neighbouring countries in Central Asia.
–IANS–
Turkey does not want a war with Syria but cannot rule out armed conflict, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said.
“We do not advocate war but we are not far from it,” he said.
He warned that those who are trying to put Turkey’s “deterrence policy” to the test are making a “deadly mistake”.
“We are not bluffing – we will stand by our course whatever it takes,” Erdogan said.
He warned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against “testing Turkey’s patience”.
The Turkish parliament has authorised military action inside Syria.
Turkish police have arrested two Tunisian nationals at the Istanbul airport for their alleged involvement in the killing of the US ambassador to Libya, Xinhua reported.
The Shems FM report quoted Turkish Kanal D channel as saying that both Tunisians were trying to enter Turkey with fake passports.
They were arrested Friday at the Ataturk International Airport.