A 35-year-old woman was allegedly raped by her neighbour, who had barged into her house in west Delhi while she was away and threatened her with a knife when she returned, police Saturday.
The incident occurred Friday, around 10 p.m. in west Delhi’s Aman Vihar.
The victim lives with her husband and three children.
After recording the victim’s statement, police registered a case against her neighbour, Naresh, 31, a police officer said.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Saturday said MGNREGA has accelerated the pace of financial inclusion in villages, and accounts opened under the programme would help in the direct cash benefit transfer scheme of the government.
Speaking at the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) anniversary function here, Manmohan Singh said that over four crore bank accounts have been opened after the implementation of the scheme, and many more have been started in post offices.
A Pakistani court hearing Jamaat-ud- Dawah chief Hafiz Saeed’s petition against American drone strikes in Pakistan has said it cannot order a war against the US.
However, Lahore High Court Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial yesterday said it was the Pakistan government’s duty to stop attacks by the CIA-operated spy planes in the tribal areas.
“The US drone attacks are against Pakistan’s policy but the court cannot order a war against America,” Bandial said while hearing Saeed’s petition.
He observed that courts were bound to pass orders in light of the Constitution.
Rahul Gandhi will visit Amethi Feb 5, his first trip to his constituency after being elevated as Congress vice president, an official said Saturday.
During the two-day trip, he will meet local party workers and state Congress leaders and would hold a “feedback session with youth wing leaders”, party sources said.
A Pakistani court has questioned the legal status of a parliamentary commission on forming new provinces, reflecting the growing tensions between the ruling Pakistan People’s Party and the superior judiciary.
While hearing a petition challenging the parliamentary commission which has recommended the formation of a new province to be carved out of southern Punjab, a bench of the Lahore High Court observed that the incumbent assemblies have “no mandate to create new provinces.”
A Delhi court on Saturday framed charged against five men accused of gang-raping and murdering a 23-year-old student in New Delhi in December 2012.
The accused have charged under 13 sections of the Indian Penal Code by the fast track court. Next day of hearing has been fixed as February 5.
The accused will now face trial for which maximum sentence is death.
The case brought thousands of protesters onto the streets and ignited intense public debate over the failure of the police and the government to stem rampant violence against women in India.
CIA drones pounded Pakistani soil with renewed intensity in January 2013, a report has said.
According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s monthly report based on the ‘Covert Drone War’ project, January saw six drone strikes in merely nine days, a number exceeded only by August 2012.
Compared to the January of last year, the number of strikes doubled this year, the Express Tribune reports.
A joint sitting of the two Houses of Pakistan’s Parliament has been convened on February 6 to endorse the imposition of Governor’s Rule in the restive Balochistan province and to discuss the upcoming general election.
Acting President Syed Nayyer Hussain Bokhari has summoned the joint session of parliament at 5 pm on February 6, presidential spokesman Farhatullah Babar said.
President Asif Ali Zardari is currently on an official visit to Britain to attend a trilateral summit on Afghanistan.
At least 22 people were killed and a dozen injured Saturday when a military camp came under a fierce attack from heavily-armed Taliban rebels in Pakistan’s northwest, media reports said.
The attack was launched at about 4 a.m. when 30 militants equipped with sophisticated weapons stormed the army camp located in the Saraey Noor Rang area of Laki Marwat, a restive district located in the country’s northwest province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
The attack was followed by a gun battle between security forces and militants which lasted for more than four hours.
The United States will have to keep up an open-ended drone war against al Qaeda militants in Pakistan to prevent another terror attack on America, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has said.
The assassination of al Qaeda figures in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia with unmanned, robotic aircraft has provoked widespread criticism from human rights groups and some US allies, but Panetta stressed that the attacks had been effective.
Dozens of heavily-armed Taliban militants attacked a security forces check post in Pakistan’s restive northwest on Saturday, triggering fierce fighting that killed 30 people, including six paramilitary personnel and 12 civilians.
Security forces foiled the raid on the isolated check post, located at Serai Norang area in Lakki Marwat district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, after an intense gun battle that continued for over three years.
The militants, who were armed with rocket-propelled grenades, launched the assault shortly before 4 am.
All the residents of Andhra Pradesh are requested to make their Aadhaar card issued by the government of India at the earliest, as it may help you anytime. This card is more important than a passport. Those who have not applied for Aadhaar card must reach the Aadhaar card counter of their respective mandal.
Besides that a general counter for residents of all circles has also been setup at Abids post office, opposite BSNL office. For further information contact on phone nos: 040-65699966, 8801055999 between 11 am to 4 pm.
Siasat news
North Korea is threatening to retaliate for what it calls US Double standards over recent rocket launches by Pyongyang and US Ally Seoul.
A North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman did not elaborate on what that might entail in his comments today to the official Korean Central News Agency. But Pyongyang has recently threatened to conduct its third nuclear test in response to what it calls US Hostility.
Washington says Seoul’s rocket launch Wednesday had no military intent while Pyongyang’s in December was a test of banned ballistic missile technology.
As Hillary Clinton passed on the baton of America’s top diplomat to John Kerry, a question was raised whether his supposed soft corner for Pakistan should be a cause for worry to New Delhi?
Much has been made out of his remarks during his confirmation hearings when he declined to make US aid to Islamabad conditional to the release of Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi, who helped find Osama bin Laden.
Authorities in the central Mexican state of Hidalgo say they have captured a man who allegedly killed seven women in as many months.
Hidalgo state Public Safety Secretary Damian Canales says Omar Nieves has confessed that he raped and strangled his first victim in June.
Canales said yesterday that Nieves then killed three more women, including an ex-girlfriend, by strangling or smothering them.
He says the 33-year-old taxi driver killed an additional three women in December with the help of a friend, Constantino Dominguez, who also has been detained.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Saturday unveiled a new indigenous fighter jet, media reports said.
Iran’s advancement in military sector does not aim at “expansionism and violating others’ rights”, however, it will be utilized for “defensive and deterrence” purposes, Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying by semi-official ISNA news agency in a ceremony held here.
The family of the Indian-origin nurse, who committed suicide following a hoax call about the Duchess of Cambridge by two Australian DJs, is struggling to come to terms with the fact that the DJs will not be prosecuted.
Labeling the hoax calls as ‘misguided but harmless pranks’, the Crown Prosecution Service has said that there is no evidence to support a manslaughter charge against 2Day FM announcers Mel Greig and Michael Christian for the offending call to the nurse Jacintha Saldanha, News.com.au reports.
Vice President Joe Biden says the US is prepared to hold direct talks with Iran in the standoff over its nuclear ambitions – but only if the leadership in Tehran “is serious.”
Washington has indicated in the past that it’s prepared to hold talk directly with Iran, and talks involving all five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany have made little headway.
Asked at an international security conference when direct talks might be possible, Biden replied Saturday: “when the Iranian leadership, the supreme leader, is serious.”
Four road accidents in past two days have claimed at least 49 lives in China, amid country’s Spring Festival travel rush that started last week, underscoring concerns about country’s road-safety record.
The latest accident occurred on Saturday morning in southwest China’s Guizhou Province, when an overloaded coach turned over and crashed along a 100-meter slope, killing 14 people and injuring 21 others.
The coach, designed for 19 passengers, was carrying 34 when the accident occurred in Congjiang County, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
Japan’s Prime Minister vowed on Saturday to defend disputed remote islands from threats by China after a series of confrontations that have raised the risk of an armed clash.
“The security environment surrounding our country is increasingly becoming more severe as we face provocation to our territorial rights,” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said.
“I will take the lead to stand up against the present danger and protect the people’s lives and asset, as well as our land, the seas and the air at all costs.”
Living in a society where violence and social attitude towards women has become a major societal concern, historian Romila Thapar called atrocities against women as assertion of power to maintain the caste structure.
“Whether it is killing of a Dalit or rape of a woman, it is assertion by those who see social violence as a way of expressing power,” Thapar said at a panel discussion on violence against women organised by Centre for Policy Analysis at the India International Centre on Friday evening.
With the BJP being constantly targeted over Gujarat riots, party president Rajnath Singh on Saturday alleged it was being defamed and maligned continuously under a “planned conspiracy”.
He said the BJP did not believe in politics of divide and creating differences among people, and appealed the Muslim community to help removing the “widespread confusion”.
Amid talks within BJP over prime ministerial candidate, party leader Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi on Saturday called Narendra Modi a “towering symbol of nationalism” having country-wide appeal, but said there were a number of “capable leaders” and decision will be taken at appropriate time.
“Narendra Modi has definitely emerged, over the years, as a towering symbol of nationalism with proven record of providing good governance and tackling terrorism and lawlessness,” Naqvi told reporters here.
Observing that MNREGA has brought about “financial inclusion” of rural population, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Saturday expressed confidence that bank and post office accounts opened under the central scheme will assist government in providing direct cash transfers to the people.
“MNREGA has brought momentum in the financial inclusion of our rural population. Besides direct financial benefit, the scheme has given many indirect benefits to the people and brought down the migration graph,” Singh said at a conference here on Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act.
Taking on Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar for trying to “slight” Justice (retd) N Santosh Hegde’s credibility, India Against Corruption (IAC) said on Saturday those who criticise the former Karnataka Lokayukta “should have the stature to sit at his feet”.
“Before making comments about his credibility, those who criticise him should see whether they have the stature to even sit at Hegde’s feet,” IAC spokesperson Satish Sonak said at a press conference here.