Humayun Kabir, the Trinamool Congress minister who was defeated in the recent assembly bypoll, today claimed he had been asked by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to continue as minister. “I met the CM today. She has asked me to continue as minister. I will attend office from tomorrow,” Kabir told reporters at the state secretariat. However, no comment was available in this regard from the chief minister.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy today questioned the TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu’s promise of a farm loan waiver if TDP came to power in AP and said such a move was not feasible. “Let him (Naidu) explain how he will do it. Which existing schemes will he disband? How will he pay salaries to government employees?
The lawyer of Sarabjit Singh, who is on death row in a Pakistani prison, today said he had received a death threat from the Taliban for pursuing the case of the Indian national. Awais Shiekh said a letter written by an anonymous activist of the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan had warned his wife to stop her husband from pursuing the case of Sarabjit. He said the letter read: “I belong to Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan and I am a resident of Faisalabad district (150 km from Lahore).
Over 20 kg of Charas worth about Rs two crore in international market were seized from a proclaimed offender, police said today. Inder Singh was arrested with 22.68 kg of Charas from a house in Ghotari village under Rajgarh sub division, deputy superintendent of police (Rajgarh) R L Bansal said. Bansal said that Singh was earlier arrested by the Theog police of Shimla district in 2009 for committing offence punishable under Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (ND&PS) Act and was convicted by a court and lodged in the Kanda Jail of Shimla district.
Al-Qaeda’s top commander in Mali has been killed, Chadian President Idriss Deby Itno said today, in what would be one of the most significant blows to the rebels in the seven-week French-led intervention against Islamist insurgents. Several newspapers in Abou Zeid’s native Algeria had reported his death and Washington had described the reports as “very credible”. Deby said Abou Zeid, the Mali-based operative in Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), was killed in deadly fighting between Chadian troops and Islamist fighters on February 22.
In a stern warning to rebels, Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Friday said that from now on doors won’t remain open for those who left the party and contested elections against official nominees as he would do away with the past practice of re-inducting such members. In his first interaction with party leaders and office bearers of the Mumbai unit after his elevation as Vice President, Rahul said he had come to meet them so that there could be fruitful discussions during which some rules could be formulated for effective functioning of the organisation.
The son of a police sub-inspector in Uttar Pradesh’s Ghaziabad district was booked for the rape of a woman, police said on Friday.
In her complaint to the police, the women alleged that Tarun Singh, son of sub-inspector Bachhu Singh, posted at the Muradnagar police station, raped her for several months on false promise of marriage but later backed out.
Bachhu Singh was the first investigation officer in the Aarushi-Hemraj murder case when he was posted at the Sector-20 police station in Noida.
Another report into illegal phone tapping, allegedly by the previous BJP government in Himachal Pradesh, on Friday said 350 telephone calls were recorded. These phone calls were mostly of politicians and bureaucrats.
The total number of phones tapped, mainly of Congress leaders, in violation of the Indian Telegraph Act have now risen to over 1,000, said officials.
The report is prepared by the state forensic science laboratory was submitted to the Chief Minister’s Office.
Fresh moves are afoot to have cricket become an Olympic sport perhaps in time for the 2024 Summer Games.
The popular Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) World Committee is lobbying for Twenty 20 cricket to be included, claiming it could significantly raise the profile of the sport.
The earliest the International Cricket Council (IOC) can apply to be part of the Olympics is for the 2024 Games.
“The MCC World Cricket committee appreciates that a great deal of effort may be needed to lobby for the inclusion of cricket in the Olympic Games of 2024,” MCC said in a statement.
Pakistan’s former President Pervez Musharraf says he will return home from self-imposed exile this month to run in parliamentary elections despite facing arrest warrants in connection with the slaying of an ex-prime minister.
Musharrraf has not followed through on previous pledges to return to Pakistan.
But he told reporters on Friday that he would head back in mid-March, as soon as an interim government is in place.
He said he would lead his party, the All Pakistan Muslim League, in elections later this spring.
Two suspected IM operatives are being questioned by the NIA today in connection with the February 21 twin blasts here that left 16 people dead.
A court in Delhi had yesterday granted the NIA five-day custody of Syed Maqbool and Imran Khan for their interrogation following which the two were brought here by the agency.
The agency had told the court that it would take both of them to Hyderabad and question them for more clues about the blasts, as the ongoing probe points that Indian Mujahideen (IM) module was behind it.
The rising stock of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi within the BJP was apparently visible at the party’s national executive meet here today when President Rajnath Singh gave him a special welcome and noted that even the European Union is recognising his achievements.
Modi, seen as a frontrunner among BJP’s prime ministerial probables, was lauded by Singh for achieving the unprecedented feat of winning three consecutive elections in Gujarat. Singh said no other BJP chief minister has such a record.
Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde Friday stressed that the government was not involved in keeping tabs on phone conversations of MPs, even as the opposition members alleged “official” involvement in the attempts to access call records of BJP leader Arun Jaitley.
Shinde, making a statement in the Rajya Sabha, offered details of the case and said there was no tapping of Jaitley’s phone. Records of calls he made were never disclosed, he said.
An eight-year-old girl, a student of Class 2, was allegedly raped inside the premises of a municipal school here leading to a violent protest outside the school and hospital where she was admitted Friday afternoon, police said.
Three people were detained for questioning for the rape while 14 others were detained for destroying and damaging government vehicles and property.
The Union Home Ministry has asked the Andhra Pradesh government to hand over the probe into the Dilsukhnagar twin blasts here to the National Investigation Agency (NIA), a senior officer said yesterday.
The Home Ministry has written a letter to the state government to hand over the probe to NIA, the officer said.
Andhra Pradesh Police are probing the blasts case and has formed 15 teams to carry out the investigation.
“The NIA had registered a case against Indian Mujahideen in September last year on its larger conspiracy,” the NIA official said.
MNS chief Raj Thackeray on Friday said that it was his duty as an Opposition leader to highlight the problems of the state, and if he came to power, he would certainly solve them.
Raj, talking to reporters here, criticised the media for giving little coverage to Bhandara rape and murder case, compared to the Delhi gang rape case.
Replying to a question about his targeting Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, he said he had no personal enmity, but he must communicate to the people the failures of the ruling parties.
A 22-year-old man on Friday tried to immolate himself outside a local court here claiming that his wife’s parents were not allowing her to return back to him.
Dilshad (22) tried to self immolate outside District Judges Court premises here this afternoon but was immediately rescued, Sub Inspector Jyotiram Yadav said here.
Dilshad had married Zeba an year back and was not being allowed to meet her by her parents and therefore, to draw attention to the matter he tried to immolate himself.
Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit Friday described as “inhuman” and “shameful” the rape of a seven-year-old girl inside a municipal school in the city.
“The incident is inhuman and shameful. It is a shocking incident. The municipal corporation must strengthen their existing security infrastructure in the schools,” she said.
The Class-II student was sexually assaulted inside the North Delhi Municipal Corporation-run primary school in Mongolpuri L Block allegedly by an unidentified man. The incident came to light at around 9 AM today when her parents informed police about it.
Charging Congress-led UPA with pushing people into another crisis and ‘untold miseries’ with today’s petrol price hike, Chief Minister Jayalalithaa Friday warned such repeated revision could well become a tool “that will destroy the central government.”
Demanding a rollback of the hike, she said “I wish to tell the government that if it goes ahead with troubling-the-people-is-a-norm’ approach, they will shed tears unable to tolerate the atrocity which will become a tool that will destroy the central government”.
In an indication of his growing stature within the Bharatiya Janata Party, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi came in for special praise at its national executive meeting Friday as party chief Rajnath Singh termed the atmosphere favourable for the party in the next general elections.
Modi came in for repeated praise in Rajnath Singh’s speech, signalling he may be accorded a national role. There have been demands from within the BJP that Modi should be declared prime ministerial candidate, effectively pitching him against Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi.
A resolution adopted by the Friends of Syria Group in Rome encourages extremists there to seize power by force, Russian foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said Friday.
The US, the European Union and Arab officials met in Rome Thursday and pledged more assistance to the Syrian opposition fighting President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
They also pledged to recognise the National Coalition as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people.
NHRC today sought a report from West Bengal government in connection with a major fire in Kolkata two days ago which left 20 people dead and several injured.
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) issued notices to the Chief Secretary of West Bengal and Commissioner
of Kolkata Municipal Corporation after taking suo motu cognisance of media reports about the incident.
It asked the state government to submit its report within four weeks.
The Commission has expressed concern over recurring incidents of fire and loss of several lives in Kolkata in the
Hearing a PIL, the Bombay High Court today asked the Maharashtra Government to explain why it was not using the state-owned land for training the police personnel.
A division bench of Justices A M Khanwilkar and K K Tated was hearing a suo motu PIL after it took note of a
report which said that a large number of vacancies in police department were responsible for delay in probes.
Observing that inadequate police force effects the functioning of the law and order in the state, the court asked
a senior officer of Recruitment Department to remain present on March 7.
The Majlis Bachao Tehreek has accused the Andhra Pradesh Police and a section of media of trying to demonise the Muslim community over the issue of Dilsukhnagar twin blast.
Referring to the missing of 22-year Syed Adnan, a B.Com final year student of Anwarul Uloom College and a resident of Amin Colony of Sayeedabad, MBT Corporator Mohammad Amjadullah Khan Khaled said that the student has been picked up by the police personnel two days ago for questioning into the blast case. He said Adnan’s father Syed Haji was not being given any information about his whereabouts by the police.
Setting aside the order of the lower court, Special CBI Sessions Court today remanded senior police officers Girish Singhal and J G Parmar, arrested in connection with the Ishrat Jahan encounter case, to six days custody.
Following the hearing on Wednesday, the court today set aside the lower court’s order denying police remand of two officers but also rejected CBI’s demand for 14 days custody.