Month: July 2013

Freebies promised by political parties in their election manifestos shake the roots of free and fair polls, the Supreme Court today said and directed the Election Commission to frame guidelines for regulating contents of manifestos.

A bench of justices P Sathasivam and Ranjan Gogoi said though the election manifesto is published before the code of conduct comes into force, the Commission can make an exception by bringing its within code of conduct.

In a bid to clear the huge backlog of cases, the Chief Justice of India-designate Justice P Sathasivam plans to put in place special courts, to deal with cases relating to offences against women, children and compensation claims.

“The cases pertaining to offences against women and children will be given priority and more special courts should be set up across the country to deal with them,” says the judge, who will take over as the 40th CJI on July 19.

In a massive operation against the Maoists, security forces have laid siege to a hill in Jharkhand, entrapping nearly 250 guerrillas by cutting their supply lines, police said here Friday.

The ‘Jaal Char’ operation has been jointly launched by the state police and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in Latehar district, around 145 km from the state capital Ranchi.

The indefinite economic blockade called by two student bodies to demand that 7000 students be allowed to appear in the Class-X Manipur board exam began from midnight last night along Imphal-Moreh National Highway, affecting movement of vehicles carrying goods.

A 1,400-piece silver-gilt dinner set commissioned by the former Maharaja of Patiala Bhupinder Singh has fetched a whopping 1.96 million pounds, setting a world record for an English dinner service sold at auction.

The price paid for the Maharaja’s banqueting service, used almost a century ago, is almost double its pre-sale estimate.

The set was purchased by an anonymous collector, Christie’s auction house in London said.

The opening bid was pegged at 1.3 million pounds, and its estimated value was between 1 million – 1.5 million pounds.

Athletics Federation of India’s plan to include dope-tainted Ashwini Akkunji in the women’s 4x400m relay team in the ongoing Asian Championships here was today nixed by the competition technical delegate on the ground that it would violate IAAF rules.

Plans were afoot to draft Akkunji, whose two-year ban for a doping offence committed in 2011 ended on Wednesday, into the women’s 4x400m relay team to raise hopes of a gold medal in the event.

An AFI top official had, however, denied yesterday that there was any plan to include Akkunji in the women’s 4x400m relay team.

Government today expressed confidence that the President will sign the ordinance on food security programme.

Addressing the press conference at the AICC, Food Minister K V Thomas said, “We are now waiting for the official communication from the Rashtrapati Bhavan.”

He said that the government was confident that President Pranab Mukherjee will sign the ordinance.

The ordinance on food security aims to provide highly subsidised foodgrains to 67 per cent of the country’s population at Rs 1-3 per kg.

Sister Infant Teresa, eldest sister of Defence Minister A K Antony, passed away at a private hospital here due to kidney failure.

Sister Teresa (80) died last night. She was admitted to the hospital here on July 2 and was undergoing treatment for kidney failure, hospital sources said.

She was one of the senior most nuns of St Joseph’s convent at Pattanakad near Cherthala in Alappuzha district. She was Provincial Superior of the Franciscan Clarist Congregation’s Ernakulam province for several years.