Month: September 2014

Telangana BJP president G Kishan Reddy today asserted that development in the State would be possible only with the BJP government at the Centre.

Addressing a joint public meeting here on Tuesday, Kishan Reddy urged the people to support the BJP-TDP combine candidate Jayaprakash Reddy (Jagga Reddy) in Medak Lok Sabha bye-election. He alleged that Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has failed to keep his election eve promises made to the people.

TDP leaders L Ramana, MLAs Revanth Reddy and Errabelli Dayakar Rao also participated in the public meeting.

———————-NSS

Home Minister Rajnath Singh today visited the headquarters of the National Investigation Agency here and assured that all issues concerning the premier agency will be resolved soon.

During the visit, Singh held a meeting with senior officials of the NIA and discussed various aspects of the NIA, the cases Being probed by it and other issues concerning the agency.

Director General Sharad Kumar and other officials briefed the Home Minister on the functioning of the NIA which was set up after the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack.

Republican Party of India (Athawale), a part of Shiv Sena-BJP-led alliance, today said it is keen to contest at least 14-15 seats in the upcoming Assembly polls in Maharashtra and hopes to win a dozen of them to emerge as a state-level recognised party.

Talking to reporters here, RPI chief Ramdas Athawale said his party has submitted a list of 20 Assembly seats to the Sena-BJP and hoped the Dalit outfit gets to fight at least 14-15 of them.

The eye bank of AIIMS has seen a rise in the number of donors in the last couple of years, an official said Tuesday.

“In the last couple of years, the eye bank of AIIMS has seen an increase in the number of eye donors. From a very few eye donors in the beginning of the eye bank, it has now 39,855 registered eye donors,” said AIIMS Eye Bank chairman Jeewan S. Titiyal.

Titiyal was speaking during the National Eye Donation Fortnight, which is celebrated every year for 15 days to create awareness about eye donation.

Budget carrier IndiGo Tuesday started promotional air fares by offering discounted one-way fares starting at a low of Rs.999 (all inclusive one-way fare), a day after SpiceJet started its offer of Rs.499 one-way charge.

According to IndiGo, its Delhi-Japiur flight is priced at Rs.999 one-way, follwoed by Rs.1,399 Srinagar-Chandigarh. The fares go all the way upto Rs.4,829 for Bangalore-Delhi.

The fares are applicable for booking in 90 days in advance.

Half of young women are unable to properly label a vagina on a medical diagramme, while 65 percent admitted having a problem simply using the words “vagina” or “vulva”, a British survey has revealed.

As Gynaecological cancer awareness month kicks off, research by the Eve Appeal, a cancer charity, unearths worrying information about young women’s awareness of their own bodies and the potential warning signs of the five cancers that can affect the womb, ovaries, vulva, vagina, and cervix.

Telangana Congress Legislature Party deputy leader Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka today flayed the TRS Government for failing to keep its poll promises.

Addressing the media at the CLP conference hall, Mallu accused the TRS of ignoring the plight of the farmers, who were anxiously awaiting crop loan waiver. Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao, who promised every thing, is now focusing on Medak bypoll. Though the farm sector needs adequate power supply, the government is yet to take steps in this regard, he alleged.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan said here today that seat sharing talks with the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) are on at an “appropriate level”, but refused to disclose any timeframe set to arrive at a final formula.

Addressing a press conference here today, Chavan said that talks are on at “the appropriate level”.

Replying to questions, he denied that the Congress-NCP tie-up depended upon the outcome of the Shiv Sena-BJP seat sharing deadlock.

“We have nothing to do with what is going on in the opposition,” he said.

A video footage has emerged from Liberia showing a person tagged positive for Ebola virus disease (EVD) walking through a busy market, sending hundreds of horrified onlookers fleeing in fear, a media report said Tuesday.

The incident occurred Monday in the capital Monrovia after the victim fled from a hospital. The video footage shows the man lashing out angrily at anyone who tries to confront him, The Independent reported.

The patient, who was apparently looking for food, was eventually surrounded by health workers and forced inside an ambulance.

Having played two matches and won one, Kamal Chawla remained in contention Tuesday for the knock-out phase, while compatriot Shivam Arora, with three defeats, has virtually bowed out of the World 6-Red snooker championship in progress here.

Chawla continued his consistent game in the last two years with a highly satisfying 69 break, but lost that match to Mathew Stevens 2-5. However, the Indian recovered to beat Aussie Steve Donohue 5-2.

Arora lost to Amin Sarkosh of Iran 0-5, went down 3-5 to Thailand’s Thepchaiya Un Nooh and was bested 4-5 by Sachar Ruberg of Ireland.

(IANS)

Not a single out of 33 incidents in various nuclear power plants in India during 2013-2014 has been classified as “accident” as per the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale, India’s atomic energy regulator said Tuesday.

While 32 incidents were below scale or having no safety significance, only one was pegged at scale 1, signifying “anomaly” or implying minor problems in components while sufficient defense in depth is remaining, said the the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) in its annual report for 2013-2014.

Opposition Congress is “conspiring to tarnish” the image of the Narendra Modi government after being unable to find anything against its “transparent” functioning, Union Minister Prakash Javadekar said today.

Hitting back at the opposition party for its comments that the NDA regime’s first 100 days in power was “high on rhetoric and low on performance”, Javadekar said the “policy paralysis” under the previous UPA regime had ended and decisions are now being taken transparently.

Hyderabad Metro Rail project has escalated by Rs.2,500 crore to Rs.3,000 crore, said L&T Metro Rail Hyderabad Limited (LTMRHL), the developer of the elevated metro project in public private partnership.

LTMRHL chief executive and managing director V. B. Gadgil told reporters here Tuesday that the project is in a “very very precarious mode”. He attributed the cost overrun to high inflation and increase in interest rates by 13 to 14 times during last three years.

Army troops busted a terrorist hideout in Kishtwar district of Jammu and Kashmir and recovered a cache of arms and ammunition including sniper and bolt-action rifles.

Acting on a tip-off, Rashtriya Rifles jawans launched a search operation at Bhandarkut forest areas in Kishtwar district and recovered the cache of arms and ammunition today, a defence spokesman said.

The recovery included a sniper rifle, bolt-action rifle with magazine, one telescopic sight, 17 rounds of assorted ammunition, two Chinese grenades and two radio sets, he said.

PTI

Sports Minister Sarbananda Sonowal was Tuesday advised by his officials not to clear teams in five disciplines, including football — where the men’s team has won two gold medals, for the 2014 Asian Games slated for Sep 19-Oct 4 in the South Korean city of Incheon.

Besides football, basketball, handball, table tennis and sepak takraw will also be axed if Sonowal strictly goes by his ministry officials’ recommendations before taking the final call Wednesday.

Barely one in three people in Britain support launching military action against Sunni militant organisation Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria at a time when the British prime minister has not ruled out supporting the US for it.

According to a survey for The Independent, only one in three people supporting Britain launching air strikes against IS (also called ISIS) in Iraq and Syria.

Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah Tuesday said residents of areas near the boundary between India and Pakistan in the state bear the brunt on border skirmishes, making their lives miserable and difficult.

Visiting areas close to the international border in Jammu district where ceasefire violations by Pakistan have forced residents to migrate to safer places, he said people living near the Line of Control (LoC) and the border have to bear the brunt of firing and shelling and their life and property is endangered by such incidents.

A court here Tuesday summoned a joint commissioner of Delhi Police observing that forensic reports have not been filed yet in the maid torture-and-death case against former parliamentarian Dhananjay Singh and his wife Jagriti Singh.

Additional Sessions Judge Lokesh Kumar Sharma pulled up Delhi Police for not taking the murder case seriously.

The station house officer of Chanakyapuri Police Station filed a status report in the court but said that FSL reports were still awaited.

The three-day Home Secretary-level talks between India- Bangladesh began in Dhaka today.

The two countries are expected to discuss issues like security and cross border crimes, border management, land boundary agreement, Interpol mechanism, reopening of immigration points, besides reviewing progress and implementation of existing protocols and agreements.

A MOU on bilateral co-operation for prevention of human trafficking and rescue and rehabilitation of victims is most likely to be signed.

The last round of talks was held in New Delhi in June, 2013. (ANI)

Union Rural Development Minister Nitin Gadkari has ordered that 50 per cent of all works taken up by line agencies at District level should be for water conservation works to mitigate situations of drought and water scarcity.

This decision has been made in response to combat the corruption in Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act ( MGNREGA ), which critics have said has resulted in no productive assets are being created through the rural job scheme.

Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi Tuesday said he will replace the government and called for a national unity administration in a move to calm down the recent spate of protests, media here reported.

Hadi will “name a new prime minister within a week” and assign him with the task to form a national unity government, Xinhua reported citing the official Saba news agency.

The president also said the government would reduce fuel prices by 25 Yemeni riyals (12 cents) per litre to appease the mass protests which were triggered by a steep increase in fuel prices at the end of July.

The World Food Program provided assistance to a record 4.1 million people inside Syria last month, reaching more of those in need with shipments traversing borders and front lines, the agency said today.

Syria’s civil war has touched off a massive humanitarian crisis, with some 10.8 million people in need of assistance, including 4.7 million in hard-to-reach areas, according to the UN.

Scoreboard of England’s innings against India in the fourth ODI of the five-match cricket series at Edgbaston here Tuesday.

England
Alastair Cook c Raina b Kumar 9
Alex Hales b Kumar 6
Gary Ballance c Rahane b Shami 7
Joe Root c Kulkarni b Raina 44
Eoin Morgan c Raina b Jadeja 32
Jos Buttler lbw Mohammed Shami 11
Moeen Ali b Ashwin 67
Chris Woakes run out (Raina) 10
Steve Finn b Jadeja 2
James Anderson not out 1
Harry Gurney b Mohammed Shami 3
Extras (lb 5, w 9) 14
Total (all out in 49.3 overs) 206

Saudi Arabia’s interior ministry has in the last few days arrested 88 people on terrorism charges in different parts of the country, media reported Tuesday.

Of the total, three are Yemenis, one of undetermined nationality and the rest are Saudis, the interior ministry said in a statement, adding that 59 more suspects had been detained previously.

The restructuring plan of the capital’s land development body DDA, including computerisation of all of its departments, will be submitted to Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung in two weeks, said an official.

“The plan will be finalised in two weeks and submitted to the lt governor,” the official said.

The plan, being prepared by the National Productivity Council in consultation with Delhi Development Authority, aims to make the capital’s land development agency more transparent and accountable.