Month: February 2015

Pushed increasingly into a corner by western sanctions over Ukraine, Russia Friday stressed on the relevance of the Russia-India-China troika in “ensuring international and regional stability and security” and setting up a BRICS inter-parliamentary forum.

Sergey Naryshkin, speaker of the Russian parliament, said the Russia-India-China (RIC) grouping “reinstates once again the impossibility of creating a unipolar world”, referring to the US which has been leading the sanctions against Russia over the unrest in eastern Ukraine.

Former Board of Control for Cricket in India chief N Srinivasan on Friday apologised to the Supreme Court for attending the body’s working committee meeting despite orders to the contrary.

According to reports, Srinivasan has also assured the apex court that he will not chair the upcoming annual general meeting of the BCCI.

Meanwhile, Cricket Association of Bihar secretary and main petitioner in the Indian Premier League spot-fixing case, Aditya Verma said that N Srinivasan has been barred from participating in any affairs of the BCCI.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress President Sonia Gandhi were among a host of political leaders attending the wedding reception of Lalu Prasad Yadav’s daughter with Mulayam Singh Yadav’s grandnephew in New Delhi on Thursday night.

Leaders cutting across party line were at the ceremony, which marked the union of the country’s two foremost backward leaders and regional satraps. President Pranab Mukherjee was also there.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday urged the opposition to help create a land acquisition bill that works for the benefit of the farmers, inviting his critics to ‘work together’ on the ordinance.

“The land reforms I want to introduce are necessary, because for the past 120 years, farmers have lived with a law that has denied them their rights. You [the Congress] have allowed this,” the Prime Minister said in reply to the Motion of Thanks to President Pranab Mukherjee’s address in the Lok Sabha.

India is not expecting any dramatic results from Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar’s visit to Pakistan on Tuesday, senior officials said today emphasising that his visit was a “SAARC yatra and not a Pak yatra”.

Jaishankar will be travelling to Bhutan on Sunday and go to Bangladesh next day before flying off from Dhaka to Islamabad on March three, as part of India’s initiative to reach out to SAARC countries.

Denied permission by Odisha government to visit communally sensitive Kandhamal district, VHP President Praveen Togadia today clarified that he was not against the minorities but would continue to speak in favour of his Hindu brothers and sisters.

“I am not against the minorities, but I’ll certainly speak on the interest of my Hindu brothers and sisters,” Togadia told reporters, adding that he was, however, against the illegal entry of Bangladeshi Muslims.

Togadia said he had been worried over the safety, security and well being of the Hindus.

Major (late) A K Kanal of 4 Parachute Regiment laid down his life fighting the Pakistanis in the 1971 war at Nagi.

His elder brother, Gulab Kanal, and his family, who are settled in the United States since 1960, recently came to know of the War Memorial at Nagi and visited it and the Karanpur cemetery on February 15 to pay homage to the brave officer.

Mr. and Mrs. Kanal were given a detailed account of Major (late) AK Kanal heroic act during the war. He got emotional seeing his brother’s name at the Nagi War Memorial and at the Karanpur cemetery.