Using a modified peep-hole, Barrett had videotaped the ESPN reporter at a Tennessee hotel.

The divorced insurance executive, 48, accepted the charge of stalking last December after prosecutors accused him of altering hotel peepholes to make nude videos of Andrews, 31, reports SKY News.

According to court papers, prosecutors said Barrett uploaded as many as 10 videos of Andrews on the Internet.

They also said Barrett had posted videos of another 16 as-yet-unidentified victim onto the web.

In a statement issued through his attorney, Barrett, who was given a 27-month sentence, expressed ‘deep regret’ to Andrews ‘for his conduct that caused her so much pain’. (ANI)

IFA Secretary, Utpal Ganguli and AIFF Vice-president Subrata Dutta have expressed happiness over Banerjee’’s selection.

Ever since she made it to the semifinals of the All England Badminton Championships, she has been flooded with calls from well-wishers and admirers. So much so that despite taking a temporary UK mobile connection, there was little respite for the Indian ace.

“I do not know how to handle all this. I am a sportsperson and know how to handle the pressure while playing matches,” the Hyedrabadi told MAIL TODAY . But then her achievements at the National Indoor Stadium in Birmingham last week have become part of sporting folklore, for she scaled a height no other Indian female shuttler has reached – the semi-finals of the Holy Grail of badminton.

The enormity of the achievement is yet to sink in. “Yes it is almost two days now and I still find it hard to believe that I made it to the semi-finals of the world’s premier event and that too in its centenary year.” For the first time, her father Harvir has accompanied her to a tournament.

“For the first time in my life, my father accompanied me. Before the tournament began, he asked me whether he could come with me.”

“He has rarely accompanied me on an international tournament. So I was a bit surprised when he asked whether I could accompany him to the All England.” Saina feels she is reaping the benefits of the hard work she has put in.

“I guess all the hard work which I put in towards the end of last year has begun to pay dividends.” She also said that her excellent run in the Uber Cup Asia qualifiers had given her a boost ahead of the All England.

Saina lost just once in the whole tournament after scalping World No. 3 Zhou Mi in the tie against Hong Kong.

“Yes, I think the good form I showed in the Uber Cup qualifiers did help me a lot in these championships. I lost just one out of the seven matches I played there. It is always good to come into a major tournament after winning some matches. Fortunately, I had a good run at the Uber Cup which lifted my game in Birmingham,” she said.

However, Saina felt that she had her chances in the semifinal against Tine Rassmussen. “I had my fair share of chances in the opening game. I was leading 9-6, 15-13 when she made me play more at the net. That was the mistake I made. I should have made her play more at the baseline,” she said.

Tine succeeded in engaging her in short dribbles at the net. “Tine is one of the best players in the world at the net. I should not have got into the trap of playing at the net. But next time we play, I will come up with something different,” she said.

OUT OF SWISS OPEN

Saina has pulled out of the Swiss Super Series badminton championships, which gets underway in Basel on Wednesday. “After consulting my coach Pullela Gopi Chand, I have decided to pull out of these championships . I have been playing non- stop for the last three weeks.”

“So he told me to take a small break before playing the Asian Championship in Delhi in April,” she said.

saji.chacko@mailtoday.in

On Monday here at the Commonwealth Championships, Olympic medallist Vijender Kumar displayed this as well as a solid gameplan when he outclassed Tanzanian Selemani Kidunda in the semi-final and assured India of at least a silver medal.

The punches that the Indian threw were far fewer, but Vijender scored 10 times more than the Tanzanian before the referee stopped the contest in the third round after Kidunda suffered a head injury.

The Indian was leading 10-1 at that stage. On a day when all four Indians in fray registered victories to assure at least a silver each, Dinesh Kumar (81 kg) followed in Vijender’s footsteps outclassing another Tanzanian Leonard Machichi and moved into the final.

M Suranjoy Singh’s 4-0 victory over Welsh Andrew Selby in his semi-finals was like a stroll in the park while super heavyweight Paramjeet Samota’s 5-2 win over Scot Ross Henderson was a stunner even for national coach Gurbax Sing Sandhu.

Kidunda failed to provide any challenge for Vijender, who almost used him as a punching bag in preparation for the final clash. As is his style, Vijender counter-attacked with straight punches and the trick worked giving him a 5-0 lead after the first By Shaghil Bilali in New Delhi round, and 8-0 after the second.

The Tanzanian also threw punches, but Vijender’s footwork and technique were up to it.

Vijender scored points whenever he wanted. In the final round, it was the Tanzanian who scored his first and only point, but Vijender roared back with two points and took an unassailable 10-1 lead and when he pulled off a straight powerpunch on Kidunda’s head, the referee immediately stopped the bout to declare the Indian victorious.

Vijender will face Frank Buglioni of England in the final on Wednesday. The victory provided Vijender a chance to break his gold medal jinx, after he clinched the yellow metal at the Chemistry Cup in Germany in May 2008.

“I am feeling excited because I am on the brink of claiming a gold after a long time. I know that the England boxer is good but I am sure I will beat him and break the gold jinx,” said Vijender.

Dinesh took a lesson from teammate Akhil Kumar’s defeat a day before. Akhil’s strategy of using hooks and uppercuts excessively did not provide the desired results. Dinesh, also an expert in uppercuts and hooks, changed his style to straight punches against the Tanzanian, and the strategy worked wonders.

Dinesh used clever strategy to outwit his opponent. The Indian was defensive and scored one point conceding none in the opening round.

However, he changed tactics in the next round and stretched his lead to 6- 1. A jab and a long range right punch saw him moving to 8-1 in the final round, and an uppercut on Machihi’s head led to an injury that prompted the referee to stop the bout.

Dinesh will face Callum Johnson of Scotland on in the final on Wednesday. Suranjoy, leading 4-0 after the second round against Selby, used a good mixture of attack and defence in the decisive round to make it to the final where he is pitted against Oliver Lavigi in the summit clash on Wednesday.

Paramjeet too changed his style from attack to defence against Henderson, who was taller and had a stronger build than the Indian. The change paid off when Indian overpowered the Scot to nail the biggest victory of his career. He will play Kiwi Joseph Parker in the final on Wednesday.

On Tuesday, India’s Jai Bhagwan (60 kg) will take on Danny Phillips of England while Amandeep ( 49 kg) will be up against MFBM Redzuan of Malaysia in their semi- final bouts.

shaghil.bilali@mailtoday.in

United, who returned to the top of the table with Sunday’s 3-0 win over Fulham, are chasing a double record – a fourth straight title and a 19th in all to eclipse arch rivals Liverpool.

“I’d like to think we have the right players, ones who’ve been there before and know how tough it can be to win the League,” The Mirror quoted Scholes, as saying.

The game against Chelsea at Old Trafford is going to be massive and we know we need to win that one.But that’s not the only important match. If we want to win the League we’re going to have to win every game. It’s a tough ask, but I’m sure we can achieve it,” he added.

“You can’t rule out Arsenal, especially with the run-in they’ve got,” said 35-year-old Scholes. (ANI)

“I am upset but want to thank everyone for their messages of support. I hope to make a swift and full recovery,” The Mirror quoted the 34-year-old, as saying on his web site.

Meanwhile, Dr Sakari Orava, who operated on Becks at the Mehilainen Hospital in Helsinki, has said that there is no chance of Beckham making it to the World Cup.

When asked, Orava said: “No, I don’t think so. Healing takes a long time. Beckham’s Achilles tendon was torn completely off, and we had to put together the two parts. He will probably be discharged on Wednesday. The operation was successful. Everything is fine.”

Becks picked up the injury while playing for AC Milan on Sunday.

Becks hobbled off his private jet on crutches as he touched down at Turku airport yesterday. He was then whisked to the hospital in a SUV.

Posh decided to make the 16-hour, 5,400-mile trip from LA after speaking to her distraught husband.

The 35-year-old scrapped a host of work engagements to be there.

A source said: “The entire family is absolutely broken by this.

Posh is expected to stay in Finland for 48 hours before returning to LA to finish a commercial shoot.

She will then fly to Milan with children Brooklyn, Romeo and Cruz, to Milan for the Easter reunion.

England boss Fabio Capello gave the stricken star a boost by declaring he would not close the door on his international career.

He even hinted that he could be handed a place in the squad for the 2012 Euro qualifiers. (ANI)

“I have a double fracture in my right middle finger, so will be missing the IPL. I hurt it taking the catch off Sehwag last night. wen (When) I landed, my finger got hooked in the ground,” Smith wrote on his Twitter page.

The burly South African had suffered a finger injury during the Test series against India also in February and did not play the following One-day series. The Rajasthan team is already without key performers in Shane Watson and Ravindra Jadeja.

While the Australian all-rounder is doing national duty in New Zealand, Jadeja is serving a one-year ban. Explosive batsman Yusuf Pathan and Dimitri Mascarenhas also injured themselves in Monday’’s match.

The inaugural edition champions will next play against Royal Challengers Bangalore on March 18. They lost their first match to Mumbai Indians on Saturday and second to Delhi Daredevils yesterday.

The 34-year-old’s visit to top specialist Dr. Sakari Orava has enraptured Finland, with tabloid Ilta-Sanomat writing, “The centre of the world: Turku” in its Tuesday edition.

“Superstar David Beckham’s surgery turned eyes to Finland,” the tabloid said of the England player’s visit to the western part of the Nordic nation.

Finnish newspapers on Tuesday were jam-packed with photos of a sombre-looking Beckham arriving at the Turku clinic on the west coast, 165 kilometres (100 miles) from capital Helsinki.

Beckham, who suffered the injury in AC Milan’s 1-0 win over Chievo on Sunday, was the perfect patient, Orava said.

“I think he prefers to stay one more night here. I just visited him … and he said if it’s possible he would stay one more night so we can check the wound tomorrow,” Orava told Reuters by telephone from Turku early on Tuesday.

“(His mood) was pretty good … he was smiling and there was no pain. He was really happy.

“He’s a nice patient, he’s very satisfied with everything, behaves well and doesn’t complain,” Orava laughed.

Orava, who has been operating on top athletes such as Haile Gebrselassie, Josep Guardiola and Merlene Ottey for the past 25 years, told Reuters on Monday Beckham would likely miss the World Cup in South Africa due to the injury.

With his foot to be kept in a cast for 6-8 weeks, Beckham is unlikely to regain full fitness ahead of the tournament, which begins on June 11.

‘DRAMA NAMED DAVID’

Beckham, England’s most capped outfield player with 115 appearances, had been bidding to play in a fourth World Cup. Such is Beckham’s status in Britain that even Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he had written to wish him a speedy recovery.

Beckham’s visit has put the local media into overdrive in this small Nordic country, which is more known for its love of ice hockey and winter sports than soccer.

Papers published stories on the nature of Beckham’s injury, profiles of Orava and also rumours that Beckham’s wife Victoria would arrive in Turku later on Tuesday.

“The Drama named David Beckham” tabloid Iltalehti wrote.

“Becks is great looking and stylish. He has a beautiful and successful wife. They are a dream family,” it quoted four young girls as saying outside the clinic.

Some were simply drawn by the spectacle.

“It’s pretty interesting,” 17-year-old Miro Vasama told Turun Sanomat. “Probably we would have come, even if would have been some other star of this size.”
Brett Young

Playing on Tuesday

Wigan Athletic v Aston Villa (1945)

Playing on Saturday

Aston Villa v Wolverhampton Wanderers (1245)

Everton v Bolton Wanderers (1500)

Portsmouth v Hull City (1500)

Stoke City v Tottenham Hotspur (1500)

Sunderland v Birmingham City (1500)

Wigan Athletic v Burnley (1500)

Arsenal v West Ham United (1730)

Playing on Sunday

Manchester United v Liverpool (1330)

Fulham v Manchester City (1500)

Blackburn Rovers v Chelsea (1600)

(Compiled by Infostrada Sports; Editing by Toby Davis)

These may just be numbers but they only confirm what has been repeatedly seen during the tournament — the Indian defence was the team’s sore spot all through.

“We played very well between the two circles,” Brasa admitted after India’s loss to Argentina. That, perhaps, sums up India’s story in the tournament. The midfield held up the middle but the finishers at either end were unable to back them up.

Sandeep Singh was the only experienced player in the backline but he was completely outplayed. The other two — Diwakar Ram and Dhananjay Mahadik — had both been included as specialist drag-flickers, making India’s defence a trio of PC experts. But apart from Mahadik to some extent, neither of the other two managed to do anything that could be called defending, and they failed in converting penalty corners as well. “We gave away some easy goals in every match. The defence is a concern and it is an area we need to work on,” Brasa said on Friday, as he has said after every game.

In every match India played here, at least one goal was scored in exactly the same way — unmarked scorer in front of an open goal with no defender, ball being put past the goalkeeper and deflected in. Against Argentina, when Lucas Vila scored their third goal, he was standing in front of an open net, the Indian defence nowhere in sight. Against Spain, it was Pol Amat in a similar position.

“We left a player each in front of the posts unmarked (against Argentina) and we left their key player Fernando Oscar Zylberberg unmarked and we paid for it,” Brasa said. Rajpal Singh also accepted there were concerns at the back.

“We have lacked in defence and finishing,” he said. Asked if it was the lack of experience that hurt them, Rajpal agreed. “Yes, that is a problem. But it is not lack of fitness,” he said.

Rajpal also said that the team were missing Dilip Tirkey’s experience. “The biggest problem is not that we do not have him, but that there is no one like him around to replace him either,” he said. For long, the Indian defence, marshalled by Tirkey, had been their strongest point. Now, all of a sudden, it has become India’s weak link.

Known for his lower-guard technique, the Haryana boxer went into a 3-2 lead before going down 7-6 in the second round. While most of Kumar’s punches were landing above Weaver’s waist, the fact that it did not result in scoring punches for Kumar hurt him the most. “The two points which Weaver got at the end of round one made all the difference. My plan was to go with the right uppercut technique. I was able to connect with my right jabs but I was little unfortunate that the left hooks did not carry much power,” said Kumar after the bout. “I know a lot of people will criticise my lower-guard technique but it is the same technique which got me gold in Melbourne as well as the Olympic qualifiers. I will always be ready to vacate my slot if I feel I am not performing well,” said Akhil.

Jai Bhagwan continued his fine run with a 7-1 win over Scotland’s Josh Taylor in the lightweight category (60 kg). Amandeep Singh assured India a sixth medal with a clinical 9-1 win over Rajabu O Mbwana of Tanzania in the light flyweight category. In the last bout of the day, Manpreet Singh of India lost 6-1 to Scotland’s Stephen Simmons in the 91+ kg category.

Results: 48 kg: Bathusi Mogajane (BOT) bt TMC Thennakoon (SRI) 14-1, Peter Mungai (KEN) bt Iain Butcher 4-0, Amandeep Singh (IND) bt Rajabu O Mbwana 9-1, M Redzuan (MAS) bt Afzal Hossan (MRI) 7-2, 56 kg: Bruno Julie (MRI) bt Muhammed Solihin (SIN) 18-0 RSC, Ian Weaver (ENG) bt Akhil Kumar (IND) 12-6, Tirafalo Seoka (BOT) bt Martin Odur (KEN) 2-1, M Wanniarachchi (SRI) bt Michael Roberts (SCO) 8-4, 60 kg: Joseph Njohu (KEN) bt Nort Beauchamp (NZL) 3-1, Valention Knowles (BAH) bt R Gunathilaka (SRI) 8-2, Jai Bhagwan (IND) bt Josh Taylor (SCO) 7-1, Danny Phillips (ENG) bt Darren Edwards (WAL) 10-2

“We have just come off a good win against (Taiwan) and are really looking forward to this,” Australian Davis Cup captain John Fitzgerald said. “The guys are very keen to play on clay.

Peter Luczak, Bernard Tomic, Carsten Ball and Paul Hanley were all in good form and hopefully Lleyton Hewitt and Chris Guccione will also be back from injury, which would give us some great options.” Former No.

1-ranked Hewitt injured his hip at the Australian Open in January and missed the subsequent Davis Cup match. Australia, which has won the Davis Cup 28 times, usually hosts its home matches on hard courts or grass, but had a 4-1 win over Britain in Sydney when it chose a clay surface in the first round in 2003, the last year it won the title.

Australia last met Japan in an Asia-Oceania Group 1 semifinal in 1996, winning 4-1. It leads Japan 14-2 in Davis Cup head-to-heads and has won their last six encounters.

Australia beat Taiwan 5-0 in its Asia Oceania Group 1 first-round match, while Japan beat the Philippines 5-0 in Osaka.

The state government would consider significant investment in infrastructure, building an athletes’ village and velodrome at Southport and upgrading existing swimming and track and field venues. Gold Coast, south of the state capital Brisbane, would host most events but some might be held in other cities, Bligh said.

“Not only will we have the chance to host a very significant event with major economic benefits for the state, the coastal strip will benefit with a significant boost to its infrastructure,” Bligh said. “That will not only include new and upgraded sporting facilities, but improvements and upgrades to roads and other transport networks and new housing developments.

” The Nigerian capital Abuja is the only other confirmed bidder for the 2018 games. The successful bidder will be named in November, 2011.

The next Commonwealth Games will be staged in October at New Delhi, where construction delays at venues have overshadowed preparations. The 2014 edition will be held in Glasgow, Scotland.

Australia lasted hosted the quadrennial event, which features countries and states of the former British Empire, at Melbourne in Victoria state in 2006. Queensland state hosted the Commonwealth Games at Brisbane in 1982.

Unification Ministry spokeswoman Lee Jong-joo in Seoul confirmed that North Koreans are working in South Africa. She says it’s part of the communist nation’s efforts to earn much-needed foreign currency.

North Korea is making its first World Cup appearance since 1966 and is in a tough group with Brazil, Portugal and Ivory Coast.

There was only a few minutes to talk about Floyd Mayweather Jr. and his run for congress in the Philippines in May.

The postfight party awaited, and once more the star was ready to perform. “The first song I’m going to sing is ‘La Bamba,’” Pacquiao said.

It’s a good time to be Manny Pacquiao, and Texas proved to be a good host to the hottest fighter around. Nearly 51,000 made their way into the edifice built by Jerry Jones to watch him fight Saturday night and few seemed to leave disappointed, even if Clottey’s reluctance to mix it up deprived them of a spectacular fight.

Pacquiao won every round on one judge’s scorecard and all but one on the other two. By the time they count all the pay-per-view receipts he’ll probably head home at least $15 million richer, and he didn’t have to put up with Mayweather’s antics to make another huge payday.

The fight that never was may still happen, perhaps in November, perhaps at Cowboys Stadium. Pacquiao made it clear he still wants it, and both his trainer and promoter seem to want it even more badly than the fighter himself.

“We will crush him,” trainer Freddie Roach said. It wasn’t an idle boast, and it wasn’t a way to hype the fight because it doesn’t need hyping.

Before it fell apart over Mayweather’s insistence on blood testing, the bout was supposed to have taken place Saturday night and likely would have been the richest ever in boxing. But Mayweather must first now get past a fight of his own, a May 1 bout against Shane Mosley that may be his toughest yet.

And promoter Bob Arum made it clear that there will be no negotiations this time around about any sort of blood testing no matter how much Mayweather might try to raise the point. There clearly isn’t any need for Pacquiao’s camp to bend on the issue.

Any thought that Mayweather diminished his popularity when he insinuated Pacquiao must be juiced to have won titles from 112 to 147 pounds evaporated when they opened the doors at Cowboys Stadium and throngs of people poured in hours early for the party. Pacquiao did the best he could to force the issue, throwing punch after punch after punch more than 1,200 in all.

Someone who managed to get a microphone at the postfight news conference congratulated Clottey for making it through 12 rounds, and asked him what his secret for success was. “Manny Pacquiao is beating everybody,” Clottey said.

“He’s knocking them out. I have to do what I can and I think I did my best.

” Arum didn’t seem to mind that he had just paid someone $2 million to go into a shell. “What was he supposed to do?” Arum said.

“If he played offense he’d get knocked out.” This was a freebie for Pacquiao, and one he had probably earned.

It’s hard to blame him for having an opponent just trying to stay upright, not after what he did to Oscar De La Hoya, Ricky Hatton and Miguel Cotto in his previous three fights. This, apparently, is what it has come to with Pacman.

No longer just content to beat fighters he’s now a 145 3/4 pounds of sheer intimidation, kind of a junior Mike Tyson who takes on his business with a smile instead of a scowl. He’s so good that a very good and veteran practicer of the sweet science decided that it was better to survive intact than go down in a blaze of glory.

So good that there wouldn’t be any question about his place on boxing’s hierarchy if there wasn’t this annoyance named Floyd Mayweather. So good that the only worry in his camp is that he will actually win a seat in congress back home and not fight anymore.

The glow of his latest win had even his tough guy trainer speaking fondly about the fighter he has helped transform a tough sport. “I’m just happy to be a part of Manny Pacquiao’s life,” Roach said.

____ Tim Dahlberg is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at tdahlberg(at)ap.

org.

Chennai were chasing a total of 191 but all they could manage was 159 for nine. “When you chase 190, you want a good start but we lost early wickets.

And if you lose early wickets, it becomes difficult for other batsmen to chase. “It all depended on the start, that we are capable of getting.

Matthew Hayden and Suresh Raina being the big hitters in top of order followed by Justin Kemp and Albie Morkel. We could have got those runs,” Dhoni said after the match.

Dhoni was not happy with fast bowlers, who were hit round the park in the clash. “In the practice sessions during the last ten days, all the bowlers did well and were accurate.

This game, may be the pressure got in to them. Hopefully, they will convert what they are doing in the practice games in the reminder of the matches,” he said.

He though was satisfied with the show of his spinners and lavished praise on rival batsmen Andrew Symonds and Herschelle Gibbs, who lifted Deccan out of pits with their 95-run stand. More PTI RE AT.

The Movement for the Niger Delta (MEND) said in an emailed statement it had planted three explosive devices in and around Delta State Government House in Warri.

Witnesses said the first explosion happened opposite the compound, the second at the gates of the building, where talks were due to be held about reviving an amnesty programme in the heartland of Africa’s biggest oil and gas industry.

“There was a huge explosion a few minutes ago at the venue of the programme. Every one of us started running helter skelter,” said a Delta state government official who asked not to be named.

Gbenga Ahmed, a local television journalist who witnessed the explosions, said the first outside the compound appeared to have been a car bomb. The second, about 30 minutes later, was about 100 metres away from the governor’s office.

(Reporting by Segun Owen, Austin Ekeinde in Port Harcourt; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Dominic Evans)

The scientists said their monitoring and research of the world’s driest inhabited continent for 100 years “clearly demonstrate that climate change is real”.

“We are seeing significant evidence of a changing climate. We are warming in every part of the country during every season and as each decade goes by, the records are being broken,” said Megan Clark, head of Australia’s state-backed Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).

The U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change acknowledged in January its 2007 report had exaggerated the pace of Himalayan glaciers melting, and last month said the report also had overstated how much of the Netherlands is below sea level.

The 2007 report is based on the work of thousands of scientists and is the main policy guide for governments looking to act on climate change. Sceptics have leapt on the errors, saying they undermine the science of climate change but the IPCC, which has announced a review, has defended its work.

The CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology report said international research showed it is extremely unlikely that global warming could be explained by natural causes alone.

“There is greater than 90 percent certainty that increases in greenhouse gas emissions have caused most of the global warming since the mid-20th century,” said the report.

“Evidence of human influence has been detected in ocean warming, sea-level rise, continental-average temperatures, temperature extremes and wind patterns,” said the report.

Australia, a major grains and meat producer, battled the worst drought in 100 years for most of the past decade, damaging its farm output, but in recent years the commodities sector has been recovering due to good rainfall.

The government estimated farm output for 2008/09 at A$42 billion ($38.4 billion) out of total Australian gross domestic product of A$1.2 trillion.

Studies show that rising seas, shifting rainfall patterns and greater extremes of droughts and floods could cost Australia’s economy dearly. A government report last November said residential buildings worth up to A$63 billion could be inundated if seas rise by 1.1 metres (3.5 feet) this century.

HEATING UP

Since 1960, the mean temperature in Australia has increased by about 0.7 degrees Celsius, but some areas of the country had warmed by 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius in the past 50 years, the report said.

Australia’s warmest decade on record is 2000 to 2009.

While total rainfall in Australia had been relatively stable, the geographic distribution changed significantly over the past 50 years, with rainfall decreasing in southwest and southeast Australia, the major population areas.

Sea levels around the island continent since 1993 have risen 7-10mm per year in the north and west and 1.5 to 3mm in the south and east, said the report.

From 1870 to 2007, the global average sea level rose by close to 200mm (8 inches), sea levels rose at an average of 1.7mm a year in the 20th century and about 3mm per year from 1993-2009, it said.

Sea surface temperatures around Australia have increased by about 0.4 degrees Celsius in the past 50 years.

The scientists said global carbon dioxide concentration in 2009 of 386 parts per million (ppm) was much higher than the natural range of 170 to 300 ppm that existed in the atmosphere for the past 800,000 years and possibly 20 million years.

The scientists said that based on their monitoring of the nation’s climate for 100 years, Australian average temperatures are projected to rise by 0.6 to 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2030.

The red-shirted supporters of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra gave the government an ultimatum to dissolve parliament and call elections by midday on Monday or face mass street demonstrations.

Backed by the powerful military and establishment elite, Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva flatly refused, reinforcing speculation he will prevail in the showdown.

“Everyone agrees that we cannot do it,” Abhisit said in a live national broadcast Monday morning.

“It’s not that we will not listen to the people, including the protesters. We want to see the country moving forward within the rule of law not just for today but also for the future.”

The protests, which began on Friday, reached more than 150,000 people on Sunday but have been peaceful and orderly. But Monday’s march could stoke anger by worsening traffic congestion in Bangkok, whose residents are mostly allied with Abhisit.

Despite the increase in political tension, foreign funds have been flowing into Thailand’s stock market — to the tune of $812 million over the past three weeks — as investors seek to benefit from a swift rebound in Southeast Asia’s emerging economies.

As a sign of this, Thai stocks were slightly firmer on Monday after racing ahead 63 percent last year.

Recent foreign buying was based on three factors: Thai assets are already trading at a substantial risk discount, the economy has rebounded well from the the global downturn despite bouts of unrest; and, Abhisit is widely expected to survive the protests.

The protesters caused immediate congestion as they started moving from their rally site in the centre before 9 a.m. (0200 GMT), mostly on motorbikes and pickup trucks. Tens of thousands had regrouped at the military base.

Protest leaders hope a powerful display of non-violent support will pressure Abhisit into call an election that Thaksin’s allies would be well placed to win. They also want to convince wavering partners in his coalition to break away.

Weng Tojirakarn, a protest leader, said they will rally peacefully outside the base.

“We will not besiege anything,” he said aboard a truck-turned-makeshift stage as the crowd moved toward the infantry. “We want to bring the people to Abhisit to show him how much support we have and how little he has.”

About 3,000 soldiers were deployed at the base and helicopters were ready for evacuation, said army spokesman Sansern Kaewkamnerd. Soldiers lined up behind barricaded and barb-wired fences and gates.

The protest deepens a seemingly intractable political crisis pitting the military, urban elite and royalists — who wear yellow at protests and back Abhisit — against mainly rural Thaksin supporters who wear red and say they are disenfranchised.

Most of the protesters travelled from Thailand’s poor, rural provinces, piling into pick-up trucks, cars and even river boats, illustrating Thaksin’s influence despite his removal in a 2006 coup, a graft conviction and self-imposed exile.

Although foreign investors expect Abhisit to prevail in the “red shirt” showdown, some risks loom ahead.

Thaksin’s allies are likely to win the next election which must be called by the end of next year, just as they have won every poll held since 2001. The military and urban elite could seek to overturn that result, possibly with a coup, as in 2006, or a judicial intervention, as in 2008, triggering unrest.

The “red shirt” protesters say the British-born, Oxford-educated Abhisit came to power illegitimately, heading a coalition the military cobbled together after courts dissolved a pro-Thaksin party that led the previous coalition government.

Adding to their anger, Thailand’s top court seized $1.4 billion of Thaksin’s assets last month, saying it was accrued through abuse of power.

Abhisit insists his government came to power legitimately. While his party came in second in the last election in 2007, he won the support of the majority in parliament.

Thailand was plagued by political upheaval in 2008, when yellow-shirted protesters who opposed Thaksin’s allies in the previous government occupied the prime minister’s office for three months and then blockaded Bangkok’s international airport until a court ousted the government.

Last April, protests by Thaksin supporters triggered Thailand’s worst street violence in 17 years. In recent months, they have emphasised non-violence — and Thaksin’s rhetoric is less incendiary than last year when he spoke of a “revolution”.

(Writing by Jason Szep and Alan Raybould; Additional reporting by Ambika Ahuja, Martin Petty and Vithoon Amorn; Editing by david Fox)

The red-shirted supporters of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra have given the government an ultimatum: call elections by midday on Monday or face crippling mass demonstrations.

The protests which began on Friday and involved more than 150,000 people by Sunday have been peaceful, and the “red shirts” say they will remain that way. But Monday’s march could stoke anger by paralysing already-congested streets in Bangkok.

“We will march over there, brothers and sisters. We will go to the infantry to get an answer from Abhisit himself,” said Nattawut Saikua, a leader of the protest group, the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD).

“With this many people on the streets, I don’t see how he still thinks he has any legitimacy,” he added.

Foreign investors worry any violence will derail a nascent recovery in Southeast Asia’s second-biggest economy but they have expressed confidence in Thailand’s financial markets by snapping up local stocks in recent weeks.

That view is based on three factors: Thai assets are already trading at a substantial risk discount, the economy has rebounded well from the the global downturn despite bouts of unrest, and Abhisit is widely expected to survive the showdown.

Protest leaders hope a powerful display of popular support will force Abhisit to dissolve parliament and call an election that Thaksin allies would be well-placed to win. They also want to convince wavering partners in his coalition to break away.

Abhisit and his coalition are unlikely to bow to the pressure, the latest in a seemingly intractable political crisis pitting the military, urban elite and royalists — who wear yellow shirts at protests and back Abhisit — against mainly rural Thaksin supporters who wear red and say they are disenfranchised.

Most of the protesters travelled from Thailand’s poor, rural provinces, piling into pick-up trucks, cars and even river boats, and illustrating Thaksin’s influence even after his ouster in a 2006 coup, graft conviction and self-imposed exile.

Take a Look on the political crisis in Thailand.

RISKS TO COME

Abhisit must go to the polls by the end of next year.

Thaksin’s allies are likely to win those elections just as they have won every poll held since 2001. The military and urban elite are likely to seek to overturn that result, possibly with a coup, as in 2006, or a judicial intervention, as in 2008.

In his weekly television address on Sunday, Abhisit indicated immediate elections were unlikely, citing the tense political climate and his government’s parliamentary majority.

Several main roads near government offices were blocked off either by protesters’ pick-up trucks and motorcycles or cordoned off by police and soldiers. Authorities deployed 50,000 police, soldiers and other security personnel across the city.

Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thuagsuban said protesters risk arrest if they disrupt life for Bangkok residents.

Last April, protests by Thaksin supporters triggered Thailand’s worst street violence in 17 years. In recent months, they have emphasised non-violence — and Thaksin’s rhetoric has softened since last year when he spoke of a “revolution”.

But without causing a big disruption, they may have trouble forcing elections, said Charnvit Kasetsiri, a political historian at Thammasart University. “It’s hard to pressure the government if the crowd is under control,” he said.

The protesters say the British-born, Oxford-educated Abhisit came to power illegitimately, heading a coalition the military cobbled together after courts dissolved a pro-Thaksin party that led the previous coalition government.

Adding to their anger, Thailand’s top court seized $1.4 billion of Thaksin’s assets last month, saying it was accrued through abuse of power.

Thailand was plagued by political upheaval in 2008 when yellow-shirted protesters who opposed Thaksin’s allies in the previous government occupied the prime minister’s office for three months and then blockaded Bangkok’s international airport until a court ousted the government.

(Writing by Jason Szep; Additional reporting by Ambika Ahuja; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Britons can register from Monday on www.giveyourvote.org to donate votes to Afghans, Ghanaians or Bangladeshis and, on the eve of the election — expected on May 6 — they will receive a text message telling them who wants to vote for which party.

“I’ve voted in the past but I find that this is a really exciting way for my vote to be important and to count … Our actions in this country are responsible for so much all over the world,” said student Fanny Rhodes-James, 23, who plans to donate her vote.

Hundreds of Britons have already committed their votes, Egality says, adding it expects thousands to register.

At the last two general elections in 2001 and 2005, national turnout in Britain slumped to around 60 percent, compared to 77 percent in 1992.

“When we complain that our political parties are all the same, that voting changes nothing, we’re missing the vital perspective of vulnerable people in developing nations — people whose livelihoods can be destroyed by the stroke of a pen in an anonymous office in Whitehall,” Egality said in a statement.

Whitehall is shorthand for British government departments.

Ghanaian Kwabena Okai Ofosuhene says one of the reasons he wants a vote in the British election is Britain’s influence on international financial institutions, such as the World Bank, which are “key to development in Ghana”.

“UK is one of the leading economies in the world and one of Ghana’s leading trading partners,” he told Reuters by telephone.

Britain’s political clout is another factor, added Ofosuhene who works for a non-governmental organisation. “America would not have gone to Iraq without the UK backing it, or to Afghanistan without the UK,” he said.

Britain is one of the world’s biggest donors of development and humanitarian aid, with the government saying it donated 5.5 billion pounds ($8.34 billion) between 2008 and 2009.

Would-be voters in the three participating countries can contact Egality with questions for British politicians and British volunteers can put them to their local parliamentary representatives, in local debates or via media channels.

“We are essentially running a UK election campaign (in those countries), not dissimilar to what the Electoral Commission does in the UK,” said campaign coordinator May Abdalla.

An Electoral Commission spokesman said that if people were not being paid for votes, there was nothing illegal in Egality campaign and said he had not heard of a similar campaign before.

(Editing by Louise Ireland)

(For more news on humanitarian issues please visit www.alertnet.org; email alertnetnewsdesk@reuters.com)

Addressing about 350 Lutherans in their small church, Benedict said both sides had accused each other of slowing down the ecumenical movement, but that only God, not humans, could create true unity.

The movement has brought Christian churches closer together in recent decades but has lost momentum lately.

Some Protestants, especially in Germany, say Benedict has contributed to that by stressing more strongly the Catholic claim to be the only true church.

They say he also seems more interested in improving ties with the theologically conservative Orthodox churches than with more liberal Protestant groups.

In the Vatican’s view, several Protestant churches have drifted away from common ground by ordaining women as priests and bishops or blessing same-sex marriages.

“We have divided the one path into many, so the witness we should give has been obscured,” Benedict told the German-speaking congregation, which his predecessor John Paul II visited in 1983, in their common native tongue.

“I think we should first be thankful that there is so much unity. It’s nice that we can pray together today, sing the same hymns together, hear the same word of God together, that we can interpret and try to understand it together.”

Benedict said only God could create more unity among Christians because “a unity we negotiate ourselves would be human-made and as fragile as everything that humans make”.

The leader of the Lutheran community, Doris Esch, recalled that Benedict had helped to work out a Catholic-Lutheran statement in 1999 resolving some theological disagreements dating back to the Reformation, the split between Catholicism and Protestantism, in the 16th century.

“Holy Father, may you feel welcome here,” she said.

Germany’s churches are planning an ecumenical festival in Munich in May. Some Protestants asked for a joint communion service but the Catholics declined because the two sides do not agree on the nature of this central Christian rite.

Sarkozy has tried to play down the importance of the ballot, saying it would have no impact on his reform drive and would not force a major cabinet reshuffle, but the scale of the projected loss heartened the Socialists after years of bitter infighting.

“This vote represents a severe punishment for the right,” said the Socialist party’s Segolene Royal, who lost heavily to Sarkozy in the 2007 presidential election.

Initial estimates showed the Socialists winning up to 30 percent of the first round vote against around 27 percent for the UMP and its coalition partners, leaving the left well placed to win convincingly in the second round run-off on March 21.

The Greens and far-right National Front also scored highly in the vote, while the far-left and centrists lost ground.

The vote was the last national test before the 2012 presidential race and the Socialists had been counting on a successful result to build a platform to challenge Sarkozy.

However, the Socialists also triumphed in the last regional vote in 2004, winning all but two of mainland France’s 22 regions only to then lose heavily in 2007 national elections.

Unemployment at more than 10 percent and worries over issues such as security and immigration have drained support for the government in the euro zone’s No. 2 economy while Sarkozy’s personal approval ratings have dropped to around 36 percent.

But Prime Minister Francois Fillon said a record abstention rate, estimated at some 53 percent, made it impossible to draw any conclusions at national level.

“Against all previous predictions, nothing has been decided for the second round in numerous regions. Everything is still left to do,” he said.

NATIONAL FRONT RESURFACES

Opinion polls before the vote had forecast a good result for the Socialists but the surprisingly strong backing for the anti-immigration National Front and the Greens left both well placed also to play a significant role in the second round.

The Greens were expected to hook up with the Socialists, but the National Front will carry on alone and will almost certainly bleed votes from the UMP in some key polls.

“The National Front, which people said was beaten, dead and buried by the president, has shown that it is still a national force, and probably getting bigger and bigger,” veteran far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen told TF1 television.

The far-right was forecast to win up to 12 percent of the vote at a nationwide level, with Le Pen himself expected to win more than 20 percent of the vote in southern region based around the Mediterranean port of Marseille.

In the last parliamentary election in 2007, the party took just 4.3 percent of the vote.

The environmentalist Europe Ecology party won an estimated 12.5 percent of the vote on Sunday, making it France’s third biggest political party.

France’s regional councils, responsible for issues ranging from maintaining school buildings to local transport, have little economic power and normally attract scant interest.

But the message the vote sends will be closely watched outside France for the possible impact on the pace of reform.

With the public deficit seen at 8.2 percent of gross domestic product after the billions of euros in stimulus measures pumped into the economy last year, the government faces a major task to get state finances back under control.

Sarkozy has pledged to continue with a major overhaul of the pension system due to be completed later this year but in an interview with Le Figaro newspaper last week, he signalled a pause in the pace of reform next year.

“It would have been nice to have had something a bit different,” Ashton, who is British, told the BBC when asked if she was surprised at the degree of hostility she had faced.

“When you have a new job that’s built on three people’s jobs … it’s inevitable that some people will be dissatisfied. I hope though, as they see what I do, that they will become more and more satisfied with what I’m doing,” she said.

Ashton, 53, a former EU trade commissioner, was a surprise appointment to the post of EU high representative for foreign affairs and security policy created under the Lisbon treaty.

The post is intended to give the 27-nation EU a louder voice on the world stage. But Ashton has struggled to overcome her critics since starting the job in December, has little experience in diplomacy and has never held elected office.

France’s defence minister criticised her last month for attending the inauguration of Ukraine’s president rather than chairing an EU meeting in Spain and she has also faced criticism for her perceived slowness to react to the Haiti earthquake.

Ashton said that when she did visit Haiti this month “everybody I met said ‘thank you very much for not coming when we needed the runways for aid, when we needed the roads clear to get people out’.”

“I feel completely that I did the right thing and I would do that again,” she said.

Ashton is in charge of setting up an EU diplomatic corps, or External Action Service (EAS), which will have as many as 3,000 diplomats driving foreign, aid and trade policies.

“The tectonic plates of Europe are shifting a little and the friction that you see is people trying to decide and determine what exactly the new external service, the new diplomatic service, should include within it,” she said.

“I’m absolutely confident that, as we work through this, the (EU) institutions all want to see this be effective and I believe I can bring that together effectively myself,” she said.

Mike Gapes, chairman of the British parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee and, like Ashton, a member of the ruling Labour Party, told Reuters last week he felt Ashton had been treated unfairly.

“She is being asked to do three jobs. She is being asked to build the new foreign service while she is doing the job. This is never what was envisaged,” he said.

(Reporting by Adrian Croft; Editing by Jon Hemming)

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s United Russia scored most votes in the eight regions but in six of those its support fell by between nine and 24 percentage points compared to national elections in those regions in 2007, early results indicated.

Opposition parties said the elections were marred by widespread violations and showed President Dmitry Medvedev had failed to follow through on a pledge to loosen the Kremlin’s grip of the political system.

Around 32 million of Russia’s 110 million registered voters were eligible to vote in the elections for eight regional parliaments, five city mayors and dozens of town councils. Early results showed United Russia was leading in most.

In the Urals region of Sverdlovsk, United Russia was in the lead with 39.46 percent of the vote with 82 percent of the vote counted, state-run news agency RIA news agency reported.

That marked a fall of support of 24 percentage points from the 64.77 percent scored in the 2007 national poll.

Early results showed United Russia down 21 percentage points in Kurgansk region, 19 points down in Kaluga and 15 points down in Altai compared to the 2007 parliamentary elections.

“United Russia is falling far short of its targets,” said Nikolai Levichev, a senior member of opposition Fair Russia.

United Russia spent much of its campaign trying to deflect growing anger over rapid hikes in prices for communal services and growing unemployment, which has sparked a series of large opposition protests in recent months.

Ten thousand people rallied against rising taxes and communal charges in the western region of Kaliningrad in January, in one of the largest opposition rallies in a decade.

Early results also showed the Communist candidate was set to be elected as mayor of the Siberian city of Irkutsk with more than double the number of votes of his United Russia rival.

They showed United Russia up four percentage points compared to 2007 in elections to the regional parliament of Ryazan with 29 percent of the votes counted and up 20 points in Voronezh region with two percent of votes counted, RIA said.

DEMOCRATIC TEST

Sunday’s vote came half way through Medvedev’s four-year term as he struggles to demonstrate progress on a promise to loosen tight control of the political system introduced during Vladimir Putin’s eight years in the Kremlin.

Accusations of voting violations were so widespread in a Moscow city council vote last October — overwhelmingly won by United Russia — that three usually loyal opposition parties walked out of parliament in a rare protest. They were coaxed back by Medvedev’s promise of a fairer vote this time.

Opposition parties said little had changed.

“So far we have seen no improvement,” said senior Communist lawmaker Sergei Obukhov. “The wave of violations is growing because United Russia’s support is falling.”

But like the Liberal Democrats and Fair Russia, two other opposition parties tolerated by the Kremlin, Obukhov said the Communists would withhold final judgement on the elections until official results are published on Monday.

Widespread violations could boost a series of anti-Kremlin protests on March 20.

Despite a series of relatively liberal speeches by Medvedev, analysts have struggled to point to any significant deviation from policies introduced by Putin, now prime minister and dominant partner in Russia’s ruling “tandem”.

Analysts say Medvedev is under pressure to demonstrate some genuine progress in his reform agenda ahead as the 2012 presidential election approaches. He has not said whether he will run for re-election.

Golos, Russia’s leading election watchdog, said it was still tracking the vote count, but that the election campaign and voting were as dirty as any election in recent years.

Federal election officials have dismissed opposition complaints of bias and said it had received almost 50 percent fewer complaints than during the campaign for the October vote.

(Editing by Louise Ireland)

“The raids … killed two leading al Qaeda elements who were planning terrorist operations against vital installations in Yemen,” the official said in a statement.

Residents earlier told Reuters that up to 20 people may have been killed in the raid in southern Abyan province.

Yemen has boosted security at oil and gas facilities after it declared open war on al Qaeda following the failed bombing of a U.S.-bound plane on Christmas Day which was claimed by the group’s regional wing in December.

Western allies and neighbouring Saudi Arabia, the world’s top oil exporter, fear al Qaeda is exploiting instability in impoverished Yemen to recruit and train militants for attacks in the region and beyond.

“This area (in Abyan) had seen an appreciable rise in activity by al Qaeda elements, which was being monitored by security services,” the website of the ruling party said.

Yemen has repeatedly bombed suspected al Qaeda sites, but residents and opposition groups have said dozens of civilians, including women and children, were killed in a Dec. 17 strike in which authorities said more than 30 al Qaeda members died.

Earlier in March, the government expressed regret over the civilian deaths in that raid in south Yemen and said it would pay compensation to families of civilian victims.

Al Qaeda’s wing in Yemen has said the attempted Christmas Day attack was in retaliation for the Dec. 17 raid which it accused the U.S. air force of carrying out.

Separately, the group said in an Internet statement that a Saudi militant — who it said had been active in raising funds in Saudi Arabia for fighters in Yemen, Iraq and Afghanistan — was killed in a clash with government forces in southern Yemen.

REBEL WITHDRAWAL

In addition to its conflict with al Qaeda and southern separatists, Yemen is trying to bring an end to a northern Shi’ite insurgency that in November drew in Saudi Arabia. It sealed a truce with northern Shi’ite rebels last month.

The rebels said on Sunday they had completed their withdrawal from three districts near the border with Saudi Arabia, Al Arabiya television reported.

A rebel spokesman said the insurgents had handed back state and military buildings to authorities, but warned the military to stay out of villages which had been rebel strongholds during the fighting, the news channel said.

While insurgent violence in north Yemen has faded, tension has escalated with separatists in the south despite an offer of talks by Sanaa, which faces international pressure to quell domestic unrest and focus on a bigger global threat: al Qaeda.

State media said a gang leader driving a stolen car was killed on Saturday in a clash in Abyan. A southern opposition news website said the man was a separatist, and that he was shot after he resisted arrest at a checkpoint.

State media also reported that in southeastern Hadramout province a court began the trial of 11 suspected separatists on Sunday on charges including “threatening Yemen’s unity”.

North and South Yemen united in 1990, but many in the south — home to most of Yemen’s oil industry — complain northerners have seized resources and discriminate against them.

(Additional reporting by Mohammed Ghobari in Sanaa; Writing by Cynthia Johnston and Firouz Sedarat; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Making his second brief visit to the wrecked capital Port-au-Prince since the Jan. 12 quake, Ban sought to restore momentum to what some fear is faltering donor support for efforts to help more than a million homeless quake survivors.

The U.N. chief, who held talks with Haitian President Rene Preval and leaders of the international relief operation, said the world’s response to Haiti has so far been “extraordinarily generous.”

“Seldom in history has there been such an outpouring of support and heartfelt solidarity,” he told a news conference with Preval before visiting one of the most crowded survivors’ camps in the city accompanied by U.S. actor Sean Penn.

Haiti’s president has said that up to 300,000 people may have been killed in the magnitude 7 quake that reduced parts of Port-au-Prince and surrounding towns to rubble. Some experts have described the temblor, which struck the disaster-prone poorest state in the Western Hemisphere, as the deadliest natural catastrophe of modern times.

Ban noted the U.N.’s revised emergency appeal for $1.4 billion this year to fund continuing humanitarian assistance and reconstruction in Haiti was only 49 percent funded so far.

“I assured President Preval and his ministers that I will continue my best personal efforts to fulfill the remainder, particularly for such underfunded programs as early recovery and agriculture,” Ban said at the news conference.

With Haiti’s annual rainy season looming and the hurricane season due to start on June 1, some aid experts say there is a risk of another humanitarian disaster, and even social conflict, unless adequate shelter is found quickly for hundreds of thousands of quake victims camped out in open spaces.

Outspoken Hollywood star Penn, who with Ban toured one sprawling camp of up to 40,000 quake survivors sheltering at the Petionville club golf course, said it was important for the world to keep on caring about Haiti and its quake victims.

“We need tents, we need funds,” said Penn, whose own charity organization has been helping with the relief efforts.

JOINT-MANAGED RECONSTRUCTION FUND

The U.N.’s chief of humanitarian operations, John Holmes, said on Thursday the international organization was struggling to provide support to Haiti, as donor nations had been slow to hand over much-needed aid. Last month, in a leaked e-mail, Holmes chided aid agencies for what he called poor coordination and resourcing, citing “major unmet humanitarian needs.”

Recovery and development experts and the Haitian government are drawing up a long-term reconstruction plan to be presented to international donors at a meeting in New York on March 31. Some economists have already estimated the cost of the damage inflicted by the quake at up to $14 billion.

“Our challenge is to maintain the spirit of solidarity through the upcoming donors’ conference and beyond,” Ban said.

A Haiti Reconstruction Fund to be financed by foreign donors is expected to be finalized at the New York meeting and Preval said he and Ban had agreed the fund should be jointly managed for 18 months by representatives from both Haiti and the donors.

After that, its administration would revert to Haiti’s government under the leadership of the president.

Preval also referred to the idea of creating a “red helmets” U.N. emergency humanitarian response force that could intervene quickly in countries hit by natural disasters.

This would be an additional role to the traditional U.N. peacekeeping activities already carried out around the world by the organization’s “blue helmet” troops and police.

The existing U.N. peackeeping force in Haiti was boosted in January when the Security Council unanimously agreed to increase its number by 3,500 to 12,651.

At the Petionville club encampment, Ban said the U.N.’s top priority would be to protect women and young girls, some of whom have reported rapes in the crowded camps.

“When their life is very difficult at this time, if they are the objects of sexual abuse, attacks and rape, it is totally unacceptable. We must stop it,” Ban said.

Possible solutions included moving vulnerable survivors to safer camps, and five likely sites had been identified.

Haiti’s Jan. 12 earthquake demolished the headquarters of the U.N. mission in Port-au-Prince and killed 101 U.N. personnel, including the mission chief, Hedi Annabi.

It was the worst loss of life in a single incident in the United Nations’ 65-year history.

(Writing by Pascal Fletcher; editing by Todd Eastham)

As many as 200 people were watching or taking part in the event on Boulder Mountain on Saturday when the snowmobiles triggered the slide and sent a wall of snow crashing down on the onlookers, witnesses and police said.

A search for survivors ended late on Sunday when police were able to locate everyone associated with the rally, by finding the owners of cars left near the accident scene and canvassing hotels for any missing tourists.

Search dogs able to find bodies will double-check the mountain again on Monday, said a spokesman for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Witnesses told local media the slide started when several snowmobiles raced high up the slope during the privately run rally, which was held despite warnings of a high avalanche risk in the area.

The survivors described a chaotic scene of snowmobilers scrambling down the mountain to outrun the avalanche, or driving into the forest in hopes that the trees would protect them from the wall of snow.

Many of the snowmobilers who escaped the snow were carrying avalanche-survival gear that allowed them to quickly rescue those who were buried.

Revelstoke is located about 195 miles (300 km) west of Calgary, Alberta, in an area of western Canada popular for backcountry recreation such as snowmobiling and skiing.

(Reporting by Allan Dowd; Editing by Paul Simao and Chris Wilson)

Unstable snow conditions hampered efforts to get to search crews onto Boulder Mountain, where as many as 200 people were believed to be watching or participating in the annual event when the snow slide hit on Saturday, police said.

Police believe most of the people are accounted for but were canvassing hotels in Revelstoke, located about 195 miles (300 km) west of Calgary, Alberta, to determine if tourists who attended the event might be missing.

“There could very well be injured persons or deceased persons that remain buried. We have not confirmed the whereabouts or identified all persons who were on the mountain,” said Dan Moskaluk, a corporal with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Police initially thought three people were killed but later said there were only two fatalities. One of the 30 people known to have been injured in the slide was hospitalized in critical condition. Two others were in serious condition.

Survivors told local media of a chaotic scene of snowmobilers scrambling down the mountain to outrun the avalanche, or driving into the forest in hopes that the trees would protect them from the wall of snow.

The snow and debris pile left by the avalanche was believed to be as much as 30 feet (9.1 meters) deep, police said.

The event, which could only reached by snowmobile, featured competitors with high-powered machines racing up the mountain. The Canadian Avalanche Centre, based in Revelstoke, had warned local residents that the risk of avalanches in backcountry mountain areas was high because of recent snowfall.

3510.00 April Rs.4750.00 Rs.

3600.00 May Rs.4760.00 Rs.

3500.00 June Rs.4700.00 Rs.

3450.00 PTI TKR TRK.

13400.00 Ginger Rs. 8000.00 Rubber RS.14500.00 Aricanut new Rs.

5700.00 Turmaric Rs. 6500.00 Coir koylandy 1 Rs.

3700.00 2 Rs. 3600.00 Beypore 1 Rs.

3100.00 2 Rs. 3000.00 Cardamam Rs.

900.00 (KG) Graded Rs. 700.00 PTI EPD TKR TRK.

Copra (FAQ) Rs.3325/- Copra (As it is) Rs.

3255/- Oilcake Rotary Rs.1600/- Expeller Rs.

1125/- PTI TKR TKR TRK.

In the saria section, Kamdhenu 8-mm,10-mm and 12-mm were up by Rs 200 each to Rs 34,450, Rs 34,450 and Rs 34,300 per tone. Following are today’’s quotations in Rs per tonne: CTD saria (Kamdhenu) 8-mm, 34,450, 10-mm, 34,450, 12-mm 34,250, 16-25 mm 34,450.

Rathi tor steel : 8-mm 33,600, 10-mm 33,500, 12-mm 33,500, 16-20 mm 33,400 and 25-32 mm 33,100. Saria Jai Bharat (iso 9002) 8-mm 33,200, 10 mm 33,100, 12-mm 33,200, 16-25 mm 33,100.

Amba saria (iso-9002) 8-mm 32,000, 10-mm 31,500, 12-mm 31,200, 16-25-mm 31,300. Amba shakti: (TMT) 8-mm 31,100, 10 mm 31,000, 12 mm 31,100, 16 to 25 mm 31,300.

M S Angle: (50×5) (50×6) 32,000, (40×5) (40×6) 32,500. Angle capital (ISI) (40X5) (40×6) 36,000, (35X5) (65X6)32,000.

Garder (joist) (150×75) 32,500 (175×85) 31,500 (200×100) 32,800 (125×70) 32,700. T-IRON (40X5) (40X6)(50X6) 32,700.

PTI SUN KPS RS AMK.

“With a partnership spirit we have mutually agreed with Boeing to adjust the Air Berlin order book to meet Air Berlin’s operational requirements and the market conditions,” the company said on Tuesday.

Air Berlin cut its firm order to 15 planes from 25 and the number of options for further 787 aircraft to 5 from 10. Each 787 aircraft has a list price of about $170 million.

In addition, it is deferring delivery of nine Boeing 737 aircraft to 2015 from 2010 or 2011, it said.

“For Air Berlin, the agreement means a significant reduction of its financial obligations due to lower and much more distributed investment profile,” it said.

Air Berlin had already said last year that it could cancel or defer some of its outstanding aircraft orders, which also include 4 Q400s built by Bombardier and 26 A320-family aircraft from Airbus.

Chief Operating Officer Gurdeep Singh did not say whether the firm would bid in selected telecoms zones or across the country.

India’s 3G auction starts from April 9 and Friday is the last date for submitting applications to participate.

(Reporting by Devidutta Tripathy)

NALCO is India’s third-biggest aluminium maker that sells aluminium and alumina in the local and foreign markets. Its tenders are watched by international metal traders.

“We have increased the prices of all aluminium products because the LME aluminium prices have risen,” said the official who could not be named due to company policy.

This is the second increase in prices by NALCO this month.

Aluminium prices on the LME traded at $2,249 a tonne on Tuesday, up 13.6 percent from the year’s low at $1,980 on Feb. 5 on improving demand for the metal.

The NALCO official said the basic price of standard aluminium ingots and standard aluminium sow ingots would now be 123,700 rupees per tonne.

(Reporting by Jatindra Dash; Editing by Ranjit Gangadharan)

The 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 17,169.84 points, shut shop at 17,396.9 points (provisional), up 231.91 points or 1.35 percent from its previous close at 17,396.9 points.

At the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the broader 50-share S&P CNX Nifty closed at 5,202.05 points, up 1.43 percent against the previous close at 5,128.9 points.

Broader markets too saw buying interest as the BSE midcap index ended 1.08 percent higher and the BSE small cap index closed 1.27 percent up.

“I am exploring the possibility of getting imported coal through our own international contacts for our suppliers,” Amulya Charan, managing director of Tata Power Trading Co said in an interview on Tuesday.

“My requirement is about 10-15 million tonnes of coal in another 5 years.”

More than half of India’s power generation is coal-fed, but demand for the resource outstrips supply which means India has to depend on foreign markets to keep its power sector growth on track.

For a graphic showing India’s coal imports, click http://graphics.thomsonreuters.com/310/IN_CLIMP0310.gif

Tata Power Trading buys electricity from about 100 power producers and sells to transmission companies and other firms.

The firm’s move to help its suppliers get coal speaks for the urgency in the power sector to secure the resource, which will also boost the power trading business.

“I have added this as a new line of business,” Charan said. “Few deals are likely this year, maybe four or five. It is very difficult to say as the availability is also becoming tight.”

India has been facing a shortfall of 12.6 percent of peak power demand, data from the Central Electricity Authority shows, and coal shortage is one of the main reasons.

“Power producers sometimes operate with just a week’s supply,” Charan said. “Sometimes there is coal available, but there are no railway rakes to move it.”

An estimate by Karvy Stock Broking shows India may need 595 million tonnes of coal by 2012 for its power needs.

“If the economy gallops, the gap becomes bigger,” Charan said.

Tata Power Company has stakes in coal companies owned by PT Bumi Resources in Indonesia.

(Editing by Ranjit Gangadharan)

(For more business news on Reuters Money visit http://www.reutersmoney.in)

The deal is a milestone for INQ Mobile, a unit of Hong Kong’s Hutchison Whampoa, which so far has sold its phones mostly through Hutchison’s operators in different countries.

The INQ Mini 3G and the INQ Chat 3G will be available later this week, the companies said.

INQ is benefiting from its early move to make cheaper phones for connecting to social networks and the Internet in general — a move large handset makers such as Nokia Oyj and Motorola Inc are only now following.

INQ models integrate key features of Facebook and other social networking sites into the phone’s address book, removing the need to separately log on to the service.

The INQ Mini 3G is the first mass-market phone with an Internet-based Twitter client. The phone will use Internet connections for sending the 140-character messages, called Tweets.

User numbers of mobile Facebook grew more than five-fold in India last year, with the country’s top social networking site Orkut seeing almost three-fold growth, according to Opera Software, maker of the most used mobile browser in India.

(Reporting by Devidutta Tripathy and Tarmo Virki; Editing by David Holmes)

(For more business news on Reuters Money visit http://www.reutersmoney.in)

Investors sold off Google Inc shares a day earlier after signs the company could soon shut its Web search site in China, Google.cn, two months after saying it would not abide by Beijing’s censorship rules and was alarmed by hacking from inside China.

Shares of Google fell nearly 3 percent in regular trading on Monday to close at $563.18. Shares of Baidu, the No.1 search engine in China, rose 4.8 percent to $576.84.

Google has not unveiled any plans, leaving users to guess whether the company may seek to unilaterally do away with the Chinese-mandated filters that censor content on google.cn or announce it is shutting down the site.

In what appeared to be a reminder that China would not welcome any abrupt steps, a spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce said Google should follow rules even if it decides not to stay in the country.

“On entering the Chinese market in 2007, it clearly stated that it would respect Chinese law,” the spokesman, Yao Jian, told reporters in answer to a question about Google.

Google opened its Chinese search portal in 2006.

“We hope that whether Google Inc continues operating in China or makes other choices, it will respect Chinese legal regulations,” Yao told a regular news conference.

“Even if it pulls out, it should handle things according to the rules and appropriately handle remaining issues,” he said.

UNCENSORED SEARCH ENGINE

Yao said those rules included one that a foreign company report to the Commerce Ministry about plans to pull out.

If Google does decide to leave China, it could unnerve other foreign investors in the country. But Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang downplayed the significance of such an action.

“I think this would just be the individual act of one company, and will not affect China’s investment environment,” Qin told a regular news briefing. “It will not change the fact that most foreign companies, U.S. ones included, have a good business in China and generate large profits.”

Google’s chief executive, Eric Schmidt, said last week he hoped to have an outcome soon from talks with Chinese officials on offering an uncensored search engine in that country of 384 million Internet users.

Many experts doubt China’s ruling Communist Party would compromise on censorship. The Financial Times reported at the weekend the talks had reached an impasse and Google was “99.9 percent” certain to shut Google.cn.

A Google spokesperson said on Monday that talks with Chinese authorities had not ended, but added that the company was adamant about not accepting self-censorship.

China requires Internet operators to block words and images the ruling Communist Party deems unacceptable.

Internationally popular websites Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are entirely blocked in China, which uses a filtering “firewall” to block Internet users from other overseas website content banned by authorities.

(Reporting by Chris Buckley, Wang Lan and Ben Blanchard)

(For more business news on Reuters Money visit http://www.reutersmoney.in)

Attributing to people briefed on the plan, ‘The Financial Times’ reported Daimler and Renault are discussing acquiring mutual equity stakes.

“The stakes to be bought or swapped were likely to be smaller than 10 per cent,” the daily said.

According to the publication, if the talks are successful, the German and French carmakers would take stakes in each other as part of “a longer-term framework for co-operation,” the report noted.

However, the report said that discussions have been long-running, and are still ongoing.

Daimler and Renault said in December that they were discussing a possible partnership on small and compact vehicles.

Both companies are in constant talks with their competitors about pooling costs and building scale for costly new technologies and cars. These have intensified during the industry’s current deep recession.

Besides, the report also said the two companies were also discussing cooperation in light trucks.

Katie Robertson spotted the toy at a Borders book store being sold for $14.99, ABC News reported Tuesday.

‘There are certain buttons there. For example, the male may decide that he wants beer, sex or food. He may press a button in which he requires the woman to remove her clothes, cook, clean, leave, (or) say yes.’

‘There’s also a button in which you can increase her breast size,’ Robertson told ABC Radio.

She said that she was troubled by the item ‘mainly because it encourages a stereotype of women as submissive, who are to be controlled’.

Lauren Thompson of Borders said the item was intended as a joke.

She pointed out they were also retailing a ‘control a man’ remote that had sold out.

‘All I can say in its defence is that it is base level humour.

‘But it’s meant to be a bit funny, a bit of a gimmick, something you might buy for your best mate before a stag night or a hens night,’ Lauren was quoted as saying.

This groundbreaking and aggressive pricing design allows organizations registered with Eagle Conferencing to conduct audio conferences with business partners or family members within India and the U.K. without incurring international call charges. With this unique service, millions of Indian consumers who want to conference with counterparts in the U.K. can enjoy a call experience with an unmatched voice quality that has never been possible before.

This service eliminates expensive international call charges and is available to all existing customers, as well as to new customers, as a part of their service package. There are no additional costs for this international conferencing feature!

Eagle Conferencing provides access to audio conference call capabilities that support calls for up to 25 participants. The conference moderator has access to a full range of call management facilities and award-winning, state-of-the-art conferencing services. Sign up online at www.eagleconferencing.in or www.eagleconferencing.co.uk.

In an effort to re-define the future of the Indian telecom sector, this significant development is part of an overall commitment to provide customers with quality service and global reach. Eagle Conferencing offers consumers a bouquet of global telecom value-added services. India’s currently expanding market has inspired us to transform industry dynamics and reinvent economic models.

Eagle Conferencing, with almost a quarter of a century of global infrastructure and an operations experience of over 10 billion annual minutes of calling traffic capacity, is one of the global leaders in conferencing services.

The conferencing solutions provided by Eagle Conferencing have been instrumental in forming the communication backbone of the entire switching and transmission communications value chain.

Providing an inexpensive global bridge facility between India and the U.K. supports the communication delivery structure which has contributed towards strengthening economic and social development in India. (ANI)

U.S. safety investigators said separately that they had yet to pinpoint any evidence to support or disprove the claim that a 2008 Prius sped out of control near San Diego a week ago.

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration engineers drove the hybrid in an effort to recreate the episode reported by the driver, James Sikes, but failed to do so, the agency said in its first statement on a hurried and high-profile analysis.

“We would caution people that our work continues and that we may never know exactly what happened with this car,” NHTSA said.

Sikes, 61, had reported in a call to emergency telephone operators that his Prius was racing out of control for some 20 minutes before he could slow down the vehicle and bring it to a safe stop with coaching from a California Highway Patrol officer who pulled alongside him.

Highway patrol spokesman Brian Pennings said on Monday that the initial findings of Toyota and NHTSA did not constitute sufficient grounds to reopen an inquiry into the incident.

“Up until now, they’ve presented no physical evidence that’s like a smoking gun to disprove Mr. Sikes’ statement,” Pennings told Reuters. “We have to take Mr. Sikes at his word until there’s evidence to discount his statement.”

Pennings added that observations of the highway patrol officer who came to Sikes aid supported his claim. When the state trooper caught up with Sikes’ Prius on the freeway, the car was traveling at 90 mph with the brake lights illuminated and the smell of burning brakes in the air, he said.

Pennings said that even when Sikes managed to slow the car by following the officer’s instructions to apply the footbrakes and emergency brake simultaneously, the driver appeared to be “literally standing on the brakes.”

Had the brake override system been working correctly, as Toyota says it was, that “should have killed the engine,” Pennings said.

Toyota said it had found no evidence that Sikes had been applying the brake forcefully and said he should have been able to stop the Prius by doing so, or by shifting into neutral or turning off the electronic power switch.

The March 8 incident came at a crucial time for Toyota. The automaker has been struggling for almost two months to reassure a jittery public it has turned a corner in dealing with safety issues that sparked a recall of 8.5 million vehicles.

Although Toyota’s March U.S. sales have been up sharply because of cash rebates and zero-percent financing offers, some analysts have said the long-term commercial damage from the automaker’s safety crisis remains harder to assess.

Scrutiny of the Prius, a vehicle the automaker considers its most important, has also raised the stakes for the automaker in ongoing U.S. investigations of unintended acceleration.

Toyota plans to cut output of the Prius by 10 percent starting this month due to a sales slowdown, a source with knowledge of the plans told Reuters.

The 2010 Prius was the subject of a February recall for braking problems, and the 2004 to 2009 model-year Prius hybrids were included in an October recall for loose floor mats.

But the San Diego case was the first to trigger a federal examination of the Prius for unintended acceleration, something U.S. consumers have complained about in a range of other Toyota models, including its top-selling Camry.

‘THE HUNT FOR THE GHOST’

California police have said they had no reason to doubt Sikes based on the burning brakes in his car and observations of the officer who helped him.

Toyota, which convened a news conference in San Diego to question Sikes’ account of events, declined to comment directly on whether Sikes might have misled investigators.

But Toyota said an examination of his Prius showed that the car was being driven with the brakes lightly and repeatedly applied — some 250 times over the period of the incident.

The brake override in the Prius would have cut engine power to the vehicle had the driver applied “moderate to heavy” pressure on the brake pedal as Sikes had claimed, it said.

Sikes could not be reached for comment. The San Diego-based law firm representing him said it would not comment until NHTSA had completed its investigation.

Toyota has said it has not been able to identify a cause for cases of unintended acceleration consumers have reported beyond ill-fitting floor mats and sticky accelerator pedals. The automaker has recalled more than 6 million vehicles in the United States for that pair of problems since October.

Commentators have focused on the prospect that drivers could be making mistakes — hitting the accelerator instead of the brake — or that Toyota vehicles could be subject to a software glitch or other problem that is hard to replicate.

Toyota said again on Monday that there is no evidence for that latter possibility — a hypothesis that some critics have dubbed “the ghost in the machine.”

“The hunt for the ghost seems to ignore or fly in the face of known facts,” Toyota spokesman Mike Michels said outside a San Diego sports stadium where the automaker demonstrated the safety systems on the Prius for reporters.

“There’s no evidence that the system heals itself mysteriously,” Michels said.

Kelley Blue Book analyst James Bell said Toyota needed to do more than discredit one report of unintended acceleration to reassure consumers. “Until they have a more definitive answer, the elephant stays in the room,” Bell said in an email.

RECALLS HURTING IMAGE

ALG, a Santa Barbara, Calif-based firm that tracks vehicle resale values, said Toyota’s recalls had damaged the brand. It said its survey of consumer attitudes showed Toyota had dropped to No. 6 from No. 1 in perceived quality.

In response to weaker demand, Toyota will probably need to extend aggressive discounts through June, ALG said.

Sikes had told police and reporters he was driving the car on a freeway when it unexpectedly surged forward and reached speeds exceeding 90 miles per hour.

Two NHTSA investigators joined Toyota experts to examine his Prius, including an on-board diagnostic system designed to record information about the car’s various systems.

NHTSA has been criticized by Congress for not aggressively investigating complaints against Toyota.

Authorities believe floor mat problems in Toyota and Lexus vehicles are linked to five U.S. crash deaths since 2007. Another 47 crash fatalities reports over the past decade have been reported due to unintended acceleration in Toyota vehicles, according to NHTSA.

There are 59 reports of fatalities linked to episodes of unintended acceleration for other automakers over the same period, NHTSA says.

(Reporting by John Crawley; Editing by Derek Caney, Maureen Bavdek and Carol Bishopric)

At 9.30 a.m. the 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 17,176.02, points, was ruling at 17,233.74 points, 65.78 points or 0.38 percent higher than its previous close at 17,167.96 points.

At the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the broader 50-share S&P CNX Nifty was ruling at 5,155.5 points against the previous close at 5,133.4 points, a gain of 0.43 percent.

Broader markets were also in the green with the BSE midcap index up 0.52 percent and the BSE small cap index ruling 0.7 percent higher.

At 9.28 a.m. the 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 17,087.63 points, was ruling at 17,062.37 points, 35.96 points or 0.21 percent lower than its previous close at 17,098.33 points.

At the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the broader 50-share S&P CNX Nifty was ruling at 5,106.65 points against the previous close at 5,116.25 points, a loss of 0.19 percent.

Broader markets were flat at this time of the day.

US wholesalers reported a drop of 0.2 percent in inventories in January, which was widely interpreted as a sign of rising demand.

Share prices for major banks and insurers helped drive the increase in the broader stock market. The financial subset within the Standard and Poor’s 500 Index was up for a ninth straight trading session, the sectors longest share rally in 12 years, according to the Bloomberg financial news agency.

The blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average added 2.95 points, or 0.03 percent, to 10,567.33. The broader Standard and Poor’s 500 Index gained 5.16 points, or 0.45 percent, to 1,145.61. The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 18.27 points, or 0.78 percent, to 2,358.95.

The US currency was off against the euro at 73.23 euro cents from 73.53 euro cents Tuesday. The dollar rose against the Japanese currency to 90.51 yen from 89.99 yen.

The 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 17,072.94 points, was ruling at 17,092.16 points (provisional), 39.62 points or 0.23 percent higher than its previous close at 17,052.54 points.

At the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the broader 50-share S&P CNX Nifty was ruling at 5,115.95 points against the previous close at 5,101.5 points, up 0.28 percent or 14.45 points.

Broader markets came under greater selling pressure with the BSE midcap index ending 0.27 percent lower and the BSE small cap index closing 0.19 percent down.

The market breadth was negative, with 1,184 stocks advancing, compared to 1,649 scrips on the decline, while 68 remained unchanged.

Most other Asian markets too ended trade on a dull note.

The benchmark Japanese index, Nikkei, ended flat at 10,563.92 points, while the South Korean Kospi closed a meagre 0.08 percent up at 1,662.24 points.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng too shut shop at 21,208.29 points. Chinese Shanghai composite index, however, closed 0.66 percent down at 3,048.93 points.

‘If you look at Indian geography, we are basically a summer-dominated country. Eighty percent of the country witnesses hot weather and even if north India witnesses winter, it lasts for not more than two months,’ Pradeep Hirani, owner of Mumbai retail outlet Kimaya, told IANS.

‘So it is a good shift. Orders are small, production won’t take much time and as a result retail outlets will get new designs every three months, which is a very good thing, keeping in mind how fashion forward today’s consumer is,’ he added.

So this year, keeping the domestic market in mind, LFW organisers had taken a collective decision to present a spring-resort collection instead of an autumn-winter one during the five-day fashion event from March 5 to 9.

At fashion shows the world over, an autumn-winter collection is presented early in the year and a spring-summer edition in the latter part.

But Hirani feels the Indian fashion market is so huge and so creative that it need not follow the international fashion week formula.

‘In the West, they have extreme summer and extreme winter. We don’t have that here; so what is the point of following their standards?’ he asked.

‘We don’t have to go by international fashion weeks because our fashion caters to the domestic market and that is where designers make business. This is the time to show our attitude and our identity,’ he said.

Designer Digvijay Singh agreed and said: ‘You know what I feel? I feel that we don’t need tags like spring-summer or autumn-winter. It’s because Indian sensibilities are different from the West. We dress in a complete different way. So this strategic shift works for me.’

Even Middle East-based buyer Khaled Mekkawi feels the strategic shift is good for business because nowadays designers are so capable that they deliver apparel at two months’ notice.

‘Due to global meltdown, competition has increased; so designers are now capable of delivering in just two months. So this shift is great for us because back home we have very hot weather and the collection will hit the stores bang on time,’ Mekkawi, who retails from store K & MAK, told IANS.

Mekkawi, who has been participating in LFW for over two seasons, likes to place orders with young and budding designers as he feels they have creativity and talent in abundance.

This year he has collaborated with Anupama Dayal and TV actress Neena Gupta’s daughter Masaba.

As Alka Nishar, founder of Aza, a retail-chain outlet, puts it: ‘Any experiments are welcome.

‘See the thing is that unless and until you experiment, you don’t know what will be the outcome. So it’s always a good idea to experiment and be prepared for the outcome,’ said Nisar, also a buyer.

This year the Bollywood quotient at LFW was low compared to previous years, making it a more design-focused event.

Among the designers who participated were Manish Malhotra, Narendra Kumar, Malini Ramani, Rocky, Sabyasachi Mukherjee, Satya Paul, Shantanu and Nikhil, Suneet Varma and Vikram Phadnis.

Anand Bhushan, Anand Kabra, Digvijay Singh, Lecoanet-Hemant, Nachiket Barve, Payal Singhal, Pooja Kapoor, Vipin Batra also showcased their collections at LFW.

In all, no one is complaining about the seasonal shift, but its effect will be seen in the next season.

The 30-share BSE index provisionally ended up 231.91 points at 17,396.90, with 23 components gaining.

The 50-share NSE index provisionally closed up 1.4 percent at 5,202.05 points.

(Reporting by Ami Shah; Editing by Aradhana Aravindan)

(For more business news on Reuters Money visit http://www.reutersmoney.in)

At 3:05 p.m. (0935 GMT), the 30-share BSE index was up 1.01 percent at 17,338.90, with 24 components advancing.

Energy giant Reliance Industries, which has the highest weight on the index, was up 3.7 percent to 1,065.55 rupees, on improving outlook, analysts said.

The 50-share NSE index was up 1.2 percent at 5,188.95.

(Reporting by Ami Shah)

(For more business news on Reuters Money visit http://www.reutersmoney.in)

The Federal Reserve is expected to leave benchmark rates near zero given lingering labour market weakness and nagging doubts about the solidity of the economic recovery. The outcome of the meeting is due at 1815 GMT.

“Given the market’s reaction to the surprise cut in the discount rate, we suspect that the FOMC will be cautious in their language,” said Mitul Kotecha, head of global FX strategy at Credit Agricole, referring to the policy setting arm of the Fed — the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).

“Policy will remain unchanged and we expect the majority of the FOMC to remain comfortable with the notion that rates will stay low for an ‘extended period’.”

Leaving out ‘extended period’ in the statement would likely cause U.S. Treasury yields to rise but may boost the dollar as it would be seen by the market as a further step towards normalising ultra-loose monetary policy, analysts said.

MSCI’s all-country world index rose 0.3 percent, with the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 gaining 0.7 percent. Japan’s Nikkei closed 0.3 percent lower as the market took a breather after having risen to a seven-week high in the previous session.

The Fed’s decision comes as investors braced for China to further tighten policy following a recent raft of strong economic data and inflation at a 16-month high in February.

This has been keeping equity investors cautious.

The Bank of Japan, which will announce the outcome of its meeting on Wednesday, is leaning towards easing monetary policy again, under pressure from a government calling for action to beat deflation, sources said, but the board is split on how to justify the move.

EURO OUTLOOK HINGES ON GREECE

In the forex market, the dollar index, a gauge of its performance against six other currencies, slipped 0.1 percent to 80.18, but was still some way off a three-week low of 79.692 set set on Friday.

“No one seriously expects much change in the Fed’s language, but the market thinks that if there is a risk it will be that they are more upbeat, which would benefit the dollar,” said Jeremy Stretch, currency strategist at Rabobank in London.

The euro also struggled and was little changed against the dollar and yen at $1.3677 123.84 yen.

Analysts said a rescue plan for Greece outlined by euro zone finance minsters on Monday lacked detail and was unlikely to provide the euro with firm support for now.

“Only a complete plan, which defines not just the aid payments but also the conditions it is linked to, the control mechanisms and the sanctions to be taken in case the conditions are breached, would have the potential of causing a sustainable correction in euro/dollar,” said Commerzbank forex analysts in a note.

Finance ministers from the 16-country euro zone agreed on Monday to mobilise financial aid for Greece rapidly if needed but revealed little of how their standby plan for the debt-stricken nation would work.

With stocks rising, demand for lower risk government debt eased, driving yields higher. The benchmark U.S. 10-year note yield climbed 1.1 basis points to 3.71 percent, while the euro zone benchmark German Bund yield edged up one basis point to 3.165 percent.

U.S. crude futures slipped 0.3 percent to $79.54 a barrel, still shaky after falling 1.8 percent to the lowest close in two weeks on Monday.

Spot gold rose to around $1,113 an ounce, up more than $4 from New York’s notional close, while copper prices gained one percent to $7,371 a tonne.

“We think the EU has got the judgement wrong,” Treasury Chief Secretary Liam Byrne told BBC radio.

“We think the plan that they’ve set out would require us to take something like 20 billion pounds ($30 billion) more out of the economy by 2014-15 and we think that would do irreparable damage to public services or to taxpayers.”

Byrne was responding to a draft from the EU executive obtained by Reuters which said Britain’s fiscal programme failed to guarantee it would meet an EU deadline of 2014-15 for cutting the deficit to below the bloc’s cap of 3 percent of economic output.

Cutting Britain’s record budget deficit will be a crucial issue in the upcoming election expected in May, with the ruling Labour government trailing the opposition Conservatives in opinion polls.

Britain’s plan envisages cutting the gap to 4.7 percent of gross domestic product in the fiscal year 2014-15 from 12.1 percent planned for 2010-2011. That means it will fail to meet a deadline given by EU finance ministers late last year.

Ruling Labour, in power since 1997, wants to put off cuts until a fragile economic recovery is assured.

The government is expected to detail further plans to deal with the deficit in a budget on March 24.

The Conservatives, whose lead in the polls has slipped in recent weeks, seized on the EU report. They have promised to take quicker action on tackling the deficit than either the Labour government or the Liberal Democrat party and have warned that Britain’s triple-A credit rating was under threat because of government profligacy.

“What has to be done now is to get this debt rapidly under control and get the bulk of the structural deficit, get rid of it during the next parliament and I also think one needs to start now,” said Conservative business spokesman Ken Clarke.

“It’s necessary to get rid of the structural deficit because if you don’t so that interest rates will go up, we won’t have any economic recovery, you will have rising unemployment,” he told the same radio programme.

Byrne said such spending cuts would be a disaster for public services.

“You would have to take 20 billion pounds of public spending out by 2014-15, that’s about half the education budget. We think that halving the deficit over four years is the right approach,” he said.

“We think that is not reckless. It’s not painless either.”

(Reporting by Michael Holden and Kylie MacLellan; Editing by Susan Fenton)

In a filing on Monday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York, the sons said they ranked among the “numerous victims of their father’s terrible crimes”.

On Dec. 10, 2008, Bernard Madoff confessed to his sons about a Ponzi scheme “of epic proportions”. Mark and Andrew contacted federal authorities within hours of learning of their father’s betrayal of their trust, the filing said.

The Plaintiff, Securities Investor Protection Corp (SIPC), sued the sons seeking damages, including their duly earned compensation for running the market making and trading businesses, Andrew and Mark said in the filing.

“Long on rhetoric, but short on legal or factual support, this is a case that as a matter of fairness never should have been brought, and as a matter of law should be dismissed,” the sons said in the filing.

In separate filings, niece Shana Madoff and brother Peter Madoff also sought dismissal of all complaints against them, with prejudice.

Peter Madoff will move before Judge Burton Lifland, for an order dismissing the Trustee’s complaint in its entirety, a filing said.

The lawsuit against Peter, sons Mark and Andrew and niece Shana, is a civil action and none of the family members has been criminally charged.

When pleading guilty in March 2009, Madoff said he acted alone. His long-time deputy Frank DiPascali admitted in August to working with others, whom he did not identify, in perpetrating the decades-long fraud.

The festival of ‘Nav Samvatsar’ is celebrated as the birth of Mother Earth and devotees gather in large numbers on the bank to participate in holy rituals.

Young Brahmin boys, also known as ‘Vedpathis’, sing Vedic hymns and perform Surya Namaskara on the first day of the festival.

“Nav Samvatsar has great significance in our Indian culture and Hindu religion. On the first day of this festival we pray that god blesses us with peace and prosperity throughout the year. We just hope and pray for a happy year ahead,” said D K Thakur, Deputy Inspector General of Police of Varanasi.

After the initial prayers, devotees thronged the riverbanks for a dip in Ganga to cleanse their souls.

The astrologers revealed the Hindu calendar, which is prepared according to the planetary motion, on this day.

“This Nav Samvatsar is dedicated to the nature and is celebrated as the new year of the Mother Earth. I extend my heartiest wishes on this occasion,” said Atul Tandon, an astrologer.

The Hindu calendar also has 12 months like its Roman counterpart and most of the months are named after various seasons and astrological signs. (ANI)

The current presidential term in Africa’s most populous nation ends in May 2011 and elections are due by April next year under the present system. But a reform bill before parliament could bring the polls forward to as early as November this year.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will announce the timetables at a joint presentation with Acting President Goodluck Jonathan, a source in the presidency said.

“The Acting President will be at the event to assure Nigerians of government’s commitment to ensuring free and fair elections,” the source told Reuters, asking not to be named.

Maurice Iwu, the head of INEC, told local television that the commission planned to announce two timetables.

Jonathan took over executive powers a month ago in the absence of ailing President Umaru Yar’Adua, who has since returned from three months in a Saudi hospital but remains too sick to govern the OPEC member nation of 140 million people.

Jonathan’s takeover as acting leader ended immediate concerns about stagnation in government business but did not resolve the broader issue of who the country’s next president will be, a decision which will determine whether economic and political reforms accelerate or stagnate.

Nigeria’s political kingpins are jockeying for influence over who the ruling PDP party’s presidential nominee should be and some say an early election would draw the uncertainty to a faster close.

Parliament is considering electoral reforms including a suggestion made by former Chief Justice Muhammadu Uwais that elections should take place at least six months before the presidential term expires, allowing time to settle any legal challenges before the new president is sworn in.

The aim is to avoid the sorts of legal battles that dogged the first half of Yar’Adua’s term and undermined his authority.

e full body scanners made their debut at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport on Monday and the two Islamic groups claim the technology is too invasive.

The Fiqh Council of North America, a body of Islamic scholars located in Plainfield, Indiana, said the screening imagery is a violation of Islam.

Last month the council issued a statement that said the full body imagery “is against the teachings of Islam, natural law, and all religions and cultures that stand for decency and modesty.”

“It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women,” the statement continued. “There must be a compelling case for the necessity and the exemption to this rule must be proportional to the demonstrated need.”

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Washington-based civil rights advocacy group, agreed.

Its Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper said CAIR plans to track Muslims concerns with the scanners before deciding what actions to take next.

“Modesty is a basic principal of the Islamic faith, it’s very important and always has been. People say, ‘I’ll do anything for safety,’ but that’s not the question. Everybody wants to be safe. Muslims fly like anybody else … you can be safe and secure and still maintain your privacy rights,” Hooper said.

The number of full-body scanners at US airports is to triple in 2010, reports the Christian Science Monitor (CSM).

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has deployed 150 scanners across 21 US airports this month, partly in response to the failed Christmas Day bombing of a Detroit-bound jetliner, where bomb-making materials were hidden in a passenger’s underwear – something full-body scanners would have seen.

The TSA expects to install an additional 300 scanners in nine additional airports by the end of this year.

But security officials say they will be able to accommodate the wishes of passengers – Muslim or otherwise – who object to the full-body screener.

The technology is “completely optional for all passengers,” says Jim Fotenos, a TSA spokesman, and those who choose not to participate get “an equal level of screening,” which includes a walk through a metal detector and a physical pat-down by an officer of the same sex.

To stress the anonymity of the process, the TSA says officers review the images in a remote location and never see the actual passengers. What they do see via their monitors is automatically deleted from the system once the passenger passes review.

The Fiqh Council, however, is urging followers to request pat-down searches as an alternative.

CAIR’s Mr. Hooper also advocates an increase in federal funding for alternate screening technologies that do not require visual screening, such as the “Puffer,” a machine that can identify chemical particles a person may have on their body and analyze whether or not they are harmful. (ANI)

The council, led by the country’s interim leader Voreqe Bainimarama met early today as cyclone Tomas, a category four hurricane, continued to batter the country.

At least 10,000 people were evacuated from the northern and eastern islands, and a number of people were killed.

One woman drowned in rough seas off the island of Vanua Levu as the cyclone approached on Sunday.

National Disaster Management Office operations officer Anthony Blake said: “We have so far got a tally of over 50 homes destroyed – a very serious issue. We expect these figures to increase for the next few days.” (ANI)

The attacks, claimed by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) militant group, are a major setback for Acting President Goodluck Jonathan as his government also tries to calm ethnic tensions in the centre of the country.

Jonathan has made reviving an amnesty programme and restoring peace in the Niger Delta, the heartland of Africa’s biggest oil and gas industry, a top priority since he took over as acting leader in the absence of the nation’s sick president.

MEND said the explosions were meant to “announce our continued presence” and warned of renewed attacks against the oil industry in the coming days, threatening firms such as French energy giant Total which have so far largely avoided significant strikes on their infrastructure.

“It is quite a statement,” said Antony Goldman, a Nigeria expert and head of London-based PM Consulting.

“Apparently with timed devices, they have sabotaged not just some lonely, impossible-to-guard pipeline, but an official government building on a relatively high-profile occasion.”

The first vehicle exploded on an expressway several hundred metres from Delta State Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan’s compound, the second at the gates of the building. Witnesses said around six passers-by were wounded. There were no reports of deaths.

Several hundred police officers and soldiers in armoured vehicles cordoned off Government House as cars burned on the expressway outside. Security was also tightened around the nearby offices of U.S. energy giant Chevron.

Officials from states around the Niger Delta were meeting in Warri to discuss implementing the terms of an amnesty programme launched last year by President Umaru Yar’Adua, under which thousands of gunmen agreed to lay down their weapons.

The programme was the most concerted effort yet to end years of unrest which have prevented the OPEC member from producing much above two-thirds of its 3 million barrels per day (bpd) oil capacity, costing it around $1 billion a month in lost revenue.

But the amnesty started to stall after Yar’Adua left for three months of medical treatment in Saudi Arabia last November. He returned to Nigeria last month but remains too sick to govern and the programme has made little concrete progress.

Monday’s attacks did not immediately affect oil prices.

THREAT OF FURTHER ATTACKS

The governors of Edo and Abia states, along with representatives from Cross Rivers state and other officials had been meeting with Uduaghan when the attacks took place to discuss amnesty pledges including development for the region and stipends and re-training for ex-militants.

“There was a huge explosion … Every one of us started running helter skelter,” said one state government official shortly after the first blast, asking not to be named.

Government delegations from two of the main oil-producing states — Bayelsa and Rivers — were approaching the venue at the time of the attack but turned back, witnesses said.

MEND said in a statement it planted three explosive devices which would be detonated remotely in response to comments from Uduaghan in the local media that MEND was “a media creation”.

“The deceit of endless dialogue and conferences will no longer be tolerated. The lands of the people of the Niger Delta were stolen by the oil companies and northern Nigeria with the stroke of a pen,” MEND said in its emailed statement.

“In the coming days we will carry out a number of attacks against installations and oil companies across the Niger Delta and will spread out to companies such as Total which have been spared in the past,” it said.

Activists said there had been complaints for months that an amnesty committee led by Defence Minister Godwin Abbe was not involving local communities and ex-militants closely enough and that Monday’s meeting had only been for government officials.

“They are not doing things at the right place and the right time. Programmes are very delayed,” said Jonjon Oyeinfe, ex-leader of the Ijaw Youth Council ethnic rights group who has been involved in negotiations with government for years.

“What people need now is how the programme can be implemented on a practical level, not people sitting together jaw-jawing (talking) — what else do they want to discuss?”

(Additional reporting Austin Ekeinde in Port Harcourt, Yinka Ibukun and Tume Ahemba in Lagos, Felix Onuah in Abuja; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Dominic Evans)

In the study, researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill showed that obese mice were not able to develop protective influenza-specific memory T cells.

These cells are generated by the body during an initial influenza infection. They help protect against a second infection by targeting internal proteins common among most strains of influenza viruses.

Leaner mice were able to develop the infection-fighting T cells and ward off a second bout of influenza.

“Our work suggests that obese people should be considered at high risk for infection,” said Erik Karlsson, doctoral candidate in nutrition and lead author of the study.

The researchers infected lean and obese mice with a mild influenza virus. The lean mice had been fed a low-fat diet, and obese mice had been fed a high-fat diet. When the mice recovered from the first bout of flu, they were infected a second time, with a larger dose of a more lethal influenza strain.

“We lost none of the lean mice, but 25 percent of obese mice died,” Karlsson said.

Rao, who is on a six-day official visit to Washington, addressed the meeting of USA-India High Technology Cooperation Group (HTCG) meeting, hosted by the US Chamber of Commerce.

“The implementation of civil nuclear deal is proceeding smoothly and satisfactorily that is first point I would like to make and as far the introduction of civil nuclear liability bill in Parliament is concerned it is ready for introduction and in all likelihood it will be introduced after recess,” said Rao.

She also cautioned the international community that integration process in Afghanistan should only include the forces (Taliban) that have abandoned the path of violence and abide by the values of democracy.

“We believe that any integration process should include only those who abjure violence, give up arm struggle, terrorism and are willing to abide by the values of democracy, pluralism and human rights,” she said.

“There is every risk otherwise that Taliban would resurrect themselves as they have in the past when we think that they have been defeated or we are rid-off their hardcore elements,” added Rao,” she added.

Seven Indians, including three Army officers, were killed and nine injured in the attack in Afghanistan on February 26. (ANI)

‘Despite the provocations we have faced constantly from terrorists whose linkages we have traced back to Pakistani soil, we have not abandoned the path of dialogue,’ Rao said in an address Monday at the Woodrow Wilson Centre, a renowned Washington think tank.

Rao said that like the US administration, ‘India, too, is concerned at the terror infrastructure that has been allowed to be established, take root and be used as an instrument of state policy in our immediate neighbourhood’.

‘Our heartland, our cities and our people are exposed to the threat of terrorism in a constant and almost unremitting way in a manner the US well understands, given the similar threats directed against the American people,’ she said.

Rao added that India was in the process of operationalising the India-US civil nuclear deal and stressed that New Delhi sees its case for permanent membership of the Security Council as ‘valid and legitimate’.

India will also not scale down operations in Afghanistan despite terror attacks on its intetests, she said. ‘We feel it is vital for the international community to stay the course in Afghanistan.’

But Rao focussed on terror threats from Pakistan, a US ally.

India’s approach has been to deal with terrorism with restraint, she said. ‘However, our restraint should not be confused with weakness or unwillingness to act against those that seek to harm our people, create insecurity, and hamper our developmental goals.

‘We are a strong country and we possess the capacity to deal effectively with those that pursue destructive agendas against India and its people.

‘We have, time and again, made genuine attempts to address outstanding issues, most importantly, the issue of terrorism through dialogue with Pakistan,’ she said, referring to her meeting in New Delhi with Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir of Pakistan.

‘But it continues to be our conviction that for this dialogue to really make progress, Pakistan should take meaningful steps to address our concerns on terrorism, and cease the encouragement of terrorism targeted against India.’

Referring to US military aid to Pakistan, Rao said it is ‘important that there are strict accountability criteria that apply to defence assistance rendered to Pakistan for operations against terrorists and insurgents on the border with Afghanistan’.

Indian officials say that Islamabad has in the past used American military assistance against India.

Rao described the India-US nuclear deal as ‘a major definitive milestone in Indo-US relationship’. ‘We are in the process of operationalising the agreement through close coordination between our two governments.’

The civil nuclear liability bill is ready for introduction, and in all likelihood it would be introduced after the parliament recess, she said.

The bill was to be introduced in the Lok Sabha Monday but the government withdrew it at the eleventh hour in the face of stiff opposition from the opposition.

Seeking US support for India’s membership of the UN Security Council, she said: ‘Both our governments are agreed that the new global realities require that we revisit and reorganize existing governance models which were put in place over six decades ago.

‘We see our case for permanent membership of the Security Council as valid and legitimate. We seek the support of the US in this endeavour.’

Rao said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would participate in the Nuclear Security Summit to be hosted by Obama next month. ‘We believe the summit can be milestone in addressing the threat of nuclear terrorism.’

On Afghanistan, she said: ‘The deteriorating situation is one of the foremost security related challenges faced by our region. We feel it is vital for the international community to stay the course in Afghanistan.’

Referring to the latest attacks on Indians in Kabul Feb 26, she said: ‘The international community should understand that such attempts, if unchecked, will only embolden the forces that held sway in Afghanistan in the 1990s and caused the tragedy of 9/11.’

‘We are not scaling down our operations in Afghanistan, we are taking all necessary security measures to safeguard Indian lives there,’ she added.

The scanner, which sees through a person’s clothing to reveal explosives or weapons, was installed at the airport’s Terminal one. It resembles two blue telephone booths standing side-by-side.

Transportation Security Administration (TSA) Director at O’Hare Kathleen Petrowsky said she anticipates the body scans — currently optional for passengers — will become mandatory soon.

Passengers who refuse to go through these scanners on grounds that they are an invasion of privacy have the option to submit to a physical pat-down by a TSA officer using a metal detector.

City officials said they expect more body-imaging technology to be installed at O’Hare later this year.

So far, 21 airports across the country have been equipped with the units and nine more are slated to receive the scanners soon.

TSA plans to deploy a total of 450 body scanners across US airports this year, after the failed December 25 attempt last year to blow up a Detroit-bound flight by an al-Qaeda-trained Nigerian bomber who had hidden explosives in his underwear.

Despite the provocations we have faced constantly from terrorists whose linkages we have traced back to Pakistani soil, we have not abandoned the path of dialogue,’ Rao said in an address Monday at the Woodrow Wilson Centre, a renowned Washington think tank.

Prefacing her remarks about Pakistan in more general terms Rao said like the US administration, ‘India, too, is concerned at the terror infrastructure that has been allowed to be established, take root and be used as an instrument of state policy in our immediate neighbourhood.’

‘Our heartland, our cities and our people, are exposed to the threat of terrorism in a constant and almost unremitting way in a manner that the United States well understands, given the similar threats that are directed against the American people,’ she said.

India’s approach has been to deal with the challenge of terrorism with restraint, Rao said. ‘However, our restraint should not be confused with weakness or unwillingness to act against those that seek to harm our people, create insecurity, and hamper our developmental goals,’ she said.

‘We are a strong country and we possess the capacity to deal effectively with those that pursue destructive agendas against India and its people,’ Rao warned.

‘Despite the brazen and malignant nature of the threats we face, India has made several genuine efforts to restore trust and confidence,’ she said.

‘We have, time and again, made genuine attempts to address outstanding issues, most importantly, the issue of terrorism through dialogue with Pakistan,’ Rao said referring to her recent meeting with Pakistan Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir as the latest such move.

At this meeting ‘India’s approach was to focus on our concerns regarding terrorism, pending humanitarian issues, and some bilateral visits that have been planned or spoken of, but have not taken place,’ she said.

‘But it continues to be our conviction that for this dialogue to really make progress, Pakistan should take meaningful steps to address our concerns on terrorism, and cease the encouragement of terrorism targeted against India.’

Recalling that India had resumed its Composite Dialogue with Islamabad after the then Pakistani leadership made such an assurance in January 2004, Rao noted: ‘Today, Pakistan claims that it is in no position to give us such a guarantee that terrorism can be controlled by its authorities.’

‘In such a situation, the people of India who are already bitterly affected by the series of terrorist attacks directed against them, can hardly be expected to support the resumption of a full-blown Composite Dialogue with Pakistan,’ she said.

Referring to US military aid to Pakistan Rao said, it is ‘also important that there are strict accountability criteria that apply to defence assistance rendered to Pakistan for operations against terrorists and insurgents on the border with Afghanistan’.

India’s past experience regarding such assistance has taught it to be vigilant to the possibility of it being used for purposes that generate tension and hostile actions against India, she said.

India does ‘not have aggressive designs against Pakistan and we want it to be a stable and prosperous country,’ Rao said. ‘But we will be vigilant about our security. That is our sovereign right,’ she asserted.

Finance ministers from the 16-country euro zone announced late on Monday they had agreed the “technical modalities” that would permit aid to be rapidly rolled out but gave no figures and few details of a plan likely to involve bilateral loans.

Before they reconvened on Tuesday with the other ministers from the 27-country European Union, Spanish Finance Minister Elena Salgado reiterated that Athens did not need help for now.

Her Swedish colleague, a critic of Greece, said things were looking up after Athens announced extra austerity measures to cut a bloated public deficit and tame a national debt that is bigger than the country’s entire gross domestic product.

“We have a situation which is much better than one month ago,” said Swedish Finance Minister Anders Borg, who earlier this year said that Greece’s statistical reporting on public finances was “basically fraudulent”.

Initial financial market reaction was muted, with no dramatic change in the euro exchange rate or bond yields, both of which have been buffeted by fears about Greece’s ability to honour its debts and what this would mean for the monetary union more broadly.

Euro zone help for Greece could take the form of bilateral aid but loan guarantees were ruled out by ministers, said Jean-Claude Juncker, the Luxembourg prime minister who chaired Monday’s talks.

A statement published by the euro zone ministers provided no figures. It commended Greece’s recently redoubled efforts to repair its public finances and said the rest of the Eurogroup club of common currency countries stood ready to help.

“It (the Eurogroup club of finance ministers) clarified the technical modalities enabling a decision on coordinated action and which could be activated swiftly in the case of need,” the statement said.

“The objective would not be to provide financing at average euro zone interest rates, but to safeguard financial stability in the euro area as a whole.”

EXTRA AUSTERITY MEASURES

Greece this month unveiled extra austerity measures to knock its deficit from 12.7 to 8.7 percent of gross domestic product this year, including cuts in public sector pay and tax hikes. A poll on Sunday showed most Greeks saw this as a good step.

The measures and the euro zone’s verbal backing have helped ease the premium Greece must offer over benchmark German bonds as it seeks to refinance some 20 billion euros ($27.5 billion) in debt that it has to roll over in April and May.

But the so-called spread, or debt financing premium, remains unsustainable, analysts say. Policymakers are also looking at what could be done to insulate Athens against market turbulence and a risk of default that has hurt the euro.

On Tuesday morning, the price investors demand to hold Greek debt instead of German benchmark bonds narrowed somewhat, coming in 12 basis points in early trading, but remained close to 300 basis points, or three percent, above German Bund yields.

Juncker said EU leaders would have the last word on any aid if it came to that. Belgian Finance Minister Didier Reynders suggested options were still far from set in stone.

“It could be guarantees, or loans, we will see,” Reynders told reporters. “It will be on a voluntary basis.”

Austrian Finance Minister Josef Proell said on Monday that the talks did not focus on how much money to have on standby.

Dutch Finance Minister Jan Kees De Jager said any help would be tied to tough conditions of the kind that the International Monetary Fund applies when rescuing countries in trouble.

“If we talk about measures, for example about loans, they will follow the same kind of methodology as the IMF,” he said.

Germany, Europe’s biggest economy and the country that would be the linchpin of any support, is reluctant to bail out Greece and above all to rush into anything before Athens shows it is willing to take the painful steps needed to fix its finances.

European Central Bank Executive Board member Lorenzo Bini Smaghi was quoted on Tuesday as saying “constructive ambiguity” could be useful to ratchet up pressure on troubled countries or institutions to take necessary steps.

Writing in the Financial Times, he said authorities should be ready for a bail out as a last resort to prevent worse problems developing.

(With reporting by Jan Strupczewski, Marcin Grajewski and John O’Donnell; Writing by Brian Love; editing by Stephen Nisbet)

Charlotte Adams, 25, told of her four-month ordeal waiting to hear if she and pal Ayman Najafi, 24, will be imprisoned for breaking strict modesty laws.

“It has been difficult. But now we just want to focus on the case,” the Sun quoted the estate agent as saying.

“Everyone back home has been very supportive and understanding,” she added.

Tourist Charlotte and Ayman, both of North London, were arrested after being spotted kissing in a restaurant.

They are on bail after appealing against a month’s jail sentence. They will learn their fate in three weeks. (ANI)

Lundberg, 24, who lost his sight when he was struck by a rocket-propelled grenade while serving in Basra in 2007, can read words, identify shapes and walk unaided thanks to the BrainPort device.

A resident of Walton, Liverpool, he now plays blind football for England.

Life could have been bleak and dismal for Lundberg but everything changed when the Ministry of Defence (MoD) chose him to be the first person to try the BrainPort.

The BrainPort changes visual images into a sequence of electrical pulses, which are sent to the tongue. The varying strength of the tingles can be read or interpreted helping the user to mentally visualise their surroundings and navigate around objects.

The device comprises a tiny video camera attached to a pair of sunglasses linked to a plastic “lolly pop” which the user places on their tongue to decipher the electrical pulses.

“It feels like licking a nine volt battery or like popping candy,” the Independent quoted Lundberg, as saying.

He went on: “The camera sends signals down onto the lolly pop and onto your tongue. You can then determine what they mean and transfer it to shapes.

“You get lines and shapes of things. It sees in black and white so you get a two-dimensional image on your tongue – it’s a bit like a pins and needles sensation.

“It’s only a prototype, but the potential to change my life is massive. It’s got a lot of potential to advance things for blind people.

“One of the things it has enabled me to do is pick up objects straight away. I can reach out and pick them up when before I would be fumbling around to feel for them.

“There is no way I’m getting rid of my guide dog Hugo, though – I love him.

“This is another mobility device, it’s not the be-all and end-all of my disability.”

Unveiling the BrainPort at the MoD headquarters in Whitehall, US Major General Gale Pollock, who worked on the scheme, said: “It’s just so exciting to finally be able to say to people: here is a tool that may help you and start to restore hope to the visually impaired community. It’s just wonderful.”

Group Captain Rob Scott, who is Lundberg’s eye doctor, said: “It is certainly a device with absolutely huge potential.

“The BrainPort is a device that effectively lets blind people see through their tongue. What it uses is electro-tactile stimulation as a sensory substitution for vision.

“It allows an image of their surroundings to be experienced and helps find your way about a place. It is designed to help orientation in an unfamiliar environment.” (ANI)

An expression combining thrill and panic spreads on the heroine’s face, the will-he-make-it-won’t-he excitement plain on her face. The train is, of course, the last one for the day and naturally the journey is important and urgent.

Oh look! He may just make it, here he comes, throws suitcases on but the train’s picking up speed but there he jumps, oh! I can’t bear to look. They made it. I didn’t think it was ever possible but the crowd of deviant people I was travelling with did finally get on to the night train from Amsterdam to Munich, all intact with baggage. Though we couldn’t bear to look at each other for a bit afterwards.

Train journeys are exciting, to say the least. Group journeys are even more so. Take seven people who have just about nothing in common except a love for travel and food, take one week and six cities, add trains that leave sharp on time and mix it with a really early morning start each day.

This is the perfect recipe for excitement of the sort that can transfer you to an ambulance for a journey of quite another kind. And, being the daredevil traveller that I am, this is just the sort of journey I found myself on about two months ago.

Having reached Amsterdam the previous day, we tried to pack in Utrecht, a lovely Uni town, before leaving for Munich by the night train. We were all set. Reach Utrecht at 10, explore the ancient city centre, grab lunch, shop for a bit, return by 3p.m. train and catch the 8p.m. to Munich.

We left our suitcases at the Movenpick hotel in Amsterdam, thinking there will be enough time to return to the hotel, barely 10 minutes from the station, before catching the Munich train. Here is a suggestion when travelling in a group: assume the worst. At 3p.m. in Utrecht, only three people made the set meeting place. And the rest is at the beginning.

But let me go back to the real beginning. We were a bunch of people doing that definitive journey: travelling across Europe on train. The cheapest, cheesiest, most scenic way of seeing this beautiful part of the world, it’s really a must for those who love travelling by train and are keen on historical cities.

The Eurail Global Pass was our ticket to this wonderland, with which we could travel up to 21 countries, but we decided that in one week we could do a maximum of six, if we wanted to live to tell the tale. We took Swiss Air to Amsterdam, ignoring Zurich on the way, as the plan was to end the tour in Switzerland.

It was my first time in all these cities and hence when I landed in Amsterdam, I was filled the happiness that comes with the joy of discovering new places. Our place for the night was the fairly new Movenpick hotel, which is a stylish, comfortable place, very near the railway station. Since we had only a day in each city, we wanted to set out as early as possible.

We decided to lunch on pancakes, somewhere near the heart of the city. The way to travel in Amsterdam is to either bike it or tram it, so naturally, not wanting to exert ourselves too much, we hopped on the tram to get to Dam Square. If you want the buzz of Amsterdam, in the day time at any rate, this is where you should come, and stay.

Packed with fashionable people, busy shops, cycling youngsters, clicking tourists, Dam Square is the kind of hub you can spend entire days at. David and Goliath (www.davidengoliath.nl) was our choice for pancakes and it turned out to be one of those (rare) good ones. Two months on, I still remember that bacon pancake longingly.

A cheerfully decorated cafe, there are many vegetarian options on the menu. A huge pancake, the size of a pizza, and a cup of frothy coffee later, I was ready to take on the world, let alone a canal.

Maybe it’s just me. I have never seen the point of going slowly through unchanging scenery for many hours. The backwaters cruise of Kerala, for instance, or the canal ride in Amsterdam makes even an essentially slothful person like me to want to do something.

An hour of the must-do canal ride and we were ready to throw the driver off and zoom past the gloomy brown buildings. The canal adds charm to the city, my suggestion is that you look at it and take in the scenery from dry land. We rushed back to the square. Dinner was back at the hotel, where seeing an Indian group, the chef and waiter assumed we were vegetarian.

They hid the meat and took out the carrots to impress us, only to be thrown by my insistence on eating animals. Recovering swiftly though, the charming waiter quickly slipped a grilled sea bass on top of my risotto and everything was delicious again.

This dinner was to linger in my thoughts while partaking of a much duller dinner on the train to Munich. Train food is not great anywhere but somehow the overall luxury of the European trains had raised my expectation.

The Global Pass adult ticket is a First Class ticket and you get used to better standards by day two. To make things worse, we reached Munich around midnight and parked ourselves at the rather ordinary Conrad de Ville.

Life picked up again at Marienplatz in Munich, where we spent the entire next day, eating bratwurst off carts and walking in and out of shops. I sat for hours listening to buskers and watching people go by on a lovely sunny day, while some people made better use of the day by taking the hop-on hop-off tour that took you around the charming castles and parks that surround this city.

In between all this the ugly word Vegetarian was brought up again. I was taken to Prinz Myshkin (www.prinzmyshkin.com), while being promised great and wonderful things and then just at the door someone quickly said it was fully vegetarian.

I would have run away immediately to my hot dog vendor, had I not caught glimpse of the smart decor. As it turned out, this is a hip, classy restaurant with an exhaustive menu and, wonders never cease, the veg stuff here is absolutely fantastic.

They even have Indian options under the section Indian Dreams, which includes an Ayurveda Thali, but then three weeks of hunger wouldn’t make me try that even in India. Another great option to eat is Ratskeller (www.ratskeller.com), a buzzy tavern sort of place right on Marienplatz, where you can try typical German specialities and some great wines.

Our next destination, Frankfurt, was all about high-rises and high winds. Clutching firmly to our jackets and holding down the frail boy who was travelling with us, we rushed through the city to somewhere warmer: the house of Goethe. Whether you are a fan or not, this is a charming, old world house with spiral staircases, wooden libraries and gardens with spooky creepers. Preserved as a museum, there is a shop outside where I added to my bookmark collection.

Every Thursday there is a streetfood market in the city, where you can have (more sausages), pancakes, crepes, cakes and many more sinfully delicious things. Just the thought makes me sigh satisfactorily.

Early, of course, next day, we were to change two trains and reach the most exotic of our cities, Luxembourg. On the way, for only the third or fourth time in the history of Luxembourg rail, the train broke down. Just my luck. The number of first time ever disasters that have happened to me are positively morbid. I even bring rain to deserts.

Also, this was disastrous for our packed plan and meant changing another train and fewer hours in a city we were looking forward to the most.

But the minute you step into the beautiful city of Luxembourg, negative thoughts vanish from your mind. Astonishingly beautiful, full of charming buildings from a time you can only imagine, Luxembourg lived up to our expectation of an exotic city, and how.

Everywhere I turned, frames were ready and posing, buildings quaint, trees green, churches silent and tall, people stylish, it was as this was a model of the perfect world. A postcard town.

Influenced greatly by neighbouring countries, there is a huge chic French stamp all over the city, with a posh city centre and cafes fragrant with baked goodies. To make things perfect, our hotel here was the definitely the best of the entire trip, the charming boutique hotel, Le Chatelet. Dinner was at the stylish Um Dierfgen (www.umdierfgen.lu) where we had local wine and, among other things, a crispy potato and bacon side dish that I shall never forget.

What is a trip across Europe without good food? Reluctantly, at 6 next morning (of course) we left for our last city, Basel in Switzerland. I was returning to Basel after four years and this popular arty city was as charming as I remembered. We spent the day doing the best thing to do in European cities: walk around and eat.

Walking up and down the cobbled slopes of the old city, I reflected on the beauty and comforts of Europe versus the buzz and colours of Asia. One can never pick, I suppose. The only option is to travel everywhere, all the time. Back to the railway station, then.

PLUS SAYS

Stay: Mevenpick, Amsterdam www.moevenpick-hotels.com Hotel Conrad de Ville, Munich www.conrad-hotel.de Hotel Mercure, Frankfurt www.mercure.com Le Chatelet, Luxembourg www.chatelet.lu Hotel Schweizerhof, Basel www.schweizerhof-basel.ch

Eat: Waffles and sausages from roadside vans and carts.

Shop: From clothes to souvenirs, anything that takes your fancy!

See: If we were to pick one: The Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam.

Using Eurail Pass The Global Pass is by far the most popular pass, which enables you to visit a maximum of 21 countries. There are various options on this pass–you can get one for 15 days or two months. You have a set number of journeys, and each one must be noted down in your pass, otherwise you risk a frown from the TC. Check out various exciting options on www.eurail.com

One night free Book three nights for the price of two and get free upgrade to next category room or daily breakfast. Check www.moevenpick-hotels.com

Austrian neurologists suggest Da Vinci was proficient at a technique called “sfumato”, in which layers of paint are added on top of each another to create subtle changes in shading.

In his masterpiece the Mona Lisa, when the eyes are stared at, a smile seems to appear on her lips.

However, if the mouth is focused on, the smile disappears.

Professor Florian Hutzler, a psychology expert at the Centre for Neurocognitive Research in Salzburg, insists that a direct view of the painting makes visible soft layers of shading around the mouth.

It apparently makes the expression appear neutral.

However, in a peripheral vision, the same brush strokes merge to give the impression of a subtle smile.

“In Mona Lisa’s mouth, there is a smile hidden. When you look directly on the mouth, you see the fine details, the smile disappears and there is only a neutral expression,” the Telegraph quoted Hutzler, as saying.

He added: “Mona Lisa changes her expression depending on where you look at her face.”

Professor Stephen Porter, a psychology expert at the University of British Columbia, said the study gives an idea on how people perceive facial expressions.

He said: “The most significant finding of this elegant, brilliant study was that people pick up on, and are influenced by, subtle information from another person’s face at a subliminal level.

“It shows that we quickly analyse faces holistically but are not aware of this process. Our assessments of trustworthiness and attractiveness are affected in powerful ways by very subtle factors.”

In a telephone call, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ordered Netanyahu to reverse a decision to build 1,600 homes for Israeli settlers in occupied East Jerusalem that sparked the diplomatic row.

She also instructed him to issue a formal pledge that peace talks would focus on core issues such as the future of Jerusalem and the borders of a Palestinian state.

In addition, Netanyahu was urged to make a substantial confidence-building gesture to the Palestinians. Clinton suggested this could take the form of prisoner releases, an easing of the blockade of Gaza and the transfer of greater territory in the West Bank to Palestinian control.

The Telegraph quoted Israeli officials as saying that relations with Washington had hit a “35-year low” after a visit by Vice President Joe Biden last week was overshadowed by the announcement.

Washington has warned Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he will remain out of favour unless he accedes to the politically painful demands.

Signalling the depth of America’s displeasure, Michael Oren, Israel’s ambassador to Washington, told colleagues the crisis was one of “historic” proportions.

Not since the Gerald Ford administration had demanded Israel’s partial withdrawal from Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula had ties been so strained, he was quoted as saying.

Oren spoke after being summoned for reprimand at the State Department, which he described as “extremely harsh”.

The Obama administration’s anger towards Israel reflects a growing perception in Washington that Netanyahu is deliberately seeking to scupper the US president’s attempts to resurrect the Middle East peace process.

Israel has consistently refused Palestinian demands for a limited halt to all Jewish construction on land captured during the Six Day War of 1967, although Netanyahu has agreed to slow down building in the West Bank for 10 months.

US anger has been exacerbated by the humiliation and embarrassment suffered by Biden who had expected to announce new talks during his visit last week.

Biden is thought to have been under the impression he had broken the impasse after allegedly securing a private commitment from Netanyahu that no new building would begin in East Jerusalem while talks were under way.

But just hours after he triumphantly heralded a new era of compromise, matters quickly soured when approval was given for the construction of 1,600 new homes in Ramat Shlomo, a Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem.

Netanyahu, who claimed he was unaware that the construction order had been made, apologised for the timing of the announcement and has, at Mrs Clinton’s insistence, ordered an investigation into how it was made. (ANI)

The parties are pressing for all amendments that consecrate the holding of power by a single ruler to be scrapped. They also want laws restricting freedoms to be annulled, along with a decades-old state of emergency that gives the government sweeping powers.

Egypt has been led by President Hosni Mubarak for nearly three decades. A 2005 presidential election was the first to allow multiple candidates, but tough requirements limit who can run.

Monday’s call was made by the Democratic Front Party, the Nasserite Party, the Wafd Party and the Tagammu Party. The next presidential election is in 2011. Mubarak has not said if he’ll run again.

Israel’s nod last week for the construction of 1,600 new settlements for Jews in East Jerusalem angered the United States, particularly since it coincided with a visit by US Vice-President Joe Biden aimed at promoting renewed peace talks with the Palestinians. The issue has led to a diplomatic row leading to the worst crisis in US-Israel ties in the last 35 years.

Last week, Netanyahu had described the construction of 1,600 housing units in the area as “destructive” and an incident that “should not have happened”.

Facing members of his Right-wing ruling Likud party, Netanyahu retracted from Sunday’s position by asserting that Israel would “continue to build in Jerusalem in the same way that it has over the last 42 years”.

Speaking to his cabinet on Sunday, Netanyahu had described the embarrassing incident when the Interior Ministry announced new constructions in East Jerusalem during US Vice-President Joe Biden’s visit as “destructive”, he constituted a committee to look into the fiasco which has strained Israel-US ties.

The Israeli Prime Minister did not specifically address the diplomatic crisis with US over Israel’s announcement that it would construct 1,600 new housing units in East Jerusalem, but political analysts have been predicting a hard time for the hawkish Israeli leader leading an overwhelmingly Right-wing dominated coalition peppered with some extreme elements in his own party.

When asked by lawmaker Tzipi Hotovely as to what would happen in September, when the 10-month settlement freeze in the West Bank ends, Netanyahu responded by saying that construction would continue unabated”.

Egypt arrests Haaretz reporter

JERUSALEM: Egyptian security officials arrested an Israeli journalist as he tried to sneak across the porous Israeli-Egyptian border with African migrants, his newspaper reported on Monday.

The Haaretz newspaper identified the man as one of its reporters, Yotam Feldman, but said he had taken a leave of absence to work on a story for an Israeli TV station.

UN detonates leftover shells

GAZA CITY: United Nations explosives experts have blown up several Israeli white phosphorous shells as they try to rid Gaza of munitions left behind in last year’s war. Kerei Ruru of the U.N. Mine Action Team says his staff has collected 340 unexploded bombs and shells fired during Israel’s three-week offensive in Gaza.

Amid further repercussions from last week’s announcement by Israel of new construction in East Jerusalem, US diplomats said that a visit by Washington’s Mideast envoy George Mitchell to kick off indirect Israeli-Palestinian talks remained uncertain Monday.

Netanyahu, in remarks reported after a meeting of his Likud party faction, would not back off plans for 1,600 new homes in East Jerusalem.

‘Construction in Jerusalem – and anywhere else – will continue as has been the custom during the past 42 years,’ he said according to the Haaretz daily.

‘The cabinet’s decision to end the construction freeze after 10 months remains standing,’ Netanyahu added.

The Israeli premier also said that there was nearly total consensus among the country’s political parties that what were deemed as Jewish neighbourhoods in and around Jerusalem would remain ‘part of the state of Israel’, Haaretz reported.

Netanyahu’s comments came amid concerns about Mitchell arriving to kick off the long-anticipated indirect talks between Israeli and Palestinian officials, who were expecting Mitchell Tuesday.

But Kurt Hoyer, a spokesman for the US embassy in Tel Aviv, said the visit’s details were not finalized by late Monday afternoon. ‘There is no timetable. It’s all up in the air,’ he told DPA.

US State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters in Washington that Mitchell’s travel plans remain ‘fluid’ and would not say whether he will go the region before flying to Moscow for international discussions on the peace process.

‘I expect him in the region soon,’ Crowley said.

Israeli media quoted Israel’s ambassador to Washington, Michael Oren, as calling the US-Israeli crisis the worst in 35 years.

He reportedly made the remark in a conference call with Israeli consuls in the US Saturday night.

US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in an unusually harsh telephone call with Netanyahu last Friday said the action had ‘undermined trust and confidence in the peace process and in America’s interests’, Crowley said.

Clinton ‘made clear that the Israeli government needed to not just through words, but through specific actions, that they are committed to this relationship and to the peace process,’ Crowley said.

On Monday, Crowley refused to get into the details of Clinton’s demands, or if they included Israel repeal the construction plans for East Jerusalem, nor would he respond to Netanyahu’s remarks about the plans moving forward.

‘We asked for a formal response from the Israeli government and when we get that response we’ll react to it,’ he said.

Israeli media reported Monday that these specific actions included shelving the Ramat Shlomo project, as well as other confidence-building measures to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has threatened he would not go through with the indirect talks.

Meanwhile further criticism of Israeli’s housing plans came Monday from German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the European Union’s top diplomat Catherine Ashton, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abdul Gheit and Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa.

In Berlin, in talks with visiting Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, Merkel called the housing decision a ’serious blow’ to the prospects for the proximity talks.

She said she had called Netanyahu to warn that the decision could disrupt the entire Middle East peace process.

In Cairo, Ashton – embarking on her first official tour of the region – Monday told the Arab League the Israeli decision ‘endangered and undermined the tentative agreement to begin proximity talks.

‘The EU position on settlements is clear,’ Ashton said. ‘Settlements are illegal, constitute an obstacle to peace, and threaten to make a two-state solution impossible. A solution that the Israeli prime minister says he supports,’ she said.

Moussa, speaking after Ashton, said Arab states had backed the indirect talks only after four hours of debate.

Eventually, he said, Arab League members came to a consensus that the talks were ‘a futile exercise, but let’s see what happens. I hope that we shall not regret our decision’.

Abul-Gheit told reporters he and Ashton had discussed Europe’s commitment to halting the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank. ‘Israel must understand that the international community is angry … and that there must be a price,’ he said.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said in an emailed statement prior to the detonations that its operatives had planted three bombs in the compound of the building.

MEND has rejected a government amnesty aimed at ending years of unrest and sabotage in the oil-producing Niger Delta.

Local government officials said that two cars exploded outside the compound, shattering the windows of the building. No injuries were reported.

The group gave only 30 minutes notice of their intention to detonate the bomb and allow evacuation.

Several state governors were attending the conference, which was organized by the Vanguard newspaper group and aimed at discussing the post-amnesty environment.

MEND spokesman Jomo Gbomo warned this was the beginning of a new onslaught.

‘In the coming days, we will carry out a number of attacks against installations and oil companies across the Niger Delta,’ he said in a statement.

MEND says it is fighting for a share of oil revenue for Niger Delta residents, who complain that multinational oil companies have ruined their agriculture and fishing livelihoods and caused environmental damage in the deltas creeks.

Attacks by militant groups had slashed Nigeria’s oil production by around a quarter from 2006 levels, allowing Angola to overtake it as Africa’s biggest oil producer.

The redhotpie.com.au poll, a follow-up to last year’s Great Australian Sex Census, found 59 per cent of women refusing to wed men with whom they had a fling.

In comparison, 67 per cent of men said they had no problem walking the aisle with some one they had an affair with.

“Sexual politics have spoken loud and clear. If Australians are on a mission to find the one, they may need to let the moment of passion pass and stick to courtships of the past,” News.com.au quoted relationship expert and author Geoff Barker, as saying.

The survey found 68 per cent of Aussies have had a one-night stand. (ANI)

According to ABC Radio, Borders was forced to defend the 15 dollars novelty product after a woman told of her anger at seeing it during last week’s celebration of female rights and achievements.

Katie Robertson said she was “troubled” by the toy, “mainly because it encourages a stereotype of women as submissive, who are to be controlled”.

“There are certain buttons on there. For example, the male may decide that he wants beer, sex or food,” News.com.au quoted her as saying.

“He may press a button in which he requires the woman to remove her clothes, cook, clean, leave, (or) say yes.

“There’s also a button in which you can increase her breast size,” she revealed.

Borders spokeswoman Lauren Thompson said the product was intended to be “a bit funny, a bit of a gimmick”, and that “it is base level humour”.

She also said the chain sells a “control a man” remote, which has sold out. (ANI)

Obama’s proposed visit to Indonesia and Australia was rescheduled on Sunday, after difficulties in passing health reform in the US Congress forced a three-day delay.

The President’s itinerary for a one-night stopover will include dinner and bilateral talks with Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and an address to a special joint sitting of Parliament, The Sydney Morning Herald reports.

During his visit he will also hold a meeting with Australian Governor-General Quentin Bryce.

He will attend a ceremony celebrating the 70th anniversary of official US ties with Australia and then depart from Canberra Airport aboard Air Force One.

Obama was originally meant to bring his wife Michelle and their daughters Malia and Sasha, but now will travel without his family.

A proposed visit to Sydney has been cancelled. (ANI)

A Springvale Monash Legal Service report claimed that police officers labeled young African men as “monkey” and “black c***”, took photographs of them gathered on the streets for intelligence purposes and, in one case, took off their uniforms to bash black men in a public park.

Overland also vowed that if the bashing allegations were true, those involved would be investigated and charged.

“If that’s happened, it’s criminal and if we find evidence of that I would expect that officer or those officers to be charged,” The Sydney Morning Herald quoted Overland, as saying.

“Racist attitudes held by members of Victoria Police – that is not OK. Acting on those racial attitudes is clearly not OK and where we find it people can expect that I will deal with them in the strongest possible terms,” he added.

Overland further said his message that racism was unacceptable was getting through to most officers.

“The vast majority of my staff actually understands that message all too well and in fact not only understand it, they are not racist. They absolutely understand their responsibilities to the community,” he said.

However, Springvale Monash Legal Service director Helen Yandell said racism was entrenched in the force.

“There is a culture (of racism) in Victoria Police,” Helen said.

“We can’t say it’s a few isolated bad cops when we’re talking about across three major regions across Melbourne (Flemington, Dandenong and Braybrook) and communities that are quite widespread,” she added. (ANI)
ANI

In its annual report, Rio Tinto said the short-term outlook for mining and metals is also improving, but would likely remain volatile.

It also highlighted that there are risks to outlook, including the possibility of monetary tightening by Asian economies and constrained consumer spending in developed nations.

“As China nears the top of the commodity intensity usage curve, India is expected to follow, supporting a further potential wave of strong commodity demand,” The Sydney Morning Herald quoted Tom Albanese, Rio Tinto chief executive, as saying.

He said the company’s move towards a joint venture with BHP Billiton to tie-up its massive iron ore operations in Western Australia’s Pilbara region was a highlight of 2009.

Albanese further said the strong demand for iron ore provided option for production growth, with plans to increase its capacity in the Pilbara.

Meanwhile, Chairman Jan du Plessis said China continued to drive demand, but there were concerns about the sustainability of that demand in the short term.

“Longer term, China is likely to move towards more domestic, consumption-led development,” Plessis said. (ANI)

The detention of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar — second in the Taliban only to one-eyed Mullah Mohammed Omar – has raised new questions about whether the US is willing to back peace discussions with leaders who harbored the terrorists behind the September 11 attacks.

Karzai was “very angry” when he heard that the Pakistanis had picked up Baradar with an assist from US intelligence, the adviser said. Besides the ongoing talks, he said Baradar had “given a green light” to participating in a three-day peace jirga that Karzai is hosting next month.

Other Afghan officials, including Abdul Ali Shamsi, security adviser to the governor of Helmand province, also confirmed talks between Baradar and the Afghan government. Several media reports have suggested that Baradar had been in touch with Karzai representatives, but these are the first details to emerge from the discussions.

Talking with the Taliban is gaining traction in Afghanistan as thousands of US and NATO reinforcements are streaming in to reverse the insurgents’ momentum.

Reconciliation was one topic Karzai and President Barack Obama discussed during a more than one-hour video conference last night, Karzai’s office said.

Baradar’s arrest has already prompted Pakistan and others to stake out their positions on possible reconciliation negotiations that could mean an endgame to the eight-year war.

Officials have disclosed little about how Baradar was nabbed last month in the port city of Karachi. The Pakistanis were said to be upset that the Americans were the source of news reports about his arrest.

The capture was part of a US-backed crackdown in which the Pakistanis also arrested several other Afghan Taliban figures along the porous border between the two countries, after years of being accused by Washington of doing little to stop them.

Far from expressing gratitude, members of Karzai’s administration were quick to accuse Pakistan of picking up Baradar either to sabotage or gain control of talks with the Taliban leaders.

Whatever the reason, the delicate dance among Karzai, his neighbours and international partners put the debate over reconciliation on fast forward.

Top United Nations and British officials emphasised last week that the time to talk to the Taliban is now. The Afghan government, for its part, has plans to offer economic incentives to coax low and midlevel fighters off the battlefield. Another driving force is Obama’s goal of starting to withdraw US troops in July 2011.

The US, with nearly 950 lives lost and billions of dollars spent in the war, is moving with caution on reconciliation.

At a breakfast meeting in Islamabad last week, Karzai said he and his Western allies were at odds over who should be at the negotiating table. Karzai said the US was expressing reservations about talks with the top echelon of the Taliban while the British were “pushing for an acceleration” in the negotiation process.

“Our allies are not always talking the same language,” he said. Karzai said overtures to the Taliban stood little chance of success without the support of the US and its international partners. He says his previous attempts to negotiate with insurgents were not fruitful because “sections of the international community undermined — not backed – our efforts.”

The US has said generally that it supports efforts to welcome back any militants who renounce violence, cut ties with al-Qaeda and recognise and respect the Afghan constitution, but it is keeping details of its position closely held.

During his trip to Afghanistan last week, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said it was premature to expect senior members of the Taliban to reconcile with the government. He said until the insurgents believe they can’t win the war, they won’t come to the table. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has said she’s highly sceptical that Taliban leaders will be willing to renounce violence.

A US military official in Kabul said the top commander in Afghanistan, US Gen Stanley McChrystal, has not yet solidified his opinion on this issue.

He said the US is still debating the timing of the Afghan government’s outreach to senior leaders of three main Afghan insurgent groups — Omar; Jalaluddin Haqqani, who runs an al-Qaeda-linked organisation; and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the boss of the powerful Hezb-e-Islami.

The official added that the international military coalition had no problem with the Afghan government’s reaching out to anyone, at any time, but is concerned that a deal to end the violence not come at too high a price.

Karzai won’t discuss his administration’s talks with Taliban members or their representatives, but several Afghan officials confirmed that his government was in discussions with Baradar, who hails from Karzai’s Popalzai tribe of the Durrani Pashtuns in Kandahar.

“The government has been negotiating with Mullah Baradar, who took an offer to the Taliban shura,” Shamsi said, using the word for the group’s governing board.

Shamsi said he’d seen intelligence reports indicating that Omar resisted the offer and that Baradar’s rivals within the Taliban leadership were fiercely opposed to any negotiations with the Afghan government.

An intelligence official in southern Afghanistan said there were reports that Omar was angry about Baradar’s negotiations with the government and asked Pakistani intelligence officials to arrest him.

Nevertheless, Hakim Mujahed, a former Taliban ambassador to the United Nations, said many Taliban leaders are willing to talk.

Hamid Gul, a former director of the Pakistani intelligence service who has criticised the US role in Afghanistan, said the insurgents want three things from the US before talks could begin — a clearer timetable on the withdrawal of troops, to stop labeling them terrorists, and the release of all Taliban militants imprisoned in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

What actually precipitated Baradar’s arrest remains a mystery.

Ending days of speculation, 59-year-old Fonseka, who suffered defeat in the Presidential Polls at the hands of his former boss and incumbent Mahinda Rajapaksa, appeared before the three-member First Court Martial with his lawyers this morning.

There was speculation whether Fonseka would face Court Martial on Tuesday as it was reported that he was not inclined to appear before the panel as it consisted his junior officers.

“Representatives of the Attorney General’s Department appeared for the prosecution. They commenced the sittings as scheduled at 9.30 am this morning at the Navy Headquarters,” according to a communique issued by the Army.

Fonseka faces charges that he prepared the groundwork for his presidential campaign while still in military uniform and one relating to military procurement.

The Sri Lankan Government had appointed two Court Martials to inquire separate charges against the former Army Chief, who was arrested on February 10 by the Army for allegedly planning a coup against the government while in service.

Fonseka will appear on Wednesday before the Second Court Martial that will hear charges relating to military procurement.

Both Court Martials are presided by Major General H L Weerathunga.

“These two Courts Martial are hearing charges only pertaining to the offences committed by him during his military career,” the communique said.

The Court Martial will resume its sittings on April 6.

Fonseka served the Sri Lankan Army for nearly four decades and presided over the last phase of the civil war that saw the elimination of LTTE.

Fonseka joined the Sri Lanka Army in 1970 and rose through the ranks to become the Army chief in 2005 immediately after Rajapaksa became President.

Fonseka led the Eelam War-IV, the last phase of the 30-year-old civil war, that culminated in the death of LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran in May, 2009.

He was then made the chief of defence staff, a ceremonial post, which he quit in November last year to take a plunge in politics.

Speaking during a function organised by the Tehreek-e-Kashmir (United Kingdom), Ahmed said the Gilani government is conspiring to make the Line of Control (LoC) a permanent border between India and Pakistan, and giving a provincial status to Gilgit-Baltistan was the first step in this regard.

He termed the special autonomy package for Gilgit-Baltistan as ‘unconstitutional’ and urged Kashmiri people from both sides of the border to oppose the move.

Ahmed blasted Pakistani leaders of playing into the hands of international powers.

He also took a swipe at former President General Pervez Musharraf, saying he took a ‘u-turn’ on the Kashmir issue under foreign pressure, and added that the PPP government is still following Musharraf’s policies over the long pending issues.

Speaking during the function, Tehreek-e- Kashmir president Mohammad Ghalib also criticised Musharraf for compromising on Pakistan’s stance over the issue.

“Former military dictator Pervez Mushrraf has caused huge damage to Kashmir cause by accepting the dictation of foreign powers and compromising legitimate position of the country on this key issue,” The Nation quoted Ghalib, as saying. (ANI)

Talking to reporters after delivering a lecture at Seattle, United States, Musharraf said Sharif was a threat to the stability of Pakistan, media reports said.

However, organisers of the event have denied reports regarding Musharraf calling Sharif a ‘closet Taliban.’

“He did not say anything of the sort. He did not utter these words at any event in Seattle,” The Dawn quoted Rizwan Nasr, a member of the executive board of the Friends of Pakistan, which had organised Musharraf’s visit to the US city, as saying.

Musharraf also reportedly called for enhanced efforts for establishing peace between India and Pakistan.

“We must stop this confrontation between India and Pakistan… We must go for peace for the sake of the world, because the world considers us to be a nuclear flashpoint,” The Seattle Times quoted Musharraf, as saying.

He rejected India’s stance regarding Pakistan supporting terrorist activities in the inside its geographical boundaries, he accused New Delhi of “hyper reactions” following the November 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.

Musharraf, who has been living in London on an unannounced exile, has been on an extended lecture tour of the US and Europe since stepping down in August 2008.

When asked that whether he would be returning to Pakistan for another stint or not, Musharraf reiterated that he would do so if the people of the country wanted him and if he garners enough public support.

“If I have to just go there and join a political fray and be involved in accusations and counter-accusations … like most of the politicians are doing…I am not interested in that kind of politics,” Musharraf said. (ANI)
ANI

Fonseka was arrested last month for allegedly plotting a coup against the government. He is also accused of violating military supply procedures.

The former army commander has denied the allegations and said these were political motivated and aimed at denying him the chance to run in parliamentary elections next month.

A military spokesman declined any comment on the court martial. (ANI)

It is the first opinion poll this year to restore the Tories to a double-figure lead.

It puts Cameron on course for a majority of around 40 seats.

Last night he pledged that a Tory government would mean “more prosperity and a better life”. (ANI)

Deputy Superintendent of Police Chandrakant Salgaonkar told IANS that the sting operation in which Atala was filmed naming police officers allegedly involved in drug trade was shot by his girlfriend.

‘We are contacting Interpol to record his girlfriend’s statement. She is presently in Sweden,’ Salgaonkar said, refusing to name the woman.

He said Atala had said that his girlfriend shot the video in 2008.

Atala was arrested for allegedly bribing anti-narcotics cell police inspector Ashish Shirodkar after his spy camera video uploaded by an anonymous user on www.youtube.com rocked the police establishment.

In the video Atala is shown travelling in a car packed with drugs like charas and cocaine and speaking to an unidentified person about his clout with the Goa Police.

Atala alleged in the video that Shirodkar stole drugs from court’s custody and sold it to him. He said he paid the officer Rs.100,000 to allow a suspect arrested in a drug raid to go scot-free.

The exercise to elect the Youth Congress office-bearers at the local level is going on in Tamil Nadu.

Rahul Gandhi, who is keen to see the party’s ascendancy in the state, is expected to make a flying visit to Trichy, some 300 km from here.

When contacted, police officials in Trichy told IANS they have been informed about Rahul Gandhi’s tentative visit and the force is geared up to provide necessary security.

This will be Rahul Gandhi’s second visit to Tamil Nadu since his three-day visit to the state last September to revitalise the party in general as well as the Youth Congress in the state.

In a massive membership drive launched last year, around 1.3 million members have been added to the Youth Congress in the state, Mayura S. Jayakumar, a Youth Congress leader, told IANS.

‘We forecast that India will overtake China as the fastest growing major economy by 2018. We expect India’s growth on an average of eight percent in the next five years,’ EIU senior analyst Anjalika Bardalai told reporters on the sidelines of 14th Business Roundtable here.

She said the Indian economy would grow at 6.8 percent during the current fiscal, at 7.7 percent in 2010-11, and 8 percent the year later.

But the statistical arm of the Indian government, the Central Statistical Organisation, has projected the economy to grow by 7.2 percent in the current fiscal.

‘Our growth projection is based on expenditures in the economy and is not based on factor cost as done by the Indian government,’ Bardalai explained.

The Indian government measures growth on the basis of factor cost. Factor cost is the cost of factors of production used to produce final goods and services.

India’s GDP during the three quarters in the current fiscal grew at 6.1 percent, 7.9 percent and 6 percent. While during 2008-09 it grew at 6.7 percent and in 2007-08 at 9.1 percent.

‘The GDP will not return back to 9 percent and more as it was during 2005-08. Also the monetary pressure may not go down as expected,’ The Economist executive editor Daniel Franklin said.

Driven by increasing food prices, India’s annual rate of inflation, based on the wholesale price index, rose to 9.89 percent in February from 8.56 percent in the previous month, according to an official data revealed Monday.

It also predicted inflow of investments through Foreign Institutional Investors (FII) at $75 billion by 2014.

The Lok Sabha will now meet April 12, after a three-week break.

The members were on feet on the issue as the house re-assembled at 2 p.m. after two adjournments on the issue earlier in the day.

Deputy Speaker Karia Munda invited Congress’ Sandip Dixit to speak on the National Green Tribunal Bill, 2009, which was moved by Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh Monday.

When the MPs continued their protest, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs V. Narayanasamy requested the members to let the house function as the Green Tribunal Bill had to be passed.

‘I’ve coveyed it to the government and we will look into the matter. Beyond this the government cannot do anything.’

‘Please let the house function. The bill has to be passed,’ Narayansamy said.

But Leader of Opposition Sushma Swaraj said the government has made similar promises earlier and members should be allowed to raise the matter.

‘So many MPs are on their feet on a particular issue and they should be allowed to speak on this,’ she said.

Meanwhile, the BSP MPs strongly defended their leader.

The deputy speaker, however, did not allow the MPs to speak. As the protest continued, the chair adjourned the house to meet April 12 after the inter-session recess.

Outside the Parliament House, the MPs, however, demanded an investigation into the extravaganza.

‘An investigation should be initiated to reveal the source of the money,’ Congress MP Jagadambika Pal told reporters outside parliament after the second adjournment of the house at 1 p.m.

BJP MPs also joined the protest to demand an inquiry into the extravaganza.

BJP MP Yogi Adityanath said: ‘We would like to know the source of money. She is the chief minister of the state. So, the people have the right to know about the source of the money.’

The Lok Sabha was first adjourned during zero hour after Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and Jagadambika Pal tried to raise the issue. Speaker Meira Kumar, however, invited other MPs who had given notices earlier to speak on other subjects.

MPs from the SP and Congress belonging to Uttar Pradesh were up on their feet while BSP members protested noisily. Amid the uproar, the speaker adjourned the house for 40 minutes at 12.20 p.m.

The unrest continued when the house re-assembled at 1 p.m. The MPs asked the deputy speaker to allow them to raise the matter. But he said the chair did not receive any notice from the MPs on the issue and therefore could not be allowed to speak on it.

The MPs continued their protests and the deputy speaker adjourned the house till 2 p.m.

Critics alleged that the multi-crore garland was just a small part of the extravagant Rs.200 crore celebrations Monday to mark 25 years of the BSP and party founder Kanshi Ram’s birth anniversary.

The garland made of thousands of Rs.1,000 denomination currency notes was presented to Mayawati at the rally in Lucknow Monday.

‘There was no intelligence failure. Enough intelligence was shared with the Maharashtra Police,’ Chidambaram said during question hour in the Lok Sabha.

He said the Pune police issued advisories in Marathi to all important establishments, including the German Bakery.

Replying to a supplementary by Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) MP Supriya Sule, he said: ‘Despite the intelligence shared, despite the advisories issued, the Pune blast occurred. It is a blot on our record.’

‘About 371 tribal refugee families comprising 1,855 men, women and children have been shifted to nearby areas after their temporary huts made of bamboo and hemp at Hamshapara in northern Tripura were reduced to ashes by the fire that broke out late Monday night,’ Sub-Divisional Magistrate Dilip Chakma told IANS by phone.

The cause of the fire is yet to be determined.

Over 37,000 Reang tribal refugees have sought shelter in six camps in north Tripura, adjacent to Mizoram, since 1997 when they fled western Mizoram following ethnic clashes with the majority Mizos over the killing of a forest official.

The union home ministry through the Tripura government has so far spent around Rs.1.64 billion for their upkeep.

The Tripura government and the union home ministry has been asking the Mizoram government to take back the refugees. However, the government is yet to take any steps for their repatriation.

The General Officer Commanding of 14 Corps, Lt. General S.K. Singh, briefed Mubeen about the high altitude conditions that the Indian soldiers face in the area as they guard the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China, the Line of Control (LoC) with Pakistan and the Siachen glacier, considered to be the highest battlefield in the world, bordering Pakistan controlled Kashmir.

‘The visiting chief was briefed by Lt. Gen. S.K. Singh on various commitments of the army, peculiarities of operating in the extreme high altitude terrain of the Himalayas and various developmental projects undertaken in the remote region of Ladakh,’ Indian Army spokesman Lt. Col. Biplab Nath said in a release.

‘He (the Bangladesh Army chief) praised the Indian soldiers for carrying out their tasks with elan while braving hardships of extreme weather and terrain in the toughest battlefield of the world,’ the spokesman added.

Mubeen also visited Shanti Stupa, an iconic landmark in Leh city reflecting the region’s Buddhist culture and religion and interacted with Buddhist priests there.

‘This visit to Leh has played a significant role in promoting and strengthening the bonds of friendship, mutual trust and confidence between the two armies and the countries,’ the spokesman added.

Mubeen’s visit comes at a time when Indian troops have strengthened their vigil along the LAC following a series of incursions by Chinese troops in 2008 and 2009.

The Lok Sabha saw two adjournments as parties questioned the extravagance of the Bahujan Samaj Party’s 25th anniversary celebrations in Lucknow Tuesday when Chief Minister Mayawati was given a garland made of thousands of Rs.1,000 notes.

Critics alleged that the garland was just a small part of the Rs.200 crore celebrations that also marked party founder Kanshi Ram’s birth anniversary.

The continuous uproar over the issue forced the chair to adjourn the house for the day to meet on April 12, after a nearly four-week recess.

Outside parliament, the MPs demanded a probe into the extravaganza.

‘An investigation should be initiated to reveal the source of the money,’ Congress MP Jagadambika Pal told reporters after the second adjournment of the house.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Yogi Adityanath added: ‘She is the chief minister of the state. So, the people have the right to know about the source of the money.’

The house was first adjourned during zero hour after Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and Jagadambika Pal tried to raise the issue. Speaker Meira Kumar, however, invited other MPs who had given notice earlier to speak on other topics.

MPs from the SP and Congress belonging to Uttar Pradesh were up on their feet while BSP members protested noisily. Amid the uproar, the speaker adjourned the house for 40 minutes at 12.20 p.m.

The unrest continued when the house reassembled at 1 p.m and it was adjourned till 2 p.m.

The BSP was put on the mat in the Rajya Sabha too.

The SP, BJP and the Congress accused the Mayawati government of failing to bring the situation in Bareilly under control and sought the intervention of the central government. Parts of Bareilly have been under curfew since March 2 when clashes broke out over the Barawafat procession.

‘The city is burning but the officials are busy elsewhere,’ said SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav, referring to the Lucknow rally.

‘The administration is sleeping. People do not have milk, medicines,’ he said, raising the issue during zero hour.

Congress member Rashid Alvi added that he had been arrested in Ghaziabad Tuesday and prevented from going to Bareilly.

‘It is against the constitution. I was in Ghaziabad but the orders were given by district magistrate of Bareilly. How does the Uttar Pradesh government want to function?’

Alvi said he had never seen leaders being garlanded with notes except during elections.

‘She was garlanded with Rs.1,000 notes. What more can be more shameful,’ he said, pointing out that no state minister had visited Bareilly.

BJP leader S.S. Ahluwalia said the Sikh community in Bareilly had suffered losses in the communal strife as many shops owned by them had been burnt.

BSP member Brajesh Pathak responded by saying that law and order was a state subject and demanded that remarks of the members on Bareilly situation be expunged.

However, Deputy Chairman K. Rahman Khan did not agree to his request and said the matter had been raised with the permission of the chair.

Justice S. Muralidhar dismissed the SIMI’s plea for de-sealing the house number 151-C at Lane 9 in Zakir Nagar.

While opposing the desealing plea, a home ministry director in an affidavit stated that municipal records showed the house belonged to Habibullah Siddiqui, and neither the SIMI nor its president Shahid Badar Falahi had any claim to the building.

Following the central government ban on the outfit in 2001, Falahi was arrested under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act and since then the office has remained locked.

The ban on the organisation was lifted in August 2008 but the building has remained sealed.

‘The house is in an utter state of neglect with no guard to restrict unauthorised admission and prevent trespass,’ SIMI activists said in their petition.

Their petition said: ‘The windows are broken, the iron gates have long been ripped off their hinges and taken away and paint is peeling off the red brick concrete facade. A plan for a second storey seems to have been aborted, half-way through.’

Among those arrested are STF chief Ashok Sheoran, an additional superintendent of police, three assistant sub-inspectors and four constables.

‘The eight surrendered (Monday). At that time we had taken them in for interrogation. We (have now) formally arrested them,’ an official told IANS here Tuesday.

‘We have proof they were in Panipat on the day of the crime. We are verifying their (mobile) call records and details of their activities of the past few months.’

According to the jeweller, the STF men came to his shop in Panipat, 150 km from Chandigarh, March 11 and demanded Rs.10 lakh. The jeweller gave Rs.1 lakh to head constable Jagbir Singh and asked him to come later for the remaining amount.

The handover was recorded by the CCTV cameras in the shop. The jeweller complained to the police who set a trap.

The police was already investigating a complaint by a stock broker who had claimed paying Rs.10 lakh to the STF team a few days ago. When the stock broker viewed the CCTV footage, he recognised the STF personnel as men who had taken the money from him also.

The police have directed the STF to stop their operations till the completion of the inquiry.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Leader of Opposition Arun Jaitley and Deputy Chairman K. Rahman Khan also recalled contribution of the outgoing members in their speeches.

Ansari said the house will miss the members who were not returning.

Expressing his heart-felt appreciation for their contribution, he wished them long life and good health.

The prime minister also appreciated the contribution of retiring members and recalled that he has been a member of the house for nearly 19 years.

‘My experience is that this house has some unique characteristics which enrich public life and reflect plurality and diversity of the country.’

Jaitley said new members enter the house with a certain awe and ‘all go back wiser, considering the environment of the house’.

He said the members had excellent inter-personal relations. ‘Even if we disagree, we learn a lot from each other,’ he said.

Rahman said the dynamic exposure in the house will come handy to retiring members in discharging their public role.

Members who will retire April 2 include two from Assam, one each from Himachal Pradesh, Tripura and Nagaland, three from Kerala and five from Punjab.

Two paramilitary troopers and two civilians were injured.

‘A civilian is dead. Two CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force) troopers and two civilians are injured. They have been taken to SMHS hospital,’ an officer said.

Police sources said militants fired from a close range at a CRPF posse guarding the main business hub in the city when it was bustling with shoppers.

People in the area were seen running for the cover when they heard gunshots as tension gripped Lal Chowk and adjoining localities.

‘They shot at CRPF men on guard in the Koker Bazaar and fired from point blank range before escaping into a by-lane,’ a police officer told IANS.

Police and paramilitary forces cordoned off the area and its many labyrinthine lanes for searches.

Traffic was also diverted from the area.

‘We have raised concerns over the issue as it will cause noise pollution, which will affect the health of the people,’ the minister told reporters here.

The Maharashtra government had last year amended the development control rules to allow helipads atop residential and commercial buildings, even in coastal, environmentally sensitive and silent zones.

According to the Maharashtra government, the helipads would not only save businessmen commuting time but they could also be used for rescue operations and disaster relief in an emergency.

Vijay Mishra, who represents Gyanpur constituency, allegedly ran the inter-state gang with help from relatives and friends. Police said Tuesday that the gang stole vehicles from Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and other states and sold them in Delhi using fake documents.

A case against Mishra was registered late Monday on the basis of statements from three alleged thieves arrested in Mirzapur district, 280 km from Lucknow.

‘We have learnt that the legislator not only operated the gang but also provided them shelter and patronage to avoid arrest,’ police inspector Gorakhnath Yadav said in Mirzapur. ‘We are yet to trace Mishra.’

Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman K. Rahman Khan said a meeting of leaders of various political parties had decided that the house will not meet on March 17 and 18.

The Rajya Sabha was scheduled to go into recess from March 16 but the house decided earlier this month to extend the sittings by two days to discuss private member bills and other government business.

However, the leaders decided Tuesday against extending the session for two days. The Lok Sabha is also expected to go for a near four week recess from Tuesday.

Both the houses are expected to meet on April 12.

‘After all in a democracy (you) can’t bulldoze. Talking is the real beauty of democracy,’ Moily told IANS in an exclusive interview, underscoring a change of heart on the part of the ruling coaliton that pushed through the proposed legislation in the Rajya Sabha March 9.

The minister said that parties opposed to the bill had ‘demanded a discussion outside the house’ and indicated that the government had also softened its position because of the pending legislative agenda.

He said the government intended to bring the bill in the lower house of parliament in the budget session but wanted a ’smooth passage’.

Moily indicated that dates for consultations with political parties would be decided by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

The Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal and a section of the Janata Dal-United are bitterly opposed to the bill which provides for reservation of 33 percent seats in legislatures for women on a rotational basis for 15 years.

The parties opposing the bill want a quota for women belonging to backward classes, minorities and the Dalit community. The Bahujan Samaj Party has an added demand: increase the percentage of reservation for women to 50 percent.

The minister ruled out the possibility of quota within quota as demanded by the bill’s opponents. ‘How can we provide quota within quota? It can’t be done as there is no reservation for minorities and backward classes in the present set-up. It’s not lawful,’ he said.

The women’s reservation bill has been on the political agenda since 1996. ‘It lapsed three times and was introduced for the fourth time in 2008. It has been looked into by a standing committee where all parties were represented.’

Asked if the government’s thrust on the quota bill posed any threat to its stability, Moily said: ‘For any change in society, one should have boldness. Commitment to a cause, that is the criterion.’

The minister said the task of determining the reserved seats will be similar to that performed by the delimitation commission which went across the country to consult political parties for deciding new configuration of Lok Sabha constituencies. The delimitation commission took almost five years to complete its work.

Asked if a commission will be formed to carry out consultations to determine the process of reserving seats, Moily said the task could also be done by the Election Commission.

He said that procedures were involved in implementation of the legislation ‘which can’t be cut short’

The minister said once the bill was passed by parliament, it will go to 14 states for ratification. ‘That may take not less than nine months.’ But he was confident the legislation will be ‘definitely implemented before the next general election’.

Asked about apprehensions that women from privileged classes will benefit more from the bill, he said that in the ultimate analysis women will profit from the changes being contemplated.

He said that women’s representation in Indian legislatures was less than the average in Asia and the world.

‘An investigation should be initiated to reveal the source of the money,’ Congress MP Jagadambika Pal told reporters outside parliament after the second adjournment of the house at 1 p.m.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MPs also joined the protest to demand an inquiry into the extravaganza.

BJP MP Yogi Adityanath said: ‘We would like to know the source of money. She is the chief minister of the state. So, the people have the right to know about the source of the money.’

The house was first adjourned during zero hour after Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and Jagadambika Pal tried to raise the issue. Speaker Meira Kumar, however, invited other MPs who had given notice earlier to speak on other topics.

MPs from the SP and Congress belonging to Uttar Pradesh were up on their feet while BSP members protested noisily. Amid the uproar, the speaker adjourned the house for 40 minutes at 12.20 p.m.

The unrest continued when the house reassembled at 1. The MPs asked Deputy Speaker Karia Munda to allow them to raise the matter. But he said the chair did not receive any notice from the MPs on the matter.

The MPs continued protest and the deputy speaker adjourned the house till 2 p.m.

Critics alleged that the multi-crore garland was just a small part of the extravagant Rs.200 crore celebrations Monday to mark 25 years of the BSP and party founder Kanshi Ram’s birth anniversary.

The garland made of thousands of Rs.1,000 currency notes was presented to Mayawati at the rally in Lucknow Monday.

‘We are in the process of defining the honour killing,’ Chidambaram said while replying to questions related to the caste panchayats’ controversial rulings on marriages in some parts of the country.

The government had stated in the Rajya Sabha earlier that a proposal to amend the Indian Penal Code (IPC) to deal with honour killings was under consideration.

The government, however, did not give any timeframe by which the amendment would be effected.

‘We are looking at a broader definition of sexual assault,’ Chidambaram said when asked about the government’s reported decision to amend the IPC, replacing the word ‘rape’ with ’sexual assault’ in the existing law in order to broaden the ambit of crimes covered under the sections and make the provisions gender neutral.

Quoting home ministry officials, the reports said ‘making sexual assault ‘gender neutral’ will imply that the relevant sections of IPC can be slapped on accused of any gender who has committed the crime’.

‘We have sent a proposal to the centre seeking necessary arrangements for an interim administrative set up in the hills till 31 Dec, 2011. The proposal has been sent to the union home ministry considering next year’s West Bengal assembly polls.

‘There is no question of backtracking from our Gorkhaland demand but we are in favour of this interim set up to find a temporary solution to the statehood question before the assembly polls,’ Giri told IANS.

According to him, the GJM has asked for legislative, administrative and financial power for the proposed hill body. It has also demanded the replacement of the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC) of 1988. It has suggested the new body be named the Golkhaland Regional Authority (GRA) or Darjeeling Dooars Regional Authority (DDRA).

‘Besides a separate Gorkhaland state, we are also going to press for interim set-up at the tripartite meeting in New Delhi (Thursday),’ he said, adding the interim set-up will only be valid till December 2011.

Asked if the central government has responded to the GJM proposal, Giri said: ‘We have not received anything so far. But we will discuss this issue in Delhi on Thursday.’

Gadkari’s jumbo team, including 13 vice presidents, 10 general secretaries, 15 secretaries and a treasurer, also gives place to former Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje, now a general secretary.

‘The list is such that people from Andaman to Jammu and Kashmir, from Gujarat to Assam are being represented. It is a balanced list with women, Dalits, tribes, all included,’ BJP chief spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad told reporters.

He said the team will bring new enthusiasm in the party. ‘It is a blend of young and experience.’

The office bearers include 13 women. In all, there are 40 women members in the new team.

Gadkari has also constituted a 12-member BJP parliamentary board.

Gadkari will head the board whose other members include Atal Bihari Vajpayee, L.K. Advani, Murali Manohar Joshi, M. Venkaiah Naidu, Rajnath Singh, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and Bal Apte.

In the process, he lost two years of his academic life.

Sethi, a student of the Palai High School in Jajpur district, was convinced that he passed the exam in his first attempt in 2008 but the authorities ruled otherwise.

He appeared again in 2009 but failed due to lack of adequate preparation.

‘I started preparing for the exam once again this year but I was told that I already passed the exam in 2008,’ Sethi said.

Not surprisingly, his mother, Malati Sethi, is livid.

‘My son lost two years due to the fault of officials. We insisted that he take the exam once again (this year). But we were shocked to learn that he passed the exam two years ago,’ she said.

When this was brought to the notice of the school authorities they conceded the mistake but blamed it on the Orissa Board of Secondary Education.

‘He had passed in 2008. But there was some tabulation error on the part of the Board,’ said Kailash Chandra Swain, headmaster of the Palai High School.

This 34-year-old made a fortune out of stealing tractors in Gujarat and selling them off in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. All he needed was a little help from an accomplice who dismantled the stolen vehicles, gave them a new look and drove them into other states.

Prajapati’s tally of stolen tractors was 20 when he ran out of luck and fell in the police net: The cost he had to pay for being over adventurous and striking too close to a police post.

A school dropout from a family of potters, Prajapati was picked up and taken to Vejalpur police station near Ahmedabad for questioning March 13 after a tractor went missing from it’s jurisdiction.

During questioning, the tractor thief from Zeera town of Unjha in north Gujarat confessed to stealing 20 tractors from the peripheral areas of Ahmedabad and other parts of north Gujarat.

‘This could well be the tip of the proverbial iceberg and we may get links to more such thefts,’ said Inspector J.M. Bharwad, who is investigating the case. Prajapati has been taken on a five-day police remand till March 18.

According to the police, Prajapati’s last tractor theft was from just behind the Vejalpur police post. This came soon after his strike outside a crematorium in Siddhpur while the owner was mourning inside.

The government was to introduce the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damages Bill, which seeks to cap the liability of nuclear plant operators and equipment suppliers in case of an accident, in the Lok Sabha Monday but withdrew it at the eleventh hour.

The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) and three other Left parties said in a joint statement that the legislation ‘is being pushed by the government because of pressure from the US equipment suppliers and investors put through the US administration at the highest levels’.

‘The US has made a precondition that India must put a cap on liability of the nuclear operators and virtually remove all liabilities of the equipment suppliers before it delivers on its promises in the India-US Nuclear Deal.

‘That is why the Fuel Reprocessing Consent, claimed to be a done deal by the proponents of the nuclear deal, has yet to be agreed to by the US. Neither have the dual use technology restrictions been removed as Prime Minister (Manmohan Singh) had claimed before parliament.’

The Left statement added that ‘the nuclear liability regime being proposed… is nothing but a huge hidden subsidy to the US equipment suppliers. In order to promote private nuclear power plants and favour US equipment suppliers, the government is willing to sacrifice the interests of the Indian people’.

‘We hope you (MPs) will take a stand against this bill which compromises the vital interests of the Indian people regarding their safety and security,’ said the statement signed by CPI-M’s Prakash Karat and leaders of the Communist Party of India, Forward Bloc and Revolutionary Socialist Party.

The statement pointed out that neither Russian nor French nuclear equipment suppliers had raised the issue of capping or limiting nuclear liability.

‘It is an entirely US concern and being driven by the interests of US suppliers and investors. If this is accepted, this will be yet another case of the central government capitulating to the US.

‘The government has already proposed to buy 10,000 MW of nuclear reactors from private US suppliers like GE, Westinghouse and others without going through open tendering and competitive bidding mandated under the present Electricity Act. This is being done as government to government contracts, precluding public scrutiny of the terms of these contracts.

‘The government is also unwilling to tell the people either the cost of those reactors or the cost of electricity to be produced from such imported reactors.’

Under the bill, the financial liability for a nuclear accident will be capped at only 300 million SDRs (Rs.2,142.85 crore), the statement said. Beyond this, the affected people will not get any compensation for either loss of life, health damages or damages to property and environment.

The liability of the Indian operator of nuclear plants will be limited to only to Rs.500 crore. The central government can decrease the amount of liability to a minimum of Rs.100 crore.

The difference between the two – Rs.2,142.85 and Rs.500 crore, of about Rs.1,642 crore – is the government’s share of the liability.

‘There is no legal liability of the foreign reactor supplier even if it supplies faulty and substandard equipment.’

The statement said the Bhopal settlement of $470 million (Rs.2,152 crore) reached between the central government and Union Carbide Corp following the 1984 gas disaster and accepted by the Supreme Court had proved to be totally inadequate.

‘It is completely unconscionable of the government to suggest that all nuclear accidents, which have the potential of being much larger than the Bhopal tragedy, be capped at a figure that has already been shown to be a gross underestimate.’

The 28 state assemblies have only 311 women legislators, according to the data from state assembly websites. Nagaland figures at the bottom of the list with no women representative in a house of 60.

Rajasthan is at the top, percentage-wise (14.5), with 29 of the 200 elected representatives being women. Andhra Pradesh comes next – a little over 12 percent of 294 legislators are women. The state assembly has 36 women lawmakers.

The Left Front-ruled West Bengal follows close behind with 11.5 percent. The state has 34 women MLAs in a house of 294. Kerala, the state with the highest literacy, has just five percent of women lawmakers. There are only seven women in a house of 140.

Other northeastern states are slightly better than Nagaland. Meghalaya and Manipur have only one woman legislator each. Both the states have 60-member houses.

The southern state of Karnataka has only five women in a house of 225 legislators.

Only eight state assemblies cross the 10 percent mark. Apart from West Bengal, Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh, the others are: Madhya Pradesh (26 out of 231), Chhattisgarh (10 out of 90), Bihar (26 out of 243), Assam (13 out of 126) and Haryana (nine out of 90).

Ten state assemblies have only five percent or less women legislators. The Congress-ruled Maharashtra has 10 in a house of 288 members.

Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state, has 27 in a house of 403 mebers – 6.69 percent.

Goa has just one woman lawmaker in a house of 40.

Punjab has eight women out of 117 legislators. Jharkhand, with 9.87 percent of women legislators, scores better with eight women in a house of 81.

According to statistics available with the ministry, Arjun Singh gave admission in central schools to 1,387 students in 2006-07, to 1,501 the next year and recommended 1,822 candidates in 2008-09.

According to current practice, the minister can recommend admission for only 1,200 seats a year across India.

His successor Kapil Sibal is learnt to be unhappy with the discretionary quotas exceeding their limits.

‘The ministry has now found out about all these recommended seats. The current HRD minister is against any quota for the minister or the MPs. You may see the provision entirely being scrapped,’ a HRD ministry official told IANS.

Ministry officials said additional admissions based on only discretion violates the principle of transparency and fair play.

Statistics show that Arjun Singh’s most favourite states were Delhi and his home state Madhya Pradesh.

In Delhi, for instance, the minister was allotted only 200 seats for recommendations per year. But he admitted 609 students in 2006, 666 in 2007 and a whopping 911 in 2008-09, just when the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government was getting ready for Lok Sabha polls.

In Madhya Pradesh, the minister’s allotted quota to recommend admission was just 60 but Arjun Singh did not disappoint his people. In 2006, he helped 215 students, nearly four times his official brief. In 2007-08, the veteran Congress leader recommended 88 student. The year after, he helped 92 families.

According to the ministry report, there are no ministry quotas in Uttarkhand but the former HRD minister recommended admission for 17, 26 and 43 students in the state in the specified three years.

States that received less than their allotted quota included Gujarat, Assam, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.

Though Rajasthan had a ministry quota of 50 seats per year, the minister only recommended 16, 27 and 19 names for 2006-07, 2007-08 and 2008-09 respectively.

Those that did not get any favour were the northeastern states, Chandigarh and Andaman Nicobar Islands.

Since inception in 1965, the Kendriya Vidyalayas (Central Schools) have come to be known as centres of excellence in the field of secondary and senior secondary education in India. The Kendriya Vidyalayas Sangathan runs 981 schools with 1,033,500 students across India.

A police spokesperson said the incident took place at Majuli village in Darrang district, about 120 km north of Assam’s main city Guwahati.

‘Based on specific intelligence that NDFB militants were taking shelter in a house, we conducted a raid and soon there was an encounter,’ a police officer said.

The militants challenged the joint team of army and police.

‘After more than an hour-long encounter, we managed to kill two NDFB militants and probably a few of them managed to escape,’ the officer said.

A large cache of weapons and explosives, including two AK series rifles, detonators and grenades, were recovered from the dead rebels.

The NDFB is fighting for an independent homeland for the tribal Bodos in Assam.

At least 20 NDFB militants were killed in gun battles in the past three months in Assam.

Two builders of Ahmedabad disclosed unaccounted income of Rs.100 crore after a survey by the department that ended Monday.

While one builder disclosed unaccounted income of Rs.75 crore, the other revealed an income of Rs.25 crore.

D.S.Rastogi, chief commissioner of the income-tax department, said Tuesday that a survey was in the offing in all cases where advance tax paid this year was lower than that of last year.

In a similar operation in Surat, the income-tax authorities detected unaccounted income of Rs.90 crore from seven firms involved in textile trading and real estate, official sources said.

With sealed bank lockers and documents still being scrutinized, the amount may well cross Rs.100 crore, it was pointed out.

The investigation wing of the income tax department which conducted the Surat operation termed it as one of its biggest, with one textile company alone disclosing Rs.38 crore of unaccounted income while the remaining partnership firms disclosed a total of Rs.52 crore.

Thousands of people from all walks of life are expected to gather at the historic Gandhi maidan here for the celebrations. ‘People from different parts of the state would participate in the Bihar Divas celebration from March 22 to 24,’ an official from the department of art, culture and youth affairs, said.

Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said the state government’s decision to observe the celebration was to help advertise Bihar.

In order to ensure the people’s involvement in the event, the government has declared a public holiday on Bihar Divas.

A mega set to display Bihar’s heritage was being designed by well-known Mumbai based set designer Umesh Kumar Sharma. ‘I am trying my best to make this mega event a memorable one,’ Sharma, who is from Bihar, told IANS.

He said that all the important heritage sites will be showcased during the celebrations. ‘It will be a rare show as people will be able to enjoy Bodh Gaya’s Mahabodhi temple, Rajgir’s peace pagoda, Pawaqpuri’s jalmandir and Vaishali-garh.’

According to official sources, different government departments have been directed to organize programmes and highlight their achievements.

A coffee table book on Bihar’s monuments will also be released to mark the occasion.

‘We have received reports that Maoists continue to kill dogs at different places across the state. It appears that Maoists have simply ignored PETA’s appeal,’ a police officer told IANS.

The officer said the dogs were killed because they barked and alerted villagers and security forces of Maoists’ movement from one place to another.

‘Stray dogs are the best watchdogs for the police. They help alet us,’ said another police officer in Gaya district, a Maoist stronghold.

Earlier this month, the Indian chapter of US-based organisation PETA appealed to the Maoist guerrillas in Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal not to kill dogs.

In a signed appeal, PETA India senior campaign coordinator Nikunj Sharma said: ‘Animals have no part in your battle and should not be made to suffer in the crossfire.’

A few years ago, Maoists in Bihar issued a diktat to the villagers directing them to poison the dogs as they bark when the ultras visit the region, especially at night, alerting the security forces.

‘Long queues were seen since early this (Tuesday) morning. The devotees paid obeisance at the Naina Devi shrine (in Bilaspur). All steps have been taken to ensure the safety of the devotees,’ Deputy Commissioner Nandita Gupta told IANS.

She said steps have been taken to manage crowd and streamline traffic during the festival.

The hilltop Naina Devi temple in the foothills of Shivaliks in Bilaspur district is one of the prominent temples in northern India.

During the Navratra festival, the devotees from India and abroad visit various shrines in Kangra, Una and Bilaspur districts to pay obeisance to Goddess Durga.

Many devotees have also arrived at Jawalamukhi, Chamunda and Brajeshwari Devi in Kangra district and Chintpurni in Una district.

Superintendent of Police Atul Kumar Fulzele said all necessary arrangements have been made in the temples of Kangra district during the Navratra festival.

He said this time a special police force has been deployed in the temples following warnings of possible strikes by a Punjab terrorist group.

‘There have been intelligence inputs that Babbar Khalsa might target temples during Navratras. Accordingly, security has been intensified,’ he said.

Fulzele said bomb disposal and dog squads have also been deployed.

‘I have not written anything in a while since joining the government, barring tweeting and writing regular official notes and missives,’ Tharoor said, with a twinge of regret and nostalgia, at the ongoing Penguin Spring Fever 2010 at the India Habitat Centre.

‘I barely have enough time to read these days. Sadly, I have left all that behind me. That creative part of me is deeply unfulfilled – caught somewhere between my ministry and my constituency where I have to devote time. I can barely meet the demands of my ministry and the writer in me,’ Tharoor told IANS.

‘It is no accident that most politicians who have written books have done it while in the opposition. I get at least a dozen messages on the twitter every day from my fans who want to know why I am not writing – or when I will write my next book and what it will be about,’ Tharoor said.

‘I hope this will be a temporary situation and I can get back to writing again,’ he said.

The suave UN official-career diplomat- writer-turned minister, however, still loves to talk about the Mahabharata, the epic which he re-interpreted in the context of 20th century politics as a satire, ‘The Great Indian Novel’ in 1989.

‘Every character in the Mahabharata has human failings – perhaps barring Krishna – and they address contemporary sensibilities. It makes the epic more relevant than any other Indian epic because there is this huge classical movement that exists in our collective consciousness. We deal with the same dilemmas in our normal lives that they deal with,’ Tharoor said.

The minister said ‘there are some things in the epic which should be done differently now’. ‘For example, I would like to do the story of Ekalavya differently,’ he said. The

Mahabharata, said Tharoor, was full of modern-day imageries.

‘The slaying of the demon Jarasandha (he was ripped apart) reminds me of the 1971 Pakistan war – when it was ripped in two different directions,’ the minister said.

Dharma, feels Tharoor, is central to the Mahabharata. ‘For me, the best definition of dharma came from a Muslim friend. Dharma is that by which we live,’ he said.

Even as the debate over the women’s reservation bill continues, Shia cleric Maulana Syed Kalbe Jawwad had said Saturday that women should have no role in politics and stay at home.

‘They should become mothers of good leaders rather than try to be leaders themselves,’ he reportedly said. Also, the Lucknow-based Nadwatul Ulema had also issued a ‘fatwa’ (edict) against Muslim women’s participation in politics, in line with the 2005 fatwa of the influential Darul Uloom Deoband, which contends that Muslim women cannot remain in purdah when in politics.

However, the advice has not been taken well by Muslim women here who not only described them as ‘personal views’ and also disagreed that it could be a fatwa as Islam does not prohibit women from being leaders and a fatwa can only be issued in reply to religious queries.

‘Who is he to advise us on what to do and what not to do? It is a conspiracy of vested interests to keep women within the four walls of a house under the garb of Islam’s strictures despite our religion giving equal status to men and women,’ social activist Shahala Masood told IANS.

Her views were supported by ‘Shahar Qazi’ (city religious judge) Abdul Lateef Qasmi. ‘Islam does not prohibit women from being leaders but if some one has issued any fatwa, it needs to be checked under what circumstances it was delivered,’ he said.

Masood’s stand has more adherents.

‘The views expressed by ulema could be their personal thoughts as no one had sought their opinion. I am of the view that more and more women from the community should come forward and contest elections as Islam does not put any bar on it,’ Samajwadi Party member Nazma Parveen told IANS.

‘Everyone has the liberty to express views, and the statement of the Maulana could be his personal view, because as far as my knowledge is concerned, Islam does not prohibit women from entering politics,’ Congress state unit women cell general secretary Noori Khan said.

Madhya Pradesh Urdu Academy secretary Nusrat Mehndi contended women should prepare themselves for a double responsibility ‘looking after domestic activities and performing well in professional life as well, be it politics or job,’ she said.

‘No religion including Islam prohibits anyone from serving the people and in the present time, entering politics is the best way to serve the people. Women can also serve the people and Islalm does not stop them from doing so,’ Shamim Nasir, a corporator, said.

The Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB), which conducts the examinations, has made elaborate arrangements for peaceful and fair exams.

‘The first day’s exam took place at 561 examination centres peacefully and without any trouble,’ Anup Kumar Sinha, a BSEB official, told IANS.

BSEB has taken extensive measures to curb cheating for which the state has been notorious in the past, Sinha said.

‘The examinations are being conducted with unprecedented measures to curb cheating,’ he added.

It has ordered videography at all centres to check cheating and has set up a control room with a telephone for round the clock vigil.

‘Special anti-copying squads have been deployed at the district level to keep strict vigil at each centre,’ said Sinha.

In Bihar, cheating is rampant and any action to stop it has often led to violent protests.

‘We also want reservation in parliament and legislative assemblies. As we are transgenders we are deprived of our basic rights and are ill-treated by society. So if there is reservation for our community in parliament, we can raise our issues in the temple of the Indian constitution,’ Sujoy Debnath alias Suzane, a transgender, told IANS.

Biswanath Nandi, another transgender from Shyambazar, echoes Sujoy.

He says whenever they go to hospitals, the officers are in a dilemma whether to admit them in the male or female ward.

‘We want reservation in parliament and legislative assemblies. It will be of great help to us in achieving our basic rights. Apart from parliament and legislative assembies, we also want reservations in healthcare, education and jobs so that we can also live a decent life,’ says Nandi.

‘We feel prostitutes and transgenders need reservation. We are the most neglected lot,’ said Rekha, a sex worker.

However, there is a divided view on providing reservations for members of the sexual minority groups.

Manas Bangla, an organisation keeping track of different sexual minority welfare organisations, says that transgenders deserve reservation as they come from poor economic background.

‘In my personal view I do feel that transgenders, gays, lesbians should be brought under the reservation system. The transgenders need it as most of them come from a very poor economic background,’ says Sanjib Chakroborty, a Manas Bangla official and a gay.

Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) central committee leader Mohammed Salim told IANS: ‘They can contest from general seats.’

Kunal Choudhury, a gay and an activist working for the rights of sexual minority groups, said: ‘We do have this reservation issue in our minds but before that we need to secure the basic rights for sexual minority groups and increase awareness regarding these groups.’

Faiyaz Ahmed Khan, member of the mayor-in-council, Kolkata Municipal Corporation, said: ‘They are always welcome to contest elections as they are part and parcel of society. They can contest elections for general seats only.’

The women’s reservation bill, which was passed by the Rajya Sabha, seeks to reserve 33 percent seats in parliament and state legislatures for women. The bill has still to be tabled in the Lok Sabha.

Subhash has been living a life of loneliness at the Himalayan Nature Park in Kufri, 15 km from here, since his maturity. He was bred from a pair of snow leopards brought from Finland.

‘Efforts have been on to find a suitable partner for Subhash for quite some time. We are now pinning hopes on the Padmaja Naidu Zoological Zoo in Darjeeling to arrange a new bloodline female snow leopard for him,’ Chief Conservator (Faunal Diversity and Protected Areas) Sanjeeva Pandey told IANS.

‘Darjeeling is the only other zoo in the country besides Kufri which has a snow leopard. We have approached them and they assured us that they would soon be in a position to provide a female snow leopard,’ he said.

Subhash and his sibling Sapna were brought to Kufri from Darjeeling under an exchange programme in 2004. The breeding programme couldn’t be initiated as they belonged to the same bloodline. Sapna died due to disease in 2007.

This was the second mysterious death of a snow leopard in the nature park. Earlier, a female snow leopard had died. The female leopard had been discovered as a cub by the shepherds in the Spiti Valley in Lahaul and Spiti district and was reared in the park.

‘We are hoping that we might be lucky again to encounter an abandoned female cub or a wounded snow leopard from the higher reaches of Lahaul and Spiti, Kinnaur and Kullu districts, where there is a good population of snow leopards,’ Pandey said.

Principal Chief Conservator of Forests Vinay Tandon said: ‘We are scouting for a partner even from abroad. Subhash was bred from a pair brought from Finland. We are still trying to contact zoos in Finland, Holland and Bronx in the US to get a female snow leopard so that the breeding programme of the highly endangered species could be initiated.’

According to wildlife experts, the captive animals need to be kept in pairs; otherwise their natural behaviour could be affected.

‘Keeping animals in isolation for a longer duration often results in emotional stress and other behavioural problems,’ said Sandeep Rattan, a veterinary surgeon with the wildlife wing.

Even rule 37 of the Recognition of Zoo Rules, 1992, clearly mentions that no animal will be kept without a mate for a period exceeding one year unless there is a legitimate reason for doing so or if the animal has already passed its prime and is of no use for breeding purposes.

Photo Caption: A male snow leopard at the Himalayan Nature Park in Kufri, 15 km from Shimla. Photo: Kumar Lalit (Photo IANS)

Three generations of the family of the late Borno Bahadur Thapa reside in a cluster of mud-and-thatch huts in Nepalipam village of Sonitpur district, about 220 km north of Assam’s main city of Guwahati.

‘In all we have 181 people from the same family now. My father had five wives and we are 12 brothers and nine sisters, and now the family tree has grown very big, but all of us live in the same village,’ said 45-year-old Purno Bahadur Thapa, one of the 12 brothers.

There are two schools in the village – a lower primary school and a middle school. Up to 70 children go to the two schools – and both the teachers and students are from the same family.

‘Our children go to schools with all the teachers and students from the same family. No outsiders are allowed to study in our schools,’ said another of the 12 brothers, adding ‘We eke out a living through agriculture.’

Another interesting facet of this jumbo family is that they buy their essentials from a government-aided cooperative shop run by one of the 12 brothers.

‘Even the daily provisions of the entire village are bought from the shop run by my brother,’ said Thapa with a broad smile.

Their father settled in this area some 60 years ago – he was a daily wage earner and later took to farming.

So far none of the family members is into a government job. While a majority of them are engaged in agriculture, cultivating paddy, some of them work as daily wage labourers, and a few do contract works in nearby areas.

‘We are happy the way we are. We are a mini community by ourselves and we are proud, because we have family values and unity,’ said Hari Thapa, one of the family members.

During festivals and other rituals, the entire family gets together in a common field to celebrate.

‘It is true we don’t remember the names of all the family members, but yes we do recognize all of them and feel for each other,’ Purno Bahadur Thapa said.

For politicians, the village is an attraction. During every election, candidates try to woo the head of the family, or the influential among the 12 brothers, to get votes.

‘We are much sought after during each election with candidates seeking votes. But they always make promises, but have never done anything for us,’ said Hari.

All of these motorcycles are equipped with latest gadgets to meet the demanding requirements of highway patrolling.

‘This fleet of motor-cycles has been introduced on 534 kilometers of national highway falling in Punjab, from Shambhu to Jalandhar, Jalandhar to Amritsar and Jalandhar to Pathankot, besides on the roads connecting these highways to airports at Amritsar and Mohali (in Chandigarh),’ Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal said.

All motor-cycles have been equipped with latest gadgets such as GPS (global positioning system), wireless and mobile phones, warning lights and sirens besides other aids required for traffic management and control, he said.

All of these motorcycles are equipped with latest gadgets to meet the demanding requirements of highway patrolling.

‘This fleet of motor-cycles has been introduced on 534 kilometers of national highway falling in Punjab, from Shambhu to Jalandhar, Jalandhar to Amritsar and Jalandhar to Pathankot, besides on the roads connecting these highways to airports at Amritsar and Mohali (in Chandigarh),’ Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal said.

All motor-cycles have been equipped with latest gadgets such as GPS (global positioning system), wireless and mobile phones, warning lights and sirens besides other aids required for traffic management and control, he said.

According to an official press statement issued here, ‘The inquiry will be carried out by Lucknow Deputy Inspector General of police Rajiv Krishna.’

The release said, ‘It was learnt that the swarm of bees had come from a neighbouring Kendriya Vidyalaya, where someone lighted a fire under a huge beehive.’

It observed, ‘The inquiry will go into the apparent mischievous intention behind the act.’

Interestingly, the release added, ‘The chief minister remained undaunted, even as the bees continued to hover around her podium for a long time.’

The swarm of bees had descended at the rally venue around 1 p.m. and its presence did cause some commotion among everyone present. Even the chief minister’s personal security officers appeared to be at their wit’s end when the swarm reached the podium. However they were lucky that the swarm soon flew away.

Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Anshul Berry found Dharminder Shastri and his parents Bhoop Singh and Chanderpatti guilty of harassing Anjala and sent them to jail.

According to the police, a case was filed against Shastri Jan 15, 2002, on the complaint filed by his wife. Shastri was then posted as a teacher of Sanskrit in the Government School of village Khuda Ali Sher in Chandigarh.

‘Anjala married with Shastri in December 1998. In her complaint, she alleged that just after a few days of the marriage, her husband and in-laws started harassing her to bring more dowry, including a television, a washing machine and cash,’ her counsel said.

Later, the case was handed over to police’s crime against women cell. Anjala was the second wife of Shastri as he had already married Simla Devi in February 1996.

‘The Jharkhand government will survey prisoners of all jails who have exceeded their sentences in jail,’ said Hemlal Murmu, Human Resources Development (HRD) minister, in the state assembly Monday.

He was replying to a question of Kamal Kishore Bhagat of the All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU).

Bhagat wanted to know whether there is a provision in the jail manual to release life term prisoners after 14 years. ‘The latest Supreme Court ruling says life term means life long. There is a state review committee which looks into the cases of life term prisoners and orders release of those whose conduct is good.’

To another query, the minister said: ‘Prisoners who are staying in different jails beyond the sentence period will be released after the survey report.’

A central government administered UT, Chandigarh is the joint capital of Punjab and Haryana.

The resolution, moved by Education Minister Upinderjit Kaur, said Chandigarh city was established (in early 1950s) in nearly 30,000 acres of land of 28 villages of erstwhile undivided Punjab before Haryana and Himachal Pradesh were carved out of it, ‘but Punjabi, the mother-tongue of Punjabis, was never accorded its due respect, significance and recognition’.

‘It is being treated with indifference and neglect,’ the resolution said, demanding first language status be accorded to Punjabi language and it should be made compulsory and taught from class 1 to Class 10 in all schools.

The resolution also demanded a Punjabi Sahitya (literary) Academy be set up in Chandigarh for the promotion of Punjabi literature, heritage and culture. Official work should be discharged in Punjabi along with other languages.

It also sought that all the sign-boards and nameplates of all government offices, roads and public places should be displayed in Punjabi.

Members of the assembly later unanimously decided to call on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to impress upon him to secure second language status for Punjabi in all the neighbouring states.

A delegation of politicians and literary people, led by Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, will meet Punjab Governor Shivraj Patil, who is also the administrator of Chandigarh, Tuesday to seek first language status to Punjabi in Chandigarh.

In its reply in the state assembly, the government termed the killing of two students during the violent protests as ‘merely an accident’. It also said the coaching institutes hardly used force or fire-arms against protesting students Feb 9.

Angry over the government’s clean chit, the opposition members – particularly the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Lok Janshakti Party legislators – criticised the government.

However, in view of the violent protests, the state government said it has decided to bring in a new law to monitor and regulate the functioning of private coaching institutes. The bill, possibly the first of its kind in the country, will help to prevent innocent students from falling prey to false promises made by coaching institutes.

There are over 5,000 private coaching institutes in Patna, operating without any surveillance or legal sanction.

The gang leader was picked up March 9 from south Delhi. He has escaped with 26 others from the remand home in Mukherjee Nagar area late Sunday, injuring three guards of the juvenile home.

‘Twenty-seven juveniles have escaped remand house by jumping the wall. We have brought back two of them to the remand home. We will be interrogating them so we could know the hideouts of other culprits,’ said Deputy Commissioner of Police (northwest Delhi) N.C. Bundela.

Police said his gang is suspected of involvement in over 100 thefts and burglaries in the city.

Highly-placed sources in the police said that Bashir, who arrived in Ahmedabad Feb 20, used to make frequent calls to his home state.

Getting emboldened over the days, he also began making calls to his Hizbul Mujahideen handler Bilal Shera in Pakistan. In one such careless call made prior to Holi he is reported to have remarked that there was no fun in a Holi with colours and one steeped in blood would be more in keeping with the spirit of festivities this time.

Security agencies entrusted with screening suspect calls to terrorist hotbeds traced the conversation and subsequently the Gujarat ATS was tipped off. Bashir was tracked and subsequently picked up.

Bashir was produced before a magistrate in Ahmedabad and taken on 14 days remand late on Sunday night.

Ostensibly in Ahmedabad to be trained in setting up a cleft lip surgery camp in Kashmir for the Kemaya Foundation where he was employed as a camp assistant, Bashir was using the telephone and the laptop of the local doctor who had allowed him to stay in his flat.

ATS sources said that the flat-owning doctor was unaware of the terror background of Bashir and the use his phone and flat were being put to. Bashir’s extravagant lifestyle with food being ordered from McDonald’s daily also drew the attention of neighbours who later spilled the details to investigating cops, the source said.

Director General Police, Gujarat, S.S. Khandwawala when asked as to how Bashir was allowed to stay in a flat despite a notification making it mandatory for anyone renting his property to inform the cops – said that action would be taken against violators of the law.

‘A young scientist as a brand ambassador is certainly an interesting idea that could be explored,’ ISCA’s president-elect K.C. Pandey told IANS on the sidelines of a press meet here Monday.

The only ‘brand ambassador’ for science and technology that India now has and who fires the imagination of school children is former president A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.

Agreeing with Pandey, Sri Venkateswara University’s former vice chancellor R.Ramamurthy said that perhaps Nobel laureates of Indian origin could be looked at as possible brand ambassadors.

When it was noted that they were not in India, he said: ‘Perhaps we should identity ‘icons’ for different regions and different scientific streams.’

The officials, however, agreed that glamourising science or forcing students to study science will boomerang as scientists need perseverance and patience and there is no short cut to success in this field.

Citing the next Indian Science Congress’ (ISC) core theme ‘Quality Education and Excellence in Scientific Research in Indian Universities’, Pandey said the quality of science teaching has gone down tremendously in the country and in particular in states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.

Compounding the problem is that students are disinterested in studying science and are lured by other courses like management and software engineering.

‘We are not going to get good scientists in the years to come. It should be of great concern for the policy makers,’ Pandey told reporters here.

He said a session in the Science Congress will focus on making science teaching interesting to the students, and strongly rejected the idea of forcing science subjects on students at the college level.

‘Students should be attracted to study science. If you don’t have interest, then you will be a failure,’ he said.

The accident took place near the Mahuni railway station in Sitapur, some 80 km from Lucknow.

‘The derailment substantially damaged the tracks. The exact reason behind it is yet to be established, it appears it was due to some technical snag in the train’s brakes,’ Government Railway Police (GRP) inspector Vishwanath Yadav told reporters in Sitapur.

Senior railway officials have been asked to conduct an enquiry into the accident and submit the report at the earliest, he added.

According to officials, it would take a few hours to repair the tracks and allow the traffic on the route. Work was on under supervision of senior officials.

The goods train was headed for Moradabad from Lucknow.

The tag will allow 50 percent reservation for Muslims but no quota for any other category.

N.U. Khan, president of the Jamia Teachers’ Association, said: ‘This is another effort to press the government to recognise Jamia Millia Islamia as a Muslim minority educational institution in clear terms.’

‘Reserving 50 percent seats for Muslims will leave the rest 50 percent for general category. Implementation of this reservation will do away with other types of reservations for the Scheduled Castes (SC), the Scheduled Tribes (ST) and Other Backward Classes (OBC),’ Khan added.

He said that colleges like Khalsa and St. Stephen’s also have minority status.

Under the central government guidelines, all central universities must implement 27 percent OBC reservation quota. Jamia, which has a central university status, is yet to initiate the process.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) has written many times that the varsity must implement the government rule or else it may face monetary sanctions.

The Jamia, established in 1920 by an act of parliament, currently has around 19,000 students.

The teachers’ march also saw the participation of MPs like Kamal Akhtar of the Samajwadi Party and Ahmad Saeed Maleehabadi, a Rajya Sabha member from West Bengal.

Special Public Prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam and defence counsel K.P. Pawar informed Special Judge M.L. Tahaliyani that they hoped to complete their respective arguments by the weekend.

‘I informed the court that I would need another two days to complete the final arguments,’ Nikam, who argued for the fifth day Monday, later told IANS.

Thereafter, defence lawyer Pawar representing Kasab also said that he would take another day or so to reply to the arguments and the same was the response of the defence lawyers for the other two co-accused Sabauddin Ahmed and Faheem Ansari.

To this Special Judge Tahaliyani said that if the final arguments could be concluded by March 20, then he would post the case for delivering the judgement.

‘We expect that the verdict will be delivered in April,’ Nikam said.

This would bring the curtains down on one of the most high-profile trials in the country’s legal history, involving the sole survivor of the Nov 26-29, 2008, Mumbai terror attack, Kasab.

He and his nine associates created mayhem lasting for 60 hours during which they killed 166 people and wounded nearly 300 others in one of the worst terror attacks in the country.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is part of the Punjab’s coalition government, named former Lok Sabha MP Avinash Rai Khanna as its candidate for the elections.

Elections for five Rajya Sabha seats from the state, which are falling vacant next month, is scheduled for March 26.

The Akali Dal-BJP alliance is likely to get three seats and the opposition Congress is likely to win two seats on the basis of the respective strengths of the parties in the state assembly.

While Dhindsa, one of the senior-most Akali Dal leaders, lost the Lok Sabha election from Sangrur last year, Gujral, the son of former prime minister Inder Kumar Gujral, has earlier been a Lok Sabha member from the state.

The Congress is likely to re-nominate union Sports Minister M.S. Gill for the Rajya Sabha poll since his term in the house ends next month.

Punjab’s Chief Electoral Officer Kusumjit Sidhu said that Dhindsa and Gujral filed their nomination papers Monday.

Tuesday is the last date for filing nominations.

Earlier this month, a special court at the Sabarmati prison had turned down the accused’ plea and started to consider the confession statements as evidence against them.

Designated Judge P.R. Patel had observed that a decision whether to accept the statements as evidence can be considered at a later stage and the trial should continue.

The accused had, thereafter, approached the high court, challenging the decision.

During the hearing of the case in the high court Monday, Ashok Shah, counsel for the petitioners, advanced the plea that section 32 of the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) cannot be applied in this case as the act has been abolished and, therefore, it is now a normal trial.

‘According to section 32 of POTA, confessional statements of the accused could be considered as evidence in POTA trial. However, as POTA has been revoked, confessional statements cannot be used as evidence in a normal trial,’ he argued.

After hearing Shah’s arguments, Justice Anant Dave adjourned the matter till Tuesday.

A total of 59 people were burnt alive when the Sabarmati Express’ coach numbers S-5 and S-6 were set afire at Godhra station Feb 27, 2002. According to public prosecutor J.M. Shah, 101 people were put on trial.

Police had arrested 116 of the 134 who were charged. Thirteen were released due to lack of evidence whereas 17 are still on the run. The minor accused have been kept at a juvenile observation home.

‘Allaying fears that subdued placements for the finance vertical would continue due to the spill-over effect of the recession, finance emerged to be the most preferred vertical among the students. A whopping 39 percent of the total roles on offer were made in the finance domain,’ the institute’s director Debashis Chatterjee said in a communique.

This year, 122 firms went to IIM-K to recruit students, 28 more than the last placement season.

Roles ranging from investment banking, corporate finance, equity research, retail banking and risk management were on offer.

This segment expectedly witnessed an impressive average salary of about Rs.1.76 million per annum package. Besides, Indian financial companies like ICICI, IDBI, SBI, international players like Nomura, Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, Bank of America-Merrill Lynch, J.P. Morgan, Standard Chartered, HSBC, Citi, and Royal Bank of Scotland also went to hire students.

Other than finance, marketing and consulting also dominated the placement season, with 27 percent of the roles offered being for sales and marketing profiles and 22 percent for consulting profiles.

The largest recruiter for the season was Deloitte, who picked up 19 students from the campus.

The bill, cleared by the cabinet in December last year, was tabled in the Lok Sabha Monday by Minister of State for Environment Jairam Ramesh.

Criticising some of the provisions of the bill, BJP MP Anant Kumar said: ‘The tribunal would have the right to levy any amount of costs on litigants. It would be unconstitutional and would discourage environment-friendly people from coming forward with their issues related to ecology.’

He said the experts body proposed to be set up would be nothing but a club of retired IAS officers.

‘There is a complete mismatch between the government’s claims and the provisions of the bill. We can’t accept the bill in its present form and it should be relooked at,’ he said.

The bill aims to establish an autonomous tribunal, independent of the ministry of environment and forests, for environmental clearance of developmental projects.

President Pratibha Patil had mentioned the bill in her address to the joint session of parliament last month, saying: ‘To ensure expeditious and effective disposal of civil cases relating to environmental protection and conservation of forests, a National Green Tribunal Bill has been introduced.’

If approved by parliament, the bill will be used for effective and expeditious disposal of cases relating to environmental protection, conservation of forests and other natural resources, thus strengthening environmental adjudication and settlement of disputes, the government says.

The bill incorporates the best practices in other countries and international nuclear liability regimes, well placed sources familiar with government thinking, said.

The government denies that the legislation has been done under American pressure and was conceptualized much before the 2005 India-US civil nuclear deal with a view to ramp up nuclear energy production in the country. It has been in the making for the last 10 years, the sources said.

The bill, said sources, caps the liability of the operator at Rs.500 crore, but there are provisions within the legislation that allow the government to scale up liability and take over the responsibility of safeguarding the interests of the victims.

India plans to scale up its nuclear energy production from the current 4,100 MW to 20,000 MW by 2020 and take it further to 40,000 MW by 2035.

To achieve these targets, it is necessary to instil confidence in potential investors in the civil nuclear industry to save them from financially ruinous consequences of unlimited liability in the case of a nuclear accident.

Given the fierce opposition from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Left parties, the government Monday decided against moving the contentious Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill in the Lok Sabha.

The bill also envisages the setting up of a commission to investigate an accident and fix the responsibility.

The passing of the bill in parliament is a crucial step that India is required to take under the 123 agreement with the US.

The passing of the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2010, was accompanied by a spirited debate.

The bill, which was promulgated as an ordinance by President Pratibha Patil Jan 23, seeks to strengthen the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958, and imposes stringent punishment on the violators of the act’s provisions.

The bill, piloted by Law and Justice Minister Veerappa Moily, stipulates that a minimum area of 100 metres in all directions of the protected monuments and sites shall be declared prohibited for purposes of construction and no private or public construction in the prohibited area will be allowed except those undertaken by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI).

The ASI will be responsible for the upkeep, maintenance and management of the protected monuments and sites.

The bill says in addition to the 100 metres of prohibited area around the site, a minimum area of 200 metres in all directions of the protected site will be regulated.

No construction will also be allowed on these areas, ‘except in accordance and permitted by extent of the heritage bylaws’ which will have to be approved by the central government which might extend it more than 200 metres.

The bill recommends the constitution of an expert committee, which will look after conservation of heritage. ‘The National Monument Authority will comprise archaeological and heritage experts and will work without any interference from the bureaucracy,’ Moily said.

Sarpanch Surender and council member (panch) Ramesh in Samaspur village of Bhiwani, 300 km from here, were placed under suspension under section 51(1)(a) of Haryana Panchayati Raj Act, 1994, for declaring void the marriage of a couple.

The two members have been charged with making a marriage an issue of dispute of ‘gotras’ (lineage) and inciting people against it, violating the directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

Bhiwani Deputy Commissioner Vikas Gupta Monday said that both have also been directed to submit the funds of their panchayat, the records and moveable and immoveable property to the authorities concerned.

They have been directed not to attend any meeting of the Samaspur panchayat.

Gupta said the Bhiwani police submitted a report March 10 that Bhagwan, a resident of village Samaspur, had married Anita of village Makrani on January 11 at the Arya Samaj Mandir in Jaipur.

However, the Samaspur headman and council member announced the marriage void since both the groom and the bride belonged to the same gotra, and also provoked people against this marriage.

The duo then organised the panchayat (council meeting) of ‘Faugat Gotra’ Feb 26 and 27 and March 3 and a unilateral decision was taken to socially boycott the family of Randhir Singh, the father of the groom (Bhagwan).

The council also asked the family to leave the village.

Gupta said that the panchayat’s decision was in violation of the directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and could have led to a serious law and order problem.

With the rising number of controversial and illegal decisions being announced by Khap panchayats in Haryana in recent years, especially against young married couples belonging to the same gotra, the state administration has started acting against the extra-constitutional authority being wielded by these ‘khap councils’.

A campaign has been launched in Haryana’s Rohtak district to put an end to such decisions.

The Rohtak district administration has urged the representatives of khap panchayats to desist from pronouncing unilateral and controversial decisions and have been urged to instead work for the welfare of the society.

The administration asked khap members not to pronounce any decision which adversely affected the rights of any particular community or section of the society or any individual.

The district officials cautioned the Khap panchayats that the district administration would not hesitate to take legal action against those panchayats which would take ‘atrocious and anti-society decisions’ in future.

In recent months, Khap panchayat decisions have led to murders after objections were raised, particularly against couples from the same gotra getting married. Affected families have faced social boycotts and turned out of villages after the khaps arbitrarily ruled against them even at the cost of going against the law.

‘What’s wrong if I install my own statues together with those of my party icons whose contribution as great social reformers remained unrecognised for decades because of the sick caste bias of those who were in power?’ she asked the crowd which converged at her party rally here Monday.

The rally was organised to mark the party’s silver jubilee celebrations, and coincided with the 76th birth anniversary of party founder and her political mentor Kanshi Ram.

She said: ‘My critics often argue that it is inappropriate to install statues of a living person, but I wish to ask them if there is any law disallowing installation of statues of important personalities?’

‘Where is the law preventing official expenditure on statues of living personalities?’ she said, defending her actions of spending billions of rupees on statues and memorials.

‘Remember, what I have spent on memorials and statues was only one per cent of the state’s annual budget, but what I have built is going to be there for posterity.’

‘I firmly believe that those who are unable to create history are always pushed into oblivion. That is why it was important to leave such imprints that will stay for all times to come,’ Mayawati said.

A bench of Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan, Justice Deepak Verma and Justice B.S. Chauhan asked the DAV Trust to pay the interim damages first as a condition for hearing its lawsuit challenging a Punjab and Haryana High Court ruling for a compensation of Rs.46 crore.

The bench asked the DAV Trust to deposit the interim compensation amount with Sirsa’s additional civil judge within six weeks for onward distribution of relatives of 446 people, including 230 children, killed at a school run by the DAV Trust in Dabwali in Haryana, in one of the country’s worst fire tragedies.

The bench also issued notice to the Dabwali Fire Tragedy Victims’ Association, seeking its response to the lawsuit filed of the DAV managing committee.

The DAV managing committee had come to the apex court challenging the Nov 9, 2009, decision of the Punjab and Haryana high court fixing a compensation of about Rs.46 crore to be shared between the committee and the Haryana government.

The high court had also directed the managing committee to foot 55 percent of the compensation amount. The state government had accepted the order to pay 45 percent of the compensation amount.

The committee challenged the order, contending that the amount and the share fixed by the high court was excessive.

The tragedy on December 23, 1995, had claimed 446 lives and left 200 others injured.

Mohit Sharma, 33, a resident of Dilshad Garden applied for information about illegal construction in Shahdara area. However, when he didn’t get information, he approached the Central Information Commission (CIC). He runs a confectionery shop in Dilshad Garden area.

Though the CIC ordered the MCD officials to provide him the information, till date he claims he has not got the information.

‘In the past, I got a few threats not to pursue my application but I never paid heed to them. But on March 12 afternoon, three persons – MCD’s executive engineer B.M.N. Rao, assistant engineer Umesh Singh and one unidentified man – came to my house. They were very angry with me and said, ‘Due to your case, the CIC is after us and even our superintending engineer has issued a showcause notice to B.M.N. Rao’,’ Mohit told IANS.

‘Umesh Singh threatened me and said ‘you are too young to play with such dangerous things’. He said, ‘you do not have an idea what actually you are doing, you are playing with fire and it can harm you’,’ Mohit alleged.

Mohit has a hearing scheduled in his case at the CIC Wednesday but alleged that they warned him not to attend it.

‘Umesh Singh warned me against attending the March 17 hearing. He said if I don’t tell information commissioner Shailesh Gandhi that I have got all the information, then he will shoot me. He said, ‘no one can survive after having a clash with MCD officials’,’ Mohit Sharma said.

Mohit alleged Umesh Singh threatened him that he would demolish his house and his brother’s shop.

However, the MCD officials – B.M.N. Rao and Umesh Singh – refuted all allegations and said they never threatened him.

‘He is just like other RTI applicants. Government officers can’t even kill a fly, why will we threaten him of life,’ Umesh Singh said to IANS but admitted that they went to Sharma’s house.

Mohit Sharma said: ‘He (Umesh) told me that they take only 10 minutes to start action. ‘We keep on getting suspended and reinstated. If you die in an accident, then no-one can do anything. You have to live a long life but in this way you cannot live long’.’

‘I am scared for my life but will not withdraw from the case. The authorities should take proper action against them,’ he said.

The country has recently witnessed a number of incidents in which activists were either killed or attacked for asking information under the RTI act.

In fact, no one noticed the Rs.1,000 currency notes with which the giant garland was created until these were identified by a local photographer when he zoomed in.

Earlier, while Mayawati was being garlanded, mediapersons could make out from a distance that it was not a run-of-the-mill garland. But beholders perceived it as one made of some exquisite imported flowers.

However, the mystery was unravelled no sooner than the still pictures were promptly lifted and beamed by TV channels.

Those present on the dais, however, feigned ignorance about the unique garland in which some 50,000 currency notes of Rs.1,000 each were believed to have been used.

The garland was specially crafted and brought by Mayawati’s party functionaries all the way from Bangalore for Monday’s mega rally organised by her to mark the Bahujan Samaj Party’s silver jubilee celebrations, which coincided with the 76th birth anniversary of party founder and her political mentor Kanshi Ram.

‘This is a milestone, which will enhance choices, increase competition, and benchmark quality,’ Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal said after a cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

‘(It’s) a larger revolution than even (the one) in the telecom sector,’ Sibal added.

The bill, which will now be tabled in parliament for its approval, has provisions to regulate the entry and operation of foreign institutions, which will set up campus and offer degrees in India.

Thousands of Indian students go to the US, Britain and Australia among other countries, every year, to study in foreign universities. The effort is part of the central government’s continued focus on education reform.

Sibal, who sounded elated Monday, has been pushing for this since he took over the ministry last year. The minister, too, has been in touch with several top universities in the US and Britain about such a move.

Welcoming the move, Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow, director, Devi Singh said: ‘It is a good move and will help bring internationally reputed education providers to India.’

‘However, it is important that the foreign institutions entering India offer the same degrees and diplomas that they are offering back home. This will help ensure that the certification provided by them in India will have the same value internationally as their current qualifications,’ Singh added.

This will help ensure Indian students access the same curriculum and quality of education that these institutions provide in their own countries, he added.

Among the foreign universities likely to set up shop in India are Boston University, Harvard and Yale University from the US.

Two days after police recovered huge cache of arms and ammunition from a Maoist dump, Director General of Police R.R. Girish Kumar told media persons here that the guerrillas were planning major strikes and some ‘action teams’ were moving to different places for the purpose.

Alarmed over the seizure of spare parts sufficient to make 3,000 hand grenades and rocket launchers from a peaceful village in coastal Andhra, the police chief appealed to people to alert police about any movement of Maoists or their arms and ammunition caches.

He displayed before media the huge stockpiles of arms and ammunitions recovered from a house in Paidiparru village near Tanuku mandal in West Godavari district Saturday.

The material, in 26 gunny bags, included spare parts like springs, pins and tubes used for making hand grenades, tube launchers used to assemble rocket launchers, parts used for land mines and 26 rounds of 9mm pistol ammunition.

The dump was recovered a day after the killing of a top Maoist, S. Kondal Reddy, by the police in Warangal district. Popular as ‘Tech Ramna’ among Maoists, he was proficient in technical matters and had taken the house on rent for storing arms and ammunition.

The police chief said if used, the material could have caused huge loss of life. ‘These are deadly weapons meant for liquidating the police and security personnel as well as the common man. Imagine what they could have done with this huge arms stockpile,’ he said.

Police claimed that Maoists were collecting the material for last two to three years from different places in preparation for major attacks.

The police chief did not rule out the possibility of Maoists having similar caches in other places and appealed to people to be vigilant.

The DGP said Maoists were trying to again make their presence felt following a series of setbacks they suffered in recent years. He said the number of Maoists in the state could be around 400.

Kondal Reddy and Shakhamuri Appa Rao, two of the most wanted Maoists, were gunned down by police in two different shoot-outs in the state’s Warangal and Prakasam districts Friday.

The office in Hyderabad will support users, advertisers and developers in India and around the world, according to a statement issued by the company.

The move is part of a push to establish support centres in multiple time zones, with round-the-clock, multilingual support, the company said, adding that the office will supplement operations supported out of Palo Alto, California, Dublin, Ireland and a recently announced location in Austin, Texas.

Facebook has around 400 million users, of which more than eight million are in India.

‘Satish Misra will henceforth head a new legal cell that we have created in view of the increasing litigation against me and the party. He is being taken away from political work as the legal work is time consuming and requires focused attention,’ she said at the party’s silver jubilee function here.

However, she added that her intention was not to sideline Misra, her blue-eyed Brahmin mascot. ‘The opposition has often misused the media to spread canards that Misra is being marginalized in the party, but that is absolutely baseless and false,’ she stressed.

However, unlike her last major rally after she rode on to power in 2007, when Misra was not only seated next to her, but was also asked to address the mammoth gathering, this time there was no chair kept beside her. All ministers and senior leaders including Misra were seated in a row behind her on the dias.