‘Modi for PM’ cry in BJP grows louder, pressure on leadership

NEW DELHI: Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi stole the show at BJP's national council meeting here without uttering a word. Even as the BJP leadership debates whether or not to declare Modi as the party's candidate for prime minister in the coming election, party delegates cutting across regions made plain their choice unambiguously on Saturday. While the leadership now has to take note of the...

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BJP meet to discuss larger role for Modi

NEW DELHI: A two-day meeting of BJP's national council, which is likely to clear the way for Gujarat CM Narendra Modi to play a larger role on the national stage, is beginning here on Saturday. Although the meeting of the council has been convened to ratify Rajnath Singh's appointment as the party chief, it has taken on a greater significance because it is also supposed to clear the way for the return...

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Manik Sarkar, son of tailor, to be Tripura chief minister again

AGARTALA: Tripura chief minister Manik Sarkar, set to assume office for a fourth time after leading the Left to a huge electoral win, is the son of a tailor who still washes his own clothes.An unassuming man, the 64-year-old got down to work no soon than he was declared the winner from Dhanpur constituency. He met CPM leaders and activists at Sonamura, 60km from here. On Thursday, the Communist...

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No difference in Cong, NDA regimes: Pawar

NEW DELHI: NCP chief and Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar said he did not find much difference in the policies of the Congress governments and the Vajpayee-led NDA regime, in what can set off speculation of political realignment. Speaking at a book launch function on Wednesday, the NCP chief said while many governments had been formed by the opposition parties, most of them were supported...

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PDP’s Mufti joins chorus of demand for Afzal body

SRINAGAR: Former Union minister and Jammu and Kashmir's main Opposition PDP's patriarch Mufti Mohammad Sayeed has expressed solidarity with the crowded corner that is asking for the dead body of Afzal Guru. The ruling National Conference, a coalition government between the NC and the Congress, has already pressed for the return of the mortal remains of Guru, hanged inside Tihar jail on February...

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Four IM men plotting strikes in India in return for ISI hospitality

NEW DELHI: They had fled to Pakistan to escape the long arm of the law in India. Now, they are plotting terror strikes on India with unflinching regularity as a trade-off for their own safety. Four top Indian Mujahideen (IM) operatives - Riyaz Bhatkal, Iqbal Bhatkal, Amir Raza Khan and Fayyaz Kagzi - have been enjoying Pakistani spy agency ISI's hospitality with a quid pro quo of carrying out attacks...

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PM expresses solidarity with blast victims

HYDERABAD: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Sunday expressed solidarity with the people of the city, shaken by the twin bomb blasts in Dilsukhnagar on Thursday. After visiting the blast site and the hospitals where the injured were being treated, the PM lauded the people for refusing to be provoked. Singh, who flew to Hyderabad from Delhi in a special IAF plane, paid a visit to Disukhnagar following...

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Polls: Meghalaya, Nagaland witness high voter turnout

DIMAPUR/SHILLONG: Despite a boycott call by a militant outfit, Meghalaya saw a high turnout of over 85 per cent voters in the assembly polls on Saturday. In Nagaland, the other northeastern state to go to the polls along with Meghalaya, more than 83 per cent of the electorate cast their votes.Defying the 36-hour bandh called by the Hynniewtrep National Liberation Council (HNLC) to keep people away...

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Indian Mujahideen hand becomes clearer in Hyderabad blasts

NEW DELHI: As investigators trawl the devastated spots in Hyderabad's Dilsukhnagar for clues to Thursday's twin blasts, a debate has begun in the home ministry over whether the terror attack could have been prevented.According to reports reaching here, there is no breakthrough yet for the investigators. "We are still groping in the dark," a senior home ministry official familiar with the details of...

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Hyderabad blasts: Dilsukhnagar has been on Indian Mujahideen radar since 1999

NEW DELHI: The twin blasts at Hyderabad are suspected to be the handiwork of Indian Mujahideen(IM) commander Riyaz Bhatkal. Although intelligence agencies are in no rush to jump to a judgment, their suspicion of IM's role is derived from the fact that the terror outfit had targeted precisely the same spot — near the foot overbridge in Dilsukhnagar — on August 25, 2007 when IM carried out serial blasts...

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Delhi airport Metro link operator got 'undue benefits': CAG

NEW DELHI: The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has said that there were serious irregularities, flouting of government norms and undue financial benefits to the private player in the Delhi airport Metro link.The country's first Metro rail project under the public-private partnership (PPP) model - Delhi Airport Metro Express Line (DAMPEL) - has been riddled with concessions to DAMPEL, the joint...

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Bihar records 11.95% growth, highest among states

PATNA: Despite global economic slowdown and sagging domestic demand, Bihar has managed to record 11.95% annual growth rate, the highest among all the states, during the 11th Plan period. According to the Economic Survey 2012-13 tabled by deputy CM and finance minister Sushil Kumar Modi in the state legislature on Tuesday, Bihar almost remained untouched by the overall global slowdown but for some...

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David Cameron woos India with visa, education sops

MUMBAI: Clearly out to woo Indian businesses and students, British Prime Minister David Cameron on his visit to Mumbai on Monday announced that the UK would introduce same-day visa services for investors and that there would be no cap on the number of Indian students to UK or the duration of their residence there. Accompanied by the largest-ever trade delegation from the UK to any country, the PM...

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Lokpal, right to reject can eliminate graft: Anna Hazare

HYDERABAD: Declaring that he would mobilize six crore people over next one and a half years for his anti-graft campaign, Anna Hazare on Sunday said Jan Lokpal alone cannot root out corruption and called for comprehensive electoral reforms and empowering of village-level bodies.Addressing a public meeting, he said his fight was for changing the entire system and called upon youths to join hands with...

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Rs 20 lakh Red Fort replica for Mayawati

NAGPUR: Former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati's state-level rally scheduled at Kasturchand Park on Sunday will also reflect the extravagant display of money power. The Bahujan Samaj Party chief would address the rally from the stage which would be a replica of the historic Red Fort at Delhi. The stage will be built at a cost of Rs 20 lakh. BSP workers in Nagpur roped in local decorator...

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IAF saddled with 3 Agusta choppers with limited spares

NEW DELHI: Three helicopters that have spare parts to fly for just a few months, pilots who are not fully conversant with the new VVIP helicopters, almost 45% of the money already paid and a huge consortium that may have to be blacklisted out of India for a decade. Friday's decision to cancel the controversial deal for the three-engine AW-101 helicopters from UK-based AgustaWestland, a subsidiary...

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J&K on edge, forces on guard

NEW DELHI: Although strict curfew is expected to be clamped in all trouble-prone areas of Kashmir, especially in Srinagar, on Friday, security forces are keeping their fingers crossed for what they believe will be the first full-blown expression of anger over Afzal Guru's hanging in the Valley. Government has dispatched 25 companies of Border Security Force (BSF) to assist CRPF, which is the main...

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All further payments to AgustaWestland put on hold

NEW DELHI: The government on Wednesday put on hold all further payments to AgustaWestland, the UK-based company accused of paying kickbacks in the Rs 3,546-crore deal for VVIP helicopters inked by India in 2010, in a grim bid to contain the political fallout from the fresh scam to have hit UPA-II. AgustaWestland, the subsidiary of Italian military giant Finmeccanica, has also been asked to explain...

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Kurien writes to Sonia, Ansari; pleads innocence

NEW DELHI: RajyaSabha deputy chairman PJKurien has written to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and Vice-President HamidAnsari, claiming innocence in the Suryanelli rape case. Kurien is learnt to have written to the two leaders last week to counter the renewed controversy over the rape scandal that has put him in the line of fire. BJP and CPM have adopted a tough stand, demanding that he step down from...

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No poll considerations in Guru’s hanging: Congress

NEW DELHI: Congress on Monday said it was preposterous to call Afzal Guru's hanging as timed to help the ruling party in elections, dismissing the allegations that have accompanied the execution of the Parliament attack case convict. "Elections are one-and-a-half years away and it is a long time in politics," AICC spokesman Sandeep Dikshit said, facing a barrage of queries on the timing of Guru's...

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