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Pranab nominated leader of House in Lok Sabha

         New Delhi: Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee has been nominated as the Leader of the House in the Lok Sabha, official sources said on Thursday. The nomination was made by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the sources said, adding Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad has conveyed the Prime Minister's decision through a letter to Mukherjee. The Lok Sabha secretariat has also been informed by Azad of this decision, the sources said.

CMP promises repeal of POTA, reservation for women (Go To Top)

          New Delhi: The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance Government on Thursday committed itself to repeal the controversial POTA, prevent privatisation of profit-making public sector units, go for 33 per cent reservation of seats for women in the Lok Sabha and State Assemblies and initiate a national dialogue on job reservation for SC and ST people in the private sector. These commitments were made in the Common Minimum Programme of the coalition released here by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the presence of UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and leaders of Congress' allies and supporting parties including those from the Left. The Prime Minister said the CMP lays down broad parameters according to which the UPA will work. The government will seek to preserve, protect and promote social harmony and ensure 7 to 8 per cent growth on a sustainable manner over a decade. Singh said the government will also enhance welfare of farmers, artisans and labour, particularly in the unorganised sector. The government will seek to fully empower women, provide full equality of opportunity in jobs and education and release the creative energies of entrepreneurs, scientists and other professionals.

          The Prime Minister said the UPA was committed to provide "corruption-free, transparent, accountable, responsible and responsive" government at all times. He further pledged to preserve and protect social harmony and enforce the law without fear and favour. The UPA, Singh said, was committed to welfare and well-being of farmers, workers and farm labourers and to ensure a secure future for their families. The CMP also pledged to provide political and economic empowerment and equality of opportunities, particularly in education and employment for scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, minorities and other weaker sections.

Dixit takes over as National Security Advisor (Go To Top)

          New Delhi: Former Foreign Secretary J N Dixit assumed charge as India's National Security Advisor (NSA) today with the rank of a Minister of State. Dixit's prime responsibility will be to assist Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh in areas of security and foreign policy, besides serving as the key link between the Prime Minister's Office and India's recently formed Nuclear Command Authority. Dixit brings to job loads of diplomatic and security-related experience, having served as the country's envoy in key neighbouring countries like Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. He has also been a former member of the National Security Advisory Board, and contributed to the decision-making process that followed the 1998 Pokhran nuclear tests. Dixit, who joined the Congress party nearly three years ago is creditted with formulating a consistent foreign policy for the party, especially on Pakistan.

New petrol pricing policy soon: Mani Shankar (Go To Top)

          New Delhi: Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar on Thursday said that the Government would come out with a new pricing mechanism "soon" to ensure that petroleum products are available to consumers at "reasonable prices". Indicating no revision in petrol prices on May 31, he said a large number of factors would be considered before taking any decision on prices. The government is watching developments abroad and it would wait till the 'outcome of June 3-meeting of OPEC members'. The members were expected to take a decision to increase supplies in the international markets to stabilise prices, he said.

BSF hands over list of 210 more militant camps in Bangla (Go To Top)

          Shillong: Border Security Force (BSF) has handed over to Bangladesh Rifles a fresh list of 210 camps of various insurgent outfits in that country and said a joint operation would be conducted if similar camps existed in India. BSF Inspector General of Assam, Meghalaya, Manipur and Nagaland, S C Srivastava, said on Thursday the list was handed over during a meeting between the Directors, general of the two forces at Dhaka last month. The list referred to the listing 194 odd camps of the banned ULFA, NLFT, ATTF and KLO in Bangladesh which the Indian authorities requested the Bangladesh government to destroy. Asked about BDR's response, he said they made counter- allegations about the existence of Bangladesh militant camps in India. "But our DG Ajai Raj Sharma strongly refuted the charge and offered joint operations by the BSF and BDR in both countries." He said arms smuggling across the border was another major concern of the BSF and that the seizure of huge consignment of arms and ammunition by Bangladesh police on April 2 at Chittagong port "proved that it was being sent for the insurgents in the North East".

Pak spy arrested in Bhopal (Go To Top)

         Bhopal: A Pakistani national suspected to be a spy has been arrested by police in Bhopal. Acting on a tip-off, police raided a house in the city's locality and arrested Abdul Sami. Sami is said to have links with ISI, Pakistan's intelligence services. They also recovered secret documents which carried information about the Indian army. "We had received information that a Pakistani National is living in Gandhi Nagar. Our crime branch took action on this and arrested him. During interrogation he revealed that he was a resident of Punjab in Pakistan. We also recovered secret documents which carry information about our army," said Vipin Maheshwari, superitendent of police.

Junior military men involved in attempts on me: Musharraf (Go To Top)

          Islamabad: President Pervez Musharraf has disclosed that people from within the Pakistan army and air force at a junior level were involved in an assassination attempt on him in December last year and most of them are now in custody. "Well there are some people in uniform, junior level, people in uniform, air force and army but they are very small," Musharraf said. In an exclusive interview with Geo's talk show "Follow Up With Fahd" which was aired on Thursday at 10.05 p.m, Musharraf said these personnel of the armed forces would be tried in a military court. The proceedings, he said, would be open. The President was referring to the attempt on his life on December---when a bridge on his route was blown up seconds after his motorcade passed over it. Musharraf said no senior officers were involved in the attempt on his life. "We have investigated everything, we exactly know who is involved", Musharraf said. Musharraf said that the explosives used in the attack were taken from the Tribal Areas to Multan and then brought to Islamabad. He said the government knew exactly how the two attacks on him were planned and executed. Musharraf said the mastermind behind these attacks has been identified and that he was a Pakistani.

Army colonel denies charge of Siachen fake killings (Go To Top)

          Jodhpur: Colonel K D Singh, commanding officer of the battalion allegedly involved in Siachen fake killings, today denied the charge saying that during the deployment of his regiment on higher reaches of the Himalaya 45 Pakistani soldiers were killed in 'real' encounters. Deposing before a military court in the first open trial, Commanding officer of Gorkha battalion Col Singh, pointed out several strategic locations captured on video shots to assert that killing of enemy soldiers was "indeed real". He said there had been regular exchange of fire whenever Pakistanis tried to intrude into Indian territoty in Siachen glacier region where Indian positions were at higher reaches. "My battalian did an excellent job in the inhospitable terrain in defending border and it was wrong to charge that we 'faked' encounter killings". Col Singh told the court that there were six vedio cameras with the troops at the glacier. Two of the cameras belonged to army headquarters, two others belonged to the battalion and the remaining two were of army personnel. He said 45 Pakistani soldiers were killed by his battalion during its deployment in the region.

Bhupathi-Mirnyi advance to 2nd round at French Open (Go To Top)

          New Delhi: India's Mahesh Bhupathi and Max Mirnyi of Belarus moved into the second round of men's doubles at the French Open Grand Slam tennis championship in Paris. The third seeded Indo-Belarussian pair defeated Sebastien de Chaunac and Stephane Robert of France 6-1, 6-4 in the first round match yesterday. Earlier, Leander Paes and David Rikl (Czech Republic) also advanced to the second round defeating Juan Ignacio Carrasco and Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo of Spain 6-2, 6-4.