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Nation pays homage to Indira Gandhi New Delhi, Oct 31: Special prayers were held on Friday at the mausoleum of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to mark her 19th death anniversary. Congress president Sonia Gandhi, who is Indira's daughter-in-law, alongwith her son Rahul Gandhi, were among the first to pay homage. Delhi's chief minister Sheila Dixit and senior Congress leader and former Speaker of the Lok Sabha Shivraj Patil were among others who paid homage to Indira Gandhi at "Shakti Sthal". The sombre occasion was marked by musicians playing classical Indian music. Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards on October 31, 1984 at her official residence in New Delhi. The security personnel allegedly plotted the murder to take revenge on her ordering the troops into the Golden temple to eject the Sikh militants who were hiding there. The Golden temple in Amritsar is the holiest of Sikh shrines. Born on November 19, 1917 in Allahabad, the only child of Jawaharlal Nehru, country's first prime minister, Indira Gandhi joined politics in 1955, when she was elected to the executive body of the Congress Party. Following the death of prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri in 1966, Indira Gandhi was elected Prime Minister, becoming the first and only woman to occupy the office. During her tenure, India scored a convincing military victory against arch rival Pakistan in 1971, undertook the country's first nuclear test in 1974 and the country's first satellite Aryabhatta zoomed into space a year later. She declared internal emergency in but was ousted from power in the subsequent election, only to make a comeback as a more sombre leader. Indira Gandhi's tough image earned her the acronym of India's "Iron lady," a title bestowed on her contemporary, Britain's Margaret Thatcher, and incidentally Indira's mausoleum came to be known as "Shakti Sthal" or place of power. Indira's son Rajiv Gandhi who succeeded her, was also assassinated by a suspected Tamil rebel human bomb in 1991. Plebiscite only solution for Kashmir: US Congressman (Go To Top) Washington, Oct 31: The Kashmiris must be given the right to choose whether they want to live with India or Pakistan, a key US Congressman and member of the House Committee on International Relations has said. "The bottom line is right now we need to solve the problem, and Americans believe - and I believe Indians believe it's true as well - that people have a right to control their own destiny via the ballot box," the Dawn quoted Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican from California, as saying. "And I would suggest that people of good faith in India and in Pakistan get together to try to find a solution to which the people of Kashmir will vote for and approve," Rohrabacher said. The US Congressman said there could be no peace in South Asia until the Kashmir dispute is resolved. "All the rest of these problems are going to fester. Pakistan will continue to be destabilized because what we're doing is we're empowering the most radical elements in Pakistan by keeping the Kashmir an issue," he reportedly said at a meeting also attended by a former RAW chief. 'Big B' is UNICEF's goodwill envoy New Delhi, Oct 31: Amitabh Bachchan, the "angry young man" of yesteryears, will now promote children's cause. He has agreed to become UNICEF's (United Nations International Children's Education Fund) Goodwill Ambassador, it was announced Friday. "Bachchan's tremendous appeal to young people makes him an ideal Goodwill Ambassador. When he speaks, people from all walks of life, from the youngest to the oldest, listen carefully," said Maria Calivis, Unicef representative in India. She further said: "Our hope is to leverage Bachchan's powerful connection with the people of India to make a difference in children's lives, as he has already done for polio." As a part of his new responsibility, the "Big B" will be promoting rights of children in the country and around the world. He will periodically speak out on issues critical to the lives of children, such as HIV/AIDS, polio eradication and the need for all girls to have an opportunity to go to school. On his accepting the UNICEF's offer, Amitabh said, "I am extremely pleased to accept this responsibility. I hope that by adding my voice to the cause of children, it will make a difference in the lives of boys and girls here at home and across the region." Daler refused bail extension (Go To Top) New Delhi, Oct 31: The Delhi High Court on Friday refused to extend the interim anticipatory bail of Daler Mehndi in an illegal human trafficking case. Justice S K Agrawal, who had on October 23 granted 10-day interim anticipatory bail to Mehndi, told his counsel R P Bansal and Ravinder Kumar that no ex-parte relief would be given to the petitioner. The petitioner was advised to either go to the Punjab and Haryana High Court or the Supreme Court for further relief even as he issued notices to the Punjab police and the Delhi Government seeking their reply by Monday, the next date of hearing. Interim stay on arrest of former UP minister (Go To Top) Lucknow, Oct 31: The Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court on Friday ordered an interim stay on the arrest of former Minister Naseemuddin Siddiqui and two others in the Taj Heritage Corridor case till the conclusion of the investigation. The court, however, observed the stay on the interim arrest would apply till the arrest was absolutely necessary in accordance with the Supreme Court's directions. 30 kg RDX seized in Doda (Go To Top) Doda (J-K), Oct 31: Security forces in Jammu and Kashmir seized 30 kg of deadly RDX in Doda district after suspected militants damaged a bridge. A bridge near Kotli village, two km from the district headquarters, was damaged partially in a powerful RDX blast. Security forces detected the explosives under a culvert near the village when they cordoned the area. Police said the security forces foiled the militants' plans for powerful explosions in the area. "Since police and army were able to dominate the area, the militants were not able to explode it. We were able to recover the RDX late Thursday evening and have exploded it at a safe place," Bhaderwah Mohd Irshad, a police official in the area, said. RDX is a white crystalline chemical, which becomes deadly when mixed with oil, wax or other explosives. The blast on Thursday was the seventh in the Doda district during the last one week. At least a dozen militant groups are fighting New Delhi's rule in Jammu and Kashmir. More than 40,000 people have died in 14 years of rebellion in Kashmir. Separatists, however, put the death toll at 80,000. As the month-long Ramadan fasting has begun, the separatist violence has increased in the Himalayan region despite tentative peace between India and Pakistan. The attacks in the region followed a report by the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba militant groups to intensify their activities in Jammu and Kashmir during Ramadan. Calling India! Lloyds headed eastward... (Go To Top) London, Oct 31: It seems to be a bout of India calling for corporate firms across the United Kingdom. The latest to join the bandwagon is Lloyds Tsb, which is in the process of wrapping up one of its UK call centres and shifting base to India. According to a report in tabloid 'Sun', the move will be costing Britain 1,000 jobs and comes just two weeks after Hong Kong and Shangahi Banking Corporation announced it was moving 4,000 jobs to India from Britain. Other firms which have followed suit are British Telecom, Tesco and Prudential. Meanwhile, Lloyds has promised to handle the loss of jobs at the Newcastle call centre "with care and sensitivity" and hoped to offer staff jobs elsewhere. Sania, Rushmi bag doubles gold (Go To Top) Hyderabad, Oct 31: Sania Mirza and Rushmi Chakravarthy lifted the women's doubles title to complete a triple and a double, respectively, in the ongoing Afro-Asian Games here Friday. The top seeded Indian pair defeated Indonesia's Stephanie Rosa Maya and Septi Mende 7-6 (2) 6-3 to give India the fourth tennis gold. Sania, who has already won the singles gold after leading the country to the team title along with Rushmi, is headed for a grand quadruplet as she along with grand slam champion Mahesh Bhupathi is to play in the final of the mixed doubles later Friday. The final turned was a dull affair with both the pairs putting up a below par performance and yielded advantage time and again after breaking each other's services. Tennis gold goes to Vijay Kannan (Go To Top) Hyderabad, Oct 31: Vijay Kannan thrashed Jhonny Arcilla of Philipines 6-1 6-1 in the men's singles final to assure India of a clean sweep of all the seven golds in the tennis competition in the inaugural Afro-Asian Games here on Friday. The second seed proved far superior to Arcilla and dominated the one-sided match throughout, making hardly any errors as he blew away the Filipino in quick time as India won the sixth gold. As Mahesh Bhupathi with Sania Mirza and Vihsal Uppal with Rushmi Chakravarthy will feature in the all-Indian mixed doubles, the hosts will live up to the pre-tournament expectation of bagging all the seven golds. For 23-year-old Kannan, the former hard court national champion, this will be the second gold as he was part of the men's team which won the yellow metal. Kannan, who was under pressure to keep up the country's gold hunt after Prakash Amritraj pulled out of the event, rose to the occasion and entertained the good crowd with an authoritative serve and volley game besides a couple of aces. Aussies take on India at Wankhade Stadium (Go To Top) Mumbai, Oct 31: The visiting Australian cricket team had a long practice session at Wankhade Stadium in Mumbai on Friday ahead of their second league encounter with hosts India. The two teams clash again on Saturday after India beat Australia in the first match by 37 runs in Gwalior in the tri- nation one-day tournament. The Australians buoyed by a thumping victory over the Kiwis are all geared to take on India. Ricky Ponting, the Australian cricket captain, promised better performance against India this time. "The biggest challenge for Australia coming to India is playing the Indian spinners in these conditions and some of us have been a little better than others and yeah, I think we are all pretty more confident, we learned a little but from that last game, probably here we should play, we made a few mistakes long ago in the first game which we think we can rectify for this game. I foresee a more disciplined and better batting performance from us this time," Ponting said. Ponting said Michael Kasprowicz would not be available for the game against India but hoped would be fit for their league game with New Zealand on November 9. India leads the points table with eight points with Australia moving to second place with seven points after handing out a humiliating defeat to New Zealand in Faridabad on Wednesday. New Zealand has just three points from two games.
New York, Oct 31: She gets paid for putting on weight. She gets paid for losing it too. According to a report in ratethemusic.com, two-times Oscar nominee Renee Zellweger has been offered 3.2 million dollars to shed the weight she's put on for the Bridget Jones sequel. Diet giants Weightwatchers are tempting the actress with a 110,000 dollars per pound sponsorship deal if she manages to lose 30 pounds after the movie, which has already netted the actress a reported 2.4 million dollars. The company wants Zellweger to follow British royal Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York's slimming plan and appear with her in adverts when filming finishes on the "Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason" set at the start of next year. "This is the easiest cash she'll ever earn. Being paid to eat more to play Bridget again is great, but getting even more cash just to shift that weight is beyond belief," an insider said. UK cinemas attract film fans like never before! (Go To Top) London, Oct 31: Movie theatres are attracting more and more film-goers than at any time in the last 30 years, squelching fears people are shunning movie theatres. According to a report in ratethemusic.com, a string of blockbusters last year - including "Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers" and "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" - secured 2002 as the most successful year since 1972, with UK cinemas grossing 281.4 million dollars in ticket sales. Figures from Britain's National Statistics also show film-goers aged between 15 to 24 are the fastest growing audience. Buy my bras, says busty Jordan! (Go To Top) London, Oct 31: Sexy model Jordan is all set to design her own range of lingerie following in the footsteps of glamour icons like Kylie Minouge, Caprice Bourett and Elle Macpherson. Jordan is busy doing a series of sketches and has also talked to two store groups about a six-figure deal. According to a report in the Sun, Jordan said, "I find it hard to buy sexy underwear. The only bras available for girls like me are the kind of stuff your granny would wear. I want to design stuff that will turn men on." However, Jordan's dissatisfaction with the existing lingerie has not dampened her desire of showing off her silicon breasts. A delighted fan says, "If she behaves like that with a frumpy bra on, I can't wait to see what'll happen when she puts on a sexy one." Britney, Cusack a couple? (Go To Top) London, Oct 31: Is U.S. actor John Cusack the new man in pop princess Britney Spears' life? Well, if Britain's Daily Star newspaper is to be believed, then yes. Britney, 21, met the 37-year-old "Serendipity" star during a promotional tour for her upcoming album in New York recently. She reportedly asked an assistant for Cusack's number and then headed straight for the plush Four Seasons Hotel, where he was staying. And sources close to the singer insist the pair have subsequently shared some intimate dates. As one puts it: They are seeing each other but not really dating. It's too early to say where this may lead, but there is something there." No `evening in Paris' for Britney Spears (Go To Top) London, Oct 31: In a last-minute hitch pop diva Britney Spears called off her European album launch Thursday night, after falling ill an hour before it was scheduled to start. According to a report in British tabloid 'Sun', the blonde bombshell axed the Paris event, blaming flu and a throat infection. Around 100 scribes have already flown to Paris to hear her sing tracks from the new album "In the Zone", slated to hit the stores on November 17. It has been a huge let-down for fans, who had gathered from around Europe to see the singer in action. "In the middle of our two-and-a-half-week promotional tour Britney has been ordered to take bed rest as a result of flu and a severe throat infection. Her representatives have cancelled her performance and she will resume her European promo tour with visits to Germany, the UK, Spain and France," a spokesman for the star said. If I were PM, I would ban television: Hugh Grant (Go To Top) London, Oct 31: This is clearly a case of art imitating life! Stiff upper lip British actor Hugh Grant has said that he will oust television if he were to ever become the Prime Minister. According to a report in British tabloid 'Sun', Grant, who plays a very Tony Blairish type Prime Minister in his new movie "Love Actually" contemplates banning television if he rose to the top in a new career in politics. "I would ban television. That would be really good. It's ruined my life and, I think, ruined everyone else's, so I'd pull the plug on telly. I'd also outlaw most newspapers and I'd vastly increase taxes," the "Four Weddings and a Funeral" star said. -ANI |