U.P. Minister sacked, LCP withdraws support
The Uttar Pradesh Minister for Energy, Mr.
Naresh Agrawal, was today dismissed from the State Council of
Ministers, giving a new twist to the politics of coalition the
Bharatiya Janata Party had authored four years ago in the
country's most populous State.
BJP sees no crisis
The Bharatiya Janata Party sees no crisis in
Uttar Pradesh and is confident the Rajnath Singh Government will
continue to enjoy majority support in the 403-member State
Assembly despite the ``withdrawal of support'' by the 19-MLA
strong Loktantrik Congress Party of Mr. Naresh Agrawal, who was
sacked as Energy Minister earlier today.
'Normalisation linked to cross-border terrorism'
While maintaining its commitment to the
continuation of the dialogue initiated at the Agra summit, India
today put across a tough message to Pakistan at the meeting of
the Foreign Secretaries of the two countries here that the
engagement would not be on its terms.
TANSI case: I overlooked details, says ex-official
A former registration department official in
Tamil Nadu, who was suspended from service on the day of his
retirement on June 30, is said to have given a fresh statement to
the CB-CID on the value of the land involved in the TANSI land
deal case.
Pak. was unprepared: Jaswant
The External Affairs Minister, Mr. Jaswant
Singh, today said that contrary to the widespread impression of
Indian underpreparedness at Agra, it was in fact the Pakistani
side which did not have ``clear instructions'' from its
President, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. It was Gen. Musharraf who
preferred to draw the draft declaration with the Prime Minister,
Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee.
India invited to informal WTO ministerial meeting
In a bid to prevent a Seattle-like fiasco at
the next ministerial conference of the World Trade Organisation
(WTO) in November, the U.S. has invited India for an informal
ministerial conference of about 15 to 20 countries in September.
The aim is to evolve a preparatory draft on the framework for a
new trade round by involving the key players in developed and
developing countries.
Mirwaiz criticises acid attacks on women
Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and the Jamat-e-Islami
have taken exception to throwing acid at young girls for
enforcing ``Islamic'' dress code.
India keeps caste off agenda
With the backing of China, South Korea and some
other countries, India frustrated the attempts of non-government
organisations to get the issue of caste discrimination included
on the agenda for the coming conference on racism.
