AFP reports: Iran's Revolutionary Guards said it test fired today medium-range surface-to-air missiles designed to knock attacking aircraft out of the sky at a range of 50 kilometres.

US today said that all options 'including military force' remain on the table to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and asked Tehran to abide by its international obligations.

AFP reports: Syria's rebels have captured hundreds of kilometres (miles) of territory in the country's north in the past six months, an AFP correspondent who visited the area in March reported on Monday.

A 41-year-old woman created a scare after she breached layers of security to gain entry into the headquarters of Indian Space Research Organisation here using a fake identity before being arrested, ISRO sources said.

K Anurag reports One person was killed and six others were injured when suspected militants belonging to the anti-talks faction of United Liberation Front of Assam triggered a powerful bomb explosion in the heart of Sivasagar town un Upper Assam tonight.

US Navy today announced to name a new class of research vessels after Neil Armstrong, the first man to land on the Moon in 1969, to honour the late astronaut. 

Telangana Joint Action Committee (JAC) today said it will go ahead with its proposed 'march' for separate statehood on September 30 notwithstanding appeals made by chief minister and others to put it off. 

Israel's former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who was forced out of office by a series of graft charges, was let off with a light punishment carrying a suspended one-year jail term today, meaning the disgraced leader can now calculate a possible return to public life.

Indian actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan was today appointed as the new international Goodwill Ambassador for UNAIDS, the joint UN programme on AIDS and HIV. 

The union cabinet on Monday hiked dearness allowance by 7 per cent to 72 per cent of the basic pay for all central government employees.The move will benefit about 50 lakh serving employees and 30 lakh pensioners. 

DMK President M Karunanidhi today alleged Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa had not estimated future power requirements of the state and claimed the previous government headed by him had taken efforts to generate nearly 7800 mw during its 2006-11 rule. 

He came to the Rajya Sabha in 1991 as a representative of Assam on the basis of the fraudulence that he was a rent-paying resident of that State. Twenty-one years thereafter, he continues to bite the bullet --- of hiding the truth. 

Deputy Chairman of the planning commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia in an interview to RSTV has said that a National Investment Board will be set soon to take a final call on big infrastructure and policy decisions. 

Attacking Centre over its decision on FDI in retail sector, CPI-M Politburo member Sitaram Yechury today alleged that the UPA government was "looting" the common man to fill the pockets of rich people. 

The Telugu Desam Party will make its stand clear on the contentious Telangana statehood demand in the next couple of days.        

 

Party chief N Chandrababu Naidu reportedly told this to Telugu Desam rank and file at its extended general body meet in Hyderabad today.        

 

Party sources said Chandrababu would complete his deliberations with TDP leaders from all the three regions in the state in the next two days before announcing the stand.        

 

He will hold a special meeting with party leaders from Telangana before firming up the TDP's stand on the statehood issue. While leaders from Telangana are pressing for a fresh letter to the Centre notifying the party stand, those from Andhra-Rayalaseema regions are averse to it.

Criticising Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for notifying 51 per cent FDI in multi-brand retail, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today said he has 'neither time nor interest to hear the grievances of the people'.        

 

"The PM is not bothered about the problems of the people and so he is not able to spare time or have interest to hear their grievances even as he is keen to keep up his image in the foreign media," he said in a press release after his weekly Janata Durbar for NDA workers.      

 

"Singh has taken a number of anti-people decisions like FDI in multi-brand retail, diesel price hike and rationing of subsidized LPG cylinders as part of the image makeover strategy in foreign media in the aftermath of reports that described him as an under-achiever."

The government today cleared the proposal to restructure debt worth nearly Rs 2 lakh crore of state electricity boards, giving a boost to the ailing power sector. 

The Cabinet on Sunday cleared debt restructuring package for power distribution companies. 

Normal life in the Bhopal administrative division was disrupted following a bandh observed by the BJP and Left parties in protest against the Centre's decision to hike diesel prices and allow FDI in retail.        

 

Today's shutdown was part of the nationwide strike observed by BJP and Left parties on September 20. The Bhopal division was excluded from the protest owing to the visit of Bhutan Prime Minister Jigme Y Thinley and Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa for a function at Sanchi.        

 

The shutdown was marked by the protest rallies being taken out by BJP workers. The party activists took out a "funeral procession" of an household gas cylinder symbolizing the burden on common man by the Centre's decision to cut the annual subsidies. The party's women wing also participated in the protest. The bandh was observed in Bhopal and Raisen districts of the division.  

PTI: After week-long closure in the backdrop of anti-US protests, the visa section of the US consulate in Chennai today resumed operations, with over 1,100 applicants thronging the consular office.        

 

A consulate spokesperson said more than 1,100 applicants visited the office for their US visa appointments. This included the people whose appointments had been rescheduled last week following a wave of protests against an American film allegedly denigrating Islam.

The CVC on Monday asked the CBI to probe all coal block allocations since 1993. 

At least six people were killed when a four-storeyed building collapsed in Sahakarnagar in Pune. Seven people were feared to be trapped under debris.

Sahakar Nagar is a congested residential area.

More details are awaited.

Focused on reducing its subsidy bill, the government will discuss at a Cabinet meeting today whether the price of sugar sold at ration shops can be hiked by a whopping Rs 10 a kg. If approved, it will be the first hike in 10 years, reports NDTV.

The price of sugar available through the Public Distribution System or ration shops is Rs 13.50 and has not been increased since March 2002.

But, huge political opposition and the timing, just before the festival season, will make this a difficult decision to push even in reforms season.

Author Salman Rushdie has dedicated his new memoir Joseph Anton to his son Zafar, for whom the book has been a trip down memory lane. "I have a sense of pride in my father," he tells Sebastian Shakespeare of the London Evening Standard. 

The 33-year-old tells this reporter how the fatwa on his father has made him who he his and how he has not yet read the controversial Satanic Verses.

No, I havent read it. It is one of the greatest lackings, I guess, in my life, he says, half in jest. I think I probably should have done. I know a lot of other kids of writers who dont read their parents work. If your parent is in a high-profile role there is a need or desire to keep seeing them as parents, and not for what they do.

Read the full story here

In his televised speech defending government reforms, Prime Minister Manmohab Singh made a credible economic case for the measures. But he failed to address the political dynamics that this bold action, late in his tenure as prime minister, has unleashed, writes Vivek Daheja in a blog in the New York Times.  

The measures might amount to good economics, but are they also good politics? Mr Singh left that question unanswered.

Read the full blog here

The American President and the Pakistani, a new play about Barack and the friend he left behind, tells the American story of reinvention, says its author Rashid Razaq.

Read the full story here

The armed forces are mulling overthe creation of three new joint commands for tackling security issues in space, cyberspace and special operations.   

The efforts are part of increasing significance being given on the joint operations by the three services by the defence ministry and to avoid duplication of their resources.   

The three services are discussing the format of the new commands to look after space, cyberspace and special operations, defence officials said.   

The issue may also come up for discussion at the Combined Commanders' Conference to be addressed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on October 19, they said.   

The proposal for the creation of an aerospace command has been there for the last few years but it is stuck as the three services have not agreed over the structure of the new formation and the force which will head it. At present, the three services have their separate space cells.

Thirty-two-year-old Mohammad Muqueemuddin Yaser, who was acquitted by an Indore sessions court in the Mecca Masjid blast case on  September 1, recalls how the Hyderabad police tortured him while he was in custody.

Yaser and his brother Mohammad Baleeghuddin Jaber (27), both sons of Maulna Naseeruddin (63), an Islamic cleric, have spent close to four years in Madhya Pradesh jails on charges of "waging war against India" under jihadi influence.

"For the Hyderabad police, sending us to Gujarat, Karnataka or Madhya Pradesh is equal to sending us to Kalapani (Andaman Islands). This is one way of punishing us for the crime we have not committed," said Yaser.

"The Hyderabad police arrested me on 18 July 2008 and Jaber on 1 September 2008 in the 2007 Mecca Masjid blast case. They were aware that they did not have any evidence against several Muslim youth they had detained. Still, they detained us because we were the children of Naseeruddin, against whom they had a grudge," Yaser added.

Read the full story here

Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal today said that mobile phone subscribers will not have to pay roaming charges from next year.

"From next year. Our secretary has told you that it will be free from next year,"  Sibal said in response to a query on the timing of removing roaming charges as proposed in the National Telecom Policy 2012.

The minister was speaking to the media on the sidelines of the curtain raiser event of India Internet Governance Conference.

 Helicopters scoured the icy Himalayan peaks in western Nepal looking for four foreign climbers still missing in a deadly avalanche on the 8,156 metre Mount Manaslu which left 12 mountaineers dead, including eight Frenchmen.   

The helicopters were pressed into service as a number offoreign expeditions attempting the peak were trapped byfalling walls of snow near the base camp in Gorkha district, 350 km west of the Nepalese capital Kathmandu.   

Twelve climbers including eight French nationals and a Sherpa guide were killed in the avalanche, said Jimba JangbuSherpa, President of Nepal Mountaineering Association. Others who were killed include one Italian, one German and one Spanish climber, according to Sherpa.

Fifty years ago, James Bond strode into movie history, to show audiences how stylish and thrilling life could be. But creating the cinematic Bond was fraught with peril, as best-selling author Ian Fleming discovered when he first tried to take his hero to the screen.

David Kamp recalls the unlikely team that bought 007 to the big screen in Vanity Fair.

Read the full story here

The Congress Working Committee is expected to endorse FDI in retail tomorrow, which should provide a booster to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

More details are waited.

Mamata Banerjee to hold dharna on October 1 in New Delhi to protest against government's reforms on FDI in retail and hike in diesel prices.

On Friday, the Trinamool Congress formally withdrew its support from the UPA government.

The Trinamool chief wrote on Facebook, "On 1st October, we, on behalf of the All India Trinamool Congress, will be organising a demonstration at Jantar Mantar at New Delhi. We all will be present to highlight these issues and request the Central Government to withdraw the anti-people decisions. I am requesting all of you to please come and tell your friends also to join the democratic demonstration at 1 pm on 1st October, 2012."

Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan met Congress chief Sonia Gandhi today amid reports of a leadership change in the state.  

A woman posing as a scientist was arrested today by the Central Industrial Security Force at the  Indian Space Research Organisation campus in Bangalore.

At the time of the arrest, the CISF personnel found the woman to be carrying fake ID cards. She has been taken into judicial custody till October 6.

The woman is identified as Buela Shah and hails from Ahmedabad. She is married to a school teacher from Kerala.

More details are awaited.

 India has decided to make fresh efforts for extradition of Purulia arms drop case prime accused Kim Davy after a Danish court turned down a plea for sending him here to face trial in the 17 year-old sensational case.   

The decision was taken after Union Home Secretary R K Singh discussed the issue of extradition of Kim Davy to India with Indian Ambassador to Denmark Ashok Attri last week.   

"It was decided that the case should be pursued vigorously with the Danish government to extradite Davy to India at the earliest," a home ministry official said.   

The case relates to an incident on the night of December17, 1995, when an AN-26 aircraft dropped arms and ammunition in West Bengal's Purulia district. The consignment had hundreds of AK-47 rifles, pistols, anti-tank grenades, rocketlaunchers and thousands of rounds of ammunition.

The Pakistan government on Monday made it clear that one of its minister's offer of a bounty of $ 100,000 for the maker of an anti-Islam film did not represent official policy but did not say whether any action would be taken against him.

Foreign Office spokesman Moazzam Khan said Railway Minister Ghulam Ahmed Bilour's announcement of a bounty for the maker of the offensive anti-Islam film "was representative of Bilour's personal views and had nothing to do with the official policy of the government of Pakistan".

Bilour's statement did not represent official policy, Khan said in a brief statement. The statement did not say whether any action would be taken against Bilour, who had called on Taliban and Al Qaeda to help in the "noble cause" of killing the film's maker.

The minister, who belongs to the secular Awami National Party, triggered a storm on Saturday by announcing the bounty during a news conference in the northwestern city of Peshawar.

United States President Barack Obama is likely to touch upon the issue of recent unrest in the Muslimworld over an anti-Islam film during his speech at the annual United Nations General Assembly in New York tomorrow, officials said.  

Obama travels to New York today to attend 67th annual session of General assembly of the world body.   

Noting that the UN General Assembly always provides anopportunity for the US President to put the international situation in context and to put forward a vision of American leadership, National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said he would certainly expect Obama to address the recentunrest in the Muslim world, and the broader context of the democratic transitions in the Arab World.   

"As he has in recent days, the President will make it clear that we reject the views in this video, while also underscoring that violence is never acceptable '" a message that has been echoed by the leaders he has personally reached out to in places like Libya, Egypt and Yemen," Vietor said.   

"He will also send a clear message that the United States will never retreat from the world; will bring justice to those who harm Americans; and will stand strongly for our democratic values abroad," he said.

 The engine of the India-bound Samjhauta Express caught fire in Pakistan's Lahore district on Monday, police said. There were no casualties.

According to Railway Deputy Superintendent of Police Javed Anwar, the incident occurred near Mughalpura station.

Fire brigade personnel detached the engine from the Samjhauta Express, reported Geo News.

The 312 passengers who were on board the train were safe and a substitute engine has been sent, Anwar said.

Here's an interesting pov on the Assam violence, by blogger BrahmaUG. He says: 

LPG distributors plan a nationwide took strike on October 1 to protest the cap of subsidised cylinders.

The federation will be holding a meeting of around 1,200 dealers and member-associations tomorrow. "Without consulting us, wrong policies are being adopted that will create a black market and promote unfair trade practices," said Pawan Soni, general secretary, National Federation of LPG Distributors of India.

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs had on September 13 decided that consumers of domestic LPG cylinder would get a subsidy for only six refills. Subsidised cylinders are priced currently at Rs 399 in this city, while the non-subsidised cylinders will cost around Rs 750.  

Newly-appointed Railway Minister C P Joshi today said safety of passengers will be his top priority, along with modernisation and improvement in passenger amenities.

Joshi, who has been given additional charge of railways after the Trinamool Congress withdrew support to the UPA government, said he will set the agenda for his ministry after holding discussions with railways officials.

Talking to reporters after his maiden visit to Rail Bhawan in New Delhi, Joshi said, "Safety will be my top priority, along with passenger amenities and modernisation of rail infrastructure."

Showtime's psychological thriller 'Homeland' upstaged the more established dramas at the 64th Primetime Emmys Sunday night, winning four Emmys, including the top drama series honor.

ABC's 'Modern Family' captured four comedy awards, including the top sitcom prize, to continue its comedy series domination at the Emmys.

Jimmy Kimmel hosted the broadcast from the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles.

'Homeland's' Claire Danes won best lead drama actress, while Damian Lewis won best lead actor in a drama.

The show, which just started a second season, upset 'Mad Men', which had dominated the drama category in its four years, and 'Breaking Bad', which is in its final season.

'Mad Men' was going for what would have been a record fifth straight win in the best drama series category.

For the latest on the Emmys, click here

Nine dead and 24 injured in a stampede at a satsang in Deoghar, Jharkhand. The stampede took place as the annual fest at Thakur Anukulchandhra's samadi in began today.

Eight among those killed are women.

Thakur Anukulchandra was a guru and founder of the satsang ashram at Deoghar.    

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar faced the ire of the public at a rally in Madhubani, when a group of para teachers (contractual teachers) staged a protest by showing their slippers to hom, according to an NDTV report.

The agitating teachers were demanding parity in salaries and allowances with regular teachers.

The incident happened in Madhubani during the CM's ongoing Adhikar yatra (rights march).

For almost four hours now, three Rajdhani trains from Delhi have been stranded in different places in Jharkhand because a Bharatiya Janata Party MLA and his supporters are sitting on railway tracks and holding them hostage, reports NDTV.

They say they will not allow the trains to move till 5 pm today; the administration in the BJP ruled state has done nothing yet to evict them.

Amit Yadav, the MLA from Parkatta, says he is on a 5 am to 5 pm protest against Rajdhanis and other prestigious trains not having scheduled stops at Parsabad in his constituency.

Two of the trains stopped are West Bengal bound, one is headed to Odisha. The Howrah Rajdhani has been stalled at Sharmatand, the Sealdah Rajdhani at Parsabad, and the Bhubaneswar Rajdhani has been at the Koderma Railway station. All three trains have been stranded since 5 am today, the report said.

Read the full story here

The bus service between Tripura and Dhaka has been temporarily susepended, reports CNN-IBN.

The suspension comes after a mob burnt down India's 'Maitree' passenger bus at Narsingdi District, 50 km from Dhaka. All 22 passengers escaped unhurt.

The bus was reportedly torched in a case of mistaken identity during a political clash in the area.

India has taken up the issue with Bangladesh.     

Renowned Malayalam stage and film actor Thilakan died at a private hospital here following a cardiac arrest in the wee hours today, reports PTI. He was 77.

He is survived by two sons and two daughters. Thilakan had been battling for life at the hospital where he was admitted on August 23 after he had suffered two heart attacks. He had been on and off ventilator since then and had an attack of pneumonia. 

Thilakan who began his acting career in his intermediate days, had been associated with several drama troupes in his early days including the pro-Left Kerala Peoples' Arts Centre. He entered the filmdom in 1979 with a minor role in K G George's Ulkadal.

The ex-police chief at the heart of China's biggest political scandal in years has been sentenced to 15 years in jail.

Wang Lijun was jailed for ''bending the law for selfish ends, defection, abuse of power and bribe taking", Xinhua said.

The policeman's flight in February to a US consulate led to the downfall of his ex-boss, top politician Bo Xilai.

Bo's wife was convicted in August of killing UK national Neil Heywood. Wang was accused of helping in a cover up.

Wang had faced up to 20 years in jail, but prosecutors called his co-operation "meritorious service". He told the court that he would not appeal the sentence, state media said.

Former England captain John Terry has announced his retirement from international soccer, the BBC reported on Sunday.

The 31-year-old Chelsea defender was capped 78 times in an international career  stretching back to 2003.

Landslides triggered by heavy rains claimed 27 lives, including those of Indo-Tibetan Border Police and Border Roads Organisation personnel in Sikkim, even as flood situation in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh deteriorated with vast areas reeling under its impact.

Official sources on Sunday said in Gangtok that at least 21 bodies, including those of the ITBP and the BRO personnel, were found while eight persons were missing following flash floods and landslides in remote areas of North Sikkim.

Army and IAF personnel have launched rescue operations in full swing in the badly affected areas.

The dead include four from the ITBP, two of their family members, and 12 junior officers from the BRO. Other victims were casual labourers, they said. Most of the casualties were reported from Rangma range.

Top headlines in the last 24 hours:

SP ready for snap polls; rules out joining UPA govt

Anna will be back with us if we work honestly: Kejriwal

Major Cabinet rejig-cum-expansion in the offing

Flood situation worsens in Assam; 5 lakh affected

Mines secretary's removal shocks entire babudom

Flash floods and landslides kill 21 in Sikkim