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Mon, 16 November 2015
Show must go on: France tells people to go back to bars, concerts

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23:32   FSSAI moves SC against lifting ban on Maggi noodles
In fresh trouble for Nestle India Ltd, food regulator FSSAI today moved the Supreme Court against the Bombay High Court order lifting the ban on Maggi noodles in the country. 

Food Safety and Standards Authority of India approached the apex court, terming the High Court's August 13 order as "erroneous" and questioned the sanctity of the samples provided for re-test to government-approved labs. 

In its petition, FSSAI has contended that the High Court "erred" by asking Nestle, the Indian arm of the Swiss company itself, to provide the fresh samples instead of asking a neutral authority to do so.

Earlier, the High Court had quashed the orders of FSSAI and Maharashtra food regulator FDA, which had banned nine variants of Maggi noodles in the country. It had said that the principles of natural justice were not followed in executing the ban as the manufacturer was not given a hearing. 

The court had allowed Nestle to go in for fresh testing of five samples of each variant of the noodles at three independent laboratories in Punjab, Hyderabad and Jaipur which were accredited with National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories.
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22:35   BJD MLA's 'ladoo' remark on farmers triggers controversy
Ruling BJD women's wing president and MLA Pramila Mallick has made 'Amar Ladoo' (immortality sweet) remark in the context of farmers committing suicide due to crop loss and debt burden in Odisha, inviting criticism from the opposition. 

The BJD legislator had yesterday suggested the Opposition parties distribute 'amar ladoo' among the farmers and make efforts so that the people of Odisha would never die. 

Mallick, however, today discounted the opposition charge and claimed that she had never made light of the suffering farmers and had targetted the opposition hullabaloo over the suicide issue.

"My contention was against the opposition parties who give colour to all suicide cases," she said in a clarification.

BJD sources said Mallick also met Chief Minister and party president Naveen Patnaik and presented her side of story.

"I have not made the remark aginst the farmers," she explained to the chief minister, the sources said adding Patnaik, however, expressed displeasure over the "Amar Ladoo" remark.
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20:33   Police fail to catch key Paris suspect in Brussels raid
Belgian police launched a major raid in Brussels targeting fugitive Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam today but the operation ended without any arrests, prosecutors said.

Police meanwhile freed one of his brothers without charge, following his arrest at the weekend in the wake of the attacks in which a third Abdeslam brother took part as a suicide bomber, officials told AFP.

Dozens of officers in balclavas and carrying submachineguns surrounded a house in the run-down immigrant area of Molenbeek in western Brussels, which is increasingly under scrutiny as a hotbed of European militancy.

"The operation is over and the result is negative. No one was arrested," spokesman Eric Van Der Sypt told AFP. The mayor of Molenbeek district where the raid took place also confirmed it was over. 

Van Der Sypt had earlier confirmed that the raid targeted Salah Abdeslam -- a 26-year-old former Brussels tram worker who is the subject of an international arrest warrant by French police -- without saying whether he was in the house.
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20:25   Show must go on: France tells people to go back to bars, concerts
France declared that the show must go on today, with the public urged to go back out to bars, concerts and restaurants in defiance of the terror attacks on Paris. 

Culture minister Fleur Pellerin said musicians would "never stop putting on concerts" and claimed that in the face of "barbarism... culture is our biggest shield and our artists our best weapon". 

As the French capital still reeled from Friday attacks in which 129 people died, some were coming up with inventive ways of thumbing their noses at the extremists. 

Music fans shared their favourite memories at the Bataclan rock venue on Twitter, while others started a social media campaign to get the US group on stage at the time, Eagles of Death Metal, to the top of the UK charts. 

Amid emotional declarations that live music must go on in the shocked city, the hashtag #MonPlusBeauSouvenirDuBataclan (My most beautiful memory of the Bataclan) became one of the top trending topics on Twitter in France, with many sharing photos and videos of singers and bands who had played there such as Ed Sheeran,Arctic Monkeys and the late Jeff Buckley. 

Pellerin said the government was preparing a special fund to help get live entertainment up and running again and to aid with the cost of new security measures. 
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20:24   12 infants among 22 airlifted from flood-hit Chennai
The Indian Air Force today airlifted 22 people, including 12 infants, from rainwater-inundated parts of the Chennai.

IAF officials said the evacuation was done from Ashok Nagar and another adjoining area of the city.

They also airdropped 100 litres of water and 150 food packets.

"12 infants and 10 adults, including six women were today airlifted. The helicopter took off from the Tambaram base. Other helicopters have also been put on standby," the officials said.

They added that all the evacuees were winched up during multiple sorties. 

Normal life has been hit in Tamil Nadu as incessant rains led to inundation of large areas and authorities have shut down educational institutions. The weather office forecast heavy downpour in the next three days in the state, Puducherry and coastal Andhra Pradesh. 

At least 71 people have died due to the rains in Tamil Nadu.
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20:02   12 infants among 22 airlifted from flood-hit Chennai
The Indian Air Force today airlifted 22 people, including 12 infants, from rainwater-inundated parts of the Chennai.

IAF officials said the evacuation was done from Ashok Nagar and another adjoining area of the city.

They also airdropped 100 litres of water and 150 food packets.

"12 infants and 10 adults, including six women were today airlifted. The helicopter took off from the Tambaram base. Other helicopters have also been put on standby," the officials said.

They added that all the evacuees were winched up during multiple sorties. 

Normal life has been hit in Tamil Nadu as incessant rains led to inundation of large areas and authorities have shut down educational institutions. The weather office forecast heavy downpour in the next three days in the state, Puducherry and coastal Andhra Pradesh. 

At least 71 people have died due to the rains in Tamil Nadu.
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19:59   Chhota Rajan's CBI custody extended by 3 days
Underworld don Chhota Rajan's CBI custody, which was to end today, has been extended by three days in a case of alleged procurement of a passport on the basis of fake documents from Indian mission in Zimbabwe. 

The CBI announced during a daily briefing that the custody of Rajan, whose real name is Rajendra Sadashiv Nikalje, has been extended till November 19, without revealing the details about the court proceedings and whether he was produced before a CBI magistrate. 

After being brought to India from Bali earlier this month, 55-year-old Rajan, who has provided tip-offs to Indian intelligence agencies on India's most wanted terrorists Dawood Ibrahim, has been secretly guarded by central security agencies. 

Before his deportation process was to complete, the CBI was directed to register a case against him. The agency booked him for alleged cheating, forgery, and violations of the Passport Act and the Prevention of Corruption Act. 

This is the second case of fake passport against him with the first one having been registered in 2002 for another passport, issued in 1996, with fake identity of Vijay Kadam, in Bangkok.
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19:59   Ashok Singhal's condition serious: Doctors
VHP leader Ashok Singhal, who is undergoing treatment in a Gurgaon hospital after he was admitted there in early hours of Saturday with complaints of acute breathlessness continues to be in a serious condition and is on life support system.

"He is presently in the Intensive Care Unit under treatment of a team of specialists comprising of Critical Care, Respiratory, Cardiology, Endocrinology, Neurology and Nephrology. His condition continues to be serious and he is on life support system," Medical Superintendent of Medanta Dr A K Dubey said in a statement.

89-year-old Singhal was admitted on November 14 to Medanta with complaints of acute breathlessness and has been diagnosed with right lower Lobe Pneumonia. He has been on a ventilator from November 14 evening.

A number of BJP and VHP leaders have visited the ailing leader in the hospital.
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19:57   HC upholds order disallowing celebrities at Juhu Chhath puja
The Bombay High Court today refused to interfere with a decision of the District Collector to prohibit city-based organisation Bihari Front from inviting celebrities for Chhath Puja celebration organised by it on November 17 and 18 at the Juhu beach. 

Bihari Front, of which the former MP Sanjay Nirupam is a member, had challenged the conditions imposed by the Collector of Mumbai suburban district on November 5 while giving permission for puja on the beach.

The Collector allowed the organisation to hold a puja and erect a platform but nixed its plan to put up a temporary fence to create a dry zone and to invite celebrities. 

The division bench headed by Justice S C Dharmadhikari today said the Collector's order had been passed keeping the larger public interest in mind and with a view to avoiding untoward incidents like stampede.

"The Collector has written a letter on November 10 to the organisation clarifying that devotional songs and bhajans can be performed by artists. The idea behind the conditions appears to be to ensure that the festival remains a religious one instead of turning into an entertainment programme.

"Bhajans and devotional songs should not become a rock concert. If devotional songs are sung by normal artists, no one will bother but if the same is sung by some celebrity then more crowd will gather and (people) will also want to meet the celebrity," the court said.
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19:55   Confusion continues at DDCA over fourth Test
The logjam regarding Delhi and District Cricket Association hosting the fourth Test between India and South Africa continued today with the tax department of the state government yet to give clearance for the game scheduled from December 3-7. 

The DDCA are supposed to pay entertainment tax in excess of Rs 24 crore in order to get clearance for organizing the match.

The last two days have been one of twists and turns even as DDCA vice president Chetan Chauhan and treasurer Ravinder Manchanda met CM Arvind Kejriwal yesterday. 

"Myself and Chetan Chauhan met the CM yesterday and we told them about the exorbitant entertainment tax levied. Kejriwal told us to get in touch with the relevant tax commissioner Sanjay Kumar," Manchanda told PTI today. 

"When we met the tax commissioner, he told us to file an appeal. There was no discussions on exemption but he said that he will issue a letter keeping the tax amount in abeyance. Which meant that matter will be resolved after the Test is over."
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18:28   Paris attacks may have been arranged on a PlayStation 4
The attacks in Paris may have been planned using a PlayStation 4, reports the Independent.


The games console is being increasingly used as a way to chat secretly. And at least one PlayStation 4 was reportedly seized during a huge night of raids across Belgium and France.


Last week, Belgium's foreign affairs minister warned that the PlayStation 4 was being increasingly used and was very difficult to track.


"The thing that keeps me awake at night is the guy behind his computer, looking for messages from IS and other hate preachers," Jan Jambon said.


"PlayStation 4 is even more difficult to keep track of than WhatsApp.The PlayStation Network that allows online players to communicate uses encrypted text and voice chat, which means that intelligence agencies can't intercept messages as they pass between users. Users can also create private chat rooms easily, meaning that people are more likely to know that they are being eavesdropped on.


Earlier this year, an Austrian teenager was found to have been using a PlayStation 4 to make contact with Isis activists in Syria, according to prosecutors. Police had found data on the console that included bomb-making instructions, according to Reuters.
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18:21  
Mindless terrorists? The truth about Isis is much worse. Read
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17:50   Indian girl's poem 'Pray for the World' goes viral
As France came under the grip of terrorism on November 13, people across the world took to social media as a medium to pour their hearts out.


They lambasted those behind the Paris massacre, while extending their support to the victims of the unfortunate attack. But amid the outcry for Paris, Beirut -- which also played victim to an ISIS attack just the day before -- lay forgotten.


A similar callous attitude was what Baghdad got, which has been under continuous terrorist attacks. Like many have said, it's probably because of the sad truth that 'these things just happen there'.


It was this hard-hitting dichotomy of outrage and unconcern that's reflected in a poem posted by Indian-origin blogger Karuna Ezara Parikh on Twitter -- which instantly went viral.


Click on the picture to enlarge
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17:23   PCB turns down BCCI's offer to tour India
Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Shahryar Khan has made it clear that its team will not play a bilateral series in India as desired by the Board of Control for Cricket in India.


A day after he said that BCCI president Shashank Manohar had offered to host Pakistan in December, Khan asserted that the series would only be possible if India play in the UAE, which acts as Pakistan's home venue ever since the 2009 terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team.
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17:13  
A man has been arrested in Kolkata for having ISIS links. Details awaited. 
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16:51   Cong dismisses Swamy's 'silly' allegations
The Congress has dismissed Subramanian Swamy's allegations that Rahul Gandhi is a UK citizen. "It has been the habit of Subramanian Swamy to make silly statements in order to try and seek some publicity whenever he is sidelined. Nobody takes his statements seriously", Congress spokesperson Ajay Maken said at the official AICC briefing in response to question on Swamy's latest allegation against Rahul Gandhi.


Swamy said that Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi had declared himself as a British citizen (2003-2009) for the purpose of floating a private company in London. Swamy has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi demanding the government strip Gandhi of his citizenship.
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16:49   Hacker group Anonymous declares war against ISIS
Hacker group Anonymous has declared "war' on Isis, in response to the attacks in Paris that left over a hundred people dead.


Members of the online collective have posted a video which says the group will continue the work against Isis, which began after the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January.


In a video posted soon after the attacks, a person claiming to represent the group warns members of Islamic State that it intends to hunt them down. It said that it would "unite humanity' in the operation, which it claimed would use hacking to weaken the group.
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16:31   Rahul UK citizen, can't be MP, Subramanian Swamy writes to PM
BJP leader Subramanian Swamy writes to PM Narendra Modi and Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan saying Rahul Gandhi cannot be a Member of Parliament and asks that the Congress vice president be stripped off his Lok Sabha membership. Swamy said he is in possession of documents that show that Rahul has listed himself as UK citizen. He has also urged the PM and the Speaker to refer the documents to the ethics committee. Rahul Gandhi is a Lok Sabha MP from Amethi.


In July this year, Swamy wrote in his blog alleging Rahul Gandhi was arrested in Boston airport for carrying 1,60,000 USD cash and holding white powder. He also said that it was former Prime Minister Vajpayee was the one who saved Rahul by asking the then US President George Bush to release Rahul Gandhi.This isn't the first time Swamy is making a controversial claim, he took it further by claiming that the Gandhi family was blackmailing Vajpayee and didn't know the reason behind it.
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16:17   French PM warns that more attacks could come as rocket launcher found in pre-dawn police raids
A rocket launcher was discovered in the French city of Lyon overnight as police mounted more than 150 raids following the Paris attacks.At least five people have been arrested and taken into custody after weapons were found at their homes, BFM TV reported.


The anti-terror operation in Lyon reportedly has no direct links to the shooting and bombing attacks that killed at 129 people in the capital on Friday night but are part of measures under the state of emergency declared by Francois Hollande.
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15:53   Farooq Abdullah to attend Nitish Kumar's swearing-in ceremony
National Conference president Dr Farooq Abdullah will be attending the oath taking ceremony of Nitish Kumar as chief minister of Bihar on November 20.

 

A statement issued by the NC said, Nitish Kumar called up the President of the National Conference personally in the morning and requested his participation at the oath taking ceremony.


Dr Abdullah has accepted the invitation.


 
-- Mukhtar Ahmad/Rediff.com in Srinagar

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15:49   France names Belgian man Abdelhamid Abaaoud terror mastermind
A French official has named the suspected mastermind behind the Paris attacks as a Belgian man called Abdelhamid Abaaoud, reports the Independent.


He was reportedly involved in previously thwarted train and church attacks. RTL radio in France reported that the 27-year-old is "one of the most active Isis executioners" in Syria.


He is said to be from the Molenbeek district of Brussels, which has seen multiple police raids since eight suicide bombers armed with assault rifles killed at least 129 people in Paris on Friday night.


Abaaoud allegedly oversaw the attack and funded it. He was suspected of planning a series of foiled terror attacks in Belgium and his phone was traced to Greece.


A man pays tribute to victims at Place de la Republique near the deadly attack sites in Paris. Christian Hartman/Reuters
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15:33   Syed Akbaruddin appointed Ambassador to UN
Just in: Syed Akbaruddin appointed as the next Ambassador/Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations at New York. Akbaruddin was a familiar face as MEA's spokesperson, and it's known that PM Modi regards him highly.


He will replace Asoke Mukerji who will be retiring. The post is generally a secretary-level one, so Akbaruddin's elevation is the first sign that merit is again one of the top considerations for posts. 
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15:29   They wanted me to cook chapatis, stay indoors: Imran Khan's ex-wife Reham
If you haven't read this, do.


Two weeks after Imran Khan's second marriage ended in a divorce in just 10 months, Reham has spoken out, claiming that she was told that she should be making chapatis in the kitchen and not to be seen outside.

The Pakistani cricket legend-turned-politician and the 42-year-old TV journalist announced their decision to split on October 30 amid reports that Imran objected to her meddling in politics.

62-year-old Imran's marriage to Reham was his second after his first marriage with English heiress Jemima Goldsmith for nine years ended in divorce in June, 2004.

Reham Khan, a divorced mother of three, left a job on regional BBC news and moved back to Pakistan in 2013.

"I was told specifically by a senior adviser: they basically wanted me to be in the kitchen, to be cooking chapatis and not to be seen ever again," Reham told Sunday Times.

Reham said as soon as she and her youngest daughter moved into Imran's mansion in Bani Gala, on a hilltop overlooking Islamabad, she felt stifled.

Her career was a constant problem, particularly when she became an "ambassador for street children" in Peshawar.

"There wasn't any involvement, I never attended meetings or anything of the sort, but obviously there was insecurity," Reham said.

Reham said she gave up her television show to avoid a conflict of interest and did not work for several months.

But she still upset Imran Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) early on when a journalist questioned her about problems in her first marriage. Asked in an interview if she had been the victim of domestic abuse, she "didn't want to lie" and said yes.

"I answered as diplomatically as I could, being a politician's wife," she told the paper.

But the media storm that followed upset Imran's party.

Imran's response was silence, she said.

"I was told not to defend myself, to let it die down, she said. But the "attacks escalated". Although Imran knew about her past, she thinks it took its toll on him: "I don't know if he was surprised by it, but he was affected by it."

She said guests to Imran's home were never fed and Imran was surviving on "one chapati a day".

Imran was not, she thinks, quite prepared for married bliss.

"I tried to talk to him. I'm very talkative and I'm very chatty but, you know, you can't exactly with Imran Khan. You can't discuss the colour of the curtains; you can only talk politics. You cannot exactly discuss Bollywood films with him.

God knows I tried," she said.

Reham said she plans to continue her work with street children in Pakistan, is producing two films.

"I have to make up for loss of income. I married a man who convinced me that he loved me, who looked lonely and who I thought had the same ideas about life and the same goals, but we were just too different," she said.
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15:09   The wrong response to Paris would create countless new recruits
"The worst response to a tragic and horrific attack like that on Paris last night would be one that strengthens Isis. When French President Francois Hollande said we are at war with Isis today, he was right. But it is a war we can only win if we don't get provoked into the response they want from us.


"The response they expect.Parisians are sadly becoming all too used to this kind of violence. It was only in January this year when the attack on Charlie Hebdo left most of its staff dead or maimed. And now this, an attack so ferocious and brutal that Paris may take years to recover. Seven years ago, to this very month, gunmen also ran amok in Mumbai and unleashed terror that was to last four days and claim 166 lives. This is global war, and and it could be very well be a generational war."


Read Sunny Hundal's column for the Independent.
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14:58   France names fifth attacker in Paris massacre
France has so far named five of the eight attackers who created mayhem on Friday night in Paris. The fifth attacker is Ahmad al Mohammad, a Syrian. He is the man who entered the EU through Greece in October as an asylum seeker. The authenticity of his passport, which said he was born in Idlib in 1990, has not been confirmed. He blew himself up at the Stade de France.

Prosecutors have also confirmed the identity of the fourth named suicide bomber. He is Samy Amimour, born in 1987 in Paris, living in Drancy. He was reportedly known to security services following a terror case in 2012.


Bilal Hadfi, 20, Brahim Abdeslam, 31 and Omar Mostefa, 29, had already been named by authorities.A Europe-wide search warrant is still out for Brahim's brother, Salah Abdeslam, 26, who allegedly drove the terrorists to their targets.



Rescue workers on duty at the Le Carillon restaurant. Photograph: Philippe Wojazer/ Reuters
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14:48   150 raids on suspected Islamists across France today
French police have carried out "more than 150" raids on suspected Islamists since the attacks on Paris, Prime Minister Manuel Valls said on Monday, as a source in the southeastern city of Lyon said an arsenal of weapons had been seized there. Police sources in Paris said "several dozen' pre-dawn raids were carried out in French cities on Sunday, including in Bobigny, an eastern suburb of the capital.


They led to five arrests and the seizure of an arsenal of weapons, including a rocket launcher, a Kalashnikov assault rifle, bulletproof vests, handguns and combat gear, the source said. Police also carried out raids in Toulouse in southwestern France, where at least three people were arrested, according to the local prosecutors office.


In the Alpine city of Grenoble, according to the local newspaper Le Dauphine Libere, at least half a dozen people were arrested and guns and money were seized. Police have additional powers under a state of emergency declared after the coordinated attacks in Paris on Friday that left 129 people dead and more than 350 injured.
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14:22   In a first, US warplanes attack IS oil trucks in Syria
Intensifying pressure on the Islamic State, United States warplanes for the first time attacked hundreds of trucks on Monday that the extremist group has been using to smuggle the crude oil it has been producing in Syria, American officials said.


The New York Times reports that according to an initial assessment, 116 trucks were destroyed in the attack, which took place near Deir al-Zour, an area of Syria controlled by the Islamic State that is close to the eastern border with Iraq.


The airstrikes were carried out by four A-10 attack planes and two AC-130 gunships based in Turkey.


Plans for the strike were developed well before the terrorist attacks in and around Paris on Friday, and the assault is part of a broader operation to disrupt the ability of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, to generate revenue to support its military operations and run its self-styled caliphate.


Representational picture of oil trucks on fire.
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14:03   Advani may begin blogging again after winter session of Parliament
Insiders in the LK Advani camp speculate that senior leader will soon begin his blog -- a popular commentary on national and international politics. Advani is likely to now blog about the RSS and how in 1950s and 1960s former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee and he had built the Jan Sangh and later the BJP. 


Advani has not been blogging for a while, and plans of its relaunch has created suspicion, as the Bihar result will also be analysed by Advani. Senior leaders of the party have chosen to ignore this as Advani does not have sufficient supporters in the party though he may get good press. 
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13:46   Image of Sikh man from Canada photoshopped as Paris terrorist
A Sikh man named Veerender Jubbal was falsely framed as one of the Paris attackers after a photo-shopped image of him went viral on social media. Shockingly the image was also used by a Spanish newspaper La Razon on the front page and named Jubbal as a terrorist.


A picture of Jubbal holding an iPad was photoshopped where the iPad was replaced with a Quran and a suicide vest was also added. One of the first tweets was put out by an handle named @abualut8 which shared the image and the caption, BREAKING, one Islamic State attacker in #ParisAttacks was a Sikh convert to Islam.


The tweet has since then been deleted, but not before causing some serious damage to Jubbals reputation given that media in various parts of Europe already labelled him a terrorist.


Jubal tweeted: "Has spread to the point, where many people have had to tweet about the photos being photoshopped.. Any support/nice messages are welcome."


Followed by this tweet: 
"Let us start with basics.
Never been to Paris.
Am a Sikh dude with a turban.
Lives in Canada."
3:56 AM - 15 Nov 2015



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13:36   Sonia, Rahul send Diwali mithai to Advani
While LK Advani may not always be the picture of cheer, the senior BJP leader does not mince words. That Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice-president Rahul Gandhi greeted him on Diwali and sent him a box of sweets has been broadcast to everyone willing to listen. Advani also let it be known that the Sonia was extremely warm in greeting him.


In fact, it was Advani who went to 10 Janpath (Sonia Gandhi's official residence) to hand over his autobiography, My Country, My life.


The BJP leadership is believed to be upset over this, but have not made any official comment as PM Modi hates back channels getting active.
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13:31   Advani to host breakfast, lunch meets with MPs
BJP senior leader LK Advani does not even have six MPs in the Lok Sabha to support his attempt at raising the banner of revolt in the BJP. The internal assessment done by the Advani camp reveals that during the winter session Advani may try to reach out to many MPs by hosting a intimate breakfast and luncheon in New Delhi.


Deepak Chopra who is Advani's blue-eyed secretary and coordinates between his daughter Prathibha Advani to leak stories about the Advani camp is also meeting innumerable journalists. Chopra fought for his right in the Lok Sabha Secretariat to get the status and pay scale of secretary to the Government of India as he is designated as the Officer on Special Duty to Advani.
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12:54   NSCN-K which killed 18 army men declared terror outfit
National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Khaplang (NSCN-K), a group which is allegedly responsible for killing of 18 army personnel in Manipur, has been declared a terrorist organisation under the stringent anti-terror law.


In a gazette notification issued recently, the government declared NSCN-K, all its front organizations and formations as a terrorist organization under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, a Home Ministry spokesman said.


The group, which had signed a peace agreement in March 2001, had withdrawn unilaterally from the ceasefire agreement in March this year after it was alleged that the area along Indo-Myanmar border being under their control was fast turning out to be 'safe-zone' for terrorists of ULFA faction led by Paresh Barua, the NDFB led by I K Songbijit, and the Meitei armed groups like the People's Liberation Army of Manipur.


The spokesman said that the NSCN (K) has resorted to terrorism by killing innocent civilians and security forces and engaged in other violent activities including the June four attack on an Army convoy in Chandel district of Manipur.


This case is being probed by the NIA, which has announced a bounty of Rs 17 lakh for providing information about two top leaders of militant NSCN-K including its chief S S Khaplang who were allegedly behind the strike.


The probe agency declared a cash reward of Rs seven lakh for Khaplang while a Rs 10 lakh bounty was announced for Niki Sumi, self-styled chief of the armed wing of NSCN-K, who is alleged to have led a group of rebels on June 4.


Khaplang is a resident of Myanmar while Sumi hails from Nagaland. There are reports that 75-year-old Khaplang was in a hospital and later shifted to Taga, a place which is at a junction of India-Myanmar-China border.
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12:31   Intolerance debate created by those being paid money: VK Singh
Union Minister VK Singh hit back at those who were saying that India was becoming increasing intolerant saying that the debate was unnecessary and creation of very imaginative minds being 'paid with a lot of money'.


He also asserted that it was a politically motivated move before the Bihar polls. "This particular debate (on intolerance) is no debate. It is the unnecessary creation of very imaginative minds who are being paid with a lot of money," Minister of State for External Affairs Singh said on the sidelines of the Regional Pravasi Bharatiya Divas in Los Angeles.


Singh was in the city to attend the two-day event in place of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, who had to return mid-way from Dubai in the wake of the Paris terror attacks.
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12:25  
West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee tweets @MamataOfficial  Saddened at the passing away of veteran actor Saeed Jaffrey. End of an era. Condolences to his family and friends
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12:21   Veteran actor Saeed Jaffrey passes away
Veteran actor Saeed Jaffrey, who appeared in several Bollywood as well as British movies, passed away at the age of 86, according to International Business Times. Saeed Jaffrey's niece Shaheen Aggarwal shared the news on her Facebook account.


Born on 8 January 1929, Jaffrey, an Indian-born British actor was born in Malerkotla, Punjab. His film credits include The Man Who Would Be King (1975), Shatranj Ke Khiladi (The Chess Players) (1977), Gandhi (1982), A Passage to India (1965 BBC version and 1984 film), The Far Pavilions (1984), and My Beautiful Laundrette (1985). He has also appeared in many Bollywood films in the 1980s and 1990s. For television he has starred in Gangsters (1975'"1978), The Jewel in the Crown (1984), Tandoori Nights (1985-1987) and Little Napoleons (1994). He also appeared as Ravi Desai on Coronation Street and in Minder as Mr Mukerjee in Series 1 episode The Bengal Tiger.
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12:15   ISIS flag waving in Kashmir should be dealt with iron hand: Sena
In the wake of Paris terror attacks that claimed at least 129 lives, the Shiv Sena today said that it was time India dealt with periodic incidents of waving of ISIS flags in Kashmir with an "iron hand'.


The Sena also noted that talks of human rights of terrorists should be shunned as they need to be rooted out completely.


"ISIS, which has claimed responsibility for the Paris attacks, has lately become active in Jammu and Kashmir as well. The raising of ISIS flags in Kashmir is a very serious issue. After the human slaughter in Paris, we need to deal with this issue even more seriously,' the Sena said in an editorial in party mouthpiece 'Saamana'.


The edit said that it was imperative for India to understand that Western countries' fight against terror was limited to their own interests and "we need to fight terror in our own way.


"Many countries including Pakistan have condemned the terror attacks in Paris. One can only laugh when a country like Pakistan condemns these attacks because the neighbouring country is a factory that makes terrorists.


"But until these terror attacks happen on their soil, America and European nations won't understand India's pain. Terrorists are not even leaving European nations now. Cracks are developing in their once impregnable security walls. This incident has claimed the largest number of lives after the Second World War. Europe needs to take lessons from this incident. Shun talks of human rights of terrorists and eliminate them from their roots," the Sena said.
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12:10   Pak PM wrties to Separatist Andrabi on Kashmir
Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif stirs the pot of unrest in Jammu and Kashmir. In a letter to Separatist Asiya Andrabi, Sharif writes, "We respect your feelings about Pakistan and appreciate you being a well wisher. Pakistan knows its responsibility towards Kashmir, we will continue to raise issue globally."


Andrabi is the chief of the radical womens outfit Dukhtaran-e-Millat, and was detained in September for hoisting a Pakistani flag in August. The DeM chief celebrated Pakistans Independence Day on August 14 at her residence by singing that countrys national anthem and unfurling the flag of the neighbouring country on the outskirts of the city.


Hours after that, Andrabi had stoked another controversy by addressing via phone a rally in Pakistan which was organized by Mumbai attack mastermind Hafiz Saeed-led Jamat-ud Dawa (JuD).
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11:53   Greater intelligence-sharing needed to prevent attacks: India
In the wake of the grisly Paris attacks, India has called for greater amount of intelligence- sharing among all countries and hoped that the world would unite against the menace of terrorism.


"India has always said that terrorism and anything to do with terrorism is a threat (to the world). India has always said that terrorism should never be used as a state policy by anybody," Minister of State for External Affairs V K Singh told reporters on the sidelines of the Regional Pravasi Bharatiya Divas in Los Angeles

Attending the two-day event in place of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, who had to return mid-way from Dubai to New Delhi in view of the Paris terror attacks, Singh said India is concerned over spreading of terrorism, whether it is India or anywhere else in the world. "We seriously condemn the incident that has happened in France. We are hopeful that everybody would unite together to fight against this kind of a menace," he said.
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11:51   Katara murder: Death plea for for Yadavs struck down, 30 years in jail
Just in: Nitish Katara murder case: The Supreme Court dismisses a petition of the Delhi Govt seeking death sentence for convicts Vikas and Vishal Yadav.


Delhi's AAP government had moved the Supreme Court to seek death penalty for Vikas, his cousin Vishal Yadav and accomplice Sukhdev Yadav in connection with the Nitish Katara murder case.


Nitish, son of an IAS officer, was killed by Vikas Yadav, his cousin Vishal Yadav and Sukhdev Pehlwan on the intervening night of February 16 and 17, 2002, after they abducted him from a marriage party in Uttar Pradesh's Ghaziabad. Both Vikas and Vishal objected to Nitish's alleged relationship with their sister, Bharti Yadav.


Recently, the Supreme Court rejected a petition seeking death penalty for Vikas and Vishal Yadav in the Katara murder case. Refusing to call it a case of honour killing, the apex court said that the case does not fall in the rarest of rare category under which death penalty is awarded.


An apex court bench of Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar and Justice R. Banumati had said that while it was a murder and could even be pre-meditated, it certainly was not heinous or a matter of honour killing.


Nitish's mother Neelam Katara had moved the Supreme Court questioning the Delhi high court order sentencing the duo to 25 and five years sentences which are to be run one after the other. She had sought an enhancement of the sentence to death or alternatively imprisonment for whole life.


Vikas Yadav was given an enhanced 30-year jail term without remission by the Delhi high court, including 25 years for murder and another five years for destruction of evidence. Sukhdev Yadav too was awarded an enhanced life sentence by the high court and is undergoing 20 years in jail without remission.
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11:32   Some countries still use terror as state policy instrument: PM
Pressing for the need to delink terror from religion, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said some countries still use terrorism as "an instrument of state policy" and the world must act against radicalisation without any political consideration.


Modi said terrorism is the main global challenge today and "from regions in conflict to the streets of distant cities, terrorism extracts a deadly price".


Speaking at the G20 Summit in Antalya, being held against the backdrop of deadly Paris attacks, the Prime Minister said, "Old structures of terrorism remain. There are countries that still use it as an instrument of state policy."


"The world must speak in one voice and act in unison against terrorism, without any political considerations. There should be no distinction between terrorist groups or discrimination between states.


"We must isolate those who support and sponsor terrorism; and, stand with those who share our values of humanism. We need to restructure the international legal framework to deal with the unique challenges of terrorism," he said.


He was making an intervention at G-20 Working Dinner last night on the issue of 'Global Challenges '" Terrorism and Refugee Crisis'. Modi said the world is seeing a changing character of terrorism with "global links, franchise relations, home-grown terrorism and use of cyber space for recruitment and propaganda".
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11:22   Paris massacre: Cops stop key suspect at checkpoint, let him go
Hours after the synchronised attacks that terrorised Paris, French police questioned and released the suspect who is now the focus of an international manhunt, officials have said.


Saleh Abdelslam, 26, was one of three men in a getaway car, headed for France's border with Belgium, when police pulled them over after daybreak Saturday.


The French president had already announced new border controls to prevent the perpetrators from escaping. Hours had passed since investigators identified Abdelslam as the renter of a Volkswagen Polo that carried hostage-takers to the Paris theater where almost three-quarters of the 129 victims were killed. It's not clear why the local French police, known as gendarmes, didn't take Abdelslam into custody.


They checked his identification, but it's not known whether they had been informed of his apparent connection to the attacks. "It was a simple check. There was no lookout notice at the time of the traffic stop," a French police official told the AP yesterday.


Asked whether Abdelslam's name had been shared over police networks by then, the official simply said: "I have no explanation." It may not have been the only missed opportunity before and after France's deadliest extremist attack since World War II.


The day before the attacks, senior Iraqi intelligence officials warned France and other members of the US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State that assaults by the militant group could be imminent, according to a dispatch obtained by the AP.


Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the group's leader, had ordered supporters to use guns and bombs and take hostages in the days ahead in coalition countries as well as Iran and Russia, Thursday's dispatch said.


The dispatch did not say where or when the attacks might take place, and a senior French security official told the AP that French intelligence gets this kind of communication "all the time" and "every day."


But Iraqi intelligence officials told the AP that they also shared specific details with French authorities before the attack including the size of a sleeper cell of militants they said was directing attackers sent back to France from Islamic State's de-facto capital in Raqqa, Syria.


These additional details were not corroborated by French or Western security officials. But one US official said yesterday that the evident weaponry skill displayed by the attackers suggests that they might have received training somewhere.
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11:07   Paris attackers linked to Belgian suburb where authorities have 'lost control'
Two of the Paris attackers -- and at least three other people involved -- are linked to a heavily-Muslim suburb of Brussels where the authorities admit they have "lost control".


The Telegraph reports that Belgian prosecutors said that one of the seven killers who died in Paris had been identified as a Frenchman living in Molenbeek, which is described by one expert as "the capital of political Islam in continental Europe". A second attacker lived in or close to the district.


France carried out massive raids in Syria, their biggest to date, in co-ordination with US forces, striking the Islamic State stronghold in Raqqa just days after the terror outfit carried a series of coordinated attacks that killed around 129 people.

Raqqa is seen as the de facto capital of the Islamic States territory.

According to the Guardian, the French defence ministry has claimed that the raid was launched simultaneously from the United Arab Emirates and Jordan.


Pic: An injured man in the immediate aftermath of the attack
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10:53   Islamic State takes war to its foes after battlefield setbacks
Facing military setbacks in its self-declared caliphate in Syria and Iraq and intensified air strikes from a US-led coalition, Islamic State may have decided in September to take the fight to France and elsewhere.


The ultra-hardline group has frequently threatened to strike inside Western countries since it established itself amid Syria's civil war and then spread to northern Iraq last year, but one fighter reached inside Syria said its spokesman Abu Mohammad al-Adnani had issued an instruction to act abroad.


"He sent a written order to all sectors and security brigades to start moving, including in Lebanon and Turkey," the Syrian IS fighter said via social media from northern Syria."Lebanon and France and other places are all part of the operations ordered two months ago."  Read more
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10:25   Paris attacks a reaction to US actions in Syria: Azam Khan
In a controversial statement on Friday's Paris attacks, senior Samajwadi Party leader and UP minister Azam Khan said the global superpowers must realise that the terror attack was a reaction to their action in Syria and Iraq. Khan, who condemned the terror attack as unfortunate, however, added that European cities "cannot be lit up with the ill-gotten wealth from the oil reserves of Middle East". 

Blaming the US and Russia for precipitating crisis in the troubled region, Khan said, "Western powers have already destroyed countries, like Libya, Syria, Afghanistan, and to some extent, Iran. The reason is simple: they want to acquire oil reserves in these countries by brute force and deck up their own cities which is totally unjustified."

Lashing out at Western powers for trying to grab power though illegitimate means, Khan said, "If you want to earn money and retain your splendour, you should slog like Indians and earn it. At least, you shouldn't be resorting to unethical means."
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10:21  
JUST IN: The government declares National Socialist Council of Nagaland- Khaplang as a terrorist organisation.
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10:20   Ratnakar Shetty replaces Sundar Raman as IPL COO?
In a bid to clean up system and regain credibility, the BCCI has appointed Professor Ratnakar Shetty to take over as Indian Premier League's administrative head, according to reports. Shetty will take over the vacant post of IPL COO, which until recently was held by Sundar Raman. Shetty is a veteran cricket administrator and enjoys a relatively clean image.
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09:55   Intolerance debate created by those being paid money: VK Singh
The debate over intolerance in India is an "unnecessary" creation of very imaginative minds being "paid with a lot of money", Union Minister V K Singh has alleged, asserting that it was a politically motivated movebefore the Bihar polls. "This particular debate (on intolerance) is no debate. Itis the unnecessary creation of very imaginative minds who are being paid a lot of money," Minister of State for External Affairs Singh said. 
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09:33   UN chief Ban Ki-moon to visit North Korea
United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon is to visit North Korea, the first head of the world body to set foot in the isolated state for more than 20 years, Citing an unidentified high-level UN source, Yonhap news agency said Ban would visit Pyongyang in his official capacity as secretary general later this week, though no precise dates were given. 

The UN spokesman's office in New York declined to comment on the report.  

The high-level UN source told Yonhap that Ban was almost certain to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, who has yet to receive a single head of state since taking over power following the death of his father Kim Jong-II in 2011.
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09:21   Glorifying Godse will bring bad name to Hindutva, says RSS leader
The BJP and its ideological mentor Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh strongly expressed their disapproval today as a fringe group commemorated the 66th death anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi's assassin Nathuram Godse and launched a website on his life. 

"I do not know which organisation is glorifying him (Godse). But I believe that to glorify him is wrong," said senior RSS ideologue MG Vaidya said. "Some people say it (glorifying Godse) will bring pride to Hindutva. No. It will bring a bad name to Hindutva... I can even say, Hindutva has suffered due to the assassination of Gandhi," he said in an apparent reference to the programme by the fringe group Hindu Mahasabha.
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08:25   OOPS! CST lights up in solidarity, gets French national flag wrong
To show their solidarity with the victims of the horrific Paris attack a host of building across the world changed their colours to the French flag's blue, white and red. On Sunday, Mumbai's Chatrapati Shivaji Terminal followed suit but they made one big, glaring mistake.  Instead of displaying the colours blue, white and red (in accordance with the French flag), they showed the colour combination red, white and blue (left to right)  which actually signifes the Netherlands flag. 
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08:18   France launches fierce assault on Islamic State targets in Syria
French warplanes pounded Islamic State positions as police in Europe widened their investigations into coordinated attacks in Paris that killed more than 130 people. 

Islamic State has claimed responsibility for Friday's suicide bombings and shootings, which have re-ignited a row over Europe's refugee crisis and drawn calls to block a huge influx of Muslim asylum-seekers.

France has been bombing Islamic State positions in Iraq and Syria for months as part of a US-led operation. Following Friday's mayhem, Paris vowed to destroy the group. Underlining its resolve, French jets launched their biggest raids in Syria to date, hitting its stronghold in Raqqa. 

"The raid, including 10 fighter jets, was launched simultaneously from the United Arab Emirates and Jordan. Twenty bombs were dropped," the French defence ministry said. Among the targets were a munitions depot and training camp, it said.

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