The trial of former Indian-American Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta began in New York on Monday in what is the most high profile case of insider trading in US history.

The trial began at US District Court, Southern Disctrict of New York with the judge Jed Rakoff meeting defence and procecution and sorting out routene issues and is expected to last for three weeks.

Gupta, 63, was also present in the cortroom. He appeared composed and was seen talking to his lawyers and taking down notes.

Gupta's lawyer Gary Naftalis told the judge that he would be making "three or four sentences about Gupta's charitable work in his opening remarks". The judge agreed to that.

The jury selection process is on. About 100 people have been called and jurors will be selected from them.

Gupta is the most high profile Wall Street executive to be charged in the government's crackdown on insider trading.

Opening remarks are expected later in the day. Gupta's wife and eldest daughter are also expected to be present during the trial, Naftalis informed the judge.

Vishwanathan Anand hit back strongly in game 8 to restore in his 12 match world chess championship match against Boris Gefland of Israel.

Anand, who has lost game 7 to trail in the match, destroyed Gefland in 17 moves to draw level with four matches to play.

Congress today steered clear of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee remaining non-committal on Pranab Mukherjee as the next President but strongly backing Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar for the post.

"I have not heard or seen the statement", party spokesman Rashid Alvi told reporters.

He was asked to react to Banerjee's remarks that she would be "very happy" to see Meira Kumar, Gopal Gandhi or even A P J Abdul Kalam as the next President.

Alvi said Congress will hold consultations with all concerned on the issue of next President.

England have won the first Test of their series against the West Indies at Lords by five wickets.

Scores: West Indies 243 & 345, England 398 & 193/5 (A Cook 79, I Bell 63 no, K Roach 3/60)

Army chief General V.K Singh's farewell function on May 31 has the organisers defence ministry on tenterhooks -- his date of birth will be read out.

Read the report on the Daily Mail.

In 2009 a recruiting team from Intimate Fashions, a Tamil Nadu manufacturer that makes bras for the American lingerie retailer Victoria's Secret, came to the Tiruvannamalai district of Tamil Nadu and changed lives.

Read

Amid charges of black money playing a part in the IPL, Sports Ministry has asked the Finance Ministry to order an expeditious probe into it. 

Sports Minister Ajay Maken told the Lok Sabha today that the Sports Secretary has written a letter last week in this regard to the Revenue Secretary and has sought the inquiry to be conducted in an expeditious manner by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the Income Tax Department. 

Maken also said that 19 notices have been issued to IPL and BCCI for FEMA violations to the tune of Rs 1,077 crore and Sports Ministry Joint Secretary has also written a letter to the ED on May 17 seeking expeditious probe into the matter. 

When Manmohan Singh took over for his second term as Prime Minister, the tablet was an underpowered computer, open source was for geeks and A. Raja was the telecom minister. Read more on the Daily Mail.

Another must-read piece from P Sainath on the goverment's austerity drive.

Rrural Indian spending Rs. 22.50 a day would not be considered poor by a Planning Commission whose Deputy Chairman's foreign trips between May and October last year cost a daily average of Rs. 2.02 lakh Pranab Mukherjee's stirring call for austerity tugs at the national tear ducts.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has pleaded for it in the past and watched his flock embrace it creatively. With the Finance Ministry even acting on Dr. Singh's call in 2009 (economy class air travel, spending cuts), we are now in the fourth year of our noble quest.

More 

Also read Sainath's columun last week on BT cotton and the Times of India.

The finance minister also said that PAN card was mandatory for buying gold above Rs 5 lakh.

The White Paper bill also says:

-- Lokpal and Lokayuktas will be put in place at the earliest to expedite investigations into corruption cases.  

-- All financial offences should be tried through fast track courts and punishment be made more stringent.

Facebook plans to relax a ban on children under the age of 13 joining the website, according to a report.  

According to a senior Facebook employee, the decision to lift the restriction came after finding that many kids, some with their parents' permission and help, were already signing up.  

If the decision to lift the ban is implemented, a flood of new users are likely to sign up to the site, which currently has nearly 900 million active users, The Daily Mail reports.

Early feeds on what the White Paper on black money holds:

 
-- Multi-pronged strategy needed to deal with generation and transfer of black money.

-- Vodafone tax case provides instance of misuse of corporate structure to avoid payment of taxes.

-- Five-pronged strategy adopted by government to deal with menace of black money yielding "good results".

-- To check black money, government may provide tax incentives on use of debit/credit card as it leaves audit trail.

The government had last year formed a committee to examine the black money issue. The report was submitted to the finance ministry earlier this year. The reports say it will provide information about the steps that the government has taken to tackle the issue but may not divulge estimates of the black money stashed abroad, as expert committees are yet to submit their reports.

The deal to reopen the NATO supply lines through Pakistan to Afghanistan fell apart after U.S. President Barack Obama remained at loggerheads with Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari, refusing even to meet with him without an agreement on the supply routes.

Zardari, who flew to Chicago for a two-day NATO summit with hopes of meeting with Obama, is prepared to leave empty-handed, reports the New York Times. Pakistan had closed the NATO routes into Afghanistan after an US air raid last November killed 24 Pakistani soldiers, for which Obama has offered condolences but no apology.

"This breakdown in the U.S. and Pakistan relationship has come down to a fixation of this apology issue," said Vali Nasr, a former State Department adviser on Pakistan.

The Ghaziabad special CBI court has begun arguments for framing of charges against dentist couple Nupur and Rajesh Talwar in the twin murders of their daughter Aarushi and domestic help Hemraj.

"The CBI has relied on 141 documents in the case but now they are saying that they are not relying on more than 96 documents. The court has directed them to provide all the documents by 8.30 p.m. tomorrow,' Talwars' counsel Manoj Kumar Sisodia said. 

Just in: The Delhi High Court has directed ND Tiwari to give his blood sample by May 26. The Delhi high court last weekn had ordered its registrar to take police assistance for bringing the defiant veteran Congress leader for taking his blood sample to decide the paternity suit of a man claiming to be his son.

The court fixed the matter for further hearing today before the Joint Registrar, who in turn fixed the date for collection of the blood sample from Tiwari as May 26.

The court made it clear that the process of collecting the sample would be initiated within a week after the joint registrar receives the DNA sample kit from Hyderabad-based Centre for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics.

The court in its order said that considering the age of Tiwari, the order of taking the blood sample is required to be implemented "as expeditiously as possible otherwise an irreparable loss is bound to visit the plaintiff".

The court's directions came on the plea of 32-year-old Rohit Shekhar seeking to compel Tiwari to furnish his blood sample at the earliest to decide the four-year-old paternity suit. He has sought a judicial declaration that Tiwari is his biological father.

Just in: Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee has tabled the White Paper on black money in Parliament just now.

The paper is likely to give a comprehensive strategy on bringing back black money stashed abroad. It will also focus on bullion, gold jewellery and the real estate sector and is likely to recommend more transparency in land dealings and regularisation of land registration.

The government had last year formed a committee to examine the black money issue. The report was submitted to the finance ministry earlier this year. The reports say it will provide information about the steps that the government has taken to tackle the issue but may not divulge estimates of the black money stashed abroad, as expert committees are yet to submit their reports.

Appealing to the striking pilots to return to work, Singh had earlier said that the strike by pilots was illegal, and they should come back to work in the larger interest of the passengers.

"When the Justice Dharmadhikari Committee Report is expected, there is no reason for the strike and the pilots should come back to work," he added. He assured that there will be no victimization by the government and management will look into the problems of the pilots.

Former India cricketer and BJP MP Kirti Azad is trending for his Sunday fast. He demanded that the Indian Premier League, which has been a hit by a series a controversies, be scrapped. What the tweets say.. 

@sardesairajdeep Kirti Azad today showed what a 20-20 fast is like! Started at 12.30 and over by 3.30!  

@smitaprakash *facepalm* RT @ANI_news The behavior of the people in the IPL is similar to that of Somalian pirates: Kirti Azad    

@LalitKModi RT @nitinjchavan: @LalitKModi Kirti Azad just bowled fastest FAST in d world!!    

@veeraa1410 His own partymen r ignoring Kirti Azad So what is the political motive for so called fasting which lasted for 3 hrs Pl tell us Mr Azad

Read the report where Kirti Azad compares the IPL to pirates 

Pakistan was ranked second in the list of most negatively rated countries in the world by a global poll for BBC World Service, which surveyed 24,090 people around the world. 

Read

US-Pakistan rift widens over supply lines into Afghanistan as Obama refuses bilateral meeting with his Pakistani counterpart, Asif Ali Zardari, who wants demands met before roads reopen.

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Finance Minister Pranab Mukherje is likely to present a White Paper on black money in Parliament today, as promised to the House during a debate on the Finance Bill last week.

"I will try to give all the relevant and possible information," Mukherjee had said in the Lok Sabha,while promising to bring the White Paper in the on-going Budget Session. The Opposition, led by the BJP has been accusing the government of going slow on the black money probe.

Update on the Mumbai rave party.

Vishay Handa, director of a city-based hotel where a rave party was held last night at which two IPL players were present, was today arrested under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act. 

"Handa, organiser of the rave party and director of Oakwood Premier Hotel, has been arrested under NDPS Act... as charas and cocaine were found at the venue. He has been booked under the Act," said a police officer.

Police had said last night that two IPL players from the Pune Warriors team, one of them a foreigner, were among the 96 persons who were detained following a raid. The police have not yet disclosed the identity of these two players. 

"Approximately 110 grams of cocaine along with MDMA, popularly known as ecstasy, and charas were seized," Additional Commissioner of Police Vishwas Nagre Patil had said. At least 58 boys and 38 girls were taken to Cooper hospital here for a blood and urine test, and cases would be registeredagainst those who tested positive, he had said.

A must-read on the DNA:

Ashwin, son of BCCI president N Srinivasan, has accused his father of homophobia and of using his clout to unleash a cycle of violence against him and his partner Avi Mukherjee in order to 'cure' him of homosexuality.

Ashwin, 43, says he and his partner have been subjected to physical and mental torture at Srinivasan's behest for years. He says the latest incident took place on April 30, when the police picked up the couple from an upmarket Bandra restaurant-pub Escobar and beat them with iron rods.

Read

She likes Target, the Food Network and sun-dried tomatoes. She loves taking pictures of her dog Beast, and admits to checking her phone "every five seconds." Priscilla Chan vaulted into the spotlight on Saturday when it was revealed she had married longtime boyfriend Mark Zuckerberg -- billionaire and Facebook founder. 

Read

From seven-year-olds to 70-year-olds, people in Boston, New York, Seattle, Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles and other cities over the US are attending Sanskrit classes, not just to chant shlokas but also to learn to speak, read and write this ancient language. A revival is brewing.

More on the WSJ

Several states in India are ramping up legislation to protect cows, and maybe even buffaloes, in many cases making it harder to buy or sell their meat.

And yet it's increasingly common to find restaurant menus in major Indian cities that feature dishes described as 'tenderloin' or 'filet mignon'. But what is this mystery meat? And is it even legal for it to be on the menu?

Read

Barely a day went by at the insider-trading trial of multimillionaire hedge-fund founder Raj Rajaratnam a year ago without mention of Rajat Gupta, a boldface name in business and charity circles.

On Monday in the same federal court in New York, it will be Gupta's turn to go on trial. The former Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Procter & Gamble board member is accused of leaking stock secrets to Rajaratnam, his erstwhile friend and business associate who was convicted and is now in prison.

More on Reuters

Even if the Lokpal Bill is to be tabled today, a lack of consensus on key provisions of the Lokpal Bill, including the one dealing with superintendence over CBI, appears to be major road blocks.

Though the original plan was to move official amendments to the Lokpal Bill and bring it for passage in the Rajya Sabha on May 21, the reluctance of BJP and other parties to soften up on other amendments, sought by them, seems to have come in the way of government's consensus-building exercise, reports ET.

Question Time Didi, organised by CNN-IBN at the Town Hall on Friday evening, was meant to be a platform for Mamata Banerjee to field questions from a cross-section of Calcuttans on the eve of her completing one year as chief minister.

But less than 12 minutes and five questions into the event, Mamata stormed off, accusing some students of being "Maoists and CPM cadres'.

Taniya Bhardwaj, a Presidency University student whose question about the conduct of some of her ministers prompted Mamata to take off her lapel microphone and leave, writes a letter to her chief minister via The Telegraph..

Read

@sardesairajdeep: CNN IBN exclusive: Mamata breaks silence on President issue. Kalam, Gopal Gandhi, Meira Kumar her choices, refuses to endorse Pranab."

If you've missed yesterday's India and dowry episode on Satyamev Jayate (didn't miss much, honestly), this column on the Hindu, should give you a feel Aamir Khan's take on the issue. Read

(The column is by Aamir Khan and will be published in The Hindu every Monday.)

Meanwhile, Mumbai police last night busted a high-profile rave party at a plush hotel in Juhu and rounded up 96 partygoers, including two IPL players.  Additional commissioner of police, west region, Vishwas Nangre Patil confirmed that two IPL players were at the party. He, however, said no one would be arrested until the medical tests proved they had consumed drugs.

Read the report on the HT

Royal Challengers player K P Appanna's name has cropped up in the investigations into the molestation case. Investigators claimed that Appanna was the person who accompanied Pomersbach when he went to the victim's room for the second time. 

Pomersbach was arrested on Friday after Zohal Hamid alleged that he molested her and hit her fiance Sahil Peerzada when he objected to the cricketer's behaviour. Peerzada was punched in his ear following which he had to undergo a surgery. 

"We have examined the CCTV footages and identified Appanna. We have spoken to him. We are yet to formally question him," a senior police official said. Appanna, a leg spinner who plays for Karnataka in Ranji Trophy, could not be contacted for his comments.

Update on Friday's molestation story. Zohal Hamid, the victim of the alleged sexual molestation attempt by Bangalore Royal Challengers player Luke Pomersbach is arms trader Abhishek Verma's "rakhi" sister, and a veritable part of his "extended family", a relationship confirmed by Verma to The Sunday Guardian.

Read more

Accusing Odisha Government of failing to fulfil promises made during recent hostage crisis, top Maoist leader Sabyasachi Panda today said rebels may turn violent if the administration resorted to suppression.

In a fresh audio message to a section of the media, the top leader of Odisha State Organising Committee of CPI (Maoist) alleged that the state government had failed to keep its commitment made during the hostage crisis.

Claiming that his wife Subhashree Das alias Mili Panda was falsely implicated in Nayagarh attack case, the Naxal leader rued woman rebel Arati Majhi was yet to be freed.Panda criticised the statement made by Odisha Home Secretary U N Behera on May 15 that the state government had been following the commitments made during hostage crisis involving two Italian nationals and an MLA.

Read more on the Outlook.