NEW DELHI: Trial in the sensational murder case of bandit-turned-politician Phoolan Devi was today transferred to a fast track court by the
District Judge on the request of an accused. Read the rest of this entry

PATNA : Tributes were paid to Maharana Pratap Singh, the legendary Rajput hero of Mewar, at a function held to mark his 411th death anniversary at Sri Krishna Memorial Hall here today. Read the rest of this entry

Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram presented the Budget against a backdrop of slowing expansion and creeping inflation which has hit the poor hardest.

The highlights of this year budget are as follows :

• Tax exemption for women increased to Rs 1.8 lakh
• New tax slabs: 10 per cent for 1,50,000 to 3,00,000, 20 per cent for 3,00,000 to 5,00,000 and 30 per cent above 5,00,000
• Excise on packaged softwares to be lower from 8% to 12%
• No excise duty on refrigerating equipments
• Anti-Aids drug exempted from excise duty
• Small cars to become cheaper
• Reduced excise duty on two, three wheelers
• Excise duty on hybrid cars cut from 24 pct to 14 pct
• Excise on small cars cut to 12 pct from 16 pct
• Rs 50 cr for tiger conservation
• Sixth Pay Commission report by March 2008
• Defence allocation up by 10% from Rs 96,000 cr to Rs 1,56,000 cr
• 22 Sainik schools get Rs 44 crore
• Rs 624 cr for Commonwealth Games
• PAN sole identification in securities market
• Debt waiver scheme and relief to small and marginal farmers
• Duty reduced on life saving drugs
• Rs 750 crore for upgradation of 300 ITIs in 25 districts.
• No change in peak customs duty
• Money changers and people running gains of chance and tour operators to be brought under service tax net
• Revenue Deficit is Rs 55,184 cr at 1% of GDP and fiscal deficit is Rs 1,33,287 cr at 3.1% of GDP
• Estimated planned expenditure at Rs 2,43,086 cr and non-panned expenditure Rs 57,409 cr
• Central Plans Scheme monitoring system under Plan Panel to be unveiled
• Non-agri peak rates for customs raises to 10% from 2% in 2004
• Tax to GDP ratio at 9.2% in 2004 up by 12.5% in 2007-08
• Custom duty on steel scrapped
• Set-top boxes to become cheaper
• Custom duty on vitamin pre-mixes to lower from 30% to 20%
• Agri loans disbursed by rural banks, RRBs and Cooperative banks before March 2007 and overdue on Dec 2007 waived
• Overdue agri loans amount to Rs 50,000 cr under the waiver and Rs 10,000 cr under the one time settlement
• Implementation of waiver to be completed by June 2008
• Farmers eligible for fresh agri loans post the waiver or one time settlement
• Haryana and Chandigarh to introduce smart card based delivery system under PDS
• National Agri Insurance scheme get Rs 640 cr
• National Highway development program gets Rs 12966 cr
• Rs 8000 cr plan for faster power reforms
• National housing bank gets Rs 1,200 cr for refinancing
• Govt asks commercial banks to add 250 rural household accounts every year in rural and semi-urban banks
• States urged to open bidding for 5 more ultra mega power projects
• All 30 integrated textile parks approved
• Rs 340 cr insurance scheme to cover 17 lakh farmers and weavers
• SITP gets Rs 450 crore
• Rs 275 cr earmarked for state data centres
• NHDP allocation up from Rs 10,866 cr to Rs 12,966 cr
• Move towards nutrient-based fertiliser subsidy stressed
• National fund for transmission and distribution reforms for power sector
• FDI in Apr-Dec at $12.7 billion, FII inflow over $18 billion
• PNB says banks to be reimbursed accordingly
• Tea Research association gets Rs 20 cr
• 500 soil testing labs to be set up in the 11th plan, govt to give 1 time budgetary assistance of Rs 75 cr to agri ministry for setting up mobile soil testing facilities
• National Horticulure Mission to get Rs 1,100 cr
• Govt sets up irrigation and water resource finance corp with an initial corpus of Rs 100 cr
• Schedule Commercial Banks farm credit 75%
• Micro irrigation scheme gets Rs 500 cr to cover 4,00,000 additional hectares
• Rs 12050 cr for strengthening rural health services
• 24 pct allocation hike for women, child development
• Inflation will be kept under check
• Jawaharlal Navoday Vidyalaya to be set in 20 new districts for SC/STs
• Healthcare allocation to be raised by 15%
• Bhopal and Tripura to get one IIScR each and 2 colleges of art
• 288 public sector bank branches to be opened in areas with concentration of minorities
• Irrigation outlay increased
• National Minority Development and Finance Corp to get Rs 75 cr
• More funds for North East
• 54 gender budgeting cells set up
• Agriculture share in total investment up from 10.2% in 2003-04 to 16% during the 11th Plan
• Agri credit target to be Rs 2,80,000 cr for 2008-09
• LIC to cover all woman SHGs linked to the bank
• Mobilisation of additional resources of Rs 10,000 cr as planned capital expenditure under Plan-B
• Allocation for ministry of minorities doubled to Rs 1,000 cr
• Schemes for woman to get Rs 1,460 cr this fiscal
• Child related schemes to get Rs 33,434 cr
• 54 departments to be set up gender budgeting divisions
• Rajiv Gandhi drinking water mission to get Rs 7,300 cr
• Rs 3,966 cr for SC/STs schemes
• Allocation of Rs 75 cr for 2008-09 for the Rajiv Gandhi felicitation programme
• Sanitation to get Rs1,200 cr
• Rs 200 cr for providing portable water system in each school in areas of water scarce regions
• IT industry gets Rs 100 cr for connecting knowledge institutions
• NREGS to be extended to 596 rural distt with an outlay of Rs 16,000cr
• The remuneration Angan Bari workers has been increased from Rs 1000 cr-1500 cr per month
• Women entitled to equal share and equal say
• Science scholarships for young learners
• 16 Central universities to be set up
• 6000 model high schools to be started
• Science scholarships for young learners
• Inflation will be kept under check
• More allocation for polio and AIDS
• Health covers of Rs 30000 for workers in unorganised sectors
• Education sector gets a boost
• Agri credit doubled in first two years
• Bharat Nirman allocation to go up to Rs 31,280 cr from Rs 24,603 cr
• Gross Budgetary support to be Rs 24,3386 cr about Rs 38,286 cr more than 2007-08
• Agriculture credit to touch 2,40,000 cr in 2008
• Focus on achievement of self-sufficiency in food grain
• Soyabean output to be 9.45 mn tonnes
• Maize production to be 16.78 mn tonnes
• Rice production to be 94.08 mn tonnes
• Total agri production to be 219.32 mn tonnes at all time high
• Agriculture disappointing at average annual growth of 2.6%
• Keeping inflation under check to be on focus
• Focus on management of supply side of food, market, capital inflows next year
• India has registered a growth of over 8% for 12 successive quarters till Dec 2007
• New IITs to come up in Bihar, Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh

An explosion rocked cinema hall in Panvel (Navi Mumbai ) showing JA. There is no report of any causality.

Police said the blast may have been caused by a very low intensity explosive, loud enough to get the film stopped without harming anybody.

Immediately after the blast, panic-stricken viewers rushed out of the Cineraj theatre. All cinema halls in the area has stopped screening the film for time being.

In a precautionary move, another theatre in the locality was evacuated and searched by a bomb detection squad and sniffer dogs. The police were combing the whole area for suspicious things.

The Uttar Pradesh government Thursday banned a book on Rani Laxmibai, better known as Jhansi ki Rani. Read the rest of this entry

An impressive life-size statue of Maharana Pratap and his favorite and loyal horse Chetak, who was fiercely protective about his master and stood by him till his last breath was inaugurated by former Vice President Shri Bhairon Singh Shekhawat at Aurangabad in Bihar. Read the rest of this entry

Former Gujarat Minister for Urban development Shri IK Jadeja will replace Vijay Rupani as the state spokesperson of BJP. The decision was taken at a meeting of party executives. Read the rest of this entry

The Mysore District Rajput Sabha claimed the ownership of the 12 acre land on Shivaji Road in N.R. Mohalla (Mysore). Narasimhbhan Singh, president of Rajput Sabha told that the Wakf Board evicted the petty shops and acquired the property illegally. Read the rest of this entry

Gujarat Rajput Yuva Sangh organised Samuha Lagan (mass marriage ceremony) at Bhavnagar recently. The next Samuh lagan is to be organised at Rajkot and Ahemdabad. Read the rest of this entry

Director General of the Coast Guard, Vice Admiral RF Cotractor, today said that the Sethusamudram project poses a security threat to the country. He said that there is a strong possibility of the canal being used by militants. Read the rest of this entry