Tamil Nadu chief minister M. Karunanidhi’s daughter, Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, on Thursday said the series of raids by the CBI on Tuesday and a week earlier in connection with the 2G spectrum scam at her offices and residential premises, and those of former Union communications and IT minister A. Raja’s relatives and associates, would not affect the DMK’s ties with the Congress.

The Supreme Court on Thursday asked the Delhi Development Authority to re-build the night shelters razed by it on Tuesday evening within three days. Rebuking the DDA for being callous, the Supreme Court asked the additional solicitor general Mohan Parasaran to visit one of the night shelters and get a first-hand account of the conditions there.

India and China have decided to hold regular exchange of high-level visits and to institutionalise annual meetings between their foreign ministers, said the joint statement issued towards the end of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s talks with visiting Chinese premier Wen Jiabao. Prime Minister Singh can be expected to visit China in 2011 on a bilateral visit and to participate in the next Bric summit to be hosted there.

India and China have agreed to set up a working mechanism for consultation and coordination on the boundary question, Chinese premier Wen Jiabao said in his speech at the Indian Council of World Affairs.

The Congress party has not taken any decision about whether or not to have a pre-poll alliance with the like minded parties in the coming Assam Assembly elections.
“It has not been discussed... it is a political decision,” said the Congress general secretary in charge of the party affairs in Assam, Mr Digvijay Singh, here on Thursday. He was answering to questions by reporters.

Union minister of state (independent charge) for corporate affairs Salman Khurshid on Thursday said that corporate lobbying per say was not illegal. “There is a democratic right to lobby, to argue, to defend, to promote but it should be within legitimate limits,” he added. Mr Khurshid was speaking on the sidelines of a Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) programme in the city.

Union law and justice minister Veerappa Moily on Thursday clarified that the name of former telecom minister A. Raja did not figure in the letter written by the former Chief Justice of India K.G. Balakrishnan to him in August 2009. “I wrote to the then Chief Justice of India Justice Balakrishnan to which he responded. The name of any minister did not figure in the correspondence. This is a matter of fact. There is no controversy at all,” Mr Moily clarified.

Welcoming the Supreme Court’s directives to the CBI and ED to carry out investigations into the 2G spectrum allocation scam, the main Opposition BJP on Thursday however, reiterated its demand for a JPC probe into the scam. The party clarified that Supreme Court’s directives have not diluted its stand favouring a JPC and contended that while the CBI would only investigate the “criminal conduct,” a JPC would look into all aspects of the scam.

The Goa NCP on Thursday evening asked two of its MLAs who are ministers in the Congress-led coalition to resign from the Cabinet after the duo met Congress leaders on Wednesday night, promising support to the party.

The Maharashtra home minister on Thursday said that the state police had no record of any telephonic conversation between Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh and slain Anti-Terrorism Squad chief Hemant Karkare on November 26, 2008.