The Congress vision document that promises justice, rights and development to the people of Uttar Pradesh also focuses on minority empowerment and gives a major push to minority education and skill development through setting up new schools, recruitment of minority teachers, scholarships and vocational training.

The Bharatiya Janata Party in Uttar Pradesh finally again had to revert to the Ram temple issue to regain its lost political glory in the crucial state for the coming Assembly polls.

Manipur goes to polls on Saturday in the shadow of bomb attacks by militants to mark the start of crucial Assembly elections in five states, including Uttar Pradesh and Punjab.

Taking Punjab election campaigning to its crescendo, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi on Friday blamed the Akalis and BJP for standing against the FDI in retail bill which is going to benefit the farmers immensely.

The Congress has promised to create two million new jobs in Uttar Pradesh in the next five years if elected to power in its “vision document” released in 10 cities across the state on Friday.

Labour unrest at Regency Ceramics in Yanam, 25 km from Kakinada, took a tragically violent turn on Friday and resulted in the death of trade union leader M. Murali Mohan and the company’s president, (operations and maintenance), K.C. Chandrasekhar.

Reacting to the report published in this newspaper on Friday, the government tried to downplay the stand of its key ally, the Trinamul Congress, to the proposed National Textbook Council.

Stung by a Siberian court’s rejection of their plea seeking a ban on Bhagavad Gita and branding it extremist literature, Russian prosecutors are now planning to move a higher court for appeal. Insisting that the Russian translation of the Hindu text “Bhagavad Gita As It Is” should be banned for promoting “social discord”, prosecutors in the Siberian city of Tomsk have moved the local court seeking more time to file an appeal.

A host of issues, like civil nuclear cooperation, Iran and Afghanistan figured in talks between secretary of state Hillary Clinton and Indian envoy Nirupama Rao, with both agreeing to work for consolidating the “tremendous progress” made in boosting Indo-US strategic ties.

Pointing out that Pakistan has “excellent” relationship with India, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani today said cooperation between the two to tackle climate change was “doable”.