Even as the Supreme Court on Monday declined to entertain a PIL seeking direction to the Centre for amending the Hindu Marriage Act to prevent same “gotra marriages”, an NGO approac-hed the top court for stopping “honour killings” on the pressure of khap panchayats.

Naga leaders, after a meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh here on Monday, hinted at a temporary suspension of their 65-day-old blockade of two national highways in the Northeast.

The Karnataka high court, which faces a piquant situation arising out of an order passed by its division bench that virtually amounts to inquiring into the functioning of the Chief Justice on the administrative side, moved the Supreme Court on Monday for a stay on the order.

Foreign secretary Nirupama Rao has said that the issue of peace and stability in Afghanistan needs to be addressed separately and comprehensively and not within the matrix of India-Pakistan relations, a view which was concurred by the delegates from Kabul who participated in a conference here on Sunday.

India has sent its comments to the United Nations about the cases pending against underworld don Kaskar Dawood Ibrahim.
The comments have also been conveyed to the Interpol for renewal of the “red corner” notice (RCN) against the underworld don. Sources in the intelligence agencies informed that Dawood, who is wanted in several cases by the Indian agencies, is operating from the UAE and Pakistan.

As part of passage naval exercises with southeast Asian countries, including Singapore, the Indian Navy despatched two of its Dornier maritime reconnaissance aircraft to Singapore on Monday. The aircraft, which will operate from Singapore till June 18, will fly over the south China sea in a “coordinated patrol” with four Indian Navy ships, naval sources said on Monday. The despatch of the two Dornier aircraft is intended to demonstrate the “reach” of the Indian Navy as part of the exercises.

Sources told this newspaper that the proposal to set up an empowered commission to look after the interests of those affected by the 1984 Bhopal gas leak had been made by the previous GoM headed by senior Congress leader Arjun Singh but was rejected by a BJP-led Madhya Pradesh government.

The Congress on Monday put the BJP in the dock asking the saffron party to explain what steps were taken by the NDA government to extradite Warren Anderson.
“The BJP should explain why its then solicitor-general Soli Sorabjee gave one opinion in 2001 and then subsequently backtracked to say that Warren Anderson could not be extradited, based on the legal opinion obtained by the NDA government from a American law firm,” party spokesperson Jayanthi Natarajan said.

The Congress is gearing up for the upcoming Bihar Assembly polls at a time when the ruling Janata Dal (U)-BJP combine is feeling uncomfortable and thus losing its killer instinct, while the RJD-LJP combine is not in a position to emerge as an alternative to chief minister Nitish Kumar.

Cracks between the JD(U) and BJP continued to widen with the saffron brigade making clear its intention to launch Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi in Bihar for its election campaign. “Modi will campaign in Bihar if the state units wants him,” BJP spokesperson and Bihar leader Rajiv Pratap Rudy declared on Monday. Assembly