Delhi health minister Dr A.K. Walia on Tuesday said that a 500-bed new block will be built in the GTB hospital.

On a day when its youth wing activists were observing “Batla House encounter anniversary” and demanding renaming of a road after the slain Delhi police inspector Mohan Chand Sharma, Bharatiya Janata Party’s minority cell incharge J.K. Jain was sitting among members of the Ulema Council who were demanding judicial probe into the encounter.

Chief minister and Trinamul Congress candidate for Bhowanipore byelection Mamata Banerjee postponed her scheduled roadshow in the constituency on
Tuesday because of her visit to the earthquake-hit North Bengal and Sikkim. “I have been forced to cancel my election rally on Tuesday. I offer my
apologies to my brothers and sisters in Bhowanipore about this decision. Now I will reschedule my meeting for Thursday,” she added.

Contrary to earlier estimates, Sunday’s earthquake caused extensive destruction in several parts of north Bengal, killing at least 10 persons.

Mandarin Chinese will be taught as a compulsory subject in Pakistani schools in Karachi city and other areas of Sindh province, officials said.
“Mandarin will become a compulsory part of the school curriculum in Karachi and Sindh schools,” a senior government official said, adding that the

Union home secretary R.K. Singh on Monday did not rule out the possibility of more people still lying trapped in the debris of collapsed houses since rescue teams have not been able to reach all villages. “So we can not really rule out right now whether any more persons are dead. But, since some time has already elapsed, I think the possibility of the toll increasing is thin, but you can’t say about a hilly area, you can’t say about an area which has far-flung villages,” he said.

Crumbling in the face of charges of land irregularities against him, the Karnataka Lokayukta, Justice Shivaraj Patil, on Monday resigned 45 days

after he assumed the office of the State ombudsman. He is the first Lokayukta in the state to demit office in such a short span of time and also

The Centre is hoping that the proposed Teesta Waters Treaty with Bangladesh may still happen once the “small technical misunderstanding” between it and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee is sorted out. The proposed treaty, which had been billed as one of the high-points of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s recent Dhaka visit, could not be signed leading to considerable disappointment on both sides.

Prime Minister Manm-ohan Singh told Tamil Nadu chief minister J. Jayalaithaa over the telephone Monday eve-ning he would depute Union minister V.

Narayanasamy to Koodankulam to hold talks with the protesters over their objectio-ns to the nuclear power plant coming up there.

Former minister B. Sreeramulu called off his fast for supply of iron ore to sponge iron manufacturing plants in the district after chief minister

D.V. Sadananda Gowda assured him on Monday that the problem would be resolved and invited him for talks on the issue .