CHANDIGARH: Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today directed the Medical Education and Research Department to ensure filling of vacant NRI quota for MBBS and BDS seats in all medical and dental colleges in the state.Badal said the seats should be filled on the basis of PMET merit under the guidelines issued by Medical Council of India (MCI) and...

ISLAMABAD: The extension in service given to Pakistan Army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani has been challenged by a retired army officer in the Islamabad High Court.Col (retired) Inam-ur-Rahim, the convener of the Ex-Servicemen Legal Forum, said in a petition filed in the High Court that the forum was of the opinion that the extension was "immoral and unconstitutional"....

New York: Indian authorities have requested the US State Department to address the concerns of an Indian couple, who have been given limited access to their one-year- old son after he underwent surgery for brain injury and are facing criminal probe for failing to take proper care of him.The Consulate General of India here has taken up with the...

WASHINGTON: Pakistan's powerful spy agency ISI regards the US as its "worst enemy" and Islamabad's claim that it is cooperating with Washington is a sham to extract billions of dollars in aid, jailed Pakistani doctor who helped CIA trace Osama bin Laden has said.Shakeel Afridi, who spoke to Fox News from inside Peshawar Central Jail, also accused Inter-Services Intelligence...

WASHINGTON: A dramatic video of the tragic Gurdwara shooting incident in Wisconsin was released today in which Wade Michael Page, the white supremacist who gunned down six Sikh worshippers, is shown on the rampage."He (Page) was on a mission and he had to be stopped," Oak Creek police officer, Sam Lenda, who shot at Page told reporters at a...

MUMBAI: US Ambassador to India Nancy Powell has refrained from commenting on the "policy paralysis" in India but expressed hope that "things related to US investment" in the country would move soon.The Ambassador, who was speaking at an interaction organized by the Asia Society here last night, was asked if she was "a bit despondent about India's present policy...

NEW DELHI: Sharat Sabharwal, the Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan, has been given a six-month extension.A 1975-batch IFS officer, Sabharwal's extension has been approved by the Prime Minister's Office. The High Commissioner was to retire this month end.The extension comes after a "fruitful" visit of External Affairs Minister S M Krishna to Pakistan where he held talks with his...

NEW DELHI: A meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs in India (CCPA), which could have decided on raising diesel and cooking fuel prices, was on Tuesday postponed even as Oil Minister S Jaipal Reddy said the price increase was "unavoidable".CCPA, which is headed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and includes ministers from allies of the UPA alliance,...

MEHSANA, Gujarat: Launching a month-long campaign in poll-bound Gujarat, Chief Minister Narendra Modi today accused Congress of "misusing" the CBI to target him and also demanded that the Prime Minister face a SIT probe in the coal block allocation scam.Seeking a fourth term in office, the BJP stalwart also slammed the Congress for "attacking the constitutional authorities", accusing it...

MUMBAI: Anti-corruption activist Arvind Kejriwal today demanded that all the charges against the jailed cartoonist Aseem Trivedi be dropped or else he will sit on protest outside the Arthur Road prison here from Saturday."I spoke to Aseem. By Friday, all the charges should be dropped and he should be freed or else from Saturday onwards we will sit here...