One of the main reasons Trinamul Congress leader and Union railway minister Mamata Banerjee is holding a rally in Lalgarh, deep in the Maoist belt, is her attempt to make inroads into West Midnapore, which continues to remain a weak zone for the Trinamul. The rally “could signal the Trinamul’s tacit understanding with the Maoists since the area is completely dominated by the insurgents,” sources said.

The Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar will now be working to bring together non-Congress chief ministers to arrive at an unified approach on centre-state relations. Mr Kumar, who has been avoiding the Gujarat chief minister Mr Narrendra Modi, would now once again be rubbing shoulders with him.

In a bid to reach out to the Muslims ahead of the Bihar elections, the JD(U) in its national executive meeting passed a resolution to demand for a sub-plan on the pattern of one for the scheduled tribes for the minorities. The JD(U) also sought for the implementation of the Rangnath Mishra Commission report for reservation for the Muslims in jobs.

The “Review Report of the Political-Tactical Line of the 19th Party Congress” of the CPI(M) being debated at the ongoing four-day extended Central Committee of the CPI(M) targeted the party general-secretary Mr Prakash Karat’s electoral line.

The Supreme Court has directed the CBI and DGP of Bihar to arrest former RJD MP Rajesh Ranjan, alias Pappu Yadav, forthwith and put him behind bars for flouting the top court’s order cancelling his bail in the case of the murder of CPI(M) leader Ajit Sarkar.

There is a delay even in installing condom-vending machines at various Commonwealth Games sites. And if that’s not enough, the Central Vigilance Commission, keeping a hawk’s eye on the progress, has asked officials of the CWG Organising Committee, headed by Mr Suresh Kalmadi, to explain why the free packets containing

A 44-year-old man on Friday shot at point blank range by two unidentified motorcyclists who fled away with his bag containing Rs 8 lakhs in the Harsh Vihar area. The victim, Mukesh Jindal, was rushed to a near by hospital where he is stated to be in critical condition.

A girl was abducted hours before her marriage on Friday by a man who claimed to love her but she was rescued by the police.
The incident was reported from Shastri Park area in Seelampur on Thursday and one Naeem was arrested in connection with the incident, a senior police official said.

The Metro services were affected for about half-an-hour on Dwarka line during the morning rush hour on Friday when a man jumped in front of a train at Janakpuri East station in an apparent suicide attempt.

A 52-year-old street vendor in Sarojini Nagar market, who was involved in a scuffle with the officials of the NDMC and the local police on Thursday evening, died of cardiac arrest in the early hours of Friday. There were allegations that he was “mentally tortured” by the civic and police officials at the police station, which led to his death.