For BSP supremo and Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati, it was the perfect political salvo to fire — a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seeking reservation for Muslims — as UP heads into a poll year. After all, with nearly one-fifth of UP’s population belonging to the minority community, Ms Mayawati had decided to wield the perfect political weapon — quotas and, thus, vote-bank politics.

Amar Kant, an eminent Hindi writer whose work focuses on poverty and hardship in life, was jointly awarded the 45th Jnanpith Award for 2009 with Shrilal Shukla, veteran Hindi novelist and satirist, whose works deal with the falling moral values of Indian society. The 2010 award was conferred on Kannada poet, novelist and playwright Chandrasekhar Kambar.

UN agencies have drafted an action plan to improve the safety of journalists and combat impunity of crimes against them. The measures in the draft plan include the establishment of a coordinated inter-agency mechanism to handle issues connected to the safety of journalists.

The Intelligence Bureau says in a new report that the number of militants operating in the Kashmir Valley has dropped to around 200 — one of the biggest drops since militancy erupted there two decades ago.

As the UN General Assembly adopted the political declaration on the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), Union health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad reaffirmed to prevent and combat NCDs by improving accessibility and affordability of health care in a concerted manner.

Telangana Rashtra Sami-thi president K. Chandra-sekhar Rao on Tuesday threatened to begin a fast-unto-death again if the Centre failed to take a decision on Telangana soon.

United Nation’s India Armed Violence Survey said that roughly 40 million civilians owned firearms are in India, out of an estimated 650 million civilian guns worldwide.

Despite the CBI’s virtual attempt in the Supreme Court to “rescue” home minister P. Chidambaram by not investigating his alleged role as finance minister in UPA-1 in “fixing” 2G spectrum prices along with then communications minister A.

Is the government’s overarching attempt to transform India into a nuclear powerhouse facing a roadblock? With protests against the Koodankulam nuclear project intensifying, the government is now under pressure from Russia to ensure the commissioning of the 1000 Mwe reactors does not get stalled.

After hearing a plea of a girl student who was allegedly denied admission in the LLB course despite securing a rank much above the last admitted candidate in the OBC category, Justice Kailash Gambhir of the Delhi high court has sought response from the DU on September 30.