L A T E S T      N E W S

Manish Tewari not to contest Lok Sabha polls

New Delhi: Union minister Manish Tewari will not contest Lok Sabha polls and his Ludhiana seat in Punjab has been given to Ravneet Singh Bittu, a grandson of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh.

This brings to an end the speculation over Tewari's candidature, who was reporting sick and is understood to have expressed his unwillingness to contest from Ludhiana on this ground.

There was speculation that Tewari wanted to shift to Chandigarh seat, however, former Union minister Pawan Kumar Bansal was renominated.

Bittu, the sitting MP from Anandpur Sahib was not keen on contesting from his seat from where the party fielded AICC general secretary Ambika Soni.

Jalandhar MP Mohinder Singh Kaypee has been fielded from Hoshiarpur while Santokh Singh Choudhary has been fielded from Jalandhar.

With this, Tewari joins the league of a number of senior party leaders who are not in fray this time. P Chidambaram, A K Antony, G K Vasan and Jayanti Natarajan are some of them. —PTI

Congress to release Lok Sabha manifesto Wednesday

New Delhi: The Congress will Wednesday release its manifesto for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, with the document reflecting the party's thrust on inclusive development, party spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi said here Tuesday.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and party vice president Rahul Gandhi will be present at the party office here to release the manifesto.

Rahul Gandhi has taken personal interest in framing the document by meeting a cross-section of people including porters, farmers and fishermen.

"The manifesto will be released tomorrow (Wednesday). It will be progressive and inclusive," Singhvi told media persons here.

Asked if the party had fulfilled the promises made in its previous manifesto, he said these had been done to a great degree.

Singhvi said the party has been releasing a report to the people every year which outlined welfare measures taken by the United Progressive Alliance government, including the steps taken to fulfill the party's manifesto.

Mahila Congress president Shobha Oza had earlier told IANS that the manifesto was likely to announce measures related to women's empowerment.

Sources said the party may also announce a scheme for expanding coverage of subsidised healthcare. They said there was likely to be a thrust on anti-corruption measures also. —IANS

It will be Kejriwal vs Modi in Varanasi

Varanasi: In what will be the mother of all battles in the coming election, AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal announced Tuesday he will take on BJP's prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi from this Hindu holy city.

In an hour-long speech at the Beniyabagh ground where thousands cheered him, many waving the party symbol broom, Kejriwal asked people to "unleash a revolution" by ensuring the defeat of both Modi and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi, who he described as two sides of the same coin.

Having faced hostile crowds of Modi supporters after his arrival here in the morning, Kejriwal asked aloud at the rally if he should battle the Lok Sabha election from this city or not.

As the crowds responded with a roaring "yes", Kejriwal, who was Delhi chief minister for 49 days, declared in what was clearly a scripted answer that he was ready to accept the electoral challenge.

"I am ready to fight elections from Varanasi," said Kejriwal, wearing his traditional white cap printed with the AAP's election symbol broom and his shirt still stained with ink hurled at him only hours earlier.

As a party activist garlanded Kejriwal amid cheering and clapping, Kejriwal dubbed Modi's development agenda in Gujarat as a "farce" and called upon Modi to engage with him in a public debate. Later, as Kejriwal proceeded towards the rally in an open vehicle, ink was thrown at him. It stained his face and clothes and those of other party leaders.

The culprit was identified as a member of the ultra-right Hindu Vahini Sena. Some people waved black flags.

The unfazed AAP leader began his visit to Varanasi, where hundreds of his supporters have been campaigning for weeks, with visits to prominent temples and a dip in the Ganges. —IANS

Srinivasan should  quit as BCCI chief for fair IPL probe : SC

Sahara says its ready to pay Rs.20,000 crore to SEBI

NEW DELHI: Sahara group on Tuesday offered to the Supreme Court to pay market regulator SEBI in a span of one year Rs.20,000 crore of the money it has to return to the investors collected through Optionally Fully Convertible Debentures (OFCD).

In a fresh proposal to the apex court bench of Justice K.S. Radhakrishnan and Justice J.S. Kehar, the Sahara group said they will deposit Rs.2,500 crore within three working days of the acceptance of its proposal and three instalments of Rs.3,500 each would be deposited with SEBI June 30, Sep 30 and Dec 31. The balance of Rs.7,000 crore would be deposited March 31, 2015.

The Sahara group said its proposal to deposit Rs.20,000 crore to the market regulator in five instalments would be backed by an irrevocable bank guarantee.

The court will consider the proposal on Wednesday as it declined to entertain the same Tuesday, saying that it cannot appreciate a proposal being made across the bar. The court said the same should have been submitted to the registry Wednesday evening so that they could have gone through it.

The court had March 4 sent Sahara chief Subrata Roy and his two directors to Tihar jail for failing to deposit the said amount to the market regulator. - Agencies

Russia suspended from G8 over Ukraine crisis

WASHINGTON: The G7 group of top economic powers have kicked out Russia from the powerful G8 over its annexation of Crimea and threatened to impose far-reaching sanctions if Moscow continued its incursion into Ukraine.

The US and six other economic powers also scrapped the G8 summit to be hosted by Russia in Sochi in June to build pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin against his military action in Ukraine.

At an emergency summit in the Hague yesterday, the leaders of the US, Britain, Canada, Germany, France, Italy and Japan - who met for the first time since Russia was admitted to their exclusive club 16 years ago, cancelled the planned G8 summit and decided to convene without Russia in Brussels.

"We will suspend our participation in the G8 until Russia changes course and the environment comes back to where the G8 is able to have a meaningful discussion and will meet again in G7 format at the same time as planned, in June 2014, in Brussels, to discuss the broad agenda we have together," the G7 countries said in a joint statement.

The G7 leaders also reaffirmed their support for Ukraine's sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence, and pledged to assist the country as its seeks to restore unity, democracy and political stability based on the interim government's reform agenda.

They deplored the referendum held in Crimea on its future status and subsequent Russian annexation of the Ukrainian autonomous region a week ago as "illegal and in contravention of international law".

A senior Obama administration official described this as a strong statement from the G7 that Russia's actions will have significant consequences.

"We've already imposed a cost on Russia in the sanctions that we've issued in coordination with Europe, Canada, and Japan as well.

"In short, Russia is suspended from the G8 pending its current activities in Ukraine, and the necessity is now on Russia to de-escalate to avoid this continued isolation from the international community," the official said.

If Russia "continues to escalate this situation", they will be prepared to expand a variety of sanctions slashed earlier on individuals and entities responsible for the crisis by taking "coordinated sectoral sanctions which will have an increasingly significant impact on the Russian economy," the statement said. - PTI