NEW DELHI: A Delhi BJP MLA was called out of his home and thrice shot at on Wednesday. The bullets whizzed past him and he escaped unhurt, the police said.

Jitender Singh Shunty was shot at three times here, police said.

The incident took place outside Shunty's home in Shahdara in east Delhi around 6 am. Shunty was elected to the Delhi assembly from the Shahdara assembly segment.
Police sources said an unidentified man on a motorcycle and wearing a helmet called out Shunty, asking him to attest some documents. 

As Shunty looked at the papers, one of the papers fell on the ground. Suddenly, the assailant whipped out a pistol. 

Shunty grappled with the armed assailant and pushed him away. He then tried to run towards his home.

It was then that the three shots were fired, following which the assailant fled from the spot.

The entire dramatic incident was caught on CCTV. -IANS

Jalpaiguri: The naked body of a girl, who tried to save her father from being beaten by locals for failing to pay for a rented tractor at a village meeting, has been found lying on a railway track at Dhupguri in Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal.

After identifying the body, her father lodged an FIR against 13 persons at Dhupguri Police Station on Tuesday for “rape, murder and kidnapping” of his daughter, the police said.

Jalpaiguri Superintendent of Police Kunal Agarwal and Additional Superintendent of Police James Kujur rushed to the spot last night.

Two persons have been detained in this connection and the body has been sent for post-mortem, Kujur said.

Trouble began at the ‘Salishi Sabha’ (reconciliation meeting) convened at Dhupguri on Monday night when the farmer’s request for some more time to make the payment was turned down, the police said.

The local Trinamool Congress councillor of Ward No. 9 and her husband were present at the meeting, the police said.

The girl came out of her house pleading with the locals not to beat her father. A person known to her took her away from the meeting and she was missing since then, the police said.

The councillor was not available for comment.

Student and youth wings of the CPI(M), SFI and DYFI, are observing a students strike and ‘Black Day’ in Dhupguri block on Wednesday demanding punishment for the culprits. They also put up road blockades on NH 31 on Wednesday.

BJP activists staged a demonstration in front of Dhupguri Police Station on Tuesday, the police said.

District Trinamool Congress president Sourav Chakrabarty said the police were investigating and there was no need to give “political colour” to it. — PTI

TALLINN, ESTONIA: US President Barack Obama said on Wednesday that the United States will not be intimidated by Islamic State militants after the beheading of a second American journalist and will build a coalition to "degrade and destroy'' the group.

Obama still did not give a timeline for deciding on a strategy to go after the extremist group's operations in Syria. "It'll take time to roll them back,'' the president said at a news conference during a visit to Europe.

Obama's comments came after he said the US had verified the authenticity of a video released on Tuesday showing the beheading of freelance reporter Steven Sotloff, two weeks after journalist James Foley was similarly killed.

Obama vowed the US would not forget the "terrible crime against these two fine young men.''

"Our reach is long and justice will be served,'' Obama said.

In the Sotloff video, a masked militant warns Obama that as long as US air strikes against the militant group continue, "our knife will continue to strike the necks of your people.''

Obama responded that he will continue to fight the militant threat and the "barbaric and ultimately empty vision'' it represents.

"Our objective is to make sure that ISIL is not an ongoing threat to the region,'' he said, using an acronym for the militant group. "And we can accomplish that. It's going to take some time and it's going to take some effort.''

Sotloff, a 31-year-old Miami-area native who freelanced for Time and Foreign Policy magazines, vanished a year ago in Syria and was not seen again until he appeared in the video that showed Foley's beheading. Dressed in an orange jumpsuit against an arid Syrian landscape, Sotloff was threatened in that video with death unless the US stopped air strikes on the Islamic State.

In the video distributed on Tuesday and titled "A Second Message to America,'' Sotloff appears in a similar jumpsuit before he is apparently beheaded by a fighter with the Islamic State, the extremist group that has conquered wide swaths of territory across Syria and Iraq and declared itself a caliphate.

British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond told the BBC on Wednesday that the masked, British-accented jihadist appears to be the same person shown in the Foley footage.

In the video, the organisation threatens to kill another hostage, this one identified as a British citizen, David Cawthorne Haines. It was not immediately clear who Haines was.

Last week, Sotloff's mother, Shirley Sotloff, pleaded with his captors for mercy, saying in a video that her son was "an innocent journalist'' and "an honourable man'' who "has always tried to help the weak.''

Obama said the prayers of the American people are with the family of the ``devoted and courageous journalist'' who deeply loved the Islamic world and whose ``life stood in stark contrast to those who murdered him so brutally.''

"Whatever these murderers think they will achieve by murdering innocents like Steven, they have already failed,'' Obama said. "We will not be intimated. Their horrific acts only unite us."

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Tuesday that it is believed that "a few" Americans are still being held by the Islamic State. Psaki would not give any specifics, but one is a 26-year-old woman who was kidnapped while doing humanitarian aid work in Syria, according to a family representative who asked that the hostage not be identified out of fear for her safety. — AP

Govt notifies new Lokpal search committee rules

NEW DELHI: The government has notified new Lokpal search committee rules, giving it more freedom to recommend names for chairperson and members of the anti-corruption body outside the list provided by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT).

Earlier rules, which were formed by the previous UPA government, mandated the search committee to prepare a panel of persons to be considered by the Prime Minister-led selection committee for appointment as the chairperson and members of the Lokpal, from amongst the list of persons given by DoPT.

In the new rules, the government has omitted restrictions for the search committee to recommend the names for Lokpal through the list provided by the DoPT.

"The search committee may, for the purpose of short-listing of persons, adopt such short-listing norms as it may consider appropriate," said the rules notified by the DoPT.

"The words 'from amongst the list of persons provided by the Central government in the Department of Personnel and Training' shall be omitted," the new rules said.

The Central government shall provide such assistance as may be required by the search committee in efficient discharge of its functions in accordance with the provisions of the Act, they said.

The government has also reduced the composition of the search committee to seven members from eight.

The search committee will now consist of at least seven persons of standing and having special knowledge in anti-corruption, public administration and vigilance among others, the rules said.

As per the earlier rules, an eight-member search panel was tasked to draw up a panel of persons for consideration by the selection committee.

With changes in the search committee rules have been notified, the government will go ahead with the process of appointment of chairperson and members of the Lokpal, official sources said.

The government has also done away with the time-limit of 30 days given to the search committee for recommending the names, after receiving the list from the DoPT, to the selection committee.

The search committee will have to give the list of names who could be considered for chairperson and members of the Lokpal "within such period as may be decided by the selection committee".

The search committee shall, as far as possible, in case of members recommend a panel containing names at least three times the number of vacancies to be filled, the new rules said.

Earlier, the committee was to recommend a panel containing at least three times the number of vacancies advertised.

The search committee is mandated to recommend, in case of chairperson of Lokpal, a panel of at least five names.

The rules were notified following a recommendation by a committee headed by Attorney General (AG) Mukul Rohatgi.

The committee was formed to look into any legal complications for bringing in changes in the search panel rules, which were formed by the last UPA government.

The UPA government could not go ahead with the much- touted appointment of chairperson and members of Lokpal due to BJP's objection to the selection procedure.

The Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act provides for establishment of a Lokpal for the Union and Lokayuktas for the states to inquire into corruption charges against public functionaries.

The Lokpal selection committee has as its members the Lok Sabha Speaker, Leader of Opposition in the Lower House, the Chief Justice of India or a judge of the apex court nominated by him, and an eminent jurist who could be nominated by the President or any other member. — PTI

WASHINGTON: India-born scientist Dr Thomas John Colacot has won the American Chemical Society's ACS Award in Industrial Chemistry, one of the top honours in the field.

Colacot, who studied at St Berchman's College, Changanacherry, Kerala and IIT, Chennai, is the first Indian to get the award in industrial chemistry. He also holds an MBA degree and was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. The award is sponsored by the ACS Division of Business Development and Management and the ACS Division of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry.

Currently Global R&D manager in the homogenous catalysis area at Johnson Matthey, a specialty chemicals company, Colacot directs research in US, UK and in Indian labs.

"The ACS is proud to recognize your outstanding contributions to the development and commercialization of ligands and precatalysts for metal-catalyzed organic synthesis, particularly cross-couplings, for industrial and academic use and applications," a letter from Tom Barton, president of ACS noted.
The 2015 national awards recipients will be honoured at the awards ceremony in conjunction with the 249th ACS national meeting in Denver, Colorado in March next year.

Colacot had received Royal Society of Chemistry's RSC Applied Catalysis Award in 2012 for his contributions to the area of catalysis. His work on 'cross-coupling' is particularly acclaimed.

Colacot joined Johnson Matthey, USA in 1995 and started working in the area of palladium catalyzed cross-coupling.

The catalysts developed in his labs are currently used to make new drugs for Hepatitis C, a deadly disease with no cure, one pill per week for type II diabetics, and many hypertension drugs.

Colacot's work involves developing and commercializing ligands and catalysts for applications in metal-catalyzed synthetic organic chemistry.

His book on 'New Trends in Cross-Coupling: Theory and Applications' is scheduled to be published in October, 2014 by the Royal Society of Chemistry.

He is also PhD thesis examiner to many IITs and visiting faculty at Rutgers University. -IANS

NEW YORK: Indian tennis player Sania Mirza moved into the women's doubles semi-finals of the US Open with Zimbabwe partner Cara Black after rivals Zarina Diyas and Yi-Fan Xu retired in the quarters.

Third seeds Sania and Cara took the first set 6-1 in 40 minutes and won a game in the second set when Kazakh Zarina and her Chinese partner Yi-Fan retired at the Flushing Meadows on Tuesday.

Sania and Cara will now face Martina Hingis of Switzerland and Flavia Pennetta of Italy in the semi-final. 

The Swiss-Italian pair registered a 6-4, 6-3 win over fifth seeds Kveta Peschke of Czech Republic and Katarina Srebotnik of Slovakia.

Sania has now equalled her best performance here. She had also reached the semis last year with Chinese partner Zheng Jie.

In the mixed doubles semi-final, top seeded Sania and her Brazilian partner Bruno Soares will face Yung-Jan Chan of Chinese Taipei and Ross Hutchins of Britain on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, in the junior boys' singles second round, South Korean seventh seed Duckhee Lee eased past India's Sumit Nagal 6-2, 6-2. -Agencies 

3 killed, 2 hurt in road mishap in Jind 

CHANDIGARH: Three persons, including two women, died while two others seriously injured in an accident on the Jind-Delhi national highway in Jind district today, the police said.

The accident happened near Gosian Khera village, when a jeep, in which two teachers were traveling, collided with a truck while trying to avoid hitting a motorcycle which suddenly came on the highway, said Virender Singh Dalal, DSP Jind.

The jeep, which was going to Delhi, was hit by the truck coming from opposite direction, he added.

"Two woman teachers and a man riding the motorcycle died, while the driver of the jeep and a motorcyclist were seriously injured in the accident and rushed to the PGIMS hospital at Rohtak," said the SHO of the area under whose jurisdiction the accident took place.

He said the teachers hailed from Jind and were teaching at a Christian school.

After the accident, the truck driver and his cleaner managed to escape.

A case had been registered, he added. — PTI

Schools in J&K gear up for Modi's pep-talk on Teachers Day

JAMMU: Preparations are underway in various schools in Jammu and Kashmir, particularly in rural and remote areas of the state, ahead of the Teacher's Day celebrations.

Prime Minister Modi is to give a pep-talk to about 1,000 select students at the Manekshaw Auditorium in New Delhi on September 5, which will be beamed live to over 18 lakh government and private schools in the country through Doordarshan and education channels.

"We have already directed the district magistrates and directors to provide facilities throughout the state, particularly in the rural and remote areas and to ensure that the students watch this programme live", Secretary, Department of Education, J&K, Nirmal Sharma told reporters here.

The Prime Minister will 'interact' with students here and take questions through a video-conference facility. The telecast will start at 3 pm and will continue up to 4.45 pm.

"It (Teacher's Day) is going to be observed in a new and energetic way this year. On this day, prime minister will directly interact with schoolchildren and then he will give a speech through live telecast throughout India, which will reach out to all the schools and all students will watch this programme", Sharma said.

The secretary said the students will assemble by 2.30 pm at some schools in rural and remote areas and TV sets and and generators will be made available if there is no power supply in these places.

"All children and schools have been instructed to ensure implementation of the order. All facilities including web, Internet, educom and edusat and radio and tv set would be made available as the requirements in the schools", she said. -PTI

Kashmir farmers worried as rain may continue

SRINAGAR: The freakish weather with spells of rain is expected to continue in Jammu and Kashmir till Friday, said the Met department on Wednesday.

This has the state's farmers worried as the crops are in the ripening stage and continuous rain can damage them.

Sonam Lotus, director of the local weather office, told IANS here: "A low pressure system exists over Jammu and Kashmir at the moment. The combined effect of western disturbances and monsoon is causing the present rainfall in the Valley, the Jammu division and the Ladakh region." "The low pressure system is moving very slowly because of which the same weather conditions are likely to continue till Friday evening. Although there is no impending possibility of floods in the Valley and other places, landslides and flash floods in mountainous areas of the state especially the Ladakh region cannot be ruled out," Lotus added.

"People in such areas are generally advised to take precautions. As of now, there is no flood warning from our side." Moderate rain continued in all the three regions of Jammu and Kashmir and is expected to continue till the weather improves, which according to the Met office is not likely till Friday evening.

"Intermittent rain will occur across the state till Friday evening," Lotus said.

The water level in the Chenab, Jhelum and other major rivers and streams of the state has risen overnight, although it still continues to be below the danger mark.

The most worried by the continuing rain in the Valley are the farmers and fruit growers who see the present rains as a bad omen for their crops.

The paddy crop is presently laden with ripe and half ripe grains and even moderate rainfall like the present one can have an adverse impact.

Besides delaying ripening, water-logging in paddy fields creates numerous other problems for the farmers.

"When we needed rains during the summer months it did not rain and when we cannot afford rains because the crop is in the ripening stage we have heavy rains.

"God should come to our rescue otherwise the crop would suffer heavy damage," said Zahoor Ahmad, 37, a north Kashmir farmer. –IANS