Special to the tribune
Obama to keep his November date
‘Proud to go to India, look forward to script history’
US President Barack Obama ended all speculation about his travel plans on Thursday by confirming that he and his family will visit India in early November. Obama broke with protocol to attend a reception at the State Department for External Affairs Minister SM Krishna at a time when many in India have been doubting his commitment to the US-India relationship.

WHY SUKHNA IS DYING-III
A TRIBUNE INVESTIGATION
Sukhna: Death by choking
Chandigarh, June 4
Sukhna Lake owes its origin to a Swiss-French architect and his Indian associates. Now another ‘foreign hand’ is choking it — a weed that has its origins in Canada. While lakhs of tonnes of silt flowing down into the Sukhna Lake has often been recognised as the cause of its slow but sure death, little was it realised that the floating greens at the bottom of the lake were as beautiful as they were deadly.

Workers manually de-weed the Sukhna Lake. Tribune photo: Pradeep Tiwari

RS Poll
BJP selects Advani loyalists Chandan Mitra, Tarun Vijay
New Delhi, June 4
The BJP parliamentary board nominated here today Chandan Mitra, The Pioneer Editor, as their Rajya Sabha candidate from Madhya Pradesh and BJP spokesman Tarun Vijay for the lone seat falling in BJP’s quota from Uttarakhand.

Nation page: Oscar, Kidwai in, no word on Sharma yet
Punjab page: Badal names Bhunder

25 pc public float must for listed firms
The government has now made it mandatory for all listed companies to float 25 per cent of their equity as public holdings in a bid to prevent share price manipulation. The proposal first mooted by Sebi last year and proposed by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee in the last Budget has now become law.

Business page: Firms to sell shares worth Rs 60K cr

2 days, 2 scares
Emergency landing at Delhi airport...
New Delhi, June 4
An Alliance Air plane operating on Delhi-Ludhiana-Pathankot-Delhi sector with 32 persons on board today landed here under emergency conditions as officials at Pathankot airport found pieces of rubber on the tarmac after it took off for Delhi and alerted Air Traffic Control.

  Nation page: Near-miss at Mumbai airport

No link to Pune bid, says Pawar
New Delhi/Mumbai, June 4
The IPL controversy today returned to haunt Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar and his MP daughter Supriya Sule, with a fresh uproar over a bid for the Pune team by a company in which they had direct shareholding. The BJP has demanded Pawar’s resignation. (Details on Nation page)

Nityananda’s sleazy video ‘authentic’ New Delhi, June 4 Forensic experts have confirmed that an amorous video allegedly showing Paramahamsa Nityananda alias Rajasekharan with a woman is “authentic” and there is no evidence of tinkering or fabrication, as claimed by the tainted godman. Official sources told The Tribune that Forensic Science Laboratoy, Delhi, had done authentication test on two memory chips carrying the lewd video and found it genuine.