New Delhi, August 4
Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit today said the aim of Delhi government is to make the city a hub of pollution-free and knowledge-based industrial activities.

Releasing the Industrial Policy 2010-2021 for Delhi, she said the policy envisages maintenance of existing industrial areas while developing new areas on public-private partnership basis.

This is the first industrial policy for Delhi after 1982 and it is an achievement for the city government.

Delhi's industrial scenario is different from other states. The new policy will help develop industries and create more job opportunities, Dikshit said.

She said due to multiplicity of authorities, there was no maintenance in industrial estates. Roads are broken, drains and sewers overflow. Parks are dirty while jhuggi clusters are a common near every industrial estate.

Under this policy, the Delhi State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation (DSIIDC) has been empowered to develop all industrial estates, she added.

She appealed to industrialists to construct flats for industrial workers in cooperation with the government.

Industry minister Haroon Yusuf said despite limitation of local resources, especially land, Delhi has emerged as an important centre of small-scale industries.

The Industrial Policy 2010-2021 addresses the need to channel the development of industry in keeping with the expectations of a cosmopolitan metropolis. This policy, therefore, envisages development of non-polluting, hi-tech industries in the knowledge-based and service sectors, added Yusuf.

He said before giving final shape to the policy, all stake holders were consulted.

New Delhi, August 4
The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) is all set to now to construct the Metro Rail for Jaipur city after being asked by the Government of Rajasthan. An agreement to this effect will be signed tomorrow at Jaipur.

Initially, a 9.25-km Metro corridor between Mansarover and Chand Pole consisting of eight elevated and one underground stations will be constructed by the DMRC.

The elevated section will be 8.77 km long and consist of the following stations: Mansarover, New Atish Market, Vivek Vihar, Shyam Nagar, Ram Nagar, Civil Lines, Railway Station and Sindhi Camp.

The underground section will be only 0.473 km in length and consist of only one station namely Chand Pole.

The DMRC will be doing the civil construction, including the track work, construction of the Metro maintenance depot, arrangement for traction and power supply and much more as per the agreement.

The estimated cost of the project is Rs 1, 250 crore.

The implementation time for the project is three years and seven months after signing the agreement and the DMRC has already set up a project office at Jaipur.

Though this is the first project that the DMRC is directly implementing outside Delhi and NCR, the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation has already provided consultancy to all other state governments interested in implementing Metro projects in their cities such as Bengaluru, Kochi, Kolkata, Chennai, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Pune and Ludhiana.

New Delhi, August 4
The Delhi University Students' Union elections are all set to take place on September 3. However, the usual craze this year may be overshadowed by the Commonwealth fever that has gripped the city as well as the university.

Topping the agenda is the Commonwealth Games over issues like labs, hostel amenities and failure rate. Faculty and the student body feel that students have had to suffer a lot because of the Games, especially the hostellers, who were asked to vacate the hostels.

While the Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) members are keen on the Games-related issues, NSUI is planning to raise questions on the introduction of semester system in science courses.

However, both the student organisations are on their toes as candidature of most of their aspirants got cancelled last year for flouting the Lyngdoh Committee regulations, which state that only handmade posters and bills can be used for campaigning. All in All, seven nominations for the DUSU elections were cancelled last year.

"Since last year, students are compromising on something or the other because of the Games, the latest being the hostels. Outstation students are in a fix as the rents for private hostels and PGs have soared drastically," said Ashutosh Srivastava, Delhi state secretary of ABVP.

"We plan to take up the Commonwealth Games as one of the biggest issues in this year's campaign. Heaps of debris are lying on roads. We will be taking up this matter in the DUSU election," he added.

The ABVP is planning to take up the semester system and infrastructural problems inside colleges during the polls. "Since its inception, the semester system in undergraduate courses has been in the news. Teachers and the VC have been fighting over its implementation. The matter got so ugly that the case went to the High Court. However, in the entire process, students were never consulted," said Srivastava.

"Science students suffered a lot in the first couple of weeks due to the ambiguity that surrounded the issue," he added.

Robert Rahman of the Students' Federation of India (SFI) said, "We are also planning to add CWG to our agenda in this year's DUSU elections. Students have been widely affected because of the construction work. Several accidents have been reported on campus due to this work." 

New Delhi, August 4
A city court today deferred its order on a plea filed by Association of Victims of Uphaar Tragedy (AVUT), seeking rejection of the CBI's report that denied prosecution to former IPS officer Amod Kanth, thereby giving him clean chit.

Metropolitan magistrate Sanjeev Kumar after hearing the submissions deferred the matter for August 9.

The AVUT alleged that Kanth, as the then DCP (licencing), had allowed extra seats in Uphaar Cinema hall's balcony which led to the closure of exit gates, leading to the death of 59 people due to asphyxia during the screening of Hindi film 'Border'.

AVUT counsel K.T.S. Tulsi had said that in October 1997, Kanth had allowed the theatre owners to retain the extra seats in contravention of the affidavit filed by him before the Delhi High Court.

The CBI's plea that Kanth had allowed 37 extra seats as he had received wrong technical advice, Tulsi had said that the CBI's closure report was liable to be rejected.

Earlier, the CBI, in pursuance of a Delhi High Court order, had filed a report after probing Kanth's role and favoured his non-prosecution, saying that he did not commit any offence and had acted as per the technical advice.

The AVUT, led by Neelam Krishnamurthy who lost her two children in the inferno, had sought rejection of the CBI's report and prosecution of Kanth.

Gurgaon, August 4
Neelam Sharma, a middle-aged widow, was strangled to death at her house here today. The police has arrested a former tenant of the woman on suspicion of murder.

According to police sources, the woman, who was in her 50s, was a resident of Sector 7 Extension here. Ajay Kumar Yadav, alias Ashu, a former tenant of the deceased, reportedly used to visit her.

"Ashu wanted to get some money from Neelam Sharma in the name of some investment. He used to visit her to persuade her in this regard," said DCP (West) Maheshwar Dayal.

However, Neelam was reluctant to give him money and it seems that when Ashu thought it would be difficult to get money from her easily, he killed her with an intention to loot the household.

Dayal said Ashu was jobless and in need of money, which perhaps led him to commit the crime.

When Neelam Sharma's son Akshay, who studies at Delhi, returned home this evening, he found Ashu coming out of his house.When Akshay asked him about his mother, Ashu reportedly said she had gone to get some photocopies done.

However, Akshay found his mother lying inside the house and raised the alarm.

Some neighbours rushed to the scene, nabbed Ashu and called the police.

Ashu was then handed over to the police.

The police has registered a case and sent the body for a post-mortem examination.

New Delhi, August 4
The east district police has arrested a 24-year-old driver for allegedly murdering an ITI tutor.

The accused, Lokesh Kumar, told the police that the tutor, Pramod Kumar, had fallen in love with his girlfriend. As a result, his girlfriend had been avoiding him for a few days.

According to the police, Lokesh killed Pramod on May 18. Pramod's body was found after three days he went missing from a canal in Ghaziabad.

Additional commissioner of police (east) K.C. Dwivedi said the police found that Pramod was attracted towards a girl who had affairs with Pradeep and Lokesh. The team tried to find out the mobile number from which Pramod had received the last call, but it could not be traced.

Surveillance was maintained on the activities of Pradeep and Lokesh. Lokesh was apprehended from Dungar Mohalla in Shahdara yesterday.

"Lokesh said he was having an affair with the girl who studied at ITI. Lokesh wanted to marry her. But for the last few months, she had been avoiding him. He started spying on her and found that she was in relationship with two others-- Pramod and Pradeep. He planned to eliminate them," Dwivedi said.

As per the plan, Lokesh started an affair with another girl. He told her that he wanted to take revenge on Pramod and Pradeep.

Lokesh allegedly bought a new SIM card on forged documents. He asked his new girlfriend to phone Pradeep and Pramod and fix a meeting with them. As per Lokesh's instructions, she phoned Pradeep, but he felt something fishy and did not come to meet her. Then, she contacted Pramod, who agreed to meet her. She called him to Big Bazaar in Vishwas Nagar on May 18, but Lokesh allegedly beat him outside the mall. The girl reached the spot and a compromise was reached.

"Later, all three went to a restaurant in Geeta Colony in Lokesh's Maruti van. Lokesh served coffee and burger laced with sedatives to Pramod. After dropping the girl, Lokesh told her that that he would leave Pramod at his house. He then called his friend Sandeep, a parking attendant at Cross River Mall in Karkardooma and strangulated Pramod," the official said, adding that Sandeep helped him in disposing the Pramod's body at Muradnagar Canal in Ghaziabad.

Sandeep is absconding and efforts are on to nab him. 

Noida, August 4
Three men robbed a Toyota Corrolla car from outside the GIP Mall at gunpoint last evening.

Later, the car met with an accident. The robbers then shot at the driver and robbed the bike of a youth and fled towards Indirapuram.

"I was sitting in the car outside the GIP Mall parking. Suddenly, someone opened the door and two persons pushed me at the back seat and sat near me. Pointing a countrymade pistol at me, they told me to keep quiet. One of their accomplices took hold of the steering and drove away the car," said Naresh Chauhan, the injured driver.

"After some distance, the car hit another car. They speeded up and moved towards the Sector 58 area. Near Labour Chowk, the car with which they had accident overtook and forced them to halt. As they stopped the car, the man pulled the keys from the dashboard. He was not aware that they were robbers. He asked them for damages," said Chauhan.

"This made the robbers angry as they were now encircled by passers-by. One of them then took out a pistol and shot at me. They ran away towards NH 24 highway while firing in the air. The man who was asking for damages too vanished, fearing for his life," said Chauhan.

"The injured driver was rushed to Prakash Hospital where his condition was stable till late this evening," said V.C.Tripathi, deputy superintendent of police.

"While fleeing, they robbed the bike of one Hafiz Ahmed and all the three then got on to it and speeded out of the city towards the Indirapuram area," said Tripathi.

"The Toyata Corolla car was of an exporter Prabhakar Mishra, resident of Sector 50, Mahagun Apartments. Chauhan had brought his family members to GP Mall this afternoon. After they had got down, he parked the car in the parking lot when the incident took place," said another police official.

New Delhi, August 4
The Delhi police has arrested a man for allegedly murdering the wife of a former UP minister four days ago at her residence in Muzaffarnagar.

The accused has been identified as Joshodh Chaudhury was apprehended from his rented accommodation in south-east Delhi's Badarpur area yesterday.

He had been hiding there after committing the murder, additional commissioner of police (south-east) Virender Chahal said.

On July 31, Chaudhury along with his associates allegedly murdered Revati Singh (75), wife of sitting BJP MLA Hukkum Nairain Singh who has served as a minister in the UP Cabinet, at her Muzaffarnagar residence.

The police has seized Rs 50.8 lakh and six rings from Chaudhury's rented house. Two gunny bags used in transporting the looted amount to Delhi has also been seized, Chahal said.

"Chaudhury, a native of Bihar's Madhubani district, shifted to Delhi 13 years ago and opened a tailor's shop in Molar Band Extension,” Chahal said.

The UP police had declared a reward of Rs 12,000 on his arrest, he added.

Chaudhury revealed that he had committed the crime in connivance with Shankar, one of the servants of Singh, and Ravinder Chaudhary, Singh's former servant.

Chaudhury along with Ravinder and three others had plotted to rob the MLA's house on the intervening night of July 30 and 31, after receiving a tip off from Shankar that Singh was not present in the house.

While committing the crime, they strangled to death Revati. Chaudhury told the police that one of his co-accused, Pradeep, left Delhi after taking his share of Rs 12 lakh.