New Delhi, January 8
Fog returned to the national Capital late last night enveloping the city skies and reducing visibility on roads, making it difficult for commuters. Road, air and train traffic also took a beating due to poor visibility.

While close to 12 flights were delayed, more than 80 trains ran behind schedule today. The chilling cold also continued to trouble the residents as the minimum temperature today also settled three degrees below normal.

However, the thick fog cleared up as the day progressed. Even the sun showed up feebly for sometime but the day largely remained cold. The minimum temperature recorded this morning was 4.3 degree Celsius and the maximum temperature settled at 15°.

The IMD said the cold day conditions were likely to continue and forecast that the maximum and minimum temperatures were likely to be 12 and 5° C tomorrow and 14 and 5° on Monday "The cold conditions will continue in the coming days," said an official of the India Meteorological Department (IMD).

The maximum humidity level stood at 100 per cent, while the minimum was 61 per cent. Low temperature coupled with icy winds has made life difficult for the people and the Capital has recorded at least three cold-related deaths since December 26.

However, despite heavy fog cover, Indira Gandhi International Airport did not see flight cancellations, said an official statement from IGI, adding that only one cargo flight was diverted. However, about a dozen domestic and four international flights were delayed due to heavy fog.

"Low Visibility Procedure (LVP) was implemented at IGIA from 11.30 pm last night and terminated today at 11.48 pm for 12 hours 28 minutes," a Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL) official said.

As per official, 208 flights operated under various categories of Instrument Landing System in the duration of LVP.

New Delhi, January 8
Four northeastern youths were last night allegedly assaulted by their landlord at Munirka village in south Delhi.

A case in this regard has been registered at the Vasant Vihar police station and the main accused, Dinesh, has been arrested.

According to information, the victims include three youths and a 24-year-old woman. Madhu Chandra, spokesperson of the Northeast Support Centre and Helpline, said the victims were temporarily residing in Munirka.

"The victims-- John (25), Richard (23), Calvin (24) and Jenny (all names changed) -- were assaulted by their landlord and his men. All the victims hail from Manipur. John and Kalvin work with private companies in New Delhi. Jenny has a one-year-old child," said Chandra.

The incident occurred around 9.30 pm when John had come to his cousin brother's house (who is Dinesh's tenant) to tell him about a job vacancy. While returning, he met Dinesh on the road. Dinesh wanted to speak to him as John had also been his tenant earlier. However, John was in a hurry and said he would speak to him later. But this enraged Dinesh and he started thrashing him. Soon, locals also joined Dinesh in beating John. When his sister Jenny, brother-in-law Calvin and Richard came to know about the incident, they rushed to help John.

However, they too were assaulted. Jenny fell on the road while her husband Kalvin was beaten with iron rods and sticks by Dinesh and his associates," said Chandra.

It was only after the victims called the Kuki Students Organisation Delhi (KSOD) general secretary T Douminlian that a formal complaint was lodged at the Vasant Vihar police station around 1.30 am.

Noida, January 8
Twenty factory employees were injured as their company bus crashed into a road divider and overturned last night near sector 48 area.

The employees were returning home after late night shift when the accident took place. Eleven injured were admitted to hospital while the rest were discharged by this afternoon.

They were employees of Uniparts Pvt Ltd factory at sector 82. Company manufactures tractor parts.

Some of the injured were Mahinder Thakur, Pankaj, Pappu, Mohan, Naval, Prem and Manoj. One injured person who had head injury was at ICU of Prayag hospital till late this evening. The rest had injuries on body with minor fractures. One employee was admitted to district hospital.

Superintendent of police H.N.Singh said, "Overspeeding and fog was the cause of the accident."

Passengers were pulled out of the overturned bus by the police team and company staff who had reached the spot immediately.

New Delhi, January 8
It is the third time in a row that the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) has made a mention of parking projects in the city in its annual budget, which lists the developmental works to be carried out in the next financial year.

The projects were, in fact, supposed to be completed before the Commonwealth Games.

The development of 16 automated and 24 manual parking lots in the national capital is being mentioned in the budget for several years by the civic agency but not even a single project has been materialised as of now.

Though, the MCD has also announced 8,000 additional parking lots in the city by next year. These facilities include the automated multi-level parking sites, conventional and stack parking and strip parking, which will include different types of parking along the 2,800 commercial and mixed land use streets in the city.

Whereas, the 16 automated multi-level car parking lots and 24 manual parking were announced over four years back. Of the automated parking sites, only the one at Kamala Nagar has seen some progress with tenders yet to be floated for the other 15 parking lots. Officials say the Kamla Nagar project will be completed by December 2011, four years after its foundation stone was laid. As far as conventional parking sites are concerned, work has started only at 13 lots. Four of these lots - Model Town, Parade Ground, Hauz Khas and Munirka - are likely to be completed by June 2011.

Earlier, the MCD had announced to have constructed two parking lots at Karol Bagh and Paharganj before the Games but these projects were put on hold as, according to MCD officials, the MCD was not happy with the quality of work.

However, there is no one to take the responsibility of the delayed projects, as both the officials and the leaders indulge in blame game when it comes to missing the deadlines.

But going by the municipal officials, only 10 to 20 per cent work has been completed at the proposed parking sites.

In many cases, even when the projects are at an initial stage the politicians do not hesitate to make announcements.

No analysis is done even on the simple fact that whether the project is feasible or not, said an official.

New Delhi, January 8
At a face to face interaction with the people at the FICCI auditorium today, representatives of the Delhi government had a hard time answering queries.

Delhi Government Chief Secretary Rakesh Mehta, MCD Commissioner KS Mehra, Transport Commissioner RK Verma, Trade and Taxes Commissioner Jalaj Shrivastava and Citizen Services IT Secretary Savitur Prasad were the panelists who addressed various queries in the interactive session.

The audience raised some fundamental questions about the literacy programmes, effective implementation of Right to Education, safety of women, MCD discrepancies and transport hassles in the capital city.

When asked about the inhospitable environment at the Delhi's licensing office, Transport Commissioner RK Verma said, "We have been working on that. Within the next four to five months we will introduce the licensing process online. We will also be engaging a call centre that will take a telephonic test and help the applicant fulfil all requirements. The applicant will have only to come to the centre to appear for the driving test."

"The move will benefit women and the elderly who find it hard to follow the tedious process at the centre. Also, we are looking at decentralisation of the system. We will soon introduce multiple offices and everyone in Delhi will have a licensing office within a 5 to 10 km reach," he added.

Organised by the FICCI Ladies Organisation (FLO), the session also focused on discussing ways to improve governance, delivery and accountability on the part of government officials. The session also delved into how budgeting helps in better utilisation of public funds and how to spread awareness about women-related government policies and benefits. On the occasion, MCD Commissioner Mehta also released the citizen handbook on "Women related Policies" initiated by the Delhi government.

Responding to a recommendation made by the FLO, Delhi government Chief Secretary Mehta said, "There are numerous polices for the benefit of the needy in Delhi but the problem is that they do not know about these. We will now think about of introducing this information in school curriculum so that it reaches the target audience. This is the best way to reach them. Although we publicise these reforms adequately, I think this will increase the reach."

New Delhi, January 8
"Women have the ability to bring about massive changes in society. They have immense potential and the next century definitely belongs to them," said Dr Karan Singh, president ICCR while inaugurating "Crafting Friendships", an exhibition by expert craftswomen from eight south Asian countries at Dilli Haat on Thursday. The exhibition that will see exquisite crafts work from the finest women crafters will be on till January 17.

This endeavour brings together 70 craftswomen and experts, 15 important crafts from eight countries along with their regional folklore. "Crafting Friendships" will be an intrinsic part of the annual crafts bazaar organized each year at Dilli Haat by the Dastkari Haat Samiti where crafts and textiles of over 150 crafts people from all over India are on sale.

"Through this event, craftswomen from the eight participating countries will be able to display their products. They will have this unique opportunity to interact with one another, discuss best practices and exchange experiences, participate in lecture demonstrations and strengthen friendships through their presence at a time when Dilli Haat receives the maximum number of visitors, estimated to be around one lakh over the fortnight," said Jaya Jaitley, founder trustee, Dastkar Haat Samiti.

"Participating countries include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. It is a cross fertilization of arts and the start of a cultural dialogue among women of south Asia," said Suresh K Goel, director general of ICCR.

"We will also arrange cultural performance for visitors to Dilli Haat at 6 pm on January 7, 8, 9 and 14," he added.

Mina Sherzoy from Afghanistan, an expert in carpet weaving, embroidery and pottery is one of the participants. Naushaba Choudhury from Aarong organization in Bangaladesh has displayed works of Kantha embroidery, hemp and handmade paper in the event.

Karma Choden from Taranya Foundation in Thimpu is an expert in textile weaving and bamboo work and is participating in many workshops at Dilli Haat. "Ours is a foundation which is a non-profit organization working to uplift the lives of vulnerable individuals and communities in rural Bhutan. We mostly have women working with us, even young girls who join us in their spare time after school," said Karma.

Expert Daw Nu Nu Yee, vice-president, Myanmar Women Entrepreneurs' Association, a non-profit programme that works with women, said that they work with most women at the grass-roots level with the objective of teaching, guiding and educating them in micro credit income generation. Myanmar has displayed silk weaving, embroidery, handicrafts, tapestry and jewellery work.

New Delhi, January 8
Health and Woman and Child Welfare Minister Kiran Walia said today that the Delhi government would make it mandatory for pregnant women to undergo diabetes test as the lives of mothers and their child are sometimes put at risk if she has diabetes.

At the inauguration of the symposium - Diabetes Management in Pregnant Women - she said the government's move would go a long way in making people, especially women, aware about the ill-effects of the chronic disease which could be contained but not cured and which aggravates its victims' vulnerability to several other health complications.

The test, she said, would help save two lives, that of the child as well as mother. She said the government would also appoint diabetes educators from among the Asha workers.

Walia said anganwadi workers apart from the government officials would also be trained on diabetes and its ill-effects so that they could spread awareness about them.

Walia admitted to the falsehood spread of quacks through advertisements that they could cure diabetes and said her department would identify such charlatans and take punitive actions against them.

She said it was a matter of serious concern that the increasing number of children and youngsters were suffering diabetes and she would call a meeting of experts concerned from the government and private hospitals to explore the possibilities of reaching out to the child victims.

It's jokingly said that the quality of services at an airline is inversely proportional to its ticket price. But Srinagar resident Shabir Hussain had an experience which proved this argument right. So much so he now says he would rather pay twice the ticket cost than settle for a low-cost carrier.

His airline, Go Air, failed to load his luggage into the Srinagar-Delhi bound flight on January 5 and later promised to deliver the same at his address. The luggage of course never came. What came instead was a message from the airline that the same had arrived at the New Delhi airport and may be collected from there.

Ghaziabad, January 8
A major fire broke out at a departmental store in a three-storey building at Gandhi Nagar here today in which a fireman was injured, the police said.

Goods worth over Rs 30 lakh were destroyed and a fireman, identified as Surender Singh, sustained injuries while trying to douse the fire that broke out in the shop due to an electrical short-circuit.

New Delhi, January 8
The Crime Branch of the Delhi police has arrested a 35-year-old woman, along with her brother, for allegedly killing a 28-year-old man with whom she was staying for the past two years.

According to the police, victim Rakesh Gupta was reported missing on October 18 by accused Shehnaz herself. It has now emerged that Gupta was killed by Shehnaz and her brother Shakeel (27) as he objected to Shehnaz seeing another man.

"Gupta was working as a tailor in a boutique run by Shehnaz and was in live-in relationship with her. Later, she developed friendship with another man, Raees, to which Gupta used to object. Following his objection, she decided to get rid of him," said PS Kushwah, Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police .

According to Kushwah, Shehnaz allured Rakesh for alcohol and then entered into an argument with him leading to attack by wicket and killing him on October 5. "Then she called her brothers Shahid and Shakeel to dispose of his body in a sewage tank of Sector 26, Rohini, from where the body has been recovered," said Kushwah.

After the passage of few days, Shehnaz shifted to a new location in Rohini and lodged Gupta's missing complaint. "After questioning and monitoring her movements for about two months, the duo was arrested while fleeing near Rithala Metro station yesterday and confessed to the crime under sustained interrogation," said Kushwah. Shakeel, who runs a tea stall in Rohini, has previous criminal cases, is still absconding.

New Delhi, January 8
Police have busted a gang of shoplifting housewives after tracing them from the footage of the CCTV cameras which caught them in the act at a shop.

DCP, Southeast district, OP Mishra said the CCTV cameras at a South Delhi shop caught them. The women, two of whom are wives of traders, visit different shops, identify the vulnerable places and steal goods from the shops.

The gang was led by one Surinder Kaur, who has a history of such crimes and is an accused in six similar cases. All the women are in their 30s or early 40s and hailed from decent background.

They had lifted artificial jewelleries worth over Rs 15,000 from a store in Kalkaji. The CCTVs installed there had the recording and the police managed to reach them using the footage.