NEW DELHI: Exiled Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen on Tuesday said the appearance of an article in a Karnataka newspaper purportedly written by her, which triggered violent protests in Shimoga and Hassan towns, is a "deliberate attempt to malign" her and "misuse" her writings to create disturbance in the society.
Nasreen said in a statement that she never penned any article for a newspaper in Karnataka.
"The incident that occurred in Karnataka on Monday shocked me. I learned that it was provoked by an article written by me that appeared in a Karnataka newspaper. But I have never written any article for any Karnataka newspaper in my life," she said.
Indian Sports News
Nasreen said, "The appearance of the article is atrocious. In any of my writings I have never mentioned that Prophet Muhammad was against burkha. Therefore this is a distorted story."
The author said, "I suspect that it is a deliberate attempt to malign me and to misuse my writings to create disturbance in the society. I wish peace will prevail."
The violence in Shimoga, the home town of Karnataka chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, left two persons dead, one of them in police firing on Sunday.
Nasreen, staying in an undisclosed destination due to security reasons since her return to India last month, had her visa extended recently by six months till August this year.
Replying to a question, she said she would not like to say anything other than the statement issued by her.
NASA radar aboard Chandrayaan-1 finds ice on moon's north pole
WASHINGTON: A NASA radar aboard India's maiden lunar mission Chandrayaan-1 has detected craters filled with thick deposits of ice near the moon's north pole, the US space agency said on Tuesday.
NASA's Mini-Sar experiment found more than 40 small craters, ranging in size from one to nine miles, containing water ice.
"Although the total amount of ice depends on its thickness in each crater, it's estimated there could be at least 600 million metric tons of water ice," the space agency said in a statement.
The radar's findings "show the moon is an even more interesting and attractive scientific, exploration and operational destination than people had previously thought," said Paul Spudis, lead investigator of the Mini-SAR experiment at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston, Texas.
The Mini-SAR has spent the last year mapping the moon's permanently-shadowed polar craters that are not visible from Earth, using the polarization properties of reflected radio waves.
"After analysing the data, our science team determined a strong indication of water ice, a finding which will give future missions a new target to further explore and exploit," Jason Crusan of NASA's Space Operations Mission Directorate in Washington said.
India's Prof J N Goswami and Dr M Chakrabarty are among the scientists from 13 agencies from the USA and India who authored and published the Mini-SAR's findings in the journal, "Geophysical Research Letters".
Prof Goswami is Principal Scientist, Chandrayaan-1 from Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmadabad, and Dr Chakrabarty is from Space Applications Centre, Ahmedabad.
Analysis of data obtained by the Miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar (Mini-SAR) onboard Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft has provided evidence of presence of ice deposits near the moon's North pole.
The new findings add to the growing scientific understanding of the multiple forms of water on the moon, according to an ISRO statement.
Chandrayaan-1 was India's contribution to the armada of unmanned spacecraft to have been launched to the Moon in recent years.
Zero tolerance for assaults on Indians: Australian foreign minister
NEW DELHI: Hours within a fresh incident of violence against Asians in his country, Australian foreign minister Stephen Smith on Tuesday said they have zero tolerance for assaults on Indians or against anyone else who comes to Australia.
"Regrettable, we know as I said to my Parliament that there have been some racial or racist overtones to a small number of those assaults and we condemn them absolutely," he said.
Smith pointed out that several steps have been taken to ensure that when people visit his country they have an "enjoyable and safe experience".
Govt's U-turn on Indo-Pak talks was at US nudge: Advani
New Delhi: Accusing the Government of making a U-turn on holding talks with Pakistan following US 'nudge', senior BJP leader L K Advani has said that no concrete outcome is possible in any dialogue till that country abandons terrorism.
Terming the UPA's stand on Indo-Pak talks as a "self-inflicted insult", he said the only outcome that seemed to have emerged from the recent Foreign Secretary-level talks was that they will stay in touch.
"Our Foreign Secretary called the recently concluded meeting 'constructive' but her Pakistani counterpart ridiculed the meeting and said his country did not believe in 'cosmetic engagement' and did not want India to 'lecture' them by demanding that Pakistan should 'do this or that'," Advani said in his latest blog posting titled 'UPA's shabby approach to Indo-Pak talks : A self-inflicted insult'. Taking a dig at the Government on the outcome of the talks, Advani said in his statement to Parliament External Affairs Minister S M Krishna described the meeting as constructive and useful.
"But the only concrete outcome that seemed to emerge from the 500-word statement was the Foreign Secretaries agreement to stay in touch," the BJP leader said.
He said India's "U-turn" on the issue of dialogue with Pakistan seems to be the upshot of "Washington's nudge." The "firmness" shown by the NDA government in dealing with Pakistan bore fruits in the form of a joint statement in which Islamabad assured that it would not permit Pakistan or any territory in Pakistan's control to be used to support terrorism in any manner, he said.
Business News
Sensex at 2-month high, Nifty above 5K
Mumbai: The markets roared to a more than two-month high on Tuesday, led by an over 12 per cent surge in Tata Motors, pushing the bellwether Sensex up over 340 points and the Nifty above the psychological 5,000-mark.
Bouyed by the feel-good factor in the Budget amid a jump in exports and manufacturing numbers, foreign funds were in full strength and lapped up shares in the auto, metals, banks and FMCG counters like hot cakes.
The biggest gainer of the day was Tata Motors which hit a nine-month high zooming 12.10 pct, after Moodys upgraded it following the turnaround of its luxe marque JLR. Tata Steel was the second best performer gaining 6.18 pct. The BSE auto index charged the Sensex rally gaining 4.29 pct, with M&M also supporting with a 4.65 pct jump.
After a gap-up opening of 243 points, the BSE barometer zoomed to a high of 2.3 pct or 372.05 points to 16,801.60 at the fag-end, recording its best-ever single day rally since December 23, but settled the day a tad down at 16,772.56 points or 343.01 points, clocking a net gain of 2.09 pct.
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Similarly, the 50-share NSE Nifty surged by 94.70 points or 1.92 pct to close above 5,000-mark at 5,017. The index zoomed past 74 points in opening deals and touched high of 5,026.95.
CNI Research chairman Kishor Ostwal said,"it's post-budget rally as the budget has given the direction to the market."
The market also got support from growth in exports for the third straight month in January at 11.5 per cent.
Google acquires photo-editing site Picnik
San Francisco: Google Inc acquired online photo-editing site Picnik, as the Web search leader continues with a deal binge includes three acquisitions in about three weeks.
Google did not disclose the financial terms of the deal for Picnik, a 5-year-old Seattle-based start-up which said on its website that it has 20 employees.
Google spokesman Andrew Pederson said in an email message that the Picnik team has joined Google's Seattle office and will work with Google's Picasa group. Picasa is Google's Web photo sharing service.
The deal is the latest example of Google's increasing appetite for acquisitions, as the company's core Internet search business has benefited from a recovery in the advertising sector.
In October, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said the company would resume its historic pace of acquiring one small company per month on average, with larger deals happening every year or two.
Last month Google acquired Aardvark, a social search engine and mobile Web email service reMail. Since September, Google has acquired 8 companies, said Pederson.
Google Chief Financial Officer Patrick Pichette, speaking at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference conference on Monday, said that Google was beefing up its ranks as business conditions improve.
"The bottleneck for us right now is engineering. How many engineers can we find given that we have all these great opportunities?" Pichette said.
Picnik allows users to edit online photos from directly within a Web browser, eliminating the need for special, stand-alone editing software.
Indian Sports News
Lighter ban but Shivendra says it's still injustice
The ban on him has been reduced by a match but Indian forward Shivendra Singh on Tuesday said even the lighter penalty amounts to "injustice" on him as he has been punished for no fault.
During India's World Cup opener against Pakistan on Sunday, Shivendra's stick hit rival player Fareed Ahmed who suffered a cut on his eye as a result. Tournament Director Ken Read, while handing out the initial three-match suspension to Shivendra, said the act was "deliberate".
The Indian player, who after the reduced ban will sit out of the matches against Australia and Spain, however, insisted that he had no intention to hurt the Pakistani player and it was just an accident.
"I am very disappointed with the decision. The penalty is injustice to me because I never committed the fault intentionally. I was running for the ball and while I was in motion the stick suddenly hit the Pakistani player. But it was never deliberate," Shivendra said.
The seasoned forward, who had scored a goal in India's 4-1 win in the tournament opener, said the slight relief hardly matters to him as he would be sitting out of two 0crucial matches.
"It does not matter to me because at the end of the day I would be missing the crucial match against Australia. It hardly matters," he said.
Shivendra said the episode has only made him more determined to make a strong comeback.
"Now I am even more determined to perform better when I return to field after suspension," he said. India coach Jose Brasa was also livid with the harsh penalty imposed on his ward.
"The three-match suspension penalty was very harsh and in that sense wrong. I don't say he (tournament director) does not have the power under FIH rules. He has the authority but the decision was wrong. It was an enormous penalty for an unintentional foul," Brasa told reporters.
"If Mr Read wants to send a message why did he pick the Indian team. My players were struck on the face in that match against Pakistan and matches involving Australia, England and other countries were much more physical involving graver 0offences by their players.
"I have never ever experienced a player being handed a three-match penalty in my life -- be it Olympics, World Cup or Champions Trophy. Three match is half of the World Cup. To penalise a player by suspending him half of a World Cup for an unintentional foul was enormous," Brasa had said yesterday.
Pakistan clinch thrilling 2-1 win over Spain
New Delhi: A nervy Pakistan put behind their defeat against arch-rivals India to eke out a narrow 2-1 win against Spain in a hard-fought Pool B encounter of the hockey World Cup here on Tuesday.
A defeat on Tuesday would have virtually shut the semifinal door on Pakistan after their 1-4 defeat against India but Abdul Haseem Khan (30th minute, 70th) sounded the board twice to see them through.
David Alegre scored the lone goal for Spain in the 67th minute.
As expected, the match started on a fast pace with Pakistan going for the attack right at the beginning.
As early as in the ninth minute of the game, Pakistan got a great opportunity to go ahead but Waseem Ahmed's shot, after dodging some Spanish defenders in side the D, was saved by goalkeeper Francisco Cortes.
But Spain seemed in no mood to sit back and got their first scoring opportunity in the next minute.
A quick through ball from captain Pol Amat found Rodrigo Garza right in front of the goal but his shot was cleared by Pakistan custodian Salman Akbar.
Pakistan's experienced centre forward Rehan Butt also wasted an opportunity in the 11th minute as he failed to touch the ball with only the Spanish goalkeeper to beat.
England register second win, beat SA 6-4 in hockey WC
New Delhi: European champions England registered their second straight victory in the hockey World Cup on Tuesday, defeating a lowly South Africa 6-4 in a high scoring second Pool B match at the Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium here.
The first half witnessed an exciting contest between the two teams with playing clean hockey and using short passes to great effect.
England, however, was the more dominant side after the change of ends as they earned penalty corners at will and pumped in four goals to inflict on South Africa their second defeat on the trot.
South Africa, however, were the first to sound the board in the 10th minute of the match through Harper after Justin Reid-Ross had set up the goal with a great solo run down the baseline.
England equalised five minutes later through Mantell, who converted his side's first penalty corner with aplomb.
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