Sardiha/New Delhi: The death toll in the Jnaneswari train carnage climbed to 131 on Saturday and the rescue workers feared that even after 38 hours, they were yet to take out several bodies from the badly mangled compartments.
The body of the assistant driver of the goods train, Niranjan Singh, was taken out this afternoon as the crane which has been stationed at the accident site for the last 30 hours lifted the debris from his body. A portion of the crane, while lifting the debris of the goods train, collapsed at the site. “The portion of the crane collapsed in such a way that it could have led to casualties among the rescue workers. But luckily there was no rescue worker in that area,” said a senior police officer. The rescue work got delayed by several hours because of the crane collapse.
The derailment is all set to be investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has concurred with the Railway Ministry’s demand seeking a CBI probe into the accident, which Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee has attributed to a “political conspiracy”.
“We are in favour of it. The state government has also agreed to it. Once we get a formal approval from the state government, we’ll initiate the process,” Union Home Secretary G.K Pillai said when asked about whether the Centre had agreed to the Railways’ demand for a CBI probe.
As per government sources, Railway Board’s Member Traffic Vivek Sahai and Member Staff A K Goyal had met the Home Secretary on Friday and had conveyed Banerjee’s demand for a CBI probe into the derailment. The Home Secretary is learnt to have called up the West Bengal DGP asking whether the state government would agree for a CBI probe. Under the rules, the Centre can’t hand over a case to the CBI unless the state agrees .
After Maoists held the 2443A Special Bhubaneswar-New Delhi Rajdhani Express hostage for close to seven hours near Jhargram in October last year, Mamata had asked the MHA to get the matter investigated saying that the Railway Ministry did not expect the West Bengal government to conduct a fair and just inquiry into the hijack. The demand was not accepted. In fact, Mamata had also demanded CBI probes into the October 21 train collision near Mathura and the death of an Assistant Executive Engineer in Jhalawar. Both these demands were also turned down.
What appears to have convinced the Centre about the merit in handing over this case to the CBI is the fact that the accident was engineered two days before the civic elections in West Bengal. Also, the cloud of uncertainty over the cause of the derailment and identities of its perpetrators appear to have made this case eligible for investigation by a Central agency.
Maoists were on spot, says DGP; there are more signs
While the Maoists have been trying to back off from taking responsibility for the train carnage near Sardiha, circumstantial evidence points to the involvement of the members of the People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCAPA) and CPI-Maoists.
Director General of Police Bhupinder Singh said on Saturday that 10-12 Maoists had assembled at the accident site around midnight. “ We have identified the gang and the village from where they had come. It’s a known Maoist den and raids are continuing,” he said.
There were several other pointers to the Maoist involvement.
* The officer in charge of the Manikpara police station had turned up at the Sardiha station on Thursday afternoon to warn the station staff against possible Maoist strikes. The police had been tipped off about Maoist threats. The police team that got in touch with the Sardiha police station even identified some spots that should be kept under watch. “We had kept a watch on the area suggested by the police team but the actual sabotage took place at another spot, maybe because we had put that spot under watch,” said a railway official. Senior police officials also confirmed specific intelligence inputs about possible Maoist strikes.
* Police have got reports about some gangmen having been forced by the Maoists to remove pandrol clips from the railway tracks which caused the derailment of the Jnaneswari Express. The last train to pass the stretch was the Howrah-Hatia Express which passed Khemashuli-Sardiha stations at 12.44 am. There was a gap of merely 30 minutes to remove pandrol clips rom a stretch of about 40-50 metres. It needed experts to do it and the police are also investigating the names of some gangmen who were threatened by Maoists.
* After the goods train rammed into the derailed Jnaneswari Express, a passenger train running between Tatanagar and Kolaghat arrived at Sardiha station. It was about 1.50 am and the train had to be stopped at Sardiha as the goods train had left and by then rammed into the derailed train. A senior station official confirmed to The Sunday Express that the driver of the passenger train reported that he saw a group of about 15 walking past the tracks towards a jungle that leads to Banstala, a Maoist stronghold.
* In the Kharagpur-Jhargram stretch of the South Eastern Railway, four station areas are virtually a liberated zone for the Maoists—Khemashuli, Sardiha, Banstala and Jhargram. The Maoists can trigger such attacks easily at any stretch of this section surrounded by thick forest. In the past six months, the group has attempted four such attacks on important trains, including Bhubaneshwar Rajdhani, Steel Express, Howrah-Korapur Express and now Jnaneswari Express.
* The Maoists and PCAPA had called an indefinite blockade of road and rail routes to protest “excesses” by joint security forces. During such blockades and bandhs, the Maoists and the PCAPA are known for indulging in such terror activities to enforce their writ.
* The Sunday Express visited some tribal villages in the periphery of the accident site. The commanding officer of battalion of CRPF engaged in anti-Maoists operations in the area as well as state police sources admitted that raids to trace Maoists and for area domination were underway in these areas. Villagers in Jal Jali, Patharghata, Guimara, Akhrasole and some others said that the security forces had been to the villages in the wee hours of Friday and picked up men indiscriminately.
In one village, for instance, seven men were picked up merely on the suspicion that they had Maoists links. Kshsith Mahato, a school chowkidar, Manoranjan Mahato, a farmer, Basanta Mahato, a farmer, and Prasanta Mahato were taken into custody and allegedly beaten up on Friday. “What is their fault? Why should we, daily-wage earners, run after the cops to secure the release of our husbands with babies on our shoulders?” asked Renuka Mahato with tears in his eyes.
Monoranjan is yet to be released and she did not know where her husband is. The villagers said Rabindra mahato and Banamali Mahato were yet to be traced.
The PCAPA and the Maoists control these areas. And most probably, the retaliation came immediately on Friday.
No merger with Congress in future: Chiranjeevi
New Delhi: Telugu cine star and Praja Rajyam Party (PRP) President Chiranjeevi on Saturday ruled out any merger with the Congress party in the future.
“The Congress has asked PRP to withdraw from Rajya Sabha polls,” said Chiranjeevi after his meeting with Congress President Sonia Gandhi at 10, Janpath.
“The PRP has allied with Congress only for Rajya Sabha polls,” he added The meeting gained significance after Congress MP and former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y. S. Rajshekhar Reddy’s son Y. S. Jaganmohan Reddy defied the party orders and decided to go ahead with his planned ‘Odarpu Yatra,’ which caused a lot of violence in the Telangana region.
The Praja Rajyam Party, which has 18 MLAs in the 295-member Andhra Pradesh Assembly, is keen on contesting the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections.
The actor-turned politician was asked by the Congress High Command to come here for discussions to reach an understanding on the biennial Rajya Sabha polls, after he announced that his party would contest the election.
Other war on Afzal: Human rights vs Kashmiri cause
The debate over the mercy petition of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru, who has been sentenced to death, is already a raging political match between the Opposition BJP and the Congress. But even within the prison walls, Afzal is finding himself drawn into a tussle on how to allow his case to pan out — is it just about ‘human rights’ or should it be made into a larger political question around the Kashmir ‘cause’.
His lawyer N D Pancholi, a well-known rights activist and founder-member of the PUCL in 1973, finds himself in a confrontation with former co-accused (now acquitted) of the Parliament case, S A R Geelani, over the matter of representing Afzal.
Pancholi met Afzal in Tihar on Friday and emerged with a hand-written letter by Afzal, authorising him to follow his appeal for shifting him to Srinagar Prison.
Simultaneously, Geelani has put out another hand-written letter by Afzal, written on the same date, saying that Pancholi is not his advocate “as he had never represented him in court.”
The roots of the dispute are deeper and complex. A campaign to free Geelani, when this DU teacher was also an accused, was spearheaded by those he is now opposing. Nandita Haksar and Pancholi had also led the campaign to meet the then-President and ask for clemency for Afzal.
That was four years ago and the seeds of the dispute were sown, as Geelani insists, “Afzal did not approve of certain passages in the clemency petition. And that was the problem. I have nothing against Nandita Haksar, she has been very good to me.”
Sources say the debate is in the politics of how the Afzal matter is to be handled. Pancholi (who finally took Afzal’s wife Tabassum to the President) and Haksar say it is from a human rights perspective that the Afzal matter needs to be approached, keeping it free of using him as a symbol of the larger Kashmir cause.
While Geelani and his recently set up NGO, Committee for the Release of Political Prisoners (CRPP), do not say so openly, they are keen to project Afzal as a martyr in the Kashmir cause, rather than have him appear as a surrendered militant, one who has confessed to the Indian state and one who has petitioned for clemency. Says Geelani, “We have this letter from Afzal now, he wants these people to stay away.”
Haksar, who was in the forefront of the campaign to free Geelani and then bat for him when he was freed and shot at outside her house, is now angry and saddened by the course of events. She says Pancholi’s credentials cannot be doubted: “He was not only a founding member of the PUCL, but also the secretary of Citizens for Democracy, when Jayprakash Narayan was its President. He was the first to visit Geelani in jail when he was arrested. He took up Afzal’s case pro-bono once the death penalty was awarded. Afzal is suffering because of the pressure being brought on him in jail now.”
Interestingly, it was under the name of the Society for Protection of Detainees and Prisoners’ Rights (SPDPR) set up in 2004, that the campaign to free Geelani was conducted. But soon afterward, says a founding member of SPDPR, Janaki Srinivasan, now based in Chandigarh, “it stopped functioning, things dried up. We then heard that another group had been set up”. The new body, CRPP, is now anxious to distance Pancholi from the Afzal case. Asserts Geelani, “It has 13 chapters, and people from Andhra, Kerala, Maharashtra and Kashmir, we have people from everywhere. It’s a larger platform.”
On Friday, human rights activists including Rajni Kothari and Surendra Mohan had come out in support of Pancholi, castigating Geelani for “creating a controversy on the matter and asking him to apologise to Pancholi.”
VIP flights force 3 jets to land with no fuel to spare
CHENNAI: Three days after the Mangalore aircrash, three planes that had been diverted from Delhi airport on account of VIP movement, had a narrow shave when they all but ran out of fuel above Jaipur airport. The three flights had more than 450 passengers on board at the time.
Wednesday's Jetlite flight JLL 108 from Mumbai landed with just enough fuel to remain airborne for three minutes. The Mumbai-Delhi Kingfisher flight IT 300 landed just 10 minutes before its fuel tank ran dry. Jet Airways 9W 2357 from Chennai made it onto the runway with fuel for just 13 minutes of flying time. Both Jet planes were Boeing 737s and carried 192 and 174 people each.
The Kingfisher plane was an Airbus 330 and had 158 people on board. Wednesday saw 11 flights diverted to Jaipur, Chandigarh and Lucknow, even as 20 others were forced to circle Delhi airport for an hour starting 9am. The airport was closed because of President Pratibha Patil's flight to China and Turkmenistan president Gurbanguly Berdimunha-medov's flight to Agra.
The tension built up for planes queuing to land at Jaipur as challenging weather - gusts of wind and a duststorm - worsened conditions already difficult because of the absence of approach radar to monitor flight movement.
Planes are supposed to carry enough fuel to fly to a nearby airport in case of an emergency but the uncertainty over the VIP planes' take-off had them circling in the air till they got to Jaipur with little fuel left. The pilots have filed 'flight safety reports' detailing the emergency situation to the Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
VIP movement nearly caused an aviation disaster when three planes, with more than 450 passengers, nearly ran out of fuel when they were diverted from Delhi to Jaipur airport. The pilots of Jetlite flight JLL 108, Kingfisher flight IT 300 and Jet Airways 9W 2357 were caught unawares as there was no Notam (notice to airmen) about the closure of airspace until they reached Delhi.
Airports Authority of India authorities said the practice of issuing Notam during VIP movements has been stopped due to security reasons and Wednesday's flap was unforeseen. "Usually there is only a three-minute shutdown of airspace during VIP movement. But on Wednesday, the Turkmenistan president's flight got delayed because of bad weather in Agra, resulting in diversions and go-arounds," PK Mishra, AAI general manager, air traffic maintenance, told TOI.
The three flights were using up the final reserve fuel when they declared emergency. "The Kingfisher flight which first declared fuel emergency was allowed to land. The Jet Airlines flight, which had only 10 minutes of fuel left, declared emergency next, but it gave way to a Jetlite flight which radioed an emergency declaration," said a source.
Business News
Gold rebounds on wedding season demand
New Delhi: Gold prices rebounded by Rs 115 to Rs 18,790 per ten gram in the bullion market on aggressive buying by stockists and jewellers for the ongoing marriage season amid a firming global trend.
The precious metal gained 2.30 dollar to 1,214.30 dollar an ounce in overseas markets.
Standard gold and ornaments recovered sharply by Rs 115 each to Rs 18,790 and Rs 18,640 per ten gram respectively.
They had lost Rs 135 in the previous trading session.
Sovereign gained Rs 50 to Rs 14,600 per piece of eight gram.
Spurred by an all-round boom in buying for the wedding season and a firming global trend, gold prices climbed to a record level of Rs 18,810 on Wednesday.
However, silver ready held steady at Rs 29,600 per kg and weekly-based delivery gained Rs 20 to Rs 29,275 per kg.
Silver coins continue to be asked around the previous level of Rs 34,400 for buying and Rs 34,500 for selling of 100 pieces.
AI won't tolerate any indiscipline: Patel
New Delhi: Asserting that "indiscipline" in Air India would not be tolerated, Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel on Saturday said he had given full freedom to the management to take any step to deal with disruptions like the recent strike.
Asked whether more employees would be sacked for going on strike, he said, "If they (airline management) feel, they are free to do it, we will not come into the picture."
He distanced the government from the airline management's decision to derecognise two unions and terminating the services of union leaders, saying it was for the management to take any decision.
Patel said the merger of Air India and Indian Airlines was a long-term process and there had been "opposition" from within and "systematic effort" was made to ensure that it did not succeed.
"I will tell you that there has been opposition from within and systematic effort to see that the merger does not succeed... by a lot of people in the organisation. Now some of the unions also have to be blamed for that," he said.
Accepting that merger was delayed but it was not a wrong step, he said merger is not a single day process. "It was envisaged as a three to five year process... to say that it is internally or inherently flawed is wrong.
"It has been delayed - Yes. The fact is, who has to make it work - the organisation. But I still feel, if these people do not make it work, they will be losers in the long run," Patel said, adding that the merger should not be blamed for all the problems of Air India.
"I would like to put across.... if there are any problems, if there are losses and if they are systemic issues.. please do not put one attribute of merger. That is another issue," he said.
"Even today, there are two streams in the organisation - one is domestic operations, which was earlier the Indian Airlines, and the other is Air India. But that doesn't mean that anything is fundamentally wrong with the orgainsation. It takes time for the whole pyramid to build," he said.
The Civil Aviation Minister said, "It is not that I conceived the merger. This merger discussion is going on in the Ministry from the days of J R D Tata. .. chances were taken but nothing really fructified. Eventually it happened."
Patel referred to the mergers of Jet Airways-Air Sahara, Air Deccan-Kingfisher and internationally Continental and United Airlines in the US and asserted that "merger per se is absolutely sound".
Asked if Air India was not worth reviving and what would convince him to "shut it down and consigning it to history", he said, "I cannot take the call for shutting it down and consigning it to history. Its a larger call that government of India has to take. ..Don't say that everything is wrong in Air India."
"You are raising a larger issue whether the government should be running the airlines or not ... running a public sector airline is far different from private sector running airlines".
Asked why the government was not ready to privatise it and hand it over to professional hands, he said, "There were attempts in the past... during the NDA regime, when they tried there were few takers and that is the reason why it didn't get privatised."
On whether new Air India COO Gustav Baldauf would be given a free hand to operate or would he face interference, Patel said, "Not at all. He will be (given freedom)... even today there is full freedom, do not think we run it from Rajiv Gandhi Bhawan".
Patel said the new COO and the independent Board of Directors were undertaking a lot of activism to revive the airlines. "They are free to do whatever they think in their wisdom is good for Air India."
Observing that there was a misconception that "everything happens out of the Ministry" in Air India, he said "unfortunately, for all the bad things that happen there we get blame. Its okay... I mean we are not absolving ourselves... we stand by but the fact is they have the autonomy and I wish they exercise it in the best interests of Air India."
2G scam: CBI to conduct 'impartial' probe
Chennai: CBI on Saturday asserted that it would undertake "a very impartial, correct and legal investigation" into the alleged 2G spectrum allocation scam over which Union IT Minister A Raja is entangled in a major controversy.
Kumar said CBI would not go by the opinions of individuals, media or anybody else in its probe into the spectrum controversy, adding, "whatever evidence comes it has to be legally admissible"
"We are not going to go by the opinions of individuals, media or anybody.. it has to be a legal investigation and we have to have legal evidence.. there has been a lot of media, public and Parliament attention" on this case, he said.
Stating that legally admissible evidence was important, the CBI chief said "we are doing that investigation and we will continue to do that."
To a query, Kumar said once the agency takes up investigation of a matter, it confines itself to the allegations made in the FIR and "if something mo e comes up, we can register another FIR."
Indian Sports News
I stand vindicated: Shoaib Malik
Dubai: Pakistani cricketer Shoaib Malik heaved a sigh of relief after the PCB appeals judge revoked his one-year ban, paving the way for his comeback to the national team.
"I am very happy that with the blessings of Allah, my stand has been vindicated and all the baseless charges and allegations have been quashed," he said in a statement.
Malik was charged with indiscipline and punished by PCB enquiry committee, which probed into the team's disastrous Australian tour early this year.
The committee had handed out punishments to seven Pakistani players and barring Mohammed Yousuf, all appealed against the decision.
Malik said he was ready to get back to national team.
"As always, my commitment for the country and for my team continues to be 100 per cent. I look forward to focusing purely on my game and will be delighted to serve my country in whatever capacity my team needs me, as and when required," said Malik who is here after his marriage with Indian tennis star Sania Mirza.
Malik has been included among the 35-man probables for next month's Asia Cup in Sri Lanka and PCB will soon announce the team.
PCB arbitrator lifts 1-year ban on Shoaib Malik
A Pakistan Cricket Board-appointed appeals judge on Saturday lifted the one-year ban on former captain Shoaib Malik, saying the all-rounder, accused of being a "negative influence" in the past, is a changed man now.
Former High Court judge Irfan Qadir's decision came at the National Cricket Academy where he held his hearing in which Malik was represented by his lawyer.
The judge also reduced a fine on Malik from Rs two million to Rs one million.
"The board's legal advisor has reported to me that after monitoring Malik in the last three months they feel he has improved his behavior and attitude," Qadir told reporters.
"I have decided to uphold his appeal and lift the ban as the purpose of disciplinary action against players was to make them rethink about their careers," he said.
Malik, who is in Dubai after his marriage to Indian tennis star Sania Mirza, hailed the Qadir's decision, saying the ban was a slur on his career.
"The purpose of my appealing to the board was to clear this stigma against my name. The ban was a stigma for me and my family," Malik told 'Geo News'.
The PCB had banned Malik and all-rounder Rana Naved for 12 months and fined them Rs two million each in March for indiscipline on the tour of Australia.
The board also banned former captains Muhammad Yousuf and Younus Khan for indefinite periods and fined Shahid Afridi, Kamran Akmal and Umar Akmal on the recommendations of an inquiry committee report into the tour in March.
Leaked video recordings of the hearings revealed that most of the players including captain Shahid Afridi, former coach Intikhab Alam and manager Abdul Raquib blamed Malik for fanning intrigues and creating disharmony in the team.
PCB legal advisor Talib Rizvi said the ban was lifted because the board wanted these players to represent the country again after they reformed themselves.
The national selectors have included Malik and Younus in a list of 35 probables for the next month's Asia Cup and tour to England.
Rizvi said Malik is free to represent the country again.
The judge had also scheduled a hearing for Younus Khan whose lawyer Ahmed Qayyum was present at the hearing but could not give a decision after Qayyum refused to accept a decision behind closed doors and wanted the media to attend the proceedings.
Rizvi said the appeals judge has now scheduled the hearing for Younus on June 12 while the appeals of Afridi and the Akmal brothers would be heard on June 9.
The appeal of Rana Naved is due to be heard on June 19 but he is not included in the list of probables for the coming tournaments.
Jolted India seek revival against new-look Lankans
Bulawayo: Their pride dented by the embarrassing loss to Zimbabwe in the lung-opener, a jolted India will hope to revive their campaign against Sri Lanka in the second match of the cricket tri-series in Bulawayo on Sunday.
Missing their regular stars, India were given a rude shock by the Zimbabweans who chased down a rather stiff target of 285 with consummate ease.
Indian bowlers let down the team but the batting was not too impressive either and had it not been for Rohit Sharma's breezy 114 and Ravindra Jadeja's 61 after a top-order collapse, getting to 285 would have also been a difficult task.
"We need to work on our bowling and fielding department to come back against Sri Lanka," Raina said after the match.
Dinesh Karthik and Murali Vijay were always going to find it difficult to replicate the flying starts that India are so used to with Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir at the top.
The middle order looks alright with Raina, Rohit and Jadeja in good nick.
The bowling is, however, a worry as the team found out against Zimbabwe.
Umesh Yadav and Ashok Dinda failed to either take wickets or stem the run flow against lowly side while R Vinay Kumar proved expensive. Raina minced no words in expressing his disappointment after the match.
Sri Lanka, meanwhile, have also fielded a young team and have rested key players, prominent among them are regular skipper Kumar Sangakkara and the in-form Mahela Jayawardene.
Tillakaratne Dilshan is leading the side without having the services of senior players like Sanath Jayasuriya and Lasith Malinga. All-rounder Angelo Mathews is Dilshan's deputy on his maiden assignment as captain for an ODI series.
Muttiah Muralitharan, who was ruled out during the World Twenty20 due to a groin injury, is also not there in the side.
The new-look team features greenhorns like all-rounder Jeewan Mendis and left-handed batsman Lahiru Thirimanne.
The trio of opener Upul Tharanga, middle-order batsman Chamara Silva and fast bowler Dilhara Fernando, who were ignored for the Twenty20 World Cup in the West Indies, are the prominent names in the squad.
It seems an evenly-matched contests where two inexperienced sides face off but given the opening loss to Zimbabwe, India can hardly afford to relax.
After all, a tour meant to test India's bench strength could well become an embarrassment if the young side fails to rise to the occasion.
Serena survives funny turn, Roddick not amused by loss
Paris: Serena Williams pulled through with the aid of a doctor at the French Open on Saturday but there was no reviving Andy Roddick as he packed up his kit bag and headed off to find some grasscourts.
Top seed Williams shrugged off a funny turn midway through her third-round match against Russian teenager Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova before recovering her senses to win 6-1 1-6 6-2 and join sister Venus in the last 16.
Fellow American Roddick was trounced in straight sets by Teimuraz Gabashvili -- his misfiring game no match for the flashy Russian or the cool, breezy conditions that returned to Roland Garros after the glorious sunshine of Frantic Friday.
I fought through a couple of matches that were a little dicey. Today I got outplayed from the first ball, Roddick, who will now begin his preparations for Wimbledon, told reporters after his 6-4 6-4 6-2 defeat to a qualifier ranked 114 in the world rankings.
Roddick angrily threw his spare rackets to his entourage after dropping his serve in the seventh game, complaining about string tensions. By the time they returned to a chilly Court Suzamme Lenglen, it was virtually all over.
I felt like I wasn't getting much on the ball so I kind of threw them in and wanted some looser tensions, Roddick said. By the time I got them in I think I was down two breaks in the third. Little too late to experiment.
The 27-year-old's mood was not helped by the balls rolling into the wet tarpaulins used to cover the courts.
If a ball rolls through a puddle enough times, can you tell me what happens to it? Then when clay attaches to it, it doesn't get lighter...
Spain's David Ferrer also joined Roddick on the casualty list, the ninth seed surprisingly beaten in straight sets by Austrian Jurgen Melzer, who now faces Gabashvili for a place in the quarter-finals.
After Friday's champagne tennis when organisers got the tournament schedule back on track with a feast of top seeds in action, the middle weekend began with a hangover.
Hopes that home favourite Aravane Rezai would lift the mood evaporated when she lost what amounted to a sudden death shoot-out against Russia's Nadia Petrova.
Starting at 7-7 in the deciding third set after darkness interrupted a thrilling match the previous evening, 15th seed Rezai was back off court in 15 minutes after Petrova held her nerve to prevail 10-8.
Marion Bartoli also lost her third-round match against Israel's Shahar Peer to leave Jo-Wilfried Tsonga as the only home player left in the singles draw.
Peer will face Serena Williams for a quarter-final berth but at one stage Pavlyuchenkova looked the more likely winner of the day's opening match on Phillipe Chatrier court.
Williams lost her opening service game of the morning to the 18-year-old but rattled off the next six in what looked to be shaping up as gentle Saturday morning workout.
The 28-year-old, shooting for a 13th grand slam singles title, then slumped 5-0 down in the second set and called for the trainer and the doctor at the changeover.
After having her pulse taken and her temperature checked she emerged rather gingerly before losing the set.
She resisted some aggressive play early in the third and saved two break points before regaining control, clinching victory in one hour 48 minutes.
By reaching the fourth round Serena is guaranteed holding the world number one ranking from Venus, whatever happens in the rest of the tournament.
Two matches later on Saturday should get the pulse racing.
Four-times champions Rafael Nadal and Justine Henin both come up against former world number ones -- Nadal tangling with Lleyton Hewitt and Henin facing Maria Sharapova.
nandalal mahata from Akhrasole , Manikpare(W.B) kidnapped from his village on 14-05-2010(Sunday), & this kidnapping case his villge people are knowing this matter, so our request to West Bengal Govt. please forward this case to CBI for founding to Mr. Nandala Mahata because Nandalal Mahata kidnapping date to till now he has no found any information , so please forward this case to CXbi. beause Nandalal Mahata is struggling in his life , always help to others, he was sertvice in ex- military , Ex- ploce wire less operater
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