Congress leader Arif Naseem Khan today asked Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis to 'come clean' on his stand on reservations for Muslims, warning of agitation similar to that of the Maratha community.

The Maratha community has been taking out huge 'silent marches' across the state to press its demands including reservations in jobs and education.

"Prime Minister says Muslims should not be treated as vote banks, while his CM in Maharashtra deliberately lets the ordinance which provided 5 per cent quota to Muslims in education lapse," the former Minority Affairs Minister said.

The then Congress-led government had decided to provide reservations to the Muslims not on religious ground but taking into account their social and economic backwardness, he said.

"Even the HC found our decision on quota for education fair. This decision was taken after Sachar and Mehmood-ur-Rehman committees said the condition of Muslims is worse than that of SC/STs," Khan said.
Maharashtra Samajwadi Party president Abu Asim Azmi said he had called a meeting of all Muslim leaders including legislators across the party lines on quota issue.

"If Marathas are protesting for their right of reservation, it is time for the Muslim community to unite and put pressure on the BJP government to ensure that the community gets reservation as well....prominent professionals and political leaders will meet and decide the further course of action," Azmi said.

Long queue of people wanting to compliment External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on her UNGA address, tweets MEA spokesperson Vikas Swarup.

Dalit leader Jignesh Mevani and 400 agitators, including several women, were today detained for trying to gherao the head office of Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation. The agitation had been called by Jan Sangharsh Manch and Rashtriya Dalit Adhikar Manch to press for their various demands, including permanent job status to sanitation workers of the civic body working on contract basis for the past many years.

To draw government's attention towards their demands, Mevani, along with advocate and social activist Amrish Patel, led the agitating workers and their supporters to the AMC building in Gol Limda area of city this afternoon.

After reaching the main gate of the AMC office, these agitators confronted with police, who were deployed in large number to control the situation.

After some heated exchanges, Mevani, Patel and around 400 agitators were detained by police and taken to the city police headquarter in Shahibaug area.

"We detained around 400 agitators, including women, as they tried to stop people from entering in the AMC office and tried to block the road. We released them later. No one was injured during the detention," Assistant Police Commissioner of 'D' division, Baldev Desai, said.

Talking to media after his detention, Mevani alleged that the Gujarat government is persecuting people for raising their voice.

"This is a good step and we hope this continues," Brahamdagh Bugti, Baloch leader on EAM Sushma Swaraj raising Balochistan issue at UNGA.

More highlights from Sushma's speech:

Just In: Reuters is reporting that a shooter has injured two in a supermarket west of Paris; police are at a flat where the suspect is holed up.

Delhi Police has written to Canada's Department of Justice seeking details of the deleted chats from the mobile phones of Sunanda Pushkar and her husband, Congress leader Shashi Tharoor. 

Ahead of the launch of its Prime Video in the country, e-commerce giant Amazon has signed a long-term agreement with Dharma Productions to stream existing and upcoming movies.

Just in: Setback for Malegaon blast accused Colonel Purohit. His bail has been rejected again.

Purohit had argued that he was in jail for more than seven years and as NIA had concluded the investigation, he should be set free on bail.

The trial court has consistently refused bail to Purohit since 2010. His last bail plea was rejected in October 2015, following which he moved the High Court.

Among other things, Purohits appeal claimed that the trial court should have appreciated the fact that he has an outstanding meritorious record and that he risked his life to fight against terrorism across the country.

It also said that he had been framed.

On May 13, NIA filed a supplementary chargesheet giving a clean chit to six accused, including Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur. It also said Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act was not applicable in the case.

Six persons were killed in a blast at Malegaon in north Maharashtra in September 2008.

TV reports coming on what PM Narendra Modi said at the Indus Waters Treaty meeting today. The prime minister today Monday chaired a meeting to review the treaty with Pakistan amidst heightened tension between the two countries. Principal secretary to PM, Nripendra Misra, NSA Ajit Doval and foreign secretary S Jaishankar also attended the meeting in the PM's residence.

NDTV reports that the PM is believed to have said, "Blood and water cannot flow at the same time." While this does not mean that India will abrogate the treaty, India has said that this is the appropriate time to review the Indus Waters treaty and that it needs more time to study the treaty.

Meanwhile, the Congress has also demanded a special Parliament session to discuss the security situation. The party wants Pakistan declared a terrorist state.

Foreign ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup said that while India did not intend to violate the 1960 treaty, "eventually any cooperative arrangement requires goodwill and mutual trust on both sides".

Skipper Virat Kohli reacts to Uri attack: "As an Indian it hurts. What is going on is disturbing and I cannot even imagine what is going through the minds of the families," the 27-year-old said after 500th Test match. While Kohli was all smiles after the 197-run triumph, he paused to pay homage to the 18 soldiers killed by Pakistan-based terror group Jaish-e-Mohammed on in Uri on September 18.


The cricketer had previously tweeted a message to the brave men of the Indian Armed Forces. @BCCI#TeamIndia skipper @imVkohli pays homage to the martyrs of #UriAttack and condolences to their families.

Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi reacts to the shoe missile hurled at him during his road show at Sitapur, Uttar Pradesh during his Kisan Yatra.
The missile flew close past the Congress leader's head and hit former HRD minister Jitin Prasada.


The youth was immediately detained by the police and taken to the city police station. The youth was heard saying "roadshow is useless", according to an eyewitness. Prima facie, the youth has no political links, police said. The matter was being probed.


However, Rahul said the attacker was from the BJP and RSS. "A BJP-RSS worker attacked me while I was heading for my rally. They can keep attacking me, but I shall continue fighting and I won't back down. BJP, RSS spread hate, but the Congress and I operate with love," Rahul said.

The New Delhi media corp is still has no clear or definite answers to the questions it has been asking in the aftermath of the Uri attack. Will there be an escalation of the army in border areas? Will there be a surgical strike? What is happening in the North and South Block.

Everyone is unanimous on the answers: Nobody has the faintest clue.

Home minister Rajnath Singh, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, or Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar seem to have the answer.

At least 50 to 60 senior correspondents are scratching their heads, contacting their sources for information, but there are still no clear answers.

As of now, only one person knows the answer to the questions being raised: Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

We mourn the sad passing of Major General K K Tewari (retd) in Auroville on Monday afternoon. Our senior contributor Claude Arpi -- who is married to Abha, one of the general's daughters -- recorded General Tewari's experiences during the 1962 War with China in this memorable piece. Please do read. Our heartfelt condolences to the general's family.


Image: Major General Tewari (extreme right)

A shoe was today hurled at Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi during his roadshow at Sitapur, Uttar Pradesh.

Hariom Sharma, a resident of Shastri Nagar locality, flung his shoe from a distance at Rahul at Transport Crossing, from where the roadshow started.

However, the shoe did not hit him.

The youth was immediately detained by the police and taken to the city police station. The youth was heard saying "roadshow is useless", according to an eyewitness. Prima facie, the youth has no political links, police said. The matter was being probed.

Shoes have been hurled at former PM Manmohan Singh, P Chidambaram, Kanhaiya Kumar, Arvind Kejriwal, Jitan Ram Manjhi.

The Modi government is likely to convene the winter session of Parliament early, on November 7, 2016, a Monday. The most important piece of business before it is the passage of the enabling clauses of the Goods and Services Tax Act.  

K Rosaiah, the former governor of Tamil Nadu who shifted to his own house in Hyderabad after demitting office, realised to his shock that his escort cars, pilot car, walkie-talkie wielding policemen were all missing. All he had was one constable with a lathi, no weapon. When asked the policeman said that his z plus had been withdrawn, and that's how Rosaiah came to know of his security being downgraded. 

Senior executives of Samsung today met officials of aviation regulator DGCA, two days after one of the company's high-end smartphones caught fire inside an IndiGo aircraft.

During the meeting, which lasted for more than an hour, the watchdog sought technical details about Galaxy Note series amid concerns over batteries of some of the devices getting overheated and exploding, sources said.

On September 23, a Samsung Galaxy Note 2 caught fire inside an IndiGo aircraft coming from Singapore during landing at the Chennai airport. Following the incident, which was the first of its kind involving a Samsung Galaxy Note on board an aircraft in India, DGCA had summoned the company's officials for a meeting.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) will further examine the smartphone that caught fire, the sources said. The incident happened within a fortnight of the regulator prohibiting the use of Galaxy Note 7 on board following a series of cases of the smartphone's battery exploding in various countries.

This model is yet to be launched in the Indian market.


Representational image.

That's former PM Nehru and Pakistan counterpart Ayub Khan sign the Indus Water Treaty in Karachi.

The Indus Waters Treaty is a water-sharing arrangement signed by then Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and then President of Pakistan Ayub Khan on September 19, 1960, in Karachi. It covers the water distribution and sharing rights of six rivers -- Beas, Ravi, Sutlej, Indus, Chenab and Jhelum. The agreement was brokered by the World Bank. 

Just in: Tainted former Mines Minister Gayatri Prasad Prajapati reinducted in Akhilesh Yadav cabinet.

Just in: Three CRPF men injured in grenade attack in Kulgam.

@IndiaHistorypic  1960: Jawaharlal Nehru Arrives in Karachi to Sign Indus Water Treaty.

Amidst the surge in India-Pakistan tensions and our existential angst over 'jaw-for-tooth' versus 'strategic restraint', it shouldn't be that life in South Block doesn't become Pakistan-centric. What the notable indifference on the part of the international community to both Pakistan's tirade on Kashmir against India and India's narrative on Pakistan-sponsored terrorism alike, is that time and tide doesn't wait for us. That, quintessentially, is also what the Russian-Pakistani military exercises signify. Read more

And while on water, Tamil Nadu moves the Supreme Court, saying 'don't hear Karnataka's petition till it releases Cauvery water as ordered'.

The Karnataka government on Monday reportedly told the Supreme Court that additional Cauvery river water can be released to Tamil Nadu only in December because the state's major cities were on the verge of running out of drinking water.

Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's government moved an appeal in the Apex court seeking modification of the its order on supplying 6,000 cusecs of water for a week to help farmers in Tamil Nadu till September 27.

The petition came three days after Karnataka assembly passed a resolution saying the river will be used only for meeting drinking water needs of villages and towns in the Cauvery basin and Bengaluru. However, the resolutions did not mention the Apex court's order.

Karnataka has said its citizens would go thirsty and crops ravaged if it released any more water to Tamil Nadu.

The state, including capital Bengaluru, has witnessed violent protests over the water-sharing, provoking an appeal from Prime Minister Narendra Modi for calm.

PM Narendra Modi chairs a meeting on the IndusWater Treaty. Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar, NSA Ajit Doval and PM's Principal Secretary Nripendra Mishra attend the meeting.


The PM today held discussions on the five-decade-old Indus Waters Treaty between India and Pakistan. Modi was also briefed by officials from various ministries including external affairs and water resources. He wants to discuss the pros and cons of any action on the 1960 water treaty that has survived two full-scale wars between the two countries.


The discussions are being seen as a sign that reviewing the Indus Waters Treaty may be on the table for India as a response to the Uri attack in which 18 soldiers were killed by terrorists of the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed.


The Indus flows from India into Pakistan and if India goes ahead and blocks the flow, it could lead to drought and famine in Pakistan. Blocking the flow of the Indus could also flood Kashmir.


Take our quiz alongside and have your say on what YOU think India should do.

Nobody knows for certain who will win on Nov. 8 - but one man is pretty sure: Professor Allan Lichtman, who's correctly predicted every presidential election since 1984. Here's the answer.

The Supreme Court today refused to grant an urgent hearing on a PIL seeking declaration of the India-Pakistan Indus Water Treaty as unconstitutional. 

Five terrorists from the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen, who were involved in the Burdwan blasts in October 2014, were arrested from Kolkata. A Special Task Force found detonators, live wires and an unidentified white powder on the terrorists, indicating that they may have been planning another attack. Sources said that three of the terrorists were Bangladeshi. 

Strong tremors hit south-eastern Tokyo and Okinawa island and a chain of neighboring islands this morning. An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.7 has been recorded, but no tsunami warning was issued and there were no immediate reports of damage or injury, reports Reuters.

Earthquakes are common in Japan, one of the world's most seismically active areas.

Japan accounts for about 20 percent of the world's earthquakes of magnitude 6 or greater.On March 11, 2011, the northeast coast was struck by a magnitude 9 earthquake, the strongest quake in Japan on record, and a massive tsunami.

Those events triggered the world's worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl a quarter of a century earlier.


Representational image.

Kashmir continued to remain curfew-free for the second consecutive day today after the curbs on the movement of people were lifted from the entire Valley yesterday following improvement in the situation.

However, restrictions on the assembly of people were in force in most areas.

There is no curfew anywhere in Kashmir today as well, but restrictions on the assembly of people were in place in many parts of the Valley as a precautionary measure, a police official said here. He said the decision to not clamp curfew was taken in view of the improving situation.

However, normal life continued to remain affected in Kashmir, where the markets came to life in the afternoon yesterday in the wake of relaxation, from 2 PM, announced by separatists. Shops, petrol pumps and other business establishments remained closed today due to the separatist call for shut down, while public transport remained off the roads for the 80th straight day.

Cauvery row: Karnataka tells Supreme Court it can't release water to Tamil Nadu now, can do so only by year end. 

Acting on the mandate from both the Houses of the legislature to draw Cauvery water only for drinking purposes of Bengaluru and other towns in the State, Karnataka filed a petition in the Supreme Court on Monday seeking a modification of the apex courts order of September 20.

The Supreme Court order had asked Karnataka to release 6,000 cusecs of Cauvery water on a daily basis from September 21 to 27.


This is what the SC directive said: Read


Image: Former PM HD Deve Gowda, extreme left, speaks with Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah during an all party meeting on the Cauvery water sharing issue last week.

India's much-awaited address at the United Nations General Assembly is scheduled later on Monday with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj expected to focus on the recent terror attack at Uri in Kashmir, up the ante against Pakistan and seek global support to dub it a "terror state'.

First Secretary in the Permanent Mission of India to the UN Eenam Gambhir had said,"the worst violation of human rights is terrorism".

"When practiced as an instrument of state policy it is a war crime. What my country and our other neighbours are facing today is Pakistan's long-standing policy of sponsoring terrorism, the consequences of which have spread well beyond our region," she said.

She had said India sees in Pakistan "a terrorist state"which channelises billions of dollars, much of it diverted from international aid, to training, financing and supporting terror groups as militant proxies against it neighbours.

Sushma Swaraj is also expected to give a befitting reply to an earlier address at the UNGA by Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

Under the UNGA's right to reply, after Sharif's address, the Indian diplomatic mission at the UN was also point-blank and called the neighbouring country the "Ivy League of terror'.


Image: External Affairs minister Sushma Swaraj shares a light moment with reporters and India's Permanent Representative in the United Nations, Syed Akbaruddin at the UNGA, New York, on Saturday.

Celebrations are on in Marathwada. It's been raining for nearly 10 days now, and the region till recently in the news for a water train is marking the end of four years of drought with sweets, drums and photos next to overflowing dams. While delighted, officials now have a different problem on their hands: eight people have died in the past few days in Beed due to water-related incidents. Villages have got inundated, and in Beed, the NDRF had to be called in for help. Read more

Continuing to move south, the BSE Sensex fell over 149 points and the NSE Nifty broke below the 8,800-mark in early trade today amid weak global cues.

Sentiment remained downbeat as investors went about booking profits in recent gainers. The 30-share barometer declined 149.22 points, or 0.52 per cent, to 28,519, with sectoral indices led by realty, banking and auto accounting for much of the losses, falling by up to 0.94 per cent. The index had lost 104.91 points in the previous session on Friday.

More than a decade after they first started talks, India has finally inked an 8bn agreement to buy 36 Rafale fighter jets from France's Dassault. Last week's deal is one of the biggest weapons contracts New Delhi has ever signed and should plug a significant gap in the country's air force.

But, while the initial reaction might be relief, the protracted negotiations and the reduction of the deal to a third of its original size underscores the long-running problems with Indian defence procurement, an even more pressing concern given rising tensions with Pakistan.

And while Narendra Modi enjoys the credit for a deal he personally helped broker, the Indian prime minister must now also work out where he gets the 90 aircraft he chose not to buy. Read more

Just in: Gunshots heard after security forces cordoned off Bagtor in Gurez village, Bandipur district (J&K) near LoC. Details awaited.

PM Narendra Modi congratulates ISRO scientists for the successful launch of its longest and most complex mission till date. ISRO today launched eight satellites from one rocket into two different orbits.

PM Modi tweeted: "Moment of immense joy and pride for India. Congratulations to @isro on successful launch of PSLV-C35/SCATSAT-1 & 7 co-passenger satellites. Our space scientists keep scripting history. Their innovative zeal has touched the lives of 125 crore Indians & made India proud worldwide."

The 37th Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle or PSLV, carrying eight satellites - three from India, three from Algeria, and one each from Canada and the US - successfully lifted off from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh at 9:12 am.PSLV takes off from Sriharikota carrying 8 satellites - three from India, three from Algeria, and one each from Canada and the US.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi today greeted his predecessor Manmohan Singh on his 83rd birthday, wishing him a long and healthy life. He also spoke to Singh and extended birthday greetings to him.

"Warm birthday wishes to Dr. Manmohan Singh ji. May God bless him with a long and healthy life," he said in a tweet.

"PM @narendramodi spoke to Dr Manmohan Singh-ji and extended birthday greetings to him," the PMO said in a tweet. Singh, who served as Prime Minister from 2004 to 2014, was born in Gah in Pakistan. Singh's family migrated to India during partition in 1947.

File picture.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), is gearing up for its longest and most complex mission till date - launching multiple satellites from one rocket into two different orbits. The 37th Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle or PSLV takes off from Sriharikota carrying 8 satellites - three from India, three from Algeria, and one each from Canada and the US.

While SCATSAT-1 will be released first into a 730 km Polar Sunsynchronous Orbit after about 17 minutes, the rest will be injected into a lower orbit of 689 km after around two hours.

There will be two re-ignitions of the launch vehicle for this purpose, Kumar said.

Besides SCATSAT-1, the others are PRATHAM and PISAT, two academic satellites from India, ALSAT-1B, ALSAT-2B and ALSAT-1N (all from Algeria) and Pathfinder-1 and NLS-19, from USA and Canada, respectively.

The 48-and-a-half-hour countdown for PSLV-C35/SCATSAT-1 Mission started at 8:42am on Saturday.

According to ISRO, this is the first mission of PSLV in which it will be launching its payloads into two different orbits.

This will be the 15th flight of PSLV in 'XL' configuration with the use of solid strap-on motors, it added.

The mission objectives of SCATSAT-1 are to help provide weather forecasting services to the user communities through the generation of wind vector products for weather forecasting, cyclone detection and tracking, ISRO said.

SCATSAT-1 is a continuity mission for scatterometer payload carried by the earlier Oceansat-2 satellite, ISRO added.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi after a fiery speech in Kerala where he blamed Pakistan for exporting global terrorism has now called for a briefing on the Indus Waters Treaty.