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All India Radio News "Spotlight/ News Analysis" programme brings you a discussion on ""CAG Audit to Private Telecom Companies". This program can be heard by clicking on the following link: http://bit.ly/1dt4WRC The participants are : Sadhana Dikshit, Former Member, Telecom Commission amd Prasoon Srivastava, Special Telecom Correspondent, PTI.

Stone image of Chalukya king discovered in Samarlakota The stone image of Chandrarasi of 7th Century A.D. at Sri Kumara Bhimeswara Swamy Temple at Samarlakota.— Photo: special arrangement The Archaeological Survey of India, Hyderabad, has come across an interesting discovery of a unique inscribed image of a king in the Sri Kumara Bhimeswara Swamy Temple premises at Samarlakota in East Godavari District.

The Supreme Court on Monday quashed the Tamil Nadu government’s February 2009 order appointing Executive Officer to manage the affairs and properties of the  Natarajar temple at Chidambaram. A Bench of Justices B.S. Chauhan and S.A. Bobde, allowing a batch of appeals filed by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy and Podu Dikshitars against a Madras High Court upholding the GO, held that the right of Dikshitars to manage the temple could not taken away by the government.

The last case was detected in January 2011 in Howrah district India will be declared polio-free by the World Health Organization (WHO) if no cases of polio are detected in the country by January 13, Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad said here on Monday. “Any country that does not have a case of polio for three consecutive years is declared polio-free by the WHO,” Mr. Azad told journalists at the State Congress headquarters. The country has achieved the milestone in just four years.

The National Green Tribunal (NGT) on Monday admitted a case pertaining to the ecological issues in the downstream of the Lower Subansiri Hydro Electric Project dam by the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) Limited.

Even as hopes rise of a civil nuclear accord with Japan following confirmation that its Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will be the chief guest at Republic Day celebrations here, an influential lawmaker from Tokyo indicated on Monday that the path ahead was still not smooth and India should make concessions keeping in mind Japanese sensitivities. Chief Representative of the New Komeito Party Natsuo Yamaguchi assured India of a “flexible approach from the Japanese side” if it addressed some “areas of concern” such as non-proliferation, Comprehensive [Nuclear] Test Ban Treaty and safe use of nuclear energy for civilian purposes

Latest effort to discourage illegal trade Officers stand guard as confiscated ivory is destroyed in Dongguan, southern Guangdong, China, on Monday.— Photo: AP In an unprecedented move, China on Monday publicly destroyed 6.1 tonnes of confiscated ivory to shed its image as the world’s biggest market for smuggled elephant tusks and discourage illegal trade and poaching.

Speaking for the first time after the Maharashtra government tabled the judicial inquiry commission report on the Adarsh scam in the State Assembly, Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde on Monday said the land on which building stands always belonged to the State government.

Asks her arch rival Khaleda Zia to “give up terrorism and the Jamaat-e-Islami” The Awami League led by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is set to form the new government Bangladesh after winning an absolute majority in the January 5 parliamentary elections boycotted by the Opposition. The Election Commission received the results of 139 out of the 147 seats for which polling was held. The Awami League won 104 seats. Having already won 127 seats uncontested, the ruling party has 231 seats under its belt, giving it a clear three-fourths majority in the new Parliament. Main Opposition The Jatiya Party, which won 33 seats, is likely to be the main Opposition, while the Workers Party got 6, Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal (JSD) got 5 and Tarikat Federation 1. A total of 13 independent candidates, mostly rebels from the ruling party, defeated the official candidates. At her press conference on Monday, Ms. Hasina asked her arch-rival Khaleda Zia to “give up terrorism and the Jamaat-e-Islam...

Flush with the success of the GSLV-D5, which used an indigenous cryogenic stage to put the GSAT-14 into orbit, the Indian Space Research Organisation is getting ready for the next GSLV flight with its own cryogenic engine within a year. It will put the communication satellite GSAT-6 into orbit.

The Navy is looking to pave the way for circumnavigation of the globe by an all-woman crew, with the member officers to be trained aboard the INS Mhadei, the first Indian solo circumnavigator, as it participates in the ‘Cape2Rio Yachting Race’ 2014. The Navy on Sunday said that one lady officer would be part of the crew for each leg of the voyage. Thus, when the INS Mhadei returns to Goa, it would have trained three lady officers. — PTI

The Centre on Monday told the Supreme Court that the law did not allow the juvenile, convicted by juvenile board in the December 16 gangrape, to be tried twice for the same offence as sought by the parents of victims who demanded his retrial by a criminal court. The Ministry of Women and Child Development said it would be legally and constitutionally impermissible to put him on trial again as the Juvenile Justice (JJ) Board has already given its verdict of guilt of the juvenile and the prayer for his fresh trial has been rendered redundant. “As such, under Article 20 of the Constitution as also Section 300 of criminal procedure code, there can be no second trial for the same offence, and the adjudication of guilt of the juvenile offender having been determined by the JJ Board under Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000, the second prayer does not survive nor was sustainable,” the ministry said in its affidavit. The Ministry’s reply came on ...

Diplomats from China and Japan are invoking the evil Lord Voldemort from the bestselling “Harry Potter” series in their feud over the Yasukuni war shrine in Tokyo. China says the shrine, which Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited recently, glorifies Japan’s militaristic past.

Disproportionate credit disbursement and weak bank credit linkages remain a persistent challenge for several States including Bihar, Jharkhand and Gujarat. Taking note of this, the Government has stepped in and is taking several steps to improve bank linkages of Self Help Groups (SHGs) across the country.

One of India’s most ambitious dreams became a reality on Sunday when its Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV-D5), powered by an indigenous cryogenic engine, effortlessly put the 1,982-kg GSAT-14 communication satellite into a perfect orbit after 17 minutes of flight. The cryogenic engine built by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) fired for 12 of those 17 minutes. The precision of the cryogenic upper stage was such that it put the GSAT-14 into an orbit with a perigee of 179 km, against the target of 180 km, and the apogee achieved was off by a mere 50 km for a target of 36,000 km. The grand success caps 20 years of hard work by ISRO’s engineers, after being denied cryogenic technology under pressure from the U.S., suffering a heartbreaking failure with an indigenous cryogenic engine flight in April 2010 and having had to scrub its second attempt with an indigenous cryogenic engine in August 2013. “I am proud to say that ISRO has done it…,” ...