This week we see the release of two starkly different films namely UNGLI and ZID. While one deals with certain social evils and messages the other has been making headlines for its erotic content. Apart from these two, this week the audience also has the choice of two Hollywood releases MOCKINGJAY and PENGUINS OF MADAGASCAR.

As expected continuing the usual trend of Bollywood films taking a better opening in morning shows UNGLI has opened slightly better than ZID, though the film started on a sluggish pace. ZID on the other hand despite its headline grabbing content has opened on a poor note. However while the Bollywood releases cater to a rather niche audience, the Hollywood releases that belong to the action (MOCKINGJAY) and comedy genre (PENGUINS OF MADAGASCAR), show a better potential of attracting footfalls over evening and night shows.

On the whole with not so favourable reviews for both the Hindi releases, the chances of both the movies attracting greater footfalls from evening shows appears a distant possibility, but the English releases MOCKINGJAY and PENGUINS OF MADAGASCAR are expected to perform on a much better note over the weekend.

Russia has expressed interest in production of civil and light transport aircraft in India with their technology, Parliament was informed today.

The Indian government has welcomed the Russian interest and is committed to enhancing bilateral investment and trade cooperation, Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said in a written reply to the Lok Sabha.

“The Russian side expressed their interest in production of civil aircraft, light transport aircraft and helicopter in India with Russian technology,” she said.

The eighth session of the Indian-Russia Forum on trade and investment was held here on November 5.

Replying to a separate question on coffee industry, she said that stem borer pest is amongst major constraints affecting cultivation of Arabica variety of coffee.

“The combined effects of higher temperatures, reduction of shade for increasing the yield of pepper grown as intercrop and lack of timely control measures by the growers have led to increase in the incidence of the pest,” she said.

About 3,200 hectares of productive area in Karnatka are reported to have been affected by stem borer due to long dry spell from November 2013 to May 2014 and resultant high temperatures.

She added that several steps have been initiated to address the problem of pest in coffee cultivation.

“The government has approved a two year action plan (2014-15 and 2015-16) for combating the stem borer in affected areas,” the minister said.

Twenty-three-year-old Arif Majeed from neighbouring Kalyan, who until now was believed to have been killed while fighting for ISIS in Syria, returned to Mumbai today and is being interrogated by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) here.

In May this year, four youths from Kalyan town — Arif Majeed, Shaheen Tanki, Fahad Shaikh and Aman Tandel — had left India to visit holy places in the Middle East, but disappeared thereafter. They were suspected to have joined the middle-east terror group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

Arif returned this morning and is being quizzed by the NIA, a police officer said.

His family friend Iftekhar Khan told PTI, “Arif’s father Ejaz received a phone call from security agencies this morning saying his son is in Mumbai.”

Maharashtra ATS, which had earlier questioned the family members of the youths, is also in touch with the NIA over the return of Arif to Mumbai, sources said.

According to police, the four engineering students flew to Baghdad on May 23 as part of a group of 22 pilgrims to visit religious shrines in Iraq. The next day, Arif had called his family from Baghdad and apologised for having left without informing them. Upon returning to India, other pilgrims had told the police that, Arif, Fahad, Aman and Saheen had hired a taxi to Fallujah, a city west of Baghdad which had emerged as the epicentre of Iraq’s deadly insurgency.

“On August 26, Tanki called up Arif’s family and told them that their son had become a “martyr” claiming that the latter died fighting for ISIS in Syria,” a family friend Ateek Khan had told reporters.
Accordingly the next day, Arif’s family performed ‘Janaza-e-gayabana’ (prayers for the departed soul in absence of the body) in Kalyan.

Recently, Arif’s father Ejaz Majeed had reportedly met the NIA and told them his son had fled from the IS-controlled areas to Turkey after fighting for the militant group for nearly three months and wants to return to India.

Two teenage Indian girls found hanging from a tree in May took their own lives and were not gang-raped and murdered, federal investigators have said.

The announcement came after months of inquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation following global outrage.

Three men arrested in connection with the case in northern Uttar Pradesh state were freed on bail in September.

It is unclear why the girls might have taken their lives. Correspondents say there are many unanswered questions.

Women’s rights activists say they are not happy with the latest findings and are urging the CBI to continue investigating.

The lower-caste cousins, thought to have been 14 and 15, were found hanged from a mango tree in Badaun district on 28 May.

The fact that there has been little explanation about the motive has led many people to question the findings of the CBI.

“CBI has tried to fudge the case and save the accused from the very beginning,” Sohan Lal, father of one of the girls, told BBC Hindi.

“I am very angry with their decision. The team did not show any promptness while investigating the case.”

‘Forty scientific reports’

The girls went missing after apparently going outside to relieve themselves during the night as they had no toilet at home.

A local post-mortem examination initially confirmed multiple sexual assaults and death due to hanging.

But forensic tests conducted since then have concluded the girls were not sexually assaulted, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said.

“Based on around 40 scientific reports the CBI has concluded that the two minor girls in the Badaun case had not been raped and murdered as had been alleged in the FIR [first information report],” CBI spokeswoman Kanchan Prasad said on Thursday.

“Investigation has concluded that it is a case of suicide.”

More details are due at a news conference later on Thursday.

Analysis: Geeta Pandey, BBC News, Delhi

The latest CBI revelations are baffling and many will not believe them.

It was initially believed that the two lower-caste girls were gang raped and hanged by young men from a slightly higher caste. A post-mortem carried out on the bodies by a team of three local doctors said the girls had injuries “suggestive of rape”.

In August, the CBI had the clothes, vaginal swabs and other personal effects of the girls and the three accused men tested – and came up with the startling revelation that the cousins had not been sexually assaulted at all.

It was also suggested the murders could be a case of “honour killing” by relatives. The CBI chief’s latest statement that the girls took their own lives “because of family pressure” over their friendship with a villager has added a further twist.

In just six months, there have been three different theories about how the teenagers died and each theory has raised more questions than it has answered. How the investigators arrived at a verdict of suicide is as yet unclear.

Indians are now beginning to wonder whether they will ever know what actually happened on the night the two girls brutally died.

Earlier, CBI chief Ranjit Sinha told the Hindustan Times newspaper they had “cracked the Badaun case”.

“The local police had erroneously conducted their probe along the lines that the sisters were killed,” he said.

Correspondents say the story of the hangings has become murkier and murkier over the past few months, with officials raising questions over the testimony of the victims’ families, accusing them of failing lie-detector tests.

Investigators also raised doubts about the credibility of the main witness, a neighbour of the girls, amid reports that he had been paid money by their families.

It also became clear that the CBI did not trust the original local police investigation.

In September a court bailed the three accused after federal investigators refused to charge them, citing a lack of evidence.

Two constables, who were also arrested along with the accused and charged with dereliction of duty and criminal conspiracy for not taking the parents’ complaint seriously, were also bailed in September.

Federal investigators have said the clothes and personal effects of the girls were examined by the Centre for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics (CDFD) in Hyderabad and it found no proof of sexual assault.

Mathura: Efforts of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to have cordial relations with the maximum number of countries are paying dividend and it is evident from US President Barack Obama’s acceptance of the invitation to grace India’s Republic Day function, former diplomat V B Soni said here today.

Referring to Obama’s acceptance of Modi’s invitation to grace the Republic Day function as chief guest, Soni said, “It is a proof that the efforts of the Prime Minister to have cordial relations with maximum countries is paying dividend.”

Though relations with a few neighbours were not very cordial, now the situation is gradually changing under the stewardship of Prime Minister Modi, said the former diplomat who was here to attend a function.

“Efforts of Modi for cordial relations with SAARC countries are paying positive result,” he said, adding while relations with Nepal are improving, efforts to improve relations with Sri Lanka are gradually turning towards positive direction.

“The manner in which five Tamil fishermen on death row in Sri Lanka were released shows that Indian efforts of improving relations with Sri Lanka are getting momentum,” he said.

Modi knows it well that unless cordial relations with the governments of Tamil Nadu and West Bengal are developed, relations with Bangladesh and Sri Lanka cannot be strengthened and China would take advantage of it, he claimed.

– See more at: http://freepressjournal.in/modis-efforts-for-good-foreign-relations-paying-off/#sthash.baIZ3NpR.dpuf

A 52-year-old woman was today killed and another injured during a blanket distribution programme on the occasion of SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav’s birthday in Bisauli area here.

Sharbati Devi was injured in the stampede during distribution of blankets at the premises of Madanlal Inter College following which she was taken to the community health centre where doctors declared her dead, ASP Balendra Bhushan Singh said.

He said the injured person has been admitted to hospital. Distribution of blankets is a very common phenomenon in Bihar and U.P. Laloo Prasad Yadav ex CM of Bihar was caught live on TV

Distributing blankets and cash on his birthday some years ago. The huge chunk of the population below poverty line are the vote bank of these political parties and this is an easy way to lure

Lure them.

Police atrocity evoked mixed response today. The shops and markets remained closed in the state and vehicles were off the roads except in Gandacherra sub-division of Dhalai district. Many offices and banks were open but the attendance was thin.

Many picketers were arrested from different parts of the state but released after wards, police said. Opposition leader Sudip Roy Burman had announced a state wide bandh today against the clash between police and Congress activists during the civil disobedience launched by the party to protest against the rampant corruption by cadres of the ruling CPI-M and demanded resignation of Chief Minister Manik Sarkar.