Boy fakes snatch to skip test

Chennai (PTI): A 15-year-old schoolboy, who claimed that he was ?abducted?, was found to have made up the story to escape facing a school test.

The boy, a student of Class X, was sent back home after a stern warning, police said.

The boy had made a verbal complaint that he was abducted by a four-member gang in front of his school. He said he was released a few kilometres from his institution when the gang realised that he was not their quarry.

The police said they arrived at the truth after looking into the complaint and talking to the boy?s parents.

The hoax kidnapping comes in the wake of a spate of abductions from Delhi to Bengal in the past few weeks that creased the brows of parents and almost rocked Laloo Prasad Yadav?s election campaign in Bihar, the state worst hit by ransom gangs.

Students had rallied for Kislay, a Class IX student of DPS, Patna, kidnapped from near his house and the anger boiled over as Laloo Prasad refused to meet them during a campaign visit.

But the most intriguing vein in the spate has been the faking of abductions, like the Chennai boy. In Bengal, a girl has been arrested for staging a snatch with her paramour and telling the family not to contact the police but marry them off.

Death for Indian drug courier

Jakarta (AFP): An Indonesian court on Monday sentenced to death a Brazilian and an Indian for drug trafficking, the Kompas newspaper reported.

The state district court in Tanggerang of Banten province found Gurdip Singh, alias Dishal, 38, guilty of acting as a courier in an attempt to smuggle 300 gm of heroin into the country last August.

Singh said he would appeal against the judgment. The prosecutors had recommended a 20-year jail sentence for Singh.

Singh was caught with the heroin in two small packets inside his socks during a check at Jakarta?s Sukarno-Hatta International Airport on August 28, 2004. Singh later told police he was paid $2,000 by a Pakistani to smuggle the heroin.

Poet?s tomb vandalised

New Delhi (PTI): The tomb of poet Amir Khusro in south Delhi was vandalised and a person detained in this connection.

Mohammad Bakul Khan, a rice merchant from Malda, entered the tomb premises and allegedly broke a glass pane and light fittings. He also damaged part of a cement fence outside the tomb. He was remanded in judicial custody. Police said the man seemed to be in a ?hysterical state?.

Bomb hoax

Kanhangad (PTI): Panic spread at the Hosdurg assistant sessions court in Kerala following an anonymous call that a bomb was planted there. The call proved to be a hoax after no explosive material was found by a joint team of police and special bomb squad. Court officials received a call at 10 am saying the bomb would explode at noon.

Rape accused

Sonepat (PTI): Two persons were arrested in separate cases of alleged rape, police said. Rajinder of Gorar village allegedly raped his 18-year-old daughter-in-law last week. Sonu of Guhna village is accused of abducting and raping a married woman of a Sonepat colony last week.

Councillor killed

Srinagar (PTI): The newly elected councillor and chairman-designate of Beerwah municipal committee, Ghulam Mohiuddin Mir, of the People?s Democratic Party, was shot dead by militants in Budgam district on Tuesday. Mir, also known as Mohiuddin Manager, was on his way to Srinagar when he was kidnapped at Chakehama, official sources said. He was shot in the nearby fields.

Rains kill seven

Varanasi (PTI): Nine persons were killed and seven injured as heavy rains and hailstorms lashed parts of eastern Uttar Pradesh. Three persons were killed in Mirzapur district on Monday, two each in Sonebhadra and Jaunpur and one each in Varanasi and Chandauli. Rains and hailstorms also uprooted trees and affected traffic movement in the region. The maximum temperatures dropped by nine degrees celsius.

A musical night by composer Ismail Darbar will be held at Taj Mahal on February 18 to commemorate its 350th anniversary. Over 45 musicians and 65 dancers will take part. A song on the monument has also been composed.