Rahul rebel bar

Mumbai, March 1 (PTI): Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi today said that rebels, who leave the party to contest elections against official nominees,would no longer be re-inducted.

“Doors were open for them earlier. But now this will not happen,” he was quoted as telling the meeting which was not open to the media. “Those rules will be binding on me and the rest of the party,” he said at his first interaction with the party’s Mumbai unit since his elevation.

Koda bail

New Delhi (PTI): Former Jharkhand chief minister Madhu Koda and his aide Vikash Kumar Sinha have been granted conditional bail by the Supreme Court for their alleged role in a money laundering case but will remain in jail for other offences.

Tourist visa

New Delhi: Tourism minister K. Chiranjeevi met home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde with demand that tourist visa-on-arrival scheme be extended to 16 countries. The scheme is currently offered by India to 11 countries. “Visa-on-arrival helps in tapping the people who make decisions at the last moment,” Chiranjeevi said.

LoC firing

Jammu (PTI): Indian posts along the LoC in Mendhar belt of Poonch came under firing, a BSF official said on Friday. There was small arms and rocket firing, he said adding there was no loss of life or injury to anyone in the firing.

Mining scam

Bangalore (PTI): A close associate of mining baron and former Karnataka minister G. Janardhana Reddy has been arrested by the CBI in connection with illegal iron ore export from the Belekeri port. K.V. Nagaraj was on Friday produced before a CBI court, which remanded him in police custody till March 8.

Palace theft

Jamnagar (PTI): Valuables like silver utensils and antique items worth Rs 12.57 lakh have been stolen from Darbargadh, the palace of Jamnagar Maharajah Shatrusalya, police said on Friday. Silver utensils and antique items weighing 25kg were stolen in the past few months.

Chopper probe

New Delhi, March 1: The Supreme Court today dismissed a public interest litigation seeking a probe by a special investigation team into the alleged kickbacks in the purchase of 12 AgustaWestland helicopters.

The court, however, patted petitioner Manohar Lal Sharma as a “public-spirited” person and hoped the issue would not die out as long as people like him existed. The pat came after Sharma, a lawyer, told the court it ought to monitor the proposed probe.

Ishrat case

Ahmedabad (PTI): Special CBI sessions court on Friday remanded senior police officers Girish Singhal and J.G. Parmar, arrested in connection with Ishrat Jahan encounter case, to six days custody. The court set aside the lower court’s order denying police remand of the officers.

Poaching

Bhopal (PTI): Madhya Pradesh is witnessing a rising trend of tigers being poached by electrocution with five felines losing lives because of this in 2012-13, an RTI query has found. According to government records, 15 tigers lost lives in Madhya Pradesh in 2012-13, RTI activist Ajay Dube said.

Yoga syllabus

Rishikesh (PTI): Uttarakhand chief minister Vijay Bahuguna on Friday said yoga should be included in school syllabus for overall personality development of children while inaugurating the international yoga week here.

Blast quiz

Hyderabad: Two Indian Mujahideen suspects were on Friday brought from Delhi’s Tihar jail to Hyderabad for questioning in connection with last week’s blasts. A Delhi court has granted the National Investigation Agency a five-day custody of Syed Maqbool and Imran Khan for interrogation over the February 21 attack that claimed 17 lives.

Doctor strike

Thiruvananthapuram (PTI): The functioning of state run hospitals and public health centres in Kerala was badly hit on Friday following a one-day strike by a section of government doctors to protest against alleged political interference in hospital matters.