Another attack on Pakistani city Peshawar

PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN: A suicide bomber blew himself up outside a court building in Peshawar on Thursday, killing at least 15 people, officials said,

in the latest of a series of attacks on the northwestern Pakistan city.

The city, near the Afghan border, has been targeted several times since the army began an offensive against the Taliban in South Waziristan last month and militants stepped up retaliatory attacks.

"The attacker was on foot and blew himself when guards tried to search him at the gates of the court," senior city administrator Sahibzada Anis told reporters.

At least 15 bodies had been brought in to Peshawar's main hospital along with about 25 wounded people after Thursday's attack at the court complex, said senior hospital official and doctor Sahib Gul. Three policemen were among the dead, said Anis.

The court is across a road from the city's top hotel, which was attacked by a suicide car-bomber in June. A security agency building on the same road was attacked last week.

The army went on the offensive in South Waziristan on the Afghan border on Oct. 17, aiming to root out Pakistani Taliban militants who stepped up their war on the security forces in 2007. The militants have responded with intensified attacks in towns and cities, in particular in Peshawar, killing several hundred people.

The United States, weighing options for how to turn an intensifying insurgency in Afghanistan, has welcomed the offensive but is keen to see Pakistan tackle Afghan Taliban factions based in lawless enclaves along the border.

Earlier, Pakistani security officials said a US drone aircraft fired two missiles into a northwestern militant stronghold killing four people. The late night attack was in the North Waziristan region on the Afghan border, about 20 km (12 miles) west of the town of Miranshah, the intelligence agency and paramilitary force officials said.

The identity of the four people killed and six people wounded was not known, said the officials, who declined to be identified. North Waziristan is a stronghold of Taliban militants and their al-Qaida allies. The United States has carried out 44 attacks with its pilotless, missile-firing aircraft in northwest Pakistan this year as it forces in neighbouring Afghanistan have faced an intensifying Taliban insurgency. There were 32 such strikes last year, according to a Reuters tally of reports from Pakistani security agents, government officials and residents.

Reliance Retail to create over half a million jobs

During last fiscal Reliance has organised its retail initiatives to focus on product market format. "We have now grown to nearly 700 stores, comprising fourteen distinct formats, across 60 towns and cities," Ambani said adding that "the Reliance Fresh format, which was the first format launched by the retail venture has grown to nearly 600 stores."

With a view to retain talent, Reliance would nurture home-grown talent, besides hiring top talent from premier technology and management institutions, Ambani said.

Further, the company would retain talent by way of a performance oriented employee stock option plan and is also working with educational institutions to help build more robust and industry oriented programmes.

Over the years, Reliance has initiated partnerships with international players for increasing its growth perspectives.

The company has tie-ups with UK's Marks and Spencer, European firm Pearle, US-based Apple Inc to operate iStores, with Office Depot for office products and services and with Vornado for retail real estate developments.

"Reliance Retail is well on track to create significant value creating platform, generate employment opportunities and trigger a socio economic transformation particularly in rural India

SC refuses to quash PIL against Mayawati in Taj corridor scam

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday rejected Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati's plea for quashing a PIL filed against her in the Taj


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corridor scandal which had involved construction of a massive shopping mall and recreational centres near the world famous monument.

She had sought quashing of the PIL in the Allahabad High Court claiming that opposition parties could try to destabilise her government on the issue.

A bench of Justices B S Sirpurkar and B Sudershan Reddy asked the Uttar Pradesh government to approach the High Court on the issue of maintainability of the PIL.

"What the opposition is going to demand to destabilise the government, we are not bothered," the court said.

The observation of the judges came when senior counsel K K Venugopal submitted that the PIL had the propensity to destabilise the government.

He pleaded that if the PIL was allowed to be heard, it would only give the opposition an excuse to demand her government's resignation.

"Destabilisation, why should we go into all those things?" the bench asked.

The court was also not impressed with the UP government's argument that the case was politically motivated as it claimed that four other similar petitions on the same issue were earlier dismissed by the apex court.

The judges while saying that they found no reason to interfere in the matter, granted liberty to the UP government to raise its arguments before the High Court

Govt to divest 5% in NTPC, says more cos to follow

Pursuing its divestment agenda further, the government Friday announced that stake sales in NTPC, Rural Electrification Corp and Satluj Jal (an unlisted company) would go through in fiscal year 2009-10. Listed NTPC would see a disinvestment to the tune of 5% in which the government would raise Rs 8,100 crore, Divestment Secretary Sunil Mitra.

Recently, the Cabinet announced that all listed public sector undertakings (PSUs) should increase public shareholding to 10% while all profitable unlisted companies should go public. Mitra said the government had identified 50 unlisted public companies and 10 listed companies.


The government is focusing on divesting stake in PSUs to curb its burgeoning fiscal deficit. Roughly speaking, fiscal deficit is the difference between the government’s revenues and spending and India has run up a high deficit this year due to its spending to counter the effects of the global financial crisis.

The divestment secretary said he was in talks with ministries of steel, coal and telecom to explore possibility of stake sales in SAIL, Coal India and BSNL respectively.

“The listings would unlock shareholder value in the companies. We have begun inter-ministry talks to identify potential candidates for divestment. The divestment would be considered on a case-to-case basis,” Mitra said.

The government has been aggressively pushing to sell some of its stake in public companies. Recently, it listed NHPC and Oil India on the exchanges even though the initial public offers (IPOs) received a lukewarm response from investors and many experts thought the government had overpriced the issues.

This time though, the government would make sure it provides incentives for retail participation in the PSU stake sales, Mitra said. “The retail investor would benefit from the follow-on public offers (FPOs) [in case of listed companies], which would be priced at a discount to market price,” he said.