Pune cops asks 15-year-old to get back with her husband

Social workers Nasima Maniyar and Anis Shaikh, who produced the 15-year-old girl before Child Welfare Committee after officials of the Dehu Road police station refused to lodge a complaint

Pune: Officials of the Dehu Road police station have come under heavy criticism for allegedly turning down a 15-year-old's plea to register a complaint of domestic violence against her husband and in-laws. In addition, they allegedly asked the girl to go back to her husband's home, and gave her Rs. 20 for medical treatment.

Local Child Rights Activists have now demanded action against the officials. According to the complainant, unable to bear the physical torture she was being subjected to on a regular basis, the girl ran away from her in-laws residence at Kalekhadak in Wakad on June 26. She first went to Dehu Road Railway Station where she accidentally met social worker Nasima Maniyar. The victim had approached Maniyar asking her for a job. On close observation Maniyar realised that the victim, who was crying bitterly, had been beaten mercilessly.

Nasima, who was with her relative Anis Khan, consoled the victim and coaxed her to tell her story. Based on the victim's narration, Mainyar asked her to lodge a police complaint at Dehu Road police station. The girl was accompanied to the police station by a couple of Maniyar's colleagues. However, the trio was in for a rude shock when the Dehu Road police officials, instead of registering a complaint against the victim's husband and in-laws, asked her to get back to her in-laws home. In addition, one of the constables even gave the victim Rs. 20, alleged Maniyar.

Also Read

• 10-year-old raped by employer in Pune
• 36 children disappear mysteriously from Pune orphanage

To confirm that the victim was badly beaten, Maniyar then took her to Dr Yamini Adbe, a medical professional and a Human Rights activist, for a check up on June 26. "There were several marks on her body, including her private parts, which clearly indicated that she was being brutalised frequently," Dr Adbe said.

Dr Adbe then approached Child Rights Activist Anuradha Sahasrabudhhe of Childline, who suggested her to present the minor before the Child Welfare Committee (CWC). Maniyar, along with a colleague, presented the victim before the CWC yesterday. After hearing the girl's case, CWC member Anita Vipat ordered that the girl to undergo medical examination at Sassoon Hospital following which she would be sent to the observation home.

"Stringent action should be taken against the policemen who advised the girl to go back to her husband and in-laws home while ignoring her pleas for help and protection from them," Anuradha Sahasrabudhhe said. Advocate Supriya Kothari of Bhagini helpline, an NGO that provides legal help to women facing harassment from in-laws or others, seconded Sahasrabudhhe's opinion.

"Police should have sent her for medical test. If the tests proved that she was underage, then the cops should have had immediately booked her husband, in-laws and her parents, under relevant sections of the Child Marriage Act. In addition, under Section 12 of the Domestic Violence Act 2005, if the victim is unable to narrate the trauma, then anyone on its behalf can apply for protection of the aggrieved person, either to the First Class Magistrate, or at the police station," Kothari said.

The other side
Senior Police Inspector Ram Jadhav of Dehu Road police station said officials may have given money for her medical treatment. When questioned about why the officials asked her to go home instead of registering a complaint, he said, "Just because the girl is saying that she's a minor, it cannot be accepted, we need proof." When informed that some social workers had witnessed the incident, he demanded that they be sent to the police station, as he would like to hear the exact details of the June 26 incident from them.

For NDTV Updates,

Sensex soars 450 points amid global rally, rupee below 56

Video

Draft GAAR guidelines soon

24:33

The 30-share BSE Sensex soared to the highest point of the day as buying picked up in the last hour of trade. Positive global cues and a turnaround in domestic sentiments drove the Sensex 450 points higher. The Sensex and Nifty traded with over 2.5% gains, and were the top gainers among Asian markets.

European stocks maintained morning gains on the back of the agreement to use the continent's permanent bailout fund to recapitalize struggling banks. EU leaders also agreed to the idea of a tighter union in the long term.

Spain's IBEX index traded off the day's high, rising 2.4% while the CAC 40 benchmark in France extended gains, rising 2.4% higher. Earlier, Asian stocks closed near the day's high. The benchmark in Hong Kong jumped 2.2%, while Japan's Nikkei index ended 1.5% higher.

Domestic sentiments were boosted by the new draft guidelines on the general anti-avoidance rules (GAAR) announced late night yesterday. According to the guidelines, the tax evasion rule will be invoked only in those cases where foreign investors have opted to take the benefit of tax avoidance treaties. The rules would not apply retrospectively and will be triggered only above a certain income threshold.

RELATED STORIES

• Sensex, Nifty rally to 2-month high on global cues, GAAR clarity
• 10 reasons why Sensex has gained over 400 points
• Sensex soars 350 points on European deal, GAAR clarity
• Profit Top 10: PM meets top advisors, Govt plans loan recast to aid power firms
• Sensex, Nifty flat; Infosys, HCL Tech fall

Markets are likely to give thumbs up to these measures, analysts say.

'There is some cause for hope. Over the last two days, there have been new people at the finance ministry... Last night, the draft guidelines for GAAR have been out and they seem logical... Markets have been hearing about gloom and doom so far, so given the amount of bad news over the last 30 days, this gives some hopes," Shanti Ekambaram of Kotak Bank told NDTV Profit.

At 2.10 p.m., the Sensex traded 446 points higher at 17,436, while the Nifty index advanced 131 points higher at 5,280. The rupee surged over 1.6% and traded at 55.90 to the dollar.

All groups of stocks traded with large gains. ICICI Bank, ITC, Reliance Industries, L&T, and HDFC Bank were the top Sensex movers, adding over 200 index points to the BSE benchmark.

Oil and gas major Cairn India (-6%) and oil refiner BPCL (-0.85%) were the only stocks trading lower on the Nifty index. Cairn India shares fell after its erstwhile promoter Cairn Energy sold shares in the open market.

The market breadth was strong with over 87% stocks rising on the broader BSE 500 index.


With inputs from Associated Press

Britain's queen shakes hands with former IRA chief

Belfast: Britain's Queen Elizabeth shook the hand of former Irish Republican Army (IRA) commander Martin McGuinness for the first time on Wednesday, drawing a line under a conflict that cost the lives of thousands of soldiers and civilians, including that of her cousin.

The meeting with Mr McGuinness, who is now the deputy first minister of British-controlled Northern Ireland, comes 14 years after the IRA ended its war against Britain's claim to the province, and is one of the last big milestones in a peace process whose success has been studied around the world.

The queen met Mr McGuinness behind closed doors in a theatre in a leafy middle-class suburb of Belfast, which hundreds of police cordoned off ahead of the event.

There has been scattered opposition to the gesture of reconciliation from dissident Irish militants and from some of the IRA's victims. But the vast majority of the province's politicians back the meeting, the first between the queen and a top member of the IRA or its former political wing, Sinn Fein.

"Today is a huge event and it is, in a sense, the ultimate handshake," John Reid, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland from 2001 to 2002, told the BBC.

"On all sorts of levels this is a hugely significant step but it is only one more step in a long process. This may take generations - to get back to absolute reconciliation in Northern Ireland and the island of Ireland."

Mr McGuinness has long been reconciled with the fiery anti-Catholic Unionist leader Ian Paisley, who sat with him in a power-sharing provincial government.

The queen regularly meets senior Unionist politicians, Protestants who want Northern Ireland to stay inside the United Kingdom, but not Sinn Fein, the largest party representing Catholic nationalists who want a united Ireland.

HERO AND HATE-FIGURE

Mr McGuinness, deputy first minister of Northern Ireland's power-sharing government, is a hero to Republican hardliners, but has long been a hate figure to Unionists, many of whom harbour deep suspicions about his past.

He admits he was on the front line in the war with British forces, including on Bloody Sunday in 1972, when troops shot dead 13 unarmed protesters, but says he never killed anyone.

A British report said that Mr McGuinness probably was armed with a submachine gun on Bloody Sunday, but did nothing to provoke the massacre. He has said he left the IRA in 1974, but most historians believe he was active for most of its campaign.

For the queen, the Northern Ireland conflict has long had a personal edge. Her cousin Lord Mountbatten was killed by the IRA in 1979 with three others, including his 14-year-old grandson, when his boat was blown up while he was on holiday in Ireland.

More than 1,000 members of the British security forces were among 3,600 people killed during the 30 years of the "Troubles".

"I represent people that have been terribly hurt by British state violence over the course of many years," Mr McGuinness said in a video interview that Irish journalist Eamonn Mallie posted on his website on Tuesday.

"But I am also big enough to understand that Queen Elizabeth has also lost a loved one, and of course there are families in Britain. Mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers, children of people who were sent here as British soldiers who lost their lives also."

Sinn Fein, which has become increasingly popular south of the Irish border as the main party opposing an EU/IMF bailout, is keen to bolster its image as a mainstream party and distance itself from a violent past that alienates many southern voters.

REFERENDUM?

Sinn Fein still wants a referendum on whether Northern Ireland should remain part of Britain, where its members still refuse to take their parliamentary seats, but in the short term its aim is to be in government north and south simultaneously.

Just last year Sinn Fein rejected invitations to attend events during the queen's landmark visit to the Irish capital Dublin, the first by a British monarch since the republic won independence from Britain in 1921.

Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams acknowledged last week that Wednesday's meeting would cause difficulties among party supporters. Some branded Mr McGuinness a traitor for meeting a queen who is also commander-in-chief of Britain's armed forces.

"People are not unhappy that someone is shaking her hand, just not him. He's a hypocrite," said Martin, a 42-year-old unemployed man who said he and his friends had got criminal records defending their neighbourhood in working-class Belfast.

"He sent people out to fight. To die. And now he's putting on a suit and shaking her hand? I don't want war (but) this shouldn't have happened till the next generation."

However, the very fact that a visit by the queen was announced in advance, for the first time since the conflict began, shows the vast progress the province has made.

When the queen last visited for a jubilee celebration in 1977, she was forced to stay overnight on a ship at sea before flying to Belfast, parts of which were effectively controlled by the IRA.

With small splinter groups continuing to attack British targets, security forces say the risk of an attack is at its highest level since the Good Friday peace agreement was signed in 1998.

Nine police officers suffered minor injuries on Tuesday night when they were pelted with petrol bombs and other missiles.

Former Pak minister detained at US airport

Houston: Former Pakistani minister Shaikh Rashid, known for his pro-LeT leanings, was detained at Houston airport on arrival for his possible links with the terror group's founder Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind of the Mumbai attacks.

61-year-old Rashid, leader of the Awami Muslim League of Pakistan, was detained soon after he arrived by an Emirates flight on Wednesday evening and was freed after five hours of interrogation.

Sources said Rashid was detained for his possible links with Saeed.

Also Read

• Will pay Pak 10 mn for Hafiz Saeed, retorts India
• Indo-Pak talks: No headway in liberalised visa regime

Also See

• 

  4:55
  Zawahiri is in Pakistan, I cleared 10 million bounty for Hafiz: Hillary to NDTV
• 

  3:09
  Hafiz Saeed issue unlikely to be focus of talks with PM Manmohan Singh: Zardari

It is understood that he was scheduled to attend a fundraiser and meetings with his supporters in the US.

The US Department of Homeland Security was not immediately available for any comments.

According to Pakistan's Geo News channel, the former minister was released after Pakistan's Ambassador to the US, Sherry Rehman, asked the Pakistani consulate here to help him out.

Following her directives, Pakistan's Consul General in Houston, Aqil Nadeem, reached the airport to talk to the immigration authorities following which the former minister was allowed to leave the airport after five hours of interrogation, it said.

Rashid had in recent past actively attended the rallies and meetings organised by Defa-e Pakistan Council, an alliance of extremist and hardline groups formed by JuD chief Saeed.

He had accompanied Saeed to the rallies and press conferences where they both made statements against India and the US.

Rashid had served as the federal Minister for Railways in Pakistan from 2006 to 2008.

Maruti's Diwali gift: a new 800cc car

A Maruti Suzuki plant in Gurgaon. Photo: Reuters

Video

We Mean Business: Has RBI done a balancing act by keeping rates unchanged?

56:42

Maruti Suzuki India is gearing up to introduce by the end of this year a new 800cc car that is likely to be more fuel efficient, but also more expensive, than its existing best-selling model Alto.

According to sources close to the development, the company will start commercial production of the car at its Gurgaon facility from July or August and will launch it by Diwali.

RELATED STORIES

• Dealers offer plum discounts on petrol cars
• Expect uptrends in diesel car segment to continue: Maruti Suzuki
• Auto stocks fall on diesel duty concerns, M&M worst hit
• Maruti Suzuki to hire 1,900 employees this year
• Carmakers say planned diesel tax will hurt industry

"Although this will be an 800cc car, technologically it will be more advanced than the existing two 800cc models. It'll be more fuel efficient, and hence will also be more expensive than M800 and Alto," a source said.

It is understood that MSI has upgraded the existing engine and platform of the Alto instead of a complete overhaul in order to reduce development costs.

As per the company's official website, the prices of M800 varies between Rs 2.05 lakh and Rs 2.30 lakh, while that of Alto stands at Rs 2.40-3.43 lakh. A 1,000cc variant of the Alto is priced at Rs 3.14-3.31 lakh. All the prices are for ex-showroom, Delhi.

When contacted, a Maruti Suzuki India (MSI) spokesperson declined to comment "on any future model development".

Sources said the company has already done the test productions at various stages of development and is now gearing up to roll out the vehicle commercially.

"The commercial production of the car will start from July or August and it will be launched by Diwali. This will be produced at the Gurgaon facility," a source said.

The company has stopped selling M800 in specific cities where Bharat Stage IV emission norms are applicable as the car does not meet the stringent parameters.

Although MSI is still selling its first model in the country in other places, it has categorically ruled out upgrading it. The M800 will be naturally phased out once emission norms are upgraded in rest of the country.

The Alto is MSI's best-selling car so far. However, in recent times, the monthly sales have fallen to about 20,000 units, including Alto K10, from about 30,000 units earlier due to factors like high interest rates and rising petrol costs. Huge stock of petrol cars are lying at the dealers level now.

In fact, MSI had last month stopped production of petrol models, like the Alto, M800, A-Star, Estilo and Omni for three days to prevent inventory pile up.

The company is at present undergoing its week-long annual maintenance shutdown, which started from June 25.

According to SIAM data, the company's car production last month fell by 8.42 per cent to 87,220 units.

Car sales in India grew at the slowest pace in seven months during May with just 2.78 per cent rise as high interest rates and petrol prices hit the market.

TCS to report highest growth, Wipro slowest in June quarter

Corporate India will start reporting earnings for the June quarter in a fortnight. IT companies will be the first to report their performance over the first three months of this fiscal. The 12 per cent depreciation of the rupee against the dollar in the quarter is likely to benefit all IT companies.

Investment bank Barclays says Wipro and HCL Tech are likely to see margin expansion from a weaker rupee. For TCS and Infosys, the gains are likely to be limited. All four are likely to report some forex losses on outstanding hedging contracts though.

Wipro is likely to deliver the slowest sequential dollar revenue growth and TCS the fastest followed by HCL Tech.

Here's what to expect from India's biggest IT firms in the June quarter.


1) TCS: Highest growth among the top four

The company is likely to report quarterly revenue growth of 1.7 per cent (quarter-on-quarter) in dollar terms. This incorporates the negative cross currency impact of 1.5 percentage points; in constant currency terms growth is projected at 3.2%.

Margin expansion at TCS due to the currency appreciation is likely to be limited due to the salary increases and the quarterly variable payouts in the quarter. Overall loss due to currency fluctuation could be close to Rs 25 crore in the current quarter.

RELATED STORIES

• Nifty slips below 4,900 as IT stocks fall
• 10 reasons why IT stocks have fallen sharply
• Infosys Q4: Brokerages turn negative on IT sector
• Profit Top 10: Markets cheer TCS Q4 results; 2G auction deadline extended
• 5 expectations from Wipro March quarter earnings

2) Infosys: Currency impact should test guidance

It is likely to lower its FY13 revenue guidance (in dollar terms) to 6.5-8.5 per cent from 8-10 per cent. Infosys had guided for 0-1 per cent sequential top-line growth in constant currency terms for the June quarter, but might report only -0.5 per cent sequential growth due to the cross currency impact of 1.5 percentage points.

Margins are likely to show limited further upside from currency, in line with recent management commentary of investing back into the business.

However, weak rupee could boost earnings per share guidance for FY13 by 10-12 per cent. The company could report a net loss of $10 million on account of the rupee depreciation.


3) Wipro: Lowest sequential growth in the peer group

The company had guided to -1 per cent to +0.9 per cent sequential revenue growth for IT services in the June quarter, but is likely to show a 1.4% sequential decline because of cross currency impact. This includes the impact of cash flow hedges.

Wipro’s margin expansion due to currency is likely to be limited to 100 basis points; part of the gains from the rupee depreciation will be offset by cross currency impact and salary increases effected in April.

The company may guide for nearly 2 per cent sequential revenue growth.


4) HCL Tech: Benefiting from strong order backlog

The company’s performance in top-line growth is likely to remain strong. It may report 1.4 per cent (dollar terms) sequential revenue growth for the June quarter. Margins should expand by 70 basis points sequentially due to the weak rupee. The company could report a loss of nearly $10 million on account of forex losses.

Direct shaadi? Katrina stumps Salman in Ek Tha Tiger

 

If, like us, you've watched the just-released trailer of Ek Tha Tiger, you couldn't have failed to notice the witty repartee between real ex-flames and reel lovers Katrina Kaif and Salman Khan.

Especially this poser.

"Tumhari shaadi ho gayi?" (Are you married), asks Miss Kitty.

"Direct shaadi?", says the bemused Salman, "Yeh nahi poochoge ki girlfriend hai?" (Won't you ask me if I have a girlfriend)

Pat comes the answer. "Nahi. Ab tumhari umar shaadi ki ho gayi hai." (No, you are of an age to be married)

Nice one, Kat.

Revealed: Salman's fists of fury, Katrina's sex appeal in Ek Tha Tiger

And then there's the bit where Katrina introduces herself as Zoya, fondly known as Zee. Salman's sharp come back is to say he's called Doordarshan. She's not amused. Bad joke, she says. He's crestfallen.

Round one to Katrina.

Watch the trailer of Ek Tha Tiger here: