15 August, 2013

Narendra Modi to address British parliament

British MP Barry Gardiner has written to Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, inviting him to visit the House of Commons and speak on 'The Future of Modern India', a move that ends UK's decade-long boycott of Modi following the 2002 Gujarat riots.

Gardiner, who is also the chairman of Labour Friends of India, told TOI that he invited Modi because he is the chief minister of a state with which Britain has more FDI than the rest of the country put together.

IISc only Indian institution in top 500 global ranking

Bangalore-headquartered Indian Institute of Science (IISc) has once again made the country proud. It is the only Indian institute that has made it to the top 500 in the 2013 Academic Ranking of World Universities.IISc, which was ranked 45 in the world ranking for Chemistry last year, is on 43rd spot this time

President rejects last pending mercy plea, duo to hang

President Pranab Mukherjee has rejected the mercy petition of two death row convicts found guilty of raping and murdering an 18-year-old girl. With this, Mukherjee has rejected 11 mercy petitions awarding death penalty to 17 convicts -- the highest in the last 16 years. Shankar Dayal Sharma (1992-1997) had rejected 14 petitions during his five-year tenure while Mukherjee has completed 13 months in office.

Google and Microsoft in a bitter fight over YouTube app

The tussle between Google and Microsoft over the "official" YouTube app for Windows Phone turned nasty on Thursday. A few hours after Google banned its YouTube app, Microsoft hit out saying that "Google just doesn't want Windows Phone users to have the same experience as Android and Apple ( iOS) users."