North Korea has tried to shift the blame for the deadly attack in Malaysia on the estranged half-brother of its leader Kim Jong Un to the United States and South Korea.

North Korea's deputy UN ambassador, Kim In Ryong, told a news conference that "from A to Z, this case is the product of reckless moves of the United States and South Korean authorities," who he said are trying to tarnish the North's image and bringing down its social system.

Malaysian authorities say Kim Jong Nam died after two women smeared his face with the banned VX nerve agent at Kuala Lumpur's airport on February 13, but North Korea which is widely suspected to be behind the attack rejects the findings.

Ambassador Kim said the cause of Kim Jong Nam's death "has not yet been clearly identified, but the United States and the South Korean authorities are groundlessly blaming the DPRK," using the initials of the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

Malaysian authorities have identified the victim as Kim Jong Nam, though he was using a North Korean passport under the name Kim Chol. The ambassador, like other North Korean officials, referred to him only as Kim Chol and did not say he was Kim Jong Un's half brother.

He asked why the person who applied the VX agent, which is fatal if a tiny amount is inhaled, is still alive while the man it was applied to died.

The ambassador asserted that the US is one of the few countries that can manufacture VX and that it has stockpiled chemical weapons in South Korea, which could have provided the chemical agent for the attack on Kim Jong Nam.

"It is a final aim sought by the United States to store up the international repugnancy towards the DPRK," he said of the attack, with the intention of provoking a "nuclear war against DPRK at any cost." 

"So the US and South Korea were starting the political chicanery to bring down the social system in DPRK," the ambassador said.

He said the DPRK will respond by continuing to bolster its defenses "and the capability for the pre-emptive strike with a nuclear force." 

The North Korean envoy held a press conference at UN headquarters in New York after the DPRK boycotted a meeting of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, which was addressed by its special investigator on human rights in the reclusive northeast Asian nation.

Tomas Ojea Quintana told the council that tensions caused by North Korea's ballistic missile and nuclear tests are jeopardizing efforts to improve human rights in the secretive country.

A palpable warmth between the JD-U headed by chief minister Nitish Kumar and the BJP in the aftermath of elections to five states where the saffron party emerged as the “giant killer” has led to fresh tension in the ruling alliance.

Even as both RJD and the Congress are shocked after poor show of the secular groups in the elections, the JD-U has been caught mixing with the celebrating BJP people. Especially, the RJD camp led by Lalu Prasad is distressed at the way the chief minister congratulated the BJP for its spectacular victory in UP and Uttarakand and then his party leaders joined the BJP leaders to celebrate Holi this time even as the RJD chief himself didn’t join the colour celebration.

The prevailing tension took a new turn when the Union minister of state for rural development Ram Kripal Yadav visited the residence of former JD-U minister Shyam Rajak and party’s chief spokesperson Sanjay Singh on Monday and celebrated Holi together. The RJD was quick to warn JD-U, its alliance partner, for its “teasing” act saying none should take the party for granted.

“We are aware about the “khichadi” cooking between them and are keeping a close watch on who are meeting whom. None should take the RJD for granted. The RJD with 80 legislators is the single largest party in the Bihar assembly and none should think it as weak,” warmed senior RJD legislator Bhai Birendra, considered close to the RJD president.

He said the Bihar mandate is such that the RJD had the compulsion to stay together with the JD-U. “Laluji is quite aware of the ongoing development and will be deciding on the future course of action soon,” said Mr Birendra.

The RJD is also aggrieved at the way the chief minister remained “neutral” during the UP elections and didn’t campaign for the SP-Congress alliance despite his party being part of the secular alliance in Bihar. But, what hurt the RJD the most was his move to congratulate the BJP through the social networking site, Twiter.

“Congratulations to the BJP for such a spectacular victory in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. So far as the result of UP elections is concerned, the backward class people hugely supported the BJP while the non-BJP parties didn’t make efforts to bring with them. Also, no grand alliance took shape in UP on the pattern of Bihar. Further, they didn’t require to oppose the demonetisation drive so strongly since it had brought a sense of satisfaction on the poor who thought the move had harmed only the rich. But many parties ignored this point,” Bihar chief minister tweeted, soon after the results came in.

Experts say the tweet came as rubbing salts to the wounds of both RJD-Congress and indirectly intended to hit them from the front. The JD-U was peeved at the way it was kept out of the alliance formed to take on BJP in the UP polls, eventually forcing it to opt out of the contest midway through the polls. Very soon, the JD-U leadership sacked its UP unit chief after he was caught campaigning in favour of the Samajwadi Party (SP).

“Nitish Kumar didn’t fulfill the coalition dharma by openly supporting the demonetization drive. It looked like the match was fixed between Nitish and the BJP. Much before the elections were announced, Nitish held many rallies in UP but suddenly withdrew from the contest when the poll dates were announced. Nitish didn’t speak a word against the BJP. He never showed that he was with the grand alliance,” alleged RJD vice-president Raghuvansh Prasad Singh.

In a curious twist to the overall drama, the BJP has accused the RJD of humiliating the chief minister. “The way he is undergoing political torture at the hands of the RJD, it looks like Nitish Kumar will not be able to face it for too long,” remarked former BJP president Mangal Pandey, indicating another bout of bon homie between the Bihar CM and the BJP.

The Bihar chief minister has gone out of the way supporting the surgical strike and demonetization drive of the Narendra Modi government at the centre even as both his alliance partners, Congress and the RJD, have been strongly opposing it on the street. Further, Mr Kumar has also been caught sharing cool moments with his arch-rival, Mr Modi more than once in recent days.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to stay the swearing-in of Manohar Parrikar as Goa chief minister but ordered conducting of the floor test on 16 March.

The Congress party had approached the apex court to stay the ceremony but it declined to interfere with the Goa Governor's decision to appoint Manohar Parrikar as chief minister saying the Bharatiya Janata Party has shown the support of 21 out of the 40 newly elected MLAs.

A bench of Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar, and Justices Ranjan Gogoi and R K Agrawal directed the floor-test to determine the majority support, and said that all the formalities prerequisite to the floor test, including by the Election Commission, would be completed by 15 March.

In a special sitting as the apex court was on a Holi vacation, the bench requested Goa Governor Mridula Sinha to summon the House for the floor test for which the session will commence at 11 a m on 16 Marchand no other business other than holding the floor test will be conducted after the swearing-in of the members which will be completed as soon as possible.

The court direction came on a plea by leader of the Congress legislature party in the state assembly Chandrakant Kavlekar who sought stay of Governor Mridula Sinha's decision appointing Parrikar as chief minister. The court also rejected the plea by senior counsel Abhishek Manu Singhvi for a composite floor test.

It also directed putting in place the senior most member in the Assembly as the protem speaker.

During the hearing, the bench pulled up the Congress party for not raising the issue of number of MLAs supporting it before the Governor and also rushing to the apex court without the affidavits of the elected members of the regional parties and independents that they are supporting the Congress which emerged as the single largest party in the 40-member House.

It was also furious that the Congress has not impleaded Parrikar as a party in the petition despite knowing what was happening for the last two days.

The Delhi High Court on Tuesday expressed concern over the alleged suicide of a law student of Amity University last August, saying it appears that there was a communication gap between the boy and people close to him.

A bench of justices G S Sistani and Vinod Goel said that it can't be "believed that a 20-year-old boy ends his precious life, just because he was allegedly not allowed to sit for his next semester exam, due to shortfall of attendance".

"Young life was lost. A person will not commit suicide only because he was not allowed to go to next semester. This can't be the only reason. It seems that there was some gap in communication between the young boy, parents and the college authorities," the bench observed.

It also said, "even if we all believe that attendance was the reason, we could have saved his life, by better communication from all of us".

"Were the parents aware of the reason behind such a harsh step? What did the suicide note speak about," the court asked the counsel for the college and also the boy's parents inside the court room.

Sushant Rohilla, a third year law student hanged himself at his home in Delhi on August 10, 2016 after the university allegedly barred him from sitting for semester exams because he did not have the requisite attendance. Sushant left behind a note saying he was a failure and did not wish to live.

The Supreme Court on September 5, 2016 had taken suo motu cognisance of a letter written by a friend of the deceased student, saying it would examine whether there was an "element of suspicion" that the incident took place due to "harassment".

However, on March 6, the apex court transferred the matter to the Delhi High Court, to decide it on merit.

Acting on the apex court's direction, the high court today took up the matter for hearing and issued notice to the Indraprastha University, to which the college is affiliated, saying it is a necessary party.

India A and U-19 coach Rahul Dravid will not be in charge of the U-23 squad that will be taking part in the Asian Cricket Council's Emerging Trophy scheduled to be held in Bangladesh from March 25 to April 5.

While Dravid has been the coach of all junior national teams but BCCI has decided that it will allow the former India captain to join his franchise Delhi Daredevils, who will start with their IPL camp in capital tentatively on March 28.

Technically, Dravid is well within his rights to join his IPL franchise as all Indian support staff's contracts end on March 31 while the Emerging Trophy will end on April 5.

April and May are the two months when any support staff — be it coach, physio or trainer are free to offer their professional expertise to other sporting entities or to be precise IPL franchises.

The IPL starts on April 5 and BCCI has exempted all IPL players from the Emerging Cup.

The ACC tournament has provision to include four senior international players for the Test playing nation but with IPL round the corner, BCCI could not have released the top two rungs of India players, all of whom have IPL contracts.

According to well-placed sources in the BCCI, in all likelihood the National Cricket Academy coaches, WV Raman OR Narendra Hirwani will be in-charge of the team during the 10-day limited overs tournament.

"The Emerging team falls under NCA purview. Dravid is unlikely to go for this Dhaka meet. We have our NCA coaches and from among them we will select the coach for the India U-23 team," a senior BCCI official told PTI on conditions of anonymity.

Only those domestic performers with no IPL contracts have been selected for the tourney. The likes of Prithvi Shaw, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Mayank Dagar are considered to be the Gen-Next of Indian cricket.

Baba Aparajith will be leading the side despite a modest domestic season so far while brother Indrajith, who missed the bus despite 600 plus runs in the longer version.

The tournament features most of the players who have done well during the group league stage of the Vijay Hazare Trophy.

The likes of Rishabh Pant and Ishan Kishan have not been chosen for the tournament simply because they would all be with their respective IPL sides in the pre-tournament camps.

The last time when Emerging Trophy was held, India won the tournament with Surya Kumar Yadav being the captain of the side.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Tuesday promised continuity in policy as he assumed additional charge of the Defence Ministry after Manohar Parrikar's return to Goa as Chief Minister.

Jaitley, who held the additional charge of Defence Ministry from May to November 2014, was again entrusted with the responsibility as Parrikar stepped down on Sunday.

"Defence Ministry has a distinct responsibility regarding country's security and armed forces, procurement for security equipment for the country. Today, I have taken a reporting of the situation," he said.

He said he will take forward the work from where Parrikar had left.

"We have a continuous government and I will take it up from where Parrikar has left it," he told reporters here.

Parrikar's tenure as Defence Minister saw clearance of a raft of arms deals besides simplification of the acquisition process. He had also pushed for a number of stalled acquisition projects.

A Rashtrapati Bhawan communique had yesterday said that as advised by the Prime Minister, the President has directed that Jaitley shall be assigned the charge of the Defence Ministry in addition to his existing portfolios.

It is not clear for how long Jaitley will keep the two key portfolios.

The deals finalised during Parrikar's tenure included purchase of 21 Apache attack helicopters and 15 Chinook heavy-lift choppers from American aviation giant Boeing and the US government.

Last year, the Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) headed by Parrikar had approved the much delayed purchase of 145 Ultra Light Howitzers worth about Rs 5,000 crore from the US and also bulk production of 18 Dhanush artillery guns, the first acquisition of such a weapon system by the army in three decades since the Bofors scandal.

In March last year, Parrikar had come out with a new defence procurement policy to ensure transparency in defence deals, fast-track the acquisition process and indigenisation of defence procurement.

In September last year, India had inked a Euro 7.87 billion (approx Rs 59,000 crore) deal with France for purchasing 36 Rafale fighter jets capable of carrying nuclear weapons and equipped with latest missiles.

It was under Parrikar, known for taking a hard line on the issue of countering cross-border terrorism, that the army had launched the surgical strike in PoK in September last year.

On Sunday, the Goa BJP had passed a resolution requesting the central leadership to make Parrikar the Chief Minister. BJP's prospective allies had also made Parrikar's return a pre-condition for their support.

Parrikar, an IIT (Bombay) alumni, had said some time ago he had still not "settled" in the national capital as he can never be a "Delhi politician", indicating his fondness for Goa. Today, he was sworn-in as the Chief Minister of Goa for the fourth time.

Japanese authorities sent a robot to the Fukushima nuclear plant on Tuesday to measure radiation levels inside and evaluate its condition ahead of a future dismantling of a reactor.

The self-propelled, remotely-operated robot is equipped with a video camera, thermometer as well as dosimeter — to measure radiation — among other sensors, said the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the maker of the bot, in a statement.

Using the recorded data and footage, experts will try to ascertain the presence of melted fuel that could have leaked from the reactor core and accumulated at the bottom of the containment vessel, something they have been unable to verify so far, Efe news reported.

Determining the exact conditions inside the reactor is a necessary step for drafting a plan on the future recovery of the nuclear fuel; a task that has been made difficult by fatal radiation levels at the heart of the nuclear installations.

TEPCO had introduced two bots into the reactor earlier but while the first one could not make it out of the reactor, the second one became inoperative due to extreme radiation.

Another robot that TEPCO sent was also damaged by radiation, but managed to record footage that supplied important information on conditions inside, said the company.

Reactors No. 1, 2 and 3 had suffered partial meltdowns due to an earthquake and a tsunami that hit Japan in March 2011.

The Fukushima nuclear accident is considered the world's worst since Ukraine's Chernobyl disaster in 1986. 

Pakistani singer Rahat Fateh Ali Khan has crooned a track for Raveena Tandon starrer Maatr-The Mother. Its producer says the song was recorded before bilateral tensions between India and Pakistan surfaced last year.

"Rahat Fateh Ali Khan had recorded the song 'Zindagi ae zindagi'. It's an emotional track mapping Raveena's journey as a mother for the film. We have decided to retain the song as it was recorded before the India, Pakistan tension began," producer Anjum Rizvi said in a statement.

After the September 2016 Uri attack, there has been tension between both countries. A few Indian outfits even imposed a ban on Pakistani artistes working in this country.

Just last week, there was also news that filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt had approached Pakistani singer Shafqat Amanat Ali to sing for his upcoming play "Milne Do", which will be staged in Delhi in June. And now the update on Rahat's song in an Indian film could give relief to those who believe art and culture should be kept out of politics.

Maatr – The Mother director Ashtar Sayed, who finds Rahat's voice mesmerising, said: "The film originally didn't have any music, but when we started editing the movie, we felt the need for it. So we got some beautiful songs and lyrics for our film.

"The music has been given by a Pakistani Sufi rock band Fuzön. They had composed one beautiful song, which is sung by Rahat Fateh Ali Khan."

In an earlier interview, Rahat had said he always wants to maintain the "bridge of love" between India and Pakistan.

Maatr – The Mother is a movie which delves on justice for women who have been victims of violence and rape. It also features actor Madhur Mittal.

Written by Michael Pellico, the film is being produced under the banners CDB Musical in association with Anjum Rizvi Film Co, Manoj Adhikari Production and Pugmark Films Pvt Ltd. It will release on April 21.

The Congress' Maharashtra unit on Tuesday said it would join hands with the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) to demand a complete waiver of loans of debt-hit farmers in the state.

"Leaders of both the parties will meet tomorrow (Wednesday) morning to chart out a strategy to intensify our stand on the issue and ensure that the state government writes off the farm loans," Leader of Opposition in the state assembly Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil said.

The opposition action comes after ruling Shiv Sena's President Uddhav Thackeray on Monday directed all party legislators to disrupt the ongoing Budget Session of the state legislature till farm loans are written off.

Vikhe-Patil said that till date, all claims by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party-Shiv Sena government at arresting farmers suicides and related issues have proved fake.

"Since the past two-and-half years, the farmers suicides have not reduced and it will not stop till the government immediately announces a complete write-off of farm debts," Vikhe-Patil said.

During these two-and-half years Maharashtra has recorded around 9,000 farmland suicides and it was imperative to announce a loan-waiver without further delay if these deaths are to be stopped, he urged.

The Congress leader said Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has been assuring since a year that loan-waiver would be announced at the appropriate time, but that has not come and suicides continue unabated.

Rapid loss of Arctic sea ice in recent decades is partly driven by natural swings, not just global warming triggered by human activities, says a study.

A shift in wind patterns is responsible for about 60 per cent of sea ice loss in the Arctic Ocean since 1979, the researchers found. 

Some of this shift is related to climate change, but the study showed that 30-50 per cent of the observed sea ice loss since 1979 is due to natural variations in this large-scale atmospheric pattern.

"Anthropogenic forcing is still dominant — it's still the key player," said the study's lead author Qinghua Ding, climate scientist at the University of California at Santa Barbara in the US.

"But we found that natural variability has helped to accelerate this melting, especially over the past 20 years," Ding said.

The paper builds on previous work that found changes in the tropical Pacific Ocean have in recent decades created a "hot spot" over Greenland and the Canadian Arctic that has boosted warming in that region.

The hot spot is a large region of higher pressure where air is squeezed together so it becomes warmer and can hold more moisture, both of which bring more heat to the sea ice below. 

The new paper, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, focuses specifically on what this atmospheric circulation means for Arctic sea ice in September, when the ocean reaches its maximum area of open water.

"This study provides the mechanism and uses a new approach to illuminate the processes that are responsible for these changes," the study's second author Axel Schweiger, a University of Washington polar scientist who tracks Arctic sea ice, said. 

"The method is really innovative, and it nails down how much of the observed sea ice trend we've seen in recent decades in the Arctic is due to natural variability and how much is due to greenhouse gases," co-author David Battisti, Professor at University of Washington, noted.

The researchers believe that teasing apart the natural and human-caused parts of sea ice decline would help to predict future sea ice conditions in Arctic summer.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Tuesday said that forcible conversion and destruction of worship places of other religions is a crime in Islam and in Pakistan as he greeted the Hindu community on the occasion of Holi.

Addressing a function to celebrate Holi with Hindus here, he insisted that it was not anyone's job to decide who will go to hell or heaven, but to make Pakistan a heaven on earth.

In his inclusive message to minorities in Pakistan, the prime minister said "no one can force others to adopt a certain religion".

"Islam gives importance to every human being regardless of his caste, creed or religion and I say it clearly that forcing anyone to convert his religion is a crime and it is our duty to protect the worship places of the minorities in Pakistan," Sharif told the gathering.

Leading members of the Hindu community and minority lawmakers attended the function where the prime minister insisted that in Pakistan the fight was between terrorists and those who wanted to see the country progress and develop into an Asian tiger.

"There is no fight in Pakistan over religion. If there is any fight it is with these terrorists and miscreants who use religion to mislead people and kill innocent people and don t want to see this country develop or prosper," he said.

Sharif admitted that in the past some miscreants had attempted to create divisions on the basis of religion but insisted that Pakistan was created where everyone was free to practice his religion and go to his worship place.

"Pakistan didn't come into existence to be against any religion. It is wrong to consider any religion inferior. I want to see a Pakistan where there are equal opportunities for every person of any religion to progress and make a good life for himself and his family. And there is peace and protection for everyone," the prime minister said.

The Hindu community has constantly complained about their people in the rural areas being forced to convert to Islam and their women being kidnapped and forcibly converted.

The premier noted that since 2013 the law and order situation had improved in Karachi and other parts of Sindh and there had been a marked decrease in cases of Hindu traders and businessmen being kidnapped for ransom.

"Pakistan has the best future in Asia but for that we need to ensure every citizen is given equal opportunities and equal rights no matter what is his religion or belief." 

The Hindu community celebrated the Holi festival with fervor and enthusiasm in Karachi with functions held all over the city and Sharif said he was happy to see the celebrations in every nook and corner of Karachi without any hinderance.

Sharif greeted the gathering with 'Happy Holi'. He also referred to L K Advani when someone mentioned his love for the famous Hindi song 'Baharo phool barsao', saying a decade ago he (Sharif) could sing this song as melodiously as Mohammad Rafi.

He also said that Health cards should be started in Sindh and announced 500 million rupees for the welfare of the Hindu community.

Vistara on Tuesday said it has signed codeshare agreements with Singapore Airlines and SilkAir, which is a regional subsidiary of the flag carrier of the city-state.

Under the agreement, SIA will add its 'SQ' code to Vistara flights beyond Mumbai and New Delhi to 10 destinations, while SilkAir will add its 'MI' designator code to Vistara-operated flights beyond Bengaluru and Kolkata to six destinations. The Tata-SIA joint venture Vistara operates only domestic flights currently.

As a result of the agreement, four new destinations will be added to the SIA Group's India network ~ Bhubaneswar, Goa, Guwahati and Port Blair. SIA Group airlines currently serves 15 cities in the country from Singapore.

"We are very pleased with our first codeshare agreement with Vistara, which represents a strengthening of our already strong partnership," said SIA senior vice- president for marketing & planning Tan Kai Ping.

For the two-year-old airline, this is the first codeshare partnership. "As we continuously work towards eventually becoming a globally renowned airline, codeshare partnerships will play a very important role in helping us get closer to realising that aspiration," its chief executive Phee Teik Yeoh said.

Researchers have found evidence of a white dwarf star orbiting a likely black hole at a distance of only 961,000 km — just about 2.5 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon.

In a tightest orbital dance ever witnessed for a black hole and a companion star, the star whips around the black hole at an astonishing speed — about two orbits an hour, said the study published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

"This white dwarf is so close to the black hole that material is being pulled away from the star and dumped onto a disk of matter around the black hole before falling in," said study lead author Arash Bahramian, affiliated with the University of Alberta in Canada and Michigan State University in the US. 

"Luckily for this star, we don't think it will follow this path into oblivion, but instead will stay in orbit," Bahramian said.

Although the white dwarf does not appear to be in danger of falling in or being torn apart by the black hole, its fate is uncertain.

The stellar system, known as X9, is located in the globular cluster 47 Tucanae, a dense cluster of stars in our galaxy about 14,800 light years away from the Earth. 

"For a long time astronomers thought that black holes were rare or totally absent in globular star clusters," study co-author Jay Strader from Michigan State University said. 

"This discovery is additional evidence that, rather than being one of the worst places to look for black holes, globular clusters might be one of the best," Strader added.

For the study, the researchers used data from the Australia Telescope Compact Array as well as NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and NuSTAR telescope.

The airbase station here, which had witnessed a terror attack in 2016, was put on high alert on Tuesday and a massive search operation was initiated in the area following intelligence input about presence of suspicious men.

The joint operation of Punjab Police, the Army, the Air Force and the Himachal Pradesh Police was launched following the intelligence input, Pathankot SSP Nilambari Vijayjagdale said.

Without divulging much information, she said the search operation is part of precautionary measures and more than 500 security personnel are engaged in it.

The SSP said the operation is being carried out in villages and other areas located near the airbase station and air surveillance is also being conducted using helicopters.

Besides patrolling by security personnel, Quick Response Teams have also been deployed to check any suspicious activity, police said.

In 2016, terrorists had sneaked in from across the border and attacked the air base on the intervening night of January 1-2 while Dinanagar in Gurdaspur was targeted on July 27 in 2015.

The Pathankot attack had claimed the lives of seven security personnel while four terrorists were killed.

In the Dinanagar attack, three heavily-armed terrorists wearing army fatigues had stormed a police station, killing seven persons, including a Superintendent of Police, before they were gunned down during a day-long operation.

 The JNU Students Union (JNUSU) castigated the varsity Vice Chancellor (VC) on Tuesday for not meeting the parents of a student who committed suicide, but rather conveying his condolences on social media.

"It's been hours a Dalit student of our university found dead and we are shocked and appalled by the insensitivity shown by the university authorities ever since," JNUSU Vice President Amal Pullarkat said through a Facebook post. 

"Leave alone consoling the family and helping them to go through the procedure, the university authorities haven't even bothered to pay a visit to the hospital where the body of the deceased is lying since last night (Monday)," he added. 

Earlier in the day, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) VC M Jagadesh Kumar had taken to micro-blogging site Twitter to express his grief at the death of Krish Rajini whose real name was Muthukrishnan J, an M.Phil History student of the varsity, who had apparently committed suicide on March 13 and who was found hanging from the ceiling fan in his friend's house. 

"JNU community is grief stricken at untimely and sad demise of Shri Muthukrishnan J. We pray that God be with his family at this critical time," Kumar had tweeted. 

The Union continued its attack saying that the VC did not "even care to send at least a security person with the body (of the deceased)" initially, and a security person could be arranged for only after the former's intervention.

It urged the students to boycott their classes and join in a collective condolence meet and also demanded that the VC go to the hospital and meet Rajini's parents.

"It (is) also quite shocking that university did not even bother to suspend the classes despite such an incident… We appeal to all students to come out of their classes in protest and pay tribute to our friend. Mr. VC, stop tweeting and come to the hospital immediately and listen to the parents' demand," Pullarkat added.

Elections to the three municipal corporations in the national capital will be held on April 22, the Delhi State Election Commission said on Tuesday.

The announcement was made by State Election Commissioner S K Srivastava at a press conference here putting to rest months of speculation on the schedule of the polls, in which the BJP, the Congress and the AAP, are betting big.

"The polls to the three municipal corporations of Delhi will be held on April 22 and counting will take place on April 25," he said.

Informing that the nomination process will begin from March 27 and April 3 would be the last date for filing nominations, Srivastava said, "Scrutiny of nominations will take place on April 5 and the last date for withdrawal of nomination is April 8."

The commissioner also said the expenditure limit for a candidate has been hiked from Rs .5 lakh to Rs.5.75 lakh.

Incidentally, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has expressed reservations about electronic voting machines (EVMs) and sought the use of ballot papers in the civic polls.

Asked to respond to Kejriwal seeking the use of traditional mode of exercising franchise, Srivastava said, "Voting through EVMs is very safe. And, if the polls are to be held through ballot then some of the rules have to be amended."

"We started the preparations for the polls keeping in mind use of EVMs only. The dates have been assigned accordingly," the the State Election Commissioner said.

Kejriwal had earlier directed the chief secretary to ask the state election office for holding MCD elections through ballot papers.

"We have sent our comments to the government on this," Srivastava said.

The erstwhile unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi was trifurcated in 2012 into North, South and East Municipal Corporation or NDMC, SDMC and EDMC respectively.

The BJP has been ruling the MCD since 2007. The last polls were held in 2012.

The much-awaited polls will decide the fate of 272 councillors. While NDMC and SMDC have 104 seats each, EDMC has 64 seats.

The total number of electorate for the civic polls stands at 1,32,10,206, which include 73,15,915 men, 58,93,418 women and 793 voters in the other category, the state election commission said.

Indian golf star Anirban Lahiri wants to qualify again for the Masters Tournament next month and the International Team which faces the United States in the Presidents Cup later this season.

Currently ranked 77th in the world, the 2015 Asian Tour champion said his Masters hopes will hinge on this week's Arnold Palmer Invitational, beginning on March 16.

The qualifying for the Masters, to be held from April 6-9, will be open till the Shell Houston championship. The meet at Houston is the last counting tournament for players to break into the world's top-50 ranking and earn their ticket to the Masters.

But Lahiri, setting himself a challenging target of qualifying for the Masters with a good show at Arnold Palmer Invitational, has decided to skip the Houston meet.

"I've got one more week to try to qualify for the Masters. I've made up my mind up that I won't be playing Houston just because I've been a pro for 10 years now and in the entire duration, there's always something to chase," an Asian Tour release said on Tuesday.

"When you start as a rookie, you try to chase your card, and when you are a regular, you're trying to chase your first win, and then the Order of Merit. There's always something to chase. I've got to a point where I'm trying to play my best golf. 

"If that means I have to hold myself back from chasing things down, I will do that. I believe I am good enough to get into these events as long as I can play to my potential."

The Masters Tournament is an event in which Lahiri believes he can do well, especially after finishing tied 49th and equal 42nd in the past two editions.

Another event which the seven-time winner on the Asian Tour has his eyes on is the Presidents Cup, in which he made his debut in South Korea two years ago. Then he lost a vital singles match to American Chris Kirk, as the US won the Cup by a single point, 15.5 to 14.5.

"That's something I want to play," said the Florida-based Lahiri, who is ranked 20th on the International team standing, with the top-10 qualifying automatically by September 4.

"Without a doubt, I have unfinished business. I am so psyched on getting back onto that team, I'm motivated. I have to approach it as a by-product and not as a target. It has to be a by-product of me playing well. I need to spend my energy on getting myself better instead of chasing something."

After missing the cut in his first tournament of the year in Hawaii early this, Lahiri has pieced together a nice run of form, with two top-10s and three top-25s around the world.