2 days ago
July 21, 1985, Forty Years Ago: Kanishka mystery
The Soviet Union denied reports that the Air India Kanishka had been brought down by a Soviet spacerocket. 'It seems that there are always people who like to put the tag Made in USSR on every red brick that might fall from an old balcony of a London or New York House on the head of a helpless passerby,' the TASS political commentator Sergei Kulik said in reference to a report by the London Daily Mail.
Flash floods
Flash floods and heavy rains have claimed 23 lives in Punjab, 16 of them in Jalandhar, and disrupted rail and road traffic in the state. In Bihar, the overall flood situation worsened in at least five districts. The situation in West Bengal was also grim, with the Ganga in full fury at Farakka and Manikghat in Malda district. However, it was yet to touch the danger mark.
AIML leaves LDF
The All India Muslim League (AIML) decided to sever its 11-year-old alliance with the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and walked out of the Left Democratic Front in Kerala. The decision taken by the working committee of the AIML and its state council was announced here by the AIML legislature party leader, P M Aboobacker. The LDF's strength in the state assembly has dropped to 60 from 64, with the four-member AIML group parting its ways with the Marxist-led front.
Punjab polls
While the Union agricultural minister, Buta Singh, hinted at holding elections in Punjab in the near future, the AICC (I) General Secretary Rajendra Kumar Bajpai told newsmen in Delhi that the party had not yet taken any decision in this regard. Elections in Punjab, she said, depended on the situation in the state.
