Men and women from mofussil India are buying designerwear either on their laptops or their cellphones.
Cashi Crisis: Day 9: Aaj ki Taaza Khabar!
I-T lens on current account deposits over Rs 12.5 lakh. All the news and more post demonetisation.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday arrived in Beijing along with her family to attend the Olympics opening ceremony. Sonia, 61, is accompanied by her MP son Rahul, daughter Priyanka, son-in-law Robert Vadra and two grandchildren.
At the secret talks in Beijing last week, China had demanded that the Buddhist leader take "concrete steps" to curb "terrorist" activities of Tibetan Youth Congress based in India and not to support "plots to fan" violent activities and not to support any argument and activity to seek "Tibetan independence".
Pressing the international community to speak up for the Tibetan people at this "critical" stage, the Dalai Lama on Wednesday prodded China for progress in the ongoing talks over the grim Tibet situation as the two sides met in Beijing for the second day of the secretive parleys.
China on Tuesday hoped that the "contact and dialogue" with envoys of the Dalai Lama could make "positive progress" as the start of the fence-mending talks between the two sides in Beijing remained shrouded in secrecy. The Tibetan government in exile said at Dharamsala on Monday that its envoys had reached Beijing to hold the second round of talks for two days from Tuesday, but there was no official word yet from China either on the venue or schedule.
The delegation, a virtual mini-India with sprinkling of youngsters from every part of the country, comprises 'distinguished young persons' under diverse categories, including Chinese language and studies, National Service Scheme, academics, panchayati raj, media, culture and sports. He said that possibility of exchange of young entrepreneurs and civil society volunteers between the two sides was also being explored.
The Olympic torch made its way through the Tibetan capital Lhasa amidst tight security on Saturday, three months after the deadly riots hit the remote Himalayan region during anti-China protests spearheaded by monks.The 9.3 km relay kick-started from Norbulingka, known as the Summer Palace of the Dalai Lama, with 156 torch bearers, including 75 Tibetans, and wound its way through the streets in Lhasa as the security personnel kept a close vigil.
Jet Airways is in talks with Chinese carriers for code-sharing deals to other destinations after it became the first Indian private air carrier to operate a service to China by launching its Mumbai-Shanghai-San Francisco flight. The flight connecting the economic hubs of India and China was formally launched in Shanghai on Monday.
The minister handed over to Sichuan Province Vice Governor Huang Xiaoxiang the supplies brought by an Indian Air Force aircraft to Chengdu as part of the $5 million aid announced by India. Huang said the provincial government and the people were grateful to India for offering help during difficult times, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
"An open and inclusive architecture, which is flexible enough to accommodate the great diversity that exists in Asia, is needed," External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee told students and scholars at the prestigious Peking University in Beijing. "We cannot transplant ideas from other parts of the world," Mukherjee said a day after holding wide-ranging talks with his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi.
India and China are understood to have discussed the latest row over Sikkim on Thursday, during talks between their Foreign Ministers, dominated by the festering boundary issue, with the two sides agreeing to use existing mechanisms whenever necessary to maintain peace and tranquility along the border.External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, who is on a four-day official visit to China, met his counterpart Yang Jiechi and discussed issues of mutual concern.
The number of dead and missing in China's worst earthquake in recent decades is nearing 90,000, as visiting United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon flew into the disaster zone on Saturday and pledged the world body's support for the relief work. Chinese premier Wen Jiabao briefed the UN Secretary General on quake relief efforts and said China would carry out reconstruction as soon as possible. Wen told Ban that the quake had claimed more than 60,000 lives in Sichuan province.
Russia and China on Friday signed a US$ one billion deal under which Moscow would build a nuclear fuel enrichment plant and deliver uranium to Beijing as the two strategic partners condemned the United States for its proposed missile defence plans.
The death toll in the devastating earthquake in southwest China on Friday crossed 55,000 with nearly 25,000 people still missing, as Beijing, struggling to provide shelter to lakhs of survivors, braced for a new threat from the swelling 'quake lakes' in the already battered region. 'Quake lakes', which were formed after landslides and mudflows blocked rivers, continued to pose a threat to several villages in the temblor-battered areas.
Beijing's words of appreciation were conveyed to India's Ambassador Nirupama Rao by Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi during her visit to the Foreign Office to write in the condolence book opened for foreign diplomats on Monday as the country began a three-day national mourning in memory of the earthquake victims.
An IAF IL-76 plane carried the first consignment of tents, cutting machines, blankets, water purifiers, generators and other relief material to Chengdu, capital of worst-hit Sichuan Province on Saturday afternoon. The 36-tonne consignment, part of the $5 million humanitarian assistance pledged by India, was transfered to the affected areas immediately after its arrival, the Indian Embassy said in Beijing.
At least 500 bodies have been pulled out after the emergency workers reached Wenchuan county, the epicentre of the 7.8 magnitude quake that struck on Monday. The report from the official Xinhua News Agency did not say if the 7,700 believed dead in Yingxiu town of Wenchuan county were in addition to an already reported death toll of more than 12,000.
Thousands of Chinese troops and medical teams have been dispatched to the worst-affected Sichuan province. The Sichuan provincial seismological bureau said more than 1,180 aftershocks up to magnitude six on the Richter scale have been recorded as of 5 am (local time) on Tuesday.
The People's Daily, the mouthpiece of the ruling Communist Party of China, said the key word of 'various definitions put forward by the Dalai Lama clique, including the so-called 'middle-way' and 'high autonomy', is nothing but 'Tibetan independence'.
India and China on Tuesday expressed satisfaction over the steady development of bilateral ties, with New Delhi insisting that there was no stalemate on the boundary issue and a solution cannot be found overnight. Menon, who is in Beijing to attend the G-5 meeting of India, China, Mexico, South Africa and Brazil ahead of the G-8 summit of rich nations in Japan in July, said he discussed with them "what we can do and what we have been doing on bilateral relationship."
Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon arrived in Beijing on Sunday to attend a meeting of G-8 'outreach countries', becoming the first top Indian diplomat to visit China since the outbreak of the Tibet unrest. The G-5 meeting in Bejing is a multilateral consultation exercise on economic and trade issues and climate change, among others, that major developing nations wish to take up with G-8. Menon is expected to meet Chinese officials and discuss the of bilateral issues.
"China expresses its thanks for the warm support and participation of the Indian people and the great efforts by the Indian side," the Foreign Ministry spokesperson's office told PTI. Beijing was anxious about the smooth passage of the relay in India, home to an estimated population of 150,000 Tibetans living in exile, who have been staging repeated protests to draw global attention to alleged repression in Tibet.
Describing Kashmir and Palestinian issues as old disputes, Musharraf told teachers and students at the elite Tsinghua University in Beijing that as far as Pakistan was concerned, "we are going on a bilateral approach with India"."We hope that good sense prevails on both sides to resolve this long standing dispute amicably between our two countries for the benefit of people of these two countries," Musharraf, who is on a six-day visit to China, said.
Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi spoke over the phone to his Indian counterpart Pranab Mukherjee and exchanged views on bilateral relations, explaining Beijing's principled stand on the Dalai Lama issue. Mukherjee said the Tibet Autonomous Region is part of China's territory and India will never tolerate any political anti-China activities by Tibetans on the Indian territory. The conversation comes after China's State Councilor Dai Bingguo's telephonic talk with the NSA.
Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo spoke to India's National Security Adviser M K Narayanan over phone and briefed him on the 'violent crimes' in Lhasa and 'expounded' China's stance on and concerns over the Tibet issue. Narayanan stated that Tibet was part of the Chinese territory and that India does not allow Tibetans to conduct 'anti-China political activities' in the country, official Xinhua news agency said.
A police officer was killed in fresh violence in Sichuan province near Tibet, China said on Tuesday as it struggled to quell the fortnight-long pro-independence protests. Armed with knives and stones, a mob attacked the police officers in Garze prefecture on Monday, killing one of them on the spot and injuring several others, a local official said. China's Minister for Public Security Meng Jianzhu, during his Lhasa visit, vowed stricter management of Buddhist monasteries.
Concerned over the state of the world economy and depreciation of the US dollar, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Tuesday said 2008 would be the "most difficult" for the country's economy as it faced the potential risk of economic fluctuations.
Describing the Sino-Indian border row as a "complex issue", Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Tuesday said it cannot be resolved overnight and that "new progress" would be made in the negotiations as long as both countries showed sincerity and "mutual accommodation". "It is no easy task to resolve such a complex issue left from the past and we cannot expect that the issue will be resolved overnight," Wen said.
No fresh outbreak of violence was reported by authorities in Lhasa, which came under the vice-like grip of security forces after Friday's orgy of violence saw marauding mobs torching buildings and police and private vehicles, and loot banks and shops. However, spontaneous demonstrations continued elsewhere in China with at least three Tibetan protesters killed in clashes in a Tibetan-populated district of Sichuan province in southwest China, rights groups said.
"We hope that India will proceed from the overall interest of our bilateral relations and honour its commitment," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told a regular news briefing when asked if Beijing was satisfied with the Indian government's handling of protests by Tibetans. Qin said no country in the world had recognised Tibet as an independent country and, since ancient times, it had been an inalienable part of China.
Growth was 11.1 per cent in the first quarter, 11.9 per cent in the second, 11.5 per cent in the third but slowed down to 11.2 per cent in the fourth, according to figures released at a press conference in Beijing by NBS head Xie Fuzhan. China's red hot economy has continued to expand at a fast pace, despite a slew of measures including frequent hikes in interest rates and in the proportion of funds banks must hold in reserve, to cool it.
The 'encouraging' extent of consensus between the two sides reflected in the joint document issued by them at end of Singh's talks would lead to stronger relations, they feel.
"The two sides have shown their positive political willingness and we are willing to work together with India so as to reach a fair and reasonable resolution framework acceptable to both at an early date so as to build a friendly and peaceful border area," Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Jiang Yu said.
"China and India are important countries in Asia and two important neighbours. We hope such activities will be increased so that they can be helpful in improving the stability and security of this region," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told a regular bi-weekly news briefing in Beijing.
The exercise will involve setting up of a joint command post, joint battle decision making and conduct of anti-terrorism drills, officials said. The exercise is called 'Hand-in-hand 2007' involving 103 men from the Jammu and Kashmir Light Infantry and almost an equivalent number from the Chinese People's Liberation Army.
India and China will commemorate in 2008 the 70th anniversary of the arrival of revered Indian doctor Dwarkanath Kotnis in China in an effort to inspire future generations of the two countries to work for the needy.
Meena Barot, an Indian businesswoman has been chosen among eight foreigners to carry the Olympic torch on Chinese soil in August next year.
Describing the pace of change in China as truly astounding and outstanding, Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Saturday said that India had much to learn from the way the Communist nation had approached economic reforms and liberalisation. Gandhi said the world today recognised the reality of an Asian renaissance and the re-emergence of China and India. She said that the two countries must work and prosper together as the world is big enough to accommodate the growth of both.