Swaraj on Sunday briefed family members of the abducted men, who are mostly from Punjab, about information gathered by the Minister of State for External Affairs, V K Singh, who was sent to the Gulf nation after its prime minister announced the liberation of Mosul from the dreaded terror group Islamic State.
The glimpses of release of prisoners during the hostages-prisoners swap deal between Hamas and Israel amid a temporary four-day truce.
The bench, however, granted Purohit the liberty to raise his contentions before the trial court and said it is not expressing any opinion on his petition.
Irfan Ahmad Mir, a resident of Sezan Keegam, was working in the Territorial Army and was abducted by terrorists.
Making an appeal for early release of abducted Malkangiri District Collector R V Krishna, Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Thursday said the government was evaluating all options and monitoring the situation.
Father Uzhunnalil, who hails from Kerala, was abducted in March by terror group Islamic State which attacked an old-age home run by Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity in southern Yemeni city of Aden.
Communal tension has been brewing in Purola and some other towns of Uttarkashi district after two men, one of them Muslim, allegedly tried to abduct a Hindu girl on May 26.
Tribal militants from the anti-peace talk faction of Dima Halam Daogah called Black Widow, abducted three employees of a Delhi-based construction company from a place called Muktacherra in Cachar district of South Assam on Friday.
The Mumbai crime branch probing the death of Sandhya Singh, sister of Bollywood composers Jatin and Lalit, has added charges of abduction, robbery and murder in the case.
The duo is being probed for their alleged role in tampering with the blood sample of the minor following the car accident on May 19 in Maharashtra's Pune city, which claimed the lives of two IT professionals.
In a significant development, a Maoist ideologue and a human rights activists have appealed to the Maoists in Chhattisgarh to immediately release the four policemen abducted by them. Revolutionary Telugu poet and a Maoist sympathiser Vara Vara Rao made the appeal to the CPI (Maoist) through the electronic media to immediately release the hostages without harming them. "there is a sense of urgency because I want to tell the Maoists not to harm the abducted policemen."
A K Agarwala, an official of the National Hydro Power Corporation, who was abducted by militants, was rescued by the Assam Police following an operation inside a thickly forested hilly area near Assam-Arunachal Pradesh boundary late Monday night.
Serious brainstorming at the national level is fast becoming a necessity to deal with this phenomenon of abductions by the Maoists. The home ministry's hands-off approach is certainly not what India needs at the moment, says Bibhu Prasad Routray.
An Indian Christian priest, Father Alexis Prem Kumar, abducted in Afghanistan eight months back, has been released, PM Narendra Modi announced on Sunday.
Sources said the police raid on the hideout of the kidnappers followed the arrest of Rajkumar Singh.
The mystery over missing actor Gurucharan Singh, who played Roshan Singh Sodhi's character in TV serial Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah, has deepened as the Delhi police has found that the actor was using 27 separate email accounts in the fear of being "surveillanced" by someone.
Chennai Police coordinated with Metropolitan Police (Scotland Yard), London, and Serious Organised Crime Agency, United Kingdom, state and central intelligence agencies and rescued the couple from an SUV bound for a house at Mandarakuppam in Cuddalore district of Tamil Nadu on Sunday night.
Singh, along with his aide and some supporters, was abducted on Thursday night by suspected Naxalites while returning from a function in Dhanukua village.
Naxals have abducted a village sarpanch in eastern Maharashtra, the police said.
The anti-Naxal operation in Chhattisgarh's Bastar region has been suspended in the wake of abduction of Sukma district collector Alex Paul Menon.
In a bid to settle scores, a head constable and about a dozen other men allegedly thrashed a student, fired a bullet to scare him and urinated into his mouth one by one, the police said on Tuesday.
Maoists on Thursday night freed the four abducted policemen in a dense forest of Chhattisgarh's Bijapur district after keeping them hostage for 12 days, a senior police officer said.
External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said India is closely monitoring the security situation in that country.
Kataria has been involved in a big nexus of the human traffickers since last year and may have links with an international gang, the police said.
Maoists on Sunday demanded release of eight of their jailed leaders in Chattisgarh and a halt to "Operation Green Hunt" in exchange for freedom of Sukma collector Alex Paul Menon, who was safe, a day afer he was abducted. The Maoists also set an April 25 deadline.
This is the tenth meeting between Swaraj and the families since the abduction of the Indians from the war-torn country in June 2014.
A West Bengal minister on Tuesday hinted at the Maoist connection of Sankrail police officer-in-charge Atindranath Dutta, who had been kidnapped by the Naxalites on October 20 and was released after two days.
Nihar Das Pattnaik, the company's manager, CSR, and three others -- Arun Mohapatra, Debasish Swain and Prasant Rout - had gone to Patana village to conduct a survey of households for inclusion in the CSR activities.
A United Nations human rights investigator has recommended that international pressure be put on North Korea as part of a multi-pronged strategy to know the fate of hundreds of foreign nationals allegedly abducted by it.
Dr Pankaj Gupta along with his wife Subha was abducted near Barachatti on the Grand Trunk Road in Gaya on Friday evening.
Once a wanted criminal with a reward of Rs 7 lakh on his head, Sandeep from Sonipat got a six-hour parole for his wedding from a Delhi court.
A case of abduction has been lodged against Rashtriya Janata Dal MP Sitaram Yadav, his son and body guards in Bihar, the police said on Thursday.
Jagadish and Anukumar were taken into custody from the district headquarters town of Chitradurga by a team led by Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Dinakar.
The officials are admitted in Regional Institute Of Medical Science Hospital and are out of danger.
An Indian woman from Andhra Pradesh visiting the United States was killed when she apparently tried to resist the abduction of her 10-month-old granddaughter. The police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have launched a massive manhunt to find the assailants and the kidnappers.
A judicial magistrate (first class) granted bail to the 17-year-old boy's father Vishal Agarwal, a prominent builder, and his grandfather, who were arrested in May-end and are currently in judicial custody.
