DUBAI - A Saudi Arabian Airlines flight with some 200 passengers on board had to make an emergency landing after one of its engines caught fire, Bahrain’s Gulf Daily News reported on Monday. The engine caught fire following a collision with a bird, forcing the Bahrain-bound flight to return to Medina, according to the newspaper.

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AMMAN - A newly-wed Jordanian couple died from suffocation on Saturday after they left a gas heater turned on overnight, a security official said. "The newlyweds died from suffocation at dawn on Saturday after they inhaled carbon dioxide emitted from the gas heater in their room," in the northern province of Zarqa, said local civil defence chief Colonel Mohammed al-Malaba.

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The State Bank of India is planning to open another 30 overseas offices in the next year to increase its global balance sheet size. “We plan to add about 30 more overseas offices in our network in the next 12 month,” a senior SBI official told PTI.

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DUBAI - An Abu Dhabi production company has brought in a Hollywood director to make the UAE’s first feature-length horror film, local daily The National reported on Friday. Imagenation, a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi Media Company (ADMC), said the film is entitled “The Jinn” and is based on the genie in Arab folklore of the same name, according the newspaper.

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Around 55 percent of the over 10 million electorate in 12 Karnataka districts voted Sunday in the first round of bitterly-fought elections to the local governing councils, an official said. "Around 55 percent voting has taken place according to preliminary information from districts," a spokesperson of the state election commission told IANS. Voting for 375 zilla (district) and 1,340 taluka (sub-district) panchayat seats was peaceful, though there were complaints of missing names, attempts at bogus voting, malfunctioning of electronic voting machines and distribution of money to voters, the spokesperson said.

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Over 100 flights were delayed, diverted or cancelled due to dense fog at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport, which witnessed its first major disruption this winter. Stranded passengers had to spend long hours at the airport as the domestic and international flights were delayed for upto five hours. The fog started to envelop the airport around 1900 hours on Saturday evening reducing visibility to zero and lasted for over 17 hours forcing the airport authorities to implement low visibility procedure. Thirty-eight domestic and international flights were cancelled while around 30 flights were delayed. 42 flights, including 14 international, had to be diverted Hyderabad, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Kolkata and Lucknow as the runway visibility dropped to less than 100 metres.

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An Indian student of software engineering in Stratford University in Connecticut was gunned down by unidentified assailants in a grocery store in a suspected robbery case. A native of Hyderabad, Arun Kumar Narote, who was working as a part-time clerk at a grocery store in Bridgeport, was shot on Monday around 9:30 pm (local time). Police are investigating the case. According to police, two masked men walked in to the Norman Grocery Store on Monday night, robbed cash and shot Narote in the head. Though there were no signs of resistance on his part.

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Suspect strangled her new-born child, which she gave birth to in the bathroom of Dubai airport. Dubai: Dubai Police are investigating a case, in cooperation with the Interpol, of a woman who strangled her new-born child and dumped the child in the airport’s bathroom. The suspect, who is from an African country, had strangled her newborn child, which she gave birth to in the bathroom of Dubai International Airport. She then dumped the child in the trash and boarded a plane back to her country, said police sources.

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UDUPI : It has come to light of late that GM Kantaraju, the present circle inspector of Byndoor had once earlier been suspended on the charges of hushing up a murder caseby selling the body of the dead to a medical college. An aggrieved person has decided tomove the court questioning the reappointment of Kantaraju.

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UDUPI: Muslim Lekhakara Sangha, Mangalore & Udupi felicitated the eminent writer Abdul Hameed Pakkaladka on Friday with Muslim Literary Award (Muslim Sahitya Prashasti).

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India’s food inflation accelerated to a six-week high, adding pressure on authorities to curb a jump in onion prices that has forced the nation to halt exports of the staple this week. An index measuring wholesale prices of agricultural products including lentils, rice and vegetables compiled by the commerce ministry rose 12.13% in the week ended December 11 from a year earlier, a trade ministry report showed in New Delhi yesterday. The index gained 9.46% the previous week. Opposition parties have criticised Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s government for failing to check rising prices and the central bank has raised interest rates to contain inflation that’s triggered labor strikes and public protests. The Bharatiya Janata Party was defeated in local elections in 1998 after a surge in onion prices. “Everyone, irrespective of economic condition, would have to use it on a day-to-day basis and it is a very sensitive item both from an economic point of view and political point of view,” Siddhartha Sanyal, chief India economist at Barclays Bank Plc’s investment banking division, said. “They cannot ignore it.” India will take steps to cool food inflation and onion prices will ease soon, Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar said yesterday. The government said it would buy the crop from abroad.

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Hindi entertainment channel Colors is set to bring an Indian version of the Guinness World Records soon, and Indians will get a chance to showcase talent that can become new world records. “Guinness World Records, Ab India Todega,” to be produced by Miditech Pvt Ltd, will be launched early 2011. The channel is on the lookout for a “Bollywood face” to host the show. Guinness, the globally recognised authority on record breaking, will validate the achievements of the Indian participants as they attempt to break the existing records, and also recognise new world ones. “Guinness ... will provide Indian participants an opportunity to go down in history by having their achievements validated by an internationally recognised institution, a reward more precious than what any other reality show can offer on Indian television today,” Colors Head of Programming Ashvini Yardi said. The Guinness has enthralled viewers in around 90 countries with its TV shows. Now the bosses are excited about the foray into India.

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NEW DELHI (Reuters) - A rocket carrying the GSAT-5P communications satellite exploded seconds after lift-off from a launchpad in the country’s south on Saturday, officials said, in a potential setback for its commercial space business. The Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) exploded in the first stage of the flight, leaving a trail of smoke and fire. The initial launch of the GSAT-5P satellite had been pushed back because of an engine defect.

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The prayers were offered in line with the directives of President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Abu Dhabi: Prayers seeking rain were offered yesterday in various UAE mosques following the directives of President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan. The call for prayers came after the delay in rains this season. His Highness Dr Shaikh Sultan Bin Mohammad Al Qasimi, Supreme Council Member and Ruler of Sharjah, offered prayers for rains (Al Istisqaa prayer) at Al Badie prayer grounds.

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DUBAI - A Kuwait Airways flight was forced to make an emergency landing in Muscat after smoke was reported in the cabin, local news agency KUNA reported on Friday. The flight was returning to Kuwait City from Kuala Lumpur when smoke began coming from under a passenger’s seat, KUNA reported, citing an airline spokesman.

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LUANDA - Angolan airline TAAG has grounded its fleet of Boeing 777s after engine problems forced the planes to make two emergency landings in less than three weeks, a company official said Friday. In the latest incident, a Boeing 777-200ER en route from Luanda to Dubai registered engine trouble in its right turbine one minute after take-off Thursday, forcing the plane to return to Luanda with 32 passengers and 13 crew on board, TAAG spokesman Rui Carreira told Angolan state radio station RNA.

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Goldplus from Tata, Semi-urban/rural Jewellery brand from the house of Titan Industries Ltd has announced the winning design for Goldplus Nano, the campaign to present World’s 1st ever Pure Gold Jewellery Car. A monumental design that captures a plethora of jewellery techniques that India has

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India’s new track sensation Ashwini Akkunji today rued lack of corporate sponsorship even after winning two gold medals in last month’s Asian Games but still remains upbeat about a podium finish in the 2012 London Olympics. Ashwini wants to become the first Indian woman athlete to win an individual gold in the Olympics but for that to happen she said she needs money to compete in the European circuit and top IAAF events. "I want to become the first Indian woman athlete to win gold in Olympics. I have switched on to 400m hurdles just six months ago and my timing is very good. I can only improve from here. With some improvement in my technique I think I can cut down my timing by another two seconds at least and that should put me in medal contention in London," Ashwini told PTI.

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About 34 trucks loaded with onions yesterday reached India as imports from Pakistan continued for the third successive day to check onion prices in the country, officials said. A total of 98 truckloads had arrived here through the Attari-Wagah border Tuesday and Wednesday.

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NIMS started well in the first quarter as they led 13 against 10 points Dubai: St Mary’s Caholic High School, Dubai defeated hosts New Indian Model School, (NIMS) Sharjah in the finals of 21st NIMS Trophy Inter School Basketball tournament played at NIMS, Sharjah. Score 60-48. NIMS started well in the first quarter as they led 13 against 10 points. St Mary’s fought back in the second quarter and took two point lead at the end of the first half, 22-20.

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