India Top Stories - Reuters

COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan snared four wickets to leave India struggling on 159 for six when bad light ended play early on the third day of the first test on Friday.

MUMBAI/NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Emboldened by winning a confidence vote, India's government is expected to revive a privatisation drive, but a looming election means it will only have time for a few small sales rather than any jumbo ones.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Britain's Vedanta Resources Plc agreed on Friday to pay compensation to tribal people displaced by a planned bauxite mine in Orissa, as the Supreme Court concluded hearings and reserved judgement.

MUMBAI (Reuters) - About 100 people worried about industrial pollution set fire to a construction site of a local unit of Dow Chemical Co in Maharashtra on Friday, police and a Dow official said.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - A boycott of the September Champions Trophy loomed on Friday, a day after the International Cricket Council (ICC) decided to retain Pakistan as the venue despite safety concerns by many teams.

TORONTO (Reuters Life!) - The idea of going surfing or for a dip in the ocean before work is a dream for many people, but for others it's part of daily life in a beach city.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Thousands of users on YouTube, the popular video-sharing website, are toasting two young Indian politicians, one of them seen as a potential prime minister, after they spoke eloquently in a parliamentary debate last week.

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Earlier this month, a Mumbai city official stood up to make a presentation on water meters only to be heckled and jeered into silence by his colleagues.

KOLKATA (Reuters Life!) - The dead are an unlikely tourist attraction, but authorities in Kolkata are promoting the graveyards of India's former colonial capital to woo foreigners trying to trace their roots.

REUTERS - Eight blasts hit the Indian IT city of Bangalore on Friday, killing a woman and injuring around 15 others, police said.

REUTERS - Eight small bombs hit the Indian IT city of Bangalore on Friday, killing one woman and wounding at least 15 people, police said.

MUMBAI (Reuters) - McLaren's championship leader Lewis Hamilton expects Formula One's first floodlight race through the streets of Singapore in September to be tricky and technical.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Indian double trap shooter Ronjan Sodhi, who matched two world records to win gold at last month's world cup in Belgrade, will not be going to the Olympic Games after a request for a wildcard place was turned down.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush and India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday agreed to press ahead with efforts to cement a civilian nuclear deal, the White House said.

COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lanka amassed 600 for six declared then took the valuable wicket of Virender Sehwag before tea on the third day of the first test on Friday.

KABUL (Reuters) - Abdul Wahid was asleep in England when he received a panicked phone call. "Buy a plane ticket and hurry to Kabul!" his brother's voice said.

TORONTO (Reuters) - David Beckham treated the fans to what they came to see, flashing his trademark smile and curling free kicks to lead the Major League Soccer all-stars to a 3-2 win over West Ham United on Thursday.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday named South African judge Navanethem Pillay as the world body's new human rights chief, despite initial U.S. concerns about her background.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration has proposed shifting $226.5 million in U.S. counterterrorism aid to Pakistan to upgrade Pakistani F-16 fighters, U.S. officials said on Thursday.

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Tata Motors, India's top vehicle maker, sees initial demand for its ultra-cheap Nano topping supply, but expects the full year to March to be tough because of high input costs, the chairman said.

GENEVA (Reuters) - The future of manufacturing is in low-cost youthful Asian economies, and the United States and Europe should abandon ideas of propping up uncompetitive industries, India's trade minister said on Thursday.

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani told his Indian counterpart on Thursday both countries should cooperate more deeply to combat "terrorism and extremism" in the region.

PERTH, Australia (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Thursday the Bush administration would push the U.S. Congress hard to agree to a civilian nuclear deal with India before President George W. Bush leaves office.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - The International Cricket Council (ICC) has decided to keep September's Champions Trophy in Pakistan despite security concerns, it said on Thursday.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's annual inflation rate held just below 12 percent in mid-July, levelling off from the previous week and undercutting forecasts, but not cooling enough to banish expectations of monetary tightening next week.

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (Reuters) - Centuries from Malinda Warnapura, Mahela Jayawardene and Tillakaratne Samaraweera guided Sri Lanka to 422 for four on the second day of the first test against India on Thursday.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq cannot take part in the Beijing Olympics because it disbanded the country's Olympic Committee although a comment from the IOC, which organises the Games, suggested the ban may not be final.

DETROIT (Reuters) - Ford Motor Co posted a $8.7 billion quarterly loss on Thursday as it wrote down the value of truck and SUV operations and cautioned that it did not expect to see a U.S. economic turnaround until 2010.