Arjuna Ranatunga fired as SLC head for opposing IPL

Sri Lanka’s World Cup winning captain Arjuna Ranatunga’s tenure as the head of the SLC (Sri Lanka Cricket ) came to be short lived because of his opposition to IPL, a report has claimed.

‘The Island’, quoting Sri Lanka Cricket documents said Ranatunga was removed “after the BCCI applied pressure on the Sri Lankan government.” Ranatunga was unavailable for comment on the matter.

The paper says an offer was made by the ECB (English Cricket Board) when Ranatunga was the head of SLC, for Sri Lanka to play a Test series in England, but the dates were clashing with the 2009 edition of the IPL.

Ranatunga’s request for the players to return early from the IPL was staunchly resisted by the players. As there was no softening of the stance by Ranatunga, the BCCI summoned a Sri Lankan delegation to come over to Bangkok for talks.

During the meeting held in Bangkok in October 2008, the BCCI was represented by sacked IPL Commissioner Lalit Modi, current President N Srinivasan and the then secretary Niranjan Shah.

The newspaper claimed that the Sri Lanka Cricket delegation was warned of dire consequences unless they toed the BCCI line.

“The meeting that lasted for approximately two hours ended with the BCCI adopting a very aggressive stance, stating that the forthcoming Indian tours that have been indicated in the FTP up to 2012, stand unconfirmed at present and stated that they are not ready for any negotiations or to compromise with SLC, as long as SLC’s present hostile approach,” the report said.

“Mr Modi, together with Mr Srinivasan were very puzzled and shocked at the attitude of SLC towards the BCCI. The BCCI representatives had said that they had never had to contend with such an attitude with any committees which were previously handling the affairs of SLC and in particular, were very surprised and concerned about the comments made by Chairman, Arjuna Ranatunga, at different forums,” it added.

Within a few weeks of the meeting, Ranatunga was removed as head of SLC by the Minister of Sports.

Ranatunga, who was a government parliamentarian at the time, switched over to opposition thereafter and still remains a strong critic of the IPL.

Sensex opens volatile: RIL up 0.5 per cent, Infy falls 1 per cent

The BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty started of trade with mild gap down on first day of the week, but immediately rebounded. Overall it was a volatile opening ahead of expiry on Thursday.

The BSE benchmark was up 37 points to 17,410.56 and the NSE benchmark went up 12.65 points to 5,303.50.

Index heavyweight Reliance Industries dropped 0.6 per cent initially, but bounced back with 0.5 % gains. Company surprised the street by reporting gross refining margin at USD 7.6 a barrel versus USD 6.8 a barrel QoQ while its net profit fell 4.6 % to Rs 4,236 crore during the same period.

Software company Infosys lost 1 % after The Economic Times reported that the foreign brokerage firm CLSA sent letter to the company on performance.

Ambuja Cements, Sterlite Industries, JSPL and JP Associates too were under pressure. However, Cairn India was up 1 %, even after the company reported a fall of 11 % YoY and 3.35 % QoQ in its consolidated net profit of Rs 2,186 crore due to forex loss of Rs 217 crore versus Rs 38 crore YoY.

M&M, Maruti, Hero Motocorp, BHEL and L&T were other gainers. The CNX Midcap rose 23 points to 7,649. About two shares advanced for every share declining on the National Stock Exchange.

IDBI Bank was up 2.5 % as its Q4 net profit increased to Rs 770 cr. from Rs 516 cr. (YoY).

Viceroy Hotels was up 3 % and Raymond was up 1.3 %.

Max India went up 3 % as The Economic Times reported that the company will sell Polypropylene biz for Rs 800 cr.

Sensex gains 53 points in early trade

Extending gains for the fourth straight session, the BSE benchmark Sensex increased by another 53 points in early trade on Thursday on sustained buying by funds and retail investors.

The 30-share barometer, which had gained nearly 300 points in the previous three sessions, up by 53.18 points, or 0.31 %, at 17,445.57.

All sectoral indices, except capital goods, were trading in the positive zone with gains of up to 0.69 %.

The wide-based National Stock Exchange index Nifty moved up by 15.90 points, or 0.30 %, to 5,315.90.

Brokers said continued buying by funds and retail investors, driven by a cut in lending rate by RBI on Tuesday amid expectations of encouraging Q4 earnings by corporates, mainly influenced the sentiment.

In the Asian region, the Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index increased by 0.17 %, while Japan’s Nikkei index shed 0.91 % in morning trade Thursday. The U.S. Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 0.63 %  lower in Wednesday’s trade.

Delhi civic polls: BJP ahead in all 3 corporations in early trends

BJP was on Tuesday ahead in all the three municipal corporations of Delhi as counting of votes progressed for the polls held two days ago. The counting for 272 wards is taking place in 33 centres across the city.

Polling for all the 272 wards spread in three civic bodies — East, South and North — were held on Sunday in which 55 per cent of the 1.15 crore voters exercised their franchise.

The trends showed that BJP is ahead in 59 wards in the North while Congress is leading in 24 and others in 14 seats for which trends are available.

Delhi BJP chief Vijender Gupta’s wife Shobha is leading in Rohini Central ward by a margin of over 2,000 votes against her Congress rival Dr Monica Puri. Delhi Mayor Rajni Abbi (BJP) is also leading in Mukherjee Nagar.

In South Delhi Corporation, BJP is ahead in 47 seats while Congress is ahead in 22 wards while in East, BJP is surging in 28 seays and Congress 16.

Stakes are high for both the national parties in the municipal polls, considered as a semifinal ahead of the assembly elections next year.

There are 104 each wards in South and North Corporations and 64 in the East, of which 138 seats are reserved for women. South has the highest number of 904 candidates followed by North (885) and East (634).

In the 2007 polls to the undivided Municipal Corporation of Delhi ( MCD), BJP had bagged 36.17 per cent of the around 42.35 lakh votes polled while Congress got 29.17 per cent. BSP’s vote share was 9.87 per cent.

Infosys plan to hire 35,000 employees in FY’13

India’s second largest IT company Infosys on Friday said it will hire 35,000 people this fiscal, including 13,000 for its BPO operations.

“We are going to add 35,000 more people next year, which includes 13,000 people for the BPO operations,” Infosys member of the board and chief financial officer V. Balakrishnan said.

Infosys and its subsidiaries included 10,676 workers in the fourth quarter of FY12, while the net addition during the period stood at 4,906 people.

Its total employee strength was 149,994 as on March 31.

Infosys reported a 27.4% jump in consolidated net profit at Rs 2,316 crore for Q4 FY12, as against Rs 1,818 crore in the January-March quarter of FY11.

The company’s rate of attrition (excluding subsidiaries on last twelve month basis) has come down slightly to 14.7% in the reported quarter against 15.4% in the October-December quarter of 2011-12.

Infosys also plans to hire about 1,200 in the US.

“In the last two years, we hired 1,200 people onsite in the US each year (who were) local hire. We are going to continue with that this year and will hire 1,200 people…local hire in the US,” Balakrishnan said.

Over the past months, anti outsourcing promotion against Indian technology companies has gained momentum in the US and European Union—main markets for the country’s software and IT service companies.

Politicians and governments in these countries have been objecting to off shoring of work by their companies to countries like India so as to retain jobs back home. Industry experts have called such criticism a political rhetoric.

Most Indian technology companies have been consistently hiring more and more in the western countries over the past few years to blunt the criticism of ‘taking away’ jobs.

Of late, the proportion of the recruit in the US and the EU has seen a marked increase.

Akhilesh Yadav to file papers for legislative council poll

Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav would file his nomination papers on Thursday for the biennial elections to 13 seats of legislative council slated for April 26 next.

Akhilesh Yadav and Samajwadi Party spokesman Rajendra Chaudhary would be filing their nomination papers, SP sources here said.

Akhilesh Yadav, sworn in as the youngest chief minister of the state on March 15 last, is now not a member of any of the houses of the legislature.

Meanwhile, five nomination papers were on Wednesday filed for the biennial elections.

Notable among those who filed their papers are revenue minister Ambika Chaudhary, Madhu Gupta, Naresh Chand Uttam , Ram Sakal Gurjar and Vijay Yadav (all belonging to SP).

Amitabh Bachchan ill again, may undergo CT-scan

Two months after his surgery for abdominal pain, superstar Amitabh Bachchan is ill again and has been suffering from “excruciating pain” for the last few days.

Big B is likely to undergo a CT scan at the Seven Hills Hospital today, where he had been operated on in Feb. this year.

“Last night…I rose from my desk to get to bed, but excruciating pain, stopped me in my tracks and I found it difficult to walk, to stand, to sit, to lie down. Quite horrendous!” he said in a late night blog entry.

While a pain killer managed to save the day, Mr Bachchan attempted to bear with the discomfort for as long as he could. He admitted that the pain had disappeared post-operation and he was confounded about why it had recurred two months after the surgery.

“I have no answer. But tomorrow (Tuesday), there should be one as I prepare for a CT-Scan after devouring a large bottle or bottles of that yellow fluid…” he said.

Mr Bachchan recently performed at the opening ceremony of IPL 5 in Chennai, and also appeared at the launch of Pune’s new stadium.

Sunny Leone reaches Jaipur for Jism 2

Finally, adult celebrity Sunny Leone, who is playing the the best woman in Pooja Bhatt’s ” Jism 2″ reached Jaipur to start shooting for the much talked about film. It was a beautiful hot mid-day when Sunny reached the location, a luxury hotel Devi Ratn.

Rather than relaxing in her suite, Sunny determined to take a around of the property, which is a modern replica of the Jantar Mantar. She was quite impressed, and praised Jaipur and the place she was staying in, and even the people all around.

Soon, Dino Morea, who is also the co-producer of the movie and Randeep Hooda joined her and they all chilled about. The stars spent their day enjoying themselves and chatting as the was planned for overdue evening time. Incidentally hotels, Devi Ratn and Devi Rasa have already been reserved for “Jism 2” shoot till April 10.

Some night sequences were shot late in the evening on Sunday and Monday, but the real grind is yet to start. Watch this space for up-dates.

Titanic’s erotic scene is back in the film

The unforgettable and much discussed painting scene from the 1997 movie, Titanic, whereLeonardo Di Caprio sketches Kate Winsletwearing just an emerald necklace, has now been included in the 3D version, which will hit screens on April 5.

In 1997 when Titanic first released, 2 scenes were cut. However this time in 2012, Titanic 3Dhas been passed without any cuts at all and has received a clear U/A censor rating by CBFC! A source from the team confirms, “The scenes cut in 1997 have now been included in the 3D version releasing across all theatres in India.”

Opening across theatres on 5th April 2012 in India in English, Hindi, Tamil and Telegu, the film’s 3D release is a commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, and pays a special tribute to the tragedy that took place in 1912. The most celebrated film in history will be presented to audiences in 3D format by James Cameron.