Moga, Dec 24 (PTI) Former Punjab DGP P S Gill, who held the post of advisor to the State Department of Home and Justice, has resigned after the ruling Shiromani Akali Dal nominated him as a candidate from Moga constituency for the upcoming state Assembly polls. “I have resigned from the post (which he held in honorary capacity) after my name was announced as SAD candidate,” Gill told reporters... 

Chandigarh, Dec 24 (IANS) Just over a year ago, former Punjab finance minister Manpreet Badal was expelled from the ruling Shiromani Akali Dal owing to ideological differences with the top leadership. Now, as the state gets into the assembly poll mode, Manpreet is facing a situation of his closest aides deserting him and his People’s Party of Punjab (PPP). Two founder members of the PPP, Jagbir... 

AMRITSAR: While a delegation of Sikhs from Italy has come to Amritsar to clarify its stand on complaints of disrespect of Guru Granth Sahib, its meeting with the Sikh high priests has been postponed to January 3. The delegation led by national Sikh Dharam Parchar Committee president Harwant Singh Daduwal had arrived from Italy to submit its clarification on the complaint lodged by SGPC secretary Dalmegh... 

CHANDIGARH: The Shiromani Akali Dal in its core committee meeting, late on Thursday night, handed over all the rights of selecting candidates in the party to fight the forthcoming Vidhan Sabha elections. The first of the lists of Akali Dal candidates, about 50 in the first phase, will be released on December 24. The issue of Punjab and Haryana high court quashing notification denying voting rights... 

Jalandhar: Dissensions within BJP in Punjab notwithstanding, the party hopes to repeat the 2007 performance and is eying contesting 23 assembly seats, not necessarily in all the ones it contested the last time around. Hoping to turn around sagging morale of party men, BJP leaders through the week have been gearing up for making the Saturday Jan Vishwas Maha Rally here a success. Leader of the coalition... 

The city police seized 200 pro-Khalistan T-shirts from a manufacturing unit located in the Salem Tabri area here last evening. The incident has alerted the state police which had been expecting trouble from pro-Khalistan activists ahead of the assembly elections in the state. Senior police officials have said the intelligence wing has received inputs about pro-Khalistan activists getting active. The... 

Scores of organisations and groups of overseas Punjabis are making a beeline for their ancestral homes in an endeavour to extract assurances from top leadership of major political parties about the security of their landed properties here. “Election is the best time to get a commitment from the politicians,” says Dalwinder Singh Dhoot, Chairman of the North American Punjabi Association (NAPA).... 

In what will fulfil one of the long-pending demands of the Sikh community, the Union Home Ministry has given its nod to the Anand Marriage Bill, also known as the Anand Karaj Bill. This will allow Sikhs to get their marriages registered under the separate law. The next step will be the passing of the Bill in Parliament. Some fine tuning of the same is being done and it could be tabled in Parliament... 

Westminster could hand Holyrood the legal power to run a Scottish independence referendum, the BBC has learned. It is one scenario being considered as the House of Lords prepares to scrutinise a bill to give the Scottish Parliament more power. The SNP government has pledged to hold a referendum in the second half of its parliamentary term. But a debate has focused on who should be allowed to call... 

Britain’s most senior civil servant has warned that holding the United Kingdom together will be an “enormous challenge”. Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell, writing in the Daily Telegraph, said the constitutional question would be a major issue in the coming years. Sir Gus is due to retire at the end of the year. First Minister Alex Salmond, responding to the article, praised...