New Delhi

Briefly

Floral tribute

NEW DELHI: Union Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Saturday paid floral tributes at the portrait of the great nationalist Deshbandhu Chittaranjan Das in the Central Hall of Parliament here on the occasion of his 135th birth anniversary.

The Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, L.K.Advani, the Union Minister of State in the Ministry of Defence

and Parliamentary Affairs, B.K Handique, Member of Parliament Chinta Mohan and former Member of Parliament Shashi Bhushan joined Mr. Mukherjee in paying their tributes to the great leader.

A booklet on Das -- an

idealist and harbinger of the revolutionary movement in the country -- was brought out by the Lok Sabha Secretariat in Hindi and English on the occasion. Copies of the booklet

were presented to the distinguished gathering.

Blood donation

NEW DELHI: Top officials of the Capital on Saturday donated blood for the victims of the serial bomb blasts in Delhi on October 29.

The 29 officials, including Chief Fire Officer R C Sharma, Delhi Jal Board (DJB) officers and senior armymen, who donated blood, are currently

aking a two-week cours

in disaster management at the Guru Gobind Singh University.

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit inaugurated the blood donation camp organised

by the University, an

official spokesman said.

Meanwhile, the Chief Minister also inaugurated a moot court organised by the University's School of Law and Legal Studies.

Essay competition

NEW DELHI : The Foundation for Unity of Religion and Enlightened Citizenship organised an all-India essay-writing competition in which students of Bal Bhavan Public School (BBPS), Mayur Vihar Phase II, bagged five of the 150 awards on offer.

More than 2,000 students from all over the country took part in the competition. BBPS students whose essays have been published in a book titled "The Right, The Wrong and the Dividing Line" include Namrata Negi, Rahul Garg, Shefali Gupta, Pinki Chauhan, Vaibhav Jain and Jyoti Goyal.

Emergency landing

NEW DELHI: A Gulf Air aircraft with 218 passengers on board made an emergency landing an hour after takeoff for Abu Dhabi from Indira Gandhi International Airport on Saturday, official sources said.

All passengers were safe and had been shifted to various hotels.

The ground staff was put on maximum alert as per the drill as soon as the pilot noticed a problem with an engine and notified the Air Traffic Controller.

The Airbus 330 had taken

off for Abu Dhabi at 0830 hrs, but returned to the IGI airport at 0930 hrs after

the snag was noticed, the sources said.

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