The price was hiked by Rs. 1.50 on February 15.

Indian Oil Corp, India's largest state-owned oil company, has hiked the price of petrol by Rs. 1.40 per litre, excluding taxes, effective midnight.

Excluding taxes, the fuel will now cost Rs. 70.46 in Delhi, Rs. 77.99 in Kolkata, Rs. 77.29 in Mumbai and Rs. 73.57 in Chennai.

In a statement announcing the hike, the company cited high international crude prices and a falling rupee for the action.

"International prices have increased from $128.57 a barrel to $131.00 a barrel since the last revision, and the rupee has depreciated from Rs.53.43 to Rs.54.15 per US dollar during the period," Indian Oil said in a statement.

This is the second hike in over two weeks -- the price was hiked by Rs. 1.50 on February 15.

The price hike is the 21st for petrol since the fuel was deregulated. Under deregulation, oil firms are free to decide the quantum and the frequency of a price hike. Since petrol prices were decontrolled in June 2010, they have been revised 28 times (increased 20 times and decreased eight times).

State-owned oil firms lose about Rs. 450 crore every day from having to sell diesel, cooking gas (LPG) and kerosene at subsidized rates. For the full year, their total losses are estimated to be more than Rs. 1,50,000 crore.

However, these companies are compensated for their losses from the Finance Ministry and their sister upstream PSUs such as Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, GAIL and Oil India.

India is largely dependent on imports for its fuel needs. It imports 80 per cent of the crude it refines, about 3.7 million barrels per day.

In order to minimize its dependency on imports by 2030, the Oil Ministry has proposed to set up a committee under Vijay Kelkar, former advisor to the Finance Ministry, which will submit a proposal in two months. Mr Kelkar also heads a committee on fiscal consolidation that had suggested an increase in fuel prices and the deregulation of diesel.

A seven-year-old girl is in hospital after allegedly being raped at the government school: Delhi

A seven-year-old girl is in hospital after allegedly being raped at the government school she attends in north-west Delhi. This afternoon, around 300 people gathered outside the hospital in protest and threw stones and bricks damaging several buses before the police dispersed them with a lathi-charge.

The girl is a student of Class 2 in a primary school run by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). Her family has said in a police complaint that she was raped on Thursday afternoon.

The police have made no arrests yet but have detained a security guard and two male teachers of the school and are questioning them.

The girl was taken to hospital this morning, and doctors said she was in a stable condition, though traumatised. The police have sought the help of a non-government organisation to counsel the child as they try to get more details about the incident from her.

There were widespread protests for days in Delhi after the brutal gang-rape of a 23-year-old medical student in a moving bus in December last year, demanding better security for women in the national capital. The police have made promises since, the government has brought an Ordinance on new laws on sexual assault, but cases of rape and assault of women have continued with alarming regularity in Delhi.

The funniest tweets:Union Budget 2013-14

Finance Minister P Chidambaram plans to get more income for the government by taxing the super-rich and the corporate sector even though he left untouched income tax rates and slabs. But with an eye firmly on the Lok Sabha elections which are scheduled for early 2014, Chidambaram also focused on rural India while presenting Union Budget 2013-14 in Parliament on Thursday and hiked outlays for health, water and sanitation, SCs/STs and tribals and rural development.

However, it was business as usual on social media, with #Budget2013, #Chidambaram and #NirbhayaFund trending through the day and users taking potshots at the government. We've compiled a list of hilariously sarcastic tweets. Feel free to add in the comments section.

TOP 10 TIPS to keep your Password Secure

Rarely does a week go by without news of another hacking incident, whether it's Chinese hackers accused of breaking in to The New York Times' computer systems or Burger King finding its Twitter account taken over by pranksters.

Security threats aren't new and have long been part of online life. But the increased attention on them makes now a good time to review ways you can protect yourself. If nothing here feels new, that's good, as it means you've been doing the things you need to do to keep your accounts safe from hackers. Although there's no way to completely eliminate threats, minimizing them will go a long way.

One of the best things you can do is to make sure your password is strong.
Ways in which you can keep your password strong to ward off that initial intrusion.
Top 10 must-know tips on how to keep your passwords strong and secure
AP Photo

If someone's able to guess the password to your email or Facebook account, that person can post or send embarrassing things on your behalf. Someone was able to access Burger King's Twitter account recently and changed its profile picture to a McDonald's logo. If a banking or Amazon account is involved, someone could pay bills or buy iPads under your name - with your money.

What's worse, getting a password to one account is often a stepping stone to a more serious breach. Someone can use your email or Facebook account to send spam and scam messages to your friends, for instance. And because many services let you reset your password by sending an email to your address on file, someone with access to your email account can reset passwords and gain access to all sorts of things. If the compromised password is one you use for work, someone can snoop around for files on your employer's network with trade secrets or customers' credit card numbers.

Here are ways you can keep your password strong to ward off that initial intrusion:

1. Make your password long. The recommended minimum is eight characters, but 14 is better and 25 is even better than that. Some services have character limits on passwords, though.

2. Use combinations of letters and numbers, upper and lower case and symbols such as the exclamation mark. Some services won't let you do all of that, but try to vary it as much as you can. "PaSsWoRd!43" is far better than "password43."

3. Avoid words that are in dictionaries, even if you add numbers and symbols. There are programs that can crack passwords by going through databases of known words. One trick is to add numbers in the middle of a word - as in "pas123swor456d" instead of "password123456." Another is to think of a sentence and use just the first letter of each word - as in "tqbfjotld" for "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog."

4. Substitute characters. For instance, use the number zero instead of the letter O, or replace the S with a dollar sign.

5. Avoid easy-to-guess words, even if they aren't in the dictionary. You shouldn't use your name, company name or hometown, for instance. Avoid pets and relatives' names, too. Likewise, avoid things that can be looked up, such as your birthday or ZIP code. But you might use that as part of a complex password. Try reversing your ZIP code or phone number and insert that into a string of letters. As a reminder, you should also avoid "password" as the password, or consecutive keys on the keyboard, such as "1234" or "qwerty."

6. Never reuse passwords on other accounts - with two exceptions. Over the years, I've managed to create hundreds of accounts. Many are for one-time use, such as when a newspaper website requires me to register to read the full story. It's OK to use simple passwords and repeat them in those types of situations, as long as the password isn't unlocking features that involve credit cards or posting on a message board. That will let you focus on keeping passwords to the more essential accounts strong.

The other exception is to log in using a centralized sign-on service such as Facebook Connect. Hulu, for instance, gives you the option of using your Facebook username and password instead of creating a separate one for the video site. This technically isn't reusing your password, but a matter of Hulu borrowing the log-in system Facebook already has in place. The account information isn't stored with Hulu. Facebook merely tells Hulu's computers that it's you. Of course, if you do this, it's even more important to keep your Facebook password secure.

7. How do you keep track of these passwords? There are programs you can buy, if you're willing to put your trust in them. I use an Excel spreadsheet, but I encrypt it with its own password - a rather complex one. I am well aware that if the file gets compromised, all my services go with it. In fact, I once had it on a USB drive, which I had in a backpack that got stolen. I had to spend several hours changing passwords on all my accounts, just in case someone managed to break the password to that file. As a precaution, don't name that file "passwords." Name it something generic and boring.

8. Ideally you'll have a system for creating and remembering passwords without needing the spreadsheet. For example, you might have a string that's constant, such as "?t7q1b9f8j2o0t0l1d!" (the acronym for "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" with my area code and ZIP code reversed and a few special characters put in). To vary it, you could add the first two letters of the website you are using to the front and the next four to the end. Or put the consonants in front and the vowels at the end, with every other letter capitalized and the letter O replaced with the number zero. So for Amazon, it would be "mZn?t7q1b9f8j2o0t0l1d!Aa0." Just try to guess that!

Of course, I'm not smart enough to have a system like that for myself.

9. Whatever system you adopt, it's good to change your password - and system - from time to time. And if there's reason to believe your password might have been compromised, change it immediately.

10. One other thing to be aware of: Many sites let you reset your password by answering a security question, such as the name of your pet or the name of your high school. Of course, these violate good password practices by requiring you to use something that can be easily looked up. Others ask for your favourite movie or hobby. That might not be easily looked up, but your tastes change over time. Furthermore, because these questions get repeated from site to site, the answers you use violate the rule against repeating passwords.

I try to make these answers complex just like passwords, by adding numbers and special characters and making up responses. Unfortunately, some sites won't let you do that, and you'll be stopped if you try to enter a numeral when asked for a city name, for instance. These services will often send an email when a password gets reset this way, so be sure the address on file is current. Change your password and security questions immediately if you're notified of a reset you didn't initiate. You might want to contact the service as well.

While you're at it, make your username complex, too, if you're allowed to choose one. Banking sites typically do.

Some services such as Gmail even give you the option of using two passwords when you use a particular computer or device for the first time. If you have that feature turned on, the service will send a text message with a six-digit code to your phone when you try to use Gmail from an unrecognized device. You'd need to enter that for access, and then that code expires. It's optional, and it's a pain - but it could save you from grief later on. Hackers wouldn't be able to access the account without possessing your phone. Turn it on by going to the account's security settings.

Beyond passwords, here are a few other things to help you stay safe:

1. Software flaws. Many break-ins result from flaws in the software program you use, whether it's the Windows or Mac operating system, a Web browser or a video player. It's a good idea to let those programs automatically check for software updates, as those updates may contain fixes to known flaws. You can also check this government website to learn of the latest threats and fixes: http://us-cert.gov .

2. Malicious software. Even if the software you're using is flawless, hackers may create a security opening by tricking you into installing a malicious program. That can happen if you click on a bad email attachment or link in your email. In rare cases, visiting a problematic website can cause the software to download. Should malicious software get on your computer, a hacker might be able to use the opening to look around for sensitive data, or record your keystrokes to capture your complex passwords. To minimize the threat, use caution when visiting unknown sites or opening mysterious email.

3. Security software. Many companies sell anti-virus and other software to protect your computer from malicious software. There's a free one available at http://www.avg.com . Windows and Mac computers also come with firewalls to block some threats. Be sure it's turned on.

Think of these measures as layers of defence. If one gets breached, there's another to back you up. But eventually, the intruders will get through. Slow them down by making each layer as strong as possible.

Kamasutra 3D Film - Acting Sherlyn Chopra and other 8 Members with Nude

Sherlyn Chopra, who was thrown out of her debut film 'Kamasutra 3D', is back in the film. Director Rupesh Paul says that along with the actress, others will also do nude scenes in his movie.

Rupesh Paul told IANS: "Sherlyn is a very dedicated actress and she is very passionate about her job. I don't think any other actress could justify it. Besides, it's a very bold subject where she is going nude and there are eight actors in the film who are also going nude."

He further added: "Sherlyn is playing a princess in the film and I am not ready to compromise with any scene in the film."

Sherlyn Chopra, who was thrown out of her debut film 'Kamasutra 3D', is back in the film.
Sherlyn Chopra and eight others to do nude scenes in 'Kamasutra 3D'

He will start rolling the film by March 15.

"We will start shooting in Rajasthan. We have just shot two to three percent of the film and now the real journey will begin."

Sherlyn was thrown out because she leaked some montage scenes from the film.

"After the incident, she has become more mature and responsible. Had I cast anyone else, the tantrums from the actress would have been the same. But one thing I like about Sherlyn is her dedication," said Paul.

Mobile Charging with Hot Water...! Super

While researchers are busy finding newer sources of energy and ways of harvesting it, Ryan Johnstone, an independent inventor based in Nairobi, Kenya, has invented a solution that could help mobile phone users charge their devices with just the power of hot water. Ryan has developed the Bottle Charger, as he likes to call it, an apparatus that utilises the power of hot water to run a small turbine, which in turn produces electric current potent enough to charge small devices.

Explaining its working, Ryan said to The Mobile Indian, "The Bottle Charger works like a small wind turbine. Instead of natural wind currents, the pressurised air is created by expansion and contraction due to the presence and absence of hot water."

This change in air pressure is then used to run a small turbine that sits inside the apparatus and generates electricity for charging mobile devices. The inventor claims that the Bottle Charger creates electricity as long as you have access to hot water of around 100 degrees Celsius. With this the Bottle Charger enables users to charge smaller electronic devices such as mobile phones, MP3 players and so on for 15-30 minutes depending on surrounding temperatures.

Credit Card is replacing with Finger ...!What a technology

Futurists have long proclaimed the coming of a cashless society, where dollar bills and plastic cards are replaced by fingerprint and retina scanners smart enough to distinguish a living, breathing account holder from an identity thief.

What they probably didn't see coming was that one such technology would make its debut not in Silicon Valley or MIT but at a small state college in remote western South Dakota, 25 miles from Mount Rushmore.
Two shops on the School of Mines and Technology campus are performing one of the world's first experiments in Biocryptology - a mix of biometrics (using physical traits for identification) and cryptology (the study of encoding private information). Students at the Rapid City school can buy a bag of potato chips with a machine that non-intrusively detects their hemoglobin to make sure the transaction is legitimate.

PIC of the Day...! Milton...Spicy

Unforgetable Pics of Oscar 2013..Just Watch it

India is No.4th Country - Attacked by terrorists

Mumbai: In a world dotted with conflicts of all kinds, raging civil wars , bloody sectarian violence and terrorism, South Asia emerges as the worst affected. According to the Global Terrorism Index, that profiles data on terrorism from across the world, India is the fourth most affected in the world by terrorism, after Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan. 

Iraq is the worst hit by terror. It's said to be the bloodiest battle ground in the world where nearly 1800 people were killed in terror attacks in in 2011, most of which took place in Baghdad.

In the same year 1468 people died in Pakistan, 1293 people died in Afghanistan and 402 in India because of terror attacks.


Since Mumbai serial blasts of 1993, over 1300 people have died in major terror strikes in India.

Among all the acts of terror perpetrated against India on Indian soil, the 1993 serial blasts of Mumbai remain the deadliest. 257 people lost their lives and over 700 were injured when 13 bombs of RDX went off on the afternoon of 12th March, 1993.

Nearly twenty years have passed and the main accused in the case, including mafia don Dawood Ibrahim, are still at large.

In America, there has been no death due to terror since the 2001 September 11 attacks when two planes crashed into the twin towers of World Trade Centre.

But it remains the worst single attack ever by terror groups, in this case Al Qaida. 2823 people were killed.

The last big terror attack in the United Kingdom were the co-ordinated attacks on the London
Underground and a bus. 52 people lost their lives that day.

One of the worst terror strikes that targeted children was the attack on a school in Beslan in South Russia where militants laid siege for three days in 2004. It was the first day of school after summer break on September 1, when mostly Chechen militants took over the school. The siege ended after three days when Russian security forces stormed the building. By then 186 children and 154 adults were massacred.

Tourist havens like Bali in Indonesia too have suffered the brunt of terror when foreigners were targeted in a nightclub in 2002. 202 people lost their lives.

While conflicts , civil wars, skirmishes rage across the African world,  and most intensely now in Syria where a civil war that started with demonstrations against President Bashar Al Assad in March 2011,  ignited by the Arab Spring protests in the region, still continues. According to United Nation figures, nearly seventy thousand people have lost their lives in the Syrian uprising.

These figures only illustrate our intensely polarized and strife ridden world, our red earth

2G scam: Raja wants to appear as witness before the JPC

Blamed for a number of issues in the 2G scam, former Telecom Minister A Raja wants to appear before the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) as a witness to tell his side of story.

Raja's request to Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar comes days after Attorney General G E Vahanvati blamed him for various issues before the JPC.

He has also been blamed for the 2G scam by other witnesses before the special CBI court.

Raja met Kumar at her office yesterday and handed over a letter expressing his willingness to appear as a witness before the committee.

DMK members in JPC T R Baalu and T Siva had been pressing Chairman P C Chacko to call Raja as a witness. They also demanded calling Vahanvati again before the panel after he told JPC earlier this month that the controversial press note regarding 2G licences was changed at the last minute by Raja in 2008 with a different pen.

Vahanvati was then the Solicitor General.

Chacko is apparently against calling Raja as a witness.

He has told members that as an accused has legal protection, he cannot make fresh revelations before any committee. Therefore, there was no point in calling Raja.

But Chacko is yet to take a final call on the issue.

"If Raja is to be called, he will be the last witness. If DMK agrees on not calling him, then we have concluded calling witnesses before JPC and we would focus on writing the report," Chacko had recently said.

Parliament sources said the Speaker cannot direct any committee to call a person as a witness. In this case, Kumar can forward Raja's letter to Chacko who is currently in Bangalore.


Read more at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/2g-scam-raja-wants-to-appear-as-witness-before-the-jpc/1/251470.html

Dilsuknagar Twin Bomb Blast Exclusive..!

Why Google's stores shouldn't look so much like Apple stores

Some engineers have never dated a real person.

They've tried to, but it's hard for them to appreciate that real people don't necessarily use data to make decisions -- especially when it comes to love.

Perhaps their most embarrassing moments come when they try to mimic what non-engineers do in order to make themselves more attractive.

This mirrors some of the little issues that the Google brand has had over the years in becoming, well, human.

When you've spent you life believing that facts are everything, it's hard to imagine that people might prefer, oh, rounded corners or that ephemeral thing sometimes known as taste.

Google has made progress through some of its advertising. The "Jess Time" ad for Chrome was one of the very best tech ads of the 2012.

Yet when Google has wandered into retail, it has either believed that all you need is online or that an offline store ought to look rather like Apple's.

This is something against which Microsoft also struggles. It was almost comical when one Microsoft employee explained to me that its store looked -- at first glance -- a lot like the Apple store because the company used the same design firm.

This week, rumors surfaced that Google wants to make the next step in coming toward humanity by having its own shopping-mall retail presence.

The evidence so far from its pop-up stores -- as the picture above shows -- is that Google isn't thinking different. Or, at least, different enough.

If it fully intends to come out to the people -- to be itself-- then instead of having nice, clean retail staff in blue T-shirts (what brand does that remind you of?), it should embrace its true heart.

It should have real house-trained nerds, replete with bedhead and bad taste clothing, there for all to see. Yes, you could have nice, normal members of staff there to translate for them.

But the purpose of a retail store isn't merely to sell. It's to create street theater. Apple has its own version. Google must find its own too.

Instead of the now almost cliched clean lines and permanent white, it should make its stores look like excitable, sophisticated college playrooms, where books about dragons and vast Hulk hands are lying about and episodes of "Star Trek" and "Game of Thrones" are playing on huge screens.

Facebook network hit by ‘sophisticated’ attack

Facebook has said its computer system was "targeted in a sophisticated attack" last month, but that it found no evidence of any user data being compromised.
The company said in a blog post that malware came from an infected website of a mobile developer and that "we
remediated all infected machines, informed law enforcement, and began a significant investigation that continues to this day."
The attackers used a previously unseen exploit taking advantage of a flaw in Java software made by Oracle, which was alerted to the situation and released a patch the first of February, according to Facebook.

The hackers appeared to be targeting developers and technology firms based on the website they chose to booby-trap with malicious code.
"Facebook was not alone in this attack," the Northern California-based company said.
"It is clear that others were attacked and infiltrated recently as well."
The US intelligence community has concluded that America is the target of a massive cyber-espionage campaign that is threatening its competitiveness, The Washington Post reported just days ago.
Citing unnamed officials, the newspaper said the conclusion is contained in the National Intelligence Estimate, a classified report that represents the consensus view of the US intelligence community.
The document, according to the Post, identifies energy, finance, information technology, aerospace and automotive companies as the most frequent targets of hacking campaigns that appear state sponsored.
Early this month Twitter said it was hammered by a cyber attack similar to those that recently hit major Western news outlets, and that the passwords of about 250,000 users were stolen.

"This attack was not the work of amateurs, and we do not believe it was an isolated incident," Twitter information security director Bob Lord said in a blog post at the time.

Lord said there was an "uptick in large-scale security attacks aimed at US technology and media companies," as he told of Twitter detecting attempts this week to get unauthorised access to data in the firm's network.

The attack coincided with the revelation of several high-profile security breaches. The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal said that they had been hacked, and pointed to attackers from China.

It was unknown whether the cyberattack on San Francisco-based Twitter was related to high-powered hacker assaults on Facebook, the Times or the Journal.

Brazen cyberattacks on America's most high-profile media outlets revived concerns over Chinese hackers, who analysts say are likely linked to the secretive Beijing government.

The Times and the Journal reported that their computer networks had been compromised, alleging it was an effort by the Chinese government to spy on news media operating in the country.

The administration of President Barack Obama is trying to counter the electronic theft of trade secrets by lodging formal protests, expelling diplomatic personnel, imposing travel and visa restrictions, and complaining to the World Trade Organization, the Post said.