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KOLKATA, Feb 26 – Seven persons, including five BSF personnel, were killed, three injured and a number of electronic voting machines were damaged in stray violence during polling for 60-member assemblies in the three northeastern states of Tripura, Nagaland and Meghalaya today, reports PTI. The turnout in Tripura was the highest – between 75 to 80 per cent, followed by 60 to 70 per cent in Nagaland and 55 per cent in Meghalaya. Taking into account the 50 per cent turnout in Himachal Pradesh the total turnout in the four states is 60 per cent, Election Commission sources said.

Five BSF...

NEW DELHI, Feb 26 — Notwithstanding the hue-and-cry in Assam over proposed repealing of the controversial IMDT Act, the Central government is planning to play it safe and await the verdict of the Supreme Court. This was confirmed by Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani here today when in reply to a Question Hour discussion, he said that though there is difference of opinion, the Government would wait for the decision of the Apex Court.

However, he left no one in doubt about how the Centre felt about the Act saying that enacted in 1983 so far only 1496 illegal migrants could be deported under the...

KOHIMA, Feb 26 — Unprecedented security blanket was thrown across Nagaland with deployment over 45,000 police, para-military and army personnel to ensure peaceful conduct of assembly election today amidst the shadow of large-scale intimidation and threats to voters, reports PTI. To pre-empt any untoward incident, the state government on Monday clamped night curfew in the entire state for two days and mobilised all resources for a free and fair poll despite reports of initimidation, threats and kidnapping of village elders being received by the CEO office at Kohima from various parts of the...

SHILLONG, Feb 26 — Sluggish polling in the election to the 60-member Meghalaya Assembly in the morning today indicated a possible low polling in the state this time. According to state election authorities, after three hours of polling at 10 am, only 20 per cent of the nearly 12 lakh voters have exercised their franchise.

Several observers attributed the low turn-out to the disenchantment of the voters. The reasons are not far to see as historically, political instability has dogged the state since its birth. The last Assembly had witnessed a record six governments in the space of five years...

Guwahati, Feb. 25: The mortar attack on the Indian Air Force base in Borjhar here on Sunday has sparked off a blame game between New Delhi and Dispur which has all but pushed the security threat into the background. A day after defence minister George Fernandes and the Eastern Air Command blamed Dispur for the attack, the latter returned the fire with equal gusto by holding the air force responsible for the security breach.

Besides seeking a detailed report on the incident from the Eastern Air Command, Fernandes said in Shillong yesterday that if needed, he would seek an explanation from the...