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Army divers and rescue workers pulled 103 bodies out of a river after a packed ferry boat capsized in heavy winds and rain in remote northeast India, an official said Tuesday. At least 100 people were still missing after the boat carrying about 350 passengers broke into two pieces late Monday, said Pritam Saikia, the district magistrate of Goalpara district.

After several official predictions that India would grow by 7-8% in 2011-12, the finance minister finally admitted in his Budget 2012 speech that the growth would be 6.9%. The actual figure may be lower at 6.5%, thanks to the statistical error in sugar production, which dragged down January's industrial production growth figure from 6.8% to 1.1%.

Indeed, he suspects that "New Delhi's emphasis on China is more about slighting Pakistan than competing with China." China is already modernising its own nuclear-armed medium- and intermediate-range missile systems that could be used to target India. But as Taylor Fravel notes, "India and China have similar nuclear doctrines, as both emphasize no first use and achieving deterrence through development of a secure second-strike."

India announced plans Wednesday to test launch a new long-range missile, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead as far as the Chinese capital Beijing for the first time. Officials and defense experts said if the tests of the Agni-V missile proved successful, it would mark a significant improvement in India’s nuclear deterrent capability, and would strengthen its hand in a hostile neighborhood, sandwiched between nuclear-armed rivals Pakistan and China.

India's government may have lost $210 billion in what one opposition politician described as the "mother of all scams".

The United States exempted Japan and 10 EU nations from financial sanctions because they have significantly cut purchases of Iranian crude oil, but left Iran's top customers China and India exposed to the possibility of such steps.

China, India and Japan are planning cuts of at least 10 percent in Iranian crude imports as tightening U.S. sanctions make it difficult for the top Asian buyers to keep doing business with the OPEC producer.

China said on Friday it would send a senior official to Tehran to discuss Iran's nuclear standoff with the West, and India indicated it would also weigh in, as Asia's two giants seek to head off new sanctions already playing havoc with trade.

Three Indian lawmakers resigned Wednesday after they were filmed allegedly watching porn on a cell phone during a heated debate at a state assembly in Bangalore, southern India.

A tainted batch of bootleg liquor killed 102 people and sent dozens more to the hospital in villages outside the eastern Indian city of Kolkata, officials said.