New Delhi, Apr 23 : Communist Party of India (Marxist) General Secretary Prakash Karat has ruled out the possibility of forming a post-poll alliance with the with the Congress party.

In an exclusive interview with TIMESNOW, Karat clarified that his party''s aim is to see that there is a "non-Congress secular government."

He revealed that in the event of the CPI (M) failing to do so, it "would prefer to sit in the opposition."

Washington  - US President Barack Obama and key administration officials launched a full media blitz Wednesday to push for limits to climate-damaging pollution in the United States, coinciding with Earth Day.

Obama touted the importance of wind power during a trip to the US state of Iowa and called for a "new era of energy exploration," sounding a theme repeated by a series of cabinet members who testified before Congress on the same day.

Harare  - Zimbabwe's Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai said Wednesday he had given President Robert Mugabe a deadline on the resolution of issues threatening to derail the country's unity government.

Tsvangirai was speaking ahead of a third meeting between the two leaders on Thursday over the unilateral claw-back by Mugabe of the telecommunications dossier from Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

Pratapgarh, Apr. 22: Saying that the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati was just like a sister to him, Samajwadi Party General Secretary Sanjay Dutt has apologized Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister for his "Jadu ki Jhappi" remarks.

In his reply to the district magistrate and district election officer on Tuesday, Dutt apologized for the remarks and said it was a mere dialogue from his Bollywood blockbuster Munnabhai series which were used in the rally to spread a message of love in society.

Wellington - Fiji military strongman Voreqe Bainimarama's declaration that his country does not need free and open discussion about current issues placed his government "outside the community of civilized peoples," New Zealand's Society of Authors said on Wednesday.

The society, which includes the writers' organization PEN New Zealand, issued a statement saying its members joined a wide range of other freedom of speech advocates throughout the world in deploring the "vicious repression of media" by Fiji's military government.

New Delhi - Maoist militants seized a passenger train in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand and took hundreds of passengers hostage Wednesday, one day before the second phase of India's month-long general elections.

The approximately 700 passengers on board the train were unhurt, the NDTV news channel reported, citing railway authorities.

Maoist fighters took over the train early Wednesday in Latehar district, they said.