New Delhi, Mar. 15 : All 11 parties of the Third Front will gather on Sunday evening for a dinner meet at BSP chief Mayawati’s residence in New Delhi.

The first meeting of the Third Front since its launch in Karnataka is going to be crucial, as the name of coalition’s prime ministerial candidate is likely to be decided, besides a discussion on the poll strategy.

New Delhi, Mar 15 : The Election Commission will hold a meeting of poll observers here today.

During the two-day meeting, Chief Election Commissioner N Gopalawami and two Election Commissioners Navin Chawla and S Y Quraishi will brief around 1500 observers on the conduct of elections.

The election process will be set in motion on March 23 and notifications for the first phase of polling will be issued on April 16.

Nearly 714 million voters are eligible to exercise their franchise for 543 member Lok Sabha.

New Delhi, Mar 14 : A day after India hand over replies to Pakistan's 30 questions on the Mumbai terror attacks, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Saturday said India now expect Islamabad to follow up its commitment with tangible action.

"Words and commitments should be followed by tangible action," said Pranab during a press meet.

New Delhi, Mar. 14 : To deal with a slump in exports, the eight South Asian nations, including India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, will meet in July to finalize the modalities of trimming the list of sensitive items to step up regional trade.

"Officials of the SAARC countries will meet in July and would deliberate on the modalities of decreasing the sensitive list," a senior commerce Ministry official said.

New Delhi, Mar 14 : After skipping a key party meeting on Friday to express his displeasure over an appointment, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) General Secretary Arun Jaitley on Saturday attended an event at the party headquarters here.

The BJP president Rajnath Singh and party's Prime Ministerial candidate L. K. Advani were also present at the event.

Jaitley was disappointed over the appointment of Sudhanshu Mittal as co-convener of North-East affairs.

New Delhi, Mar 14 : The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday released the names of four more candidates from Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha elections.

On Friday, the BJP announced candidates for 46 more Lok Sabha seats from the states of Kerala, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Punjab and Sikkim.