Indian Oil Corp, the country's top refiner, has signed its first annual deal to buy up to 3 million tonnes or 60,000 barrels per day of US. oil, its chairman Sanjiv Singh said on Monday.

State-run IOC had previously purchased U.S. oil from spot markets and signed a mini-term deal in August to buy 6 million barrels of U.S. oil between November to January.

The rupee on Monday opened 8 paise lower at 71.31 against the US dollar amid rise in crude oil prices.

The domestic unit on Friday slipped by 7 paise to close at 71.23, pressured by heavy foreign capital outflows and firming oil prices.

The Enforcement Directorate on Saturday extended interim bail protection to businessman Robert Vadra till March 2. During the course of hearing today, the ED told the court that Vadra was not cooperating the officials in money laundering probe. Vadra’s counsel, however, denied the charge.

The ED counsel also said that Vadra is accompanied by a ‘baraat’ (procession) wherever he goes, whether to ED or to court. This comes days after ED grilled him in connection with a money laundering case and a land scam in Rajasthan’s Bikaner.

Former India cricketer Virender Sehwag on Saturday offered to bear the educational expenses of children of all the CRPF personnel martyred in the dastardly terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir’s Pulwama.

On Thursday, at least 40 CRPF paramilitary troopers were killed in a terror attack while several others are battling for their lives following what is being termed as the deadliest terrorist strike in three decades in the valley.

An all-party meeting called to discuss the Pulwama terror attack on a CRPF convoy killing 40 soldiers adopted a unanimous resolution to condemn terrorism and the support it is receiving from across the border.

The meeting, convened by Home Minister Rajnath Singh, was attended by Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma and Jyotiraditya Scindia of the Congress, Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Derek O’Brien of the Trinamool Congress, Sanjay Raut of the Shiv Sena, Jithendra Reddy of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi, D. Raja of the Communist Party of India, Farooq Abdullah of the National Conference, and Ram Vilas Paswan of the Lok Janshakti Party, among others.

The Supreme Court on Friday stayed the execution of death penalty against a school teacher, who was convicted for raping a four-year-old girl in Satna district of Madhya Pradesh in June last year. A bench comprising Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and justices L Nageswara Rao and Sanjiv Khanna stayed the execution of the death sentence of convict Mahendra Singh Gond, which was scheduled for March 2 in a Jabalpur jail. There shall be stay of execution of the death sentence of the petitioner, the bench said. According to the prosecution, the girl was so brutally assaulted that she had to spend months in the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Delhi to get her intestines realigned.

The Army has deployed nine security columns with air support in Jammu following massive protests over the terror attack in Pulwama in the Valley in which 40 CRPF personnel were killed, officials said.

Earlier, curfew was imposed in the city after stray incidents of violence and torching of vehicles.

Cash-starved Jet Airways plans to raise about Rs 2,500 crore through a rights issue. Its lenders are also looking at a debt-to-equity conversion.

While lenders may convert Rs 1,000 crore of debt into equity, they will also participate in the equity infusion through a rights issue as part of the deal. Additionally, promoter Naresh Goyal and Etihad Airways, which owns a 24 per cent stake in the airline, will infuse around Rs 2,000 crore into the airline, sources aware of the development said.

Reliance Jio continued to top the average 4G download speed chart, beating its nearest rival Airtel with almost double data speed, according to a report by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) for January.

Jio’s 4G network registered an average download speed of 18.8 megabits per second (Mbps), while Airtel network clocked a speed of 9.5 Mbps.

A post-blast analysis conducted by the National Security Guard at the scene of attack in Pulwama has established that the SUV driven by the suicide bomber was packed with RDX. A senior government official told The Hindu that preliminary investigations suggested that 100-150 kg of RDX was used in the attack on the CRPF convoy on Thursday. The official said samples had been collected for further forensic analysis.

Adil Ahmed Dar, the Jaish-e-Mohammad suicide bomber, rammed a bus in the convoy, killing 40 personnel near Pulwama, 30 km from Srinagar.

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