Titanic dead buried at sea in haunting photo made public for the first time

Bodies stacked high in bags, a mass funeral is held for dozens of Titanic victims before they are buried at sea.

The haunting photo was taken days after the ship hit an iceberg on April 15, 1912, but has just been made public.

It is now set to fetch £5,000 at auction.

In the rare snap, two men can be seen dropping a victim over the side of body recovery ship the Mackay Bennett.

The boat Rev Hind leads the service as the solemn crew look on.

Some 1,522 people died and auctioneer Andrew Aldridge said: “This picture blows away the myth the burials were dignified.”

Henry Aldridge & Son will auction the photo on October 19 in Devizes, Wilts.

Malala Yousafzai honoured at Harvard for humanitarian work

London: The Taliban is afraid of women's power and the power of education, said Pakistani teenager activist Malala Yousafzai as she has been honoured by the prestigious Harvard University.

Yousafzai, 16, an outspoken proponent for girls' education who survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban, was at Harvard on Friday to accept the 2013 Peter J Gomes humanitarian award.

Harvard president Drew Gilpin Faust said she was pleased to welcome Malala because of their shared interest in education.

Malala was shot in the head last October. Militants said she was attacked because she criticized the Taliban, not because of her views on education.

"The so-called Taliban were afraid of women's power and were afraid of the power of education," Malala told hundreds of students, faculty members and well-wishers who packed Harvard's ornate Sanders Theater for the award ceremony.

According to a report in the Guardian, the teenage activist said she hopes to become a politician because politicians can have influence on a broad scale.

She spoke nostalgically about her home region, the Swat valley, and said she hopes to return someday.

She called it a "paradise" but described a dangerous area where militants blew up dozens of schools and sought to discourage girls from going to school by snatching pens from their hands.

Students, she said, reacted by hiding their books under their shawls so that people wouldn't know they were going to school.

Malala highlighted the fact that very few people spoke out against what was happening in her home region.

"Although few people spoke, but the voice for peace and education was powerful," she said.

Malala also described waking up in a UK hospital, where she was taken for emergency treatment following the assassination attempt in Pakistan.

"And when I was in Birmingham, I didn't know where I was, I didn't know where my parents are, I didn't know who has shot me and I had no idea what was happening," she said. "But I thank God that I'm alive."

The chairman of the Norwegian Nobel peace prize committee, Thorbjorn Jagland, paid a special tribute to Malala in a message read publicly during her award ceremony.

"Your courage," Jagland said in the tribute, "is sending a strong message to women to stand up for their rights, which constitutes a precondition for peace."

Asia Cup hockey: Indian women lose to Korea in semis, World Cup dreams end

India's dreams of earning a World Cup hockey berth were shattered when they lost 2-1 in a semifinal match of the 8th women's Asia Cup championship in Kuala Lumpur on Thursday. The Koreans scored both their goals in the first half. Ritu Rani (in pic) pulled one back for India soon after halftime, but the Koreans held on to their slender lead. China and Japan will play the second semifinal. (India vs Korea match highlights)

The Koreans, who had scored 31 goals in their three group matches, were on the offensive from the start and scored both their goals in the first 10 minutes. The goals came from penalty corner conversions.

Korea took a 1-0 lead in the second minute of the match. Cheon Seul Ki converted the first penalty corner the Koreans earned. Twenty-four-year-old Cheon Seul Ki  is a veteran of 71 international matches and one of the best dragflickers in Asia. Korea make it 2-0 in the ninth minute. Cheon Eun Bi, who has played 43 matches for Korea, made no mistake.

The prolific Ritu Rani, who scored seven goals in India's first match against Hong Kong China, scored in the 41st minute. She converted a penalty corner. But the Koreans held on to their slender lead to shut the door on the Indians.

Earlier this week, India claimed a hard-fought 2-0 win against Malaysia, with Poonam Rani and Lily Chanu Mayengbam both scoring crucial second half goals. The result sealed a second place finish in Pool A behind China.

Korea continued their superb run of form with a blistering 16-2 win against Chinese Taipei to seal their place at the top of Pool B, while Japan confirmed their place in the competition semifinals with a thoroughly convincing 12-0 drubbing of Kazakhstan.

Sultan of Johor Cup hockey: India dismiss Pakistan 4-0, eye berth in final

In a dazzling second-half show, India whipped arch-rivals Pakistan 4-0 in a round-robin league match of the invitational under-21 Sultan of Johor Cup hockey tournament in Johor Bahru, Malaysia on Wednesday. Sukhmanjit Singh (38th and 46th), Imran Khan (45th) and Ramandeep Singh (61st) scored for India in what turned out to be a totally one-sided contest. The teams were locked 0-0 at half-time.

This was India's third straight win while Pakistan lost their first game in three outings. India and Malaysia are level on points (nine from three wins each) but the hosts are No. 1 in the six-team championship with a better goal-difference. India play Korea while Pakistan and Malaysia lock horns in key games on Thursday. A win against Korea should ensure India a spot in Sunday's final.

"It was a great performance from the players and I am both happy and proud. The players played to instructions, not falling into playing the pace of our opponents in the first half," said Indian team manager Baljit Singh Saini, who coached the team last year.

"The win was as a result of the ability of the players to finish off the chances created and this augurs well for our quest to make the final," the former Olympian added.

India looked a galvanized lot after the breather. Sukhmanjit scored in the 38th minute from India's second penalty corner of the game after his first-half effort hit the woodwork. It was a crisp finish after the Indians employed an indirect set-piece.

Imran's 45th minute field goal showed the Pakistan defence in poor light and after Sukhmanjit converted a stroke in the 46th, the Pakistanis looked completely gutted. Unlike the Indians, the Pakistanis had experience in their team but they looked completely out of sorts.

The hard-working Ramandeep Singh completed the rout in the 61st minute. It was a brilliant field goal and the best of the match. Imran and Mohammed Amir Khan set up Ramandeep with a simple finish after a sizzling move down the centre left the Pakistanis gasping.

With Pakistan making very little effort to hit back, India defended easily and even changed goalkeepers. India struggled to beat Argentina and England in their opening games but they looked good in a big game like Pakistan.

China to execute parking-row toddler killer

A court in China has sentenced a man to death for killing a two-year-old girl in Beijing over a parking space row, state media report.

Han Lei, 39, pulled the toddler out of her pram and threw her to the ground after her mother refused to make way for his car in July.

He fled the scene but was captured. The girl later died from her injuries.

He said the killing was unintentional, as he was drunk and had thought the pram was a shopping trolley.
"I did not know there was an infant inside," he previously said.

The case has provoked an outcry in China, with many people expressing their anger online, state media reported.

Many in China were shocked that an argument over a parking space could come to such a violent end, says the BBC's Martin Patience in Beijing.

The trial started on 16 September at the Beijing No 1 Intermediate People's Court.

Prosecutors had recommended the death sentence for Han, who committed the crime within a year of being released from prison, the Xinhua news agency said.

Han also beat the girl's mother during the altercation in Beijing's Daxing district.

Another man, Li Ming, who drove Han away from the scene, has been jailed for five years.

Ramandeep Singh stars as India register second win in Johor Cup

Johot Bahru, Malaysia:  A fighting India rode on Ramandeep Singh's brace to eke out a come-from-behind 3-2 triumph over Argentina and register their second consecutive win in the Sultan of Johor Cup Under-21 hockey tournament, here on Monday.

India trailed for a large part of the match but Ramandeep (60th, 62nd) found his scoring touch when it mattered the most and netted two field goals in final 10 minutes to turn the game in his side's favour.

Vice-captain Affan Yousuf (23rd) was the other goal-getter for India, while Isidoro Carlos Ibarra (16th, 42nd) scored both the goals for the mighty Argentines.

With two wins from as many games, India have consolidated their position in the league standings alongside arch-rivals Pakistan on six points apiece.

India had defeated England 2-1 in their tournament-opener yesterday.

Argentina, on the other hand, slumped to their second straight defeat after having lost 2-4 to hosts Malaysia yesterday.

Despite the win, it was a poor performance from the Indians who seemed lost in the midfield and lacked firepower and sting upfront.

Argentina drew the first blood in the 16th minute when Ibarra converted a penalty corner with precision that beat Indian custodian Harlot Singh all ends up. But the South American side's joy was shortlived as India drew parity seven minutes later when Affan Yusof scored with a reverse hit after some slick stickwork in the semi-circle.

Argentina restored their lead seven minutes into the second half from a penalty stroke which was awarded after Ibarra's flick from the Pan American champion's second penalty corner hit Indian skipper Manpreet Singh on the foot.

Ibarra stepped up to take the stroke and made no mistake from the spot to hand Argentina a 2-1 lead.

Thereafter, the Indians toiled hard for goals but their fowardline continued to disappoint the side.

Luck finally smiled on the Indians in the 60th minute when Ramandeep scored the equaliser from a goal-mouth melee with the ball bouncing off the Argentina keeper's pads into the net.

And two minutes later, Ramdeep was once again in the thick of things as he cleverly deflected in at the far post to score the winner for India.

After a rest day, India will play arch-rivals Pakistan in their next round-robin match on Wednesday.

Ishrat Jahan case: CBI questions Narendra Modi's minister, another summoned

Ahmedabad: Two ministers in Narendra Modi's Gujarat government are among four people to be questioned in connection with the Ishrat Jahan encounter case.

The Central Bureau of Investigation today questioned Gujarat Law Minister Pradeep Singh Jadeja at an undisclosed location, said sources. The agency has also summoned Education Minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama over audio tapes of a meeting in 2011, on which voices purportedly belonging to ministers and officials of the state government discuss derailing investigations into the killing of 19-year-old college student Ishrat Jahan in 2004.

Advocate General Kamal Trivedi, in whose office the meeting was allegedly held, has also been summoned, along with former state minister, Praful Patel.

In that meeting, the ministers and officials allegedly discussed ways to discredit the Special Investigation Team's probe into the killings.

The CBI has already questioned two officials who attended the meeting, AK Sharma and GC Murmu.

Ishrat was shot along with three men on the outskirts of Ahmedabad in 2004, by the Crime Branch of the Gujarat Police, which claimed that all four were terrorists involved in a plot to kill Narendra Modi.

The CBI in its chargesheet in July said seven cops had shot the group "in cold blood" and destroyed evidence.

One of the accused policemen, senior IPS officer DG Vanzara, recently submitted his resignation accusing the Modi government of using cops to promote their agenda and then abandoning them. Vanzara said policemen like him had acted in compliance with a conscious policy of the Modi government.