• The Monsoon Session gets over, but skies hardly clear up. Days after a Congress-led No-Trust motion is defeated by voice vote convincingly, the BJP gets an egg on the face as its allies rise up in arms over a proposed Bill to ban cow slaughter across the country. The last week sees the action as another controversial issue is shelved till the next session — that whether soft drinks made by global majors like Coke and Pepsi had pesticide residues. A JPC — interestingly, with more Opposition MPs than those from the Treasury Benches — led by Sharad Pawar is formulated to probe the issue. And for those inclined towards trivia, no, the Parliament canteen won’t serve Coke or Pepsi till the JPC exonerated them.• Scratch a scam and you get a boom. Regulatory authorities appeared miffed this week as the key Bombay Stock Exchange Sensex ended higher for the fifth straight day on Friday, nudged up by a few heavyweights amid profit-taking in the broader market. The 30-issue Sensex finished up 0.73 percent at 4,125.12, gaining 5.2 percent this week, its highest weekly gain since January 2002. • Suicide bombers ram trucks laden with explosives into the UN headquarters in Baghdad killing 25, among them Sergeo Viera de Mello, the Brazilian diplomat who was Kofi Annan’s special representative in Iraq. • Jerusalem explodes into streetfighting days as militant Palestinian groups and the Israeli Army junk the US-brokered roadmap. The two-month-old ceasefire between Israel and groups like Hamas and Islamic Jehad hits the first block when a Hamas activist blows himself up in a crowded bus in Jerusalem killing 20. The day after, Israel strikes back with a surgical strike in Gaza City that targets a car carrying Hamas’s third ranking political leader, Ismail Abu Shanab. • At times Indian hockey sticks to their goals. After a disappointing start in the Champions Trophy in which they went down to Holland, Australia and even Argentina, Dhanraj and his boys pack off a spirited Pakistani team. Yet the convincing 7-4 win won’t take them anywhere in Amstelveen. Lawn tennis fans are shocked by reports that Leander Paes has ben admitted to a US hospital with a brain leisure.
