kolkatta building fire claims 16 lives.

The devastating blaze that swept through three floors of a 150-year-old multi-storeyed building in Kolkata has claimed at least 16 lives with fire brigade personnel recovering 10 charred bodies from the sixth floor of the ill-fate structure late tonight, officials said.

While six persons died either by jumping from the burning floors of the building, 'Stephen Court', or sustaining burns during the day, 10 charred bodies were found late Tuesday night, fire brigade sources told PTI.

"Firemen were conducting routine checks whether the fire has been totally doused when they first found four bodies lying on the sixth floor. Then, six more bodies were spotted on the same floor," the sources said.

Ernst & Young on how the Budget 2010 will affect individuals and businesses.

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee took the first step towards implementation of the Direct Taxes Code (DTC) on Friday. While retaining the basic exemption limits for all income levels (as in the DTC), he increased the other slabs.

For instance, while the basic exemption limit for individuals has been retained at Rs 1.6 lakh, the 10 per cent rate will now be applicable for the Rs 1.6 lakh-Rs 5 lakh bracket. Earlier, the 10 per cent rate was applicable for income of Rs 1.6-Rs 3 lakh. The hike in the slab means that the taxpayer is going to save Rs 20,600 for incomes up to Rs 5 lakh.

Further, he has also increased the limit for the next income slab -- that is, the 20 per cent tax rate will be applicable for incomes of Rs 5 lakh-Rs 8 lakh instead of Rs 3 lakh-Rs 5 lakh. And the highest rate of 30 per cent will be applicable on incomes of over Rs 8 lakh (earlier Rs 5 lakh).

The maximum benefit that will come because of the increase in slabs would be Rs 51,500. "With the consumer inflation index rising at 14.97 per cent (December-end), this move will help reduce some of the burden by leaving more cash at the individual's hands," said a financial planner.

I don't believe in too many team meetings: Ganguly

MUMBAI: Kolkata Knight Riders skipper Sourav Ganguly believes in giving freedom to players and is not a great supporter of too many team meetings.

"I'm a believer of execution and I'm not a firm believer of too many team meetings and too many ideas," the former India skipper said on the eve of Kolkata Knight Riders' Indian Premier League clash against defending champions Deccan Chargers.

"You have to let the player play to his strength. Everybody has his strength. They have been successful so far with the way they have played.

The Bengal stalwart, India's most successful captain in Test history, was not prepared to dwell on the first two years of IPL when KKR did precious little of note and was confident this time they would deliver the goods.

"I'm not too keen on talking about what's in the past. It's a very new setup for us at the KKR. We tried and got our team. (We) have done extra work in terms of preparations and players. Hopefully we will deliver this time," Ganguly said.

The Bengal stalwart said the atmosphere in the team was good and the players were enjoying themselves.

"It's all about delivering at the big stage. It's all about delivering in the middle for all teams in the world, all teams in the competition. It's the same for us. We have a good atmosphere in the team. We're enjoying ourselves and hopefully, as I said, we will deliver," he remarked.

Ganguly said the team would miss the services of West Indian Chris Gayle and New Zealander Brendon McCullum for some matches as they were busy with their national commitments but the team had other good international players to fill in.

"We have good players in (Brad) Hodge, (Owais) Shah, Angelo Mathews. Obviously we will miss McCullum and Gayle. But we will wait for them. Gayle should be here very shortly."

He pointed out that all the other teams were facing the same handicap in the first week and things would improve later.

"Lots of the teams don't have their key players. It's going to happen in the first week of the tournament and hopefully things will settle down," he said.

Ganguly hoped his team would win most of the matches in the first week to gain the much-needed momentum in the race for the semi-final spots.

There was a fitness concern over speedster Ajit Agarkar and it will be known, on Friday, whether he can play, Ganguly said. "Yes, there's a fitness issue over Ajit. We will deal with it tomorrow," he said.

The former national skipper was full of praise for the role of Pakistan great Wasim Akram in working with his team's bowling department. Asked about the impact the ex-Pakistan captain had on his team he said, "Great impact".

"He's working with the bowlers. Our bowling department is very well looked after. Hopefully we can get some runs on the board," he said.

Elaborating he said, "We have lot of good quicks in our team who can actually go and play for India at some stage. Ishant (Sharma) is already playing for India. (Ashok) Dinda has played a game. He's in the reckoning.

"We got Varun Aaron. Once he's fit and once we get him on the park, he bowls (at) nearly 90 miles an hour. He's a bright prospect," he remarked.

Ganguly was non-committal about opening the innings, saying there were other contenders too.

"We will see. We have other contenders We will try and get the best combination on the park.

He said T20 was mostly about execution and hoped his team would do it well. "This game is all about execution, it's 10 per cent planning and 90 per cent execution and hopefully we will do that properly."

Ganguly did not see any problem in getting motivated to play in IPL after having quit international cricket more than a year ago.

"It may not be a tournament of countries but you have so many international players trying to do well. It's a very competitive tournament and the performances here get noted. Motivation is not an issue," he said.

The former India skipper welcomed Afghanistan's entry through the qualifying rounds into the World T20 Championship in the West Indies but wanted them as well as Bangladesh and Zimbabwe to concentrate in becoming good Test teams.

"It's good they (Afghanistan) have qualified for World Cup, but I would like to see Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe become strong Test sides because that's the best form of the game.

"This (T20) is also an equally good form of the game but I would be more happy to see all those three teams become very good Test teams," he said.

Team coach Dav Whatmore saw IPL as challenge for himself. "It (challenge) ranks up there with everything else. It's a totally different ball game from other forms of the game. That's another format of the game you like to be successful in as a player or coach," he commented.

India 'close friend' but Pak 'conjoined twin', says Afghanistan

ISLAMABAD: In a delicate balancing act, President Hamid Karzai on Thursday described India as a "close friend" while referring to Pakistan and Afghanistan as "conjoined twins."

In remarks apparently aimed at assuaging Pakistan's concerns about the Indian presence in Afghanistan, Karzai said his country would never allow its soil to be used for activities directed against any of its neighbours.

"India is a close friend of Afghanistan but Pakistan is a twin brother of Afghanistan. We are more than twins, we are conjoined twins. There is no separation, there cannot be a separation," he said in response to a question during a joint news conference with Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani.

At the same time, Karzai, who was here on a two-day visit, made it clear that India and Afghanistan have "very close friendly relations."

Noting that he had provided details of the cooperation between the two countries to Gilani, Karzai said: "India has gone out of its way to help Afghanistan with reconstruction and to offer Afghan youth education in India."

"Afghanistan will not allow its territory to be used against any one of our neighbours, in particular against Pakistan. And we hope the same will reflect towards Afghanistan that Pakistani territory will not be used against Afghanistan," Karzai said.

Pakistan's top leadership, including Gilani and Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, have often spoken of concerns related to India's presence in Afghanistan.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik has alleged that Indian elements were directing terror attacks on Pakistan from Afghanistan.

However, Karzai said Afghanistan would act "if there is any information of any country, not only India, using Afghan territory against a neighbour."

He also said Pakistan should be aware that there cannot be peace and stability within its territory "without a stable and peaceful Afghanistan."

"The bottom line is that Afghanistan does not want any proxy wars on its territory. It does not want a proxy war between India and Pakistan (or) between Iran and the US.

"It does not want any big or small country, neighbour or far, to engage in any activity against another nation in Afghanistan," Karzai said.

In response to a question, Gilani acknowledged that he and Karzai had discussed Afghanistan's demand for the handing over of senior Afghan-Taliban leaders recently arrested in Pakistan, including Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the deputy of Taliban chief Mullah Muhammad Omar

Gilani said Pakistan is yet to decide on Afghanistan's demand. "We have our own judiciary and they are quite active. We are looking into the (matter) and consulting legal experts too. We will sit with them and discuss about it and get back to (Karzai)," Gilani said.

Pakistan's offer to train the Afghan army and police was discussed during the Afghan President's meeting with his counterpart Asif Ali Zardari yesterday, Karzai said.

"There were a range of offers made to Afghanistan, some of which are new to us, some of which our Defence Minister already had information about. We will continue to talk about these issues," he said.

Karzai said Afghanistan had accepted some of Pakistan's offers for military cooperation, including the "supply of ammunition and some equipment."

He said there would be more detailed discussions between the two governments on "further steps."

The Afghan President, who was visiting Pakistan for the first time since his re-election, said while replying to a question on the reconciliation process in his country that the "Taliban are really a factor in the whole of the region."

The Taliban's role in the process of reintegration and reconciliation in Afghanistan was discussed with the Pakistani leadership, Karzai said.

The two sides also discussed the "extremely significant role" of Saudi Arabia in this process, he said.

Karzai said he had informed the Pakistani leaders about the details of Afghanistan's request to Saudi Arabia to "participate in facilitating peace and stability" in the country and the region.

Besides Zardari and Gilani, Karzai met the powerful army chief, Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani