DAYTON, Ohio — In a surprise move, Senator John McCain announced here Friday that he had chosen Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska as his running mate, shaking up the political world at a time when his campaign has been trying to attract women, especially disaffected supporters of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Forgive some of the 84,000 people amassed at Invesco Field Thursday if their thumbs are a bit weary by the time Barack Obama takes the stage for a triumphant acceptance of his presidential nomination.

Amritsar, Quoting verses from Gurbani: “Pawan guru pani pita, mata dhart mahat (air is tutor, water the father and earth is mother), Harsimrat Kaur Badal, wife of SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal today distributed neem and fruit saplings, sprinkled with water of the holy Sarovar, among newly wed couples and girls as “parsad” at the Golden Temple here today.

New Delhi (PTI): A group of Christian organisations on Thursday asked UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi to advice the government to send army units to Orissa to maintain law and order in the wake of attacks on the minority community in the state.

Islamabad, Legendary Urdu poet Ahmed Faraz, a passionate proponent of progress and democracy in Pakistan, has died after a prolonged illness at 77.

Kolkata, On the eve of Mamata Banerjee’s indefinite sit-in demonstrations in front of the Tata Motors’ plant at Singur, Tata group chairman Ratan Tata today threatened that they would move out from Singur if the project continued to be dogged by political opposition and violence.

Mumbai (PTI): The team of “Bachna Ae Haseeno” is overwhelmed by the response the film has got from the audience and said the “hard work of the unit has really paid off”.

Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf, the dictator who reinvented himself as a U.S. ally against terrorism, resigned to avoid facing impeachment charges for illegally seizing power and mishandling the economy.

An intensely private man, Abhinav Bindra is still struggling to come to terms with his newfound status as India’s Golden Boy. In his first blog entry after winning an Olympic gold medal in Beijing, Abhinav admits ‘it has all still not sunk in’.

NEW YORK: Justice Anup Singh Choudry was sworn in as the first Sikh High Court Judge in Uganda on May 2. At the swearing in ceremony that took place at the State House Entebbe before the President of Uganda, His Excellency Yoweri Museweni and before the Chief Justice of Uganda Bejamin Odoki.