Markets have started off on a flat note with a negative bias because of weak mixed signals from the US and the Asian markets.

Later, Sensex went up into the positive zone and again dropped into the pessimistic zone to trade on a flat note.

With positive bias, second rung stocks also traded on a flat note.

While buying is seen in realty and metal stocks, selling pressure has emerged in IT counters.

Melbourne, Mar. 17: Australian software major Telstra has dumped scandal-ridden outsourcing partner Satyam from an applications support contract believed to be worth 32 million dollars a year.

EDS will pick up the embattled Indian outsourcing firm’s IT contracts with Telstra, sources told The Australian.

Telstra chief executive Sol Trujillo, who leaves the company on June 30, sat on the board of EDS before joining TELCO in 2005.

Washington, Mar 17: The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have been asked to release United Nations staff members and three children, who have been forcibly detained by them for the past one week.

"The LTTE does not respect any international law, or even the rights of human dignity. If the terrorists will kidnap United Nations workers and their family members, the world can better understand how they treat innocent Sri Lankan civilians who are trying desperately to flee the conflict zone and seek safety," Sri Lanka''s Ambassador to the US, Jaliya Wickramasuriya said in a statement released by the embassy on Monday.

New Delhi, Mar 17: United Progressive Alliance (UPA) allies Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) and Rashtriya Janata Dal have arrived at a seat-sharing formula for 40 Lok Sabha seats in Bihar on Tuesday.

The formal announcement is expected to be made later today at a joint press conference here.

According to sources, the Ram Vilas Paswan led-LJP will field its candidates in 12 constituencies. Talking to the reporters before the meeting with RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, Paswan indicated a climbdown in his party''s earlier stand on contesting either 16 seats or going alone in all forty seats in the state.

The RJD-LJP deal is likely to encourage the Congress to bargain for eight seats that it is demanding from Lalu.

London, Mar 17: Austrian incest fiend Josef Fritzl raped his daughter up to 3,000 times in his home-made dungeon, it has emerged.

Yesterday, the full horror of Fritzl’s vile crimes were laid bare in a courtroom.

Although he admitted imprisoning his daughter, Elisabeth, for 24 years and repeatedly raping her, he rejected murder charges.

A jury was also told that Elisabeth was forced to deliver her own babies in a rat-infested dungeon with nothing but a dog-eared book on pregnancy to help her, reports The Daily Star.

Washington, Mar 17: Porn star Jenna Jameson and her boyfriend of two years, Tito Ortiz, have become proud parents of twin boys.

"They're in very good health," her rep told Us magazine.