New Delhi, Aug 3 (ANI): The funeral of veteran CPI (M) leader, Harkishan Singh Surjeet, will take place today at the Nigambodh Ghat at 5 p.m.

The funeral procession will start at 3 p.m. His body will be kept at the CPI (M) headquarters and people will be allowed to pay their last respects to the departed leader from 10 a.m.

Surjeet passed away on Friday. He was 92. 

He was admitted at the Metro Hospital in Noida where he was treated for respiratory problems. Earlier, he had slipped into coma.

New Delhi - At least 33 farm workers were killed and 17 hurt when an overloaded truck carrying them plunged into a small river in India's eastern state of Bihar, police said Sunday.

The accident occurred as the vehicle carrying 50 workers veered off a curve in the state's Lakhisarai district some 150 kilometers south-east of the state capital Patna on Saturday night.

A police spokesman said the workers were returning home to the nearby Khagaria district with sacks of food grain they earned as wages.

"The driver lost control of the truck as hit a pot-holed stretch of road near the curve, causing the vehicle to fall into the Gorhi river," Lakhisarai Superintendent of Police SP Shukla said by telephone.

New Delhi, Aug. 2: The Editors Guild of India has expressed shock at the pressure tactics being adopted by the Bharatiya Janata Party against CNN IBN Television channel.

Criticising BJP leader Venkaiah Naidu for declaring that his party would boycott CNN IBN, if the channel does not immediately telecast the tapes of the sting operation carried out in concert with the BJP MPs in New Delhi on Juy 22 in connection with the vote of confidence in the Lok Sabha, the Guild said: "The freedom of an editor to publish or telecast any news item cannot be subject to the approval or disapproval of a political party."

New Delhi, Aug 2 : Lok Sabha Speaker Somanth Chatterjee will leave for Kuala Lumpur today to attend the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) meeting.

The conference will witness a direct contest for the chairmanship of the Association between NRI industrialist Lord Swraj Paul and a Malaysian minister.

Paul, who is a Labour member of the British House of Lords, is pitted against Mohammed Shafie Apdal, Malaysia''s Minister for Unity and Culture.

New Delhi, August 1 : External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee today expressed deep sorrow at the demise of veteran Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) leader Harkishan Singh Surjeet.

He said while talking to ANI: “He was suffering from quite some time and was not in a position to communicate. I wanted to talk to him but he was hospitalized. He was doyen of Indian communist movement. Particularly Prime Minister, President and myself admitted that he was the architecture of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) left coalition, which was functioning well since the last four years."

New Delhi, August 1 : It is ironic that Harkishan Singh Surjeet, who was instrumental in ensuring the Left’s support to the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government, should pass away within a month of the death of UPA-Left alliance.

Surjeet, the 92-year-old CPM leader, was instrumental in forming a number of anti-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) coalitions in the 1990s and for ensuring Left support to the present UPA Government.