Gurgaon : Its nearing midnight. Just outside the Last Chance, a nightclub in Sahara Mall, owner Sandeep Sharma has one eye on his watch and one on the door.

Its become a habit over the past week after a 19-year-old girl fell to her death from the third floor of MGF Mall. After the incident, police have been shutting bars here exactly at midnight, he says. Earlier, we would be open till even 4 and 5 am, and the main crowd would start entering around 12, he says. The steady stream of young executives, BPO workers getting off work late, and party-goers from Delhi, where excise rules are more strictly enforced, have all but vanished.

A group steps out of the elevator, and tries to enter the club only to be told by the bouncer, Well shut at 12. Theres just time for one last order. They hesitate, and check out nearby nightclubs there are three others on the floor but its the same story there, and at other malls in Gurgaon

New Delhi : Seven years after Jessica Lal was shot dead in a Delhi restaurant, Ajit Lal died last night without seeing his daughters killers brought to justice.

The 76-year-old had suffered a cerebral stroke in late March, a month after the mass acquittals in the murder case, and had been admitted to Kalyani Hospital at Gurgaon.

With his condition showing little improvement, his family was preparing to take him home when he passed away at 11.45 pm yesterday.

Jessicas mother May had died in 2000, a year after her daughters murder and within six months of a Delhi court granting bail to prime accused Manu Sharma.

After his wifes death, Lals health kept worsening, his friends said, and he suffered his first brain stroke in 2002. He went on to suffer another four, which badly affected his memory.

He was very fond of Jessica. I have known him for the last 50 years, since the time we worked for Lipton in Delhi, said friend .P. Gurwara.

New Delhi : Restaurant owner Ashok Rajput has admitted that he killed Sonish Javed in a Gurgaon mall, on the outskirts of the national capital, police said Monday.

After sustained interrogation, Rajput accepted his involvement in the murder, said a top police official without divulging details of the interrogation.

Sonish, a 22-year-old woman was found dead April 15 in MGF mall in Gurgaon, around 25 km from here. She was working as a marketing officer for Rajput, owner of the restaurants Sun City and Iceberg here.

GURGAON: Ashok Rajput, the prime accused in the Sonish Javed murder case, has denied that he had confessed to having committed the crime to the police. Speaking to Times City on Tuesday, Rajput alleged that the police made this claim on their own.

Rajput said: I havent confessed to the crime. I will not own it up before the magistrate. Sonish was my employee two years ago and she was invited to the party by Gurung who picked her up from the airport.

On the night of the party, I was informed by the bouncers that she had jumped. He added that he did not owe her Rs 1.5 lakh. Instead, he filed a complaint against her on charges of extortion at the R K Puram police statio

Chandigarh : The Haryana government today asserted that it was committed to the extension of metro link to Gurgaon and denied reports that it did not have any budget allocations for the project.

An official spokesman said the government had approved the extension of Delhi Metro to Gurgaon from Qutab Minar to IFFCO Chowk in June last year as per detailed project report prepared by Delhi Metro Railway Corporation Limited.

Accordingly, the funding pattern of the project as per Phase-II of Delhi-Metro was placed before the Haryana Cabinet which approved it. A provision was made for the project in the budget of 2005-06 and 2006-07, he said.

However, the DMRCL suggested another funding pattern on March 8, 2006 which was under consideration of the Haryana Government, he added.

New Delhi : Three persons were killed after the car of a Gurgaon businessman, allegedly drunk, ploughed into a pavement in Punjabi Bagh late last night.

Police said two others sleeping on the pavement were also seriously injured when the car spun out of control on Club Road at 1.40 am. Medical examination of the businessman, 29-year-old Amit Sharma, showed he was under heavy influence of liquor, they added. The deceased have been identified as Hira Lal (40), Himanshu (60) and Hemchand (40) while the seriously injured are Pratap (25) and Kishan (40). Police said they were all labourers working nearby.

Sharma, who runs a courier and cargo company near the IGI airport, lives in Gurgaon Sector 4. Police officials said that he was returning home after picking up a friend from the airport and dropping him to his house in Pitampura. Officers said Sharma did not flee from the spot and PCR officials alerted by a bystanders call arrested him. He has been charged with rash and negligent driving leading to death and has not been bailed out yet.

Shree Cement has expanded its capacity by setting up a 2 million ton per annum capacity cement grinding unit at Khushkhera, near Gurgaon in the National Capital Region (NCR) to meet strong cement demand there.

The foundation stone laying ceremony of the plant was done on April 15 at Khuskhera by H M Bangur, managing director of the company.

Shree Cement was one of the largest cement producers of northern India. Bangur said the project would involve investment of around Rs 100 crore and was expected to be completed by June 2007. The principal markets for this plant would be high-realisation areas like Delhi, parts of Haryana, western UP and Uttaranchal.

The Gurgaon police had a breakthrough in the shopping mall murder case in the capital.

Ashok Rajput, the main accused in the Gurgaon mall murder case has confessed his crime to the police.

On April 15, Rajput had pushed the victim Sonish Javed off the third floor at the MGF mall in Gurgaon.

Based on the testimony of Sonishs parents, the Gurgaon police had lodged an FIR against Rajput.

New Delhi : More than 185 highrise buildings and another 100 under construction, but only two fire stations. That, in short, is the fire safety situation in Gurgaon. But by mid-2007, Gurgaon will get another fire station at least for its DLF sites.

It will be a private fire station, the countrys first to be built by a property developer, says Delhis former fire department chief, S K Dheri. The DLF Group, which has a township spread over 3,000-3,500 acres in Gurgaon, with three operational shopping malls, 14 commercial towers and residential units housing some 8,000 families, is planning this fire station, adds Dheri, who is now the director of DLF Groups fire safety.

NEW DELHI : The Rs 550-crore Delhi-Gurgaon expressway is all set to be extended by three kilometres from the present 29 km with the inclusion of Dhaula Kuan in the network. The National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has invited proposals for consultancy services to prepare a feasibility study and detailed project report (DPR) for improvement and upgradation of Dhaula Kuan to Rao Tula Ram Marg, a three-km stretch of NH-8.

The proposals will have to be submitted by May 9, 2006, and the scope of work includes eight laning of the stretch. The Delhi-Gurgaon expressway, which is both six and eight laned, is expected to be completed by December 2006 — a year behind the schedule.