India

In a standoff between farmers from India's northern breadbasket and the government that has convulsed the country, the farmers have a 21st-century ally: a handful of supporters scattered around the world running a Twitter handle.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) -India's federal territory of Jammu and Kashmir plans to attract investments worth up to $4 billion in the next two to three years and would provide security to businesses setting up shop in the insurgency-hit region, its chief said on Saturday.

Talks between India and China have yet to make headway to end a standoff on a disputed section of their Himalayan border, India's defence minister said on Wednesday, as thousands of troops from both sides faced a freezing winter in the mountains.

Indian security forces said they killed three militants in Kashmir's main city, Srinagar, on Wednesday after a gun battle, but families of the dead men said they were innocent.

India is likely to spend more next fiscal year than this year's budgeted $415 billion and prioritise infrastructure projects, relying on asset sales of around $40 billion for some of the funding, two people with knowledge of the plan told Reuters.

Over 100 retired senior civil servants and diplomats urged the Hindu nationalist leader of Uttar Pradesh state to repeal a new law criminalising forced religious conversion of brides, warning in an open letter that it risked fuelling communal tensions.

Lawmakers in a central Indian state controlled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist party approved legislation on Tuesday that would make pressuring a woman to convert to their husband's religion a crime punishable with imprisonment.

India on Tuesday sought public comment on a proposal to make airbags mandatory for the front passenger in all cars from next year, in a move that could raise costs for automakers slowly seeing a revival in demand.

India's major grain-growing state of Punjab on Monday asked police to crack down on farmers and sympathisers vandalising telecommunication masts as they intensify their weeks-long protests against farm deregulation.