Maoist rebels blew up railway tracks in India's eastern states of Jharkhand and West Bengal Saturday at the start of a 24-hour strike they called to protest the arrests of some senior leaders, news reports said.

Tracks were blown up in the early hours of the morning in Chakradharpur area of Jharkhand and Purulia in West Bengal disrupting long-distance rail traffic on the Kolkata-Mumbai route, the PTI news agency reported.

In Jharkhand, Railway Police official Richard Lakra said the rebels had blown up 18 metres of rail track. "No one was injured," Lakra said.

India's Supreme Court agreed on Thursday to hear a challenge to a recent High Court decision which legalized homosexuality, the news agency PTI reported.

The High Court in Delhi on July 2 overturned a law dating from colonial times which outlawed homosexual practices, ruling that it was unconstitutional.

India's inflation rate fell to minus 1.61 per cent for the week that ended June 6, the first time deflation has registered in 32 years, official data showed Thursday. The wholesale price-linked inflation, which was at 0.13 per cent the previous week, last turned negative in 1977, according to data released by the federal Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

Indian markets rose by over 2 per cent for a second day Wednesday buoyed by positive Asian markets and the prospect of a return to fast-track economic growth.

The benchmark 30-share Sensex of the Bombay Stock Exchange hovered at 15,488 in afternoon trade, 2.39 per cent above its previous close.

India's economy can regain 9-per-cent annual growth rate levels even amid the global recession, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said Tuesday.

During a debate in parliament, Singh exuded confidence that the domestic economy will expand by at least 7 per cent during the current financial year.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Monday called for a "new beginning" at the opening session of the new Parliament, when the Congress Party-led coalition was to unveil its policy imperatives after winning the recent national elections.

IndiaN Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Wednesday named 59 new ministers, taking the total strength of his council of ministers to 78, days after the Congress party-led United Progressive Alliance won a decisive mandate in the country's national elections.

India's newly elected federal government Saturday named veteran Congress party leader Pranab Mukherjee as the country's new finance minister, amidst other key appointments. The appointment of Mukherjee comes at a time when Asia's third largest economy is facing millions of job losses and declining growth rates owing to the global economic downturn.