European politicians leery of Google's inescapable presence on the Internet may propose that EU regulators break up the company. The European Parliament is considering a draft motion that, while having no direct effect, may recommend that course of action to the continent's antitrust powers, Reuters and theFinancial Times reported Friday. Google has been under investigation for anticompetitive business tactics for some time in Europe. Reuters quoted a section of the draft motion saying that legislation "unbundling search engines from other commercial services" should be considered by the European Commission, the Euopean Union's actual lawmaking body. Critics of Google allege that the company uses its effective monopoly on search to advance its other products, such as Gmail and Google+, while stifling competitors by assigning them lower priority in results. Divorcing search functionality from Google's other businesses, as suggested in the parliamentary motion, would force results to be more objective. The motion is still in draft form, however, and has yet to be proposed, let alone voted on. Google declined to comment to NBC News on the motion.
The deadline given by the Haryana police to controversial 'godman' Rampal to surrender and his followers to vacate his ashram has ended. Police said that water and electricity connection to the ashram have been cut off. TV reports on Wednesday morning said that Rampal’s supporters were using women and children inside the ashram as human shields. Armed devotees on Tuesday tried to hold off the police, attacking them with acid pouches, sticks and stones. Petrol bombs were also allegedly also thrown at the police. The police had called off their search till Wednesday saying the ashram is built like a maze with deadly traps set up. Violent clashes broke out at the ashram in Haryana with police lobbing teargas shells and resorting to lathicharge to disperse his supporters who allegedly fired back, leaving over 100 persons, including security and media personnel, injured. Tension mounted as supporters of Rampal refused to heed to repeated announcements by the police over loud speaker
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