Amnesty International on Saturday condemned India's execution of a Kashmiri separatist over a deadly 2001 attack on parliament, saying his trial fell "considerably short" of international fair standards.

Mohammed Afzal Guru's execution also suggested a "disturbing" trend towards the resumption of death penalty use in India, said the global human rights group.

Tens of millions of Hindu pilgrims prepared to cleanse their sins with a plunge into the sacred river Ganges, ahead of the most auspicious day of the world's largest religious festival.

Some 30 million Hindu saints, devotees and visitors were expected to take part in the Kumbh Mela on Sunday -- considered the holiest of the 55-day festival -- in north India, police said.

Hundreds of protesters on Saturday rallied in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-administered Kashmir, to condemn the execution of a Kashmiri separatist in India.

Mohammed Afzal Guru, a one-time fruit merchant, was hanged at New Delhi's Tihar Jail early Saturday over his role in a deadly attack on the Indian parliament in 2001, after President Pranab Mukherjee rejected a mercy appeal.

A Kashmiri separatist convicted of involvement in a deadly 2001 attack on the Indian parliament was executed on Saturday in New Delhi -- triggering protests on both sides of the border in disputed Kashmir.

Hundreds of demonstrators rallied near the family home of Mohammed Afzal Guru in northern Indian Kashmir hours after authorities said he had been hanged.

Scores of women were dumped unconscious in a field after a mass sterilization in eastern India because there was no room in hospital for them to recuperate, medical officials said Thursday.

The women had all undergone surgical procedures at a hospital in the Malda district of West Bengal, around 360 kilometers (220 miles) north of Kolkata, which officials admitted was not equipped to accommodate such a large number of patients.

Child victims of sex assaults in India often find themselves humiliated by the police and mistreated by doctors when they pluck up the courage to report abuse, Human Rights Watch said Thursday.

In a report released amid continuing anger at the handling of sex cases in the wake of a deadly gang-rape in Delhi, the rights watchdog said the authorities had to become more sensitive towards victims.

India's defense minister said Wednesday that New Delhi was concerned by Pakistan's decision last month to transfer management of a strategically located deep-sea port to China.

"In one sentence, it is a matter of concern for us," A.K. Antony told reporters in Bangalore where he inaugurated the Indian air show. "My answer is very straigtforward and simple."

With German sausages, French duck breasts and homegrown chicken, Francis Menezes is cashing in on the growing appetite for meat among Indians -- even in one of Mumbai's most strictly vegetarian areas.

In the upmarket neighborhood of Malabar Hill, numerous shops, restaurants and even some apartment blocks remain meat-free.

An all-girl teenage rock band from Indian-administered Kashmir has decided to split after the region's top Muslim cleric declared their music to be "un-Islamic", their manager said Tuesday.

Pragaash, a three-piece group whose members are still in high school, had been the target of an online hate campaign ever since winning a "Battle of the Bands" contest in December.

Lawyers for a French consular official who has been charged with raping his three-year-old daughter in India have urged President Francois Hollande to intervene in the high-profile case.

The lawyers, who were due to meet Hollande on Monday, say Pascal Mazurier, who worked in France's consulate in Bangalore, has been the victim of an attempted framing by his estranged Indian wife.