DEHLAN, July 24: Protests broke out on Friday in the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh - home to two of three Indian truck drivers taken hostage by militants in Iraq - as demonstrators agitated against New Delhi's alleged lack of action to secure their release.

The protestors were also infuriated by Foreign Minister Natwar Singh's statement on Friday when he said he didn't want to give "false hopes" about the fate of the three men.

The Indian hostages, along with three Kenyans and an Egyptian, are being held by an Iraqi group calling itself Black Flags.

The militants have been demanding the Kuwait and Gulf Link Transport firm for which the men worked wind up its operations in Iraq or they would behead the men one by one after a deadline that expired at 1600 GMT (9pm PST) on Saturday.

In Dehlan village, home of hostage Antaryami, there was little cheer as officials announced the militants had extended their deadline by another 48 hours.

On Friday, the group made another demand seeking "payment of damages to families of victims of Fallujah and the release of Iraqi detainees from American and Kuwaiti prisons".

In Dehlan hundreds of college students came out on the streets to press New Delhi to secure Antaryami's safe release.

But his wife stayed at home and prayed.

"I don't believe in protests. I am appealing to this group, to the Iraqis and to the Indian government to return my husband," said Kusum Lata in Dehlan, some 430 kilometres north of New Delhi.

"I want nothing. Keep his money. Just send him back alive," the 26-year-old housewife and mother of a 11-year-old girl said.

"My husband is a decent man. He didn't go to Iraq looking for riches. He just wanted to see foreign countries. What has he done to you? I beg you, send him home," she pleaded. -AFP