I have a very good debian system running for past 1 year.
from yesterday, whenever I try to install anything with apt-get install xxx,
it asks that following packages will be REMOVED
kernel-image-2.6.10
It happens with any package installation with apt-get....
Do I have broken apt-get or is it virus....or what happened to my system....?
I donot want to reinstall entire system again......

I doubt it is a virus can you show us the outpit of the commands apt-cache policy kernel-image-2.6.10 , apt-cache policy kernel-image- with the output of uname -r after the - and an actual install command eg apt-get -s install some_package where it tells you it is going to remove the kernel image. Oh and what are you running Sarge, SID ....?

I am booting with grub and kernel 2.6.10. I have never tried apt-get upgrade or dist-upgrade o this system....
My outputs are
#apt-cache policy kernel-image-2.6.10-1-686
kernel-image-2.6.10-1-686:
Installed: 2.6.10-6
Candidate: 2.6.10-6
Version Table:
*** 2.6.10-6 0
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

#apt-cache policy kernel-image-2.4.27-2-386
kernel-image-2.4.27-2-386:
Installed: 2.4.27-8
Candidate: 2.4.27-11
Version Table:
2.4.27-11 0
990 http://http.us.debian.org unstable/main Packages
2.4.27-10 0
500 http://http.us.debian.org stable/main Packages
*** 2.4.27-8 0
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
If I try to install kopete I get this
#apt-get install kopete
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
initrd-tools kernel-image-2.4.27-2-386 libc6 libc6-dev libgadu3 libxrender-dev libxrender1
locales render-dev
Suggested packages:
lilo kernel-doc-2.4.27 kernel-source-2.4.27 kernel-pcmcia-modules-2.4.27-2-386 glibc-doc
Recommended packages:
qca-tls
The following packages will be REMOVED:
kernel-image-2.6.10-1-686
The following packages will be upgraded:
initrd-tools kernel-image-2.4.27-2-386 kopete libc6 libc6-dev libgadu3 libxrender-dev
libxrender1 locales render-dev
10 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 to remove and 719 not upgraded.
Need to get 3939kB/26.7MB of archives.
After unpacking 44.0MB disk space will be freed.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] n
Abort.

Ok where did the 2.6.10 kernel come from I do not see any source in the apt-cache policy command? Anyways I assume that what to keep this kernel so do this use dpkg --get-selections > selections.txt now open the selections.txt file with an editor like vi as root then go down in the file until you get the kernel-image-2.6.10-1-686 install entry and change the install to hold in the line and save the file now use dpkg --set-selections < selections.txt to save the selections into the dpkg database and then use dselect update to update both the apt and dselect/dpkg databases now when you go to install packages it should not try to remove the kernel image because the package is on hold. BTW you should remove the entry for unstable from your sources list it going to cause you nothing but trouble at the moment as there is a major transition going on in the packages and from the looks of it in your install command it is trying to upgrade you to the version of libc6 from there which is not a good thing to be doing without upgrading the entire system.

Thanks for your tips. I followed those to change dselect options of putting kernel image 2.6.10 on hold. But no avail It gives me same errors again asking to remove kernel image. Is it that apt-get command line function id broken and if so how to reinstall apt-get functionality? Does it comes with prebuilt in kernel?

What version of Debian are you running? And what repositories are you using, stable, testing or ustable?

Where did the 2.6.10 kernel come from? The only place I have seen a 2.6.10 kernel in Debian was from a Knoppix or Kanotix install. I did a Kanotix install so I have the 2.4.7, 2.6.10, and I installed the 2.6.11-5-k7. You can choose which oe to use at boot.

Why just upgrade to the 2.6.11 kernel and get rid of the 2.4 and the 2.6.10?

I had this same problem, and here is what i found when i asked aptitude about the conflicts

all the kernels depended on initrd-tools, but if you have an early version it conflicts with the newer libc6. So
installing anything which depeneds on the new libc6 will call for the deinstall of initrd-tools, which the kernel packages need. So out they go, unless you head it off at the pass and just apt-get install initrd-tools, which in my case solved the anti-intuitve remove cycle. Upgrading initrd-tools and allows me to install the new libc6, and thus any software depending on it.

hope that helps

-dan