Breaking News, May 19 | LIVE UPDATES

Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Thursday congratulated Nikhat Zareen for bagging gold at the Women's World Boxing Championship 2022.

Two Haryana policemen were injured on Thursday when a man, who allegedly had a property dispute with his brother, opened fire when the cops had reached there after getting information about a fight between the two siblings, police said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday congratulated boxer Nikhat Zareen for clinching the coveted gold in flyweight (52kg) division at the Women's World Championship, and said Indian pugilists had made the people of the country proud.

Bank employees are again on the warpath with several major unions of different banks threatening to go on a one or two-day strike on May end, activists said on Thursday.

Fears about rising prices and slowing economies have spread to the UK and European stock markets following sharp falls in the US and Asia. 

An 18-year-old woman was found dead on Velsao beach in South Goa on Thursday afternoon and police suspect that she was allegedly murdered.

As the Ukraine conflict impacts the global GDP, India is projected to grow by 6.4 percent in 2022, slower than the last year’s 8.8 percent but still the fastest-growing major economy, with higher inflationary pressures and uneven recovery of the labor market curbing private consumption and investment, according to a UN report.

The illegal lottery business is thriving in Tamil Nadu despite the ban affected in 2003 and the claims by the state government that gambling will be strictly checked.

A 55-year-old man was beaten to death allegedly by two people over a petty issue in the Mansarover area of Jaipur, police said on Thursday.

Tamil Nadu on Thursday recorded 42 fresh COVID-19 cases, taking the cumulative infections in the state to 34,54,764. Twenty-seven men and 15 women in the state tested positive for the RT-PCR test today, according to a bulletin from the state health department here. The toll, however, remained unchanged at 38,025.

A newly approved skin test for tuberculosis diagnosis will soon be introduced in the country, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said on Thursday, underlining that the cost-effective kit made in India will be of immense benefit to other high burden countries as well.

Akasa Air's launch of services is likely to be delayed further as the airline is expected to receive its first aircraft only in June or July, according to a senior DGCA official.

Two tiger cubs that got injured after stones were pelted at them by villagers in Madhya Pradesh' Seoni district have been rescued by forest officials and shifted to a veterinary hospital in the Kanha Tiger Reserve.

A special CBI court in the city on Thursday said Indrani Mukerjea, the prime accused in the murder of her daughter Sheena Bora, can walk out on bail after furnishing a bond of Rs 2 lakh as it finalised her bail conditions.

Three members of an interstate gang have been arrested after a brief exchange of fire in Delhi's Wazirabad area, police said on Thursday. The three men are sharpshooters of the Tillu Tajpuria - Parvesh Mann - Neeraj Bawana gang, they said, adding that the trio was planning a "big attack" against their rivals and their families.

The Assam Police has issued an advisory to Oil India Ltd (OIL) and ONGC regarding probable subversive activities by banned ULFA(I) militants on their installations in the state as well as their employees, officials said on Thursday.

The Calcutta High court on Thursday directed West Bengal Minister of State for Education Paresh Chandra Adhikari to appear before the CBI soon after he lands here this evening for questioning in connection with a case of alleged illegal appointment of his daughter as a teacher in a state government-aided school.

A fire broke out in a forest near the Majnu Ki Tilla area in north Delhi on Thursday, officials said. The fire department received information about the blaze at 2.42 pm, they said. Three fire tenders are working at the spot to douse the blaze, officials said.

Pre-owned e-commerce platform CARS24 on Thursday said that around 600 employees have been let go based on their poor performance and not owing to any cost cuts.

A Varanasi court hearing the Gyanvapi-Shringar Gauri case on Thursday posted the matter to May 23 for the next hearing. Both the parties filed their objections and counter-objections on Thursday. In view of the Supreme Court's order to the lower court not to proceed with the matter till Friday, it fixed May 23 for the next hearing, Madan Mohan Yadav, the lawyer representing the Hindu side, said.

Veteran industrialist Ratan Tata and Tata Sons on Thursday welcomed the Supreme Court's dismissal of a plea of the Sapoorji Pallonji (SP) group seeking a review of the verdict that upheld the Tata group's removal of Cyrus Mistry as Chairman of Tata Sons.

Sri Lankan police on Thursday questioned three more members of the ruling SLPP parliamentary group over the violent clashes between anti- and pro-government protesters in the country that killed at least 10 people and injured over 200 others. On May 9, violence erupted in Sri Lanka after supporters of former prime minister Mahinda Rajapaksa attacked peaceful anti-government protesters demanding his ouster over the country’s worst economic crisis that led to acute shortages of staple food, fuel and power.

READ FULL STORY HERE

Kendra Sahitya Akademi award recipient and noted literary figure D S Nagabhushan died at his residence here during the early hours of Thursday. According to sources close to the family, the 70-year old was suffering from ill health and died of a heart attack. He is survived by his wife Savitha Nagabhushan, also a literary figure.

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has praised the country's military for ending the brutal conflict with the LTTE in 2009 and ushering in peace through a “humanitarian operation”, saying there was no hatred, anger or revenge involved in the nearly three-decade-long civil war. In a statement issued to mark the War Heroes Day on Wednesday, Rajapaksa, who is also the defence minister, asserted that the armed forces, who “safeguarded the freedom and territorial integrity” of the country will never be forgotten, under any circumstances.

A day after resigning from the Congress, Patidar leader Hardik Patel on Thursday said he has not taken any decision yet on joining any other party, be it the ruling BJP in Gujarat or the new entrant AAP.

Braving the scorching sun, people turned up in large numbers on Thursday morning to cast their votes in the second phase of panchayat polls in Jharkhand, officials said. Polling started at 7 am in 10,614 booths across 50 blocks in 16 districts, they said. In the second phase, around 38.82 lakh voters are eligible to exercise their franchise. Till 9 am, 18.04 per cent voter turnout was recorded. Polling is underway peacefully in all the districts amid tight security, officials said.

Two men were killed here after their motorcycle was hit by a double-decker bus carrying a marriage party, police said on Thursday. The incident happened Wednesday night near a village under the Sadar Kotwali police station in the district, they said. The deceased have been identified as Ramanand (28) and Prem Singh (29), residents of Barwara village, Shivrampur police outpost in-charge Rakesh Maurya said. The bodies have been sent for a post-mortem and the bus impounded, he said. The two men were riding the motorcycle without helmets, he added. 

The Supreme Court on Thursday granted interim bail to jailed Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan in a cheating case. A bench headed by Justice L Nageswara Rao invoked its special power under Article 142 of the Constitution to grant relief to Khan in view of the peculiar facts of the case. The apex court said the interim bail will operate till the court decides the application for regular bail. "This is a fit case to exercise the powers under Article 142," the bench, also comprising Justices B R Gavai and A S Bopanna, said. Khan is presently lodged in Sitapur jail in connection with a number of cases, including that of land grabbing, against him in Rampur. 

With the arrest of four terrorists and an overground worker of Lashkar-e-Toiba, police on Thursday claimed to have solved the grenade attack case on a liquor shop in Baramulla district of Jammu and Kashmir. Five pistols and 23 grenades were recovered from the arrested terrorists.

As the Ukraine conflict impacts the global GDP, India is projected to grow by 6.4 per cent in 2022, slower than the last year’s 8.8 per cent but still the fastest-growing major economy, with higher inflationary pressures and uneven recovery of the labour market curbing private consumption and investment, according to a UN report.

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has shut Mughal emperor Aurangzeb's tomb here in Maharashtra for five days after a mosque committee in the area tried to lock the place, an official said on Thursday. Two days ago, MNS spokesperson Gajanan Kale had in a tweet questioned the need for the monument's existence in the state and said it should be destroyed. Later, a mosque committee in Aurangabad's Khultabad area, where the tomb is located, tried to lock the monument, which is protected by the ASI. Subsequently, the ASI had deployed additional security guards at the monument.

Pakistan has summoned India’s Charge d’Affaires here to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and handed over a demarche to him conveying Islamabad’s strong condemnation of the framing of “fabricated charges” against Kashmiri separatist leader Yasin Malik. The Pakistan Foreign Office, in a late-night statement on Wednesday, said that Kashmiri Hurriyat leader Malik is currently imprisoned in Delhi's Tihar jail. “The Indian diplomat was conveyed Pakistan’s grave concern that in a bid to suppress the voice of the indigenous Kashmiri leadership, the Indian government has resorted to implicating them in fictitious and motivated cases,” it said.

The rupee extended its losses and slipped 12 paise to 77.74 against the US dollar in early trade on Thursday, weighed down by a muted trend in domestic equities and unabated foreign fund outflows. At the interbank foreign exchange, the rupee opened at 77.72 against the American dollar, then lost ground to quote at 77.74, registering a fall of 12 paise from the last close.

READ FULL STORY HERE

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has asserted that Jhargram district was free of Maoists, and that some people were trying to create panic in the area by putting up handwritten posters with mention of the ultras. Posters with names of Maoists had recently surfaced at several places in ‘Jangalmahal’, where left-wing extremists were once active. Jhargram is part of the region.

The global coronavirus caseload has topped 525.3 million, while the deaths have surged to more than 6.28 million and vaccinations to over 11.43 billion, according to the Johns Hopkins University. In its latest update on Thursday morning, the University's Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed that the current global caseload and the death toll stood at 525,259,489 and 6,283,324, respectively, while the total number of vaccine doses administered increased to 11,424,880,199. The US continues to be the worst-hit country with the world's highest number of cases and deaths at 82,951,379 and 1,001,269, respectively, according to the CSSE. India accounts for the second highest caseload at 43,127,199.

President Joe Biden on Wednesday invoked the Defense Production Act to speed production of infant formula and authorised flights to import supply from overseas, as he faces mounting political pressure over a domestic shortage caused by the safety-related closure of the country's largest formula manufacturing plant.

Massachusetts on Wednesday reported a rare case of monkeypox in a man who recently travelled to Canada, and health officials are looking into whether it is connected to small outbreaks in Europe. Monkeypox is typically limited to Africa, and rare cases in the US and elsewhere are usually linked to travel there. A small number of confirmed or suspected cases have been reported this month in the United Kingdom, Portugal, and Spain. US health officials said they are in contact with officials in the UK and Canada as part of the investigation. The US case poses no risk to the public, and the Massachusetts resident is hospitalised but in good condition, officials said.

Nearly 1,000 last-ditch Ukrainian fighters who had held out inside Mariupol's pulverised steel plant have surrendered, Russia said Wednesday, as the battle that turned the city into a worldwide symbol of defiance and suffering drew toward a close. Meanwhile, the first captured Russian soldier to be put on trial by Ukraine on war-crimes charges pleaded guilty to killing a civilian and could get life in prison. Finland and Sweden applied to join NATO, abandoning generations of neutrality for fear that Russian President Vladimir Putin will not stop with Ukraine.

Calling out the West, India on Wednesday said that food grains should not go the way of the Covid-19 vaccines as it voiced concern over hoarding and discrimination amid the “unjustified increase” in food prices. It stressed that its decision to restrict wheat exports will ensure it can truly respond to those most in need. “A number of low income societies are today confronted with the twin challenges of rising costs and difficulty in access to food grains. Even those like India, who have adequate stocks, have seen an unjustified increase in food prices. It is clear that hoarding and speculation is at work. We cannot allow this to pass unchallenged,” Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan said here Wednesday.

Sri Lankan protesters lit flames and offered prayers Wednesday remembering thousands — including ethnic Tamil civilians — killed in the final stages of the country's decadeslong civil war, in the first-ever event where mostly majority ethnic Sinhalese openly memorialised the minority group. Protesters gathered outside the president's office floated flowers in the nearby sea and prayed for all those who died in the 26-year civil war, including Tamil civilians, Tamil rebels, and government soldiers. While grand state events have been held almost every year since the war ended in 2009 to remember and celebrate the soldiers, this is the first time an event that also remembers Tamils is being held by mostly Sinhalese in the country's capital, Colombo.

Days after a 13-year-old girl was reported missing from her home in South Delhi, she was finally rescued from outside Saket Metro station after she was allegedly kidnapped, gangraped and later abandoned in Tigri area, police said on Wednesday. Three men were arrested and a juvenile has been apprehended in connection with the incident, a senior police official said.

A petitioner in the Krishna Janmabhoomi case on Wednesday sought permission from the court to perform ‘abhishek’ of child deity ‘Bal Gopal’ at his so-called actual birthplace at Shahi Jama Masjid inside the Shri Krishna temple complex, a court official said.

With global hunger levels at a new high, the United Nations chief said Wednesday he is in "intense contacts” with Russia and other key countries hoping for an agreement to allow the export of grain stored in Ukrainian ports and ensure Russian food and fertiliser have unrestricted access to global markets.

US President Joe Biden would travel to Japan for the second in-person Quad summit during which he would hold a bilateral meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, his national security advisor said Wednesday. Formed with Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, Quad was an initiative of the Trump Administration, which Biden has elevated to the leadership level. There have so far been three summits, two of them virtual. “We believe that this summit will demonstrate both in substance and in vision that democracies can deliver and that these four nations working together will defend and uphold the principles of a free and open Indo-Pacific,” US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told reporters during the daily White House news conference.