Breaking News, April 24 | HIGHLIGHTS

An 67-year-old Maharashtra man who was on a pilgrimage to Yamunotri died after falling in the parking lot at Janki Chatti while returning from the temple, officials said on Monday. The portals of Yamunotri were opened for devotees on Saturday. This is the third death of a pilgrim in the last three days. Muralidhar Sukhdev Patil, a resident of Jalgaon district in Maharashtra, fell after stumbling in the parking lot at Janki Chatti after visiting Yamunotri, the police said.

With tempretures cooling down, schools in West Bengal resumed in-person classes Monday, after closure of the campuses for one week due to extreme heat wave conditions. A school education department official said as the conditions improved with the onset of rains, the school closure advisory is not being extended. The April 16 state government notification had said "due to the heatwave situation....all autonomous/state/central government aided and private schools in state, except hill areas of Darjeeling and Kalimpong districts, will remain closed with effect from April 17 for a week or until further order" .

Delhi on Monday logged 689 fresh COVID-19 infections and three fatalities with a case positivity rate of 29.42, according to data shared by the Health department here. With the new fatalities, the death toll from the pandemic rose to 26,600 in the national capital. The total case tally is at 20,34,061. Of the 7,974 Covid beds in the city, 371 are occupied, the data showed. Delhi witnessed 948 COVID-19 infections and two fatalities with a case positivity rate of 25.69 on Sunday.

Police here have registered a case against a person for posting an objectionable photo and video of his former partner on social media, an official said here on Monday. Bansdih Road Police Station Station House Officer (SHO) Raj Kapoor Singh said acting on the complaint lodged by the 22-year-old woman, a case has been registered against a youth named Prem Yadav under the IT Act.

A private school here was sealed on Monday by the Noida Authority over non-payment of dues, officials said, even as parents of several students protested the move. The school, located in Sector 56, was allotted land in 1991 at a subsidised price and had dues worth around Rs 15 crore for which several reminders were sent to it in the past, a Noida Authority official said. 

Rain and thundershower hit parts of Jharkhand including Ranchi on Monday, which helped in keeping the maximum temperature between 30 and 35 degrees Celsius across the state, a weather official said. No heatwave conditions in Jharkhand during next one week, the official said. However, mercury may rise from Tuesday in parts of the state due to decline of rain and thundershower activities. In-charge of Ranchi Meteorological Centre Abhishek Anand told PTI, "Two cyclonic systems helped Jharkhand to experience pleasant weather. However, the activity of rain and thundershower will start declining from Tuesday and temperature will gradually start rising."

A 17-year-old girl was allegedly abducted and raped by two men in Rajasthan's Dungarpur district on Monday, police said. The two accused are on the run and searches are being conducted to nab them, they said. Station House Officer, Dovda, Hemant Chauhan said the two men abducted the girl while she was returning home after appearing in a Class 11 examination. They took her to a deserted place and raped her before fleeing.

A three-day national event on the Indian medical devices sector will be organised in August alongside the G-20 health ministers meeting, the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers said on Monday. To be held at Gandhi Nagar in Gujarat from August 18-20, the India MedTech Expo would help to create opportunities to network and explore collaborations in the medical device sector. The G-20 Health Ministers meeting has been scheduled on August 17-19 in Gandhi Nagar.

France has evacuated five Indians along with citizens of 27 other countries as part of its evacuation mission from violence-hit Sudan. The French embassy in India said 388 people from 28 countries, including India, were evacuated. "French evacuation operations are underway. Last night, two military flight rotations evacuated 388 people of 28 countries, including Indian nationals," it tweeted. French diplomatic sources said five Indian nationals were among those evacuated by France from Sudan.

Four men were arrested here for allegedly cheating more than 500 people across the country in the name of online trading of cryptocurrency, police said on Monday. The accused have been identified as Farhan Ansari (30), Sanjay Dabas (26), Pankaj Wadhwa (38) and Monu (42), they said. Police said they have recovered 5.50 lakh cash from Wadhwa and also frozen around Rs 24 lakhs in different bank accounts of the accused. In February, a Central Delhi resident was duped of Rs 22 lakhs in a single day using the same modus operandi, police said.

The body of a 19-year-old woman was retrieved from a drain in east Delhi's New Ashok Nagar on Monday, police said.
It is suspected to be a case of suicide, they added. The deceased has been identified as Swati. She was mentally ill and had been undergoing treatment for depression at IHBAS Hospital here since 2017, they said.

The Congress on Monday extended support to agitating wrestlers who are demanding action against the chief of the Wrestling Federation of India over allegations of sexual harassment of players, as it asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to break his silence on the issue. All India Mahila Congress chief Netta D'Souza visited the protest site at Jantar Mantar here. Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said he will meet the wrestlers on Tuesday while his son and Congress Rajya Sabha MP Deepinder Singh Hooda demanded an FIR against WFI president Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh and a CBI probe into the matter.

The Lok Sabha Secretariat organised a brainstorming session on Monday with an aim to boost innovative thinking and augment professional expertise of its employees. Inaugurating the two-day 'Chintan Shivir', Lok Sabha Secretary General Utpal Kumar Singh said the idea behind organising the event was to provide a platform for setting goals, fostering creativity and encouraging innovative thinking among the officials of the secretariat to augment their professional expertise.

Three persons were killed and two injured after their autorickshaw was hit by a truck in Berasia area of Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh on Monday, a police official said. The incident took place near Kulhor crossing on Vidisha road, some 46 kilometres from district headquarters, Berasia police station inspector Girish Tripathi told PTI.

An Indian man travelling from New York to Delhi in an American Airlines flight has been apprehended at the airport here for allegedly urinating on his co-passenger, official sources said Monday. The accused Indian passenger was stated by the airlines staff to be under the influence of liquor and he urinated on his co-passenger during an argument, they said.

Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Monday said skill development is one of the primary focus areas under the state government's Swayampurna Goa 2.0 initiative. Speaking at the launch of a booklet by the Directorate of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, the chief minister said the state government has been undertaking various programmes to boost employability of Goan youth in all sectors.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, who is on his first official trip to Guyana, visited the site of the ongoing East Bank-East Coast Road Linkage project along with Guyana's minister of public works Deodat Indar. Indian infrastructure company Ashoka Buildcon Limited is developing the East Bank-East Coast Road Linkage Project. Ashoka Buildcon in a statement said Jaishankar during his visit interacted with the workers and the senior staff including those of the company.

A mega parent-teacher meeting (PTM) will be organised on April 30 in all MCD and Delhi government schools, Education Minister Atishi said on Monday, noting that parents are important stakeholders in the education model. She appealed to all the parents to join the meeting.

The Madhya Pradesh forest department has asked the Centre for an "alternate" site for cheetahs currently introduced at the Kuno National Park, which has seen the death of two felines in less than a month, with officials citing lack of logistical support and space. A senior state forest official on condition of anonymity said they do not have enough logistical support for the upkeep for the cheetahs, brought in two batches of 8 and 12 felines from Namibia and South Africa respectively since September last year.

Six militants of the Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KN) outfit were apprehended following a gunfight with Assam Police in Kokrajhar district on Monday. Two of the nabbed insurgents were critically wounded in the gunbattle while two other militants managed to escape, a police spokesperson said. "An operation was launched in Chakrashila area on Sunday evening, during which a transit camp of KLO (KN) was busted on Monday. We managed to apprehend six militants," Assam Police spokesperson Prasanta Kumar Bhuyan said.

A 23-year-old man was shot dead at his home in a village here by a group of men following a clash after an accident, police said on Monday. On Sunday, while returning home with his father, Amir’s tractor-trolley collided with Afaq and Humayun’s motorcycle, they said. A dispute broke out between the two sides and the villagers intervened and pacified them, police said.

Employees at Berlin and Hamburg airports staged walkouts on Monday in an ongoing dispute over salary raises, leading to flight cancellations in both German cities.
In Berlin, all departures and 70 out of 240 incoming flights were cancelled, German news agency dpa reported. Due to a walkout announced at short notice by trade union ver.di, the airport in Hamburg announced in the early morning that 31 of 160 departures had been canceled.
The walkouts started at 3:30 a.m. and were supposed to last until midnight.
The union wants to increase pressure on employers with whom it is negotiating bonuses for special working hours, for example at weekends, and rules on overtime pay.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his deputy Tejashwi Yadav arrived here on Monday afternoon to meet West Bengal CM, Mamata Banerjee.
After landing at the airport, Kumar and Yadav went to the state secretariat 'Nabanna' where the duo will be holding a meeting with Banerjee.
The three leaders will be holding a closed-door meeting to strategise on fighting the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha election, officials said.
Banerjee held similar meetings with Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and former Karnataka chief minister and Janata Dal (Secular) leader H.D. Kumaraswamy last month.
In a bid to unite the opposition parties ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, Kumar met Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and its president Mallikarjun Kharge in New Delhi earlier this month.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot launched his government's flagship initiative 'Mehangai Rahat' camps from Sanganer district’s Mahapura village on Monday.
These camps will be organised across the state from April 24 to June 30 so that the benefits of various welfare schemes of the state government reach the beneficiaries.

Another BJP legislator in Manipur resigned from his administrative post on Monday, the fourth MLA of the ruling party in the northeastern state to do so this month.
Uripok's BJP MLA Khwairakpam Raghumani resigned from the chairmanship of Manipur Renewable Energy Development Agency (MANIREDA).
In his resignation letter to Chief Minister N Biren Singh, Raghumani said he was quitting the post for "personal reasons, and also in the public interest, it is felt that my continuance as chairman of MANIREDA is not called for at this juncture".
The state unit of the saffron party has been hit by a series of resignations of MLAs from their administrative posts, triggering speculations of trouble in the Biren Singh government.

 At least 17 police personnel were injured when a van carrying them for security deployment overturned in Maharashtra's Ratnagiri district on Monday, an official said.
The accident took place at around 9.30 am near Kasheli village under Nate police station limits, he said.
The vehicle overturned while it was ferrying police personnel towards Rajapur for bandobast duty for a survey of the proposed Barsu refinery project, the official said.

Describing Guyana as a "very special partner" of India, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has said that the two countries are forging a partnership that is fit for the purpose in the contemporary era.
Addressing the Indian community here, Jaishankar, who is on his first official visit to Guyana, also apprised them of his discussions with the top Guyanese leadership and the two countries' common resolve to upgrade the level of their partnership.
"Delighted to interact with the Indian community today evening in Guyana. Thank Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo and Speaker Manzoor Nadir for joining us. Conveyed that we are forging a partnership that is fit for purpose for the contemporary era," he tweeted after addressing the diaspora on Sunday.
He said India shares a closer, deeper and more emotional relationship with Guyana and his presence in the country's capital was an expression of that.
"Something has changed for the better, There is today energy, focus and commitment in the relationship which is quite remarkable," he said, adding that the successes, challenges and travails of the diaspora are very much in the heart of people in India.

 Consultants and service providers in the country have urged the government to stop routing domestic foreign currency deals via the US banking system, in order to avoid transaction fees and save foreign currency.
Rather such domestic deals involving foreign currencies such as the US dollar should be routed through the Reserve Bank of India.
At present a transaction fee is levied on US dollars transactions within the country.

Heatwave conditions in the national capital will stay under curbs on Monday with the met department predicting a cloudy sky and light rain or drizzle during the day.
The minimum temperature on Monday was recorded at 19 degrees Celsius, four notches below the season's average.
The relative humidity at 8.30 am stood at 52 per cent.
The air quality index at 9.10 am read 125 (moderate category).
An AQI between zero and 50 is considered 'good', 51 and 100 'satisfactory', 101 and 200 'moderate'', 201 and 300 'poor', 301 and 400 'very poor', and 401 and 500 'severe'.

At least seven Congress workers, including a KPCC secretary, were taken into preventive detention ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to this port city on Monday, police said.
District Congress Committee (DCC) President Muhammed Shiyas confirmed that seven Congress workers from the Western Kochi area were taken into preventive detention by the police in the early hours of Monday.
They include KPCC secretary Thampi Subrahmanyam and DCC secretary Sreekumar, they said.
Police said the Congress workers were taken into preventive detention as they had a history of holding black flag protests when the leaders of their rival parties visit their area.

 A five-year-old girl was found dead at her neighbour's house here following which locals thrashed the accused, police said on Monday.
The girl was playing outside her house around 4 pm on Sunday evening when she went missing.
The family found her dead at a neighbour's house at 8 PM. The man living in the house was found unconscious and under the influence of drugs, Circle Officer, Anupshahar, Anvita Upadhyay said.
Locals thrashed the accused, he said, adding police reached the crime scene and took him into custody.
Every aspect of the matter is being investigated.

A management employee of Kisan Inter College in Kharad village here has been booked for allegedly abetting the college principal to commit suicide, police said on Monday.
Police booked management committee secretary Narendra Kumar Malik for the death of college principal Yashpal Singh at the complaint of his wife, Vimlesh Devi, Circle Officer (CO) Devrat Vajpayee told media.
In her complaint, Vimlesh Devi alleged her husband was under pressure because of Malik’s harassment, the CO said. Yashpal Singh killed himself on April 20, he said.
Vimlesh Devi alleged that Narender Kumar had been pressuring her husband for illegal work, he added.

In its latest round of electioneering in poll-bound Karnataka, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP president J P Nadda will take part in separate roadshows in the southern part of the state on Monday.
Shah arrived in Bengaluru on Sunday night. According to the itinerary shared by the BJP, Shah will fly to Mysuru to pay his obeisance at the renowned Chamundeshwari Temple.
He will then take a helicopter ride from Mysuru to Gundlupet in Chamarajanagar district, and lead a roadshow from 1 pm to 2 pm.
The Home Minister, who was a former BJP chief, will then fly to Sakaleshpura where he will take out another roadshow to boost party cadres from 3 pm to 4 pm.

 Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is likely to meet his West Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata on April 25, sources said.

Kumar is expected to meet Banerjee around 2 pm at her office in state secretariat 'Nabanna' on that day, they said.

The two leaders are likely to hold a closed-door meeting to strategise on fighting the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, they added.

Banerjee held similar meetings with Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav and Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik last month.

BJP MP Nishikant Dubey shared a video clip on social media purportedly showing Jharkhand Health Minister Banna Gupta engaging in an "obscene" phone conversation with a woman.

Terming the video "fake and edited", Gupta, a Congress leader, said his political opponents circulated it to tarnish his image.

In a statement, the minister said it was part of a conspiracy and that a complaint had been filed with the police.

"I have lodged an FIR in this connection and police will soon probe it.
.
.
.
I will take legal action against the persons who have tried to frame me," Gupta said.

Rajya Sabha MP Kartikeya Sharma had a narrow escape after his SUV collided with a truck on Kundli Manesar Palwal road in Bilaspur Police Station area, police said.

Police said the parliamentarian was taken to Medanta hospital where doctors said his condition was fine.

The accident took place Sunday when Sharma was returning to Gurugram after participating in a Parashuram statue unveiling programme on the birth anniversary of Lord Parshuram in Doodiwala Kishanpura village of Charkhi Dadri district in Haryana.

Inspector Rahul Dev, SHO, Bilaspur Police Station said a police team reached the spot after getting information about the incident.

"We have taken the damaged car in custody.
Further probe is on," he said.

 The AAP government did not grant permission for the translocation of trees for the Rithala Phase-I sewage treatment plant, stalling the project and leading to discharge of untreated sewage into the Yamuna river, sources in the Lieutenant Governor's office have said.

The project was funded by the central government under the Yamuna Action Plan-III, they said.

The files pertaining to it were pending with Delhi's minister of environment and forests for nearly two years, they claimed.

There was no immediate reaction from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Delhi on the allegation made on Sunday.

The matter came up for discussion in the recent meeting of a high-level committee constituted by the National Green Tribunal (NGT) on the Yamuna rejuvenation.

"Lieutenant Governor (LG) V K Saxena expressed grave displeasure and annoyance over such deliberate misconduct on part of the Delhi government.
The LG noted that nothing could be more criminal than poisoning the Yamuna by stalling such key projects," a source said.

On the second day of his two-day visit to poll-bound Karnataka, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will have an interaction with sugarcane farmers and youth, and later address a public meeting in the state on Monday.

At 2 pm, the former AICC president will take part in an interaction with sugarcane farmers at Ramdurg in Belagavi district.

He will then leave for Gadag to take part in 'Yuva Samvaad' (interaction with youth).

Gandhi will then be in Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai's neighbouring constituency of Hangal in Haveri district where he will be addressing a public meeting in the evening.
Bommai is contesting from Shiggaon segment in the district.

The Congress leader will then leave for Hubballi to board a flight back to Delhi.

 Prime Minister Narendra Modi will participate in the National Panchayati Raj Day celebrations in Madhya Pradesh's Rewa district on Monday and address representatives and functionaries of Panchayati Raj Institutions and gram sabhas across the country.

Modi will also perform the virtual 'Griha Pravesh' (ceremony performed when entering one’s new house) for 4.
11 lakh beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana at the function to be held at the SAF ground in Rewa, an official release said.

He will inaugurate various projects worth Rs 7,853 crore under the Jal Jeevan Mission.
These projects will benefit 9.
48 lakh families of 4,036 villages, it said.

The prime minister will also visit an exhibition showcasing development of various departments at the main venue.

Madhya Pradesh Governor Mangubhai Patel, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Union Minister for Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Giriraj Singh and Union Minister of State for Steel and Rural Development Faggan Singh Kulaste will be present on the occasion.