Breaking News, August 2 | HIGLIGHTS

A team from the Election Commission of India (ECI), headed by Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar, will visit Jammu and Kashmir from August 8-10 to assess the preparedness for the upcoming assembly elections. The visit aims to ensure that all necessary arrangements and protocols are in place for a smooth and fair electoral process.

Lok Sabha Leader of Opposition and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, along with Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, visited the landslide-affected villages of Mundakkai and Punchiri Mattam in Wayanad on Friday. The visit was aimed at assessing the damage and providing support to the affected residents. During their visit, the Gandhi siblings interacted with local residents and officials to understand the extent of the damage caused by the landslide. They assured the villagers of their support and urged for immediate relief measures.

In a coordinated effort, the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and Home Guards successfully rescued four individuals from the Malana Dam tunnel in Himachal Pradesh following a devastating cloudburst.

The joint operation, conducted with precision and urgency, ensured the safe evacuation of the trapped individuals. The cloudburst had caused severe flooding, making the rescue operation challenging.

Amid natural calamities in various parts of the country, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Friday demanded that the Modi government should immediately provide additional disaster management funds to states without any discrimination. Kharge also called for improving disaster management and taking steps by adopting a scientific approach to make a solid policy for dealing with the effects of climate change such as floods, heavy rainfall, cloudburst and drought-like situations.

A 62-year-old woman and her son were killed after they were struck by lightning at a village in Chhattisgarh’s Balrampur district, police said on Friday. The incident took place on Thursday evening when the victims, identified as Dhanbasiya and her son Himachal (27), were working at a paddy field in Shardapur village under Trikunda police station limits block, an official said. 

A man wanted in connection with a woman's murder was apprehended after a brief exchange of fire with the police in Madhya Pradesh's Gwalior district on Friday, a senior official said. The accused, Akash Jadon, sustained injuries in the firing in the wee hours of the day and has been admitted at the government medical college and hospital, Gwalior Superintendent of Police (SP) Dharmaveer Singh said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the 32nd International Conference of Agricultural Economists (ICAE) here on Saturday, an event which is being held in India after 65 years, an official statement said. The theme of the six-day triennial conference, organised by the International Association of Agricultural Economists, is Transformation Towards Sustainable Agri-Food Systems.

Amidst businessmen, celebrities and institutions offering lakhs and crores of rupees to the Chief Minister's Distress Relief Fund, an elderly tea stall owner from this south Kerala district selflessly donated her meagre earnings and welfare pension towards helping those who lost everything in the devastating landslides that hit Wayanad and claimed 190 lives.

Two kanwariyas were killed and 10 more injured after their tractor-trolley overturned in Hapur in western Uttar Pradesh, police said on Friday. The kanwariyas (Shiva devotees), residents of Ghaziabad, were travelling to Brajghat in Hapur to fetch water from the Ganga.

Fear of death kept us awake all night as we climbed to a mountain to stay safe, residents of Rajban village in Himachal Pradesh's Mandi district said on Friday, two days after a cloudburst left three people dead and seven missing. Flash floods triggered by cloudburst also washed away two houses and damaged another in this village near Terang in the Padhar subdivision on Wednesday night.

A hoarding collapsed in Maharashtra’s Thane district on Friday morning, crushing three vehicles, an official said. There are no reports of any injuries so far in the accident that occurred around 10.30 am at the busy Sahajanand Chowk in the Kalyan area, he said. Kalyan Tehsildar Sachin Shejal said the hoarding came crashing down on three vehicles parked below it.

Braving rains and adverse terrain, 40 teams of rescuers began search operations in the landslide-hit Wayanad district on the fourth day on Friday, officials said. The search and rescue operations that got underway early morning received an impetus due to the completion of the 190-foot-long Bailey bridge that will enable the movement of heavy machinery, including excavators, and ambulances to the worst-affected Mundakkai and Chooralmala hamlets, they said.

A judicial commission formed to investigate the murder of gangster-politician Atiq Ahmed and his brother Ashraf in police custody has ruled out any "pre-planned conspiracy" or "police negligence". The commission's report was tabled in the Uttar Pradesh assembly on the last day of the monsoon session on Thursday. The five-member commission under former Allahabad High Court judge Dilip B Bhosale was tasked to probe the April 2023 murder of the former lawmaker and his brother.