Breaking News, January 8 | HIGHLIGHTS

Serum Institute of India chief executive officer Adar Poonawalla on Sunday said its Covovax vaccine will get approval as a booster in the next 10 to 15 days, adding it works very well against the Omicron variant of coronavirus. Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of an event at Bharti Vidyapeeth University here, Poonawalla, when asked about states and districts not getting Covishield vaccines, said there are ample stocks with the Union government for supply.

Five people were killed and a boy was injured in a head-on collision between the car they were travelling in and a truck in Punjab's Batala on Sunday evening, police said.

An illegal hospital being run by a quack here was sealed by the local administration after the death of a pregnant woman who had gone there for treatment, police said on Sunday. The quack has also been arrested. The matter came to light after the husband of the deceased registered a complaint against the hospital manager Ranjit Nishad.

 A seven-year-old boy died after being hit by a truck while crossing a road in dense fog in the Friends Colony police station area of Etawah district on Sunday, police said.

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Sunday said Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants all people in the country should worship him, while the focus of the Congress is “tapasya”. He said the Bharat Jodo Yatra was against hatred and fear being spread in society and he sees the foot march as "tapasya", suggesting the Yatra was about austerity and self-meditation.

Maharashtra on Sunday recorded 20 fresh cases of coronavirus that raised the tally of infections to 81,36,811, an official from the state health department said. With 32 patients recovering during the day, the count of recoveries reached 79,88,268, while the toll remained unchanged at 1,48,418, he said.

Four members of a family died in their sleep here apparently due to suffocation after they left a gas heater on inside their room overnight, police said on Sunday. The matter came to light after a milkman knocked on the door of the family's house in Jhajjar locality on Sunday morning but no one answered, they said.

A section of serving and retired pilots have strongly criticised the de-rostering of the captain and the crew of a New York-Delhi flight in which a male flier urinated on a female co-passenger in a drunken state. On Saturday, Air India’s CEO and Managing Director Campbell Wilson issued a statement in which he said that four cabin crew and one pilot have been issued show cause notices and de-rostered pending investigation.

A fire broke out on Sunday at an electronics factory in southeast Delhi's Okhla area, fire department said. According to it, the department was informed about the fire at 11.21 am, following which 21 fire tenders were rushed to the spot.

Mumbai-Ahmedabad highway in Maharashtra's Palghar district on Sunday, a police official said. The accident took place near a temple under Kasa police station limits at 11:45am when the car with seven members of a family was on its way from Mumbai to Bhilad in Gujarat's Valsad district, the official said.

A man allegedly killed his 11-year-old son and committed suicide at his home in Gujarat's Vadodara district, police said on Sunday. A case of abetment to suicide has been registered against the deceased man's wife based a note recovered from the scene on Saturday, an official said.

"PM Modi had a telephonic conversation with me asking about the situation in Joshimath & steps taken for the rehabilitation & safety of people in detail," said CM Dhami after the conversation with PM Modi.

A petition has been filed in the Delhi High Court seeking a direction to the Centre to constitute a committee headed by a retired judge to look into the issue of sinking of Joshimath in Uttarakhand and rehabilitate the affected families. Cracks have appeared in hundreds of houses of Joshimath, the gateway to some renowned pilgrimage sites like Badrinath and Hemkund Sahib.

Police have detained a minor from Nallasopara area for allegedly raping a minor girl in the Nagpada area. A case has also been registered under IPC section 376 and POCSO Act.

Some said we won't be getting a response from people for the yatra in BJP-ruled states and in the Hindi belt but on contrary, we got a good response in these states & it's only getting improved, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi said as he briefed the media in Haryana's Kurukshetra.

A dead body was found behind building of Joshi Bedekar College in Thane district. The deceased was identified as Raja Babu, 20 and his dead body was sent for post-mortem. 

The Himachal Pradesh government increased VAT on diesel by around Rs 3 (increase varies as per different fuel stations) whereas VAT on petrol has been also reduced by around 0.55 paise (reduction varies as per different fuel stations)

EAM Dr. S Jaishankar held a bilateral meeting with Sivakumar Varatharaju Naidu, Minister of Human Resources in the Government of Malaysia today.

A mild tremor of 3.6 magnitude was experienced in Maharashtra's Hingoli district on Sunday morning, officials said. There was no report of any loss of life or property, an official from the district disaster management office told PTI.

One more civilian succumbed to injuries taking the number of killed persons up to seven in two separate firing incidents that took place in Dhangri area of Rajouri.

A total of 7 MLAs- Dr Dhani Ram Shandil, Chander Kumar, Harshwardhan Chauhan, Jagat Singh Negi, Rohit Thakur, Anirudh Singh and Vikramaditya Singh took oath as cabinet ministers in the Himachal Pradesh cabinet expansion procedure.

Two picnickers were killed and 11 others injured in a road accident in Assam’s Karimganj district, a police officer said on Sunday. The vehicle the picnic party was travelling in fell into a ditch in Ratabari area on Saturday evening, the officer said.

Gujarat CM Bhupendra Patel inaugurated the International Kite Festival 2023 in Ahemdabad today. International Kite Festival will be held from the 8th to 14th of January, 2023.

A double-decker cruise with a capacity of carrying 150 passengers will be the new attraction in Rajasthan's Ajmer, which is famous for the shrine of Sufi saint Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti and Brahma temple in Pushkar. This will be the first cruise facility in the desert state.

Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia has said speedy action will be taken in the case where a man allegedly urinated on a woman co-passenger on a New York-Mumbai flight last November. Delhi Police on Saturday arrested the 34-year-old accused, Shankar Mishra. He allegedly urinated on the woman, a senior citizen, in an inebriated condition in the business class of the Air India flight from New York to Delhi on November 26 last year.

The death toll in the terrorist attack on Dhangri village of Jammu and Kashmir’s Rajouri has risen to seven with one more civilian succumbing to injuries at a hospital here on Sunday, officials said.

The 17th edition of the 'Pravasi Bharatiya Divas' convention will be held in Madhya Pradesh's Indore city from Sunday under the theme 'Diaspora: Reliable partners for India's progress in Amrit Kaal', an official said.

Senior BJP leader and former speaker of UP Legislative Assembly Keshari Nath Tripathi has passed away. 

The army has shot dead two terrorists near the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir's Poonch district, officials said on Sunday. The terrorists were killed in the Balakote sector of the district late Saturday, they said.

Two people were killed and 13 others injured after a mini truck fell into a deep gorge from a hill at Garod area of Chatachura hills in Karimganj district yesterday.

17 people were killed, 22 were injured in a road traffic accident in eastern China, according to reports.

A small plane clipped an SUV as it made an emergency landing Saturday on a highway north of Las Vegas, sending three people to a hospital as a precaution. 

The swearing-in ceremony of new cabinet members of Himachal Pradesh cabinet will take place today.