Breaking News, October 14

The Centre told the Supreme Court on Friday that the electoral bonds scheme is an absolutely transparent mode of political funding and it is impossible to get any black or unaccounted money through it. Electoral bonds have been pitched as an alternative to cash donations made to political parties as part of efforts to bring transparency in political funding. "The methodology of receiving money has been so transparent. We will explain step by step. Now it is impossible to get any black or unaccounted money. It is the most transparent system. To say it affects democracy does not hold water," Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Union of India, told a bench of Justices B R Gavai and B V Nagarathna. The top court was hearing a PILs by NGO, Association for Democratic Reforms, Communist Party of India (Marxist) and other petitioners. Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the NGO, said this is a very interconnected issue which affects democracy.

The Arunachal Pradesh government has appointed three new officials of the state public service commission, replacing those who were suspended in connection with an assistant engineer exam paper leak case. Arunachal Pradesh Staff Selection Board (APSSB) secretary D Verma has been given the additional charge as the secretary of the state PSC, according to a government notification issued on Thursday evening. Balijan additional deputy commissioner Tasso Gambo has been appointed as the joint secretary and controller of examination of the commission. Roing extra assistant commissioner Rakesh Tacho is now the deputy secretary of the Arunachal Pradesh Public Service Commission (APSSC), the notification said.

When Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, it wasn't clear what kind of leader he would be. His low-key persona during a steady rise through the ranks of the long-ruling Communist Party gave no hint that he would evolve into one of modern China's most dominant leaders, or that he would put the economically and militarily ascendant country on a collision course with the US-led international order. Xi is all but certain to be given a third five-year term as party leader at the end of a major party congress that opens Sunday — a break with an unofficial two-term limit that other recent leaders had followed. What's not clear is how long he will remain in power, and what that means for China and the world.

At least nine students in southern Cambodia who were crossing a river died after the boat they were on capsized, officials said. Four people- two students and two of the boat's crew- were rescued following the accident on Thursday night on the Mekong River southeast of Phnom Penh, and two students were still missing on Friday, police said. Maj. Gen. Chhoeun Sochet, chief of the Kandal provincial police, said on his Facebook page that the boat was overloaded and carried no life jackets. The students, who were between 12 and 14 years old, lived on an island in the river and used the ferry for transport almost every day in the rainy season, as did others from their village. During the dry season, the river has little or no water and can be traversed by foot.

The wholesale price-based inflation declined for the fourth consecutive month to 10.7 per cent in September on softening in prices of food, fuel and manufactured items. The Wholesale Price Index-based inflation was 12.41 per cent in August and 11.80 per cent in September last year. This year, the Wholesale Price Index (WPI) touched a record high of 15.88 per cent in May. September is the 18th consecutive month of double-digit WPI inflation.

A 28-year-old Indian student has been stabbed multiple times in the face, chest and abdomen in Australia by a man who allegedly demanded cash, authorities said. The incident took place on October 6 at about 10.30 pm, as Shubham Garg walked along the Pacific Highway, NSW Police Force said in a statement on Monday. Police have arrested Daniel Norwood and the 27-year-old suspect is charged with attempted murder after Garg, allegedly suffered multiple stab wounds to the face, chest and abdomen, the Daily Telegraph newspaper reported.

A plane from Moscow carrying 400 people made an emergency landing in the national capital on Friday following a bomb threat, according to officials. The Aeroflot aircraft operating flight SU 232 landed at the Indira Gandhi International Airport here at 2.48 am. The passengers and crew were evacuated safely, they said. According to the police, the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) received an e-mail warning of bombs on the flight on Thursday night. As the flight landed, its 386 passengers and 14 crew members were immediately evacuated, a senior police official said. The flight was checked and nothing has been found so far, the official said, adding that the aircraft has been isolated.

India has recorded a single-day rise of 2,678 new COVID-19 cases, pushing its tally of the infections to 4,46,23,997, while the count of active cases has increased to 26,583, according to Union Health Ministry data updated on Friday. The death toll due to the disease has gone up to 5,28,857 with 10 fatalities being recorded, including three reconciled by Kerala, the data updated at 8 am showed.

Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will launch the party's election campaign in Himachal Pradesh on Friday with a rally in Solan district of the state. AICC general secretary Vadra's 'Parivartan Pratigya Rally' comes a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the hill state. During his visit ahead of the assembly polls in Himachal Pradesh by the year-end, Modi launched a slew of development projects in Una and Chamba. In Una, he flagged off a Vande Bharat Express, the fourth train in the series. Modi launched the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana-III in Chamba to upgrade 3,125 km of rural roads. Gandhi will also visit the Maa Shoolini Temple around 12 noon prior to the rally, a party statement said.

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The Biden administration said on Thursday that the COVID-19 public health emergency will continue through January 11 as officials brace for a spike in cases this winter. The decision comes as the pandemic has faded from the forefront of many people's minds. Daily deaths and infections are dropping and people — many of them maskless — are returning to schools, work and grocery stores as normal. The public health emergency, first declared in January 2020 and renewed every 90 days since, has dramatically changed how health services are delivered. The declaration enabled the emergency authorisation of COVID vaccines, testing and treatments for free. It expanded Medicaid coverage to millions of people, many of whom who will risk losing that coverage once the emergency ends. It temporarily opened up telehealth access for Medicare recipients, enabling doctors to collect the same rates for those visits and encouraging health networks to adopt telehealth technology.

Singapore Airlines has confirmed that it is in talks with India's Tata Group over a potential merger of Vistara airline, a joint venture between the two companies, and Air India- the 100 per cent acquisition of which the Indian conglomerate has recently completed. The confirmation comes amid Indian media reports that Tata, having completed its acquisition of a 100 per cent stake in Air India, and looking at merging it with Vistara. Tata has a 51 per cent stake in Vistara, while SIA holds 49 per cent.

A 58-year-old security guard has been arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting a minor girl at Dongri in South Mumbai, police said on Thursday. The alleged incident took place on Wednesday afternoon when the 11-year-old girl was going for tuition, an official said. As the girl was alone, the security guard took the victim to a secluded place and sexually assaulted her, the official said. Based on a complaint lodged by the girl's mother at the Dongri police station, the accused was arrested and booked for rape and under relevant provisions of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, he said. 

Stanford University apologized for limiting the admission of Jewish students in the 1950s after a task force commissioned by the school found records that show university officials excluded Jewish students for years and later the school denied it occurred. The task force was formed in January and issued a report last month confirming assertions that Stanford had admissions quotas for Jewish students, Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne said in a letter sent on Wednesday to the Stanford community. “This ugly component of Stanford's history, confirmed by this new report, is saddening and deeply troubling,” Tessier-Lavigne said.

The man accused of kidnapping and then killing the eight-month-old baby and her family earlier this month on Thursday pleaded not guilty. Jesus Salgado allegedly kidnapped eight-month-old Aroohi, her parents, and her uncle at gunpoint from their trucking business on October 3. According to authorities, Salgado, a former employee with a longstanding dispute, likely killed them within an hour of kidnapping the family. The 48-year-old accused entered his not-guilty plea on Thursday morning, KFSN TV reported, adding that the accused is scheduled to return to court next month and remains in jail on no bail.
Douglas Foster, Salgado's court-appointed attorney, declined to comment.

A North Carolina mayor announced that five people, including a police officer, were killed in a shooting in a residential area. Raleigh Mayor Mary-Ann Baldwin told reporters that multiple people were shot on the Neuse River Greenway around 5 pm, and that the police department told her around 8 p.m. that the suspect had been “contained” at a residence in the area. Numerous police vehicles and multiple ambulances had swarmed the Hedingham neighborhood starting in the late afternoon, and officers remained in place for hours during an apparent manhunt. Details of what happened remained scant by early evening. “State and local officers are on the ground and working to stop the shooter and keep people safe,” Gov. Roy Cooper had tweeted shortly before 7 pm. Earlier, WakeMed Hospital spokesperson Deb Laughery said said at least four people connected to the shooting were being treated at the hospital, but no other information was immediately available.

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday called for collective responsibility to prevent the risks from aggravating. Sitharaman said that India’s efforts will be to encourage conversations that recognise “our inter-dependencies, our shared wisdom, and our collective aspiration” for a safe, peaceful and prosperous world. Today's global economy faces a confluence of challenges and “it is our collective responsibility” to prevent the risks from aggravating, the finance minister said in her speech during the closing session of the G-20 finance ministers and central bank governors here being held on the sidelines of the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

India has launched its indigenously developed 5G infrastructure and is ready to share it with other countries as well, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Thursday. “The story (of India’s 5G) is yet to reach the public,” Sitharaman said in her interaction with students at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

The UN special envoy for Yemen on Thursday blamed Houthi rebels for the failure to renew a six-month-long truce and called on the warring parties to demonstrate “leadership, compromise and flexibility”. Hans Grundberg urged them to quickly renew and expand the truce deal that brought the longest period of calm to Yemen since its devastating civil war began in 2014. Grundberg told the UN Security Council that after important recent discussions with regional partners in Abu Dhabi and Oman's capital Muscat on the way forward he personally believes “there is a possibility for the parties to come to an agreement”. The initial two-month truce agreed to on April 2 by Yemen's internationally recognised government and Iranian-backed Houthi rebels was extended twice, until October 2.