Breaking News, June 19 | Highlights

Police have registered a case against a Nagpur-based couple who allegedly cheated 12 persons by collecting a total of Rs 68 lakh from them on the false promise of giving jobs to them in the railways, an official said on Sunday.

Violent protests against Agnipath scheme for defence recruitment appeared to be on the wane in Bihar on Sunday as a police crackdown on troublemakers continued and train services remained hit in view of security concerns. According to a statement issued by Police Headquarters, altogether 804 people have been arrested so far in connection with the large scale violence and arson, which had the state in its throes last week.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday expressed grief over the death of 17 persons in lightning and thunderstorm related incidents in the state. According to the Chief Minister's Office, an ex-gratia of Rs 4 lakh has also been announced for the next of the kin of each deceased.

Prohibitory orders under section 144 of the CrPC have been imposed in the Jaipur police commissionerate area on Sunday in the wake of the protests against the Centre's Agnipath scheme for soldiers' recruitment for four years.

At least six Baloch militants were killed on Sunday in clashes with Pakistan’s security forces in the country’s restive Balochistan province. The forces were tipped off about their presence in the Central Makran mountain range and they launched an operation to arrest them, according to a statement by the Army.

Three persons and 52 goats were killed in separate incidents of lightning strike in three districts of Chhattisgarh on Sunday, police said. A shepherd, identified as Chintamani Dhankar (22), and his herd of goats were struck by lightning in Gariaband district, while one death each was reported in Mungeli and Balodabazar-Bhatapara districts, they said.

Nepal is debating the relocation of the Everest base camp due to increasing human activity and global warming threat that is making it unsafe.

A contractual worker of the Greater Noida Authority was hospitalised on Sunday after he was shot at by a friend allegedly due to personal enmity, police officials said.

The flood situation in Assam deteriorated on Sunday with eight more persons losing their lives and over 37 lakh people suffering across 30 districts, an official said.

Two men were crushed to death by a speeding car in Banda area here, police said on Sunday. Vipin (22) and Kaushal (23), residents of Udra village of Maksudapur on Banda-Bilsanda road, were having food on the roadside when the incident occurred, they said.

Delhi recorded 1,530 new Covid cases and three deaths in a day while the positivity rate rose to 8.41 per cent, according to data shared by the city health department on Sunday. This was the fifth consecutive day that Delhi has recorded over 1,300 cases in a day. The fresh cases were detected out of 18,183 Covid tests conducted the previous day.

Two policemen were killed on Sunday when militants opened fire on them at a security check post in Pakistan's troubled Balochistan province. Armed men on motorcycles gunned down police personnel posted in the Qaidi Shakh area of Jaffarabad district in the province, a police official said.

Firefighters in Spain and Germany struggled to contain wildfires on Sunday amid an unusual heat wave in Western Europe for this time of year. The worst damage in Spain has been in the northwest province of Zamora where over 25,000 hectares have been consumed, regional authorities said, while German officials said that residents of three villages near Berlin were ordered to leave their homes because of an approaching wildfire on Sunday.

IndiGo, a private airline, on Sunday started the regular operation of its new flight in the Mumbai-Mangaluru-Mumbai sector on Sunday. The daily flight leaves Mumbai at 8.50 AM and reaches Mangaluru at 10.20 AM. 

New chief justices were appointed to six high courts on Sunday including to the Delhi HC. The Department of Justice in the Union Law Ministry tweeted about these appointments. While five HC judges were elevated as chief justices, the chief justice of the Telangana High Court, Justice Satish Chandra Sharma, was transferred to the Delhi High Court in the same capacity.

 A special court dealing exclusively with criminal cases related to legislators has granted bail to former Karnataka chief minister B S Yediyurappa in a corruption case. Judge B Jayantha Kumar granted the bail on Saturday after the advocate for the complainant in the objections that were filed had stated that they did not oppose the granting of bail to the senior BJP leader.

In a distressing incident, a man pushed his differently-abled son into a well and later ended his life by hanging himself at Kervashe village in Karkala taluk of Udupi district, police sources said on Sunday.

A 26-year-old farmer died in Durg in Chhattisgarh after he came in contact with the barbed wire fence around his farm on which a live electric cable had fallen, officials said on Sunday.

Two minors were found hanging from a tree in Banswara district of Rajasthan on Sunday, police said.

Four persons, including two government employees, were arrested for allegedly trying to hunt wild animals and a gun, sharp-edged weapons and bullets were recovered from them in Chhattisgarh's Balodabazar-Bhatapara district, police said on Sunday. Acting on a tip-off, a police team intercepted them in Piparchhedi protected forest area under Kasdol police station limits on Friday when they were moving about in a car, Balodabazar-Bhatapara Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Deepak Kumar Jha said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday called on President Ram Nath Kovind at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here. The details of the meeting were not known immediately. “Shri Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, called on President Ram Nath Kovind at Rashtrapati Bhavan,” the Rashtrapati Bhavan tweeted. Kovind’s term as the president ends on July 24. 

Pakistan’s ousted prime minister Imran Khan had "fascist plans" to extend his rule for 15 years and wanted to get the entire opposition leadership disqualified by the end of this year, a senior PML-N minister has claimed, according to a media report on Sunday. Speaking at a TV show on Saturday, Minister for Power Khurram Dastagir said he had prior information that Khan wanted to clean sweep the entire opposition leadership, including Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) president and incumbent premier Shehbaz Sharif, Ahsan Iqbal and former Pakistan prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi.

Union Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan on Sunday alleged that BJP has "grave suspicions and concerns" that Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan may be a participant in the gold smuggling case, based on the conduct of his government in the matter. The statement was in response to a query from a reporter as to whether BJP believes that Vijayan has any involvement in the smuggling case subsequent to revelations made against him by a key accused in the matter.

Four members of a family, including two children, lost their lives when the car in which they were travelling collided head-on with a container truck on the Agra-Lucknow Expressway, police said. Additional Superintendent of Police Shashi Shekhar said that the accident took place between 5.00 am and 6.00 am under Hasanganj police station. "The occupants of the car were seriously injured and rushed to a hospital in Lucknow, where Akhilesh Mishra (40), his wife Babita Mishra (36), daughter Jyoti Mishra (10) and niece Priyanshi (12), were declared dead by the doctors," he said. Two persons who were injured in the accident have been hospitalised in Unnao.

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday asserted that modern development work being undertaken by the Centre is changing the face of Delhi and modernising the national capital. Speaking after inaugurating the main tunnel and five underpasses of the Pragati Maidan Integrated Transit Corridor project here, Modi cited a number of initiatives, including Eastern and Western Peripheral Expressways, more than doubling of metro tracks in Delhi-NCR and the Delhi-Meerut highway, among other things, as steps taken by his government to solve the region's problems.

Amid widespread protests against the Agnipath military recruitment scheme in Bihar, RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav on Sunday said there were many doubts about the scheme in the minds of the youth and demanded that it be withdrawn. Addressing a press conference here, he asked whether this was a MGNREGA-like initiative for the educated youth or there was a "hidden agenda" of the RSS in it. Yadav also appealed to the youth to protest peacefully against the scheme. Why is Prime Minister Narendra Modi silent on the whole issue, he asked.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday inaugurated the main tunnel and five underpasses of the Pragati Maidan Integrated Transit Corridor project, an integral part of the Pragati Maidan redevelopment exercise. The Pragati Maidan Integrated Transit Corridor project has been built at a cost of more than Rs 920 crore and is entirely funded by the central government. It is aimed at providing hassle-free and smooth access to the new world-class exhibition and convention centre being developed at Pragati Maidan to facilitate easy participation of exhibitors and visitors in the programmes being held there. 

A 24-year-old woman housekeeping staff of a five-star hotel was raped allegedly by a 15-year-old boy, police said on Sunday. The boy has been taken into custody and sent to a juvenile correctional home, they said. The boy, who was staying in the hotel with his parents, barged into a ladies washroom on Friday and raped a woman housekeeping staff who was charging her mobile phone there, Station House Officer, Rajpur police station, Mohan Singh said.

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Aggressive rate hike by the US Federal Reserve, coupled with elevated inflation and high valuation of equities continued to keep foreign investors at bay from the Indian stock market as they pulled out Rs 31,430 crore in this month so far. With this, net outflow by Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) from equities reached Rs 1.98 lakh crore so far in 2022, data with depositories showed. Going forward, FPI flows to remain volatile in the emerging markets on account of rising geopolitical risk, rising inflation, tightening of monetary policy by central banks, among others, Shrikant Chouhan, Head - Equity Research (Retail), Kotak Securities, said. According to the data, foreign investors withdrew a net amount of Rs 31,430 crore from equities in the month of June (till 17th).

An Iranian national has been arrested for allegedly impersonating as an intelligence agent and looting foreigners visiting India on the pretext of checking their bags on suspicion of carrying drugs, police said on Sunday. The accused has been identified as 46-year-old Hossein Rezafard Ahmad, who resides in Lajpat Nagar in south east Delhi. He came to India on May 21 on a medical visa, they said. After coming to India, he befriended two others who are currently absconding. The trio targeted vulnerable foreign nationals coming to the national capital on medical visa. The accused used to track the movement of those who visited hospitals and then followed them, police said.

India and Bangladesh will hold the 7th Meeting of the Joint Consultative Commission (JCC) in New Delhi on Sunday. The JCC will be co-chaired by External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and Bangladesh Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen. This will be the first physical JCC meeting since the onset of Covid-19 pandemic, with the previous edition held virtually in 2020. The JCC will review the entire gamut of bilateral relations, including cooperation in the wake of Covid-19, border management and security, trade and investment, connectivity, energy, water resources, development partnership and regional and multilateral issues.

Andaman and Nicobar Islands reported nine new COVID-19 cases, six less than the previous day, with the tally rising to 10,088, a health department official said on Sunday. Five fresh patients have travel history, while four infections were detected during contact tracing, he said. The Union Territory now has 32 active patients, and all of them are undergoing home quarantine. One person recuperated from the disease on Saturday, taking the total number of recoveries in the archipelago to 9,927.

Polling to Haryana's 28 municipal committees and 18 municipal councils is underway, officials said on Sunday. The polling started at 7 am and will continue till 6 pm, they said. The results will be declared on June 22. While the ruling BJP-JJP alliance as well as the Aam Aadmi Party are fighting the polls on party symbols, many Congressmen have entered the fray as independents. 

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Police on Saturday said it has arrested four members of a DJ group for allegedly creating nuisance by playing music beyond permissible limit late in the night during a private function. The accused were playing the music around 12.30 am last night during a programme at Baraat Ghar in Hoshiarpur village, police said. "The DJ group had come from Greater Noida. Those arrested have been identified as Anuj Kumar, Amit Kumar, Kapil Sharma and Chand-all residents of the Bisrakh area," a police spokesperson said. Police have also seized their 10 sound boxes, three amplifiers, six DJ lights, a generator, a sound mixer device and a pick-up truck which were used by the quartet during the function, the official said. An FIR has been lodged against them under Indian Penal Code Sections 188 (disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant), 268 (nuisance causing annoyance to public), 291 (repeat public nuisance), among others, police said.

A Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) team has seized 348 grams of heroin worth Rs 1.5 crore in Uttar Pradesh's Barabanki district and arrested two persons in connection, officials said on Sunday. The NCB also recovered Rs 3.73 lakhs from the accused, identified as Sagir and Alam. "During interrogation, the accused revealed that the seized heroin was supplied by one Mohammed Atif of Barabanki and thereafter, all out efforts were made to trace the supplier. He was apprehended by the NCB team and being questioned," said an NCB official.

Voting for 18 municipal councils and 28 municipalities was underway on Sunday in Haryana with the counting of ballots scheduled for June 22, officials said. The main contest is the between the state's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) alliance and the Congress, while the Aam Adam Party, in its maiden contest in the civic body poll, is testing the waters ahead of the 2024 Assembly polls in Haryana.

Hundreds of people participated in a yoga session organised by the Indian Embassy at the iconic Washington Monument here ahead of the International Yoga Day (June 21). The participants of the event held on Saturday were from different walks of life, including the US administration, Congress, industry, diplomatic corps, media and the Indian diaspora. Yoga is India's greatest gift to the world, US National Science Foundation (NSF) director Dr Sethuraman Panchanathan said.

A gun was fired when a fight broke out at a northern Virginia mall, but no injuries were reported and there was no active shooter situation, police said. Officers were called to Tysons Corner Center on Saturday afternoon for a report of shots fired at the prominent mall near the nation's capital, Fairfax County police tweeted. A fight broke out and one man displayed a gun and fired, police said. Police said there were no reports of any injuries and no confirmed reports of additional shots fired. Officers immediately began clearing the mall to make sure no suspects were still present and also were helping those who had sheltered in place. The authorities asked people who were sheltering to stay in place until officers came to them.

Two people were killed and 10 others had to be rescued when their boats collided at night near Key Biscayne in South Florida, the US Coast Guard and local authorities say. The Coast Guard said a person involved in the collision notified the agency of the crash around 10:30 pm (local time) Friday night. Two bodies were recovered in the ensuing rescue operation, one by the Coast Guard Station Miami Beach and another by Miami-Dade Fire Rescue, officials said. The Coast Guard said in a statement that one of its air crews in an MH-65 Dolphin helicopter played a key role in the emergency response.

Hundreds of people participated in a yoga session organised by the Indian Embassy at the iconic Washington Monument here ahead of the International Yoga Day (June 21). The participants of the event held on Saturday were from different walks of life, including the US administration, Congress, industry, diplomatic corps, media and the Indian diaspora. Yoga is India's greatest gift to the world, US National Science Foundation (NSF) director Dr Sethuraman Panchanathan said. Dr Panchanathan was the guest of honour at the event organised by the embassy in association with several diaspora and US organisations. Asserting that yoga is a strong uniting force across geographies and boundaries, the NSF director said science and yoga are in synergy towards the prosperity of the mind and body.

The Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) on Saturday condemned a terror attack on a gurdwara in Kabul and urged the Centre to take up the issue in the United Nations General Assembly. Several blasts were reported near the Gurdwara Karte Parwan on Saturday, in the latest targeting of a place of worship of a minority community in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. India has slammed the "cowardly attack" and said it is closely monitoring the situation. Addressing a press conference here, DSGMC president Harmeet Singh Kalka and General Secretary Jagdeep Singh Kahlon said it is highly condemnable that terrorists targeted the gurdwara, killed its guard and injured many pilgrims.

A local resident claiming to be the chief of a Hindu outfit offered money to two policemen on Twitter, asking them to lodge a case over cow smuggling. A senior police official said they will take legal action against the man for the slanderous post. "There are criminal cases against the man in various districts. As of now, officers are busy with the ongoing agitation, so this tweet is not on our priority list. Once we get free, we'll take legal action under appropriate sections of law," Police Commissioner Kala Ramachandran said.

India will not allow any unilateral attempt by China to change the status quo or alter the Line of Actual Control (LAC), External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Saturday, while asserting that through an enormous logistical effort, the country had countered the Chinese at the LAC in eastern Ladakh. Talking about the eastern Ladakh border row, Jaishankar said China, in violation of the 1993 and 1996 agreements not to mass troops on the Line of Actual Control (LAC), chose to do so, and added that its attempt was obviously to unilaterally change the LAC.