Breaking News, April 5 | HIGHLIGHTS

The Jharkhand High Court on Wednesday granted bail to former Ramgarh legislator Mamta Devi, who was convicted and was behind the bars for inciting protesters to violently protest against a private industrial unit over land acquisition issues. Devi and 12 others were found guilty by a Ramgarh court in December 2022 and were sentenced to five years of rigorous imprisonment. The court of Justice Navneet Kumar, while hearing the appeal filed by Mamta Devi against her conviction, ordered her release on bail. The Congress leader was earlier released on bail but was incarcerated again on December 8 last year.

An accused in the 2005 BSP MLA Raju Pal murder case, Abdul Kavi surrendered before a court here on Wednesday. Special CBI magistrate Yasha Sharma sent accused Kavi to jail under judicial custody till April 7. Earlier, Kavi had moved an application saying that he wanted to surrender. Taking him into custody, the court directed its officer to serve on him the documents of the case so that the case could be sent to the sessions court for trial. Abdul Kavi has been on the run for 18 years. Pal, a BSP MLA, was killed in Prayagraj in 2005. The CBI had booked Abdul Kavi by a supplementary charge sheet filed in 2009 but since then, the case could not proceed further due to his absence.

The North Western Railway completed the electrification work of 1,104 km of broad gauge lines in the financial year 2022-23 and has been at the first place in the entire railway network on this front. Captain Shashi Kiran, chief public relations officer, North Western Railway said in the year 2022-23, the North Western Railway has electrified the maximum number of railway routes on the entire Indian Railways. A total of about 4,000 kilometers of railway track has been electrified so far on the North Western Railway, he said.

At least 21 people including six children have died in Somalia's flash flooding over the last week, according to the UN humanitarian agency.
Nearly 100,000 people have been affected by the heavy rains and flash floods in the Bardhere district of the Gedo region of southern Somalia, according to the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
The flooded region is near Ethiopia which has been hit by heavy rains that are causing water levels to rise in the Shabelle and Juba rivers.
Health facilities have been destroyed by the flash flooding, the Somalia National Disaster Management Agency said Wednesday.
Communities living near rivers have been warned they are at risk, the agency's strategic policy and partnership advisor Mohamed Moalim told The Associated Press.

Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai will chair a meeting next week to discuss preparations for a summer action plan to fight air pollution, a statement said on Wednesday. The Delhi government had implemented a summer action plan to check air pollution for the first time last year. The plan focussed on road dust, industrial pollution, open burning of garbage, fires at landfill sites, increasing green cover on the roadside, rejuvenation of water bodies, parks, sapling plantation, tree transplantation monitoring, and phasing out of single-use plastics among others.

Four people were killed and two others injured in two separate accidents in Kullu and Una districts of Himachal Pradesh, police said on Wednesday. On Tuesday night, three people died after their tipper truck fell into a gorge near Kurpan Khadd in Kullu's Nirmand tehsil, they said. The deceased are Guddu, Ranji Thakur and Ankit Kumar, all residents of Nirmand, police said. In the other accident on Tuesday night, a woman was killed and two others were seriously injured after their car crashed into a school's wall, police said. They were on their way to Dehra from Chandigarh. It is suspected that the car's driver, Chetan Kumar, was speeding and he lost control of the vehicle, police said. Rita and her husband Ramesh Chand, residents of Dehra, and Kumar were rushed to the Una district hospital, they said. Police said Rita was declared brought dead by doctors. Chand and Kumar are undergoing treatment, they said. Una Superintendent of Police Arjit Sen Thakur said a case has been registered against the car's driver under sections 279 (rash driving), 337 (causing hurt by endangering life or personal safety of others) and 304A (causing death by negligence) of the Indian Penal Code.

A court on Wednesday sent former secretary of the Himachal Pradesh Service Selection Commission (HPSSC) Jatinder Kumar, arrested in connection with the Junior Office Assistant-Information Technology exam paper leak case, to five-day police remand. Additional Sessions Judge, Hamirpur, Gaurav Mahajan sent Kumar to police remand till April 10, vigilance officials said. The judge also allowed police to interrogate Kumar in connection with various other cases of paper leak in the HPSSC. Kumar was called in for questioning at the vigilance police station in Hamirpur in connection with the Junior Office Assistant-Information Technology (JOA-IT) exam paper leak case on Tuesday and was later arrested. DIG, Vigilance Bureau, G Shiva Kumar had said on April 1 that permission will be sought from the government under Section 17A of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 to register an FIR against highly placed officials under scanner in the case.

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday said the youth was forced to fight for their rights in the past as there was corruption at every step of their recruitment but his government's transparent work mechanism has removed such obstructions. "Right from assuming power in 2017, we worked with full commitment to empower the deserving youth. The transparency and honesty in our work mechanism have cleansed UP's tarnished image. "Earlier, youth had to fight for their rights. Today, without any discrimination or recommendations, candidates are being selected and recruited in a time-bound manner," an official statement quoting Adityanath said. As a part of the 'Mission Rozgar', the chief minister also distributed appointment letters to 795 newly-selected candidates in various departments through a recruitment process conducted by the Uttar Pradesh Public Service Commission and Uttar Pradesh Subordinate Services Selection Commission, it said. In the last six years, the administrative team along with the public representatives and the government has worked to provide 100 per cent benefits of central and state governments schemes to the people and its results are also being seen, he said.

Bandhan Bank’s total deposits in the fourth quarter of last fiscal stood at Rs 1,08,069 crore, registering a rise of 12.2 per cent over the same period a year ago, the private lender said. Loans and advances during the quarter ended March 31 was at Rs 1,09,112 crore, reflecting a year-on-year growth of 9.8 per cent, it said in a release. Collection efficiency of micro-lending during the period under review came in at 98.5 per cent as against 98 per cent a year ago.

Israeli police stormed into the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem's Old City early Wednesday, firing stun grenades at Palestinian youths who hurled firecrackers at them in a burst of violence during a sensitive holiday season. Palestinian militants in Gaza responded with rocket fire on southern Israel, prompting repeated Israeli airstrikes. The fighting, coming as Muslims mark the holiday month of Ramadan and Jews prepare to begin the Passover festival on Wednesday evening, raised fears of a wider conflagration. Similar clashes two years ago erupted into a bloody 11-day war between Israel and the ruling Hamas militant group in Gaza. The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said that dozens of worshippers who were spending the night praying were injured in the police raid. The Israeli military said one soldier was shot in a separate incident in the occupied West Bank.

"Gandhiji's death had magical effect on communal situation in the country", "Gandhi's pursuit of Hindu-Muslim unity provoked Hindu extremists" and "Organisations like RSS were banned for some time" are among the texts missing from the class 12 political science textbook for the new academic session. The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), however, claims that no curriculum trimming has taken place this year and the syllabus was rationalised in June, last year.

A Guinea-Bissau flagged cargo ship with 14 crew members on board sank off Turkey's Mediterranean coast on Wednesday, Turkish officials said. Five crew members were rescued while efforts to find nine others were underway. The Joe 2 sank off the coast of Kumluca, in Antalya province, while heading to Ukraine from the Turkish port of Iskenderun, the state-run Anadolu Agency quoted Gov. Ersin Yazici as saying.

The Thane district court on Wednesday convicted a 34-year-old man for the brutal murder of his brother in 2018 and chopping his body into pieces, and sentenced him to imprisonment for life. District and sessions court judge Rachna Tehra also imposed a fine of Rs 7,000 on the convict, Simon Patrav.

A 33-year-old Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) officer, who was leading a patrol along the India-China LAC in Ladakh, was killed after falling into a deep gorge, officials said. Assistant Commandant Tikam Singh Negi was killed in the line of duty in the Ladakh sector of the Line of Actual Control (LAC) on April 2. "ITBP salutes the braveheart AC/GD Tikam Singh Negi, 24th Battalion ITBP who made the supreme sacrifice in the line of duty in Ladakh on April 2, 2023," the force said through its official Twitter handle.

Lok Sabha adjourned till 2.00 PM amid opposition MPs raising slogans demanding a JPC probe on Adani stocks issue. 

India on Wednesday recorded 4,435 new COVID-19 infections, the biggest single-day jump in 163 days (five months and 13 days), while the number of active cases increased to 23,091, according to Union health ministry data. A total of 4,777 cases were recorded on September 25 last year.

The rupee appreciated by 24 paise to 82.08 against the US currency in early trade on Wednesday due to a weak dollar in overseas markets and forex inflows. At the interbank foreign exchange market, the rupee opened higher at 82.08 against the US dollar and moved in a narrow range of 82.04 to 82.10 later in early deals.

The Odisha Police busted a racket that was allegedly involved in making money by offering fake jobs in the government and private sectors to people, a senior officer said here. Five people, including two from Balasore, have been arrested in this connection, he said on Tuesday. The mastermind of the gang used to contact government job aspirants and those who are seeking opportunities in the private sector, and collect money by offering fake appointments to them in various organisations, the officer said. Some mediators were involved to disseminate information about job opportunities among aspirants, and fake job interviews were also conducted, police said.

In an apparent swipe at the government over the reported removal of certain references in NCERT's new class 12 textbooks, Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal on Wednesday said that consistent with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's India, modern Indian history should start from 2014. Sibal's attack on the government came after The Indian Express reported certain deletions from Class 12 National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) social sciences textbooks.

A man died here after a speeding milk tanker hit his motorcycle, police said on Wednesday. The incident took place on Etawah-Bah-Agra road near Badhpura police station when the man, Devidin (45), a resident of Badhpura Colony, was returning home on Tuesday evening, Circle Officer (CO) Amit Kumar Singh said.

Deepak “Boxer”, one of the most wanted fugitives in India who was nabbed by the police authorities in Mexico, was brought to New Delhi on Wednesday, officials said. A two-member team of Delhi Police's Special Cell landed with Deepak at Terminal 3 of Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport from Mexico via Istanbul at around 6 AM this morning.

US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have extended their greetings of Mahavir Jayanti to the Jain community across the world and encouraged people to strive for peace and harmony. “(First Lady) Jill (Biden) and I wish a happy and prosperous Mahavir Jayanti to all those observing. Today, we recognise the values of Mahavir Swami and strive to live with peace, truth, and harmony,” Biden tweeted on Tuesday.

The Odisha Police busted a racket that was allegedly involved in making money by offering fake jobs in the government and private sectors to people, a senior officer said on Tuesday. Five people, including two from Balasore, have been arrested in this connection, he said.

An Israeli security official has revealed the name and plan of the Pakistani mastermind in the foiled plot to harm Israeli and Jewish targets in Greece last week, a media report here said. Mohammad Mohsen Reza, a 65-year-old Pakistani living in Iran, has been working with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp for many years engaged in recruiting terror operatives abroad, the official told Times of Israel (TOI) on Tuesday.

Female Afghan employees of the United Nations have been banned from working by Taliban authorities in eastern Afghanistan, UN officials said on Tuesday. The UN mission expressed “serious concern” after its female staffers were prevented from reporting to work in Nangarhar province. “We remind de facto authorities that United Nations entities cannot operate and deliver life-saving assistance without female staff,” the world body said in a tweet.