An SUV of Madhya Pradesh police on Monday met with an accident in Maharashtra’s Buldhana district in which four civilians were killed and three others, including two police personnel, were injured, an official said.
The mishap occurred in the early hours at Kate Phata near Malkapur town on the national highway no. 6, over 500 kms from here, when the SUV collided with a container truck, got toppled, and hit a car tailing it.
The police team was returning to Madhya Pradesh after nabbing one Rohidas Raibole, an accused in a kidnapping case from Akola district in east Maharashtra, said Malkapur police station inspector Bhushan Gawande.
He said that the deceased included three relatives of the complainant and a relative of the accused who were also travelling in the police vehicle.
The occupants of another car escaped unhurt.
The injured persons, including two policemen, were admitted to a state-run hospital in Buldhana, around 70 km from Malkapur, before being shifted to a private facility.
The truck driver was arrested under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) by Malkapur police, Gawande said.
A battling Andy Murray bowed out of the Australian Open at the first hurdle on Monday, but it was business as usual for ruthless Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal who joined Caroline Wozniacki in round two.
The Scottish five-time Melbourne Park finalist gave it everything he had and showed glimpses of the form that won him three Grand Slams, but his ailing body let him down during a gutsy 6-4, 6-4, 6-7 (5/7), 6-7 (4/7) defeat to 22nd seed Roberto Bautista Agut.
Murray tearfully revealed before the tournament that he was in constant agony from a hip injury and planned to retire this year.
The 31-year-old hopes to end his career at Wimbledon, but has admitted the Australian Open could be his last event, unless he has a late change of heart.
“Amazing. That was incredible, thank you so, so much to everyone that came out tonight,” he said after being given a rapturous send-off.
While his tournament ended in despair, Swiss master Federer, six years older than Murray, continued his march towards a record seventh Australian Open title.
He swept past Uzbek Denis Istomin 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 said he was in “disbelief” that he was the double defending champion at his age and vowed to give his all to make it three in a row.
“I’m going to try everything possible (to win again) and leave it all on the court,” said the world number three.
His long-time rival Nadal, who cut short his 2018 season to have surgery on a foot injury, showed no mercy to Australian wildcard James Duckworth in his opening round clash.
The 17-time Grand Slam winner cruised through 6-4, 6-3, 7-5 and said it was an important victory.
“Not easy to come back after a lot of months, especially against a player playing super aggressive on every point,” said the 2009 Australian champion, who showed no sign of any injury worries. “The energy I feel in this place is fantastic.”
The second seed is bidding to become the first man in the Open era, and only the third in history along with Roy Emerson and Rod Laver, to win each Grand Slam on two or more occasions.
Fifth seed Kevin Anderson progressed, as did NextGen Finals champion Stefanos Tsitsipas. But ninth seed John Isner became the first top seed to crash out.
World number three Wozniacki, who made her Grand Slam breakthrough in Melbourne last year, opened her defence with a convincing 6-3, 6-4 win over Belgium’s Alison van Uytvanck.
It was an emotional win for the Dane who is struggling with rheumatoid arthritis and she was in tears afterwards.
“Last year I had some special memories and just to be able to be back out here on Rod Laver Arena is something extremely special and emotional,” she said.
Second seed and 2016 champion Angelique Kerber was also impressive, breezing past Slovenia’s Polona Hercog 6-2, 6-2.
Maria Sharapova, a winner at Melbourne in 2008, signalled her intent with a rare 6-0, 6-0 double bagel demolition of Britain’s Harriet Dart.
Playing in her 15th Australian Open, the three-time finalist said she was pleased to go through so easily as she battles back from injuries.
“I’m still working through some painful days. But, you know, I felt like I did all the right things today in order to get through that match,” said the Russian.
Fifth seeded Sloane Stephens, the 2017 US Open champion who struggled in her warm-up tournaments in Brisbane and Sydney, got back to business with an easy two-set win against fellow American Taylor Townsend.
Eleventh seed Aryna Sabalenka, widely tipped as a potential future champion, also safely negotiated round one on a hot day. But Germany’s 14th seed Julia Goerges was knocked out, as was former French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko.
Britain’s Katie Boulter, meanwhile, created a slice of history by becoming the first woman to win in a third set tiebreak — a new rule introduced to the Open this year, beating Russia’s Ekaterina Makarova 6-0, 4-6, 7-6 (10/6).
Often under attack from the Opposition over agrarian issues, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Monday reached out to farmers and reaffirmed his government’s commitment towards working for doubling their income by 2022.
He also assured that the Prime Minister’s Crop Insurance Scheme will benefit “only the farmers and not private companies”.
His comments came in the wake of the recent allegations of a scam in the scheme by parties like BJP’s ally Shiv Sena, the AAP and renowned journalist P Sainath.
“Our target is to double the income of farmers by 2022. We are implementing various schemes of the central and state governments for farmers, and we are going to do it (double their income by 2022),” Fadnavis said.
He was interacting with farmers from different regions of the state through video conferencing.
The government has approved Rs 24,000 crore worth loan waiver for the state’s 51 lakh farmers holding bank accounts, he said.
The government has also made available more than Rs 10,000 crore fund through budget for the current fiscal to implement various schemes meant for them, he said in his over two hour-long interaction, called ‘Lok Samvad’.
He told farmers from districts like Jalna, Palghar, Ahmednagar, Chandrapur, Yavatmal, Osmanabad, Parbhani, Gondia, Jalgaon and others that the government was laying stress on use of modern technologies to help them tackle weather uncertainties.
The government distributed compensation worth Rs 15,240 crore to farmers whose crops were hit by natural calamities, he said.
Fadnavis claimed that the government was “successful” in giving relief to farmers through the PM’s crop insurance scheme. Around 55 lakh farmers were given compensation worth “thousands of crores” under the scheme, he added.
When a farmer said there was “confusion” among cultivators that the scheme benefited insurance companies more than them, Fadnavis said, “We will ensure only the farmers benefit by the scheme and not the companies.”
On his government’s flagship Jalyukta Shivar water conservation scheme, the chief minister said it helped 16,000 villages across the state to become water-sufficient.
Nearly 1.37 lakh farm ponds were also created on demand-supply basis, he said.
Fadnavis said funds worth Rs 34,000 crore were made available by his government till now for completing the pending works on dams.
Also, 18,000 tractors were distributed among the state’s farmers under his government’s watch, he said, and stressed on processing foods to ensure cultivators benefit by getting fair price for their produce.
He also said that steps were being taken to provide fodder for livestock in areas facing drought-like situation.
On the occasion, Fadnavis launched the ‘Maha Agritech’ programme to solve agrarian problems with the help of satellite.
“Under the programme, the crop cycle can be tracked from sowing to harvesting stages… it will help foretell the prices that farmers’ produces can fetch,” he said, emphasising on the use of technology for helping cultivators.
The Nationalist Congress Party Monday announced the formation of a 22-member manifesto committee for the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls.
The committee will be headed by Dilip Walse-Patil and will have Supriya Sule, Nawab Malik, Dhananjay Munde, Jitendra Awhad, Bhaskar Jadhav and Anna Dange as members.
Mumbai NCP president Sachin Ahir, MLAs Rajesh Tope and Shashikant Shinde and the party’s women wing chief Chitra Wagh would also be members of the panel.
The announcement about the committee’s formation was made by NCP Maharashtra unit chief Jayant Patil.
The Bombay High Court Monday questioned the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) request to stay the demolition order for fugitive jeweller Nirav Modi’s illegal bungalow at Alibaug in the adjoining Raigad district.
A division bench of Chief Justice N H Patil and Justice N M Jamdar was hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) filed in 2009 by Shambhuraje Yuvakranti of the Akhil Bhartiya Maratha Seva Sangha on the issue.
The Raigad district collector had last month ordered demolition of 58 unauthorised structures, including one of Modi, built along the beach at Alibaug, a coastal town popular with weekend tourists.
The demolition order was passed following rebuke from the high court for failing to initiate action against the illegal structures.
The ED had last week filed an application before the high court, informing it that the said structure was attached by the agency as part of its money laundering probe against Modi.
The agency in its application informed the court that the tribunal set under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) had permitted it to attach the property long before the Raigad collector ordered its demolition.
According to ED, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has sealed the property.
The ED sought a stay on the Raigad Collector’s order of demolition and requested the court to give the agency a hearing.
The bench, however, sought to know why the agency was seeking a stay on the demolition order.
“What is illegal needs to go. What is your problem with those structures that are illegal?” Chief Justice Patil said.
The court then posted the matter for further hearing after four weeks.
According to an affidavit filed by the Raigad district collector on Monday, a day after the demolition order was passed last month, the sub divisional officer of Alibaug wrote a letter to the ED seeking permission to de-seal the property and demolish it.
“We were informed that the ED has sent an e-mail to the CBI on January 2, 2019, requesting CBI to depute an officer for de-sealing the property or provide an NOC to ED for the same. A reply on this is awaited,” the affidavit said.
A father-son duo were arrested for allegedly posing as hotel guests and escaping without paying bills after dining there, police said on Monday.
The two were nabbed after staff at a five-star hotel in Cuffe Parade in south Mumbai alerted police on Saturday, an official said.
He identified the two as 57-year-old Suhas Nerlekar and son Swapnil (32), both residents of Kandivali East.
Explaining the modus operandi, the official said, “They used to book rooms in posh hotels after introducing themselves as businessmen. Before collecting the keys of their rooms, the two would have dinner at the hotel and then sneak away without paying the bill.”
On Saturday, a hotel staffer stopped them while they were making an exit and asked them to pay the bill, he said.
“They were detained as they did not have any money. The police was called in and we arrested the duo under section 420 (cheating) of the IPC,” the Cuffe Parade police station official added.
He said that the accused have reportedly cheated hotels in Colaba and Santa Cruz similarly.
Central Railway has installed a blue indicator light at the entrance of a suburban train coach as a pilot project to warn passengers not to board trains on the verge of departing.
The Mumbai suburban network, among the largest in the world with over 75 lakh daily commuters, faces a perennial problem of people trying to board at the last moment or when the train has picked up speed while departing stations.
“We will monitor the performance of the new blue light visual indicator. Based on commuter feedback, a decision would be taken on installing it in more coaches,” said Sunil Udasi, chief public relations officer of CR.
He said the indicator switches on to warn passengers that boarding a train from thereon is unsafe, adding that the mechanism is linked to the train guard’s beat signal which tells the train’s motorman to proceed ahead.
The indicator mechanism was developed at CR’s Kurla Carshed, he informed.
The Delhi High Court Monday dismissed a plea alleging that there were not sufficient taxi and auto rickshaw stands in the city and those available were “illegally grabbed” by certain groups.
A bench of Chief Justice Rajendra Menon and Justice V K Rao rejected the petition after the Delhi government’s counsel said the secretary of NGO Nyayabhoomi has a personal interest.
“You are a beneficiary. At your instance in the PIL (Public Interest Litigation), we will not interfere. Dismissed,” the bench said.
The BJP-led Gujarat government on Monday implemented 10 per cent reservation in state government jobs and education for the economically weaker sections (EWS) in the general category.
With this, Gujarat has become the first state in the country to implement the new provision.
The constitutional amendment to provide the 10 per cent quota was approved by Parliament last week and had received assent of President Ram Nath Kovind on Saturday.
Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Sunday announced that his government will implement the reservation provision from January 14.
“Happy to state that the Government of Gujarat has decided to implement 10% EWS reservation benefits from 14th January, 2019. It will be implemented in all ongoing recruitment process too wherein there is only advertisement published but first stage of examination is yet to held,” he said in a tweet.
“The economically weaker sections from the general category will get 10 per cent reservation in admissions to higher education and government jobs starting Uttarayan on January 14,” the state government had said in a release.
The new quota will also be implemented in admissions and jobs which were advertised before January 14 but for which the actual process has not started, it said.
In such cases, fresh announcement about the admission process or jobs will have to be made, it further said.
The Gujarat Congress, however, criticised the government’s decision to implement the quota, saying it was done in a hurry as January 14 was a holiday on account of the Uttarayan festival.
Puducherry Pradesh Congress Committee will launch on January 20 ‘Project Shakti’, the brain-child of AICC leader Rahul Gandhi, to strength the party from the grassroots-level here.
Minister of Public Works and PCC leader A Namassivayam said in a press release here Monday that AICC general secretary Mukul Wasnik, project coordinator Praveen Chakravarty, AICC secretary Sanjay Dutt, also in-charge of the Congress party affairs in Puducherry, Territorial Chief Minister V Narayanasamy and Ministers would be among those who would participate in the launch of the project.
Namassivayam said an emergency meeting of the executive committee of the PCC held here yesterday adopted a resolution announcing the formation of the ‘Project Shakti.’
He said that the meeting also through other resolutions decided to distribute handbills door-to-door to bring into focus the ‘monumental failure and blunders’ the Narendra Modi-headed NDA government at the Centre has committed since it assumed office.
The executive committee meeting was attended among others by the Chief Minister, Ministers, Deputy Speaker V P Sivakolundhu and party MLAs.
An SUV of Madhya Pradesh police on Monday met with an accident in Maharashtra’s Buldhana district in which four civilians were killed and three others, including two police personnel, were injured, an official said.
Often under attack from the Opposition over agrarian issues, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Monday reached out to farmers and reaffirmed his government’s commitment towards working for doubling their income by 2022.
The Delhi High Court Monday dismissed a plea alleging that there were not sufficient taxi and auto rickshaw stands in the city and those available were “illegally grabbed” by certain groups.
The BJP-led Gujarat government on Monday implemented 10 per cent reservation in state government jobs and education for the economically weaker sections (EWS) in the general category.
Puducherry Pradesh Congress Committee will launch on January 20 ‘Project Shakti’, the brain-child of AICC leader Rahul Gandhi, to strength the party from the grassroots-level here.