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Clash over statue in MP: 19 held so far, situation peaceful, say police

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ANI
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Clash over statue in MP: 19 held so far, situation peaceful, say police 2

Police have so far arrested 19 persons in connection with a clash over a statue in Madhya Pradesh’s Ujjain district, and the situation is peaceful in the area amid heavy presence of cops, an official said on Saturday. Members of two communities had clashed and pelted stones at each other after a statue of former deputy prime minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel was pulled down by unidentified persons in Makdone tehsil on Thursday morning.

A total of 19 persons have been arrested so far in connection with the clash, said Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP-Rural) Nitesh Bhargava. They have been booked for rioting and using criminal force to deter a public servant from performing their duty.

He said markets are open in Makdone, and the situation is normal in the town.

There is peace between both groups, but the police are keeping an eye on the situation, he said, and added that the status quo remains intact at the disputed site.

No injuries were reported in Thursday’s clash. However, it prompted authorities to deploy police personnel in large numbers in the Makdone area, located about 50 km from the district headquarters.

In a video of the incident, which went viral on social media, a group of people was seen pulling down the statue with a tractor. They wanted a statue of social reformer and the Constitution’s chief architect Dr B R Ambedkar be installed at the site, instead of Patel’s, police sources had said.

The statue of Patel was installed at a site close to the Makdone bus stand on Wednesday night, they said. Bhargava said on Friday that they were still trying to find out when the statue was installed.

Conspiracy to topple Delhi govt, 7 AAP MLAs offered Rs 25 crore to quit party: CM Arvind Kejriwal

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PTI
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Conspiracy to topple Delhi govt, 7 AAP MLAs offered Rs 25 crore to quit party: CM Arvind Kejriwal 4

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) claimed on Saturday that the BJP has offered Rs 25 crore each to seven of its MLAs in Delhi to quit the party while also threatening to topple the Kejriwal government.

The Delhi BJP, however, rubbished the allegation and challenged the AAP to name the MLAs and the people who contacted them with the offer.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal posted on ‘X’ that seven of his party MLAs had been contacted by ”them” and warned that the AAP convener would be arrested soon.

According to Kejriwal, the callers claimed they were in contact with 21 AAP MLAs. The MLAs were promised Rs 25 crore and a BJP ticket each to contest the elections after the toppling of the Delhi government, the AAP leader charged.

Kejriwal added that all the seven AAP MLAs refused to quit the party.

He also claimed that attempts were being made to get him arrested in connection with the alleged liquor scam to bring down the AAP government in Delhi.

Several conspiracies were hatched in the past nine years to topple the AAP government in Delhi, but they all failed, Kejriwal said.

At a press conference here, Delhi minister Atishi alleged that the BJP has launched ‘Operation Lotus 2.0’ in Delhi. ”They had made a similar attempt to poach AAP MLAs last year by offering them money but failed,” she claimed.

Refuting the allegation, Delhi BJP secretary Harish Khurana challenged Atishi to name the MLAs contacted and also those who reached out to them with the offer.

He said AAP was trying to shift focus from Kejriwal skipping ED summons for questioning in the liquor scam.

Maha govt issues notification to recognise as Kunbis kin of Marathas whose Kunbi caste records found

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PTI
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Maha govt issues notification to recognise as Kunbis kin of Marathas whose Kunbi caste records found 6

The Maharashtra government issued a notification to recognise as Kunbis all blood relatives of the Maratha community members whose Kunbi caste records have been found.

Kunbi, an agrarian community, falls in the Other Backward Classes (OBC) category, and Maratha quota activist Manoj Jarange, who spearheads the agitation over the reservation issue, has been demanding Kunbi certificates for all Marathas.

The notification says the draft rules may be called the Maharashtra Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, De-Notified Tribes, Nomadic Tribes, Other Backward Classes and Special Backward Category (Regulation of Issuance and Verification of) Caste Certificate (Amendment) Rules, 2024. The notification says that the Kunbi caste certificates will be issued upon submission of an affidavit by the applicant establishing relations with his blood relatives – uncle, nephew and other members of his family as well as ”patriarchal” relatives, who have found Kunbi records being the applicants’ ”sage soyare” (blood relatives).

After conducting a field inquiry and verification, the Kunbi caste certificates will be issued immediately, it said. The word ‘sage soyare’ includes relatives of the applicant’s father, grandfather, great grandfather and in earlier generations forming out of marriages within the same castes. This will include relations forming out of marriages within the same caste, it said. The rules say ‘sage soyare’ were relations of persons belonging to the Maratha community whose records of being Kunbi have been found and will be given Kunbi caste certificates.

Relations forming out of marriages within the same caste of a person who has record of being a Kunbi, will also be given the caste certificate, it said. ”All the ‘sage soyare’ being in relation of the persons belonging to the Maratha community, whose record of being Kunbi has been found shall be given certificates on the basis of the Kunbi records of such persons belonging to Maratha community,” the notification said.

General public to be allowed to use toilets in hotels and restaurants in Bengaluru

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PTI
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toilets, toilet sign, bengaluru, hotels, karnataka
General public to be allowed to use toilets in hotels and restaurants in Bengaluru 8

The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has in a status report submitted to the High Court put forth several measures being undertaken to help people access toilets in the city. These measures include allowing the toilets in 172 ‘Indira Canteen’, which was meant only for the staff, for public use. The city civic body has also proposed permitting the general public to use toilets situated in public restaurants and hotels. The Special Commissioner (Health) and Chief Health Officer (Health) have been directed to take necessary steps and pass necessary orders/circulars in this regard.

The BBMP will also be inviting tenders for construction of 100 toilets exclusively for women, called ‘SHE’ toilets. Alternatively, the BBMP has also proposed to construct such toilets on its own and allotted a budget of Rs 25.50 crore for it in the 2024-25 Budget.

The status report was filed by the Chief Engineer, Solid Waste Management, BBMP following a HC direction in a public interest litigation. The BBMP constituted a committee for construction and maintenance of public toilets for general public and women under the civic body’s limits that includes the Chief Commissioner, Special Commissioner and all zonal Commissioners.

The status report reveals several measures including installation of new E-toilets, maintenance of the 229 existing E-toilets and identification of place for construction of toilets in places where there are large floating populations.

The BBMP is also providing separate toilet blocks for transgenders and differently abled persons in the new toilets being constructed. Recording the submission on Wednesday, the division bench headed by the Chief Justice Prasanna B Varale adjourned the hearing of the PIL.

Sri Lankan Parliament passes Bill to regulate online content, draws oppn criticism

By
Web Team
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Sri Lankan Parliament passes Bill to regulate online content, draws oppn criticism 10

Sri Lankan Parliament has passed a bill to regulate online content, drawing criticism by the opposition parties which termed it as serious threat to freedom of speech and crackdown on dissent, ahead of polls in the country, local media reported.

The Speaker said that the Bill was passed on Wednesday by a 108-62 vote, the Colombo Times reported.

Debunking allegations that the Bill will impact the freedom of speech, Public Security Minister Tiran Alles said: “It is not suppress media or opposition.”

While presenting the bill on Tuesday, President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s government has said that it is aimed at checking cybercrimes.

Offences under the Bill invite hefty fine and imprisonment up to five years.

“My priority is youth… your dreams are my resolutions”: PM Modi at ‘Namo Navmatdata Sammelan’

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ANI
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pm modi, viksit bharat, bjp, Namo Navmatdata Sammelan
"My priority is youth… your dreams are my resolutions": PM Modi at 'Namo Navmatdata Sammelan' 12

Emphasising the importance of every vote in a democracy, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday urged young voters and said that when the country is working to become a ‘Viksit Bharat’ by 2047, your vote will decide what will be the direction of India. Addressing the ‘Namo Navmatdata Sammelan’ via video conferencing, PM Modi said that where we will reach in the next few years in space, defence, manufacturing, technology, innovation, and many other sectors will all depend on youth.

“Today, when the country is working to become a Viksit Bharat by 2047, your vote will decide what the direction of India. Where we will reach in the next few years in space, defence, manufacturing, technology, innovation, and many other sectors will all depend on you. Our speed, direction, approach–all of this will be decided by you. The responsibility of what the possibilities will be for you will be on those who will manage the country during this period. In such a situation, the responsibility of making sure that those people are properly elected also depends on your votes,” he said. “Your one vote and the direction of the country’s development are interconnected,” he added.

Further, PM Modi asserted that when there is a stable government, it becomes easier for a country to make big decisions. “Your one vote will make India the third-largest economy in the world. Your one vote will bring a majority and stable government in India. Your one vote will give more energy to the digital revolution. When there is a stable government in the country, the country makes big decisions and moves forward by solving problems that have been pending for decades. Our majority government ended the decades-long wait in Jammu and Kashmir after revoking Article 370. This is our government which has ended the four-decade wait of the country’s soldiers by introducing ‘One Rank One Pension’. We implemented modern tax systems like GST. Our government ended the wait of the women by enacting the Naari Shakti Adhiniyam,” PM Modi said.

The Prime Minister mentioned that India is today showing the world how development can be done while protecting nature. “Indian Railways has set a target of zero carbon emissions by 2030. We have also set a target of net zero by the year 2070. Today, emphasis is being given to electric mobility in India. You have inspiration as well as innovation. My priority is youth…your dreams are my resolutions,” he said.

PM Modi added that the government is working day and night to ensure that every dream of youth is fulfilled. My priority is all youth. I have always believed in the youth of the country the most. We have opened business doors for you by making a start-up policy. We provided the facility to take loans from banks without guarantee under ‘Mudra Yojana.’ The Prime Minister also spoke on ‘Parivaarvad’, and urged voters to defeat parties that still thrive on it.

“Nepotism is a disease that prevents the youth of the country from moving forward. Other youth are never able to move forward in family parties. The thinking of their leaders is anti-youth. That is why you have to defeat such dynastic parties with your votes,” he said.

Congress was making unreasonable demands, prioritising CPI(M): TMC on INDIA alliance collapse in Bengal

By
Afternoon Voice
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mamata banerjee, india alliance, tmc, trinamool congress, west bengal
Congress was making unreasonable demands, prioritising CPI(M): TMC on INDIA alliance collapse in Bengal 14

Leaders of the ruling TMC in West Bengal on Wednesday blamed the Congress for its decision to fight the Lok Sabha elections on its own, maintaining that it was making unreasonable demands in terms of seats and was giving priority to the CPI(M) in the state and at INDIA bloc meetings.

TMC chairperson Mamata Banerjee, also the chief minister of West Bengal, announced in the afternoon that her party has decided to fight the upcoming Lok Sabha polls on its own.

A senior TMC leader claimed that the Congress was lacking seriousness about the alliance.

”We were serious about the INDIA alliance, but the Congress from the very beginning was behaving as if the INDIA alliance was their entity,” the TMC leader told PTI, shedding light on why the alliance was called off.

He said that the TMC offered two seats to the Congress, based on its 2019 performance, but it demanded 10-12 seats in which it got less than 3 percent votes.

The Congress won two — Maldaha Dakshin and Baharampur — of the state’s 42 Lok Sabha seats in 2019, recording an overall vote share of 5.97 percent in West Bengal. In the 2021 assembly elections, it drew a blank with a vote share of 2.9 per cent.

The TMC leader emphasised that the initial understanding at the India Bloc meetings was a 1:1 fight against the BJP.

”But the Congress was unwilling to follow the formula. They were not ready to share seats where they are strong, but want seats from regional parties from the states where they don’t have any presence,” he said.

The TMC was reportedly seeking to field its candidate in one of the two Lok Sabha seats in Meghalaya in understanding with the Congress.

The TMC leader said that despite Banerjee stating in the December meeting of the India bloc that the seat-sharing arrangement must be finalised by the end of 2023, the Congress delayed. ”Had the discussions been fruitful, we could have given them one-two more seat, but they were just adamant. They (state Congress) kept on abusing us. Despite the Congress high command being informed about the insults, it did nothing,” another TMC leader said.

A third TMC leader PTI spoke to criticised the Congress for giving undue importance to CPI(M) at India Bloc meetings and in West Bengal.

”Be it the INDIA bloc meetings or West Bengal, the Congress is obsessed with the CPI(M) for reasons best known to them. We will not work as per the instructions of the CPI(M), with whom we had fought for three decades,” he said.

Banerjee had on Monday accused the CPI(M) of trying to control the opposition bloc’s agenda.

The CPI(M), Congress and the TMC are part of the 28-party INDIA bloc. In West Bengal, the CPI(M) and Congress are opposed to the TMC and BJP.

The CPI(M) and Congress had contested the 2016 and 2021 assembly polls in West Bengal, in an alliance.

The TMC had allied with the Congress in the 2001 assembly polls, the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, and the 2011 assembly polls, leading to the ousting of the CPI (M)-led Left Front government of 34 years.

Manav, Ayhika kickstart WTT Star Contender Goa 2024 with wins, Sharath loses

By
ANI
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Manav Thakkar, Ayhika Mukherjee, WTT Star Contender Goa 2024
Manav, Ayhika kickstart WTT Star Contender Goa 2024 with wins, Sharath loses 16

Indian paddlers Manav Thakkar and Ayhika Mukherjee began their campaign at the WTT Star Contender Goa 2024 with comfortable victories on Tuesday at the Peddem Indoor Stadium in Mapusa. Manav overcame the challenge of Anshuman Agarwal 3-0 (11-7, 11-4, 11-4) in straight games to move into Men’s Singles – Qualifying Round 3 where he will face Senegal’s Ibrahima Diaw.

In the women’s singles category, Ayhika Mukherjee defeated Sayali Wani by 3-0 (11-9, 11-2, 12-10) in Qualifying Round 2, while Poymantee Baisya beat Pritha Priya Vartikar 3-0 (12-10, 11-7, 11-7) in Qualifying Round 1. Meanwhile, Achanta Sharath Kamal and Sanil Shetty faced defeats in the Men’s Singles – Qualifying Round 2 to exit the tournament. Sharath Kamal went down 2-3 (11-6, 12-10, 4-11, 15-17, 3-11) against South Korea’s Kang Dongsoo, whereas Algeria’s Mehdi Bouloussa beat Sanil Shetty 3-2 (14-12, 11-9, 11-13, 7-11, 11-6).

In the mixed doubles category, Manush Shah and Diya Chitale defeated the Singaporean pair of Quek Izaac and Zhou Jingyi 3-0 (11-4, 11-7, 11-6) in straight games, while Sreeja Akula and Snehit Suravajjula beat Pang Koen and Wong Ru of Singapore 3-1 (11-9, 13-11, 7-11, 11-8) to reach the Qualifying Round 2.

Assam Rifles soldier in Manipur opens fire on colleagues before shooting himself dead; six injured

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ANI
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assam riffle, soldier, assam riffle soldier, manipur, crime
Assam Rifles soldier in Manipur opens fire on colleagues before shooting himself dead; six injured 18

An Assam Rifles jawan opened fire on his colleagues, injuring six of them in south Manipur, before shooting himself dead on Wednesday, officials said. The firing incident took place at an Assam Rifles Battalion, deployed close to the India-Myanmar border, according to a statement released by Inspectorate General Assam Rifles (IGAR) on Wednesday.

As per the information from the IGAR, all the injured soldiers were non-Manipuris and they were rushed to the military hospital in Churachandpur for further treatment. The jawans have now been reported to be stable.

“In light of the ongoing ethnic strife in Manipur, it is important to share the details of the incident transparently to dispel any potential rumours and avoid any speculation,” said the IGAR official statement. “This unfortunate incident should not be correlated with ongoing conflict, given the fact that none of the injured are from Manipur,” the statement read.

The central paramilitary force said that an investigation into the incident has been ordered to ascertain the facts. “All Assam Rifles battalions have a mixed-class composition, including those belonging to various communities in Manipur. All personnel have been staying and operating together despite the polarisation of society to maintain peace and stability in Manipur,” it added.

Manipur has been witnessing ethnic strife between the Meitei and the Kuki-Zo tribal communities since May 2023.

6 people killed as bus hits tractor and car in Ahmednagar

By
ANI
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tractor, ahmedabad, accident, tractor bus accident
6 people killed as bus hits tractor and car in Ahmednagar 20

Six people were killed after a state transport bus hit a tractor and a car in Maharashtra’s Ahmednagar district in the early hours of Wednesday, police said.

The accident took place near Dhawalipuri Phata on Ahmednagar-Kalyan road in Parner tehsil at around 2.30 am, they said.

A tractor carrying sugarcane had toppled and another tractor was brought to offload the sugarcane from it. The driver of a car also halted and was helping the people in the off-loading work, an official from Parner police station said.

”As the tractor took a turn on the road, a state transport bus approaching there collided with the tractor and the car. Six people, including some labourers, died on the spot,” the official said.

An investigation was on into the incident, he said.

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