Category: National

PTI

New Delhi: The famous Hazrat Nizamuddin Dargah, which was closed over five months ago after the outbreak of the coronavirus, opened for devotees on Sunday, with a “moderate” number of people visting the shrine to pay obeisance to the Sufi saint.

Union Minister for Minority Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi was among the people who paid obeisance to Sufi saint Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia on the first of the reopening of the shrine, caretakers of the dargah said.

The minister appreciated measures taken by the shrine to protect devotee from the coronavirus disease, they said.

The graves of Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia and Amir Khusro in the dargah complex have been covered from all sides with plastic sheets “so that people do not touch them while paying obeisance, as it could lead to people getting infected with the virus,” Nazim Nizami, one of the caretakers of the shrine, said.

Qawwali evenings devoted to the Sufi saint have been suspended for the time being to avoid gatherings in the shrine’s courtyard.

“We were able to manage well the devotees who turned up in moderate numbers on the first day of the opening of the dargah. The number of devotees was more in the morning hours and it reduced in the afternoon, and again increased in the evening,” Nizami said.

People adhered to various safety measures like use of sanitisers and face covers as well as social distancing, he said.

There were separate entry and exit gates for devotees, and markings were made on the floor to ensure social distancing by them, Nizami said.

“The Qawwali evenings, which are hugely famous among followers of the Sufi saint, have been suspended for the time being. We are not allowing people to sit in the courtyard of the dargah, as they used to do before, and (asking them to) leave after paying obeisance,” he said.

Nizami said that crowd management at the shrine will be further improved after assessing footfall in the coming days.

The dargah located in the Hazarat Nizamuddin area of south Delhi was closed with the announcement of the lockdown due to the coronavirus outbreak in March.

Under the ‘Unlock’ process, religious places in Delhi started opening after June 8, but the dargah remained closed due to increase in COVID-19 cases, caretakers of the shrine said.

PTI

New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Sunday said the NDA’s Goods and Services Tax (GST) is not a tax system but an “attack” on India’s poor and on its small and medium businesses, and urged all to stand against it.

Dubbing the GST as “Gabbar Singh Tax”, he said it is the second major attack on India’s unorganised economy, and is an “absolute failure”.

He had earlier said demonetisation was the first attack on the informal sector in the economy.

As part of his video series on the economy, the former Congress president alleged that the NDA government has kept four different tax slabs to help those big industrialists with means and contacts to change the taxes under the GST regime.

“This GST is an absolute failure. Not only is it unsuccessful, it is an attack on the poor and on the small and medium businesses,” he said in the video series shared on his social media platforms.

“GST is not a tax system, it is an attack on India’s poor. It is an attack on small shopkeepers, small and medium businesses, farmers and labourers.

“We have to recognise this attack and stand against it together,” he said.

Gandhi shared the under 3-minute video on Twitter and said, “Another major reason for the historic decline in GDP is the Gabbar Singh Tax (GST) of the Modi government. It has destroyed a lot – lakhs of small businesses, crores of jobs and the future of youth and the financial health of states. GST means economic devastation.”

This is the third of the four-part series by him on the economy.

Gandhi and the Congress have stepped up their attack on the Modi government over the state of the economy after India’s economic growth suffered its worst fall on record in the April-June quarter, with the gross domestic product (GDP) contracting 23.9 percent.

He claimed that the GST was UPA’s idea, which meant “One tax, minimal tax, standard and simple tax”.

“NDA’s GST is completely different. Four different tax slabs, up to 28 percent, complicated and difficult to understand,” he alleged.

The Congress leader said the small and medium businesses cannot pay this tax, whereas the big companies can easily pay it by employing a few accountants to do the job.

“Why are there four different rates? This is because the government wants those who have the means to be able to easily change GST, and those who don’t have means, cannot do anything about GST.

“Who has the means? India’s biggest 15-20 industrialists. So, whatever tax law they want to change can easily be done in this GST regime,” he alleged.

Gandhi said the result of the NDA’s GST is that today, the Government of India is unable to provide the GST compensation money to the states.

The states are unable to give money to state employees and teachers, he said.

Gandhi has earlier brought out a similar video series on the situation on the border with China.

PTI

Bhubaneswar: A 13-year-old was raped at her residence here by her mother’s colleagues and a policeman among others during the March-April lockdown and the police have launched a manhunt for the accused, police said.

At least seven persons were involved in this heinous act and the mother’s colleagues are absconding, Bhubaneswar deputy commissioner of police U S Dash said on Sunday.

The complaint on the sordid incident was filed by the girl’s mother, who is an employee of a leading private TV channel here, at the Info-city police station here, he said adding the case was shifted to Mahila police station on August 30.

Two of girl’s tormentors were colleagues of her mother. They were emboldened by the woman’s engagement in the office for long hours due to the lockdown, the complaint said.

While the girl stays with her mother in a rented house at the Info-city, her father and other members of the family stay at their native place at Kendrapara, over 85 km from here, it said.

The two employees of the TV channel came to the house when the woman was in office and raped her daughter. They also threatened to kill her if she divulged the incident to anyone, the complaint said.

The girl maintained her silence for some days and finally spoke to her mother about the incident in April. When the woman confronted the two men in the office, she too was threatened that the girl would be killed.

Fearing for their lives, the mother and the daughter fled to their Kendrapara home. They returned to the city in August and filed the complaint with the police, it said.

The police have recorded the victim’s statement under Section 161 and Section 164 of CrPC and conducted the medical examination of the girl on Friday.

In her statement, the girl, a student of an English medium school, has said that her tormentors were two employees of the TV channel, two private security guards, a policeman and two others.

The DCP said a special team has been formed to identify the accused persons and the case is being probed by the inspector in-charge of Mahila police station.

A case has been registered under various sections of IPC and POCSO Act, he said.

Dash said the police have formed a special team for investigation and handed it over to Investigating Integrative Units for Crime Against Women (IUCAW).

Several raids have been conducted, but the accused are yet to be apprehended, the police said.

New Delhi: India’s COVID-19 infection tally sprinted past 40 lakh, just 13 days after it crossed 30 lakh, with a record 86,432 cases being reported in a day, while recoveries have surged to 31,07,223 on Saturday pushing the recovery rate to 77.23 per cent, according to the Union Health Ministry.

The total coronavirus cases mounted to 40,23,179, while the death toll climbed to 69,561 with 1,089 people succumbing to the disease in a span of 24 hours, data updated at 8 am showed.

India’s COVID-19 cases jumped from 10 lakh to 20 lakh in 21 days. It took 16 more days to race past 30 lakh and 13 days more to cross the 40-lakh mark.

It took 110 days for the COVID-19 cases in the country to reach one lakh while it had taken 59 days more to go past the 10-lakh post.

The COVID-19 case fatality rate due to the novel coronavirus infection has further declined to 1.73 per cent.

There are 8,46,395 active cases of coronavirus infection, which is 21.04 per cent of the total caseload, the data stated.

India’s COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7 and went past 30 lakh on August 23.

According to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), a cumulative total of 4,77,38,491 samples have been tested up to September 4 with 10,59,346 samples being tested on Friday.

Of the 1,089 fresh deaths, 378 are from Maharashtra, 116 from Karnataka, 79 from Tamil Nadu, 76 from Andhra Pradesh, 71 from Uttar Pradesh, 58 from West Bengal, 49 from Punjab, 30 from Madhya Pradesh, 29 from Bihar, 22 from Chhattisgarh, 20 from Puducherry, 19 from Haryana, 15 from Assam, 14 from Gujarat, 13 each from Delhi and Rajasthan.

Twelve fatalities each have been reported from Jammu and Kashmir and Uttarakhand, 11 each from Kerala and Telangana, nine from Odisha, eight from Goa, seven from Tripura, five from Chandigarh, three each from Jharkhand and Manipur, two from Himachal Pradesh while Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Meghalaya, Sikkim and Nagaland have registered one fatality each.

Of the total 69,561 deaths, Maharashtra has reported the maximum at 25,964, followed by 7,687 in Tamil Nadu, 6,170 in Karnataka, 4,513 in Delhi, 4,276 in Andhra Pradesh, 3,762 in Uttar Pradesh, 3,452 in West Bengal, 3,076 in Gujarat and 1,739 in Punjab.

So far, 1,513 people have died of COVID-19 in Madhya Pradesh, 1,108 in Rajasthan, 877 in Telangana, 759 in Haryana, 755 in Jammu and Kashmir, 701 in Bihar, 531 in Odisha, 447 in Jharkhand, 345 in Assam, 337 in Chhattisgarh, 326 in Kerala and 312 in Uttarakhand.

Puducherry has registered 280 fatalities, Goa 220, Tripura 136, Chandigarh 68, Himachal Pradesh 50, Andaman and Nicobar Islands 49, Ladakh and Manipur 35 each, Meghalaya 14, Nagaland 10, Arunachal Pradesh seven, Sikkim five and Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu two.

The health ministry stressed that more than 70 per cent of the deaths occurred due to comorbidities.

“Our figures are being reconciled with the Indian Council of Medical Research,” the ministry said on its website, adding that state-wise distribution of figures is subject to further verification and reconciliation.

PTI

New Delhi: India’s COVID-19 tally went past 39 lakh on Friday with 83,341 fresh cases reported in a span of 24 hours, while the number of recoveries crossed the 30-lakh mark, pushing the recovery rate of coronavirus patients in the country to 77.15 per cent, according to the Union health ministry

The total number of COVID-19 cases mounted to 39,36,747, while the death toll due to the disease climbed to 68,472 with 1,096 people succumbing to it in a day, the ministry’s data updated at 8 am showed

The COVID-19 case fatality rate has further declined to 1.74 per cent in the country

There are 8,31,124 active coronavirus cases in the country, which account for 21.11 per cent of the total caseload, the data stated

The country registered over 80,000 fresh COVID-19 cases for the second consecutive day

India is the third worst-hit nation by the pandemic in terms of cases and deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University, which has been compiling COVID-19 data from all over the world

India’s COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7 and the 30-lakh mark on August 23

According to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), a total of 4,66,79,145 samples were tested for COVID-19 in the country as on September 3, including 11,69,765 on Thursday

Of the 1,096 fresh deaths, 391 were in Maharashtra, 104 in Karnataka, 92 in Tamil Nadu,?75 each in Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh, 72?in Punjab, 55 in West Bengal, 30 in Madhya Pradesh,?26 in Bihar, 19 each in Delhi and Haryana, 16 each in Chhattisgarh and Gujarat, 14 in Rajasthan and 11 in Jammu and Kashmir

Ten fatalities each were reported from Kerala and Telangana, nine from Uttarakhand, eight each from Goa and Odisha, seven each from Assam and Puducherry, six from Jharkhand, five from Himachal Pradesh, four from Chandigarh, three each from Manipur and Tripura while one death was recorded in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands

Of the total 68,472 deaths, Maharashtra accounts for the maximum of 25,586, followed by 7,608 in Tamil Nadu, 6,054 in Karnataka, 4,500 in Delhi,?4,200 in Andhra Pradesh, 3,691 in Uttar Pradesh, 3,394 in West Bengal, 3,062 in Gujarat and 1,690 in Punjab

So far, 1,483 people have died of COVID-19 in Madhya Pradesh, 1,095 in Rajasthan, 866 in Telangana, 743 in Jammu and Kashmir, 740 in Haryana, 672 in Bihar, 522 in Odisha, 444 in Jharkhand, 330 in Assam, 315 each in Kerala and Chhattisgarh and 300 in Uttarakhand

Puducherry has registered 260 COVID-19 fatalities, Goa 212, Tripura 129, Chandigarh 63, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Himachal Pradesh 48 each, Ladakh 35, Manipur 32, Meghalaya 13, Nagaland nine, Arunachal Pradesh seven, Sikkim four and Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu two

The ministry stressed that over 70 per cent of the deaths occurred due to comorbidities

“Our figures are being reconciled with the Indian Council of Medical Research,” the ministry said on its website, adding that a state-wise distribution of the figures is subject to further verification and reconciliation.

Quad should ensure Freedom of Navigation in Indian Ocean: Gen. Rawat

India’s wants the Quad to become a system to “ensure Freedom of Navigation (FoN) and Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPS)” in the Indian Ocean and around, Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Bipin Rawat said on Thursday, while highlighting the threat of a combined challenge from Pakistan and China on two fronts, and cautioning Pakistan against taking any advantage of the tensions with China.

“As far as Quad is concerned, we feel this is a good arrangement which will ensure that the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) and all other oceans around, there is complete FoN without fear of any other nation singularly trying to dominate the oceans,” Gen. Rawat said in a webinar by the U.S. India Strategic Partnership Forum, when asked about the Quad grouping consisting of India, Australia, Japan and the U.S.

“We are very keen to ensure that there is complete FoN on the seas and in the airspace above,” he stated.

Two-front challenge

Talking of the situation on the borders, Gen. Rawat said the threat from Pakistan will be mainly in the form of a proxy war but should any threat develop around our northern borders, Pakistan could take advantage and create some trouble there. “Therefore, we have taken adequate precautions to ensure that any such misadventure by Pakistan is thwarted and they are not able to succeed in their mission. But in fact, they may suffer heavy losses should they attempt any misadventure,” he said.

Talking of China, Gen. Rawat said there were border management protocols signed from 1993 onwards that have been modified continuously. “But of late, we have been seeing some aggressive actions by the Chinese but we are capable of handling these in the best suitable way,” he said, without making any specific comment on the ongoing stand-off in Ladakh.

Infrastructure development in the Tibet Autonomous Region, completion of the highway renovation project and development of strategic railway lines, in addition to the recently introduced military reforms by China are being monitored and their implications factored while devising future military strategy, Gen. Rawat said, stating that formation of theatre commands improves Chinese ability to “conduct synergised operations”.

“Opportunities exist for us to develop strategic asymmetry in select military domains, especially operations at high altitudes,” Gen. Rawat noted.

He also stated that Chinese economic cooperation with Pakistan in Pakistan Occupied Jammu and Kashmir, along with continued military, economic and diplomatic support, mandates high levels of preparation and also poses the “threat of coordinated action on the Northern and Western fronts”. To offset this, Gen. Rawat said strategies have been devised to deal with the primary front and the secondary front. “We have earmarked forces for that and we have conceptualised our strategies to deal with such threat scenarios emerging on both our borders,” he said.

India-US cooperation

Asked about India-U.S. partnership, Gen. Rawat said several agreements have been concluded of late that had improved strategic cooperation. Stating that the Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) signed in 2018 enables Indian military to get a better picture of the maritime activities in the IOR, Gen. Rawat said, “What we are looking for from the U.S. is information sharing and continued supply of high technology battle field systems that we can use to our advantage.”

Highlighting aerospace systems, space technology, cyber and artificial intelligence as high technology areas for India-U.S. cooperation, Gen. Rawat said, “With 74% Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in defence, India should become a preferred destination for investment in defence manufacturing.”

On the COVID-19 situation, Gen. Rawat said the “pandemic has turned out to be a national security issue” and added it was being ensured that troops deployed in the frontline were not impacted by the virus.

With inputs from The Hindu

PTI

Mumbai: NCP president Sharad Pawar on Thursday said the Chinese are “surreptitiously” encircling the Indian sub-continent, and India must keep a close watch on developments in Sri Lanka and Nepal.

He had invited former foreign secretary Vijay Gokhale and Air Marshal Bhushan Gokhale (Retd) for interaction with NCP MPs Supriya Sule, Praful Patel, Amol Kolhe and Vandana Chavan against the background of the stand-off in eastern Ladakh, Pawar tweeted.

The former defence minister said that during the meeting he expressed his concerns over a larger strategic and political thinking in China that aims to halt India’s economic growth.

“I highlighted the fact that the Chinese are surreptitiously encircling the Indian Sub-Continent from all directions and also expressed my concern over their presence in the South China Sea,” Pawar said in another tweet.

“I hinted at the need to keep a close watch on affairs of Sri Lanka and Nepal and also the Chinese interventions in general,” he added.

Vijay Gokhale spoke about the history of Indo-China relationship, especially the border disputes. The former foreign secretary shared his views on the current situation on the Line of Actual Control (LAC), Pawar said.

Air Marshal Gokhale emphasized that India must take into consideration the new era of parallel warfare that includes cyber war, information war, perception creation and war on economic fronts, the NCP president added.

PTI

New Delhi: The government on Wednesday blocked 118 more mobile applications, including popular gaming app PUBG, terming them prejudicial to the sovereignty, integrity and defence of the nation.

The banned apps include Baidu, Baidu Express Edition, Tencent Watchlist, FaceU, WeChat Reading and Tencent Weiyun, besides PUBG Mobile and PUBG Mobile Lite, according to an official statement.

All these banned apps have Chinese links, sources said.

The Centre had earlier banned a number of Chinese apps, including TikTok and UC Browser.

“Government blocks 118 mobile apps which are prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order,” it said.

It said the IT Ministry had received complaints from various sources, including several reports about misuse of some mobile apps available on Android and iOS platforms for stealing and surreptitiously transmitting users’ data to servers outside India.

“The compilation of these data, its mining and profiling by elements hostile to national security and defence of India, which ultimately impinges upon the sovereignty and integrity of India, is a matter of very deep and immediate concern which requires emergency measures,” the statement said.

Srinagar: Eleven teams of Indian and US scientists will soon start jointly scouting for out of the box solutions ranging from novel early diagnostic tests, antiviral therapy, drug repurposing, ventilator research, disinfection machines, and sensor-based symptom tracking for COVID 19.

The teams have been selected to take up these initiatives through a rigorous binational review process of proposals received for an invitation under COVID-19 Ignition Grants in April 2020 issued by the U.S.-India Science and Technology Endowment Fund (USISTEF).

The USISTEF today announced the awards to eleven bilateral teams proposing out-of-the-box, innovative ideas to address the COVID-19 challenge.

The USISTEF has been established by the Government of India (through the Department of Science & Technology) and the governments of the United States of America (through the Department of State) for the promotion of joint activities that would lead to innovation and entrepreneurship through the application of science and technology.

The joint U.S.-India S&T based entrepreneurial teams will work on initiatives that address the development and implementation of new technologies, tools, and systems to address COVID-19 related challenges including monitoring, diagnosis, health and safety, public outreach, information and communication.

As countries battle the COVID-19 pandemic, innovations in Science, Engineering, and Technology will play a critical role in finding solutions to this global challenge through the development of new vaccines, devices, diagnostic tools, and information systems, as well as strategies to help communities and nations manage and deploy resources to combat this pandemic.

In keeping with its mission and vision, the USISTEF announced the Call for Proposals under the category of COVID-19 Ignition Grants with the intent to support promising joint U.S.-India S&T based entrepreneurial initiatives to address the COVID-19 challenge.

The mission of the United States–India Science & Technology Endowment Fund is to support and foster joint applied R&D to generate public good through the commercialization of technology developed through partnerships between U.S. and Indian researchers and entrepreneurs to help combat this pandemic.(KINS)

Earlier on Monday morning, the condition of the former President declined.

Former President Pranab Mukherjee passed away on Monday after he developed a lung infection at the Army’s Research and Referral hospital where he had been admitted for a brain surgery. This morning the hospital in a medical bulletin had said that Mr Mukherjee had gone into septic shock due to the lung infection. He had also tested COVID19 positive. He is survived by his son, Abhijit and daughter Sharmishta Mukherjee.

Mr Mukhrejee’s son, former Lok Sabha MP Abhijit Mukherjee, announced his father’s death on twitter on Monday evening stating that despite the best efforts of doctors and prayers of ordinary Indians throughout the country, this had come to pass.

President Ram Nath Kovind, Mr Mukherjee’s immediate successor at Rashtrapati Bhavan condoled his death and said it was the “passing of an era.”

“Endowed with perspicacity and wisdom, Bharat Ratna Shri Mukherjee combined tradition with modernity. In his five decade long illustrious public life, he remained rooted to the ground irrespective of the exalted office he held. He endeared himself to people across political spectrum. As the First Citizen, he continued to connect with everyone, bringing Rashtrapati Bhavan closer to the people. He opened its gates for public visits. His decision to discontinue the honorific “His Excellency” was historic,” said Mr. Kovind.

Reactions to the death of Pranab Mukherjee

Prime Minister Narendra Modi who had, in the past, compared Mr Mukherjee to a father figure in his life as he moved to Delhi from Gujarat as Prime Minister said that India grieved Mr Mukherjee’s passing. “India grieves the passing away of Bharat Ratna Shri Pranab Mukherjee. He has left an indelible mark on the development trajectory of our nation. A scholar par excellence, a towering statesman, he was admired across the political spectrum and by all sections of society,” he said. 

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, also expressed condolences on the passing of Mr Mukherjee, “with great sadness, the nation receives the news of the unfortunate demise of our former president Shri Pranab Mukherjee, I join the country in paying homage to him.”

Mr Mukherjee’s Cabinet colleague in the UPA government, Anand Sharma said that he would be “remembered as a great parliamentarian for his erudition, articulation and commitment to democracy.”

With inputs from The Hindu