Breaking News, April 15 | HIGHLIGHTS

Gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmad and his brother Ashraf were killed when unidentified assailants opened fire at them near a medical college here on Saturday night. The shooting was caught on camera as mediapersons were following the duo being escorted to the hospital by the police for a medical checkup. At least two persons were seen firing from close range at Ahmad and his brother who fell to the ground, while the police soon overpowered the attackers. The bullet-riddled bodies of Ahmad and Ashraf were taken away from the spot as tension gripped the area after the sensational killing.
Both of them had been brought here for a court hearing in connection with the 2005 Umesh Pal murder case. Ahmad's son Asad and an accomplice were killed in a police encounter in Jhansi on April 13. Their last rites were conducted earlier in the day. Further details are awaited.

The CBI on Saturday continued questioning Trinamool Congress MLA Jiban Krishna Saha and search operations at multiple places, including premises of the lawmaker and other party leaders, in West Bengal in connection with its probe into the school job scam case, an official said. CBI officers also conducted searches in six locations, including those of the chairperson of a trust having B.Ed and D.El.Ed colleges and the premises of another person, in Kolkata, Purba Medinipur and Birbhum districts, he said.

Mafia-turned-politician Atiq Ahmed and his brother Ashraf Ahmed shot dead while being taken for medical in Prayagraj.

A man and a woman jumped before a moving train on Delhi–Mumbai railway track here and killed themselves allegedly because their relationship was disapproved of by their families, police said on Saturday. Bodies of 25-year-old Belantabai Meena and 21-year-old Ramkishan Meena were found on the railway track under Indergarh Police Station in Bundi district late Friday night. The two hailed from the same village -- Jai Niwas. Police handed over their bodies to their family members after post mortem Saturday morning, and began investigating the case under Section 174 of CrPC.

Focus on areas like credible and well-regulated real estate landscape, greater use of technology through artificial intelligence and block chain will revolutionise the sector, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said on Saturday.
He also said that adoption of green solutions for sustainable buildings will help the country to meet the global challenge of climate change. The effective and speedy redressal of housing sector complaints has given a major impetus to this sector and in fact a lot of problems that had in and around Mumbai and Delhi are gradually resolved, Goyal said. Suggesting a few mantras to help the sector in the task ahead, he said “focus on credible and well-regulated real estate landscape…you are looking at greater use of technology through artificial intelligence, blockchain and virtual reality will revolutionise the real estate sector”.

Nepali Congress leader Narayan Prasad Saud is set to become Nepal's new foreign minister and will be sworn in on Sunday, party sources said on Saturday. The decision to appoint Saud as the Minister of Foreign Affairs was taken during a meeting of the ruling alliance attended by CPN-Maoist Centre chairperson and Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal “Prachanda”, Nepali Congress president Sher Bahadur Deuba and CPN-Unified Socialist chairperson Madhav Kumar Nepal.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday said that development of the country and society is not possible without an all-round development of its students and citizens. Quoting Greek philosopher Aristotle, Rajnath said 'educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all' and added "there cannot be a better thought on education." "Till we do not work for a holistic development of citizens and students, we cannot imagine complete development of the country and society," Singh said addressing the convocation ceremony of JRN Rajasthan Vidyapeeth in Udaipur.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Saturday disclosed that Army Chief General Asim Munir played a role in securing funds from Saudi Arabia and the UAE -- a pre-condition by the IMF to seal a bailout deal with the cash-strapped nation. Addressing a ceremony in Lahore here, Sharif also expressed hope that now the IMF will not delay in reaching an agreement for USD 1.1 billion sought by Pakistan as the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz led coalition government has made a lot of efforts to fulfill the IMF demands. "Chief of Army Staff General Asim Munir has contributed to the government's efforts to secure funds from Saudi Arabia and the UAE," Sharif said. Debt-ridden Pakistan and the IMF have failed to reach a staff-level agreement on the much-needed USD 1.1 billion bailout package aimed at preventing the country from going bankrupt.

A case has been registered in Madhya Pradesh's Shivpuri district against an unidentified person for allegedly threatening to kill Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Virendra Raghuvanshi, police said on Saturday. The legislator, who represents Kolaras constituency in the district, said in his complaint that he received a phone call at 8.22 PM on Wednesday when he was visiting Dharmapura village. The caller abused him and threatened to kill him when the MLA reached his village, Raghuvanshi said. Kolaras police station in-charge Manish Sharma said a case was registered against an unidentified person and further probe was on.

DMK President and Tamil Nadu chief minister M K Stalin on Saturday interacted with his party constituency observers with just a year to go for the conduct of general elections. During his brief interaction which was held virtually, Stalin exhorted the cadres to focus on crossing the two crore membership and formation of booth committees in a bid to strengthen his party at the grass root level. "Shared two significant points -- on party membership and setting up of booth committees with constituency observers. I encouraged them to achieve the two crore membership soon," he said on Twitter.

After being airborne for nearly two hours, a Delhi-bound Lufthansa flight is returning to Frankfurt due to a hydraulic system issue, according to a passenger. The flight LH-0760 from Frankfurt to Delhi is being operated by a Boeing 747-400 aircraft.
A PTI correspondent who is on the flight said that after being airborne for around two hours, the captain announced that the aircraft is being taken back to Frankfurt to take care of the hydraulic system. The flight, which was to take off at 1.40 pm, was delayed and took off at around 2.20 pm (local time) from Frankfurt.

A car caught fire in the compound of a hospital in Maharashtra's Gondia district on Saturday, an official said. No one was injured in the incident, which took place on the campus of KTS District General Government Hospital in the afternoon, he said. The car was parked in the compound by a man visiting his relative at the hospital and people noticed smoke coming out of the vehicle, as flames engulfed its front portion completely, the official said.

Four migrants and a suspected trafficker died on Saturday and another six were injured when their car collided head-on with another as it sped the wrong way on a major highway in Greece near the Turkish border, police said. The driver of the other car, a 46-year-old Greek man, also died in the collision, police said. The car, with the driver and other 10 passengers, some of them stowed in the trunk, was driving along an older road, away from the border, when it came upon a police checking point, near the city of Alexandroupolis, on Saturday morning. Signalled to stop, it rammed the patrol car that stood in its way and sped away instead.

The Janata Dal (Secular) on Saturday released a list of six more candidates for the May 10 Assembly elections in Karnataka. With this, the party has so far released a list of 149 candidates. The first list comprising 93 was released in December last year and 50 on Friday. The party has fielded former Congress MLC Raghu Achar from Chitradurga. He had recently joined the JD(S) after being denied a ticket by the Congress. Former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda led party has given ticket to former MLA Dr Bharathi Shankar to contest from Varuna against Congress heavyweight and former chief minister Siddaramaiah and BJP minister V Somanna. Dr Devaraj Patil who quit the Congress after being denied a ticket and joined the JD(S) on Saturday has been fielded from Bagalkote.

An IndiGo plane enroute to Bagdogra returned to Delhi on Saturday afternoon due to a technical problem. While a source said the aircraft made an emergency landing due to a technical problem, IndiGo said the flight 6E 6282 from Delhi to Bagdogra returned to Delhi as a precaution. "The pilot noticed a technical issue and requested a turn back. The aircraft landed safely and is undergoing necessary inspection. An alternate aircraft was provided for the passengers to be flown to Bagdogra," IndiGo said in a statement.

In a swipe at the Congress in Rajasthan over infighting, Union home minister Amit Shah on Saturday said the party prefers Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot over his former deputy Sachin Pilot as his contribution in filling its coffers with the "corruption" money from the state is higher. He said that Gehlot and Pilot are fighting unnecessarily as the BJP will form the next government in Rajasthan. "Pilot sits on dharna on any pretext... his contribution may be higher on the ground but his number will not come because his contribution in filling the coffers of Congress party is less and Gehlot’s contribution is higher," Shah said while addressing booth-level party workers meeting in Bharatpur.

Eight children and two women were among 11 people killed when the tractor trolley they were travelling in fell from the bridge here on Saturday, police said. The people were on their way to fetch water from Garra river for 'Bhagwat katha', they said. Of the 11 people, eight were children and two were women, Superintendent of Police S Anand said. As many as 24 people have been injured in the incident. Twenty-one of the 24 people, including seven with serious injuries, are undergoing treatment at the Government Medical College hospital, said Shailendra Kumar, Chief Medical Superintendent. Three others are admitted to Tilhar Primary Health Centre, officials said.

The last rites of Asad Ahmad, son of gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmad, were performed at Kasari Masari graveyard here on Saturday amid heavy police security, with only a few distant relatives and locals present inside the burial ground.
The burial lasted for an hour, police said. Asad and his accomplice Ghulam, both wanted in the Umesh Pal murder case, were shot dead in an exchange of fire with the Uttar Pradesh Police near Jhansi on Thursday. Asad was the third of the five sons of Atiq Ahmad and was absconding since the Umesh Pal murder case. Ghulam's burial took place at a graveyard under the Shivkuti police station area.

Union Law Minister Kiren Rijiju on Saturday took a jibe at Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for his sue CBI and ED remarks, saying the AAP leader will file a case against the court if convicted. Kejriwal on Saturday said he will sue the CBI and ED officials for alleged perjury and filing false affidavits in courts. Tagging the AAP convenor's tweet, Rijiju wrote that corruption has never been an issue for Kejriwal. "Sorry Anna ji (activist Anna Hazare). You didn't know that you have handed over such a huge burden to the country," the minister tweeted.

Police have arrested a key aide of radical preacher Amritpal Singh for allegedly providing shelter and other assistance to the absconding Khalistan sympathiser in Pilibhit in Uttar Pradesh. Joga Singh, who is a resident of Ludhiana and is managing a 'dera' in Pilibhit, was coming to Punjab from Haryana, a senior police official said on Saturday, adding the police were on his trail. "Joga Singh was in direct contact with Amritpal Singh. He arranged shelter and vehicles for Amritpal Singh. He arranged for him to stay in Pilibhit and then return to Punjab," Deputy Inspector General (Border Range) Narinder Bhargav said at a press conference.

Sharddha's Walkar's father Saturday moved an application in a city court seeking the remains of her daughter for cremation, saying tradition and culture required performance of her last rites. Shraddha was allegedly strangled by her live-in partner Aaftab Amin Poonawala on May 18 last year, following which he sawed her body into pieces and kept them in a fridge for almost three weeks at his residence in South Delhi's Mehrauli. He scattered them at different places in the national capital to avoid being caught.

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday commended Tamil Nadu Assembly for passing a resolution seeking a time-frame for governors to approve bills passed by the state legislatures, and said his government will also bring a similar resolution in the Delhi Assembly. In his reply to a letter from Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin, Kejriwal noted that the interface of the state governments and their governors or Lt Governors has "effectively become a battlefront where a silent war is being waged by the Union government." The governors and Lt Governors are "wilfully" undermining democratically elected state governments and obstructing administration as per their "whims and fancies",  Delhi Chief Minister alleged.

Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu on Saturday announced a 3 per cent increase in the dearness allowance (DA) of the state employees and pensioners on the occasion of the 76th Himachal Day. The pensioners and state government employees will now receive a 34 per cent DA, which was 31 per cent earlier. The decision will benefit around 2.15 lakh employees and 1.90 lakh pensioners. It will also put an additional burden of about Rs 500 crore on the state's exchequer, a statement issued here said. The chief minister also announced a monthly allowance of Rs 1,500 to all 9,000 women of Spiti above the age of 18 years from June 2023 in the second phase as promised in the Congress manifesto. The Congress, during the assembly polls last year, had promised to give this monthly allowance to women between the ages of 18 to 60 years under ‘Har Ghar Lakshmi, Nari Samman Nidhi’.

The Army chief is the most powerful person in Pakistan's politics and everyone follows his decisions, ousted prime minister Imran Khan has said, slamming the military establishment for siding with the country's "corrupt mafias" to ensure that he should not return to power. Addressing Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party supporters from his Zaman Park residence here on Friday evening, Khan urged the people to stand with the Supreme Court at the time when the "imported government" is trying to bring it down.

 Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Saturday filed his nominations as BJP's candidate from Shiggaon segment here for the May 10 Assembly polls and expressed confidence of getting elected again with the highest number of votes.
Bommai was accompanied by Public Works Minister C C Patil, Haveri-Gadag MP Shivakumar Udasi, and son Bharath Bommai among others as he submitted his papers to the Returning Officer.

Sustained firing was heard in the Sudanese capital Saturday morning amid tensions between the military and the country's powerful paramilitary forces.
The firing could be heard in a number of areas, including central Khartoum and the neighbourhood of Bahri.
Tensions between the military and the Rapid Support Forces, as the paramilitary is known, have escalated in recent months, forcing a delay in the signing of an internationally backed deal with political parties to revive the country's democratic transition

The last rites of Asad Ahmad, the son of gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmad, were performed at Kasari Masari graveyard here on Saturday amid heavy police security, with few distant relatives and locals allowed inside the burial ground.

The burial lasted for an hour, police said. "The last rites of Asad Ahmad have been completed, and it went for an hour. A few distant relatives of Atiq and some people of the locality were allowed to go to the graveyard. This was necessary from the security point of view," Joint Commissioner of Police, Prayagraj, Akash Kulhari told PTI.

A massive pre-dawn fire gutted thousands of shops at a shopping centre here on Saturday, forcing the country's military to make frantic attempts to douse the raging inferno, days after a popular clothing market was partially destroyed.

The fire started at the second floor of New SuperMarket, a shopping centre between the popular Newmarket and Dhaka College at 5.
45 am and quickly spread to other floors, Newmarket Police Station chief Shafiqul Gani Sabu, was quoted as saying by news portal bdnews24.
com.

Teams from the Army, the Navy and the Air Force battled to douse the raging inferno.

BSF troops recovered more than three kilogrammes of heroin, allegedly airdropped by a Pakistani drone, near the India-Pakistan border in Punjab's Amritsar, an official said on Saturday.

A Border Security Force (BSF) spokesperson said security personnel heard the buzzing sound of a drone, which allegedly entered into Indian territory from across the International Border, in an area near Amritsar's Mullakot village at 3.
21 am.

The BSF personnel opened fire at the unmanned aerial vehicle.

During the ensuing search operation, the BSF troops recovered a bag containing three packets of heroin weighing 3.
20 kilogrammes from a wheat field in the Bachiwind village, the spokesperson said.

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will address a party rally on Sunday in Kolar, the same place where he made a remark on the Modi surname for which he was convicted of criminal defamation and also stripped of his Parliament membership.

According to state Congress sources, the former AICC president will arrive in Bengaluru on Sunday morning, and travel to Kolar where he will address the 'Jai Bharat' rally organised by the party.

In the evening, Gandhi will inaugurate the newly constructed 'Indira Gandhi Bhavan' - office and auditorium with a seating capacity of 750 people - near Karnataka PCC office in Bengaluru.

Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal on Saturday hit out at the BJP-led Centre over the CBI summoning Delhi Chief Minister Arvind, alleging that "persecution" was on course.

The CBI on Friday summoned Kejriwal to appear before it on April 16 in connection with the excise policy scam case in which his former deputy Manish Sisodia was arrested last month.

Air coolers, seasonal fruits, multivitamin doses and adequate water have been arranged for the animals in Ranchi's Bhagwan Birsa Biological Park, popularly known as Birsa zoo, in a bid to deal with soaring mercury in Jharkhand, an official said on Saturday.

Most parts of Jharkhand are simmering around 40 degrees Celsius. Daltonganj district recorded the state's highest at 42.

The body of gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmed's son Asad will be cremated today. Earlier on Saturday, the bodies of Asad and his aide Ghulam were taken to a mortuary in Prayagraj. 

Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai has said that he feels sad for former Deputy Chief Minister Laxman Savadi who left the BJP and noted that the Congress does not have candidates on 60 seats and will not benefit from "some people" it has recruited.He also said that the demand for tickets in the ruling BJP is high and that real workers do not leave the party.

Ellie Bridgman spent her Thursday night shift at a local gas station in Union, Missouri, planning for the day she'll lose access to gender-affirming treatments the transgender and nonbinary 23-year-old credits with making “life worth living.” A first-of-its-kind emergency rule introduced this week by Missouri's Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey will impose numerous restrictions on both adults and children before they can receive puberty-blocking drugs, hormones or surgeries “for the purpose of transitioning gender.” Transgender rights advocates have vowed to challenge the rule in court before it takes effect April 27. But promises of swift legal action have done little to ease the worries of trans Missourians like Bridgman who say it may be time to flee the state.

A BJP leader was among two persons allegedly arrested with illicit liquor worth Rs 10 lakh in the Barkheda police station area of this Uttar Pradesh district on Friday. According to a statement issued by the Superintendent of Police (SP), a team from Barkheda Police Station, along with the joint team of the excise department recovered a large amount of illicit liquor from a vehicle and arrested two accused. The two accused have been identified as Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) district media in-charge Shyam Bihari Bhojwal and Babu, a resident of Gadarpur police station, Kotwali Sadar, district Rudrapur in Uttarakhand. BJP district president Sanjeev Pratap Singh said Bhojwal is the former district media incharge and added that a report for further action will be taken once the police investigation gets over.

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge Friday said it was because of his party that a person like him with a humble background could have a long political career and become an MLA and MP. Kharge, who addressed a 'Jai Bharat Satyagraha Sabha' at Mancherial in Telangana Friday night, said he would not have been a lawmaker had Indira Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi not encouraged a "poor man" like him. He said that Sonia Gandhi gave him an opportunity to work as the president of the Congress which is a huge responsibility.

The Supreme Court said Friday it was temporarily keeping in place federal rules for use of an abortion drug, while it takes time to more fully consider the issues raised in a court challenge. In an order signed by Justice Samuel Alito, the court asked both sides to weigh in by Tuesday over whether lower court rulings restricting the Food and Drug Administration's approval of the drug, mifepristone, should be allowed to take effect while the case works its way through federal courts. The order suggests the court will decide that issue by late Wednesday. The justices are being asked at this point only to determine what parts of an April 7 ruling by U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk in Texas, as modified by an appellate ruling Wednesday, can be in force while the case continues. The Biden administration and New York-based Danco Laboratories, the maker of the pill, asked the justices to intervene. The type of order issued by the court Friday, an administrative stay, ordinarily is not an indication of what the justices will do going forward. The Biden administration and a drug manufacturer asked the Supreme Court on Friday to preserve access to an abortion drug free from restrictions imposed by lower court rulings, while a legal fight continues. The Justice Department and Danco Laboratories both warned of “regulatory chaos” and harm to women if the high court doesn't block an appeals court ruling in a case from Texas that had the effect of tightening Food and Drug Administration rules under which the drug, mifepristone, can be prescribed and dispensed.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said an idea becomes a mass movement when it moves from "discussion tables to dinner tables" as he called for people's participation and collective efforts in the fight against climate change. He also told a gathering of world leaders on Friday that when people become conscious that simple acts in their daily lives are powerful, there will be a very positive impact on the environment. "People across the world hear a lot about climate change. Many of them feel a lot of anxiety because they do not know what they can do about it. They are constantly made to feel that only governments or global institutions have a role. If they learn that they can also contribute, their anxiety will turn into action," Modi said while addressing the World Bank-organised "Making it Personal: How behavioral change can tackle climate change" conference. Citing "Mission Life", which was launched by him and the UN secretary general last year October, Modi said the programme is about democratising the battle against climate change.