India

NEW DELHI (AP) — Shouting and crying, workers in an Indian denim factory struggled to claw their way up a ladder to a door, their only exit as a fire blazed through fabric and machinery, officials say. Seven people died in the weekend blaze, and families were still waiting on Wednesday to recover loved ones’ bodies.

“Smoke kept billowing from the building as workers trapped inside screamed for help,” said one eyewitness who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was worried he’d lose his job.

New Delhi, Feb 11 (PTI) Stating that he was not nervous, Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari Tuesday said preparations for celebration at party offices had begun, as initial trends trickled in for the assembly polls.

"I am not nervous. We have appeared for a test, results will now come in," he told reporters.

Ghaziabad 10 February (PTI) A youth has been booked for allegedly raping a woman and threatening to make her objectionable photographs viral on social media, police said here on Monday.

Police said the woman stated in her complaint that she had met Deepak at a birthday party after which they became friends on Facebook.

Thane, Feb 10 (PTI) A BJP corporator from Thane in Maharashtra was arrested on Monday in the 2015 case of extorting money from a local builder, police said.

The accused, Narayan Pawar, was booked in December 2015 along with three others when he was with the Congress.

In his FIR, the builder R G Pataskar had claimed that he had purchased a plot from one of the accused persons, Siddimian Sheikh, in 1997.

New Delhi, Feb 11 (PTI) The Congress on Tuesday accepted defeat in the Delhi Assembly polls and vowed to rebuild and revive itself at the grassroots level in the national capital.

It said the poll results also had a message for the BJP that the "most toxic campaign" unleashed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah has been defeated.

Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 11 (PTI) Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Tuesday congratulated his Delhi counterpart Arvind Kejriwal for AAP's "resounding victory" in assembly elections, saying let it be a harbinger for inclusive politics in the country.

Vijayan said the Delhi poll result could be considered as a "reaction of the people towards the continuing communal polarisation of the BJP-led NDA and its anti-people policies.

New Delhi, Feb 10 (PTI) Former finance minister P Chidambaram on Monday tore into the Modi government's handling of the economy, saying it was close to collapse and was being attended by "very incompetent doctors."

Initiating the debate on the Union Budget for 2020-21, he said rising unemployment and falling consumption was making India poorer.

New Delhi, Feb 10 (PTI) There was a heavy police deployment in New Delhi's Mandi House area on Monday morning in view of a protest call against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).

According to a senior police official, they had refused permission for the protest march as the budget session of Parliament was going on.

Guwahati, Feb 10 (PTI) Assam is likely to conduct an exercise to identify the state's indigenous Muslim population and segregate them from illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, even as doubts over the accuracy of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) are yet to be addressed.

As per the plans, the survey will be conducted to identify people of four communities -- Goria, Moria, Desi and Jolah of the tea tribes, considered as indigenous.

New Delhi, Feb 10 (PTI) Former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah's sister on Monday moved the Supreme Court to challenge his detention under the Public Safety Act.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the petitioner, mentioned the matter for urgent listing before a bench headed by Justice N V Ramana.

Sibal told the bench that they have filed a habeas corpus petition challenging the detention of Abdullah under the PSA and the matter should be heard this week.

The bench agreed for urgent listing of the matter.