West Bengal

Darjeeling (WB), Jan 22 (PTI) West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday led a 4-km-long protest march in Darjeeling hills against the new citizenship law.

The rally began at Bhanu Bhakta Bhavan near Mall in Darjeeling and will conclude in the Chowkbazar area.

Earlier, she had led ten protest marches and six rallies in various parts of the state against the CAA and the proposed nationwide National Register of Citizens (NRC).

Kolkata, Jan 19 (PTI) Eight-year-old Talha Arshad Reshi, the child artiste of National award-winning Urdu film 'Hamid', inaugurated the 9th Kolkata International Children's Film Festival here on Sunday.

In his speech, the boy from Jammu and Kashmir said, "It is an honour for me to be here and get the opportunity (to inaugurate the festival)."

Kolkata Jan 20 (PTI) West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday appealed to her counterparts in the northeast and non-BJP states to take a note of the "clauses" mentioned in the NPR form, before participating in the exercise to update the register.

Dubbing the NPR exercise as "a dangerous game", Banerjee said the form, which seeks birth details of parents, could be nothing but a precursor to NRC implementation.

Kolkata, Jan 17 (PTI) Citing "preoccupations" West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will not attend an all- party meeting called by Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Friday, to discuss issues pertaining to two bills, a Raj Bhavan official said here.

The Chief Minister's Office informed the Governor's Secretariat that on account of preoccupations on Friday, it will not be possible for Banerjee to attend the meeting, the Raj Bhavan said in a statement on Thursday.

Kolkata, Jan 15 (PTI) Bank unions on Wednesday called for a two-day nationwide strike on January 31 and February 1 after talks over wage revision failed to make headway with the Indian Banks' Association (IBA).

The United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU), which represents nine trade unions, said they will also hold a three-day strike from March 11-13.

Kolkata, Jan 15 (PTI) The arrows of Mahabharata's Arjuna had atomic power, claimed West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar, drawing sharp criticism from academicians, even as he joined a long list of politicians who have in recent years given bizarre interpretations linking mythology with science.

Speaking at the 45th Eastern India Science Fair and 19th Science and Engineering Fair on Tuesday, Dhankhar also claimed that flying objects existed during the period of Ramayana.

Kolkata, Jan 15 (PTI) A suo motu case has been registered against 150 unidentified people after Left students' activists "gheraoed" Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee at an anti-CAA rally in Kolkata on January 11, sources said on Wednesday.

The case includes non-bailable sections of causing damage, criminal intimidation, as well as assaulting a public servant from discharging duty, said a source at the Hare Street Police station where it was registered on Monday.

Kolkata, Jan 14 (PTI) TMC has lodged two police complaints against West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh in Nadia and North 24 Parganas districts for his comments that anti-CAA protesters "were shot like dogs", police and TMC sources said on Tuesday.

Senior TMC leader and state food supplies minister Jyotipriyo Mullick said on Tuesday that party activists have lodged a police complaint against Ghosh for his controversial remark.

"The common people are living in fear. Some are apprehending that Dilip Ghosh might kill them or shoot them.

Kolkata, Jan 14 (PTI) Days after demanding that the amended citizenship act be scrapped, Nobel laureate Amartya Sen has stressed the importance of opposition unity to carry out any protest for a cause.

However, he said even in the absence of opposition unity, protests can continue.

The economist was answering journalists here over the countrywide CAA-NPR-NRC protests.

Haldibari (WB), Jan 14 (PTI) More than 95 per cent work of laying tracks on the Indian side of the Haldibari- Chilahati India-Bangladesh railway link project has been completed, a top Northeast Frontier Railway official said.

The distance between Haldibari railway station in West Bengal's Coochbehar district till the international border is 4.5 kilometres while that from Chilahati in northern Bangladesh till the zero point is around 7.5 kilometres.