India

Chandigarh, Oct 1 (PTI) Leader of Opposition in the Haryana Assembly Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Friday described the government's order deferring paddy procurement as a "cruel joke" on farmers.

Many farmers have already brought their produce to mandis in the state, so the government should now tell them "what to do with this crop and where to take it", the senior Congress leader said.

Chennai, Oct 1 (PTI) Justice N Anand Venkatesh of the Madras High Court on Friday urged the government authorities to treat the HC judges on par with ministers and observe the protocol they are entitled to, remarks that came in response to him getting delayed to work due to certain traffic restrictions in the city.

Lucknow, Oct 1 (PTI) The Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) on Friday said it arrested one more person in connection with the alleged illegal conversion racket.

Dheeraj Jagtap, a resident of Yavatmal in Maharashtra, was taken into custody by an ATS team in Kanpur. After finding him suspicious, he was brought to Lucknow where he was arrested, Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) Prashant Kumar said in a statement issued by the ATS.

Jammu, Oct 1 (PTI) A court on Friday awarded rigorous eight years imprisonment to a man and a fine of Rs 50,000 for raping a girl in Jammu and Kashmir's Udhampur district.

The convict, Ashish Rajput, who had kidnapped the girl before sexually assaulting her, was also awarded three years imprisonment and a fine of Rs 25,000 by the Sessions Court of Udhampur in that case.

The court also awarded six months imprisonment and a Rs 10,000 fine for wrongful confinement of the victim, an official spokesman said.

NEW DELHI, Oct. 1 (Xinhua) -- A newly-conducted research has found three viruses from bats in Laos, which are more similar than any known viruses to COVID-19, India Today reported recently.

The research, published in preprint server Research Square, could forward the theory of origins of the COVID-19 from an animal and then transmitting into humans via zoonosis. However, the new discovery also raises concerns among the scientific community about the presence of more such viruses in nature with the capability to jump to humans.

NEW DELHI (AP) — India said Friday that British nationals arriving in the country will be subjected to COVID-19 tests and a 10-day mandatory quarantine, in response to the same measures imposed on Indians visiting the U.K.

India has been demanding that Britain revoke what it called a “discriminatory” advisory that includes Indians even if they are fully vaccinated with the Indian-made AstraZeneca shots.

India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar had discussed the issue with British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss in a meeting in New York earlier this week.

New Delhi, Oct 1 (PTI) Tata Sons has emerged as the top bidder for the takeover of debt-laden state-run airline Air India but the bid is yet to be approved by a group of ministers headed by Home Minister Amit Shah, sources said.

Financial bids put in by the salt-to-software conglomerate and SpiceJet promoter Ajay Singh were opened a few days back and were vetted by Core Group of Secretaries on Disinvestment headed by Cabinet Secretary on Wednesday, sources with knowledge of the matter said.

Kaushambi (UP), Oct 1 (PTI) A four-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a teenager in a village in Karari town area here, police said on Friday.

The incident took place on Wednesday afternoon when the girl was playing outside and playing.

She entered a neighbour's house where she was raped by a 15-year-old boy who was alone there, Superintendent of Police Radheyshyam Vishwakarma said.

An FIR was lodged on Thursday by the police on the complaint of the victim's father, he said.

Guwahati, Oct 1 (PTI) A huge quantity of explosive substances and devices were seized from a vehicle here and two persons arrested in this connection on Friday, a police spokesperson said.

A patrol party from Gorchuk Police Station of the city tried to intercept a vehicle travelling at high speed and after chasing for some time, managed to stop it at Garchuk Chariali, he said.

New Delhi, Sep 30 (PTI) The government on Thursday hiked by 62 per cent the price of natural gas that is used to produce electricity, make fertilisers and turned into CNG to use as fuel in automobiles and cooking gas for household kitchens.

This is the first increase in rates since April 2019 and comes on back of firming benchmark international prices but does not reflect the spurt in spot or current price of liquefied natural gas (LNG) witnessed during the last couple of weeks.