News update

There is never a dull day in Punjab. This week was no different. While the state was still coming to terms with the imprisonment of former Punjab Pradesh Congress chief   Navjot Singh Sidhu and his “torturous” diet plan   that has become the latest conversation starter, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann dropped a bombshell with   a very public sacking of a senior minister for corruption . Vijay Singla, a first-time legislator from Mansa , the hotbed of farmer suicides, and the first minister from the seat in three decades, held the important portfolio of health, an area in which the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government has been promising a revolutionary badlav (change). The Singla example – he has been sent to judicial custody till June 10 – has evoked both fear and sympathy among party members, with many expressing hushed dismay at the gladiatorial way in which he was sacked. But on the ground, it has given a big boost to the anti-corruption image of the party that will...

Seven Army soldiers died and 19 were injured, some of them seriously, after their vehicle skidded off a road and plunged into the Shyok river in Ladakh on Friday. The mishap happened in Turtuk sector in the morning, with the vehicle falling from a height of around 50-60 feet, officials said. The troops were initially taken to a field hospital at Partapur, with the Army dispatching surgical teams from Leh. Seven of them were declared dead. In the evening, the Air Force moved the injured soldiers to the Army Command Hospital at Chandimandir in Haryana’s Panchkula district, said an Army statement. “Seven individuals have been declared fatal so far. There are grievous injuries to others as well,” it said. The statement said the 26-soldier team was moving from a transit camp in Partapur to a forward location in the Hanif sub-sector at around 9 am on Friday. About 25 km from Thoise, a major military base in Nubra Valley, the vehicle skidded off the road and fell into the Shyok river, “result...

As campaigning for the by-poll in Uttarakhand's Champawat enters its last phase, chief minister  Pushkar Singh Dhami  held a roadshow with Uttar Pradesh counterpart Yogi Adityanath in Tanakpur on Saturday. The by-poll is critical for both the chief minister and the ruling BJP - Dhami may have been sworn in as CM in March, on the back of an emphatic election victory, but he failed to win an assembly seat. This means he has less than six months to win a by-poll or, in what will be an embarrassment for the BJP, must resign. The Champawat by-poll is scheduled for May 31. Counting of votes will take place June 3. And just how serious the BJP is about winning the seat for Dhami is reflected in senior leadership deploying the fiery Yogi Adityanath to make an appearance and offer support. "The BJP government led by Shri Pushkar Singh Dhami ji has given a model of development in the state of Uttarakhand. To fulfil the dreams of the people of Uttarakhand, BJP is necessary, youth like Pu...

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Bharatiya Janata Party’s star campaigner for the upcoming assembly elections in Gujarat, is likely to address a huge gathering of members from the influential Patidar community on Saturday morning after inaugurating a multi-speciality hospital built by the Shree Patel Sewa Samaj at Atkot village in Rajkot district, people familiar with the matter said. “We aim to gather about three lakh people for the event. This could be one of the largest gatherings addressed by any political leader in recent times,” said an official at Shree Patel Sewa Samaj. The Prime Minister, who will take part in various public functions during his two-day visit to Gujarat, will inaugurate the 200-bed K D Parwadia Multispeciality Hospital, located on Rajkot-Bhavnagar Highway. The Patidar community, many of whom have the surname Patel, constitute about 12-14% of the state’s population. Chief minister Bhupendra Patel belongs to the sub-group ‘Kadva Patel’ of the Patidar clan. The stat...