Archives for 2021

The person is being interrogated to ascertain whether he has any link to the two BJP leaders who were recently arrested in a drug seizure case.

KOLKATA: The Special Task Force (STF) of the Kolkata Police has seized over five kg of heroin, worth Rs 25.09 crore in the international market, from West Bengal’s Purba Bardhaman district and arrested a person in this connection, a senior officer said on Tuesday.

Acting on a tip-off, the STF sleuths conducted a search operation at Rasulpur Bazar in Memari on Monday night and recovered the contraband from the drug peddler’s vehicle, he said.

“We had information about the person that he would come to deliver the drugs to an agent. We recovered 5.08 kg of heroin from his possession and seized his vehicle,” the officer said.

A case has been registered against the accused under relevant sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, he said.

The person is being interrogated to ascertain whether he has any link to the two BJP leaders who were recently arrested in a drug seizure case, a source in the Kolkata Police said.

The police had arrested BJP youth wing leader Pamela Goswami and two of her associates after 90 gm of cocaine was allegedly found in her handbag and concealed in the car they were travelling.

Following Goswami’s accusation that she was “framed” by her party colleague and BJP state committee member Rakesh Singh, the Kolkata Police nabbed him and another person from Galsi in Purba Barddhaman district while they were trying to escape.

BHOPAL: Religion is no barrier in attainment of spiritual knowledge. Mushariff Khan from Madhya Pradesh’s Chhindwara district is a perfect example of this. The Class VIII student can recite shlokas from the Bhagavad Gita with élan, much to the delight of her parents and teachers.

Mushariff started learning the holy Hindu scripture as part of memory retention training, and now she and her parents are proud that she has imbibed the best tenets of another religion.

The talented girl has learnt by heart 500 out of the total 701 shlokas in the Bhagavad Gita, using the memory retention technique taught by her Abacus and Vedic Mathematics teacher Rohini Menon.

“Mushariff is one of my best students. I gave her three options to showcase her memory retention technique: memorising the entire dictionary, the entire Constitution of India or the Bhagavad Gita. To the surprise of us all, she opted for learning the Bhagavad Gita. She started learning when she was in Class VI and has so far memorised 500 Sanskrit sholkas,” Menon told this newspaper.

Menon said many of her other students, too, have tried to learn the shlokas from the Bhagavad Gita, but only Mushariff has succeeded in memorising 500 shlokas till now and is determined to learn and understand the remaining ones, too.

Mushariff, whose father is a Mathematics teacher and mother a housewife, had joined the short course of Memory Retention under Menon two years back.

“After doing the short course, I wanted to do something unique and different. I chose to memorise the Bhagavad Gita because my mother has always taught me that ‘out of your house, you are a just a human being and not an individual following a particular religion’. My parents permitted me to learn the Bhagavad Gita as they wanted me to gain knowledge of every religion,” said Musharraf.

Proud of Mushariff’s achievement, her mother Zeenat Khan said, “Yes, we are Muslims. But we want to bring up our daughter in a manner that she grows up to be a noble human being ingrained with the best tenets of every religion.”

NEW DELHI: The National Commission for Women has taken suo moto cognisance of the alleged thrashing of an elderly woman by TMC supporters in West Bengal.

Shova Majumdar, mother of BJP leader Gopal Majumdar, was allegedly attacked on Saturday by workers of the ruling party, which has dismissed the allegation as “false”.

Police, however, claimed that the mother of the BJP supporter was not attacked and that her face was swollen owing to some ailment.

“The NCW has come across a Twitter post regarding an old lady who has allegedly been assaulted by supporters of a political party as her son supported different political party,” according to a statement on Monday.

ALSO READ | Bengal: BJP alleges party worker’s mother thrashed, police say her face swollen due to ailment

The commission has taken cognisance and Chairperson Rekha Sharma has written to the director general of police for taking action in the matter to avoid recurrence of “such incidents in the future”, it said.

The apex women rights body has also written to the chief election commissioner and has sought a detailed action, the statement added.

A police officer of Barrackpore Commissionerate had said that BJP activist Gopal Majumdar was attacked by some miscreants on Saturday in North Dumdum in the Nimta police station area.

Majumdar’s mother claimed that she and her son were beaten up by TMC “goons” and that they threatened her son not to disclose the incident to anyone.

The matter is being investigated and those behind the incident are yet to be identified as they were wearing masks.

The incident is being probed from all angles, including political rivalry and family dispute, the officer had said.

ALIGARH: The postmortem report of the teenage Dalit girl, whose body was found here on Sunday, has not indicated any clear evidence of rape and found that she was strangulated to death, a senior official said here.

Five persons have been picked up by the police for questioning in the case, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Muniraj G told mediapersons on Monday night.

The body of the 16-year-old girl was found in a field in Akrabad area here following which villagers clashed with police and indulged in stone pelting.

Inspector Pranendra Kumar was injured in the attack.

The postmortem report has not indicated any clear evidence of rape, the SSP said.

He said that in view of the inconclusive evidence the police has decided to conduct further microbiological tests using vaginal swabs.

“The proceedings of the postmortem were videographed. There were multiple injury marks on the body of the victim who died due to strangulation,” the SSP said.

An FIR has been registered under IPC 302 (murder), 376 (rape) and POCSO Act.

Earlier, on Monday when the body was handed over to the family for last rites, a large group of protestors collected at the the house of the victim and blocked traffic on the main Agra road.

The SSP said efforts are on for giving adequate financial compensation to the victim’s family.

A total of 5,754 patients were discharged during the day, taking the count of recoveries in Maharashtra to 20,30,458, a health official said, adding that the state is now left with 77,618 active cases

MUMBAI: After reporting more than 8,000 COVID-19 cases for five consecutive days, Maharashtra on Monday witnessed a slight dip in fresh infections with the addition of 6,397 cases, taking the overall tally to 21,61,467, the state health department said.

With 30 more patients succumbing to the COVID-19 disease, the overall death toll in the state mounted to 52,184, it said.

A total of 5,754 patients were discharged during the day, taking the count of recoveries in Maharashtra to 20,30,458, a health official said, adding that the state is now left with 77,618 active cases.

“Of the 30 deaths reported today, 23 had occurred in the last 48 hours and three in the last week. Rest four deaths are from the period before the last week,” he said.

Maharashtra reported over 8,000 new cases for five days in a row till Sunday when 8,293 infections were added to the state’s tally.

On Monday, Mumbai reported 855 new cases and four fatalities, taking the overall tally to 3,26,774 and the toll to 11,479, the department said.

The Mumbai division comprising the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) reported 1,627 new infections, taking the tally to 7,27,553 while the fatality count stood at 19,832.

Nashik division’s cumulative case tally stood at 2,92,976 and the death toll at 5,264, the official said.

Pune division has reported 5,27,673 cases and 11,753 deaths until now. Kolhapur division has so far reported 1,19,865 cases and 4,068 deaths.

The overall case count in Aurangabad division is 80,807 and the death toll is 2,047, the department said, adding that Latur division has reported 86,448 cases and 2,525 deaths until now.

In Akola division, the overall caseload is 97,509 and the death toll is 1,775 while Nagpur division has so far reported 2,28,490 cases and 4,832 fatalities, the department said.

With 61,746 new tests, the total number of samples tested so far for coronavirus in Maharashtra rose to 1,63,46,358, it said.

Currently, 3,43,947 people are in home quarantine in the state while 3,482 people are in institutional quarantine.

Maharashtra’s COVID-19 figures are as follows: Positive cases 21,61,467, deaths 52,184, recoveries 20,30,458, active cases 77,618 and people tested so far 1,63,46,358.

MUMBAI: Maharashtra school education minister Varsha Gaikwad on Friday said the Std 10th and 12th boardexaminations will be held in the state.

She denied reports that Std 10th examination has been canceled due to the surge in coronavirus cases in the state.

In schools where coronavirus cases have been found, local authorities have been directed to ensure that necessary hygiene and disinfection measures are taken, the minister said.

Considering the rise in cases in some districts, the local administration has been asked to close schools for some time from March 1 if felt necessary, Gaikwad said.