GUWAHATI:  One person was killed and several others were injured in violent clashes in Manipur on Monday, while a bank branch that reopened after two months found Rs 1.2 crore was looted. 

The Axis Bank branch in Churachandpur was shut on May 3 in the wake of violence. When it reopened on Monday, Rs 1.2 crore and other valuables including gold were found to be missing. The bank lodged an FIR with the police. 

A gunfight erupted at Singda and Phayeng villages on the border of Imphal West and Kangpokpi districts around 3 am and continued till 6 am. It started again around 8 am and continued for some time before the security forces brought the situation under control.

Official sources said the miscreants were using drones at night to recce areas before unleashing attacks.  In a status report filed in the Supreme Court, the Manipur government said a total of 142 people were killed in the violence while 5,995 FIRs were filed. Six cases were transferred to the CBI. The police detained 6,745 people. 

Over 50,000 people were displaced by the violence. They are taking shelter in the state as well as some states in the Northeast. 

Court no platform to escalate tension: SC
The Supreme Court on Monday said it can’t be used as a platform for further escalation of violence, as it asked the counsels of Kuki and Metei groups to put forth positive suggestions to improve the law and order situation in Manipur, instead of levelling allegations

PATNA:  Bihar assembly on Monday witnessed an uproar when BJP demanded the resignation of Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav in view of the filing of chargesheet against him in the land-for-jobs scam.

As soon as the House assembled on the first day of the monsoon session, BJP chief whip Janak Ram rose from his seat and demanded the resignation of Tejashwi. Both CM Nitish Kumar and Tejashwi were present in the house at that time.

The first supplementary budget for the financial year 2023-24 was also tabled in the House in the monsoon session. Earlier, Bihar CM, Tejashwi and his elder brother and minister Tej Pratap Yadav reached the assembly in the same vehicle.

BJP’s chief whip said that it had never happened earlier, adding that for the first time, during the tenure of Nitish, a chargesheeted person was participating in the proceedings of the House as deputy CM. “Why is action not being taken against Tejashwi?” he asked.

He said that the government had to concede to the demands of teachers after they were forced to appear in Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) examination. 

“We will take out a march to assembly on July 13 and will not allow the House to conduct its proceedings,” he said. Meanwhile, the grand alliance’s legislature party meeting was held under the CM.

CHANDIGARH/LUCKNOW: At least 61 more people were reported dead across North India following incessant rains, flashfloods and lightning strikes on Monday, 34 of them in Uttar Pradesh and 17 in Himachal Pradesh, which is the worst affected state so far.

More than 300 tourists are stranded in Himachal’s Lahaul-Spiti district amid snowfall. Efforts are on to rescue them. Rains hampered the clearing of massive landslides that snapped road links. The tourists have been put up in hotels and government accommodations by the local administration. Besides, tourists and locals in two state roadways buses have been stuck following a flash flood in the Pagal nullah near Sissu village in the Lahaul Valley as it blocked the Manali-Leh highway.

The initial estimate of property loss in Himachal Pradesh is around Rs 3,000-4,000 crore. The overall toll in the North included six in Haryana and four in Punjab. In UP, 17 got electrocuted due to lightning while 12 drowned. Besides, there were five other rain-related deaths in the state.

Most rivers in the North were swollen, with the Yamuna in Delhi, too, crossing the danger mark following the release of water from the Hathnikund barrage in Haryana. Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to Himachal Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu and assured all support. The Centre deployed 39 National Disaster Response Force teams — 14 in Punjab, 12 in Himachal, eight in Uttarakhand and five in Haryana — for the rescue and relief operations.

Sukhu said efforts were underway to evacuate the stranded tourists and residents in Lahaul-Spiti and Kullu districts using helicopters whenever the weather permits. In Himachal, five persons were killed in the Nirmand area of the Kullu district while five others died in the Shimla district in two different landslides. Also, the Shimla-Kalka highway was blocked near Shoghi due to a landslide.

Besides, rail operations on the Shimla-Kalka rail track were suspended as landslides blocked the track. 
In Punjab, floodwaters entered the Nabha Thermal Power Plant near Rajpura in Patiala forcing the shutdown of one of its 700 MW units.

Army rescues 910 university students in Punjab

The Army rescued 910 students and 50 others from the flooded Chitkara University near Rajpura in Punjab. The flood relief columns of its Western Command worked through the intervening night of Sunday and Monday to evacuate them and helped prevent the breaching of canals by the flood waters, the Army said.

TIRUPATI: Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy on Tuesday tore into Opposition Leader N Chandrababu Naidu on his home turf of Chittoor district by holding him responsible for the closure of Chittoor Dairy, which stood as the lifeline of dairy farmers of the region for decades together.

Jagan fulfilled the promise he made during his Praja Sankalpa Yatra for the revival of Chittoor Cooperative Dairy, and exchanged the copies of MoU with representatives of Amul, which will invest Rs 385 crore. He also laid the foundation stone for a medical college in Chittoor.   

Addressing a huge public meeting, Jagan came down heavily on Naidu stating that the former CM had orchestrated the destruction of Chittoor Dairy and closed it down in August 2002 to develop his family-owned Heritage. “Chittoor Dairy which was started as a chilling unit, had grown to process 2.5 to 3 lakh litres of milk a day by 1993. But, it was systematically pushed into losses by Naidu, who started Heritage in 1992, between 1992 and 2002,” Jagan alleged.

The conspiracy to rundown Chittoor Dairy was so visible that while it suffered losses during the 10 years, Heritage continued to grow with huge profits every year. “The dairy was closed abruptly leaving lakhs of farmers in the lurch as the management kept pending a huge amount as arrears. The YSRC government repaid the dues of Rs 182 crore and Amul will invest Rs 150 crore in the first phase of Chittoor Dairy revival,” he explained.

The revival of Chittoor Dairy will provide direct employment to 5,000 people and indirect employment to two lakh people, besides benefiting 20 lakh dairy farmers in Rayalaseema.“Not only Chittoor Dairy, but Naidu also sold several sugar factories and paper mills in the cooperative sector and public sector units like Allwyn and Republic Forge to TDP leaders like T Devender Goud and Nama Nageswara Rao for peanuts or closed them down taking kickbacks for encouraging private units,” he charged.

After closing down or selling 54 such units for peanuts through the Department of Implementation during his regime, Naidu unabashedly brought out a book ‘Privatisation, a success story in AP’ After the launch of the Jagananna Pala Velluva programme in December 2020, in partnership with Amul, the milk procurement prices had gone up manifold, benefiting lakhs of dairy farmers, he highlighted, adding that it forced the private dairies to increase the milk procurement prices due to competition.  

“For Naidu, there is no difference between father-in-law and farmer as he can backstab anyone,” he remarked and added that some people close to the TDP chief had even created obstacles to the construction of a medical college in Chittoor.

Terming Naidu and Jana Sena Party chief Pawan Kalyan non-resident politicians, Jagan said they know nothing about social justice. “The two leaders do not reside in our State and if anyone wants to see them, a trip to the neighbouring State is a must, which shows how distant they are from the people,’’ he observed.
Naidu is now thinking of constructing a house in Kuppam 40 years after his public life and at a time when the people are preparing to bid adieu to him permanently, Jagan ridiculed.

Pawan Kalyan, who supported the TDP’s policy of ‘plunder, stash and devour’, has once again joined hands with Naidu and they are trying to cheat the people with false promises ahead of elections, hoping that people’s memory is short. The pack of wolves has come together and is spreading falsehood with the support of friendly media,’’ he observed.

Appealing to the people to think why the previous TDP regime failed to implement welfare schemes, when the present YSRC government has provided Rs 2.23 lakh crore to beneficiaries through DBT schemes in the last four years, Jagan exhorted them to support the YSRC in the next elections if they feel they are benefited.

Responding to the appeal of local MLA A Srinivasulu, the Chief Minister sanctioned Rs 75 crore for development works in the Chittoor Municipal Corporation, agreed to construct Kapu Bhavan and allocated funds for a road-over-bridge. District Collector S Shan Mohan, Energy Minister P Ramachandra Reddy and Amul Dairy MD Jayen Mehta participated in the programme.

NEW DELHI:  As part of the ongoing exercise to strengthen the party ahead of the 2024 general elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party late on Saturday night inducted 10 senior leaders, including eight former presidents of the party’s state units, to the powerful national executive committee (NEC).

The eight former state chiefs include Bandi Sanjay Kumar (Telangana), Somu Veerraju (Andhra Pradesh), Deepak Prakash (Jharkhand), Satish Punia (Rajasthan), Sanjay Jaiswal (Bihar), Ashwani Sharma (Punjab), Suresh Kashyap (Himachal) and Vishnudeo Sai (Chhattisgarh).

Chhattisgarh BJP leader Dharamlal Kaushik and Rajasthan leader Kirodi Lal Meena are the other members of the NEC, a party statement said. The NEC in the BJP acts as the apex decision and policy-making body with a galaxy of experienced leaders as members including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and national president J P Nadda. It has five presidents, five general secretaries, one general secretary (organisation) besides members.

At a meeting of BJP’s regional state presidents in Hyderabad chaired by the party’s national president J P Nadda, a majority of the attendees were of the opinion that PM Narendra Modi should contest the Lok Sabha election from Ramanathapuram in Tamil Nadu. Around 34 delegates attended the meeting including BJP state presidents from Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, and Karnataka 

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court will hear on July 14, Former Delhi Minister Manish Sisodia’s plea seeking bail in the multi-crore scam of Delhi Liquor policy. 

Sisodia who has been in custody in the multi-crore scam of the now scrapped Delhi Liquor policy has approached Supreme Court against Delhi HCs orders of refusing to grant him bail in the cases registered by the CBI and ED. 

His plea was mentioned by Senior Advocate AM Singhvi before the bench of CJI DY Chandrachud and Justice PS Narasimha. Urging the court to consider his plea, Singhvi said, “His wife is not well. If it can be on July 14.” 

Sisodia was arrested on February 26 by CBI hours nearly eight hours after questioning pursuant to an FIR registered against him on August 17, 2022 under section 120B of IPC read with Section 477 IPC and section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. Apart from the CBI case, he was also taken into custody by the ED on March 9 in a money laundering case. 

Seeking bail, he in his plea before the SC has said that charges in the chargesheet that has already been filed by the CBI are punishable with imprisonment of less than seven years. It has also been contended that the probe conducted so far has not traced any proceeds of crime to him and he thus deserves to be granted bail in the absence of evidence. 

The plea challenges Delhi HCs July 3 and May 30 order passed by Justice Dinesh Kumar Sharma of rejecting him bail in the cases registered against him by ED and CBI respectively. 

While denying him bail in the CBI case, Justice Sharma had termed while terming allegations of misconduct against him “serious” had said that the excise policy was formed at the instance of the “South Group” with malafide intention to give undue advantage to them. HC in its order had said, “The gravity and the allegations do not entitle the accused to be admitted to bail. This court, as has discussed above, is clear of the fact that the excise policy has not been examined in the present proceedings nor the powers of the government regarding the framing of the economic policies. 

However, since there are serious allegations of misconduct against the petitioner, the petitioner being an influential person and having held the position of Deputy Chief Minister having 18 portfolios and the witnesses are mostly public servants, there is a possibility of the witnesses being influenced cannot be ruled out.” Additionally, Justice Sharma while denying him bail in the ED case had said that Sisodia didn’t meet the twin conditions for the grant of bail under PMLA as well as the triple test for the grant of bail. 

Justice Sharma also underlined that the special judge’s order was well reasoned and relieved on the basis of material on record and didn’t suffer from any illegality or infirmity.