Archives for October 2020

Popularly known as the people’s doctor in Pulivendula, Gangi Reddy has been ill for some time and was undergoing treatment at a private hospital in Hyderabad.

VIJAYAWADA: Noted doctor EC Gangi Reddy passed away on Saturday in Hyderabad while undergoing treatment for illness.  

The 72-year-old was the father-in-law of Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy. 

Popularly known as the people’s doctor in Pulivenudla, Gangi Reddy has been ill for some time and was undergoing treatment at a private hospital in Hyderabad.

His body is being brought to Pulivendula.

Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy and his wife Bharathi Reddy will be leaving for Pulivendula.

It will facilitate the movement of armed forces and infantry combat vehicles to the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh besides boosting the tourism and winter sports in the region.

CHANDIGARH: Prime Minister Narendra Modi, today, inaugurated the 9.02-kilometre long Atal Tunnel, the longest highway tunnel in the world built at an altitude of 3,000 meters (10,00 feet) which will reduce the distance between Manali and Keylong by going through Lahaul-Spiti in 46 km.

It will facilitate the movement of armed forces and infantry combat vehicles to the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh besides boosting the tourism and winter sports in the region.

The tunnel was built in the Pir Panjal Range of the Himalayas at an altitude of 3,000 metres from the mean sea level using drill and blast NATM (New Austria Tunnelling Method) techniques by the Border Roads Organisation at a cost of about Rs 4,000 crore and will remain open throughout the year.

Without the tunnel the valley remained cut off for about six months every year amid heavy snowfall.

The tunnel will reduce the distance on road between Manali and Leh by 46 km and the travel time by about four to five hours.

Some three thousand cars and 1,500 trucks will pass through tunnel daily who’s overhead clearance is 5.525 metres and is horse-shoe shaped.

Its not just Leh that will be connected all-year round but also Lahul-Spiti the tribal district of the Himachal Pradesh.

There is an emergency exit at every 500 meters, a broadcasting system with CCTV cameras at every 250 meters, an automatic detection system, fire hydrant at every 60 meters, a telephone at every 150 meters, and air quality monitoring system at every one kilometre of the tunnel. 

The construction of the tunnel began in 2010 as the foundation stone was laid by then UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi on June 28 that year.

After the Geological Survey of India had given the green signal for the tunnel in 2,000 and in 2002 the then Prime Minsiter Atal Bihari Vajpayee gave the go ahead.

The feasibility study for the tunnel was first done in 1990.

Prime Minister Modi reached Manali earlier today, where he was accompanied by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Chief of Defence staff Bipin Rawat Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Jairam Thakur, Minister of State for Finance Anurag Singh Thakur and the DG BRO Lt Gen Harpal Singh at the inauguration ceremony.

After inauguration, PM Modi walked around the tunnel.

The South Portal of the tunnel is twenty five km from Manali at an altitude of 3,060 metres, while North Portal is near village Teling, Sissu in Lahaul Valley at an altitude of 3,071 Metres.

Amid country-wide outrage over the incident, UP CM Yogi Adityanath had on Wednesday formed a three-member SIT which was instructed to submit its report by October 14.

HATHRAS: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) has completed its probe into the death of a 19-year-old Dalit woman after an alleged gangrape, a Hathras administration official said on Saturday.

The administration has also lifted restrictions on the media’s entry into the village, a day after outsiders, including politicians, were barred from meeting the victim’s family due to the ongoing SIT probe, the official said.

“Only the entry of media has been allowed into the village of the victim as the probe of the SIT has completed,” Joint Magistrate Prem Prakash Meena told reporters.

He also refuted allegations that the administration had confined the victim’s family and confiscated their phones.

Amid country-wide outrage over the incident, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had on Wednesday formed a three-member SIT which was instructed to submit its report by October 14, according to officials.

The Hathras administration had on Thursday clamped prohibitory orders under CrPC section 144, which bars assembly of more than four people, in the district where political parties had reached and staged protest to demand justice for the young woman, who died earlier this week, a fortnight after her alleged gangrape here.

Bhaskar had joined the civil society activists, students, women and members of various political outfits who had gathered at the Jantar Mantar here on Friday to demand justice for the victim.

NEW DELHI: It is time the country starts fighting the “rape epidemic”, Bollywood actor Swara Bhaskar said on Friday as she joined a protest here at Jantar Mantar to demand justice for the Hathras gang-rape and murder victim.

“People from different groups are here, this shows how enraged people are against what happened in Hathras, Balrampur, Azamgargh. There is a rape epidemic which has spread in the country, especially the kind of news we are getting from Uttar Pradesh,” Bhaskar said while addressing the protesters.

“It is time we start fighting against the rape epidemic. and today we are standing against it here and we have to win,” she added.

Bhaskar had joined the civil society activists, students, women and members of various political outfits who had gathered at the Jantar Mantar here on Friday to demand justice for the victim.

The protest was initially supposed to be held at the India Gate but was later shifted to the Jantar Mantar owing to the prohibitory orders in place in the Rajpath area.

The security was beefed up in the area.

Besides ground force, senior police officers and paramilitary personnel were deployed to manage the crowd.

The body of the 19-year-old Dalit woman, who died in Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital, a fortnight after she was gang-raped, was cremated in Hathras, Uttar Pradesh, in the early hours of Wednesday, with her family alleging that the local police forced them to conduct the last rites in the dead of the night.

Local police officers, however, had said the cremation was carried out “as per the wishes of the family”.