NEW EDLHI: Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on Monday said his target is to construct 60 kilometres of highway per day.

India’s national highway construction slowed to 28.64 km a day in 2021-22 due to Covid-19 pandemic related disruptions and a longer-than-usual monsoon in some parts of the country.

“My ministry and my team are working hard, and even during Covid-19 pandemic time, our (highway) construction rate was 38 km per day and my ambition is to take it up to 60 km per day, it is a target,” Gadkari said at an event.

The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Ltd (NHIDCL) are primarily responsible for the construction of national highways and expressways across the country. The minister also said that logistics cost is a problem in India.

NEW DELHI:  India is likely to face power shortages in the short and medium terms on rising demand in the peak season and supply-demand mismatch, according to a study by Bank of America Securities. 

The report also pointed out that the slower thermal capacity addition in the past few years is one of the reasons for the power shortage. It said the power demand grew steadily at 4% annually between FY10 and FY19 as against thermal capacity addition, which rose only 9% during this period. The capacity addition declined to just about 2% between FY19 and FY22 when demand jumped 5 %.

“This demand-supply mismatch has been due to multiple stressed projects, focused on renewable energy. Besides, harsh seasons and higher economic activity have increased the peak power deficit to 1.3% as against 0.4% in FY20-21,” said the report.  

The report further mentioned that the new capacity expansion will take at least two-three years and renewables generation will be limited to 10-11% on lower plant load factors, which means the power shortages are likely to continue, going forward.

To tackle the ongoing power crisis due to the coal shortage, the government is trying to import coal. According to another study by Nomura, India imported nearly $32 billion (1% of GDP) worth of coal in FY22, nearly double the import bill from FY21.

With both prices and volumes of coal imports set to rise this year, the report expects an additional burden of 0.3% of GDP from higher coal imports. “Imported coal costs are likely to exert pressure on state government-run discoms and they may pass on the costs to consumers, the report stated. 

The actress had filed the complaint against her husband, father in law and a bank manager for allegedly forging her signature and using her bank account without her knowledge.

Senior advocate M S Shyam Sundar, who appeared for Pothraj and his father submitted that Chythra is the estranged wife of the businessman and had filed a false complaint.

The court was told that the false complaint was filed after Balaji Pothraj instituted a divorce case against his wife.

A single judge bench of the HC issued the interim order staying the proceedings.

Chythra had alleged in her complaint that her husband and father-in-law were managing an account in South India Bank in her name but without her knowledge.

Loans and other financial transactions were allegedly transacted in her name.

MANDYA: Security has been heightened in Srirangapatna, the erstwhile capital of 18th-century ruler Tipu Sultan in the district, following Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s (VHP) call to perform puja at the Jamia mosque, claiming that it was built after razing a Hanuman temple.

Prohibitory orders have been imposed in the temple town under section 144 of the CrPC to prevent any protest or procession from taking place.

Besides the district police force, contingents of Karnataka State Reserved Police have also been deployed.

The roads have been barricaded and security pickets have been erected in the town.

Wearing saffron scarves and holding saffron flags, the Bajrang Dal and VHP activists on motorcycles raised ‘Jai Sriram’ slogans.

Fearing backlash, many shopkeepers around the shrine downed shutters for the day.

Members of fringe Hindu outfits have called for a protest march to the mosque.

However, authorities have denied permission for it.

State Home Minister Araga Jnanendra has given directions to the police to take all the measures to ensure peace and public order in view of VHP’s ‘Srirangapatna Chalo’ campaign.

Meanwhile, the Sriram Sena chief Pramod Muthalik condemned the restrictions saying they should be imposed on ‘them’.

“There is a Ganapati temple, a temple tank and a well inside the mosque. Despite all these, mosques running Madrassas and offering Namaz there is wrong. It is ‘they’ who should be stopped. They should be thrown out. I condemn the BJP government which is trying to stop our protest,” Muthalik told reporters.

The right-wing organisations have been claiming that the Jamia mosque was an Anjaneya Temple, which Tipu Sultan had destroyed to build a mosque over it.

The outfits have submitted a memorandum to the district authorities seeking a survey of the mosque and taking steps to return the ‘Anjaneya Temple’ to Hindus if their claim is found to be true.

Goyal said that the police are, however, introducing some measures to prevent overcrowding and to provide emergency medical aid if there is need for it.

“Overcrowding might e there to some extent, but there was no situation where people were short of space or sweating or having issues with (other) people,” he said.

He said KK arrived at Nazrul Manch, the venue of his last soiree, at 6.22 pm and went on stage at 7.05 pm.

“At no point of time was he mobbed, we had sufficient police presence at the place,” he said.

Goyal said that a police arrangement under an assistant commissioner was in place well before the singer’s arrival.

He said that though controversy has arisen on how many people were there at the venue, the police have “clear video where you can see people are standing comfortably and dancing.”

Goyal categorically said that there was no stampede-like situation at any point of time and that when viewed from different angles of video shoots of the programme, there was ample space for the crowd to comfortably watch the performance.

He said that at no point of time the organisers, artistes, musicians on stage or the crowd told the police that there was anything amiss.

He said that the exact number of people present could not be ascertained as at various points of time the numbers would have been different.

He said that there are around 2,500 seats at Nazrul Manch and most of the crowd were standing in front of their own seats.

“We request that henceforth a medical ambulance be kept with a doctor and hospital should be identified where people can be taken to in case of emergency,” he said.

Goyal said that it should be ensured that tickets should not be distributed more than the seating capacity of a venue.

“We are putting a mechanism in place to ensure this process,” he said, adding that organisers would be requested to put up screens outside the base where excess crowd can view the programme.

Goyal said that an incident of use of a fire extinguisher happened outside the hall and about 150 metres.

It has been alleged that a fire extinguisher was used to disperse surging crowds trying to force their entry into the hall to attend KK’s performance.

“There was a small argument between some people who were trying to get to the stage and that is when I think someone used this fire extinguisher,” he said.

Goyal said that the police intervened and nothing serious took place.

“They separated the people and the situation was brought under control almost immediately,” he said.

The police commissioner said that the air-conditioning of the hall was functioning as per information from the authorities running the hall, negating allegations from certain sections that it was not working properly.

The data updated at 8 am also stated that the number of active cases in the country increased by 1,239 in 24 hours to stand at 22,416.

Of the 26 fresh fatalities, six were recorded in the last 24 hours and 20 reconciled by Kerala.

The active cases now constitute 0.05 per cent of the total infections, the health ministry said, adding the country’s overall COVID-19 recovery rate was recorded at 98.73 per cent.

The daily positivity rate was recorded at 0.89 per cent, while the weekly figure was 0.77 per cent, according to the health ministry.

The case fatality rate was recorded at 1.22 per cent.

An increase of 1,239 cases has been recorded in active COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours.

The number of people who have recuperated from the disease rose to 4,26,25,454, the data showed.

On vaccination, the ministry said the cumulative doses administered in the country so far under the nationwide COVID-19 inoculation drive has exceeded 193.96 crore.

India’s COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 2020 and 50 lakh on September 16 that year.

An official said the complaint, which was submitted on July 2, 2019, had been forwarded by the New Delhi deputy commissioner of police to ACB for necessary action. “In the complaint, it is alleged against Sisodia (Education Minister) and Jain (PWD Minister) and others that a huge scam to the tune of over `2,000 crore has been carried out in NCT of Delhi in respect of construction of school rooms/building at highly inflated costs by the Government of Delhi,” the notice read. 

The BJP leaders have been asked to furnish the details and documents that allegedly show that the ministers derived any pecuniary benefits for themselves or any other person. “Furnish the specific details, documents of the recommendation made or decision taken by the ministers and public servants, which are relatable to the purported offence,” the notice said.

On Thursday, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had alleged that central agencies were conspiring to arrest Sisodia by levelling fake charges against him, just as they had done with Jain. During a media briefing, AAP MLA Atishi repeated the allegations and said the Centre had given a mandate to all its probe agencies — the I-T department, ED, Delhi Police and CBI — to start preparing “fake” cases to get Sisodia arrested.

‘Furnish documents that establish undue benefits’  
“Furnish the documents, which prima facie reveal that Manish Sisodia, Satyendar Jain, and others derived undue advantage for self or other person. Furnish the specific details or documents of the recommendation made or decision taken by the ministers, which relate to the purported offence,” stated the ACB notice.

According to police, Indirani (40), a tout for Sudha Hospital, had forcibly taken her daughter to the facility for ovum donation in return for money.

Indirani was accompanied by her paramour Syed Ali and another woman during the visit to the hospital.

The hospital is said to have paid a total of Rs 25,000 to the accused.

Unable to bear the torture of her mother, the girl had gone to her relative’s house in Salem in May and narrated the ordeal.

Meanwhile, the relatives lodged a complaint against Indirani and two others with Erode South Police this morning following which they were arrested.

The victim was rescued by the police from the trio and admitted to the Government Headquarters Hospital in the city.

Police are interrogating the accused and the hospital authorities.

He was speaking at the concluding ceremony of the third year Sangh Shiksha Varg (officers’ training camp) here.

Hindus should realize that Muslims are descendants of their own ancestors and their “brothers by blood relation”, Bhagwat said.

“If they want to come back then we would welcome them with open arms. Even if they do not come back, it does not matter, we already have 33 crore gods, more will be added…everyone is following their religion,” he said.

“Everyone should understand and respect the sentiments of each other. There should be no extremism in the heart, in the words or in the work. There should not be words of intimidation from both sides,” the RSS chief said.

“Though it is less from the Hindu side. Hindus have maintained a lot of restraint. Hindus have paid a lot of price for this unity, even at the cost of (accepting) the division of the country. Even then such voices (of intimidation) come from their side and no one from their side protests against it,” Bhagwat further said.

If there is extremism on any side, it should be criticised, he said, adding that Hindus do object to extremism.

“The Hindu community does not accept any kind of extremism. Hence all kind of people came into the Hindu community (sought shelter from the Hindus), be it the Jews or Parsis,” Bhagwat further said.

He also said that the Hindus should “improve their Hindu character” and become more powerful.

A united Hindu community has the potential to create a new world by resolving global conflicts, Bhagwat said.

NEW DELHI:  The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has pulled a few surprises on its own cadre by dropping some top leaders, including former Union and state ministers, and a party general secretary, from its list of Rajya Sabha candidates.

Among those who did not find a place are Union Minister for Minority Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, former ministers M J Akbar and Shiv Pratap Shukla, and party’s former general secretary O P Mathur, who was in charge of Gujarat and was once considered the man who would replace

Vasundhara Raje as BJP’s top leader in Rajasthan. Others who lost out are RSS favourite Vinay Sahasrabuddhe, former Union minister Prakash Javadekar and BJP spokesperson Zafar Islam, who was credited with facilitating Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia’s entry into the BJP.

All of them are outgoing members of the Rajya Sabha and were expected to be renominated. Congress leader RPN Singh, who had recently joined the BJP, has also lost out.

The party on Monday announced four more candidates for the polls — the party’s OBC wing chief K Laxman and Mithilesh Kumar from Uttar Pradesh, Sumitra Valmiki from Madhya Pradesh, Lal Singh Sirhoya from Karnataka.

With this addition, the BJP has so far named a total of 22 candidates for the election for 57 Rajya Sabha seats.

A surprise entrant into the race whose name was earlier doing the rounds was the Vice-Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University, Tariq Mansoor.

He is said to be close to RSS leader Krishna Gopal Sharma and has become the first Vice-Chancellor in the history of AMU to get an extension in tenure. He was given a one-year extension after his term ended last month. 

Meanwhile, despondency runs high in the camp of Naqvi, who is in the Rajya Sabha from the Jharkhand quota of BJP.

“Is it the prize that a minority leader gets for being loyal to the party?,” a Muslim BJP leader told TNIE.

“At a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi claims to be working on the mantra, sab ka saath sab ka vikaas, dropping a lone Muslim face in the ministry, whose loyalty to party remains unquestioned so far, will put a dent on its image,” another BJP leader, preferring anonymity, said.