WELLINGTON: An attacker inspired by the Islamic State group stabbed six people at a New Zealand supermarket on Friday, September 3, 2021, before police who had the man under surveillance shot him dead, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said.

Ardern said the man, a Sri Lankan national who arrived in New Zealand in 2011 and was on a terror watchlist, entered a shopping mall in suburban Auckland, seized a knife from a display and went on a stabbing spree.

She said six people were wounded, three critically, before police who were monitoring him opened fire within 60 seconds of the attack starting.

“What happened today was despicable, it was hateful, it was wrong,” she said, adding it was not representative of any faith or community.

Asked about the man’s motivations, she said: “it was a violent ideology and ISIS-inspired”, using another name for the Islamic State group.

Ardern said she was limited in what she could say publicly about the man, who had been under surveillance since 2016, because he was the subject of court suppression orders.

Police Commissioner Andrew Coster said authorities were confident the man was acting alone and there was no further danger to the community.

New Zealand’s worst terror attack was the Christchurch mosques shootings in March 2019, when a white supremacist gunman murdered 51 Muslim worshippers and severely wounded another 40.

PATNA:  For the first time, close to 40% of MBBS students have failed in their first-year examinations in Bihar. A total of 1,172 first-year MBBS students appeared for the offline examinations held in March this year from Bihar’s nine medical colleges.

As many as 447 of them failed. The results were declared on August 30.   

Following such unprecedented number of failures, the student wing of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) has urged the chancellor of Bihar to conduct a reevaluation of the answer sheets of those who have failed.

The student body cited the impact of the pandemic on the students for such high failure rate.  

They said teaching was conducted online, but exams were held offline as a result of which the students faced a lot of problems while answering the questions.  

The examination was conducted in March adhering to Covid-19 protocols.

As per the letter written to the governor -cum-chancellor, of the total number of students who have failed, 104 were from Madhubani Medical College and 56 from the Bettiah Government Medical College. 

When contacted, Rajiv Ranjan, the controller of exams of the Aryabhatta Knowledge University, which conducts the examinations of all these nine medical colleges, said that there is no provision for conducting re-evaluation of such a large number of failed students. 

“But the university has allowed them to appear in the second supplementary examination, starting from September 27. And they are filling up forms for this examination,” the controller of examinations Rajiv Ranjan told this newspaper.

The examination of first year MBBS students of 2019 batch was delayed three months.

The results of the exams were declared seven months later on August 30.

JAGDALPUR: In controversial remarks, BJP General Secretary D Purandeswari on Thursday said if her party workers “spit”, Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and his cabinet will get “swept away”.

The comments triggered a controversy with Bahgel reacting by saying that “if anyone spits on the sky, it falls on one’s own face”.

While addressing BJP workers on the concluding day of the three-day- long ‘chintan shivir (brainstorming session) of the party here, Purandeswari said, “We appeal to you (activists) to work with a resolve. If you turn back and spit, then Bhupesh Baghel and his entire cabinet will be swept away. With this resolution you have to work and with your hard work, the BJP will definitely be elected to power in 2023.”

The BJP is a party with different principles, whose workers serve the poor, destitute and helpless with selfless and dedicated spirit, she said.

Every worker is respected in the BJP even if he or she hails from a small town or village, the former Union minister added.

She said an answer will be received immediately if you ask who will become the next Congress president.

However, this was not the case in the BJP where any worker who deserves can rise to become the party president, Purandeswari said.

She said winds of change in the state have started blowing from Bastar, a tribal dominated region.

The ruling Congress has “cheated” the people of Chhattisgarh and they will give the party a befitting reply, she added.

Reacting to her “spit” remarks, Chief Minister Baghel said he did not expect such a statement from the BJP leader.

“What reaction should I give to such a statement? I did not expect that D Purandeshwari’s mental state would stoop down to this level after joining the BJP. She was well when she was with us (Congress) as Union Minister of State’, he said while talking to reporters here at the helipad.

“If (anyone) spits on the sky, it falls on one’s own face,” Baghel added.

Purandeswari quit the Congress in 2014 and joined the BJP.

She was a minister in the Congress-led UPA government.

The saffron party, that ruled the state for 15 years before being ousted from power by the Congress in the 2018 polls, organized a brainstorming session for the first time in the politically significant and tribal-dominated Bastar region since the formation of the state in 2000.

AGARTALA: Trinamool Congress leader Sushmita Dev on Thursday said her party would conduct a survey in Tripura and indicated that this would help the party to assess acceptability of local leaders.

Besides Dev, those who have been frequenting Agartala include All India Trinamool Congress General Secretary, Abhishek Banerjee and West Bengal Education Minister Bratya Basu, both of whom have flown in several times.

Dev, who came here from Silchar on Wednesday plans to stay for the next fortnight.

“As directed by Mamata Banerjee, we will go in for a ground-level survey in order to strengthen the organisation. We want to bring in people who have acceptance at the grassroot level,” she said.

TMC had conducted a similar survey last year ahead of its assembly elections in West Bengal after which the party had decided to change candidates from a large number of constituencies.

The former Congress MP said she would submit a report to All India Trinamool Congress general secretary Abhishek Banerjee about the outcome of the survey.

Dev, said TMC would initiate a membership drive and organise party programmes in all eight districts of the state.

“Trinamool Congress is receiving a huge response from the people in Tripura. The party will strengthen its organisation within the next few months,” she said “I still remember that before the 2018 elections in Tripura, BJP leader Himanta Biswa Sarma used to say that people will get jobs through missed calls. After the formation of the government, neither Himanta Biswa Sarma comes to Tripura nor do the people get jobs,” Dev said at a press conference here.

The former President of All India Mahila Congress claimed that an anti-Modi wave was blowing across the country.

In a recent survey, she said, it came to light that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was losing his popularity.

She also visited the famous Mata Tripura Sundari temple in Udaipur on Thursday.

SRINAGAR:  The body Hardline separatist and former Hurriyat Conference chairman Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who died on Wednesday night, was given a quiet burial before the sunrise on Thursday amid high security. 

His family alleged that the police forcibly took his body and quietly buried it at a graveyard near his residence at 4.45 am, sources said.

Only a handful of people were allowed to attend his funeral prayers.

Geelani’s son Naeem Geelani told this newspaper that nobody from his family was allowed to attend the burial.

“The police stormed into our house around 3 am, misbehaved with the people present inside, including women and forcibly took away Geelani’s body. The women were dragged out of the room and threatened they will be fired at,” he alleged.

Naeem said it was the police who gave Geelani his last bath. They also dug his grave and buried him after giving a funeral prayer. “All this was done in our absence and none from family attended his burial or funeral prayers”.

He said IG and SSP Budgam visited their home and they told them that Geelani’s last wish was that his body is buried in the martyrs graveyard at Eidgah.

“They said it is not possible. We told them to give us permission to bury the body quietly in martyrs graveyard Eidgah. However, they did not agree and said they have orders to get the body buried before dawn,” Naeem said.

The police denied the allegations and said Geelani’s family members were present at the funeral site.

Meanwhile, with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan declaring a day of official mourning on the demise of Geelani, India on Thursday said it was the Pakistani PM’s statement and it had no comments to offer.

Geelani, 91, died at his home in Srinagar on Wednesday night after a prolonged illness.

The pro-Pakistan separatist leader, who spearheaded separatist politics for over three decades in Jammu and Kashmir, was buried at a mosque near his residence.

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan said he was “deeply saddened” to learn about Geelani’s death.

“The Pakistan flag will fly at half-mast and we will observe a day of official mourning,” Khan said.

Asked about Khan’s statement at an online media briefing, Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said, “I don’t have an immediate comment on this. It is his statement. They had given him ‘Nishan-e-Pakistan’, their wish, what can I say.”

Asked about reports of vandalising of temple and breaking of idols in Pakistan, Bagchi said India has issued many statements on attacks on minorities in Pakistan and has raised such issues with them in the past.

On the resumption of air bubble with Bangladesh, the MEA spokesperson said talks are underway and proposals are being discussed.

To a separate question on Vishal Jood, who is lodged in an Australian prison reportedly over his alleged hand in a series of hate attacks on suspected pro-Khalistan Sikhs in Sydney this year,

Bagchi said a judgment has been passed in the case on Thursday and the ministry is ascertaining its details.