Berhampur, the biggest city in southern Odisha, on Monday looked like a war zone as Cyclone Phailin left behind a trail of destruction. The cyclone accompanied by heavy rain hit Gopalpur, about 15 km from Behrampur, and battered the city and its nearby areas.
'The police just stood there watching our people being attacked.'
Dr Behera speaks about how the nationwide positive reaction to the abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir indicates that the very idea of India is changing. From a diverse, multicultural entity, could India be becoming a place where assimilation is more important than accommodation?
The accident occurred around 5.45 pm near Khatauli town, 40 km off Muzaffarnagar, leaving 23 people dead, the Uttar Pradesh police said.
Around 90-100 people received burn injuries, and the condition of some of them was serious.
Water levels have started receding in Srinagar and telecommunication has been restored in parts of the city after it faced the worst floods in decades.
The stage of alert will be based on positivity rate (on two consecutive days), cumulative number of new cases (over a week) and average oxygenated-bed occupancy (for a week).
Rains will continue to batter Tamil Nadu for the next seven days and the next 48 hours are "very crucial", the IMD has said.
'A setback in UP will be nothing short of a political disaster on the eve of the 2024 general election.' 'Will it mean that Modi will be able to stay in his new house only for a year after it becomes ready?' asks Amulya Ganguli.
'The PM of India was 20 km away from the Pakistan border and he is one of the persons under extreme threat from that country and they put his life in danger.'
'The worst affected is the electricity supply. A huge number of poles, some 6,000 to 8,000 poles have been damaged completely. That will take a lot of time for restoration.'
The Union Health ministry put the number of positive cases at 82, eight more since Thursday night, which includes the woman and a 76-year-old man from Karnataka who became the country's first coronavirus fatality besides 17 foreign nationals, Health Ministry officials said.
'From the very start, PM Modi was insistent that visiting foreign leaders should be exposed to an India beyond its capital.' 'Through these experiences, he felt that the full Indian narrative would be much better understood across the world,' explains External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. A riveting excerpt from Bluekraft Digital Foundation's Modi@20: Dreams Meet Delivery.
The Supreme Court on Friday said "a calamity and disaster" as huge as the one witnessed in Jammu and Kashmir floods "deserves national response" and asked the Centre to apprise it on Monday on the urgent steps undertaken to accelerate rescue, relief and rehabilitation operations.
"Water has gone above the head. Now we mean business. You (Centre) will arrange everything now," the court said.
'Let people across the LoC see the resolve of Bharat and the contribution of the Indian Security Forces in rebuilding the Valley. Let disaster become the rallying point for integration -- not only of society but also of all the instruments of State,' says General Anil Chait (retd).
The Indian Meteorological Department, meanwhile, warned of intense spell of 30 to 50 mm rainfall per hour with strong winds in Mumbai and suburban areas.
As India's international role expands, so must our capabilities, says Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal (retd).
The ministry has got Rs 1,03,927 crore for 2019-20 which is 4.9 per cent more than Rs 99,034 crore given in 2018-19.
Over 150 people have been killed and lakhs have been stranded in Jammu and Kashmir, which has been hit by the worst floods in five decades.
'China's opaque defence allocation processes are shrouded in mystery and have triggered security dilemmas among its neighbours and others,' notes China expert Srikanth Kondapalli.
Wang Yang and Xi Jinping's visits signal the beginning of a major Chinese push to bring about a transformation of Tibet, observes Jayadeva Ranade, the distinguished China expert and retired RA&W officer.
Teams of the National Disaster Response Force started landing in Gujarat with the help of the Indian Air Force to undertake preventive evacuation of people living on the west coast, an IAF official said.
'My belief that I could protect the Himalayas was shattered.'
Several military veterans said that the "insulting" tweet reflected what civilian officials in the ministry of defence thought about the military.
'Since each chief single-mindedly pursues his service's interests in the competition for turf and in core matters such as budget share. The CDS, therefore, must act as an "honest broker" whose decisions serve the broader national purpose, rather than narrow service interests,' says Ajai Shukla.
Educational institutions remained closed even as the weather office forecast heavy downpour in the next three days in the state, Puducherry and coastal Andhra Pradesh.
Two men came on a motorcycle and threw a grenade in front of the shopping mall at arterial R G Baruah Road just opposite the zoo around 8 pm.
'I am proud of Maharashtra and the city of Mumbai, that this is a state which has done more number of tests than any state in India.' 'The more you test, the more number of cases you will pick up.' 'If you do not do the tests, then you are groping in the dark.'
More than 3,000 squads under health and local self-government departments have started the process of cleaning houses and public places, official sources said.
According to sources, all private offices will work from home and only government offices and essential services will be open.
Three new categories -- all asymptomatic healthcare workers working in non-COVID hospitals/areas of COVID hospitals/blocks, asymptomatic frontline workers such as surveillance workers deployed in containment zones and paramilitary/police personnel involved in COVID-19 related activities -- have now been included.
The death toll also saw a record single-day increase of over 350 fatalities to move closer to the 8,500-mark, more than one-third of which have been recorded in 11 days since June 1 -- the day that marked the beginning of a phased exit from most restrictions imposed under a nationwide lockdown with effect from March 25.
The highest number of confirmed cases are from Maharashtra (748), followed by Tamil Nadu at 571 and Delhi with 523 cases. Cases in Telangana have gone up to 321, in Kerala to 314, in Uttar Pradesh to 305, while the number of cases has gone up to 274 in Rajasthan.
'Modi as chief minister did a superb job of rehabilitation after the Kutch earthquake of 2001. He can use that hard-earned expertise for the benefit of the people of Kashmir too -- but only if they let him do so,' says T V R Shenoy.
At least a dozen officers from Gujarat are handling key assignments in various important central positions
Many others are feared to have been trapped under the debris. Rescue work is on, as per last reports.
A new 7.3-magnitude earthquake and seven powerful aftershocks struck Nepal on Tuesday killing at least 50 people and triggering panic in the Himalayan nation already devastated by a monster temblor less than three weeks ago that had claimed over 8,000 lives.
'Other countries go out on a limb to save even a single life.' 'What to talk of civilian accidents and disasters, even our military does not have a priority for Combat Search and Rescue,' says Group Captain P I Muralidharan (retd).
A relatively dry spell in Chennai and its neighbourhood brought relief to the flood affected residents and rescue agencies, as hopes of water receding fast went up.
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