The Assam cabinet on Monday decided to book men who marry girls below 14 years in the state under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said.
He said that those who have surrendered and returned to the mainstream are being rehabilitated by both the central and Assam governments and they will participate in the development journey of the state.
A decision on the next chief minister in Assam is yet to be taken though two days have passed since the Bharatiya Janata Party-led alliance won the assembly election and the state chief of the saffron party said on Tuesday that either incumbent Sarbananda Sonowal or senior minister Himanta Biswa Sarma will head the next government.
Against the backdrop of the violent clashes with villagers from Meghalaya, the Assam cabinet on Wednesday decided to hand over the investigation to CBI, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said.
Poet, writer and former IPS officer Keki N Daruwalla, whose magic with words gained him national and international repute, has died at a Delhi hospital after prolonged illness and a spell of pneumonia. He was 87.
Bora said in his resignation letter to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi that infighting within the grand old party helped BJP and compelled him to leave despite having been a member since student days in 1976.
Banerjee said her microphone was stopped after five minutes, while other chief ministers were allowed to speak for longer durations.
The travel advisory is perhaps a first of its kind issued by any state government
'My father died in the liberation struggle. Bangladesh is our Motherland. This is home,' says Monindra Kumar Nath, a Hindu who has lived his 74 years in Dhaka.
The government on Saturday said a committee will be formed to propose safety measures for healthcare professionals even as OPD services were hit across the country as doctors joined the 24-hour nationwide strike called by the Indian Medical Association (IMA) to protest the alleged rape and murder of a trainee medic in Kolkata.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's tally in Rajya Sabha has dipped below 90 for the first time in several years but the party and its allies are expected to not only recoup the their losses but also make some gains when by-elections to fill the existing vacancies are held in the coming weeks.
Sarma, however, said that police cases filed against six Mizoram government officials will continue to be probed for their alleged role in the deadly gun battle along the inter-state border at Lailapur in Cachar district.
The veteran diplomat said Hasina has stayed in India before after the assassination of her father and Bangladesh independence hero Sheikh Mujibur Rahman who later became the country's prime minister. Rahman was assassinated in August 1975.
The Centre on Monday vowed to hunt down those responsible for the ethnic clashes between Bodos and minorities after fresh violence erupted in Assam. "The situation is under control as of now. There could be some external elements behind the violence. The state government and the Centre are determined that we will have this investigated and get to the people who are behind this," Union Home Secretary R K Singh told reporters.
A bench of Justices V Ramasubramanian and Pankaj Mithal, which extended the protection from arrest to Gogoi till March 3, said it would hear the matter on Friday.
Rebel Shiv Sena MLAs from Maharashtra have contributed Rs 51 lakh for the flood relief wok in Assam, where they have been camping since the last week, their spokesperson said on Wednesday.
The Congress leader compared Assam's BJP leadership with 'Dritarashtra' and 'Shakuni', characters in the epic Mahabharata, without naming whom she meant.
The govt said those who complete 4 years of service under the scheme would be given priority in the recruitment process.
2023 was the worst for the tiger population, recording the highest number of mortalities in a decade with 178 tigers dying.
During the session, General Dwivedi was asked about the overall challenges for the India Army going forward and learning from the border row in eastern Ladakh.
Assam and Meghalaya have agreed to resolve their boundary disputes in six locations and are ready to find solutions to six other such areas soon, Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma said on Wednesday.
After a series of meetings, Sarma told reporters that BJP's Assam legislature party is likely to meet in Guwahati on Sunday and all questions related to the next government will be answered there.
Two senior government functionaries said the central government does not want to take any decision that may further escalate the ground situation.
Sangma said finding the solution was not an easy decision, but for the political will of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.
Sisodia claimed that while the Assam government procured PPE kits for Rs 600 a piece from other companies, Sarma gave urgent supply orders to the firms of his wife and son's business partners for Rs 990 a piece "taking advantage of the COVID-19 emergency".
The Centre has summoned to New Delhi the chief secretaries and directors general of police (DGPs) of Assam and Mizoram for a meeting on Wednesday while the restive inter-state border was calm, a day after armed clashes left six dead and over 50 injured, officials said.
Soren, who is scheduled to join the Bharatiya Janata Party on August 30, also resigned as an MLA of the state assembly and a minister in the Jharkhand Cabinet.
Bangladesh is in turmoil, which is not good news for India, which shares a porous 4000 km border with it. There is a danger of fundamentalism growing there, and India has to move in to reset its ties with the new dispensation before China and Pakistan make capital out of it, alerts Ramesh Menon.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday asserted that she did not threaten junior doctors at state-run hospitals, who have been continuing cease-work for 21 days now to protest against the alleged rape and murder of a woman medic. Addressing a rally organised by the Trinamool Congress Chhatra Parishad, Banerjee had on Wednesday urged the agitating junior doctors of Bengal to urgently consider returning to duty and said she doesn't want to lodge first information reports (FIRs) against the striking doctors in consideration of their future careers.
The CPI-M leader was the chief minister of the state from 2000 to 2011.
The situation along the Mizoram-Assam border has been on the boil since June-end when Assam Police allegedly took control over an area known as 'Aitlang hnar' about 5 km from Vairengte, accusing the neighbouring state of encroaching on its territory.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said efforts are on to remove AFSPA completely from the northeast region.
Amid the rhythmic chug of the train, a chorus of voices rises, each bearing its tale of hope and despair.
The Supreme Court on Thursday directed the Centre and the Assam government to provide extensive data, including those on the number of Bangladeshi immigrants granted Indian citizenship in Assam between January 1, 1966 and March 25, 1971, while taking note of pleas that illegal immigration has impacted demography and cultural fabric of the border state.
In the Interim Budget, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that a high power committee would be set up to consider the challenges arising from 'fast population grown and demographic changes.' 'But who wants data? It pays to feed people's fears, insecurities and apprehensions. If such fears don't exist, they must be created,' her husband Parakala Prabhakar says in this fascinating excerpt from his book, The Crooked Timber of New India: Essays on a Republic in Crisis.
The Supreme Court on Monday directed the Manipur government, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to file reports elaborating on the status of probe and the charge sheets filed in cases of ethnic-violence to help it take a decision on whether the trials can commence in Assam or be undertaken in Manipur.
The state authorities had on Saturday suspended the internet and SMS services till Sunday noon.
'We are not secessionists, we want to coexist with our countrymen but not on the terms that will strip us off our dignity and a right to peaceful existence.'
Hearing a public interest litigation filed by NGO Amguri Naba Nirman Samity, a high court division bench comprising Chief Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia and Justice Soumitra Saikia asked the Assam government to file a detailed status report on the case.
The tribal areas, where autonomous councils were created under the 6th Schedule of the Constitution, were also exempted from the purview of the CAA, officials said quoting from the rues of the law that were notified on Monday.
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