The polling will be held between 7 am and 2 pm in 34 constituencies -- 17 each in Kashmir and Jammu divisions. Besides DDC elections, polling will be held for panchayat bypolls in 50 vacant sarpanch seats and 216 vacant panch seats falling within the DDC constituencies, an official spokesman said.
After the swearing-in, Mathur, who was given a guard of honour at the venue by the Ladakh Police, said a lot of development activities needed to be carried out in the border areas.
The ultras fired on Ghulam Rasool Dar, also the Kulgam district president of the BJP's Kisan Morcha, and his wife in Anantnag town in south Kashmir, a police official said.
Jammu and Kashmir "was, is and shall forever" remain an integral part of India, a top Indian diplomat asserted at the UN Human Rights Council's meeting in Geneva on Wednesday, a day after Pakistan sought the international community's intervention on the Kashmir issue. Speaking at the 43rd session of the UN Human Rights Council which is being held in Geneva in Switzerland from February 24 to March 20, Vikas Swarup, secretary (west), the ministry of external affairs, described Pakistan as the "epicentre of global terrorism".
'I've been illegally detained yet again. Since two days, J-K admin has refused to allow me to visit @parawahid's family in Pulwama. BJP Ministers and their puppets are allowed to move around in every corner of Kashmir but security is a problem only in my case,' Mufti tweeted in English and Urdu.
United States Congressman Dan Burton, Indiana Republican and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who was in the 1980s and 1990s India's bete-noire on Capitol Hill, after a considerable hiatus when he took a sabbatical against castigating India, seems to have had a relapse, this time at the urging of the Kashmiri American Council and the pro-Pakistan lobby.
PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti said on Sunday the dialogue process initiated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Jammu and Kashmir's mainstream leadership can gain credibility by ending what she called an 'era of oppression and suppression' in the union territory and understanding that a dissenting voice is not a criminal act.
Before assuming charge of the CDS, Gen Chauhan paid tributes to India's fallen soldiers at the National War Memorial in the India Gate complex.
'Attacking his statues disregard his values, which as we know are most needed in the world today.'
The first-ever district development council (DDC) elections will be held in eight phases to elect 280 members in 20 districts from November 28 to December 22.
'How can any religion have anything to do with terrorism? How was Islam equated with terrorism? And once that happens, how does a man in the western country differentiate between a moderate Muslim and a radical Muslim'
The People's Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) swept the maiden District Development Council (DDC) polls by winning 110 seats, while the Bharatiya Janata Party emerged as the single largest party by getting 75 seats after securing the largest vote share in Jammu and Kashmir, officials said on Wednesday.
On the situation in the Kashmir Valley, the army officials highlighted Wednesday evening's incident when a son of a prominent eatery owner was shot and critically wounded by terrorists at his shop in a high-security area of the city.
Amid the coronavirus scare, Union Sports Minister Kiren Rijiju inaugurated the Khelo India's first Winter Games chapter in Jammu and Kashmir's Gulmarg town on Saturday. This comes amid calls from Srinagar Mayor Junaid Mattu seeking cancellation of the event.
The detenues are likely to be released on Saturday as some of them are lodged in prisons located outside the union territory in places like Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, they said.
This may leave those not opting for any of the two options offered by the Centre before the GST Council meet scheduled for October 5 in the lurch. It is clear from the present situation that these states will have to wait till June 2022 to get their compensation, subject to the council extending the cess collection period beyond June 30, 2022.
Earlier this month, a controversy had erupted over the reduction of syllabus by the Central Board of Secondary Education due to the COVID-19 situation, with the Opposition alleging that chapters on India's democracy and plurality are being "dropped" to propagate a particular ideology.
Women will have a decisive say as chairpersons in seven of Jammu and Kashmir's 20 districts.
The chargesheet highlighted his links to Pakistan-trained Abu Dujana and Abu Qassim, who were killed in separate encounters with security forces, and went on to allege that he used to meet them personally as well as through Over Ground Workers.
'AAP is more acceptable to sections of the middle class because it has pragmatically tried to accommodate Hindu sensibilities.'
While the BPF and the UPPL are considered rivals in the Bodo-dominated areas, there was no pre-poll alliance among other parties as well.
Inciting the public to raise funds for jihad (holy war) is not allowed to individuals or any organisation in Pakistan and is considered as treason, the Lahore high court has ruled even as it dismissed appeals of two terrorists convicted for raising funds for a proscribed terror outfit.
The State Department in its report listed more than a dozen significant human rights issues for India. Prominent among them are unlawful and arbitrary killings, including extrajudicial killings perpetrated by police; torture and cases of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment by some police and prison officials; arbitrary arrest and detention by government authorities; harsh and life-threatening prison conditions; political and prisoners or detainees in certain states.
Nearly two years after the bifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir into two UTs and revocation of its special status, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday held talks with top political leaders from the erstwhile state, and said the Centre's priority is to strengthen grassroots democracy there for which delimitation has to happen quickly so that polls can be held.
There seems to be a desire for opacity when it comes to confronting China, points out Aakar Patel.
Wang began a two-day trip to Pakistan on Tuesday primarily to attend a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Organisation Islamic Cooperation (OIC) as a special guest.
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This is the first time that a retired officer has been appointed at this position for which a gazette notification was issued to announce the change in rules for the appointment.
India slammed China for helping Pakistan in trying to raise the Kashmir issue at the UNSC, saying Beijing should seriously reflect on the global consensus. The latest attempt failed as other countries of the 15-member council felt Kashmir is a bilateral matter between India and Pakistan.
They are the first to be declared terrorists under the new anti-law, a home ministry official said.
She also accused the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government at the Centre of "murdering the democracy" in the name of polls.
The announcement by India and Pakistan to strictly observe all agreements on ceasefire along the Line of Control (LoC) and other sectors has rekindled hope for a peaceful future among border residents in Jammu and Kashmir who have been living under constant fear of firing and shelling.
Launching the Ayushman Bharat scheme via a video-conference to extend health insurance benefits to all residents of Jammu and Kashmir, he said the three-tier panchayat system has fully taken shape in the UT, describing it as a realisation of Mahatma Gandhi's dream of 'gram swaraj' (village self-rule).
Both Khan and Modi are scheduled to address the UN General Assembly on September 27.
'I feel bad for those idiots who threw their Chinese made TVs off their balconies only to see this happen'
In his first comments since the militaries of India and Pakistan jointly announced on Thursday that they have agreed to strictly observe all agreements on the ceasefire along the Line of Control (LoC) and other sectors, Khan said Pakistan remains ready to move forward to resolve 'all outstanding issues' with India through dialogue.
The 15-nation body includes China as a permanent veto-wielding member.
With 17,51,555 people defeating the disease, the recovery rate has surged to 71.17 per cent.
'India needs to closely monitor the discussions at the UNSC and make counter-measures as this touches its core interests', points out Srikanth Kondapalli.
