At least 13 Indians were also among the over 863 people injured in the tragedy.
Meanwhile, one of the constituents of the Kerala government has said it is not averse to a leadership change.
With Maharashtra and Haryana assembly elections, results for 51 assembly and two Lok Sabha bypolls spread across 18 states were declared on Thursday. Here are state-wise results of the bypolls.
'The Chinese have a set pattern. They demonstrate, warn, threaten, attack and withdraw.' 'We were lulled into complacency, but I am certain things are being corrected now.'
Its passage in the Lok Sabha is all but certain due to the massive majority the Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies have, and the Union government is confident of its passage in the Rajya Sabha as well with the support of several non-aligned regional parties which have often joined the treasury benches in the past.
'Jignesh Mevani has many strengths: Youth, articulation, fearlessness, proficiency with social media, political and ideological flexibility.' 'Also focus, as in targeting the BJP as the one and only enemy for now and using that justification to align with the rest,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'I was very much aware of what was coming, but not to this extent.' 'If I had expressed what I felt, our campaign would have been in trouble.'
Maharashtra has reported 31 positive cases, Kerala 19, Uttar Pradesh 11, Delhi and Karnataka six each, Ladakh three, Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan and Telangana two each; and Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Punjab one case each. The total number of confirmed cases also includes 17 foreigners -- 16 Italian tourists and a Canadian, it said.
The focus is not only on governance but also to ensure that the BJP's political considerations are taken care of.
Social activist from Uttar Pradesh Gayarul Hasan will be the NCM chairperson, while activist and BJP leader from from Kerala George Kurian, former Maharashtra minister Sulekha Kumbhare, Jain representative from Gujarat Sunil Singhi, and Vada Dasturji Khurshed, chief priest of the Udvada Athornan Anjuman, are its other members.
'It would be interesting to see how Yogi Adityanath is received in Tamil Nadu, where he is due to end his Ram Rajya Rath Yatra in Rameswaram on March 23.'
Anupam Kher on why he thinks the prime minister is a genuine person.
'Kejriwal has given not only Modi and Shah some food for thought, but also to jaded Opposition leaders who must now wonder whether taking on the BJP's majoritarianism by the horns, as they have been doing so far, is the appropriate strategy in such extraordinary times,' notes M K Bhadrakumar.
The opposition parties snatched the high-profile Kairana LS seat in from BJP with a united force.
AK Antony's statement of the Congress appearing to no longer being secular and playing minority politics just might be one of the reasons for the party's poor showing in the Lok Sabha elections. Renu Mittal reports how the Congress may be adopting a new approach.
The Congress has been reduced to a C player in national politics thanks to its inability to read the pulse of the people, says Rashme Sehgal.
Gandhi also took a potshot at the RSS, saying it was bent on changing the country's Constitution.
'Hindu voters in coastal Karnataka lean more towards Hindutva than Hinduism which explains why the Siddaramaiah government's perception as anti-Hindu worked wonders for the BJP in coastal Karnataka.'
'The non-vegetarian share of the population fell from 75 to 71 per cent between 2004 and 2014, no doubt in anticipation of the lotus blooming.' 'Three years of saffron authoritarianism may have thinned the non-vegetarian ranks even more,' says Sunanda K Datta-Ray.
'The Congress's allies won't be left behind in looking out for their own interests. Some will demand a bigger share of the ministerial or electoral pie, others will simply jump ship,' says T V R Shenoy.
The momentum the BJP has in its favour is partly due to the anti-incumbency wave the Congress is battling.
Pon Radhakrishnan is also a Union minister of state. His opponent is the richest candidate in Tamil Nadu.
'The BJP is not the party it was 10 years ago. It has changed. It is emerging like the Congress.' 'Sometimes, I feel the BJP has taken the Congress' space.' 'Its politics is also resembling the Congress.'
Because of the treaty, no big dams or power projects can be built by India on Jhelum, Indus or Chenab.
Seven young students from different parts of the country had a wide-ranging discussion from bringing out Congress manifesto in Braille, setting up gender-neutral toilets to steps for removing inequalities in education system and caste discrimination in society with the Congress chief.
'We were supposed to be a united nation based on unity and diversity.' 'Now what we are doing is there will be a class called Marathas, Dangars, etc.' 'The 100 per cent of our nation's population will be in classes and you will be allocating the nation's education and service resources in terms of classes.' 'How does it work out in terms of equality? Where is your equal nation?'
'Insulting the law, instigating violence, living ostentatiously and preaching godliness?' 'This vulgar hypocrisy needs peoples' rejection and a revolt.' 'If people can't speak out, then it will be a hypocrisy that they expect the government to act and speak for them,' says Tarun Vijay.
Justifying the ban on cow slaughter, the Union minister of state for minority affairs said on Thursday, "Those who cannot survive without eating beef should go to Pakistan."
Calling cow slaughter a "vice" that must be removed, he pitched for stepping-up of cow protection efforts by bringing more people in the drive while "completely obeying the law and the Constitution".
A five judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra was apparently not in agreement with the argument of the Travancore Devaswom Board running the over 800-year-old Lord Ayyappa temple that the "practice and belief" that have continued uninterrupted cannot be tested on the ground of "modern ethos".
Of the 20 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, eight were from Maharashtra, three each from Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, two from Jammu and Kashmir and one each from Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.
'They take each and every election with seriousness.' 'No other political party has that kind of cadre who is strongly aligned with the reason, motto and ideology of their party.'
Gupta also said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi 'disappointed' him by recently claiming at the first World Sufi Forum that Islam has no connection with terrorism
'The Opposition parties should seriously give thought to endorsing Kovind's candidacy and close this chapter of divisive politics,' advises M K Bhadrakumar.
'Our case should act as a warning. It is high time change comes to society. This is not the way to treat a woman. I don't want any other woman to have a fate like mine.'
'We have Hindu values, Hindu customs, Hindu philosophy, Hindu way of looking at all religions as acceptable.' 'These are all great assets of India.'
'At no time since Independence this issue of whether we are a secular country or whether we are a Hindu Rashtra has come up in this manner.' 'This is the most important issue which is going to decide whether we remain together as one country or not.'
People, carrying "Not In My Name" placards and forming human chains, protested across Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Goa and Kerala.
'The BJP can kill two birds with one stone by wresting back control of the message; and the steps are fairly obvious. Once the media is neutral, there is a level playing field,' argues Rajeev Srinivasan.
