The boat was carrying 30 children, and 20 of them have so far been rescued, they said.
An ECI statement issued from New Delhi put the voter turnout at 68.76 per cent. The female turnout (74.03 per cent) was significantly higher, compared with males (64.1 per cent).
Bihar recorded its highest-ever voter turnout of 67.14 per cent in the second and final phase of the assembly elections. The election is seen as a referendum on Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Kishanganj recorded the highest polling percentage at 76.26.
The first phase of Bihar assembly elections saw a moderate pace of polling across 121 constituencies, with 53.77% voter turnout reported till 3 pm. Sporadic incidents of violence were also reported. Key leaders are in the fray for both the ruling NDA and the opposition INDIA bloc.
Modi accused Congress and RJD leaders of insulting 'Chhathi Maiyya' to gain votes in the Bihar elections.
The Intelligence Bureau has issued an alert on Saturday to the Bihar government that terrorists could attack the Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi's rally on March 3 in Muzaffarpur district in the state, police officials have said.
The stage is set for the crucial first phase of the assembly elections in Bihar on Thursday, as 3.75 crore voters will decide the electoral fate of 1,314 candidates, including top leaders such as Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance's (INDIA's) chief ministerial face Tejashwi Yadav and Deputy CM Samrat Choudhary of the Bharatiya Janata Party.
'This will be a close election. At least now, it appears that the NDA has an edge.'
Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan criticized Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and RJD's Tejashwi Yadav for alleged abuses directed at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's mother during a political rally in Bihar. The BJP accused the opposition leaders of crossing 'limits of insult' with their remarks.
According to Muzaffarpur District Registration Officer Sanjay Kumar, the orders to freeze the bank accounts and ban the sale or purchase of any movable or immovable assets of the Seva Sankalp Evam Vikas Samiti were passed by District Magistrate Mohammad Sohail on August 7 and 8.
Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Tejashwi Yadav escaped unhurt as a speeding truck hit two vehicles of his convoy, injuring three security personnel in Bihar's Vaishali district early on Saturday, police said.
A surge in violent crimes, including targeted killings, has raised concerns about law and order in Bihar. Police attribute the rise to the widespread availability of illegal firearms and ammunition.
More than 24 families who had fled arson-hit Ajizpur village have returned home even as 3 policemen have been sent to police lines in connection with the violence which resulted in the death of 5 persons, including an abducted youth.
At least 14 persons have been arrested in connection with Sunday's violence in a village in Bihar's Muzaffapur in which three persons were charred to death when a mob torched nine houses following recovery of body of an abducted youth.
Both NDA and INDIA are racing to woo marginalised groups with Assembly polls fast approaching.
For nearly two decades, Nitish Kumar has cultivated women as a distinct constituency. 'To create a broader vote base, he thought it would be better to bring women to electoral politics.'
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday snubbed the Rashtriya Janata Dal, headed by his arch-rival Lalu Prasad Yadav, stating that he had forged alliances 'by mistake' with the opposition party which 'did nothing' while in power.
Articulate segments of Muzaffarpur have been at the the forefront of all anti-establishment mobilisation, which makes their silence over the atrocities in a shelter home in the town puzzling. Could it be that if those accused of horrific crimes belong to dominant castes and if the victims belong to the vulnerable groups, then the middle classes become mute, asks Mohammad Sajjad.
Wednesday's joint protest march in Patna marked a significant moment, with Rahul Gandhi, the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, and Tejashwi Yadav, the Leader of Opposition in the Bihar assembly, leading a unified demonstration -- perhaps a first in the state's recent political history.
'I am alive, I have not died. Look, I am standing and speaking,' says Imarti Devi who is listed as deceased and whose name has been deleted from the voter's list. M I Khan reports from Dharaichak, a village in Bihar where 200 voters have been removed from the voter's list.
Addressing the protesters, opposition leaders attacked the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Janata Dal-United1 and demanded stringent punishment against those involved in such heinous crimes.
'The horrific episode of January 18 in Muzaffarpur, Bihar, is quite different from what happened in Muzaffarnagar, UP, in September 2013. The Akhilesh Yadav-led administration in UP and riot-mongers among our political formations need to learn lessons from the response of the state and society in Bihar's Muzaffarpur,' says Mohammad Sajjad.
'These children are wards of the State. They were exploited because the state government and its officials didn't do their jobs.'
M I Khan in Patna Nearly twelve years after he left the National Democratic Alliance and resigned from the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government after the Gujarat riots in 2002, Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan will share the dais with Gujarat Chief Minister and Bharatiya Janata party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi at his 'hunkar' rally in Bihar's Muzaffarpur town on Monday. Paswan, who joined the NDA last week to contest the Lok Sabha polls and took a U-turn on Modi, will appear in public with the BJP's top brass including Modi at the rally. Paswan's son Chirag will also be present at the function. Upendra Kushwaha is another new face that will be at the event. Kushwaha is the chief of the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) that joined hands with the BJP last week. Both Paswan and Kushwaha are known as their own caste. Paswan is said to enjoy overwhelming support of his caste -- locally known as Dusadh, the only Dalit caste in Bihar after Chief Minister Nitish Kumar categorised 21 other Dalit castes as 'Mahadalit' -- poorest of the poor. Kushwaha has been trying hard for last few years to emerge as a leader of his caste -- Koeri, an agrarian backward caste spread across the state. A senior BJP leader said that presence of Paswan and Kushwaha will send a strong political massage among respective castes in Bihar. "It will strengthen the BJP's social support base in Bihar," he said. In Bihar, the BJP is widely seen as an upper caste party. The much-hyped rally is seen as a bid to mobilise support and strengthen the support base in the state. The state in the Hindi heartland that sends 40 Lok Sabha members to Parliament is politically very important. In the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, the party had won 12 seats, while the Janata Dal-United won 20 seats, when they had contested as a combined force. It is expected that Modi will target Kumar, who has openly opposed him by repeatedly saying that the prime ministerial candidate should be of nsecular credentials.
At least 19 people from Bihar, who were on board the Coromandel Express, are still missing after the train accident in Odisha's Balasore district on June 2 in which 288 people were killed, said the state disaster management department (DMD).
The incidents occurred in 15 districts of the state during the festival held on Wednesday.
The CBI had on Friday raided nearly 12 places in four districts of Bihar, including residences of Verma in Patna and her in-law's place in Begusarai.
Several girls were allegedly raped and sexually abused at an NGO-run shelter home in Muzaffarpur and the issue had come to light following a report by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences.
'Nobody in our team had any idea that these things will come out.' 'We need to do a social audit of all the shelter homes across the country.'
'Brajesh Thakur spoke to half a dozen Union ministers, some Bihar ministers and Manju Verma's husband between the process of lodging the FIR against him on May 31 and his arrest on June 2.'
All the officials, suspended with immediate effect, have been charged with "failure to take adequate legal action" with regard to "assault.
"Look at the devastation wrought by Covid in Pakistan and elsewhere. We were saved by Modi's vaccine and his deft handling of the economy," Ram Surat Rai said.
A careful calculation of the BJP's support base seems to have been at work in the cabinet expansion that took place a day after the party's national president chaired a meeting of the "core group" here.
Mohan was released from the Saharsa jail on April 27 following an amendment in Bihar's prison rules.
The Dalits were accused of stealing a bike.
State disaster management department officials said seven people lost their lives due to floods in Muzaffarpur district, while around 65,000 people of 140 villages in Muzaffarpur, Supaul, Patna, Nalanda and Saharsa districts were affected by the deluge.
It took 119 days for the Bihar government to hand over the probe into the abduction case of Navruna Chakarwarti, 13, to the CID.
The mosquito-borne disease, which claimed over hundred lives last year, has returned with three children dying in Muzaffarpur in the last 48 hours and about a dozen children admitted in the hospital for treatment, officials on Tuesday said.
Hundreds of people took to the streets on Wednesday in Bihar's Muzaffarpur district to protest delay on the part of police to arrest a government hospital doctor who wrongly operated a woman's gallbladder instead of her leg.
At many places, Kumar lost his cool and chided the protestors for "acting on behalf of political rivals".
