Many low-lying areas in West Bengal's sub-Himalayan region were reeling from a flood-like situation while major rivers in Bihar were flowing above the danger level at several places as unabated heavy rain lashed the country's eastern parts on Sunday.
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.
The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is looking to monetise 33 stretches of national highways during the current financial year (FY25) through its toll operate transfer (TOT) and infrastructure investment trust (Invit). These stretches include Lucknow-Aligarh, Kanpur-Ayodhya-Gorakhpur, and Bareilly-Sitapur in Uttar Pradesh, Gurugram-Kotputli-Jaipur bypass and Jaipur-Kishangarh in Rajasthan, Panikoili-Rimuli in Odisha, Chennai Bypass in Tamil Nadu, and Muzaffarpur-Darbhanga-Purnia highway in Bihar. Cumulatively, the 33 stretches, spanning 2,741 kilometres (km) earned approximately Rs 5,000 crore revenue in FY24.
'We wish Bhakshak would create more public awareness about child abuse.'
There cannot be a 'blanket ban' on media reporting on cases of rape and sexual abuse, it said.
He said Verma can be asked 'to go' only if she is found to have facilitated any wrongdoing and not because of some 'noises'.
This will be the first time the BJP has got more seats than Chief Minister Nitish Kumar-led JD-U in Bihar, underscoring the change in their equations after they joined hands a few months back.
The transferred officers included 22 IAS, 79 IPS, 45 Bihar Administrative Service officers
A petition was filed before a court in Bihar on Monday against Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin and his son Udayanidhi Stalin over the latter's controversial remarks against Sanatan Dharma.
'Nitish Kumar is fooling the people of Bihar.' 'He will not probe anything because if he does so, he will be trapped himself.'
Besides Defence Minister Singh (Lucknow), Minister of Women and Child Development Irani (Amethi), those in the fray are Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Kaushal Kishor (Mohanlalganj) and Minister of State of Consumer Affairs Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti (Fatehpur).
The ongoing tussle between the Nitish Kumar government and the Raj Bhavan further escalated with the Bihar education department inviting applications for the post of vice-chancellors (VC) in different universities days after Governor (Chancellor) Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar's secretariat issued a similar advertisement.
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 Mahagathbandhan's seat-sharing announcement comes a day after the filing of nomination papers for the first phase of Lok Sabha polls was over.
A complaint petition was filed in a court in Bihar's Muzaffarpur against State Information Technology Minister Mohammad Israel Mansuri for visiting the Vishnupad temple in Gaya.
"The main imam of the masjid had gone out of station, and Saad felt duty-bound not to leave the premises until his superior, who was scheduled to return on Thursday, was back," said the bereaved uncle.
The Nitish Kumar government appeared to be heading for a showdown with Bihar Governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar as the Raj Bhavan reversed an order of the state administration to freeze bank accounts of two officials of Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar Bihar University in Muzaffarpur.
The Centre on Monday directed cooperatives NCCF and NAFED to sell tomatoes at a reduced rate of Rs 50 per kilogram from Tuesday in view of the decline in prices in the wholesale markets. Since July, both NCCF and NAFED have been selling tomatoes at a discounted rate on behalf of the consumer affairs ministry in Delhi-NCR, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Bihar to boost domestic availability and contain price rise. Initially, the ministry had asked the two cooperatives to sell tomatoes at a subsidised rate of Rs 90 per kg and later reduced the price to Rs 80 per kg. Further, the price was cut to Rs 70 per kg.
'I feel numb with the trauma we have been going through ever since we first got the news. For close to two weeks, we have been hearing my child will be rescued today. That today never comes'
The round-the-clock rescue work is being carried out by 165 personnel from multiple agencies, including the National Disaster Response Force, State Disaster Response Force, Border Roads Organisation and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, the State Emergency Operation Centre said.
Talking about the brutal killing of Krishnaiah in 1994, G Uma Krishnaiah said her husband was killed for no fault of his.
In a statement, the department of consumer affairs said about 18,000 kg of tomatoes were sold across Delhi-NCR to retail consumers.
A high performance drilling machine was brought in Uttarkashi from Indore on Saturday to pierce through the rubble of the collapsed tunnel on the Char Dham route and was being assembled before it is deployed to resume drilling, officials at the site said.
Mohan was released from the Saharsa jail on April 27 following an amendment in Bihar's prison rules.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday announced his intent to raise quotas for Other Backward Classes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the state, saying a legislation to the effect is likely to be brought in the ongoing assembly session.
Former Bihar MP Anand Mohan, who is serving a life sentence in the killing of Indian Administrative Service officer G Krishnaiah, is to be set free along with 26 others who have been lodged in different prisons of the state for more than 14 years.
The Centre will sell tomatoes at Rs 80 per kg from Sunday, as against Rs 90 per kg earlier, to provide relief to people from high prices of the key kitchen item in retail markets.
'This is going to generate a new debate on reservation because the quota for Economically Weaker Sections is 10%, and that is for nearly 16% of the population.' 'For 16% you are giving 10%. This is set to raise eyebrows among the OBCs after the caste survey.'
Some ex-MLAs from Punjab, too, had received similar threats from these numbers. The callers spoke to them in Mumbai accent and in Punjabi, the IGP said.
The Supreme Court on Friday directed the Bihar government to produce complete original records with regard to the remission granted to former MP Anand Mohan, who was serving life term in the 1994 murder case of then Gopalganj District Magistrate G Krishnaiah.
Photographs of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, star cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Bihar Governor Phagu Chauhan have been found on admit cards issued by a university in the state.
This is the first time after Nitish Kumar dumped the BJP in August 2022 that violence has broken out across the state, reports M I Khan.
"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.
The Supreme Court has dismissed a petition challenging the appointment of Nitish Kumar as chief minister of Bihar after his party forged a new alliance in August, saying post-poll alignments subject to certain conditions is permissible under the anti-defection law.
BJP candidate Kedar Prasad Gupta defeated Manoj Singh Kushwaha of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal-United by 3,645 votes in Kurhani.
Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, replying to queries from journalists in Patna, said the decision to send the team was taken after deliberations that took place over a couple of days.
In January, Nitish Kumar assured the Rajputs that he has been making efforts to release Anand Mohan from jail.
The police said the woman works as a pilot with a private airline while her husband is deployed with the ground staff in another private airline.
A complaint was filed at a court in Muzaffarpur against suspended BJP spokespersons Nupur Sharma and Naveen Jindal who were in news for their derogatory statements against Prophet Muhammad.
The order for Mohan's release follows the cabinet nod for amending the prison rules under which, previously, those involved in serious cases like the killing of a government servant could not be released even after the elapse of 14 years.
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