At least 25 people were killed in lightning strikes and hailstorms in several districts of Bihar, India, on Thursday. The India Meteorological Department has issued an 'orange alert' for a number of districts, forecasting heavy rainfall on Friday and Saturday. The state capital, Patna, recorded an average of 42.6 mm rainfall till 5.30 pm.
The eunuchs managed to collect Rs 4.5 lakh from defaulters on their first day on the job.
According to the MeT Department, the city received 145 mm rainfall since the previous day, the highest for this date in a decade.
Ahead of the impending assembly polls, the rising crime graph and poor law and order situation have led to demands being revived to adopt UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's 'bulldozer' and police encounter policy in Bihar to deal with criminals.
The state had reported 6,421 cases this year, of which 6,146 were reported only in September, three times the 1,896 registered in September last year.
Sensing anger and unhappiness over the pathetic condition of the 'ghats' (banks) along sacred Ganga river ahead of Chhath Puja -- the most popular Hindu festival in Bihar, the state government has began a cleanliness drive and beautification of all ghats in Patna and outside.
Bihar's health authorities are worried following the spread of mosquito-borne dengue in half a dozen districts. With seventeen new cases, the number of people affected by the disease has risen to 175 in the last month, officials said.
A flood-like situation prevailed in Bihar capital Patna on Thursday after it was lashed by very heavy rains over the last 24 hours.
Doctors at government hospitals in the Bihar capital were left in a daze when they realised that a young man knocking at their doors past midnight was none other than Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav.
District Magistrate Ravi Kumar on Thursday said that 75 teams have been deployed in Patna to sprinkle bleaching powder and remove animal carcass.
Rajendra Nagar, a planned colony built after Independence, is the worst-affected area in the Bihar capital, seeing an unprecedented flooding which residents said has "exposed the under-preparedness of the corporation".
Lack of a detailed crowd management plan, poor civic amenities besides absence of district magistrates from duty were some reasons cited by the Bihar government probe panel for the October 3 stampede in the state capital in which 33 people were killed.
Expressing concern over the alarming level of air pollution in Bihar, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has directed concerned officials for banning 15-year-old diesel vehicles in the state capital among other measures to improve the situation.
What some of our leaders were up to on Wednesday, March 29, 2023.
The CBI should also follow the COVID-19 safety rules, Maharashtra minister Vijay Wadettiwar said.
Bihar Police ADG wrote a letter to the Mumbai municipal commissioner, seeking the IPS officer's exemption from quarantine protocols and facilitate his return to Patna to resume his duty.
Bihar's Ruling Janata Dal-United legislator Anant Singh was arrested on Wednesday in a case of kidnapping and extortion at Bihita in rural Patna.
The Bombay high court on Monday said ex-gratia compensation for the kin of COVID-19 victims was a matter of right and they must not be deprived of it.
The annual festival dedicated to the Sun god will be celebrated on Friday and Saturday by people who originally hail from north India and are residing in the metropolis. In the past, the festival used to see large number of people thronging prominent beaches, river banks and other water bodies to make offerings to the Sun god at sunrise and sunset.
The intensity of the impact increased as many cars parked along the wall inside the society too fell on the shanties, officials said.
The feud in the family -- brother versus brother, sister versus brother, and daughter versus mother -- is an open secret. In the absence of the patriarch, there is no one to compose their differences, reports Satyavrat Mishra.
'There was news in some quarters that Modi himself will enter the fray from Patna Sahib on a second seat in addition to Varansi ... What happened?'
Buoyed by exit poll surveys, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday claimed that it would form governments on its own in Haryana and Maharashtra, and stressed that it would not require support of the Shiv Sena to form government in the latter.
The second and third positions in the category were grabbed by Surat and Navi Mumbai respectively.
According to the ministry, Maharashtra remained at the top with the total cases at 1,985, including 217 patients who have recovered/discharged and 149 patients died.
Maharashtra has reported the most coronavirus deaths at 45, followed by Gujarat at 12, Madhya Pradesh nine, Telangana and Delhi seven each, Punjab six and Tamil Nadu five fatalities.
Maharashtra has reported 3,75,799 coronavirus cases, the highest among states in the country.
With relaxations in the COVID-19 lockdown, temples across the country are all set to reopen from Monday in accordance with the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) issued by Union home ministry to prevent coronavirus spread.
Prayers were offered and sweets distributed though people mostly took the virtual route to extend wishes. People also visited temples, observing social distancing norms.
BSP chief says Ambedkar talked of separate electorates for Dalits; didn't believe in Hindutva.
The city needs some autonomy, or it will continue to decline in all the ways that are familiar, observes T N Ninan
This was the fourth consecutive day that COVID-19 cases in the country have increased by more than 26,000.
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.
Taking exception to Health Minister Harsh Vardhan not mentioning the death of healthcare workers due to Covid-19 in his statement in Parliament, the Indian Medical Association has published a list of 382 doctors who died due to the viral disease and demanded that they be treated as "martyrs".
The prime minister thanked the people but said it was the start of a long battle, as he urged them to follow social distancing to stop the chain of transmission of Coronavirus which has infected 360 people and claimed seven lives in India.
In times of social distancing, thousands of people are dying alone without a last glimpse of their loved ones who are unable to reach them.
'The foundation of the 2014 triumph was Narendra Modi's appeal to voters in the Hindi belt. The Bihar Vidhan Sabha polls will demonstrate if he continues to appeal to them,' says T V R Shenoy.
Far from the metros and big cities, the coronavirus crisis in the country's districts, towns and villages is being led by district magistrates.
The responsibility of keeping the pandemic under control lies with the DM or collector.
Subrat Kumar Sen, the young district magistrate of Saran, north Bihar, tells Rediff.com's Archana Masih how he and his staff are combating a crisis that no one has confronted before.
This was the third consecutive day that COVID-19 cases in the country have increased by more than 26,000.
Doctors and experts say that besides spike in fresh cases, health complications have aggravated in people having a history of asthma, allergy or other related ailments.
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