Responding to a question, Abdullah said elections can be held whenever the government wants.
The Centre on Tuesday said that by July or early August, there will be enough COVID-19 vaccine to inoculate one crore people a day.
The first dry run of the vaccination drive took place across 125 districts covering all States/UTs on January 2. The dry run was also conducted to familiarise the state, district, block, and hospital-level officers on all aspects of the COVID-19 rollout.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday said it will hear on December 6 the plea of a Congress leader challenging a recent notification by which the sale of electoral bonds has been extended by 15 more days in the year of general elections to legislative assemblies of states and Union territories (UTs) with a legislature.
The UT has been facing a widespread power shutdown Since Sunday owing to a deadlock between the Power Development Department (PDD) employees and the administration over the latter's bid to privatise electricity in the region.
The top court had on January 18 said the Centre will have a role in drafting the model community kitchens scheme and, particularly, exploring the possibility of providing additional food grains for it.
As of now, Azad couldn't be in the BJP leadership's calculus. The BJP has been trying to drill into the J&K electorate that this time around the UT would most certainly have a Hindu chief minister, explains Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the distinguished commentator on Kashmir affairs.
The Centre wrote to Maharashtra, Punjab and Delhi governments on Wednesday flagging below-par vaccination of eligible beneficiaries, including healthcare workers.
The cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in India has crossed 1.8 crore, the Union health ministry said on Friday.
Efforts of the government have been successful in reining in the growth of population, she said in a written reply.
So far, less than 1 per cent of the target population of 77 crore in the 18-59 age group have been administered the precaution dose.
The active caseload was below the 8 lakh mark (7,85,996) last on September 1, the ministry said.
Union health secretary Rajesh Bhushan said 50 districts account for 66 per cent of the total caseload and the COVID-19 case fatality rate has progressively declined to 2.10 per cent, the lowest since the first lockdown was imposed on March 25.
Ten Union ministers will be the permanent invitees to the Inter-State Council, according to an official notification.
'The implication of being adamant is to be arrogant. So yes, he is arrogant.'
The manufacture, import, stocking, distribution, sale and use of following single-use plastic, including polystyrene and expanded polystyrene, commodities shall be prohibited with effect from July 1, 2022: ear buds with plastic sticks, plastic sticks for balloons, plastic flags, candy sticks, ice-cream sticks, polystyrene (thermocol) for decoration; plates, cups, glasses, cutlery such as forks, spoons, knives, straw, trays; wrapping or packing films around sweet boxes, invitation cards, and cigarette packets, plastic or PVC banners less than 100 micron, stirrers, the notification read. The provisions will not apply to commodities made of compostable plastic, the notification said.
Shiv Sena Working President Uddhav Thackeray on Tuesday demanded Union Territory status for disputed Maharashtra-Karnataka boundary area to "stop the atrocities" allegedly being committed on Marathi-speaking people there.
Thinning out of the counter infiltration and counter terrorism grid is fraught with the danger of revival of terrorism in the Poonch-Rajouri area, cautions Brigadier Narender Kumar (retd), the counter-insurgency expert.
The Centre has said that on-site registration for COVID-19 inoculation for healthcare and frontline workers aged 18 to 44 years will now only be available at government COVID vaccination centres.
In a letter to the state chief secretaries on Monday, ICMR Director General (D-G) Dr Balram Bhargava said the COVID-19 diagnostic supplies are stabilising because of the indigenous production of the kits.
Remdesivir is considered a key anti-viral drug in the fight against Covid-19. In addition, the government has taken three steps to ensure easy access of hospitals and patients to Remdesivir.
The genomic consortium, citing global data, said there is now clear experimental and clinical data supporting very high immune escape potential of Omicron, which appears to be the major component of its growth advantage over Delta.
Delhi recorded the maximum number of 238 cases followed by Maharashtra at 167, Gujarat 73, Kerala 65 and Telangana 62.
Maharashtra has reported the highest daily rise of 40,414 COVID-19 cases, followed by 3,082 in Karnataka, 2,870 in Punjab, 2,276 in Madhya Pradesh, 2,270 in Gujarat, 2,216 in Kerala, 2,194 in Tamil Nadu and 2,153 in Chhattisgarh, the ministry said.
Experts say improper records could lead to large-scale leakages and pilferage and benefits going to ineligible people.
Mandaviya said this is the second phase of the Emergency Response and Health System Preparedness Package as the Central government had given Rs 15,000 crore earlier for setting up Covid-dedicated hospitals and health centres across the country.
With 78,877 people having recuperated from COVID-19 in a span of 24 hours, India's total recoveries surged to 53,52,078 pushing the recovery rate to 83.70 per cent, according to data updated at 8 am.
The Ultimate Tennis Showdown will be held at Patrick Mouratoglou's academy in Nice with 10 matches every weekend for a total of 50 matches and prize money on offer for each clash.
In a statement, the ministry said the rise in the number of total recovered cases from 1 lakh in June 2020 has been steep and the last 10 lakh recoveries were added in just 11 days.
The Jammu and Kashmir administration has transferred five Kashmiri Pandit employees from Kashmir to Jammu, a step welcomed by the community members who have been on a strike for over two months in support of the demand for their relocation over safety concerns.
Kerala has been receiving rainfall since Saturday and 10 out of the 14 weather monitoring stations in the state have received more than 2.5 mm rains.
The ministry said 24.44 per cent of the total active cases in the country have been reported from 10 districts including Bengaluru Urban, Pune, Delhi, Ernakulam, Nagpur, Ahmedabad, Thrissur, Jaipur, Kozhikode and Mumbai.
With the administration of 23,46,176 vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, the cumulative COVID-19 vaccine doses administered has exceeded 90.79 crore as per provisional reports till 7 am.
The Haryana assembly on Tuesday passed a resolution seeking the completion of the SYL canal and the transfer of Hindi-speaking areas from Punjab, while denouncing the neighbouring state for staking its claim over Chandigarh.
Jammu and Kashmir and Odisha on Tuesday recorded their first cases of the Omicron variant of COVID as the count of the new strain in 14 states and union territories crossed 200 even as the Centre said there is a need to 'activate' war rooms, take 'pro-active' action and consider night curfews.
Ten states and Union Territories have endorsed the Centre's decision to allow FDI in multi-brand retail, Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Jyotiraditya Scindia said on Monday.
The incident took place in Tuksan Dhok village and the captured terrorists included the most wanted LeT commander Talib Hussain, a resident of Rajouri district and the mastermind of the recent IED blasts in the district, the officials said.
The Centre has shared a set of parameters with all states and UTs to enable service providers and monitoring teams under the national COVID-19 vaccination programme to identify any fake COVID-19 vaccines so that they are not administered in the country.
The Union health ministry on Monday reviewed the steps for health screening of international travellers arriving in India at airports and ports after two cases of Monkeypox were reported in the country.
Days after Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar undertook an hours-long trek to a remote polling station in Uttarakhand, the poll panel on Tuesday decided to double the remuneration of polling officials going to such booths as early as three days before voting day.
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