The Maharashtra government on Sunday extended till June 30 the lockdown in the entire state, and announced easing of restrictions and phase-wise resumption of activities under the "Mission Begin Again".
Amid a raging controversy over saffronisation of education, IIT Delhi's decision to invite yoga guru Ramdev and an Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh affiliate for deliberations on a programme to leverage the technical strength of the IITs for development of rural areas has raised eyebrows.
A total of 37 deaths were reported since Thursday evening of which 14 fatalities were reported from Maharashtra, nine from Gujarat, three from Uttar Pradesh, two each from Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh,Tamil Nadu and Telengana and one from Karnataka, ministry data stated.
He, however, stressed that the incidents cannot be justified and pitched for tough action against the perpetrators.
She said the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) adopted last year by India's Parliament was of 'great concern'.
Experts believe that states will be in a predicament because of their tight fiscal position and reluctance to replace their own health schemes with this newly announced National Health Protection Scheme.
Rajasthan Chief Secretary D B Gupta said he and the representatives of a few other states raised objections to a few questions to be asked by enumerators during the NPR exercise. He said the central government officials told them that answers to all such questions are not mandatory.
Here's a simple way of knowing the change in the rank secured by each institution from 2017 to 2018.
He insisted that his ministry had not only met the 100-day targets but even exceeded them in some cases.
The scheme initiated by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs offers 100 per cent financial assistance to the naxal-affected States/Union Territories from the Centre for the purpose of benefiting students belonging to Scheduled Tribes and also primitive tribal groups, sources in the ministry said.
The Child Protection Services programme under the Integrated Child Development Services was increased to Rs 1,500 crore from Rs 925 crore.
Talking to media persons after taking charge of the new portfolio, she side-stepped questions about Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah being behind her shift saying it is not individuals but the party who takes such decisions.
Jammu and Kashmir "was, is and shall forever" remain an integral part of India, a top Indian diplomat asserted at the UN Human Rights Council's meeting in Geneva on Wednesday, a day after Pakistan sought the international community's intervention on the Kashmir issue. Speaking at the 43rd session of the UN Human Rights Council which is being held in Geneva in Switzerland from February 24 to March 20, Vikas Swarup, secretary (west), the ministry of external affairs, described Pakistan as the "epicentre of global terrorism".
According to officials, the board will inform students about the schedule 10 days in advance.
The agency had registered a preliminary enquiry in 2017 on the basis of allegations that 13 faculty members of the academy were appointed in spite of being ineligible.
The army chief said India wants peace along the borders but Pakistan was continuously violating the ceasefire, which caused loss of life and property.
Sarma's eyes, according to those close to him, were always set on the top job in Assam. However, the leader who owed his early rise to two former chief ministers from the Congress had to toil for many years with dogged determination to achieve his goal.
'Once our voices are crushed, they can bring in an agenda of privatisation.'
The ministry has gone through the entire syllabus and reached a conclusion that there are some words that are not in use by the regular Urdu speakers.
The Centre on Tuesday said it was discussing with state governments the preparations for updating the National Population Register from April 1 to September 30. Union Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai said in the Lok Sabha that no document will be collected during the exercise, which will be carried out along with the house-listing phase of Census 2021.
As the virus continued to spread its tentacles across India, several parts, including Kashmir valley headed towards a virtual lockdown with the administration restricting movement of people in several parts and banning all public transport in Srinagar city.
Ajit Balakrishnan on learning from past technology revolutions.
"We now realise that the so-called farmer agitation hardly remains a farmers' agitation. It has almost got infiltrated by Leftist and Maoist elements, a flavour of which we saw over the last two days when there were extraneous demands to release people who have been put behind bars for anti-national (and) who have been put behind bars for illegal activities," Goyal, the Minister for Railways, Commerce and Industry and Food and Consumers Affairs, said at FICCI's annual meeting.
The recent report of the union HRD minsitry wants to impose an exit tax on IIT & IIM grads who leave India. Tell us what you think: Should such a tax be imposed and if so, why? Or why not?
Needless to say, coaching institutes are unhappy with suggestion.
'The D K Adikesavulu clan is so wealthy, owns so many houses, and has so much jewellery,' notes T V R Shenoy, 'that it did not notice a servant stealing at the rate of Rs 66 lakh every year!'
Stalin has given due respect to seniority in the pecking order, but has also taken into consideration the demands of individual ministries and the suitability of individuals, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Earlier, a judicial panel reportedly rejected his caste status in its probe report.
The protests, which started in the morning, is part of the agitation against the hostel manual and several other issues like restrictions by the administration on entry to the Parthasarathy Rocks, attempts to lock students' union office, according to the students.
Is the worst of the Covid crisis behind India? As cases dip three weeks after Diwali, the answer is a possible yes, say several experts, attributing the downslide to a large section of the population already exposed to the virus during the second wave and a stepped up vaccination campaign.
Activist and journalist Madhu Kishwar on Smriti Irani and the controversy over the four-year course offered by the Delhi University.
Thus it was that for the first time in the history of the republic a constitutional amendment was announced and passed by Parliament within 72 hours, reports R Rajagopalan.
Modi seems to have an innate faith in his capabilities to handle the myriad challenges confronting the nation and would rather manage the affairs of the nation as a CEO would of a large industrial-business empire, observes Virendra Kapoor.
During the day, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan held a meeting to review preparedness for COVID-19 management, through video conference with health ministers, chief secretaries of all states and UTs, central ministers and representatives from the related organisations and stressed on the need for keeping testing and quarantine facilities, isolation wards, and labs in active readiness.
'The Olympic Spirit has been thrown to the wind in Xi Jinping's China.' 'The International Olympic Committee is ready to kowtow to totalitarian China,' notes Claude Arpi.
The resolution said the state will be called Bangla in three languages -- Bengali, English and Hindi.
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 Cabinet approved a proposal to declare Islamic Research Foundation as an 'unlawful association' under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act for five years, a home ministry official said.
As the Indian Army reported its first case of the infection with a 34-year-old soldier testing positive in Leh, the Army said it has taken a series of precautionary measures to prevent the spread of coronavirus among the forces such as checking flu symptoms among soldiers on their return from leave and cancelling non-essential travel, conferences and recruitment drives.
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