Bad management, an exhausted government vigilance mechanism, delay in roping in private players, relaxing norms, and over-dependence on antigen tests may be the reason behind the surge, reports Shine Jacob.
Asserting that India's dedication to climate commitments is evident from its performance, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday hoped that rich countries of G-7 will support India's efforts in combating climate change and invited them to tap the huge market for clean energy technologies emerging in the country. In his remarks at the session on 'Investing in a better Future: Climate, Energy, Health' at G7 Summit, Modi highlighted India's track record and said it has achieved the target of 40 per cent energy-capacity from non-fossil sources nine years before time. "The target of 10 per cent ethanol-blending in petrol has been achieved 5 months before time.
Over 29 lakh tourists visited the Statue of Unity, located near the Sardar Sarovar Dam, since it was inaugurated and this generated a revenue of Rs 82.51 crore, the government had told the assembly in December last year
'Having learnt her lesson in popular democracy, Jaya would become more populist than the DMK and more so than the imagery that mentor MGR had created in the Tamil voter's mind, both as an individual and as an elected ruler.'
It also assured that the amount of medical insurance coverage under the Ayushman Bharat scheme would be doubled from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 10 lakh.
Addressing a press conference a day after the CBI raid against him, Sisodia expressed apprehension that the agency or the Enforcement Directorate (ED) may arrest him in the next 3-4 days, while Chief Minister Kejriwal, who has been aggressively taking on the Bharatiya Janata Party in Modi's home state, announced on Twitter that he will be touring Gujarat with Sisodia from Monday.
The five-nation grouping BRICS on Tuesday resolved to combat terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, including the cross-border movement of terrorists, and vowed to step up joint efforts in building support for an India-backed global framework to effectively deal with the menace.
"There was a knock on the door around 2 am on Thursday. We opened the door and found policemen outside. They took away my husband," Nimee told PTI in a feeble voice, as her one-and-half-month-old son cried in her arms just as he was when his father was being arrested.
The deadly coronavirus has forced us to adopt new ways of life.
Will G20 showcase an India that is inclusive, culturally rich, diverse and tolerant, asks Ramesh Menon.
Yakuza Solo has travelled across 23 European countries and USA on a self-made bamboo bike.
Kang said that "at the moment, India is doing fine" but maintained that surveillance should be ensured to "detect signal of any changes in the behaviour of the virus".
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday inaugurated and laid foundation stones of development projects worth more than Rs 38,000 crore in different sectors in Mumbai, giving a big push to infrastructure, urban travel and healthcare ahead of civic polls in the city in which the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena faction will seek to showcase these ventures to take on their political rivals.
BCCI posted a video of the players working out in the gym
The incident came to light on Monday when some television reporters recorded the gardener, Halke Ram, collecting swabs of people for testing at the hospital in Sanchi, a world heritage site located 50 km away from Bhopal.
Bharatiya Janata Party vice president Radha Mohan Singh on Tuesday dismissed speculation over any change of leadership in Uttar Pradesh and called the state government's handling of the Covid pandemic "unparalleled". Singh and BJP's national general secretary (organisation) B L Santhosh are on a three-day visit to Lucknow, meeting party leaders on "preparations to fight Covid" and what participants called "organisational" issues.
How should one billion Indians, for whom deprivation has become an inescapable way of life, join us in celebrating 75 years of Independence? And where do we go from here? asks Kalyan Singhal.
Wishing him, President Droupadi Murmu said the work for nation-building under his incomparable hardwork, dedication and creativity continue to advance.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Wednesday that international travel should be made easier through mutual recognition of vaccine certificates, amid several countries adopting different sets of rules to allow foreigners to enter their territory in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
'Pakistan persists in the belief that such attacks will enable it to obtain the territory it covets. Their plans will not succeed.'
As with the Spanish flu, the world must be ready for a second and third wave as this start-stop-start-stop response plays out, recommends Rahul Jacob.
'Instead of fighting over whatever will be left of the present world, the permanent members of the UN security council should have raised a little finger to arrest the death and devastation around us,' notes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
To help the country emerge as a true welfare State, political parties must put the country's interests first before strategising to win elections and short-term goals, argues Ramesh Menon.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Monday urged dialogue between the protesting farmers and the Centre while addressing a meeting of Bharatiya Janata Party office-bearers, during which he also invoked the border clashes with China and the construction of the Ram temple.
He also said that infrastructure development in the country in the last eight years has been done with a human touch.
That AAP managed a sizeable vote share in Gujarat is creditable. The BJP can no longer ignore AAP's growing presence in its strongest bastion, explains Ramesh Menon, long-time observer of Gujarat politics.
Amid a spurt in terror attacks in various countries, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said terrorism is the "gravest threat" to the world, "equally impacting" India and Mozambique which agreed to strengthen security and defence ties and bolster cooperation in food security.
There will remain those, though, who will remain in opposition to this massive endeavour for world peace with an aim not to improve, but to scuttle the project. But for the rest of us, a cultural and spiritual event of this significance and scale is a feast for the mind and soul, say Sankrant Sanu.
Modi said the support and participation of the people last year and once again now "redeems the commitment to nurture and promote this ancient discipline and reaffirms yoga as an exemplary manifestation of 'Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam' (the world as one family)."
London 2012's head of health and safety Lawrence Waterman has called for the IOC to be 'responsible' and postpone the Games; 'People's safety and health should come before the costs of delaying contracts'.
'Using viral genomic sequences from 9,500 COVID-19 patients, the study found an increased number of infections among younger age groups (0-19 years) and women, a lower mean age for infection and symptomatic illness/hospitalisation, higher mortality and more frequent incidences of post-vaccination infections with Delta variant compared to the non-VOC (B.1) variant,' the WHO update said.
Here's the full text of address to the nation by President Droupadi Murmu on the eve of the Republic Day 2023.
Kim Jong-un declared he would never surrender North Korea's nuclear weapons weapons even if his country faced 100 years of sanctions. Dr Rajaram Panda explains Pyongyang's new nuclear doctrine that makes the world a much more dangerous place.
Politics, bureaucracy, ineptitude, double-standards and an attempt to politicise the fight in pseudo-nationalistic terms have all hampered the fight against this deadly virus, says Vir Sanghvi.
The BJP has nothing to lose after a point. For the DMK it is a difficult choice, as it would not want to give too much of space to a 'national party' lest the 'Dravidian duel' of the past decades should be lost forever, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Tamil Nadu Toddy Movement had met both Chief Minister Palaniswami and Stalin to seek their intervention in lifting the ban on toddy-tapping and had submitted petitions, but there it remained. So the matter is being taken to the people's court.
The Bengal outcome can have a marginal impact on national politics. Whereas elections in UP next year might still change the course ahead of the parliamentary poll in 2024, observes Virendra Kapoor.
The coming year will be one that will test sabka vishwas to the utmost, predicts Aditi Phadnis.
Images that capture what it was like living through 2021.
Sharvari rocks the sari... Esha sends love from Miami... Swara adds sunshine to her wardrobe...
