He said a missile firing system would be more effective in repulsing an attack or preventing an economic blockade.
The Army was deployed in Kolkata and its neighbouring districts on Saturday, hours after the West Bengal government sought its help for immediate restoration of essential infrastructure and services in the state.
The cyclone, according to an IMD report early Sunday, is developing into a severe cyclonic storm over the Bay of Bengal and can potentially become a very severe cyclonic storm in the next 24 hours, S N Pradhan, the chief of NDRF said in New Delhi.
An ambulance carrying a heart victim was held by the policemen waiting for Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's convoy on an expressway to Kolkata on Wednesday, and was not allowed to go even when the patient's kin pleaded with folded hands.
When the BJP forms government in Bengal, the chief minister will be a son of the soil, he said at the rally amid loud cheers from his supporters.
The body of an 8-year-old girl who had gone missing was on Thursday found in a field with locals lynching one man whom they claimed was part of a group which had gang-raped and murdered her, police said.
The IMD has also issued a red-coded warning alert to the Odisha and West Bengal coasts.
With his exit, the TMC will lose a crucial, politically influential vote catcher in the Jungalmahal region and areas in minority-dominated Murshidabad, and the BJP will get a face it badly needs, especially in rural Bengal, reports Aditi Phadnis.
Abhishek warned that those who dared to challenge the TMC administration will have their eyes gouged out and their hands chopped off.
An unspecified number of people were evacuated from coastal areas of Odisha where Jagatsinghpur, Kendrapara, Bhadrak and Balasore were likely to experience heavy rainfall accompanied by high-velocity winds, particularly on May 19 and 20, IMD Director General Mrutyunjay Mohapatra said.
As the West Bengal chief minister was busy containing the fallout of an internecine feud in her TMC following a rebellion by a redoubtable Suvendu Adhikari, the Centre shot off a fresh letter to her government to immediately relieve three IPS officers for central deputation.
The UNICEF said an estimated 2.4 million children have been affected by the recent floods in the country.
Once a reviled practice in the state, both the parties seem to have endorsed a record number of turncoats this time -- triggering a wave of discontentment among their loyalists.
'With sufficient gaps between polling dates, the BJP will have time to convert the 'fence-sitter' votes,' observes Payal Mohanka.
The saffron party, which had witnessed unprecedented growth in terms of vote share and mass base over the last few years, had opened its doors wide for leaders from other parties as part of its poll strategy, but that did not go down well with many senior leaders, who had once locked horns with the newbies from rival camps, sources in the BJP said.
Communist Party of India-Marxist politburo member Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee on Sunday admitted to the complicity of his partymen in the killing of nine villagers at Netai in January, 2011 during his tenure as Chief Minister of West Bengal, which had caused a nationwide outcry.
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As state minister Suvendu Adhikari, along with other functionaries, openly air grievances against the Mamata Banerjee-led dispensation, senior leaders are frantically looking for ways to pacify the rebels.
Amphan was the fiercest Cyclone to hit West Bengal in the last 100 years. A large part of the state was without power as electricity poles have been blown away. Mobile and internet services were also down as the cyclone has damaged hundreds of communication towers.
Neither do they have a no-objection certificate from the state nor any kind of Reserve Bank of India permission.
'The TMC has become a private limited company.'
With the Trinamul government and NGOs stalling the Haripur nuclear plant, will the DAE allot the Russians another site elsewhere in India?
According to Mitra, items such as foodgrain, vegetables, leather goods, footwear, cottage cheese, puffed and flattened rice, books and entertainment tax, among several others, should be in the zero-tax bracket.
Fourteen persons were killed in the firing on a demonstration against land acquisition on March 14, leading to a nationwide outrage and the Calcutta high court 'suo motu' ordering a CBI investigation.
TMC on a roll, wins 13 out of 17 zilla parishads in WB
The list, which is a mix of seasoned political players and greenhorns, has 17 women candidates, five more than the last elections, constituting roughly 41 per cent of the candidates.
India has been put in lockdown to halt the spread of the coronavirus outbreak. People have been told to stay indoors, but for many daily-wage earners this is not an option.
'The condition in Bengal is such that if you chant Jai Shri Ram, you would be put behind bars
This is the first time in many years that the BJP has been elected to the gram panchayat level in every district of the state.
The condition of the youth, who had slapped West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's nephew Abhishek Banerjee at a rally on Sunday, was stated to be critical after he suffered multiple head injuries.
Sporadic violence marked the third phase of panchayat elections in West Bengal on Friday covering three districts of Howrah, North 24-Parganas and South 24-Parganas where an average 25 per cent polling was recorded in the first four hours of voting.
It is a complete mayhem in West Bengal, Manipur and Odisha with more than 60 dead
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said on Thursday that at least 72 people have died due to Cyclone Amphan and urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to visit the affected districts and provide help to 'rebuild those areas from scratch'
Results of the panchayat polls indicated a paradigm shift in state politics with the baton of main opposition party passing from the Left to the BJP.
The Trinamool government, which cashed in on the Nandigram protests in West Bengal politics, has not yet given the Central Bureau of Investigation the sanction to prosecute five police officers involved in the 2007 police firing which killed 14 villagers.
10 central trade unions have called a nationwide shutdown against 'anti-worker policies' of the central government. Apart from being successful in Bengal, Kerala and NE states, the bandh has also got support from Cong leader Rahul Gandhi and Shiv Sena in Maharashtra.
The Trinamool Congress on Monday appeared set to sweep the crucial panchayat poll in West Bengal with a huge margin in most of the districts, taking a comfortable lead in gram panchayat in 12 of 17 districts.
Flood situation in south Bengal turned grim on Saturday with 1.19 lakh people taking shelter in relief camps in 12 districts of the state even as weatherman forecast more heavy rains in the next two days.
India's neglect of villages shows up in many other ways.
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