The traffic tells a story. During the lockdown, it took 45 minutes to zip through the deserted 35-km stretch from Chennai to reach the automobile heart of Sriperumbudur-Oragadam, where the big names of the car industry - Hyundai Motor India, Renault-Nissan India, Daimler India Commercial Vehicles, Apollo Tyres, and Royal Enfield - are based.
Just 20 years old, Inderlal Kamalsingh Dhurve is a migrant labourer, a part-time farmer, a sole breadwinner and one of four survivors from the group that was mowed down by a goods train near Aurangabad, Maharashtra, 10 days ago, claiming 16 lives.
'Mobs are entering north Indian homes and threatening families to leave Gujarat or face consequences.'
If you have seen Zwigato, Param Kumar's story will sound familiar. Laid off from his job as a repairman at a Gurugram-based water purifier provider, he now delivers groceries and food for a mobile-based delivery app, in Delhi. Kumar, who started making deliveries last August, told Business Standard that he is working longer hours than his older salaried job as an RO repairman, and has no paid leaves or health insurance. Kumar is part of India's estimated 7.7 million-strong force of gig workers.
Fearing violent response from the mob present outside the Police Club and court complex, several rings of security were thrown around Islam who was seen wearing a helmet. Before producing him in the court, he was interrogated by top officials of the Special Investigation Team probing the case.
'India has been cleaved into two by a government that has shown amazing consistency in cleaving.' 'One India is gasping for life, and the other is doing yoga and clapping from balconies and WhatsApp groups,' observes Debashish Chatterjee.
'The situation in Nuh could have easily returned to normalcy if the trader class wished so, but they didn't.'
Only asymptomatic passengers with confirmed e-tickets will be allowed in these trains and they will have to report at the station at least 90 minutes ahead of the scheduled departure.
Draft guidelines for Small Banks and Payments Banks were issued by the RBI in July and comments were invited till August 28.
The weatherman said when 'Amphan' makes the landfall between West Bengal's Digha, some 180 km from Kolkata, and Hatiya island in Bangladesh on Wednesday afternoon or evening, it will pack sustained wind speed of 155 to 165 kmph, gusting at 185 kmph. The gale-force wind, blowing at a speed of 240 to 250 kmph and gusting to 275 kmph at one point, had lost intensity and was moving at a speed of 200 to 210 kmph, gusting to 230 kmph on Tuesday evening.
Nurses from India and other non-European countries employed with Britain's state-funded National Health Service could be forced to leave the UK under new immigration rules.
'We don't want to lead this hellish life. Enough is enough.'
Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf traces the journey of PM-CARES from its founding to finally admitting it is not a government fund.
'This country's backwardness is exposed when Indians bribe, coax and cajole agents to get back-breaking jobs abroad to save a little money at home,' observes Sunanda K Datta-Ray.
'The trick in a democratic battle is to highlight those aspects of one's personality which are the opposite of the 'enemy's',' argues Amulya Ganguli.
The director successfully maintains a fine balance among the three leading men in Amar Akbar Anthony, says Paresh C Palicha.
'Nobody expected the slowdown to go for these many days. Unfortunately, it is an unbelievably bad slow down.'
Flowing from an inadequate understanding of Tamil history and politics is an urban elitist mindset that does not seem to be able to touch and feel the real angst of the larger Tamil-speaking masses, cutting across the social and economic status of the individual, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Narrow lanes and bylanes, small houses, unhygienic living conditions, common toilets and several other factors are responsible for the easy spread of COVID-19 in Dharavi, apart from non-adherence to social distancing norms.
EPF is the major vehicle for the long-term savings of organised private sector employees.
The collapse of an under-construction 11-storey building in Chennai which claimed 11 lives should serve as a wake-up call for the housing sector to have a regulatory mechanism for the construction industry, says N Sathiya Moorthy
Since the nation is now paying the price of such behaviour in terms of the long queues at the crematoriums and graveyards, the anxiety of the RSS is natural, especially if the BJP's main support base of the middle class turns away from it, observes Amulya Ganguli.
The terrorist, identified as LeT's Asif Maqbool Bhatt, was killed in a brief encounter in Sopore in the valley's Baramulla district, police said.
'No linen, blankets and curtains shall be provided inside the train. Passengers are advised to carry their own linen,' an order by the Railways said. The order also said that there would be no provision of 'tatkal' and 'premium tatkal' accommodation and there will be very few stoppages during the journey.
A total of 15,25,631 tests have been conducted so far across 332 government and 121 private laboratories.
If Uddhav continues in this mode as a serious-minded, capable leader with his hands firmly on the steering wheel, and succeeds in enabling Maharashtra weather the current storm, there is every possibility of his emergence as a leader who will be seen as someone who is ready to play a larger role, observes Amulya Ganguli.
'This is a critical story that Modi seems to grasp far better -- almost instinctively -- in comparison with most of his predecessors as prime ministers,' notes M K Bhadrakumar.
More than 50 Africa-born or African-origin players are spread across 11 teams -- excluding sides from the continent -- that are part of the tournament in Qatar.
According to officials, Punjab, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Assam and Telangana wanted the lockdown to be continued, some of them wanted the powers to decide the zoning of districts -- green, orange and red -- as per the COVID-19 situation.
'Despite the pandemic, we aspire to maintain the momentum of last year.'
'At this stage, you should distribute money and food.' 'Like you queue up to vote, let people queue up to collect this.' 'This will arrest the decline in demand which will have a multiplier effect on the demand side for the economy as a whole.' 'The government should earmark about 2% of the GDP for this.' 'And this should be the first step to revive the economy.'
Whether it was the MGNREGS or the NFSA or the Aadhaar-based DBT scheme for cash transfer, the Modi government has built on the basic architecture created by the Singh government. Policy makers in the Modi government, instead of discarding them as products of the previous political regime, worked on them, expanded their scope and reach, and used new tools to improve their performance, explains A K Bhattacharya.
Chana is majorly imported from Australia and Tanzania and it attracts an import duty of 60 per cent. A section of the traders is demanding a reduction in import duty to around 35-40 per cent to tide over any shortage of the commodity as the new crop will start hitting the market only around mid-February.
India is going into the longest lockdown in the world, with the least amount of notice given to its people and the least preparation by its government.
If the Chirag Paswan-led LJP posts a good result, the young leader could become a formidable caste challenger in the years to come and a permanent fixture as a BJP ally, reports Aditi Phadnis.
How are Indians faring during the lockdown?
'It is clear that primary care would be extremely critical in providing care to and preventing deaths of large numbers of patients,' says Pavitra Mohan and Jagdish Rattanani.
A large number of American companies like Google, Uber and IBM are offering their resources to help India successfully fight the battle against the deadly coronavirus pandemic.
The apex court, while hearing a separate plea on the issue on June 7, had directed the state and the Faridabad municipal corporation to remove "all encroachments" in the Aravali forest area, saying "land grabbers cannot take refuge of rule of law" and talk of "fairness".
