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The Delhi High Court granted bail to two persons accused in the 2023 Parliament security breach case. The bench barred Neelam Azad and Mahesh Kumawat from holding press conferences, giving interviews and posting anything on social media about the incident.

The two argued that the police had wrongly invoked the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act against them, and that their actions did not construe an act of terrorism.

On December 13, 2023, two men, Sagar Sharma and Manoranjan D, jumped into the Lok Sabha chamber from the visitors’ gallery and opened gas canisters. Outside Parliament, Azad and another man, Amol Dhanraj Shinde, opened smoke canisters and shouted “stop dictatorship”. All four were arrested in connection with the breach. A day later, the police arrested Lalit Jha, allegedly the mastermind behind the incident, and Kumawat, a co-accused. Read on.

Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal sentenced former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to six months in prison for contempt of court over a leaked phone call. She was tried in absentia. In the purported conversation with Shakil Akanda Bulbul, the former leader of her party’s student wing, Hasina had allegedly said: “I have had 227 cases filed against me, so I have received a licence to kill 227 people.”

The tribunal ruled that the comment showed contempt for the judiciary and was intended to undermine legal processes.

This is the first time that the ousted prime minister has been sentenced in any case since she fled the country in August 2024, after several weeks of widespread student-led protests against her government.

She has also been charged by the tribunal with crimes against humanity allegedly committed during the protests. Read on.

The Dalai Lama said that a trust he founded had the sole right to decide on his successor, and that no one else had the authority to interfere in the matter. The statement by the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists came in the context of Beijing’s stand that the succession of the 14th Dalai Lama needed the Chinese government’s approval.

The leader said that he had made it clear in 1969 that the people concerned should decide whether the Dalai Lama’s reincarnations should continue.

China rejected the Dalai Lama’s statement, saying that his reincarnation needed to be approved by Beijing. The succession must follow Chinese laws as well as “religious rituals and historical conventions”, Beijing said. Read on.

Seven unidentified persons, believed to be members of the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, have been booked for assaulting a shopkeeper in Thane district’s Mira Road for not speaking in Marathi. Babulal Khimji Chaudhary stated in his police complaint that members of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena came to his shop on Sunday. When a worker in the shop spoke to them in Hindi, they got angry. They allegedly abused the worker for not speaking Marathi.

“Two of the men came to me and again said that I need to know Marathi if I have to work and then assaulted me after an argument,” said Chaudhary. He added that the suspects made a video of the incident and uploaded it on social media. Read on.

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