Tamil Nadu Governor RN Ravi walked out of the Assembly without delivering the customary address on the opening day of the first session of the year. This is the fourth consecutive year that Ravi has walked out during the opening ceremony.

The governor alleged that the Assembly had disrespected the national anthem and that his mic had been switched off during the proceedings. He left the Assembly a few minutes after the state anthem, Tamil Thaai Vaazhthu, was played.

In Kerala, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan edited the policy address delivered by Governor Rajendra Arlekar to the Assembly. After Arlekar left the Assembly, Vijayan told the House to say that the governor had made changes to three paragraphs in the speech.

Among the changes, Arlekar sid that Kerala was facing financial stress arising from “curtailment of advances”. The speech approved by the Cabinet had attributed the stress to “a series of adverse Union government actions that undermine the constitutional principles of fiscal federalism”.

The speaker said that the deletions and additions made by the governor would not go on record. Read on.

Bharatiya Janata Party leader Nitin Nabin was elected as the party’s national president, succeeding Union minister JP Nadda. The 45-year-old politician is the youngest person ever to head the BJP.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that Nabin will be responsible not just for running the party but also for ensuring coordination among the constituents of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance. “When it comes to party affairs, I am a worker, and he [Nabin] is my boss,” Modi declared.

Nabin was appointed the BJP’s national working president on December 14. At the time, he held the portfolios of road construction and urban development in the Bihar government. He resigned as a minister after he was named as the BJP’s working president. Read on.

The Supreme Court ordered the Punjab government to allow the Punjab Kesari Group to resume operations at its printing press in Ludhiana. It added that no coercive steps should be taken against the publication of the Punjab Kesari newspaper until the Punjab and Haryana High Court decides on a petition filed by the media group.

The printing press was shut down by authorities on January 15 for an alleged water pollution-related violation. The Punjab Kesari Group has alleged that the action was triggered by its news reports on the ruling Aam Aadmi Party government.

The media group had moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court on Monday, which reserved its judgement but did not grant any interim relief. It then moved the Supreme Court. Read on.

The Israeli authorities on Tuesday began bulldozing buildings in East Jerusalem of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, including the agency’s local headquarters. Philippe Lazzarini, the commissioner-general of the UNRWA, said that the demolitions were a “new level of open and deliberate defiance of international law” by Israel.

The UN agency said that the action was a result of a law passed by the Israeli Parliament in December that prohibited the provision of water and electricity to facilities linked to UNRWA. This followed two laws passed in October 2024 that ban the agency from operating in Israel.

The Palestinian Prime Minister’s Office said that the action defied the International Court of Justice’s October 26 advisory opinion that Israel must not obstruct the UN agency’s work in the occupied territories. The Israeli foreign ministry said Tel Aviv owns the Jerusalem compound and that it was seized in accordance with Israeli and international law. Read on.

As the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos got underway, several Indian states announced that they had signed memoranda of understanding – with Indian companies. This led to a barrage of criticism from social media users asking why the chief ministers had spent tax payers’ money to travel to Switzerland to hold meetings and sign agreements with Indian entities. Read on.

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