Air pollution: Delhi will implement odd-even scheme whenever required, says CM Arvind Kejriwal

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday said the Aam Aadmi Party-led government will implement the odd-even road scheme for private vehicles whenever required in order to combat the deteriorating air quality.

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Patna zoo closed till further orders after six peacocks die of H5N1 virus

The Patna zoo was closed on Tuesday after strains of avian influenza virus were found in six dead peacocks. The Sanjay Gandhi Biological Park, Patna, will be shut until further orders, forest officials said.

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Himachal Pradesh: Four passengers killed after their car falls into gorge in Shimla

Four persons were killed and two others injured after their car fell into a gorge in Himachal Pradesh’s Theog on Tuesday. The four, identified as Jagpreet, Deepak, Ajay and Lokesh, died on the spot, said an unidentified police officer.

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Pakistan will treat its minorities as equal citizens ‘unlike India’, says Imran Khan

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Tuesday said his country would treat minorities as equal citizens “unlike what is happening in India”.

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Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train: CM Fadnavis-led panel cleared project without meeting, shows RTI

A Right To Information query has revealed that a ministerial committee headed by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has yet to meet to discuss the proposed Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project. The committee was set up in February 2017 to carry out an in-depth study of the feasibility of the project involving the Japan International Cooperation Agency.

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Plea in Supreme Court challenges Centre’s orders on naturalisation of immigrants fleeing persecution

A petition filed in the Supreme Court has sought the quashing of central government notifications that allow the naturalisation of Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian immigrants fleeing religious persecution in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan. The petition said these notifications would give impetus to the “uncontrolled influx of illegal migrants from Bangladesh to Assam”.

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Jammu and Kashmir: Terrorists may feel emboldened after US pulls out of Afghanistan, says former DGP

Former Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police K Rajendra Kumar on Monday said that the United States’ plan to pull out of Afghanistan may embolden terrorist organisations in the Valley. “Now USA is exiting Afghanistan. It has its implications in Kashmir,” Kumar said. “It is a matter of time that we will be feeling its implications in the Valley.”

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Madhya Pradesh: 28 legislators take oath as ministers in Kamal Nath’s Cabinet

Members of the Cabinet of new Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath were sworn in on Tuesday in Bhopal. Governor Anandiben Patel administered the oath to 28 ministers at the Raj Bhavan.

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Punjab: Former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s statue vandalised in Ludhiana

A statue of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was vandalised by two people in Ludhiana on Tuesday morning. Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh condemned the act and claimed that the two men belonged to the Shiromani Akali Dal.

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‘Unlawful’ online content: Centre says it has started consulting stakeholders on draft rules

The Centre on Monday announced that it will hold public consultations on draft rules that propose to make it mandatory for online platforms to help the government trace the origin of “unlawful content” whenever requested by authorities.The Union Ministry for Electronics and Information Technology said the government “intends to consult all stakeholders” and that the ministry “has commenced public consultation”, for which submissions must be sent by January 15, 2019.

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Noida: ‘Ensure that your Muslim staff don’t offer namaz in parks,’ police tell companies

The police in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, have asked companies working in the city’s industrial hub to ensure their employees do not offer namaz in parks. Companies will be held liable if their employees continue to do so, a notice sent by police warned.

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PNB scam: Mehul Choksi tells court he has offered to settle bank’s dues

Businessman Mehul Choksi, an accused in the Punjab National Bank scam, has told a special anti-money laundering court in Mumbai that he is in touch with the bank and has offered to settle his dues. He made the statement in a 34-page reply to the Enforcement Directorate’s plea seeking to declare him a fugitive economic offender.

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Nine ministers take oath in Chhattisgarh

Chhattisgarh Governor Anandiben Patel on Tuesday administered oath to nine Congress legislators appointed to the Cabinet of Bhupesh Baghel’s government. The event was held at the Police Parade Ground in Raipur.

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Ayodhya land dispute: Supreme Court must fast-track hearing, says Ravi Shankar Prasad

Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Monday appealed to the Supreme Court to fast-track the hearing in the Ayodhya title suit.

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Madhya Pradesh: Man sentenced to death for raping and murdering daughter

A special court in Madhya Pradesh’s capital Bhopal on Sunday sentenced a 42-year-old man to death for raping and killing his six-year-old daughter. According to the prosecution, he suspected that the girl was not his biological child and murdered her on March 15, 2017.

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‘Communists want to destroy Indian culture like Mughals and British’: Tripura CM Biplab Deb

Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb on Monday accused Communist parties of trying hard to destroy Indian culture and said the people of his state had discarded that ideology. Deb claimed the Communists had created goons instead of cadres and wanted to choke people’s voices.

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Nitin Gadkari says BJP chief is responsible for poor Assembly election results

Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari on Monday seemed to suggest that party chief Amit Shah was responsible for the BJP’s poor show in the recent Assembly elections. “If I am the party president, and my MPs and MLAs are not doing well, then who is responsible? I am,” he was quoted as saying.

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Delhi: Flight operations disrupted due to low visibility

Flight operations at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport were disrupted after departures were halted for two hours because of low visibility. Departures were stopped around 7.15 am and resumed at 9.16 am. The minimum visibility required for take off is 125 metres. According to an unidentified official, three international flights and a domestic flight were diverted.

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Maharashtra: Twelve people injured as mob attacks church in Kolhapur

A group of people attending Sunday prayers in Maharashtra’s Kolhapur district was attacked by unidentified people, leaving 12 of them injured. The 40-member congregation was attacked with swords, iron rods and bottles at the New Life Fellowship Church in Kolhapur’s Kowad, close to the Karnataka border. Eight people who suffered head injuries were taken to a hospital in Belagavi.

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Narendra Modi inaugurates country’s longest rail and road bridge in Assam today

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday inaugurated the Bogibeel bridge, India’s longest rail and road bridge, connecting Assam’s Dibrugarh to Dehamji bordering Arunachal Pradesh. The 4.94-km long bridge across the Brahmaputra river was built at a cost of Rs 5,900 crore.

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Congress accuses KCR of helping BJP by trying to keep it out of Opposition alliance

The Congress criticised Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, popularly known as KCR, on Monday after he met his West Bengal and Odisha counterparts Naveen Patnaik and Mamata Banerjee to discuss the formation of a non-Congress, non-Bharatiya Janata Party coalition.

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Afghanistan: At least 43 killed after gunmen attack government building in Kabul

At least 43 people were killed and 20 were wounded after gunmen attacked a government building in Afghanistan’s capital Kabul on Monday, AFP reported. Around 350 people who were trapped in the building at the time of the incident were freed, according to the news agency.

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Delhi government to withdraw order increasing one-time parking fees

The Delhi government on Monday ordered the “immediate withdrawal” of an order passed last week which increased the mandatory one-time parking fee across parts of the national Capital nearly 18 times from January 1, the Hindustan Times reported.

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Karnataka: JD(S) leader murdered, CM Kumaraswamy orders the criminals be ‘killed mercilessly’

Janata Dal (Secular) leader Honnalagere Prakash was hacked to death in Mandya district of Karnataka on Monday. Soon after, Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy, who visited the crime scene, was heard on camera telling someone that there would be no problem if the murderers are “killed mercilessly”.

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