1. 20 Dead in Bus-Truck Collision in TN; PM Modi Offers Condolences
At least 19 people died after a Kerala State Road Transport Corporation bus and a truck collided near Avinashi town in Tamil Nadu’s Tirupur district, ANI reported on Thursday, 20 February. According to the deputy tehsildar of Avinashi, the deceased include 14 men and five women. The bus was on its way from Karnataka’s Bengaluru to Kerala’s Ernakulam.
The bodies have been taken to the Tirupur government hospital. Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed his condolences to the bereaved families. Most of the casualties are said to be natives of Palakkad, Thrissur and Ernakulam. The bus had 48 seats, all of which were booked.
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2. IIT-M Prof Held for Allegedly Trying to Film Woman in Restroom
A faculty member of the Aero Space Engineering department at IIT-Madras has been arrested by the Kotturpuram Police in Chennai for allegedly trying to video-record a woman in the bathroom. Police sources said the incident came to light after a 30-year-old PhD scholar raised alarm.
The woman allegedly complained that when she went to use the restroom, she felt something was amiss, proceeded to find a small hole in the wall and thought she saw a cellphone. She immediately rushed out and locked the gents’ restroom, which was adjacent to that of the women, from the outside.
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3. Kamal Haasan Offers Rs 1 Crore to Families of Film Set Mishap Victims
After three people were killed and nine injured in a crane accident on the sets of Indian 2, actor Kamal Haasan has announced that he will be giving Rs 1 crore rupees to the families of the deceased.
In a statement to the media, he said, “There are accidents waiting to happen and we should make sure they don't happen. After an accident, everyone says precautions should've been taken. I am not looking at this as an accident that happened in Lyca Productions but in my own family.”
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3. TN Adopts Bill to Ban Hydrocarbon Projects in Cauvery Delta
The Tamil Nadu Assembly on Thursday adopted a bill prohibiting projects involving exploration, drilling and extraction of oil and natural gas, including coal-bed methane, and other similar hydrocarbons in the Cauvery delta region of the state.
Recently, Chief Minister Edappadi Palaniswami had declared the Cauvery delta region as a Protected Special Agriculture Zone (PSAZ). He called the bill ‘historic.’ However, none of the projects, which were in operation in the Protected Special Agriculture Zone, before the Act came into being, will be affected.
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5. Mob Attacks Sleuths, Helps Smugglers Flee Airport
As in a scene out of a Kollywood flick, a few Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) officials were attacked by a mob numbering over 50 in an alleged bid to help 18 smugglers escape from the city airport, on Wednesday. Two air customs officials are under scanner for their possible connections with the smuggling racket. Sleuths on Thursday raided the house of a tax assistant, who recently resigned from the air customs department, in connection with the case.
The incident happened minutes after DRI officials seized over 12 kg of gold from a total of 18 passengers arriving from Dubai, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka. The total worth of seized gold, according to the officials, is over Rs 5 crore.
(Source: The New Indian Express)
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