1. Political Impasse Continues: With Sasikala in Jail, Governor Keeps Tamil Nadu Pot Boiling
A week-long political drama in Tamil Nadu appeared headed for a climax on Wednesday as two rival contenders for the chief minister’s position met the governor and sources indicated Raj Bhavan would take more time before a decision.
AIADMK chief VK Sasikala’s loyalist Edappadi K Palanisamy met governor C Vidyasagar Rao first, insisting that he was elected legislature party leader unanimously and had the support of 124 MLAs.
“We are leaving here with the belief that the governor will safeguard democracy and will invite Palanasamy,” said state fisheries minister D Jayakumar.
An hour later, caretaker chief minister O Panneerselvam drove into Raj Bhavan and told the governor that AIADMK legislators were still held “captive” at a resort near Chennai, where they were taken last week when the political crisis erupted. “If given a chance, I will prove majority on the floor of the house,” he said.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
2. Uttarakhand Witnesses 68% Turnout, Polling Peaceful
Uttarakhand recorded a turnout of 68 percent till 5 pm in the Assembly elections on Wednesday. Voting was held across the difficult hill terrain and the agrarian plain regions. The polling was peaceful.
The final turnout could cross 70 percent, but the numbers will be released only tomorrow [on Thursday]. If we get a 70 percent turnout, it will be a record-breaking turnout for a hill state like Uttarakhand.Radha Ratauri, Chief Electoral Officer
(Source: The Hindu)
3. ‘Pak Flags Anti-National’: Tough Action if You Obstruct Us, Army Chief to Valley Residents
A day after four Army personnel, including a Major, were killed in two separate encounters in the Valley, Army Chief General Bipin Rawat said on Wednesday that security forces in Kashmir were suffering higher casualties as the “local population” was “preventing” them from conducting their operations and “at times even supporting the terrorists to escape”.
Warning that those who create such “hurdles” during security operations and help the “terrorists to escape”, or display flags of Pakistan and the Islamic State, would be treated as “anti-nationals”, he said the Army would “get them” and take “tough action”.
(Source: The Indian Express)
4. ISRO’s Record of Innovation: Bullock Cart to Launching 180 Foreign Satellites
In 1981, when India’s space scientists grappled with the challenge of finding a metal-free transportable platform for its new satellite, they turned to an improbable frugal innovation. As the world watched amazed, Indian scientists wheeled out their gleaming, new satellite on a creaking, old bullock cart.
More than three decades on, as Indian scientists successfully launched more than 100 nano satellites on a single rocket, creating what they said was a record, it was still, in part, the same amazing story of endless tweaking and recycling of delicate equipment to keep costs down and tide over technology constraints.
To many, Wednesday’s triumph once again underlined the credibility of India’s space technology, despite the country’s antiquated industrial processes and manufacturing record, and the brilliance of its poorly paid scientists whose only reward, perhaps, is the collective national pride their work generates.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
5. Patients Overcharged by Billions Each Year
An injection or a syringe costs around Rs 2 to make, but the common Indian patient buys it at five times the sum. The single-digit “profit“ on an injection may seem trivial till one notes that three billion injections are sold across India annually, revealing that patients as a group are overcharged by billions of rupees every year.
The import price of a popular hip implant is Rs 8,906, but by the time it’s marked on a patient’s bill, it costs Rs 1.29 lakh, a markup of no less than 1,448 percent.
These are just two examples TOI found after talking to distributors of medical devices a day after the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) capped the prices of cardiac stents at Rs 29,600 apiece.
(Source: The Times of India)
6. Did BJP Offer Money to Sharmila to Contest Manipur Polls? Cong Seeks EC probe
The Congress moved the Election Commission on Wednesday, demanding a probe into allegations by civil rights activist Irom Sharmila that she was approached by a BJP functionary with an offer of money to contest the Manipur assembly poll as a party nominee.
In a complaint to the poll panel, secretary of the legal and human rights department of the Congress, KC Mittal, said the allegations made by Sharmila were “grave” and “very serious”.
Mittal said Sharmila had told the media that she was “really selected” as a BJP candidate and “a condition requiring Rs 36 crore” was put to her, with the sum being either produced by her or “arranged from the Centre”.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
7. SC Shifts Don to Tihar Jail
The Supreme Court today directed the transfer of gangster-turned-RJD leader Mohammad Shahabuddin from a prison in Siwan to the national capital's Tihar Jail within a week and to conduct trial in 45 criminal cases through video-conferencing to ensure that witnesses depose without fear.
The bench of Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Amitava Roy passed the directions while allowing two separate petitions filed by Asha Ranjan, widow of journalist Rajdev Ranjan who was shot dead last year, and Chandrakeshwar Prasad, whose three sons were killed allegedly at the behest of Shahabuddin.
(Source: The Telegraph)
8. In a First, Mumbai, Delhi Ranked in Top 100 Student-Friendly Cities in the World
Mumbai and New Delhi have for the first time been ranked among the world’s 100 best places to be a student in the QS Best Student Cities ranking. Montreal is at first place in the list released today by QS (Quacquarelli Symonds), compilers of the QS World University Rankings. It knocked off Paris, which has topped the list in all previous editions since 2012 and is placed second his year.
QS analyses cities according to performance in six composite indicators: Affordability, desirability, student mix, rankings, employer activity, and, for the first time, student view. The ranking expands from 75 cities to 100 this year.
Mumbai has been placed 85, the highest position for an Indian city on the list, followed by New Delhi at 86.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
9. In Afghanistan, Families from Kerala Try to Build Islamic State
Last year, Ejaz Kettiyapuraiyil, his wife Rahaila, then three months pregnant, and their two-year-old child, along with Shihaz Kettiyapuraiyil, and his wife Ajmala, disappeared into the mountains of Afghanistan’s remote Nangarhar province along with eighteen other Kerala residents, all members of an Islamic State-inspired cult led by preacher Abdul Rashid.
From interviews with family members, and messages they have sent their friends, The Indian Express has pieced together a portrait of the bizarre life the group has built for itself in the eight months since they disappeared. The members of the group have set up stores, teach religion, have married, and had children. None appears to be engaged in military activity.
“The intent seems to be to set up a community that will nurture future jihadists who will arrive from Kerala and other parts of India for training,” says an Indian intelligence official. “This is the incubator, the nursery.”
(Source: The Indian Express)
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