1. PM Modi in Chennai, Announces Rs 1,000 Cr Relief for Victims
Prime Minister Modi reached Tamil Nadu to take stock of the flood situation in Chennai. During his trip, he met Chief Minister Jayalalithaa and Governor K Rosaiah. PM Modi took an aerial survey of Chennai and announced relief of Rs 1,000 crore for Tamil Nadu, which, he said, will be released “immediately by the Centre”. “This is over and above Rs 940 crore which was released earlier,” he said.
2. Floods in Chennai: Ripples in Paris?
Expressing solidarity with people affected by the worst ever floods in Chennai and its suburbs, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius on Thursday said unprecedented magnitude of the flooding confirms that time is running out and “concrete and urgent” action needs to be taken against climate disruption.
“Flooding in India’s Chennai region has taken a tragic toll. I want to express France’s solidarity with all those affected by this tragedy. The unprecedented magnitude of the flooding confirms yet again that we no longer have time. We must take concrete and urgent action against climate disruption,” Fabius said.
Meanwhile, heavy rains continued to lash coastal Cuddalore district, one of the worst affected areas ever since North-East monsoon fury started early last month, and Villupuram and Kanyakumari districts and Puducherry as the death toll in the state mounted to 269.
3. Sorry India and Pakistan, No Cricket For You Together
The NDA government has sent its signal of disapproval in favour of an Indo-Pak series, even in a neutral venue like Sri Lanka, to the cricket board, reports Hindustan Times.
The BCCI had sought the government’s permission for a short ODI and T20 series against Pakistan in Sri Lanka sometime after 15 December – a week after its ongoing series against South Africa and before it travels to Australia in January. The Lanka tie had seemed a certainty with Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif giving it the nod on 26 November. After several rounds of discussion and various venue possibilities, Sri Lanka had emerged the choice while there has also been talk of a Test series in England sometime next year.
Read the full story here.
4. D Company Controlling Mumbai’s Real Estate ?
Officials who have kept a close watch on Dawood Ibrahim’s gang say the syndicate has a highly organised system of controlling, extorting money from or taking part in many of the redevelopment projects in Mumbai, reports The Hindu.
In a series of phone calls in early 2013, Pakistan-based Dawood carried out detailed discussions on property purchases in Mumbai.
But the real show in Mumbai’s construction sector is run by Dawood’s key aide Chhota Shakeel, also based in Pakistan, as is the case in most other sectors where the D company is involved.
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5. Another “Dadri-Like” Incident Reported in Haryana
In what could be termed a related incident of mob violence over rumoured possession of beef akin to the Dadri incident, several people were injured in violent clashes in Haryana’s Palwal on Thursday morning.
Palwal District Magistrate Ashok Kumar Meena told The Hindu that around 8 am a truck carrying meat from Mewat to Uttar Pradesh’s Aligarh via Palwal was intercepted by a large crowd. They alleged that the meat carried in the truck was sourced from cows and was hurtful to their religious sentiments.
However, Dr Lalit Bhushan from Palwal’s District Animal Husbandry office said the meat appeared to be of a camel but the samples seized would be tested further for confirmation. He said camel skin and other parts were also there in the truck.
In Dadri’s Bishara village on September 28, a 50-year-old Mohammad Akhlaq was lynched and his son Danish (22) was brutally beaten up as ‘punishment’ for allegedly eating beef and ‘storing it’ for later consumption.
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6. Pak Couple that Carried Cali Shootings Had Ammo For Much More
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Wearing black tactical gear and wielding assault rifles, Farook, a 28-year-old county restaurant inspector, and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, 27, sprayed as many as 75 rounds into a room at a social service center for the disabled, where Farook’s co-workers had gathered for a holiday banquet on Wednesday. Four hours later and two miles away, the couple died in a furious gunbattle in which they fired 76 rounds, while 23 law officers unleashed about 380.
On Thursday, a US intelligence official said San Bernardino gunman Syed Rizwan Farook had been in contact with known Islamic extremists on social media.
Police also say Farook and his wife had enough bullets and bombs to slaughter hundreds when they launched their deadly attack on a holiday party. The details emerged as investigators tried to determine whether the rampage that left 14 people dead was terrorism, a workplace grudge or some combination. The husband-and-wife killers were not under FBI scrutiny before the massacre, said a second U.S. official, who likewise was not authorized to discuss the investigation and spoke on condition of anonymity.
7. In Valley, Hundreds of Soldiers and Para Commandos Hunt for Three Militants
About 600-700 soldiers and para commandos have been scanning the remote forests and villages of Haihama in North Kashmir for the past 24 days, searching for three militants reports The Indian Express. It was during the search of this group of militants, who are believed to have sneaked into the Valley in the first week of November, that Commanding Officer, 41 Rashtriya Rifles, Santosh Mahadik got killed on 17 November and another senior officer, Lt Col Karan Bir Singh Natt, second-in-command of 160 Territorial Army, was injured in another shootout.
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8. ‘Akhilesh, Akhilesh’... SP’s New Jingle Will Not Have Mulayam as Focus
For the 2017 assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Samajwadi Party’s jingle –‘Tarakki ka shubhaarambh, pragati ka Shri Ganesh… Akhilesh Akhilesh’ – will only speak about Akhilesh and his development agenda, reports The Indian Express. “The song was finalised by Akhilesh Yadav and will be used for the elections. From now, it will be played at all party functions. We want to focus on the development agenda for the next polls,” a senior SP functionary told the paper.
Read the full story here.
9. White House Says Obama Finds Modi “Honest and Direct”
US President Barack Obama “certainly does respect Prime Minister Modi and has appreciation for his skills and abilities as a politician,” the White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters Wednesday when asked about the relationship between the two leaders.
Obama, who met the Indian Prime Minister for the sixth time in Paris during the climate change summit, has found “Modi to be somebody who is honest and direct,” he said. He is “somebody who has good command of the facts; somebody who has a clear understanding of the issues that confront his country and our relationship,” Earnest said.
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