Leaders put aside personality clashes and ideological differences to form coalition to take on PM
Leaders of 26 opposition political parties in India have united to form an alliance in an attempt to oust the country’s populist prime minister, Narendra Modi, in next year’s general election.
During a conclave of opposition parties held this week, it was decided that the coalition will be called the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance: otherwise known as INDIA.
Continue reading...Chandrayaan-3 launches from island in southern India in follow-up to failed effort four years ago
An Indian spacecraft has blazed its way towards the far side of the moon in a follow-up mission to its failed effort nearly four years ago to land a rover softly on the lunar surface, India’s space agency said.
Chandrayaan-3, the word for “moon craft” in Sanskrit, took off from a launch pad in Sriharikota, an island in southern India, with an orbiter, a lander and a rover, in a demonstration of India’s emerging space technology. The spacecraft will embark on a journey lasting slightly over a month before landing on the moon’s surface later in August.
Continue reading...The Chandrayaan-3 is set to blast off from a spaceport in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh
India’s space agency has made final preparations for the launch of a rocket that will attempt to land a rover on the moon and mark the country’s arrival as a power in space exploration.
Only the United States, the former Soviet Union and China have made successful lunar landings. An attempt by a Japanese start-up earlier this year ended with the lander crashing.
Continue reading...Consumers, farmers and even McDonald’s struggle in shortage blamed on irregular weather
Listening to the chatter at Delhi’s vegetable markets, only one question is on everyone’s lips: just how much will a tomato cost today?
Prices of tomatoes, a staple of Indian cooking, have soared by more than 400% in recent weeks as the country has been gripped by a nationwide shortage.
Continue reading...Residents in Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand warned not to go outside and Delhi schools closed amid flooding and landslides in multiple states
Torrential rain across northern India has killed at least 22 people, causing landslides and flash floods in the region, with Delhi receiving the most rainfall in decades, reports and officials have said.
Schools in Delhi were closed after heavy rains lashed the national capital over the weekend, and authorities in the Himalayan states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand asked people not to venture out of their homes unless necessary.
Continue reading...Dozens more injured in state notorious for political violence during polls to elect local leaders
At least seven people were killed and dozens more injured in India after clashes over local polls in West Bengal, a state notorious for political violence during election campaigns.
India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) has in recent years worked hard to gain a toehold in West Bengal – ruled by a Communist party for much of its history – to expand its reach beyond its Hindi-speaking northern heartlands.
Continue reading...Workers charged with culpable homicide and destruction of evidence after one of country’s deadliest rail accidents
Three men have been arrested in India over a triple-train collision that killed nearly 300 people last month, one of the worst rail accidents in the country’s history, police have said.
The train crash in eastern Odisha state occurred when a packed passenger train was mistakenly diverted on to a loop line and hit a stationary goods train.
Continue reading...Judge calls conviction of opposition leader ‘just, proper and legal’ as lawyer vows to take case to supreme court
India’s most well-known opposition leader Rahul Gandhi is facing another setback after a high court judge refused to suspend his conviction for defamation, a case critics allege is politically motivated.
The judge in Gujarat high court called Gandhi’s conviction “just, proper and legal” and said “no injustice” would be done to the politician by refusing to grant his plea.
Continue reading...Tabrez Ansari was tied to a pole in Jharkhand, tortured for 12 hours and made to chant Hindu slogans widely used by Hindu hardliners
An Indian court has sentenced 10 men to 10 years each in jail for the lynching of a Muslim man, who died after being tortured and forced to chant Hindu slogans.
Tabrez Ansari was tied to a pole and tortured for 12 hours in 2019, as he cried and pleaded with a mob that accused him of burglary in the eastern state of Jharkhand.
Continue reading...Police said man charged with assault, which could see him fined and jailed for a year
Indian authorities on Wednesday demolished the home of a man accused of publicly urinating on a member of a tribal community after footage of the alleged assault sparked public condemnation.
A video shared widely on social media appeared to show Pravesh Shukla urinating on his young victim in a dark street in the central Sidhi district while smoking a cigarette. The attack took place last year but came to public attention only this week.
Continue reading...President also told leaders from China, Pakistan and India that Russia would stand up to western sanctions
Vladimir Putin has said that Russia remains “united as never before” in the wake of the failed mutiny by the Wagner mercenary group and claimed the country continued to flourish in the face of heavy western sanctions over his invasion of Ukraine.
In an address from the Kremlin to a virtual gathering of leaders from the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a group founded by Russia and China to counter western influence, the Russian president attempted to rebuff any suggestion that he had been weakened by last week’s chaotic but short-lived rebellion led by Yevgeny Prigozhin.
Continue reading...Bus was travelling on expressway to city of Pune when it hit a pole, overturned and caught fire
At least 25 people were killed and eight others injured after a bus caught fire on an expressway in western India, police said.
The bus was travelling to the city of Pune when it hit a pole and overturned in the early hours of Saturday, causing its diesel tank to catch fire, a senior police officer told the Agence France-Presse news agency.
Continue reading...Congress party accused Narendra Modi of ‘abject failure’ over two-month long crisis between majority Meitei and Kuki groups
Rahul Gandhi, the leader of India’s main opposition Congress party, has visited a north-eastern state beset by two months of violence as a shootout there claimed two more lives.
The shooting on the outskirts of Imphal, the state capital of Manipur, also left four wounded.
Continue reading...Increase of 1C in average annual temperature connected to more than 6% rise in physical and sexual domestic violence
As deadly heatwaves sweep through cities in India, China, the US and Europe amid the climate crisis, new research has found that rising temperatures are associated with a substantial rise in domestic violence against women.
A study published in JAMA Psychiatry on Wednesday found a 1C increase in average annual temperature was connected to a rise of more than 6.3% in incidents of physical and sexual domestic violence across three south Asian countries.
Continue reading...Party leader seeks to win back British Indian voters after anger over party’s perceived support for Pakistan in Kashmir dispute
Keir Starmer has promised to reset relations between the Labour party and India after years of tension between the two.
The Labour leader said on Monday that his party had made mistakes in its approach to relations with the world’s most populous country, and that it would seek closer ties if elected to power next year.
Continue reading...Development charity says patients denied treatment or held hostage until fees paid in private facilities in India and Kenya
Private hospitals in India and Kenya accused of refusing people on low incomes vital healthcare, or holding them hostage until bills have been paid, benefit from UK government investment funds, according to a report by Oxfam.
Investments worth hundreds of millions of pounds by government-backed agencies are used to facilitate the “impoverishment and even the imprisonment of the very people [the private hospitals] are supposed to be helping”, said the development charity.
Continue reading...Indian finance minister hits out after former US president said Modi government should protect rights of Muslims
India’s finance minister has derided comments by the former US president Barack Obama that Narendra Modi’s government should protect the rights of minority Muslims, accusing Obama of being hypocritical.
During the Indian prime minister’s state visit to the US last week, Obama told CNN that the issue of the “protection of the Muslim minority in a majority-Hindu India” would be worth raising in Modi’s meeting with the US president, Joe Biden.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Democracy Index downgrades country amid backsliding under nationalist rule of Narendra Modi
The Indian government has been secretly working to keep its reputation as the “world’s largest democracy” alive after being called out by researchers for serious democratic backsliding under the nationalist rule of Narendra Modi, according to internal reports seen by the Guardian.
Despite publicly dismissing several global rankings that suggest the country is on a dangerous downward trajectory, officials from government ministries have been quietly assigned to monitor India’s performance, minutes from meetings show.
Continue reading...Ankush Dutta was meant to check out after one night but reportedly stayed for nearly two years
Indian police are investigating a suspected fraudster who spent nearly two years in a five-star hotel without paying, local media have said.
Ankush Dutta booked a room at Roseate House hotel in Delhi on 30 May 2019 and was supposed to check out the next day. But he extended his stay for 603 nights until 22 January 2021, leaving behind unpaid bills of $70,000 (£55,000).
Continue reading...Ethnic violence in north-eastern state has led to more than 100 deaths since breaking out in early May
India’s home affairs minister, Amit Shah, has called opposition parties for talks on Saturday to discuss an outbreak of ethnic violence in Manipur state in the north-east, in a sign that the government has acknowledged the situation has spun out of its control.
More than 100 people have died and 50,000 have been displaced since clashes broke out in early May between members of the Kuki ethnic group, who mostly live in the hills, and the Meitei people, the dominant community in the lowlands. Churches, temples, shops and businesses have been destroyed.
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