Car Almost Falls Into Giant Crater After Lucknow Road Caves In

by Hansraj Agrawal | Mar 3, 2024 | top-stories

A car was seen hanging on the edge of the giant pothole in Lucknow.

A massive sinkhole appeared on a road in Uttar Pradesh’s capital Lucknow today after heavy rain. In visuals, a car was seen dangerously hanging on the edge of the giant pothole as a portion of the road caved in.

Several passersby were seen around the pothole in the city’s Vikas Nagar area, recording the scene on their mobile phone.

Lucknow divisional commissioner Roshan Jacob has sought a report from the Public Works Department within 24 hours regarding the matter. Orders have also been given to repair the road immediately.

Heavy rain and hailstorms hit parts of Uttar Pradesh today, resulting in four deaths from separate lightning strike incidents. Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has directed the concerned district magistrates to promptly provide permissible financial assistance to affected individuals, including cases of livestock loss and damage to houses due to disasters like lightning, hailstorm, heavy rain, and storms.

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In Madhya Pradesh, Shivraj Chouhan Gets Ticket, Pragya Thakur Does Not

by Hansraj Agrawal | Mar 3, 2024 | top-stories

At least four of Mr Chouhan’s loyalists have also got tickets.

Bhopal:

In the BJP’s list of 195 candidates announced on Saturday, 24 are for the 29 constituencies in Madhya Pradesh. As the party looks to better its stupendous record of winning 28 seats in 2019, it has given tickets to former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia while replacing controversial MP Pragya Singh Thakur in Bhopal with another candidate.

Ms Thakur is one of six sitting MPs who have been denied tickets and 13 sitting MPs have been repeated.

Two-and-a-half months after he stepped down as BJP’s longest-serving chief minister in the country to make way for Mohan Yadav, Mr Chouhan, who has been named the candidate from Vidisha, told NDTV: “I am grateful to the central leadership, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP chief JP Nadda, Home Minister Amit Shah and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.”

The former chief minister, who won the seat five times between 1996 and 2005, insisted there were “no ifs” as far as his chances in the upcoming polls were concerned. “I am very close to the people of Vidisha, we are like family. The roadmap for Vidisha is ready. The BJP will win all 29 Lok Sabha seats in Madhya Pradesh and the state will put 29 garlands on PM Modi,” he said.

Vidisha is considered one of the BJP’s fortresses in the country and was won by former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 1991 and former Union Minister Sushma Swaraj in 2009 and 2014.

Union Minister and former Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia has been named the candidate from Guna, a seat he had held since 2002 until his loss to the BJP’s Krishna Pal Singh Yadav in 2019.

Loyalists Rewarded

At least four of Mr Chouhan’s loyalists have got tickets. Former Bhopal mayor Alok Sharma (who lost from the Bhopal Uttar seat in last year’s Assembly elections) has been fielded from Bhopal, state Kisan Morcha head Darshan Singh Chaudhary from Hoshangabad and sitting MP Rodmal Nagar from Rajgarh.

Anita Nagar Singh Chouhan, who is the wife of the former chief minister’s loyalist, Nagar Singh Chouhan, has been named the candidate for the Ratlam-Jhabua (ST) seat.

Bharat Singh Kushwah, a loyalist of Assembly Speaker and former Union minister Narendra Singh Tomar, has been given a ticket from the Gwalior seat despite losing the Assembly polls from the Gwalior Rural constituency last year. Two other loyalists of Mr Tomar, sitting MP Sandhya Rai and former MLA Shivmangal Singh Tomar, have been named as candidates from the Bhind (SC) and Morena seats respectively. These constituencies are in the Gwalior-Chambal region.

MPs Denied Tickets

Apart from Ms Thakur, five other sitting MPs have also been denied tickets.

While Jyotiraditya Scindia has got the ticket from Guna in place of KP Singh Yadav, Rajbahadur Singh, the sitting MP from Sagar, has been replaced by former Women’s Commission chairperson Lata Wankhede.

Anita Nagar Singh Chauhan has replaced GS Damor in Ratlam-Jhabua,

Ramakant Bhargava has made way for Shivraj Chouhan, and former minister Bharat Singh Kushwah getting the ticket in Gwalior meant that Vivek Shejwalkar did not.

The 13 sitting MPs who have been fielded again from their seats include Union minister and 3-time MP Virendra Kumar, who will contest from the Tikamgarh-SC seat. Virendra Kumar Khatik, the seniormost sitting MP, has got the Lok Sabha election ticket for the eighth time.

State BJP chief VD Sharma will contest from Khajuraho, Himadri Singh from Shahdol (ST), Ganesh Singh from Satna and six-time MP Faggan Singh Kulaste from Mandla (ST). Both Mr Singh and Mr Kulaste had contested the Assembly polls and lost.

In the list of 24 candidates, eight are from the OBC community, five are Brahmins and four are women.

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Diamond Watch And Supercars: Tobacco Baron's Lavish Lifestyle Under Probe

by Hansraj Agrawal | Mar 2, 2024 | top-stories

New Delhi:

After establishing itself as a key player in the tobacco industry, the Banshidhar Company has come under the radar of Income Tax authorities who are working round the clock to unravel the company’s web of deception. The department today carried out raids at the home and offices of the company’s head KK Mishra.

Banshidhar Tobacco Private Limited is a major player in the tobacco industry and is known for supplying products to major pan masala groups. Reports suggest that the company has a declared income of Rs 20 to 25 crore when the actual turnover was pegged at Rs 100-150 crore. The searches so far have revealed a trail of clandestine dealings and opulent lifestyles.

In today’s raids, the agency seized several expensive watches belonging to Shivam Mishra, the scion of the tobacco company. One of the watches, diamond-studded, is worth nearly Rs 2.5 crore rupees, sources in the agency said.

Seven crore rupees in cash, along with jewellery and other assets, have also been seized, intensifying the scrutiny on the group’s financial affairs.

The agency has already seized a collection of luxury cars, all bearing the number plate ‘4018’, from Shivam Mishra’s home in Delhi’s Vasant Vihar.

Fifteen to 20 teams carried out raids across five states, metaphorically shaking down every tobacco leaf linked to Banshidhar Tobacco Company, to stumble upon a treasure trove of luxury cars worth a staggering Rs 50 crore; among them, a Rolls-Royce Phantom, priced at a cool Rs 16 crore, found at Shivam Mishra’s home in Delhi’s Vasant Vihar.

The raids, being executed with military precision, reveal an empire built on deceit and financial manipulations. There is a major gap between the company’s declared income and the actual turnover and the officials believe that they hid their money using offshore accounts and manipulated ledgers, sources said.

KK Mishra, the once-untouchable patriarch, now finds himself entangled in a web of his own making. The Banshidhar Tobacco Limited, once an impenetrable fortress, now stands exposed, its foundations cracked, and its secrets laid bare.

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Delhi Court Orders Bloomberg To Remove “Defamatory” Article Against Zee

by Hansraj Agrawal | Mar 1, 2024 | top-stories

New Delhi:

A Delhi court today ordered Bloomberg Television Production Services India Pvt. Ltd to take down a defamatory article published against Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd. Zee said that the “factually incorrect article” led to a “15 per cent drop in share price” of the company.

The company, argued in front of the Delhi Sessions Court that the article published by Bloomberg was “false and factually incorrect, with a pre-meditated and malafide intention to defame the company”. The article, on February 21, mentioned details pertaining to the corporate governance and business operations of ZEE, which were inaccurate in nature and led to a 15 per cent drop in share price of the company, eroding investor wealth, it said.

Additional district judge Harjyot Singh Bhalla, in a big relief to Zee, directed Bloomberg to “take down the defamatory article from its platform within one week of receipt of the order”, further restraining the platform from posting, circulating or publishing the article on any online or offline platform till the next date of hearing.

The article by Bloomberg, incorrectly published that Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has found a $241 million accounting issue at the Company, whereas there is no such order from the mentioned regulator, Zee insisted. It said that “despite the company firmly refuting the same, the article incorrectly published financial irregularities in Zee, without the basis of any order from the regulator”.

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43 killed, Several Injured As Fire Breaks Out At Building In Bangladesh

by Hansraj Agrawal | Feb 29, 2024 | top-stories

Dozens killed as fire broke out at 7-storey building in Bangladesh’s capital Dhaka. (Representational)

Dhaka:

At least 43 people were killed and dozens injured after a fire blazed through a seven-storey building in an upscale neighbourhood in the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka late Thursday, health authorities said.

“So far 43 people have died from the fire,” Bangladesh’s health minister Samanta Lal Sen told AFP after visiting the Dhaka Medical College Hospital and an adjoining burn hospital.

Sen said at least 40 injured people were being treated in the city’s main burn hospital.

Fire department official Mohammad Shihab said the blaze originated in a popular biriyani restaurant in Dhaka’s Bailey Road at 9:50pm Thursday (1550 GMT), and quickly spread to the upper floors, trapping scores of people.

Firefighters brought the blaze under control in two hours, he said.

They rescued 75 people alive, a statement from the fire service said.

The Bailey Road building houses mainly restaurants along with several clothing and mobile phone shops.

“We were at the sixth floor when we first saw smoke racing through the staircase. A lot of people rushed upstairs. We used a water pipe to climb down the building. Some of us were injured as they jumped from upstairs,” said a restaurant manager called Sohel.

Others were trapped on the rooftop and called out for help.

“Alhamdulillah. We are sending down all women and children including my wife and children. We all men are in rooftop. Fire service stands beside us. Fifty yet to be down,” wrote Kamruzzaman Majumdar, a professor of environmental science, in a Facebook post.

He was later rescued safely.

Fires in apartment buildings and factory complexes are common in Bangladesh due to lax enforcement of safety rules.

In July 2021, at least 52 people were killed including many children when a fire swept through a food processing factory.

In February 2019, 70 people died when an inferno ripped through several Dhaka apartment blocks.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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6 Himachal Congress MLAs, Who Cross-Voted In Rajya Sabha Polls, Disqualified

by Hansraj Agrawal | Feb 29, 2024 | top-stories

Six Congress MLAs have been disqualified for cross-voting in Rajya Sabha polls

New Delhi:

Six Congress MLAs from Himachal Pradesh who cross-voted for the BJP in the Rajya Sabha election have been disqualified from the assembly, the Speaker announced today.

The BJP had clapped for and congratulated the six MLAs for their ‘bravery’ yesterday when they came to the assembly, after staying the previous night in BJP-ruled Haryana. Their kick, however, has gone wide.

The disqualified MLAs are Rajinder Rana, Sudhir Sharma, Inder Dutt Lakhanpal, Devinder Kumar Bhutoo, Ravi Thakur, and Chetanya Sharma.

Assembly Speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania today said they have been disqualified for defying the party whip to vote in favour of the government on the Finance Bill in the house yesterday. The assembly passed the state Budget after the Speaker suspended 15 BJP MLAs.

The actions of the six MLAs violated the anti-defection law, the Speaker said.

For now, the MLAs’ disqualification has closed the chapter for the ruling Congress in Himachal Pradesh after a two-day scare over the BJP returning to power with a no-trust vote, since the six MLAs had voted for the state’s Opposition party in the Rajya Sabha election.

The BJP had deduced the six Congress MLAs no longer trusted the ruling party.

Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra yesterday questioned whether the BJP, with just 25 MLAs, was working overtime to overthrow the Himachal Pradesh government.

Minus the six disqualified MLAs, the Congress now has 34 MLAs in the 62-member house. Three independent MLAs who supported the Congress also cross-voted for the BJP in the Rajya Sabha election.

“In democracy, the public has the right to choose the government of their choice. The people of Himachal Pradesh used this right and formed the Congress government with a clear majority. But BJP wants to crush this right of the people by misusing money power, power of agencies and power of the Centre,” Priyanka Gandhi said in a post on the microblogging platform X in Hindi.

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