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Happy birthday Shruti Hassan

By
Neha Kumari
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Bollywood actress Shruti Haasan is celebrating her birthday today, she has turned 35 years old. She was born on 28 January 1986. On her birthday, Shruti has thanked her fans and well-wishers for wishing and blessing their birthdays. Shruti has also shared a picture of herself wearing a crown on a black dress with lots of balloons in the background.

Sharing this picture, Shruti wrote, “Filled with Gratitude and Joy !!! It has been the best phase of my life and I am thankful to my Lessons and Journeys … I have grown up and those ways I have given a vision to my vision of the future that I want for me full of light and creativity – I want to take a second to call my virtual family a big one thank you for making my birthday so special. Thank You for.”

Shruti started her singing career at the age of just six. She had sung his Afla song in his father’s film Tevar Magan. The voice of this film’s little Shruti was also heard in the film Aunty 420, directed by her father. After this, Shruti thought of making a career in singing and after that she moved to California to get a good education in Singing.

In those days, Shruti’s singing career was going well in Kollywood, when she got an opportunity to do a cameo in her father’s film. After which the desire for acting was awakened in him. Her first Bollywood debut was Emraan Khan’s opposite film Luck.

She did films like ‘Dil To Bachcha Hai Ji’, ‘Ramaiya Vastavaiya’, ‘Welcome Back’ and ‘Gabbar’.

Her role in Ramaiya Vastavaiya is most loved by her fans.

Punjabi actor Deep Sidhu, who has been accused for Republic day violence, is now missing

By
Shivani Negi
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A day after Kisan Unions as well as the political leaders held Deep Sidhu responsible for inciting violence on Republic day, the Punjabi actor has gone missing. While many farmers unions have distanced themselves from him, NIA had also summoned him in a case. The development has come after two new videos of the chaos that was caused on January 26 surfaced on the internet. The videos showed a vehicle chasing him as he jumps onto a motorbike to run away.

Sidhu was among the group of farmers who marched to Red Fort on Republic Day and hoisted ‘Nishan Sahib,’ a triangular saffron flag representing Sikh community. On Tuesday, farmers protesting against controversial farmers’ law reached the national capital to conduct tractor rally to show that they remain adamant in their demand of quashing new farm laws. While farmers were holding peaceful protests, Sidhu led a group to Red Fort to hoist the khalsa flag which later led to violence. Meanwhile, after hoisting the flag was hoisted, Sidhu did a live broadcast on Facebook saying that he was only exercising his democratic right.

OF late, there has been rumours that Sidhu has links with Bharatiya Janata Party as he has previously shared photos with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, and BJP MP Sunny Deol .However, Deol has tweeted on multiple occasions, insisting that he is not familiar with Deep Sidhu as well as his actions.

Covid update: India reports 11k new cases, 123 deaths

By
Shivani Negi
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India has reported 11,666 Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours, continuing its streak of low single-day cases, even as the overall tally mounted to 1,07,01,193, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said.

For the past 21 days, the country has been recording less than 20,000 daily new infections. Also, the death toll remained below 300-mark for the past 31 days.

On January 19, India had reported 10,064 new cases, the lowest so far this year. And, last year the lowest was recorded on June 3 with 9,633 cases.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Thursday said there were 123 fresh deaths taking the overall toll to 1,53,847.

As per the Ministry’s data, 1,03,73,606 people have recovered so far and currently, there are 1,73,740 active cases.

The recovery rate stands at 96.94 per cent, while the fatality rate at 1.62 per cent.

The nationwide inoculation programme across the country on January 16 after the approval of two Covid vaccines in the country. As many as 23,55,979 beneficiaries have received the first dose of Covid vaccine in the first phase so far. The third round of Covid-19 vaccination will start in Uttar Pradesh on Thursday.

Here’s some more updats:

*Another 25,308 people in Britain have tested positive for Covid-19, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 37,15,054, according to official figures released on Wednesday.

*The progress of vaccine distribution will play a decisive role on whether the Tokyo Olympic Games can be held or not, Microsoft Co-founder and philanthropist Bill Gates has said.

*A dry run for the Covid-19 vaccination began in Japan’s Kawasaki near Tokyo on Wednesday, as the country prepares to roll out the inoculation drive by late February.

* European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Stella Kyriakides has called on AstraZeneca to live up to its contractual, societal, and moral obligations as the European Union (EU) has criticised the company for not being able to deliver the amount of Covid-19 vaccine as agreed.

Delhi Police has registered more than 25 criminal cases

By
Neha Kumari
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On the case of violence during the tractor parade of farmers in Delhi, Delhi Police Commissioner SN Srivastava himself came in front of the media and told that, the farmers violated the agreement with the police. He said that, we first asked the farmers to take out their tractor march outside Delhi, but the farmers did not agree. The Commissioner said that in the five-round meeting, we finally gave them three routes. But it was not followed.

Delhi Police Commissioner said that, because it was January 26, it was decided that it should be given in writing with some conditions. The first condition was that the Kisan Tractor Rally would start from 12 noon and end by 5 pm. After this, the second condition was that the farmer leader should lead the tractor march. After this it was also decided that the leader should accompany each batch, so that they could control it. It was also said that there should not be more than 5 thousand tractors, no weapon, spear or stick should be in hand. In writing, the farmer leaders approved all the conditions and decided that the rally would start from 12 noon. The commissioner further said-

“But late in the evening of January 25, it was understood that he was retracting from his promise. Those who were aggressive and militant members were pushed forward. He also gave very provocative speeches. Which made him understand what his intention was. The next day, from 6:30 in the morning, they started breaking the barricade. The farmers reached Mukarba Chowk, instead of turning right, they sat there. Their leader Satnam Singh Pannu gave a provocative speech. After this, the farmers started breaking barricades. Another farmer leader Darshan Pal Singh was also present there. He refused to turn right. “

The Police Commissioner said that Delhi Police has registered more than 25 criminal cases. We are using facial recognition system and taking help of CCTV and video footage to identify the accused. No culprit will be spared. 19 accused have been arrested and 50 people have been detained. they are being interrogated.

England tour of India: Full fixtures, squads, venue

By
Harshit
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After an emphatic win against Australia on their home-soil, the Indian team is set for the first home series since the COVID pandemic broke out last year.

International Cricket is returning in India after almost 11 months and its back with one of the most awaited series for the Indian team which is against England.

The four match Test series will start from February 5 which will be followed by T20I also the ODIs and the series will end on March 28 with the One Day International Series.

Full Schedule

India vs England tour fixtures

Test series

1st Test – February 5-9 (Chennai), 09:30 local – 04:00 GMT

2nd Test – February 13-17 (Chennai), 09:30 local – 04:00 GMT

3rd Test – February 24-28 (Ahmedabad), 14:30 local – 09:00 GMT

4th Test – March 4-8 (Ahmedabad), 09:30 local – 04:00 GMT

T20Is

1st T20 – March 12 (Ahmedabad), 19:00 local – 13:30 GMT​

2nd T20 – March 14 (Ahmedabad), 19:00 local – 13:30 GMT​

3rd T20 – March 16 (Ahmedabad), 19:00 local – 13:30 GMT

4th T20 – March 18 (Ahmedabad), 19:00 local – 13:30 GMT

5th T20 – March 20 (Ahmedabad), 19:00 local – 13:30 GMT

ODIs

1st ODI, March 23 (Pune), 13:30 local – 08:00 GMT

2nd ODI, March 26 (Pune), 13:30 local – 08:00 GMT

3rd ODI, March 28 (Pune), 13:30 local – 09:00 BST

India squad for first two Tests

Virat Kohli (capt), Ajinkya Rahane, Rohit Sharma, Cheteshwar Pujara, Shubman Gill, Mayank Agarwal, Rishabh Pant, Wriddhiman Saha, Hardik Pandya, KL Rahul, R Ashwin, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Washington Sundar, Axar Patel, Jasprit Bumrah, Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Siraj, Shardul Thakur

England squad for first two Tests

Joe Root (capt), Jofra Archer, Moeen Ali, James Anderson, Dom Bess, Stuart Broad, Rory Burns, Jos Buttler, Zak Crawley, Ben Foakes, Dan Lawrence, Jack Leach, Dom Sibley, Ben Stokes, Olly Stone, Chris Woakes.
Reserves: James Bracey, Mason Crane, Saqib Mahmood, Matthew Parkinson), Ollie Robinson, Amar Virdi.

Uddhav Thackery: Declare Belgavi as Union Territory till SC’s order

By
Harshit
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The row over Belgavi border issue has erupted again between Maharashtra and Karnataka. Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray has said that the Begavi is dominated by Marathi speaking people and it shouldn’t be the part of Karnataka.

“CM Thackeray said this matter needs to be taken up aggressively. To bring back the Marathi speaking region of Karnataka into Maharashtra, all parties in the state need to come together and appeal to the centre,” a tweet by the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) in Marathi said.

The Cheif Minister also said that till the Supreme Court’s order the region should be declared as the Union Territory.

'Take Matter Aggressively': Uddhav Thackeray To Allies On Karnataka Dispute

“When the case is being heard in the Supreme Court, the Karnataka government renames Belgaum, declares it as its second capital, constructs a Legislature building and holds one legislature session there.” “Isn’t this contempt of court?” said Thackeray.

“We have to learn from past experiences and fight to win. The Karnataka-occupied Marathi-speaking areas will be included in Maharashtra,” he asserted.

“Earlier, the MES won half-a-dozen MLAs, Belgaum mayor used to be a Marathi-speaking person. The Shiv Sena never entered the political fray in Belgaum because it did not want to weaken the MES,” he said.

“Marathi people should also unite,” he said, adding that “let us be determined to win”.

The Belgavi border issue is the way long issue between the Maharashtra-Karnataka, Maharashtra claims that Balgaum/Belgavi, Karwar, and Nippani which are the part of Karnataka are originally the part of Maharashtra over alleged atrocities on Marathi-speaking population in those areas.

Protesting Famers call off Budget Day march to Parliament

By
Harshit
-

A day after the massive protest in the national capital the farmer leader Balbir S Rajewal Rajewal has called off the march to parliament on Budget Day, February 1.

“On Martyrs’ Day, we’ll hold public rallies across India on behalf of the farmers’ agitation. We will also keep a one-day fast. Our March to the Parliament on Feb 1st stands postponed for now due to this (yesterday’s violence)” said Balbir S Rajewal, Bhartiya Kisan Union.

Meanwhile, the Delhi Police has also filed more than 22 FIRs against the protesters and the farmers’ leaders continue to claim that they never wanted such violent protest and the those who were indulged in rule violator activity were not with them and blamed the government.

“Rally fell prey to govt conspiracy. Despite attempts to break it, 99.9% farmers were peaceful. Some incidents took place. Govt put Punjab Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee members in front of blockade put for us, no blockade for them said,” Balbir S Rajewal, Bhartiya Kisan Union.

“394 police personnel sustained injuries in the violence (during the tractor rally on Jan 26) and several of them are still admitted to hospitals. Some of them are admitted to ICU wards,” said Delhi Police Commissioner SN Shrivastava.

Purplle appoints Sara Ali Khan as its new face

By
Shivani Negi
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Purplle.com, a digital shop to buy all your cosmetics, has appointed Sara Ali Khan as its brand ambassador. With the new development, the brand has launched a new campaign, ‘Go Purplle’, featuring the actress, in a bid to promote that beauty exists irrespective of colour and gender with the tagline ‘Beauty for All.’

The TVC also gives details regarding the facilities that the brand offers such as two-day-no-questions-asked return policy and free delivery for anyone’s first order on the website. Sara also informs that the Purplle rolls out around 400 new products every month and also revealed that the brand will be holding a sale from February 8 to February 12.

Watch the TVC here:

Manish Taneja, co-founder and chief executive officer, Purplle, said, “Sara will lend her voice to inspire consumers to embrace their own unique journey; to make beauty reach the comfort of every home. This association is a step towards further strengthening the connection with our consumers. We look forward to an exciting partnership together.”

Arun Iyer, co-founder, Spring Marketing Capital, said, “Our aim has been to communicate all these features of the platform to consumers in a fun, quirky yet informative manner with Sara Ali Khan sharing our story.”

Khan, said, “Purplle stands for beauty that is inclusive and accessible to all. It enables women to fulfil their aspirations and even envision bigger dreams, as they look and feel their gorgeous best.”

TikTok owner ByteDance cuts India work force after the country bans the app permanently

By
Shivani Negi
-

In 2020 the Indian Government banned 59 chinese apps on the first go and then more than 200 apps were banned due to concerns related to user data and safety of digital space. As the government was worried that the user data is used by forgien agencies to gain intellect over Indian digital space and may provide upper hand for ill practices. The sour realtionship between India and China was further escalated with further decisions realted to business.

One of the most popular and used app was China’s ByteDance Tiktok, which is a social video app. The app garnered a cult following in youngsters and media alike, now in a recent update it is annouced by ByteDance that they are cutting the size of its 2,000 plus India team and is unsure when it will make a comeback, this was updated to employees in an internal memo on Wednesday.

The move came after India this month decided to retain its ban on TikTokand 58 other Chinese apps following responses from the companies on issues such as compliance and privacy.

In a statement company expressed dissapointment that despite its effort it had not received a clear notification when and how its apps could be reinstated and as of now it is not specified how many employees would lose their jobs

“We initially hoped that this situation would be short-lived … we find thathas not been the case,” ByteDance wrote in the memo which was seen byReuters.
“We simply cannot responsibly stay fully staffed while our apps remain unoperational … we don’t know when we will make a comeback in India”

At the time of last year’s ban, the Indian government described the apps as prejudicial to the “sovereignty and integrity of India”. The move followed a skirmish with Chinese.
TikTok has also come under the security radar in Australia for data privacy issues and in United States , the previous administration of Trump barred its use due to national security concerns.

South Africa gives green signal to AstraZeneca’s covid-19 vaccine

By
Shivani Negi
-

On Wednesday the medical regulator of South Africa annouced that AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 Vaccine is approved for the emergency purpose and the application from rival manufacturers, Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer is in review.
This is a great news for the country as new strain of Covid-19 is also reported there, the use of vaccine may prove helpful in saving lifes and faltten the curve there.

South Africa will pay $5.25 per dose for 1.5 million shots of AstraZeneca’s coronavirus vaccine from the Serum Institute of India (SII) and that is expected to arrive this month and February to provide protection for frontline workers.
“In terms of the AstraZeneca vaccine … this has been granted emergency use (approval) and there will be a press conference with the minister of health on this (later),” said Helen Rees, chairwoman of the South African Health Products Authority (SAHPRA) board, during a media briefing.
At the same briefing, SAHPRA’s chief executive said the application by J&J, which became first supplier in December to apply for registration, still needed further information before a decision was taken.

“These ones in particular are at a very advanced stage of Phase III studies wherein we’ve got initial data that indicates their safety and efficacy … We are still at that point with J&J where additional information is still required,” said Boitumelo Semete-Makokotlela.

South Africa has suffered a major blow in recent times as a surge in number of infections by new and more contagious variant of virus called 01Y.V2, which causes 21,000 new cases in early January, although they have now eased to below 10,000.

IPL 2021 auctions set to take place on February 18

By
Harshit
-

The IPL 2021 auction is all set to take place on February 18. The BCCI made an official announcement that the mini-auction for the world’s most iconic T20 league will take place in Chennai.

The mini-auction will take place between the Indian series against England starting February 5 while the second Test will be played from February 13 to 17.

There are still speclations that when the mega tournament will start as the tournament didn’t take place in India last year and was shifted to United Arab Emirates later in the month of September.

This year Indian Premier League is all set to start in the home soil itself.

The teams have already released the list of retained and released players before the auctions as February 2 was the last date to release the list.

Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin effective on UK strain of Covid-19: ICMR

By
Jyoti B
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Amidst concerns of the spread of the new COVID strain found in the UK, the Indian Council of Medical Research, which is the apex medical research institute in India, has said that as per a study conducted by them, Covaxin shows a comparable neutralization activity of the vaccinated individuals against the UK strain of the novel coronavirus.

Covaxin is India’s home-grown COVID-19 vaccine produced by Bharat Biotech, in collaboration with ICMR’s National Institute of Virology, Pune. 

A group of researchers from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), National Institute of Virology, Pune and Bharat Biotech performed the plaque reduction neutralisation test (PRNT50) using sera collected from the 26 recipients of BBV152/Covaxin against hCoV-19/India/20203522(UK-variant) and hCoV27 19/India/2020Q111 (heterologous strain).

“A comparable neutralisation activity of sera of the vaccinated individuals showed against UK-variant and the heterologous strain with similar efficiency, dispel the uncertainty of possible neutralisation escape,” says the paper, yet to be certified by peer review.

Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin was under the scanner earlier this year when it was given emergency use authorisation though it had not released any efficacy or phase three data. 

Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) chief Balram Bhargava defended the approval in early January, saying Covaxin was more likely to protect against the UK strain, though there was no publicly released data to support the claim at the time.

1.2 million Kisan fund couldn’t be transferred during lockdown: RTI data

By
Shivani Negi
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The last year probably one of the worst years for people across all walks of life, people not only suffered for their health, lives but with their job and income too. According to a report by department of agriculture, during the lockdown of Covid-19, for the period of March 23 to July 31 2020. When farmers were in desperate need of funds and assistance, approximately 11.2 lakh payment transfers under PM-KISAN scheme failed to reach the bank accounts.

Adding onto this, till late December 2020, nearly 44% of transfers failures were not recified, this was stated in response of query under Right to Information (RTI) by the department of agriculture.
In his RTI query, Venkatesh Nayak of the Commonwealth Human Rights in June 2020 had asked the department under the ministry of agriculture for data on failed transactions concerning the transfer of PM-KISAN payouts to the bank accounts of the beneficiaries.

Under the PM Kisan Yojana, income support of Rs 6,000 per annum is provided to families of eligible farmers – in which a man, wife and minor children are considered a unit – across the country in three equal instalments of Rs 2,000 each every four months.
Nayak stated that that the exact number of how many beneficiaries suffered due to these fund transfer failures is not known or provided as of now.

Reacting to the RTI reply, Nayak said: “At the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, although a large number of poor PM-KISAN beneficiaries successfully received funds during the lockdown period, a considerable number of them may not have received their dues. Almost 44% of the transfer failures remained to be sorted out at the time the CPIO sent the dataset.”
Stating that the latest instalment of PM-KISAN funds was released on December 25, 2020, Nayak said, “It is desirable for RTI activists around the country to probe the phenomena of transfer failures and successful reprocessing by seeking information from the Central and state government agencies and banks responsible for implementing the PM-KISAN Yojana.”

Among all states and union territories, he said Madhya Pradesh accounted for the largest number of failed transactions accounting for 7.29 lakh (64.55% of all), followed by Maharashtra with more than 85,000 transfer failures (7.54% of the total).

The other states which recorded a significant number of failures were Karnataka with over 55,000 (4.94%), Bihar with over 51,000 (4.52%) and Uttar Pradesh with almost 48,000 failures (4.24%).

Together, these five states recorded nearly 86% of all transfer failures during the lockdown period.

Among the union territories, Jammu and Kashmir accounted for almost 97% (6,794) of the total failures with Ladakh reporting the second-highest number of transfer failures at 110.

Sourav Ganguly admitted to hospital again after chest pain

By
Shivani Negi
-

Former Captain of Indian cricket team and current president of Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), Sourav Ganguly, was taken to Apollo Gleneagles Hospital in Kolkata after he complained of chest pain on Wednesday. According to his family members, the former Indian captain was feeling uneasy since Tuesday night.


Recently Sourav had undergone through angioplasty this month in Kolkata’s Woodlands Hospital. He was hopitalised after he suffered a sudden blackout while working out at gym earlier this month, on 2nd January. The doctor attending to him said that he suffered a mild heart attack.


At the time of his discharge, doctors had said that a decision on more stents will be taken later. A nine-member medical board of the Woodlands Hospital had on January 4 concluded that angioplasty on Ganguly’s other two coronary blockages, LAD and OM2, will be done at a later stage.

The latest reports suggest his condition is stable and according to the recent update from the hospital, “There is no change in his parameters since his last hospitalisation and vital parameters are stable,”.
The Kolkata Police created a green corridor for smooth travel from his Behala residence to the hospital off the E M Bypass, authorities at the medical establishment said.

Sasikala Released From Bengaluru Prison

By
Jyoti B
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Former AIADMK General Secretary VK Sasikala was formally released from Bengaluru’s Parappana Agrahara Central Prison on Wednesday, 27 January.

Officials from the prison department arrived at the Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute (Victoria Hospital) on Wednesday morning, where she is undergoing treatment.

She will continue to be at Victoria Hospital for four to five days more, the hospital’s medical superintendent said. A huge crowd of her supporters lined up outside Victoria Hospital, raising slogans in her favour and distributed sweets in celebration.

Earlier in the day, the hospital said Sasikala was “conscious, alert and well oriented”. It said she was stable and comfortable, eating normally and walking with support. Sasikala is asymptomatic, and is being constantly monitored, the bulletin added.

On Monday, Sasikala’s counsel N Raja Senthoor Pandian said, “Legal formalities have been completed. I have asked them (prison authorities) to produce the sentence completion certificate. They have processed it, and tomorrow (Wednesday) they will produce it to the doctor confirming that she has been released from prison.

“The local police station will be informed as well. Once all formalities are taken care of, the prison authorities will remove the protection they have provided her. The Karnataka Police will then decide whether or not to extend her protection,” he said.

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