India

New Delhi, Jan 16 (IANS) The Supreme Court on Monday held that default bail granted to an accused can be cancelled on merits -- if a strong case is made out on filing of a charge sheet -- as there cannot be a premium on lethargic probe.

A bench headed by Justice M.R. Shah directed the Telangana High Court to consider on merits the CBI's plea for cancellation of bail to Erra Gangi Reddy in connection with the murder of former Andhra Pradesh minister Y.S. Vivekananda Reddy, uncle of Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy. He was found murdered at his residence in Pulivendula on March 15, 2019.

The bench, also comprising Justice C.T. Ravikumar, noted that mere non-filing of the charge sheet (within the deadline) will not be enough when a strong case is made out against the accused. The top court remanded that matter back to the high court to consider it afresh in accordance with law and on merits.

The top court observed that the high court judgment -- which held that default bail cannot be cancelled on merits -- would give a premium to the lethargy of investigating agencies.

The top court was considering whether bail can be cancelled after presentation of the charge sheet, when the bail was granted for not filing the charge sheet within 90 days.

The bench noted that mere filing of charge sheet will not result in cancellation unless a strong case is made out that the accused has committed a non bailable offence. The detailed judgment in the matter will be uploaded later.

--IANS
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New Delhi, Jan 14 (IANS) A team of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Saturday visited the office of Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia in connection with the Delhi excise policy case.

While Sisodia claimed that the CBI raided his office, the central probe agency denied the claim.

A top CBI official said on condition of anonymity that it was only a search operation related to the excise policy case.

"Today again the CBI has reached my office. They are welcome. They raided my house, my office, searched my locker, even conducted an investigation in my village. Nothing has been found against me and nothing will be found, because I have not done anything wrong. I've sincerely worked for the education of the children in Delhi," Sisodia tweeted in Hindi.

In November last year, the CBI had filed a charge-sheet in connection with the alleged liquor policy scam, but it did not name Sisodia in it, though he was named in the FIR filed earlier in the matter.

--IANS
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Srinagar, Jan 14 (IANS) An avalanche hit Tulail area of Gurez in J&K's Bandipora district on Saturday.

Officials said that the avalanche hit Jurniyal village but no damage has been reported.

People in Gurez and adjoining areas have been advised by the administration to remain cautious and not to venture out on slopes, hilly areas, or avalanche prone areas till the weather improves.

Two labourers were killed on Friday after an avalanche hit Sarbal area of Sonamarg in Ganderbal district.

-- IANS
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Visakhapatnam, Jan 14 (IANS) Dense fog around Visakhapatnam airport affected flight operations on Saturday morning.

Flights coming from Bangalore and Delhi were diverted to Hyderabad due to poor visibility because of heavy fog at the airport in the port city.

A few flights scheduled to take off from Visakhapatnam to other destinations were also delayed.

Akasa Air's flight from Bangalore and Air Asia flight from Delhi were diverted to Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamshabad.

As the conditions improved after 10 a.m., the flights were called back. Subsequently, all flights took off and landed as scheduled.

Dense fog enveloped the port city and other parts of Visakhapatnam district. Road users also faced difficulty due to poor visibility

--IANS
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Kolkata, Jan 10 (IANS) Based on intelligence inputs, the cops of Golabari Police station in Kolkata, adjacent Howrah district, have arrested nine illegal Bangladeshi immigrants from near Howrah station late on Monday night. A local Indian agent was also arrested.

District police sources said that they received information that these nine illegal Bangladeshi immigrants arrived at Howrah with the intention of settling there. Accordingly, the cops of the Golabari Police station started keeping a watch in the areas adjacent to Howrah station.

During that screening process they noticed two cars. They stopped the cars and demanded identity proof from the commuters. After that, it was revealed that nine of the ten passengers were illegal Bangladeshi residents, of which six were men and three were women. They have been booked under various sections of the Foreigners Act, 1946.

District police source said that none of them had proper documents to come to India and the local agent arrested along with them helped in crossing the border illegally.

"Preliminary investigation has revealed that they were basically economic immigrants and the local agent arrested was supposed to take them to Bangalore for employment," a district police official said.

They are being interrogated now to ascertain how they illegally crossed the border, especially the area through which they infiltrated. They will be presented at a lower court in Howrah district on Tuesday. The police as per rules will be informing the matter to the Bangladesh Deputy High Commission in Kolkata.

--IANS
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Ambala, Jan 10 (IANS) Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will visit the Golden Temple in Amritsar on Tuesday before the Bharat Jodo Yatra (BJY) enters Punjab on Wednesday.

Taking to Twitter, Jairam Ramesh, the party's General Secretary said: "Day 116 — Bharat Jodo Yatra finishes Haryana leg in Ambala now. 2mrw morning is Punjab leg. There can be no better way to begin that than with a pilgrimage to holiest Golden Temple in Amritsar. There'll be no padyatra this afternoon so that Rahul Gandhi can pay his respects there."

After Punjab, the mega walkathon is scheduled to enter Jammu and Kashmir on January 20 after a brief halt for a day in Himachal Pradesh.

The yatra will end on January 30 in Srinagar with hoisting of the Tricolour.

--IANS
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Greater Noida, Jan 10 (IANS) A forest department team continued with its search operation after a leopard was spotted in Greater Noida's residential colony.

The search operation has been going on since January 3 when the leopard was first spotted.

The Forest Department team has used various state-of-the-art machines and tried indigenous remedies to catch the elusive big cat.

The leopard has been repeatedly spotted in the under-construction building.

The Forest department team and other special teams of the surrounding districts are also continuously trying to catch the leopard, but have failed to catch the animal.

The team sprayed lime at various places on the under-construction site so that they could record the movement of the leopard.

Apart from this, CCTV cameras and other cameras have also been installed at many places.

According to the information received, evidence of the leopard coming and staying in the under-construction society have been found by the officials of the forest department.

Sources have told IANS that the leopard has been coming to the under-construction building for the past several days. The leopard has made it a 'temporary home' here in a way and also lives in the surrounding ridge area.

Even though the forest department team is not saying this openly, they have got the evidence and are investigating accordingly.

The leopard sighting has triggered panic among the residents living in the surrounding societies.

Trap cages with goats as bait have been deployed and the forest department has been continuously monitoring the area.

--IANS
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Amroha (Uttar Pradesh), Jan 10 (IANS) The body of an 11-year-old boy was recovered from a temple premises in Tigri village here.

According to police sources, the body has some injury marks, but since it is stiff it is possible that the boy could have been killed some time ago and the body thrown away later. There are no signs of sexual assault.

Amroha Superintendent of Police Aditya Langeh said, "The deceased has been identified as Rahul Prajapati, a Class 5 student who was missing from Friday. His family had filed a complaint at the Gajraula police station in the area.

Family members, who were searching for him, found his body in a temple premises, 500 yards away from his house."

He further said, "We have sent his body to the district hospital for autopsy. His viscera has been preserved and is being sent to the laboratory for testing. We have formed two police teams to crack down the case."

One person has been detained and is being questioned.

--IANS
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Bhopal, Jan 10 (IANS) The Madhya Pradesh government hosted India's 17th 'Pravasi Bharatiya Diwas', which was attended by hundreds of representatives from several foreign countries and the Indian diaspora, was addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Indore on Monday.

Modi addressed the gathering of NRIs and the representatives of business firms, appealing them to understand the values of India in depth and spread in the countries they were living.

The Prime Minister asserted that "for me, all Indian-origin citizen and their families living in all over the world are brand ambassadors of India".

Hundreds of NRIs and people associated with business firms had arrived in Indore since the last two days while many reached on Monday as well. They wanted to attend the gathering to listen to Modi at the venue. However, many of them were disappointed due to shortage of space at the venue.

Some of those allegedly denied entry in for the inaugural season at the venue (as they claimed), were seen expressing their disappointment and questioning the arrangements.

Due to lack of space inside the hall, they were told by the staff that they should listen Prime Minister Modi's address on TV or watch it on phone through a live video link.

"If we had to watch Modiji speak on TV or phone only, why did we fly so far from the US to Indore," said a fuming Julie Jain from the US.

"We came all the way from the US to hear Prime Minister Modi address the Indian diaspora, but once at the entry of the venue of the inaugural session at 8.30 a.m. (around two hours before the PM actually arrived), we were told by the on-duty staff, that the space inside was full. We were invited guests, who had registered in advance for this main event," she added.

Veena Singh, who arrived from the UK, too, remained dejected on failing to get an entry inside.

"We were here to listen to Modiji from as close as possible and arrived by 9 a.m, still we were denied entry into the venue of the inaugural session. Is this actual 'Atithi Devo Bhava'?"

Prashant Singh, an overseas Indian from Jamaica, too, was peeved over failing to get entry to hear Prime Minister Modi speak.

"It wasn't me only, but ministers from Jamaica, who weren't allowed entry inside. If you can't even manage 3000 guests, then how can you even dream of becoming a superpower. Overseas Indian guests have been waiting outside, while officials of the government were sitting inside."

Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, however, apologised and tried to pacify the angry guests while addressing the occasion in the presence on Prime MInister Modi, several Union Ministers and the Governor Mangubhai C. Patel along with his cabinet ministers.

Shivraj Singh said, "The hall might have fallen short of space, but there is boundless love and respect for you in my heart."

Talking to IANS, officials claimed the delegates were clearly told in advance about 8 a.m. being the deadline for entry into the venue of PM's programme, but still many arrived late.

--IANS
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New Delhi, Jan 9 (IANS) With the AAP and BJP slugging it out for the Delhi Mayor's post, the AAP is expecting the support of the Congress, which has nine councillors, but Congress leaders do not trust it after the 2013 experience.

In 2013, the party supported the AAP to form the government in Delhi - despite opposition from outgoing Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit but the Arvind Kejriwal-led party junked the Congress after 49 days and in subsequent elections, the Congress has been decimated. Presently, the Congress has neither an MLA nor an MP in Delhi.

Congress ex-MLAA Anil Bhardwaj said: "The ruckus witnessed at the Civic Centre when the Mayoral election was set to take place was very shameful as both the BJP and Aam Aadmi Party councillors betrayed the confidence of the people to indulge in hooliganism and undermine democratic norms in the greed for power."

He said that the Congress councillors were committed to take up the issues of the people, and find solutions to the problems, and not for personal power and glory. He said that it was surprising that the AAP, with a voting strength of over 150, was rattled, making unsubstantiated allegations agains the Congress and trying to threaten the Congress councillors.

He said that it was a matter of serious concern that how the BJP and the Aam Aadmi Party councillors turned the oath-taking ceremony of the newly-elected Municipal Councillors and elections to the Mayor, Deputy Mayor and the Standing Committee members a shameful wrestling bout in the presence of MPs and MLAs of the BJP and the AAP.

The Congress alleged that the BJP and the AAP indulged in rowdy behavior not for addressing the issues of the people, but for capturing power in the MCD, which has exposed the real intentions of these parties.

It said that it will continue to protest against the anti-people policies of the BJP and the AAP as its mandate was to protect and serve the interests of the people and "not to endorse the power games and divisive misrule" of both these parties.

--IANS
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