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India Today’s Rahul Kanwal gets trolled by netizens after on-air faux pas about Nagaland

India Today’s Rahul Kanwal is being trolled by netizens on Twitter and other social media platforms after his faux pas about Nagaland, while he was on-air, became viral.

Rahul was on air with Rupin Sharma, Nagaland DGP and author of the book ‘Extradition’, and was discussing the repartition of Mehul Choksi from Dominica. When there was a brief power cut from Sharma’s end to which he had later apologised, Rahul had said, ‘You’re in Nagaland, electricity goes off even in India. Go on.’

This quickly made him controversy’s favourite child, as people from all over the country went ahead to question how someone who was holding a high position in one of the country’s most famous news platforms could make this blunder.

BJP’s Mizoram spokesperson Mmhonlumo Kikon tweeted about this, saying, “We need to invite @rahulkanwal to Nagaland very soon! We need major geography class for major media professionals too! What say @payalmehta100 @AdityaRajKaul @Karma_Paljor??,” to which Rahul had replied saying, “This was a slip of tongue. My apologies. Was meaning to say Delhi. My bad.” This apology did not do much to pacify those who were offended by the faux pas, and invoked a lot of comments against him online.

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Woman in Andhra thought to be dead pulls a surprise

The incident in which a woman who was thought to be dead due to COVID and then was later found to have been buried alive in Andhra Pradesh has come as a shock. It is to be noted that, a little while after she was buried, she had managed to come back, scaring the daylights out of her kin and those nearby.

Girijamma of Christianpet in Andhra Pradesh was admitted to Vijayawada Government Hospital on May 12 due to a severe case of coronavirus infection and was thought to have died on May 15. A body was handed over to relatives from the hospital.

Meanwhile, Girijamma’s son Ramesh had died earlier that month due to coronavirus. Relatives had thought that both the mother and son have died. However, 10 days after the funeral, when a special prayer meeting was being held at Girijamma’s house, everyone was shocked to find Girijamma alive.

Further investigation into this issue revealed that the body of another man, who died due to hospital negligence, was returned to her relatives and that it was his body that was buried, while Girijamma was fully alive and was undergoing treatment at the same hospital. An inquiry is underway as to find out how the body was mismatched.

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Reliance Industries and US chip-making giant Qualcomm to collaborate for developing critical 5G equipment

India’s leading telecommunication company, Reliance Industries led Jio Platforms and US chip-making giant Qualcomm have collaborated to manufacture critical 5G equipment in India, Economic Times has reported.

Qualcomm had invested $97 million in Jio last year and these 5G equipment will help catalyse the 5G ecosystem in India. Both companies has envisioned a partnership to develop open and interoperable interface compliant architecture-based 5G solutions with a virtualised RAN.

The Jio-Qualcomm partnership had achieved a speed of over 1 Gbps on Jio 5G via Qualcomm’s RAN Platforms.

Reliance has proved to be the most formidable rival for China and it has already completed the testing of its 5G radio and core solutions and is now preparing for a 5G field trial after having received a trial spectrum from Department of Telecommunications.

“India is at the forefront of the global digital revolution. Jio is accelerating the rollout of digital platforms and indigenously developed next-generation 5G stack, making it affordable and available everywhere,” RIL had said in its annual report.

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BJP MLA from Karnataka wins hearts by performing last rites for 566 people

Karnataka State Revenue Minister Ashoka’s selfless act towards performing the last rites of 566 COVID victims has been hailed by all. Since this is something that even the relatives of the victims were hesitant to perform, this has taken everyone by surprise.

In various states in India, relatives refused to bury or cremate the bodies of corona patients and left them in hospitals has caused a lot of distress and shock to the rest of the country. Acknowledging this issue,  R Ashoka, Karnataka’s Revenue Minister, had promised to cremate the bodies of more than a thousand people in Karnataka who were left unattended by relatives due to fear of COVID. He then went on to set up a 12-member committee headed by Swami Banu Prakash Sharma.

The minister, who performed the funeral rites as he had promised, posted on his Twitter page that he was satisfied with the funeral rites for the souls of the dead to be blessed. The tweet went on to read, “I would like to request all the political leaders to respectfully dispose of such unattended corpses in their district. The ashes of these 566 people have been immersed in the holy Kaveri. I have also instructed the Deputy Commissioners to conduct funeral rites in all the districts if the bodies are not claimed by the relatives.”

The minister said that when they tried to return their remains of the victims to their relatives, which had been cremated in government cemeteries by the corona, they had not accepted the invitation or had switched off their mobile phones. Therefore, he had come forward to dissolve the remains of 566 people in the Kaveri and perform the funeral rites.

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Indian Army renovates ancient Shiva Temple in Gulmarg, now open to public

The Indian Army renovated an ancient Shiva Temple in Jammu and Kashmir’s Gulmarg which has now been opened for the public. This temple is said to be constructed in 1915 by Maharani Mohini Bai Sisodia, wife of the erstwhile Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir Hari Singh. This temple is also famous for being featured in ‘Jai Jai Shivshankar’, a famous Bollywood song from the movie ‘Aap Ki Kasam’.

“The Army battalion at Gulmarg, with the help of locals repaired the structure of the Shiv temple, Gulmarg. The landscape and pathways leading to the temple were also redesigned and rebuilt,” an Army official said.

“It’s known to everyone that Kashmir is a paradise on earth but the real beauty of Kashmir is its people and the massage to the world is of Kashmiriyat and brotherhood if we see around us here we will find a Gurudwara a church a mosque and a temple this is real Kashmiriyat this temple is taken care by a Muslim from last 30 years which is a big example of Kashmiriyat and an inspiration for all,” he added.

The Kashmiri heritage has always been portrayed in an Islam-centric manner, and so, the restoration of this Shiva temple is particularly significant.

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Timely intervention by UP CM Yogi Adityanath stops Hindu exodus from Noorpur village

Yogi Adityanath UP

As the reality of demographic imbalance across India is now becoming a reality, in the state of Uttar Pradesh there has been an exodus of Hindus from the Noorpur village in Aligarh district that has gone viral on social media platforms.

However, the Yogi Adityanath administration quickly set things in motion and has lodged a complaint against 11 perpetrators who at present are absconding.

As per a report published in Amar Ujala, the minority community also tried to lodge the complaint but could not get through the authorities.

On 2 June afternoon, Aligarh MP Satish Gautam, Hathras, MP Rajveer Diler, and Khair MLA Anoop Pradhan reached the village to take stock of the situation. 

“Some families had said that they can no longer reside in the village. The SDM and the Police CO have visited the village & now the situation in normal there,” Aligarh SP (Rural) Shubham Patel was quoted as saying.

It all started on 26 May when a wedding procession was passing and as reports by TFI, a villager named Omprakash and his daughters were stopped when passing through the village near the mosque.

Immediately some of the Muslims living in that area started pelting stones on the procession and Omprakash who had also sustained injuries said, “We were intercepted by people from the minority community; they objected to the procession. Our community has faced oppression on many occasions — they try and stop our wedding processions. When we tried to reason, they attacked and beat us. It was humiliating to face this on my daughter’s wedding day. I also received injuries,”.

As the problem escalated, the Muslim community forced Hindus who are mostly Dalits to put up ‘House for Sale’ boards in front of their homes and there are other media reports wherein the Muslim community also pressurize the Hindus to convert to Islam.

However, thanks to the Yogi Adityanath government that has a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to appeasement, decisive action was taken. The hard task of rehabilitating the displaced Hindus is in motion while also ensuring no further communal incident happens in the future.

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Nagercoil BJP MLA M.R. Gandhi visits Mandaikadu Bhagavathi Amman Temple following fire accident

M.R. Gandhi, BJP MLA from Nagercoil visited the world famous Mandaikadu Bhagavathi Amman Temple where a fire broke out on Wednesday (June 2) morning.

According to reports, the the fire must have broke out at around 06:40 AM after the gurukals performed the daily poojas and came out of the sanctum sanctorum. Preliminary enquiries revealed that some silk saris kept in front of the sanctum sanctorum caught fire which spread to some parts of the ceiling. They had seen smoke coming through the roof above and attempted to douse the fire. Later, the Colachel fire station was informed and fire personnel arrived at the spot to put out the fire.

BJP MLA M.R. Gandhi immediately rushed to the spot to take stock of the situation. Later in the day BJP Tamil Nadu President Dr. L. Murugan issued a statement calling for taking strict action against the temple officials for their negligence and poor maintenance of the temple. He also said that the temple renovation should be done in such a way that its antiquity is not lost.

On June 3, the BJP Tamil Nadu President visited the temple along with M.R. Gandhi MLA to assess the damages to the temple. BJP MLA from Tirunelveli Nainar Nagendiran also accompanied.

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Centre takes steps to accelerate domestic vaccine production

India J&J vaccine Quad COVID-19 patent waiver

With the aim of vaccinating the entire eligible population at the earliest, domestic vaccine production is being steadily ramped up in the country with help from the Centre.

As part of this initiative, three public enterprises are being supported by  the Department of Biotechnology under Atmanirbhar Bharat 3.0  Mission Covid Suraksha.  These enterprises are Haffkine Biopharmaceutical Corporation Ltd, Mumbai, Indian Immunologicals Ltd, Hyderabad and Bharat Immunologicals & Biologicals Ltd, Bulandshahar, UP.

Haffkine Biopharma, a Maharashtra state PSU is getting ready to manufacture Covaxin vaccine under technology transfer arrangement with Bharat Biotech Ltd, Hyderabad.  The production will take place at the Parel complex of the company.

Dr. Sandeep Rathod, Managing Director of Haffkine BioPharma said the company proposes to produce 22.8 crore doses of Covaxin in a year.  “For undertaking production of Covaxin, Haffkine Biopharma has been provided with Rs 65 crore grant by the Centre and Rs 94 crore from the Government of Maharashtra” he added.

“We have been given a timeline of eight months and the work is being executed on a war footing. The vaccine production process involves two stages – drug substance and final drug product.  For production of drug substance we need to build a Bio Safety Level 3 (BSL 3) facility, while Haffkine already has the Fill Finish facility” said Rathod, the doctor turned IAS officer.  BSL 3 is a safety standard applicable to such facilities where work involves microbes which can cause serious disease via inhalation route.

‘Enhancing vaccine production capacity using Public sectors assets will go a long way in building production capacity of vaccines in our country to support the massive vaccination drive” said, Dr Renu Swarup,  Secretary Department of Biotechnology and Chairperson BIRAC (Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council )

Haffkine BioPharmaceutical Corporation Ltd is an offshoot of the 122 year old Haffkine Institute, which is one of the oldest biomedical research institutes in the country, named after the Russian  bacteriologist Dr. Waldemar Haffkine, who invented the plague vaccine.

(Published from PIB)

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Jharkhand, Odisha and Gujarat are top 3 contributors to Oxygen Express deliveries

Oxygen Express Karnataka

Overcoming all hurdles and finding new solutions, Indian Railways is continuing its journey of bringing relief by delivering Liquid Medical Oxygen(LMO) to various states across the country. So far, Indian Railways has delivered more than 23741 MT of LMO in more than 1405 tankers to various states across the country.

It may be noted that 344 Oxygen Expresses have completed their journey so far and brought relief to various States.

As on date, Oxygen Expresses loaded 8025 MT LMO from Jharkhand, 7102 MT from Odisha, 6384 MT from Gujarat, 1360 from West Bengal, 488 MT from Maharashtra, 218 MT from Chhattisgarh and 164 MT from Andhra Pradesh for delivery across the country.

Criss crossing the country, Indian Railways is picking up oxygen from places like Hapa , Baroda, Mundra in the West and Rourkela, Durgapur, Tatanagar, Angul in the East and then delivering it to States of Uttarakhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Telangana, Punjab, Kerala, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh & Assam in complex operational route planning scenarios.

Till the time of this release, 6 loaded Oxygen Expresses on run with more than 420 MT of LMO in 22 tankers.

Southern States of Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Telangana received more than 2000 MT of Liquid Medical Oxygen(LMO) each from Oxygen Expresses.

It is worth mentioning that Oxygen Expresses started their deliveries 39 days back on 24th April in Maharashtra with a load of 126 MT.

It is Indian Railways endeavour to deliver as much LMO as possible in the shortest time possible to the requesting states.

Oxygen relief by Oxygen Expresses reached out to 15 states namely Uttarakhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Telangana, Punjab, Kerala, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and Assam.

Till the time of this release, 614 MT of Oxygen has been offloaded in Maharashtra, nearly 3797 MT in Uttar Pradesh, 656 MT in Madhya Pradesh, 5692 MT in Delhi, 2135 MT in Haryana, 98 MT in Rajasthan, 2674 MT in Karnataka, 320 MT in Uttarakhand, 2348 MT in Tamil Nadu, 2279 MT in Andhra Pradesh, 225 MT in Punjab, 513 MT in Kerala, 2026 MT in Telangana, 38 MT in Jharkhand and 320 MT in Assam.

Till now Oxygen Expresses offloaded LMO in around 39 cities/towns in 15 states across the country namely Lucknow, Varanasi, Kanpur, Bareilly, Gorakhpur & Agra in Uttar Pradesh, Sagar, Jabalpur, Katni & Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh, Nagpur, Nashik, Pune, Mumbai & Solapur in Maharashtra, Hyderabad in Telangana, Faridabad & Gurugram in Haryana, Tuglakabad, Delhi Cantt & Okhla in Delhi, Kota & Kanakpara in Rajasthan, Bengaluru in Karnataka, Dehradun in Uttarakhand, Nellore, Guntur, Tadipatri & Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh, Ernakulam in Kerala, Tiruvallur, Chennai, Tuticorin, Coimbatore & Madurai in Tamil Nadu, Bhatinda & Phillaur in Punjab, Kamrup in Assam and Ranchi in Jharkhand.

Indian Railways has mapped different routes with Oxygen supply locations and keeps itself ready with any emerging need of the States. States provide tankers to the Indian Railways for bringing LMO.

In order to ensure that Oxygen relief reaches in the fastest time possible, Railways is creating new standards and unprecedented benchmarks in running of Oxygen Express Freight Trains. The average speed of these critical Freight trains is way above 55 in most cases over long distances. Running on high priority Green Corridor, with a highest sense of urgency, operational teams of various zones are working round the clock in most challenging circumstances to ensure that Oxygen reaches in fastest possible time frame. Technical stoppages have been reduced to 1 minute for crew changes over different sections.

Tracks are kept open and high alertness is maintained to ensure that Oxygen Express keeps zipping through.

All this is done in a manner that speed of other Freight Operation doesn’t get reduced as well.

Running of new Oxygen is a very dynamic exercise and figures keep getting updated all the time. More loaded Oxygen Expresses are expected to start their journeys later in the night.

(Published from PIB)

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Dharumai Adheenam donates oxygen concentrator to Thiruvaiyaru Government Hospital

The Dharmapuram Adheenam, one of the 18 Saivite Mutts in Tamil Nadu has donated two oxygen concentrator to the Government Hospital at Thiruvaiyaru in Thanjavur district.

The two oxygen concentrators worth ₹2 lakhs has been donated to the Thiruvaiyaru Government Hospital where those affected by the Wuhan virus have been getting treatment.

The oxygen concentrators were presented by the 27th mutt head of Dharumapuram Adheenam, Srila Sri Masilamani Desika Gnanasambandha Paramacharya Swamigal to the Chief Doctor of Thiruvaiyaru Hospital Mr. Naganathan

The Dharumai Adheenam had earlier set up a 100 bed COVID care centre at one of its college in Mayiladuthurai. The chief pontiff also donated ₹11 lakhs on behalf of the Adheenam towards the Chief Minister Relief Fund.

Apart from this, the Adheenam has also been providing Kabasura Kudineer (a herbal concoction) to more than 2000 people living in the villages of the region.

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