At least 36 people were killed and over 40 others injured in east China’s Shanghai city during New Year’s eve celebrations.
While 35 people died in the stampede late Wednesday, another person died Thursday afternoon, authorities said.
Seven of the injured have checked out of the hospital. Among the 40 remaining in treatment, 13 are seriously injured, the municipal government said.
Experts have identified one of the two bodies fished out from the Java Sea site where the AirAsia plane went down with 162 on board Sunday, saying Thursday they would hand it over to her family soon.
Budiono, head of the Disaster Victim Identification (DVI), said that one of the two bodies was successfully identified to be an Indonesian woman named Hayati Lutfiah Hamid from East Java province, Xinhua reported.
DoNER Minister Jitendra Singh will Friday meet the governors and the chief ministers of all eight northeastern states here to brainstorm on a roadmap for the development of the region.
This would be the first meeting of the minister for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) with the chief ministers of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Tripura, Nagaland, Manipur and Sikkim.
External Affairs Minister (EAM) Sushma Swaraj on Thursday reviewed preparations of the upcoming Pravasi Bhartiya Divas in Gujarat, marking the 100th anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi’s return to India.
“This is Mahatma Gandhi’s 100th year when he returned from South Africa to India that’s why we are doing centenary celebrations. It’s being done on a large scale in Gujarat. I have come here to review its preparations and I will again come on January 5. All the preparations are going on very well,” said Swaraj.
IAS officer Sutirtha Bhattacharya will take charge of Coal India Ltd. as chairman and managing director Jan 5, a company official said Thursday.
Bhattacharya has been relieved of his duties as the chairman and managing director of the state-run Singareni Collieries Co. Ltd. in Telengana with immediate effect.
N. Sridhar, a 1997 batch IAS officer, is poised to take charge of the company.
The coal ministry’s additional secretary, A.K. Dubey, is now the acting head of Coal India after its head, S. Narsing Rao, resigned in May 2014 to join the Telangana government.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said he was delighted to introduce the NITI Aayog, which will emerge as an active and important institution in India’s development journey.
“Delighted to introduce NITI (National Institution for Transforming India) Aayog. It will provide key inputs on various policy matters. NITI Aayog will emerge as an active and important institution that will play a pivotal role in India’s development journey in the years to come,” Prime Minister Modi tweeted.
With the arrival of 2015, actor Varun Dhawan has stressed attainment of gender equality and has urged his fans to respect women.
The son of director David Dhawan took to micro-blogging site Twitter to share his views.
“In 2015 if you follow me or even like me a little promise to not objectify women and disrespect them treat them as people,” he tweeted Thursday.
The actor welcomed 2015 in Las Vegas and wrote: “2015 is here the future is about to be cracked open #vegas” along with a photograph.
Asserting that people of India had the right to know about mystery behind the disappearance of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, the Left Front has urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to declassify secret files relating to the nationalist leader.
Front chairman Biman Bose, in a letter to Modi, has also called for official declaration of Jan 23 – Netaji’s birthday – as “Desh Prem Divas”. He also wrote separately to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee requesting the West Bengal government to follow suit.
The Ministry of Urban Development on Thursday approved the conversion to freehold of 23 Nazul Estates, whose term leases have expired, in the national capital.
As per the directives by Union Ministry for Urban Development Venkaiah Naidu, the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) will facilitate the conversion to freehold against payment of about Rs two lakhs per 100 square meter plot, depending on the number of years since the term leases have expired.
Pakistan’s Foreign Office has confirmed an exchange of prisoners list with India.
Foreign Office spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam said that Pakistan and India had exchanged lists of prisoners under the consular access agreement between the two countries.
Aslam confirmed that 526 Indian prisoners, including 476 fishermen and 50 other civilians, were in the custody of the Pakistani authorities.
She, however, said that the Indian list of 385 Pakistani prisoners was at variance with records in Pakistan.
President Pranab Mukherjee received greetings from all walks of life on the occasion of New Year at the Rashtrapati Bhavan here on Thursday.
He also received greetings from the officials of the Rashtrapati Bhavan .
In his message, President Mukherjee today urged the people to dedicate the New Year to create an inclusive society and promote tolerance and understanding among all communities. He said development must reach the poor and under privileged of the country.
The Haryana Police on Thursday recovered four charred dead bodies from a car near a village in Bhadugarh city of Jhajjar District.
“At around 10 a.m. we got information that a burning car has been found near a farm in Sidhipur village. We reached the spot and from the car number we traced that it belonged to Delhi. There were four boys in a Toyota Etios Liva car, their parents were called who later confirmed that the car belongs to their children,” said Station House Officer (SHO) Vijender Singh.
At least 17 low floor air-conditioned buses of Delhi Transport Corporation caught fire at the Ambedkar Nagar depot in South Delhi here on Thursday.
Nobody was reported injured in the fire which began in the wee hours of the morning.
As per reports, 11 fire tenders were rushed to the spot immediately.
An inquiry has been ordered into the incident as the cause of the fire is yet to be ascertained. (ANI)
At least 25 Syrian soldiers were killed and dozens of others wounded Wednesday in clashes with extremist groups in the eastern suburb of the capital Damascus, a monitoring group reported Thursday.
The soldiers were killed in intense battles with the Al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front and similar groups in the eastern suburb of Jobar, a main rebel stronghold, about two km from the eastern gate of the ancient walled city of Damascus, Xinhua reported citing the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists on the ground.
Firing salvos at Pakistan for the latest ceasefire violation at border outposts, Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar on Thursday said the neigbouring state doesn’t seem to learn lessons.
“We are surrounded in the northern part of the country by two neighbours who are not very comfortable. Pakistan does not like to stay quiet even on New Year’s Day. That is why they fired from across the border at 12.30 am. That nation doesn’t seem to learn lessons,” Parrikar said while addressing a rally here.
Australian vice-captain Haddin said Thursday Australia had “earned the right” to take no risk in the drawn Third Test and sew up the Border-Gavaskar series – defending skipper Steven Smith’s tactics at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).
Smith decided to bat till lunch on the fifth day despite building up a sizable lead, giving his bowlers only 70 bowlers to dismiss India. The Mahendra Singh Dhoni-led visitors were reduced to 142 for six in 55 overs. India then improved to 174 for six in 66 overs when the young Australian skipper accepted the draw.
Telangana and Andhra Pradesh Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan has made certain suggestions to resolve the row between the two states over the issue of conducting the common entrance test for engineering and other professional courses.
He told reporters Thursday that he has given some options to the two states. “I am waiting for official report from them,” he said.
The governor had summoned the education ministers of the two states a couple of days ago and made the suggestions to resolve the issue.
The Nigerian army has restated its determination to bring the ongoing counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism operations to a speedy and decisive end.
New strategies have been introduced in the ongoing war after formations and units involved were evaluated, and have impacted positively on the counter-insurgency operations in the country’s northeast, Director of Nigerian Army Public Relations Brig. Gen. Olajide Laleye told reporters in Abuja, the Nigerian capital, Wednesday, Xinhua reported.
Swedish police were hunting today for at least one suspect following what is believed to be the third arson attack on a mosque in a week.
“Someone threw a firebomb, a Molotov cocktail at the building,” Torsten Hemlin a spokesman for Uppsala police told Swedish news agency TT, adding that the bomb did not set the mosque in eastern Sweden alight.
“They also wrote some vulgar racist words,” he said, adding that no one was in the building at the time of the attack.
The Palestinians faced a fresh diplomatic battle today after taking steps to join the International Criminal Court in a move strongly condemned by both Washington and Israel.
The dramatic move to join the Hague-based court, which could pave the way for the Palestinians to sue Israeli officials over war crimes, came less than 24 hours after the UN Security Council rejected a resolution seeking to set a deadline for ending the occupation.
Four policemen were killed and two injured Thursday in a roadside bomb attack in Yemen’s southeastern Hadramout province, Xinhua reported.
A mine planted by suspected Al Qaeda elements struck a police vehicle on the main road in Shibam town, leaving four policemen dead, the official said.
Two bombs were discovered from the same area earlier in the day. Hadramout has seen a series of attacks by Al Qaeda against security forces.
The Rama Devi Autonomous Women’s College here is set to be the first women’s university in Odisha.
The central government has approved the state government’s proposal to grant university status to the college.
The women’s college now functions under Utkal University, Odisha Higher Education Minister Pradeep Kumar Panigrahy told the media Thursday.
(IANS)
Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi today claimed that Congress would get majority in the state if Assembly elections are held this year.
“We’ll get majority if Assembly elections are held this year as people can see that the BJP has already made an U-turn from all the promises they had made before the Lok Sabha polls this year,” Gogoi said during an interaction with reporters here at his residence.
RJD chief Lalu Prasad celebrated New Year’s Day in his inimitable style when he gifted a red rose to his wife and former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi.
“I gifted a red rose to Rabri to express my love for her in the new year,” Lalu Prasad told the media here.
Hundreds of Rashtriya Janata Dal workers greeted Lalu Prasad and wished him good health. The former chief minister underwent a heart surgery in August.
Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi also visited Lalu Prasad, and both of them told the media that 2015 will be a challenging year for secularism in the state.
A South Korean man drowned early Thursday when 60 people jumped into a river celebrating the New Year in Osaka in Japan, police said.
More than 6,000 people gathered around the Dotonbori area in downtown Osaka to celebrate the New Year. Shortly after midnight, about 60 men and women jumped into the river from a bridge, Xinhua said.
Most climbed onto the shore soon by themselves but a young man was rescued and died hours later in hospital. The 18-year-old had a South Korean passport.
(IANS)