'The Madhya Pradesh police has booked five persons, including three minors, for posting a Facebook comment on Union agriculture and farmers welfare minister Narendra Singh Tomar mocking the incorrect way in which he was wearing a face mask. All the accused – Ajay Pratap Singh Sikarwar, Aman Singh, and minors AB, XX and YY* – are residents of Jaura village in Morena, which the Union minister represents in the Lok Sabha...'
'It’s the season for politics over train tickets, even as migrant workers across the country are confused, and struggling to reach home. The BJP on Monday claimed that the Indian Railways has subsidised 85% of ticket fare for special trains being run to transport migrant workers. It’s only the remaining 15% that the state governments have to pay, they said. This development comes after Sonia Gandhi, interim-Congress president, earlier in the day said that state units of the Congress party will take care of the train fares which migrants are being forced to pay in many parts of the country.
'The National Investigation Agency on Thursday arrested a former village head from Shopian in South Kashmir in connection with a case registered in January, after suspended Jammu and Kashmir Police Deputy Superintendent Davinder Singh was caught with Hizbul Mujahideen militants, The Tribune reported. Tariq Ahmad Mir had unsuccessfully contested the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections on a Bharatiya Janata Party ticket, according to The Times of India. Mir was involved in providing logistical support to the militants and was in touch with Singh...'
'BJP MLA Suresh Tiwari has reportedly asked people in Deoria district not to purchase vegetables from Muslim vendors. The legislator from the district’s Barhaj constituency was heard making the remarks in a video doing the rounds on social media. “Keep one thing in mind, I am telling everyone openly, no one should purchase vegetables from Muslims,” he told some people, including government officials...'
'Three days after the mob lynching of three men in Palghar, Maharashtra, the emergence of video footage of the brutal attack has given the incident a political colour with Bharatiya Janata Party leaders and Hindutva activists on social media using the fact that the victims were Hindu to allege the killings were part of “appeasement politics”. Late evening on April 16, three persons travelling in a Ford EcoSport were attacked by a group of men in Palghar and killed.
'Last week, Mahesh Degvekar, a 55-year-old school teacher had a vision. Gajanan Maharaj, a 19th century Hindu guru from neighbouring Maharashtra appeared in it, and shared an ayurvedic formula which ''cures'' COVID-19. On Friday afternoon, Degvekar''s story took a serious turn, or a bizarre one, whichever way one looks at it.
'Even as the Prime Minister himself remained silent on the communal hate being spread against Muslims in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic, some from his party continue adding fuel to the fire. In Maharashtra, a BJP MLA has ‘demanded’ that the Indian Army be deployed in Satranjipura, a Muslim-dominated area in Nagpur. East Nagpur BJP MLA Krushna Khopde claimed that “a lot of coronavirus cases” had been reported from that area and the residents were “not cooperating with civic officials and police” towards the containment efforts.
'A 45-year-old teacher who also is a BJP local leader in Kannur has been arrested in Kerala for allegedly sexually abusing his fourth grade student. K Padmarajan's arrest comes almost a month after a complaint was registered with the police via the children's helpline Childline...'
'On rare occasions, the Indian government—which prides itself on visions of universal digital literacy, online services, and biometrical identity schemes—still conducts certain official communications by radiogram. An operator sitting at a radio transmitter taps out a message, and then a receiver spits out the transmission in another part of the country, generating an instant legal document.
'BJP MP Shobha Karandlaje on Monday took to social media to claim that some people from Belagavi, who were quarantined after they attended the Tablighi Jamaat in New Delhi, were misbehaving and spitting at the healthcare workers of the hospital that they were taken to. However, this claim has been denied by Belagavi Deputy Commissioner SB Bommanahalli, who said that the people quarantined in the district were not spitting or misbehaving with health workers...'
