Union Minister Piyush Goyal on Saturday said that the central government plans to introduce electric vehicles (EVs) on a mass scale within the next three years.

The Minister of State (Independent Charge) Power, Coal, New and Renewable Energy, and Mines was speaking at the 2017 annual session of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here. 

According to the minister, the move will support the central government's efforts to phase out petrol and diesel cars by 2030. 

Goyal elaborated that for mass introduction of EVs, the central government will build charging infrastructure and start battery swapping programmes.

On the central government's UDAY scheme, the minister pointed out that it is "not only about financial re-engineering of discoms but also inculcating financial discipline". The scheme he explained will work by capping lending to inefficient discoms. 

The minister asserted that the scheme has "zero financial implications" on the central government with "no subsidies or write-offs to discoms".

Speaking at the session on 'Changing Energy Economics and India', Goyal stated that 100 GW (giga watts) of "stranded and stressed assets" have been revived through policy reforms and resource mobilisation. 

The minister disclosed that electric power demand in the country has increased by 6.5 per cent during the last fiscal, even as "India became power surplus for the first time".

Goyal revealed that India has seen a 370 per cent growth in renewable-based generation capacity in the past three years. 

The minister added that well-organised and transparent competitive bidding processes have driven tariffs for solar and wind below Rs 3 per unit and that the central government's aim is to ensure electric power is supplied at Rs 3 per unit irrespective of source in the medium term.

In a tragic incident, popular model-actress Sonika Chauhan died while actor Vikram Chatterjee suffered serious injuries when the car in which they were travelling crashed into a pavement early Saturday morning in south Kolkata.

According to police, the Toyota SUV was being driven by Vikram, reportedly at a high speed when the accident took place. 

“In a bid to avoid crashing into an approaching vehicle, the Toyota SUV lost control and rammed into the pavement and turned on its side,” a police officer said.

The accident took place around 4.30 am near Rashbehari Avenue crossing and reportedly the car's airbags failed to open, sources said.

Vikam and Sonika, who were on the driver's and passenger seat were extracted out of the mangled car and rushed to a hospital by locals.

While Sonika was declared “brought dead”, Vikram is recovering from grave injuries on his head and legs, the sources added.

Sonika has also been hosting a prime time show on a national channel.

(With inputs from agencies)

Days after Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee hinted that some Tripura party leaders went to New Delhi to meet central BJP leaders, a Trinamool MLA on Saturday declared that they would not join the saffron party but were instead keen to build an "anti-Left maha jot" or grand alliance to oust the ruling Left in Tripura.

"We would not join BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party). We are seriously keen to build an "anti-Left maha jot" to oust the ruling Left Front in Tripura in next year's assembly elections," Trinamool Congress (TMC) main leader in Tripura, Sudip Roy Barman, said.

Addressing the party workers and leaders, Barman said the BJP on its own has no capability to win a single seat in Tripura.

Barman's announcement came amidst reports of many leaders and workers of parties, including the Trinamool, joining the BJP during the past several months.

The TMC's Tripura unit former president and a former minister and ex-President of the Tripura Pradesh Congress Committee, Surajit Datta, and TMC's Tripura unit coordination committee chairman Ratan Chakraborty and 15 other state committee members joined the BJP last month.

Datta, a five-time Congress legislator, and Chakraborty, who was a minister in the Congress government (1988-1993), joined the TMC many years ago and shaped the party in the Left-ruled state.

TMC supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee last week in an interview to a Kolkata-based television channel indicated that Barman and other party MLAs of Tripura went to Delhi to meet central BJP leaders.

Barman however denied Banerjee's observations and said that they went to Delhi to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi to apprise him about certain issues of Tripura, including chit fund related matters. Modi, however, did not meet the TMC leaders and legislators.

"All the senior leaders and MLAs of Tripura have attended the April 21 party conference in Kolkata where Banerjee was re-elected Trinamool Chairperson for six years," he added.

Barman along with five MLAs and a large number of leaders and workers had quit the Congress and joined the TMC, opposing the Congress' alliance with the Left in the West Bengal Assembly elections last year.

Barman, accompanied by TMC's Tripura unit President Ashish Saha and other party leaders, said that Trinamool Congress is the real opposition party and unlike the BJP had organised a series of movements against the Left Front government.

"BJP has huge money. To get money and benefits, some people are joining that party. Without TMC no party in the state will be able to defeat the Left in Tripura," Barman said.

His comments came as BJP's state president Biplab Kumar Deb held a closed door meeting with TMC MLA and the party's prominent leader in northern Tripura, Biswabandhu Sen.

Sen later termed the meeting as a "courtesy meet".

The 60-seat Tripura assembly elections are likely in February next year along with Nagaland and Meghalaya.
 

Kashmiri stone pelters are part of "global terrorism" and a larger "pan-Islamic intifada fundamentalist movement", a frontal organisation of displaced Kashmiri Pandits said here today.

Ashwani Chrungoo, president, Panun Kashmir told reporters that while stone pelting was not new in Kashmir (its origin dating back to 1931), stone pelters in contemporary times are part of a larger pan-Islamic intifada fundamentalist movement and global terrorism.

"Stone pelting has been a part of politics in Kashmir since 1931. Today stone pelting has been adopted as a means to cover the terrorism movement in Kashmir," he said.

"The minority community of Pandits were the first target of this stone pelting culture, and then (when the Pandits were forced out of the valley), the practice was used to settle scores with political rivals in the state," he said.

Chrungoo was here to meet displaced Kashmiris settled in Gujarat as well as city mayor Gautam Shah to discuss issues pertaining to the Kashmir situation.

The Panun Kashmir chief also came down heavily on "so-called mainstream politicians of the valley for supporting stone pelting," adding that such politicians have used the issue to meet their political ends.

"Thus, it is not astonishing that the so-called mainstream politicians of the valley have come out in support of the stone pelters.

"We expect the Government of India to take tough stand and decisive action against them, and this nationalist forces need to be strengthened in order to tackle fundamentalists," he said.

The displaced community is also pressing for their demand for carving out a union territory within Kashmir for Pandits and other minorities in the valley, Chrungoo said.

"The Centre needs to take a tough stand to instill confidence in the nationalist forces in the state and pave way for some tough security and political decisions. Creation of homeland for Hindus and other minorities is one of those decisions," he said.

"We demand from the government to hold a dialogue with the displaced Pandits and find a way out. This homeland will help Kashmiris go back to their home state. For the first time, the Indian government has given a number of things to J&K, including IIT, IIM, hotel management institute, and a river front which will be a replica of Sabarmati riverfront.

So we are hopeful that the present government will take our demands positively," he said.

Chrungoo also demanded from the Gujarat government to give displaced status to Kashmiri Pandits in the state.

Security personnel, including those of the Border Security Force (BSF), escaped bomb attacks by militants in Manipur on Saturday morning. There were no casualties.

At 7 a.m. some unidentified militants exploded a bomb near Nongren village near a BSF camp in Imphal east district. 

Though the BSF personnel swung into action, no militants were nabbed. A combing operation was launched by the state and central forces. 

No militant outfit has taken responsibility for the attack. 

In another incident, one bomb was exploded near Silshi village near the Behang boundary pillar in Churachandpur district. Again there was no casualty. 

The police said that additional forces had been rushed to the area. 

Police believe that after the Behang attack the militants escaped into 'no man's land'.
 

Alleging racial discrimination against their community in higher education policies in Mizoram, the All India Chakma Social Forum (AICSF) urged Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla on Saturday to address the issue on a priority basis.

The AICSF said the Mizoram government has amended laws which reserve 100 per cent of the higher technical education seats in the state for Zo-ethnic (Mizo) people. 

The laws from 2015 and 2016 divided the Scheduled Tribes of Mizoram into two — "Zo-ethnic people" (Category I) and "non-Zo-ethnic people" (Category II), said Paritosh Chakma, Secretary General of AICSF in a statement.

Paritosh Chakma, who has been fighting racial discrimination against the community for years, said that several other non-Zo communities — Kuki, Mara, Man, Mikri, Nagas and Synteng tribes were also facing similar discrimination in Mizoram.

The AICSF urged the Mizoram government to repeal the racist acts like Mizoram Amendment Rules 2016. 

According to AICSF, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) ratified by India defines racial discrimination as "any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin. 

The AICSF stated that it would raise the issue of racial discrimination against non-Zo ethnic people of Mizoram with the UN Special Rapporteur Against Racial Discrimination Mutuma Ruteere and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres.

One of India’s most wanted terrorists, Dawood Ibrahim is in critical condition in a Karachi hospital, media reports have said.

The underworld don suffered a heart attack on Friday night and was hospitalised in a serious condition. However, Dawood’s close aide Chota Shakeel has denied all the reports saying he was fine.

Meanwhile, another report suggested that Dawood was suffering from brain tumour and has been operated upon. Though, there are some who admitted that the dreaded don is serioulsy ill but was not admitted in a hospital.

The 61-year-old don is accused of being the mastermind behind 1993 serial blasts in Mumbai which killed as many as 257 people and injured 700.

A major fire broke out at a yarn factory in Gopal Nagar locality of Basti Jodhewal here on Saturday, officials said.

Smoke and flames could be seen emanating from the factory from a distance soon after the incident was reported in the afternoon, fire department officials said.

Eight to 10 fire tenders of Ludhiana Municipal Corporation were pressed into service to douse the flames, they said.

No loss of life was reported, said Surjit Singh, a fire department official.

However, the goods and machinery in the factory were badly damaged, he said.

Notably, today's incident comes barely three days since three labourers were burnt alive in a fire that broke out at a cotton spinning mill situated in the Industrial Area here.

Fire incidents have been reported on many occasions in garment factories in Ludhiana.

A year ago, three labourers were charred to death in a fire that broke out in a garment factory on Bajra road. PTI COR SUN
 

Turkish authorities on Saturday blocked online free encyclopedia Wikipedia in the country, citing administrative measures.

According to a report in the BBC, it was not initially clear why the ban had been imposed.

"After technical analysis and legal consideration based on the Law Nr. 5651, an administrative measure has been taken for this website," Turkey's Information and Communication Technologies Authority was quoted as saying.

However, no particular reason was given for the ban.

The website was inaccessible from 10:30 a.m IST by order of the Turkish authorities.

However, some people in Istanbul accessed Wikipedia pages using a Virtual Private Network (VPN).

According to Turkish media, the provisional order would need to be backed by a full court ruling in the next few days.

It is not the first time that Turkish authorities have censored Internet. In the past, when mass protests and terror attacks in Turkey were rampant, the country witnessed a temporary ban on popular social media sites including Facebook and Twitter.

But the government had then denied censoring the internet, saying the outage was a result of spikes in usage after major events.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently won a controversial referendum on increasing his powers, that left the country divided.

People took to social media after the news of the Wikipedia ban, with some observers speculating that the ban was a bid to suppress criticism on Erdogan's Wikipedia page.

The Border Security Force on Saturday handed over a 15-year-old boy to Pakistani authorities. The intruder had crossed over to Indian territory by mistake in Punjab's Abohar sector, an official said.

Razak Mai, a resident of Kasur district in Pakistan, was apprehended by BSF troopers on Friday afternoon when he inadvertently crossed the International Boundary, BSF spokesperson R.S. Kataria (Punjab Frontier) said. 

"The Pakistan Rangers were contacted today (Saturday) and the Pakistani national was handed over to them on humanitarian grounds," Kataria added.

In 2017, the BSF has handed over six more Pakistanis who had crossed over. 

Days after Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee hinted that some Tripura party leaders went to New Delhi to meet central BJP leaders, a Trinamool MLA on Saturday declared that they would not join the saffron party but were instead keen to build an "anti-Left maha jot" or grand alliance to oust the ruling Left in Tripura.

"We would not join BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party). We are seriously keen to build an "anti-Left maha jot" to oust the ruling Left Front in Tripura in next year's assembly elections," Trinamool Congress (TMC) main leader in Tripura, Sudip Roy Barman, said.

Addressing the party workers and leaders, Barman said the BJP on its own has no capability to win a single seat in Tripura.

Barman's announcement came amidst reports of many leaders and workers of parties, including the Trinamool, joining the BJP during the past several months.

The TMC's Tripura unit former president and a former minister and ex-President of the Tripura Pradesh Congress Committee, Surajit Datta, and TMC's Tripura unit coordination committee chairman Ratan Chakraborty and 15 other state committee members joined the BJP last month.

Datta, a five-time Congress legislator, and Chakraborty, who was a minister in the Congress government (1988-1993), joined the TMC many years ago and shaped the party in the Left-ruled state.

TMC supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee last week in an interview to a Kolkata-based television channel indicated that Barman and other party MLAs of Tripura went to Delhi to meet central BJP leaders.

Barman however denied Banerjee's observations and said that they went to Delhi to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi to apprise him about certain issues of Tripura, including chit fund related matters. Modi, however, did not meet the TMC leaders and legislators.

"All the senior leaders and MLAs of Tripura have attended the April 21 party conference in Kolkata where Banerjee was re-elected Trinamool Chairperson for six years," he added.

Barman along with five MLAs and a large number of leaders and workers had quit the Congress and joined the TMC, opposing the Congress' alliance with the Left in the West Bengal Assembly elections last year.

Barman, accompanied by TMC's Tripura unit President Ashish Saha and other party leaders, said that Trinamool Congress is the real opposition party and unlike the BJP had organised a series of movements against the Left Front government.

"BJP has huge money. To get money and benefits, some people are joining that party. Without TMC no party in the state will be able to defeat the Left in Tripura," Barman said.

His comments came as BJP's state president Biplab Kumar Deb held a closed door meeting with TMC MLA and the party's prominent leader in northern Tripura, Biswabandhu Sen.

Sen later termed the meeting as a "courtesy meet".

The 60-seat Tripura assembly elections are likely in February next year along with Nagaland and Meghalaya.

Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Saturday said the income of farmers has grown two-fold in the last 10 years and the government would continue to work to keep up the momentum in the coming years.

"We have made significant progress in terms of production, productivity and income generation. Keeping the momentum, we will make further improvement in coming years," said Patnaik.

Attending the state-level Akshaya Tritiya celebrations held in Pipili area of Puri district, he said the development of agriculture and farmers have been the top priority of the state government.

The government has set up corpus funds of Rs 100 crore each, for seeds and fertilizers. Besides a new agriculture policy and a special budget for farmers have been made while the government provides crop loans at one percent interest rate, said the Chief Minister.

Agriculture Minister Pradeep Maharathy said the state government is mulling farm loan waiver and crop insurance for farmers.

The Chief Minister kicked off the "Akhi Muthi" ceremony and ploughed land in Pipili. Farmers across Odisha observed Akshaya Tritiya marking the beginning of the farming season in the state.

Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) president Prasad Harichandan also held the "Akhi Muthi Anukula" programme at Jatni in Khurda district.
 

A group of youths attacked a government school teacher in south Delhi, police said.

"Around five-six youths attacked Kaptan Singh with sticks on Friday afternoon near Devli in Neb Sarai here," a police official said.

The police said that visuals of the attack were captured by CCTV, which were being examined to identify those involved in the incident.

Singh is the English teacher in the government school in Khanpur. His leg was fractured in the attack and he sustained other injuries as well.

The police were probing the motive behind the attack. 

A First Information Report (FIR) was lodged under Indian Penal Code section 308 for attempt to commit culpable homicide.

The leak in the Pakistani media about the differences that surfaced between the civilian government and the military leadership during a high-level security meet in October last year in the wake of surgical strikes by India has cost a trusted lieutenant of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif his job.

Mr Syed Tariq Fatemi, Special Assistant on Foreign Affairs to Mr Sharif, was on Saturday removed from his post for his alleged role in the leak in the Dawn, a leading newspaper, on 6 October 2016, after an inquiry committee submitted its findings to the Pakistani Premier. His removal is being considered another blow to the beleaguered Prime Minister, who is already facing intense heat from the Opposition over the Panama leaks.

But the Pakistan Army rejected the action taken by the government, calling it incomplete. ‘’Notification on Dawn leak is incomplete and not in line with recommendations of the Inquiry Board. Notification is rejected,’’ Maj Gen Asif Ghafoor, spokesperson of the Inter-Services Press Relations (ISPR) tweeted.

The committee held that Mr Fatemi was primarily responsible for leaking the details of the meeting held on 3 October to the Dawn journalist in which the civilian leadership had reportedly spoken about the growing diplomatic isolation of Pakistan for lack of action against some militant groups. Reportedly, the ISI Director General was also present in the meeting, presided over by the Premier. It also reportedly witnessed differences between the civilian and the army leaderships over the activities of militant groups that operate from the Pakistan territory.

India conducted surgical strikes on terrorist launch pads in Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK) on 29 September 2016, 11 days after a pre-dawn attack by Pakistan-based militant groups on an army brigade headquarters in Uri in which 18 soldiers were killed. Pakistan, which was caught unawares, denied that any surgical strikes were conducted on its territory by India but quietly started preparing itself for any such action by Indian forces again. The high-level security meet was part of that exercise.

Notably, Saturday's order from the Pakistan PM's Office did not mention in clear terms why action has been ordered against Fatemi. Additionally, it read that action would be taken against Rao Tehsin Ali, Principal Information Officer of the Ministry of Information, on charges levelled against him in the committee's report.

The PM's Office also referred Dawn to the All Pakistan Newspapers Society (APNS) for "necessary disciplinary action", but did not say what the charges against Editor Dawn or journalist Cyril Almeida ~ who wrote the story ~ were. The APNS would also be asked to develop a Code of Conduct for print media to ensure that stories on issues of national importance and security were published by abiding to basic journalistic and editorial norms.

 Superstar Salman Khan says the teaser of his upcoming historical war drama film Tubelight, which has been directed by filmmaker Kabir Khan, will be out next week.

"Kahin jaa nahi raha hoon, aap ke paas aa raha hoon (I am not going anywhere but coming to meet you)…Just in five days… 5 days for ‘Tubelight' teaser," Salman tweeted on Saturday. 

Salman also shared a still from the film, in which he seems to be sitting in a train and waving. 

After blockbusters like Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Ek Tha Tiger, Tubelight is Salman and Kabir's third film together.

Slated to release on Eid, Tubelight also features Salman's younger brother Sohail Khan and Chinese star Zhu Zhu. The film also has a special appearance by Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan.

Yash Raj Films (YRF) has bagged the overseas distribution rights — excluding Middle East and North Africa — for Tubelight. This is Salman Khan Films' first collaboration with YRF for the overseas territory. 

The Pakistan Foreign Office has refused to comment on the hush-hush visit of Indian steel magnate Sajjan Jindal to Murree to meet Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his daughter Maryam Nawaz, amid speculation that it was a move to revive the stalled dialogue process between the two countries.

The visit of Jindal, said to be Nawaz Sharif and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's mutual friend, on Wednesday came on the day Indian High Commissioner Gautam Bambawale filed an appeal with the Foreign Office against the death sentence awarded to alleged Indian spy Kulbhushan Jadhav, Dawn reported. The appeal was submitted on behalf of Jadhav's mother in which she had sought the government's intervention for the release of her son, who has been sentenced to death for espionage.

The visit echoed in the National Assembly's Foreign Affairs Committee on Friday. But after Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua, who was leading the FO team at the meeting, failed to respond to queries about Jindal's trip, committee chairman Awais Leghari brought the discussion to an end.

Jindal, who is considered as a sort of back-channel contact, was taken by helicopter to Murree to meet the Sharif family.

Jindal in the past has facilitated a secret meeting between Sharif and Modi in Kathmandu on the sidelines of a Saarc (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) summit in 2014. The meeting had then helped save the summit that had seemed to be headed for failure and a last-minute deal to create a regional electricity grid was clinched, Dawn reported.

Jindal was in Lahore on December 25, 2015, when Modi paid a surprise visit to greet Sharif on his birthday and attend his granddaughter's wedding.

"Why is the government quiet over Jindal's visit?" asked Pakistan People's Party's Nafeesa Shah during the committee's meeting.

There was no formal press statement issued by the PM Office on Jindal's meeting with Sharif.

However, Maryam Nawaz confirmed the trip in a tweet. She rejected media reports of the meeting being ‘secret'. "Mr Jindal is an old friend of the Prime Minister. Nothing ‘secret' about the meeting & should not be blown out of proportion," she tweeted on Friday after the issue hit headlines.

Pakistan Tehreek Insaf's Shireen Mazari wondered how Jindal visited Murree, when his visa was restricted for Islamabad and Lahore only.

"If Jindal had come on a private visit, why did FO officials receive him?" Mazari asked.

Meanwhile, the Daily Times, in an editorial on the visit, titled "Much ado about Jindal visit" said much of the speculation surrounding the Indian businessman's visit "revolves around whether he brought some special ‘message' to the Pakistani government from its counterparts in India, or the extent to which some sort of back-channel diplomacy took place". 

"It must be admitted that the meeting was somewhat unexpected, given the relatively tense relations between the two countries. It is also a fair demand to ask that an elected government be more forthcoming over dealings "if any" with foreign countries, through any channels.

"However, it should also be borne in mind that at the end of the day, governments must talk to each other. In tense times, personal contacts between powerful stakeholders of two countries are nothing new. More importantly, such contacts ought not to be necessarily seen in an ominous light." 

"…it is now of the utmost importance that the business of diplomacy continue. Diplomatic relations and communication between the governments of two nuclear-armed states are too important to be sacrificed to the whims of hawkish voices on either side. Those who believe that relations between the two countries are currently too tense for such communication should perhaps explain what alternative they prefer. Talking at a Pakistani hill resort is far better than exchanges of fire in the hills of Kashmir for both sides."

A ward in Kerala's Kottayam district on Saturday became India's first digitalised panchayat ward, officials said.

Union minister of state for social justice and empowerment Krishan Pal Gurjar inaugurated the website of the first digitalised panchayat ward number 15 of Aymanam grama panchayat at a function held at a temple premises.

The minister launched the website HYPERLINK "http://www.digitalaymanam.com"www.digitalaymanam.com at the function.

This small panchayat ward in Kerala has become the first one to go digital in the country, taking a very important step in fulfilling Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream of transforming India into a digitally empowered society, the Minister said.

Gurjar hailed ward member Devaki teacher for taking the challenge of collecting details of 423 families and 1,262 members in the ward and made them available in a mouse click away.

The website also contains information about blood donors' forum and telephone directory of the people of the ward, officials said.

CPI(M), which is ruling the Aymanam Gram Panchayat, boycotted the function. They, however, have not cited any reasons for the boycott.