Add another Rs 50,000 cr as cost of note ban, says Chidambaram
New Delhi, August 11 (IANS): In yet another jibe at the government over demonetisation, former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram on Friday said another Rs 50,000 crore should be added to the cost of the note ban exercise that was undertaken last year. “Cost of demonetisation: Add another Rs 50,000 crore revealed by RBI,” he tweeted in the wake of an RBI statement that it would pay Rs 30,659 crore as dividend to the government in 2016-17, less than half of the dividend transferred a year earlier. He also asked whether RBI would reveal the breakdown of the Rs 50,000 crore “loss/expenditure”. “Will RBI also tell us cost of destroying old notes and cost of printing new/replacement notes,” Chidambaram asked in another tweet.
Five dead in UP road accident
Agra, August 11 (IANS): Five persons were killed on Friday when two passenger buses coming from opposite direction collided in Uttar Pradesh’s Agra city, police said. The incident occurred near Pathauli on Jaipur Road. The bus coming from Bidhuna near Kannauj with a large number of passengers crashed against the other coming from Rajasthan that had comparatively very few riders. Malpura police along with local villagers worked hard to extricate the bodies from the Uttar Pradesh bus that had all the victims. Naresh Paras, a social activist engaged in the rescue work told IANS that the passengers were pilgrims headed for a religious shrine in Rajasthan.
IAS officer found dead in Ghaziabad
Ghaziabad, August 11 (IANS): A 2012 batch IAS officer of Bihar cadre was found dead at a railway yard in Uttar Pradesh’s Ghaziabad, police said on Friday. The body was found severed from the head at 9 p.m. on Thursday near the Kotgaon crossing and a suicide note was recovered from its pocket. The suicide note said: “I, Mukesh Pandey, committing suicide ...” The Government Railway Police (GRP) quoted the note saying that the deceased wanted his relatives -- Rakesh, Utkarsh and Poonam, to be informed. Pandey also wrote that he was staying at the Lila Palace (hotel) in room Number 742. The note also said that he had left a detailed letter in his suitcase, the police said. “A police team will unlock the room and retrieve the detailed suicide note. Further legal action would follow. The family has been informed,” said Randhir Singh Deputy Superintendent of Police, GRP, Ghaziabad.
Bengal policeman wins gold at World Police Games
Kolkata, August 11 (IANS): West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday announced that Bengal police constable Sushen Ray has won the gold medal in long jump in the World Police Games in Los Angeles. “I am very proud to share with all of you that one of the members of Bengal Police, Constable Sushen Ray has got Gold Medal in World Police Games in Los Angeles, US in long jump,” she said on Facebook. “This is a great achievement for Bengal and also Indian police. My heartiest congratulations and best wishes to him,” she added.
An epidemic of swine flu on Friday claimed two more lives in Odisha, taking the toll in the state to six, officials said. Also, swab samples of a doctor working at the orthopaedic department in Capital Hospital here and a junior doctor of SCB Medical College and Hospital were found positive for the vector-borne disease, the official said. So far, 84 patients have tested positive for the disease in the state, with 13 cases reported on Thursday.
The CBI has registered a case against a Haryana resident and others on charge of collecting money by misusing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s name, an official said on Friday. The agency registered the case on Thursday against J.P. Singh, who claims to be President of Faridabad-based Narendra Modi Vichar Manch, and some unidentified persons on charges of criminal conspiracy and cheating under the Indian Penal Code. The FIR said J.P. Singh and his accomplices had been cheating people by demanding/collecting donations fraudulently by inducement and misusing Modi’s name between 2015 and 2017. The accused was maintaining a website www.nmvmindia.org with a picture of the Prime Minister.
About 20,000 BSF personnel, including its chief, have pledged to donate their body organs after death as part of the organisation’s initiative to mark the World Organ Donation Day on Sunday. The country’s largest border-guarding force, with 2.65 lakh personnel in its ranks, today handed over the names of the personnel and their families, who have committed to the initiative, to the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) at an event here. A senior Border Security Force officer said the initiative was launched by the force last year and till now about 20,000 personnel and their families have pledged their commitment to it. Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju lauded the noble gesture of the paramilitary force saying that such an initiative is important as many “precious lives are lost” in the country because the patients do not get organ donors.
The World Organ Donation Day is observed every year on August 13.
