India's political landscape is ablaze with activity! From the ongoing debates surrounding the new farm bills and their impact on rural India, to the upcoming state elections shaping the national narrative, the stakes couldn't be higher. Key political figures are maneuvering strategically, with alliances shifting and power dynamics constantly in flux. The opposition's challenge to the ruling party is intensifying, sparking vigorous debates on crucial policy matters including economic reforms and social justice initiatives. Parliamentary proceedings are filled with heated exchanges, reflecting the deep divisions within the nation. This evolving political climate directly impacts the lives of every Indian citizen, influencing everything from economic opportunities to social welfare programs. Stay informed about the latest developments in Indian politics, from crucial legislative decisions to grassroots movements, by exploring Abtak.com for in-depth analysis and breaking news updates. Understanding the intricacies of our political system is crucial; stay engaged, stay informed, and stay ahead.
Bhubaneswar: The Orissa High Court Wednesday commuted the death sentence of a man to life imprisonment in a double murder case of 2019, saying that 'it is well settled law that the possibility of reformation and rehabilitation of the convict is an important factor which has to be taken into account as a mitigating circumstance before sentencing him to death'. A division bench of Justices BP Routray and Chittaranjan Dash, taking note of the positive report of the jail authorities regarding the convict, Niranjan Mallik, in death row, commuted the capital punishment awarded by a lower court to life term. "Taking into consideration the report of the jail authority in entirety, it cannot be said that there is no possibility of the convict being reformed and rehabilitated, foreclosing the alternative of a lesser sentence," the bench observed. "We are therefore inclined to convert the sentence imposed on the appellant (convict) from death to life, but taking note of the severity of the offences including murder of two persons, we are of the view that the convict deserves life imprisonment for the rest of his life," the division bench ordered in the judgment. According to the case details, Niranjan killed a night watchman, Lochan Sethi, and a 70-year-old woman, Badani Pradhan, at her house in Odagaon of Nayagarh district late January 16, 2019, over past enmity. "Three other persons, including Pradhan's daughter, also sustained grievous injuries in the attack," according to the prosecution. "Niranjan was booked for commission of two murders, one attempt to murder, and two grievous hurts with lurking house trespass. A court in Nayagarh district, after examining 27 witnesses and 94 documents, had awarded a death sentence to Niranjan April 27, 2024," it said. "Upon careful examination of the socio-economic background of the convict in the present case, it appears that he hails from the poor economic strata of society without having any criminal antecedent and adverse report against his conduct," the HC observed. As per the jail authority report submitted before the HC, Niranjan is cordial to others and no one spoke evil of him in his village, his conduct inside the jail is normal and cordial to other inmates, the HC said, adding that nothing on his conduct, as per the report of the jail authority, would constitute an aggravating factor against him to confi rm the death sentence. "Regardless of the heinous crime committed by him, his conduct inside jail is quite satisfactory as per the report of the Superintendent of Jail, and he had also no other antecedent than the present one to be counted against him to justify his death sentence," the division bench stated in the 53-page order.
Kolkata, Jan 21 (VOICE) The West Bengal government on Tuesday approached the Calcutta High Court, challenging the special court's verdict sentencing Sanjay Roy, convicted in the rape and murder of a junior doctor of state-run R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital, to life imprisonment. State Advocate General Kishor Datta has approached the division bench of Justice Debangshu Basak and Justice Shabbar Rashidi seeking a "death penalty" for the convict. The division bench has admitted the petition from the state government. After the court pronounced the quantum of sentence, Chief Minister Mama ...Read More >
New Delhi, Jun 6 (PTI) The Supreme Court on Friday cancelled the bail granted to former Karnataka minister Vinay Kulkarni in connection with a 2016 case related to the murder of BJP worker Yogesh Gowda. A bench of justices Sanjay Karol and Satish Chandra Sharma passed the order while noting that there was sufficient material on record to suggest that attempts were made by Kulkarni to either contact the witnesses or alternatively, influence them. "Keeping in mind the totality of circumstances, this court is of the considered opinion that the bail granted to the respondent (Kulkarni) ought to ...Read More >
Berhampur (Odisha), Jun 6 (PTI) Environmental activist Medha Patkar on Saturday appealed to the people of Odisha for protection of Rushikulya river. The government planned to construct a dam in the river Pipalapnaka under Sorada block in the district. While participating in the Save Rushikulya river movement in Ganjam district, she said, "Rivers may be small or big, but they are our mother. We have to protect the rivers from attacks." She attended a meeting were organised by the Rushikulya Banchao Kriyaanusthan Committee (RBKC) and the Centre for Climate Justice, spearheading the agitation a ...Read More >
Lucknow: The Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court has granted bail to the convict Babu Khan in the Shravan Sahu murder case. The court has granted bail to Babu Khan on the basis of parity of the bail granted to co-accused Ajay Patel on Apr 21, 2025, on the basis of his case being similar.A vacation bench of Justice Pankaj Bhatia and Justice Kshitij Shailendra passed the order, allowing the bail plea moved by the appellant Khan along with the appeal . The bench observed, "Considering the reasoning of the coordinate bench in granting bail to co- accused Ajay Patel and adopting the same as conta ...Read More >
NEW DELHI: Boosting his chances of securing premature release, Delhi high court Tuesday noted "demonstrable indicators of reformation" in Santosh Kumar Singh, convicted in the 1996 rape and murder case of DU law student Priyadarshini Mattoo.Deciding a batch of petitions by murder convicts, including Singh, challenging the rejection of their plea for remission, HC asked the Sentence Review Board (SRB) to consider their applications afresh in next four months.Justice Sanjeev Narula outlined "an element of reformation" in Singh and underlined that the nature of the original crime cannot, by itsel ...Read More >
New Delhi/Thiruvananthapuram, July 9 (SocialNews.XYZ) Kerala nurse Nimisha Priya, who has been convicted of the murder of Yemeni citizen Talal Abdo Mehdi, is set to be executed on July 16. Priya has been in a Yemeni prison for the last three years. According to the negotiator S.J. Bhaskaran, after the news of the execution came on Tuesday, he will leave for Yemen. Priya's husband, Tomy Thomas, and their daughter are expecting that they will be able to prevail upon the family of Mehdi to resolve the case by paying the blood money. So far, Mehdi's family has not responded positively to the o ...Read More >
New Delhi [India], May 21 (ANI): The Supreme Court on Wednesday granted anticipatory bail to former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) trainee officer Puja Khedkar, accused of forging her documents to obtain eligibility for the 2022 Union Public Service Commission test. A bench of Justices BV Nagarathna and Satish Chandra Sharma asked Khedkar to cooperate in the probe. Also Read | Security Scare in Kolkata: Police Launch Probe After Drone-Like Objects Spotted Over Sky, Centre Seeks Report From West Bengal Govt. During the hearing, the bench said, "What is the grave crime she has committed? ...Read More >
Bengaluru Power Cuts: Citizens of Bengaluru brace yourself for long hours of power outages from June 29 and June 30. More than 100 areas will be impacted as BESCOM undertakes its quarterly maintenance work in various of its division. Bengaluru Power Outages June 29: According to the update by BESCOM on its X handler, there will be power outages in Kittaganahalli, Palasandra, Saptagiri, Maruthinagar, Sankapur, Raghavendra Nagar, Goolarivee, Baddihalli, Kesaramadu, C.M Badawan, Kalalli and SKS village on June 29 from 10 am to 5 pm. BESCOM's executive engineer has appealed to consumers to coop ...Read More >
Kolkata Gangrape Case: Fresh details have emerged in the alleged gangrape case of a law college student in Kolkata's Kasba. IANS reported, citing investigating officials, that the accused, Monojit Mishra (31), reportedly targeted the victim in a pre-planned manner. Meanwhile, the two other accused, Zaib Ahmed (19) and Pramit Mukhopadhyay (20), actively facilitated the crime. The Kolkata Police, on Saturday, had announced the formation of a Special Investigation Team (SIT), with an Assistant Commissioner-level officer leading it, to probe the case. The head of the SIT is Pradip Kumar Ghosal, a ...Read More >
Chandigarh: Haryana chief minister Nayab Singh Saini on Tuesday said the state govt was consistently working to provide better resources to the doctors and quality healthcare services to the citizens.He mentioned that medical colleges were being established in every district.While there were only six medical colleges in 2014, the number has now increased to 15, and nine new colleges are under construction. As a result, MBBS seats in the state increased from 700 in 2014 to 2,185, at present. The state govt aims to increase the MBBS seats to over 3,400 by 2029, said Saini.The CM was addressing a ...Read More >
NEW DELHI: Congress leader K C Venugopal on Saturday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging his immediate intervention to save Nimisha Priya, an Indian nurse from Kerala, who is scheduled to be executed in Yemen on July 16.In a letter, Venugopal appealed to the Prime Minister to take urgent diplomatic steps with Yemeni authorities to halt the execution. "While efforts have been made by the Action Council and her family to negotiate with the victim's family to accept 'blood money' (diyah), which could potentially spare her life, these negotiations have faced significant challenges, due to ...Read More >
Kerala Nurse On Death Row in Yemen: Can India Save Nimisha Priya From Execution on July 16? 34-year-old Nimisha Priya, a nurse from Kerala, is facing execution in Yemen on July 16. Arrested in 2017 for the murder of her Yemeni partner, Nimisha claims she was a victim of abuse and never intended to kill. Her lawyers say it was a tragic accident during an attempt to escape. But Yemen's courts sentenced her to death by execution, and the clock is ticking. Now, there's one way out: 'Blood Money', a ...Read More >
Lucknow/Muzaffarnagar, Jul 14 (PTI) A gangster with a trail of crimes in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, including murder of a man in police custody, jail break, contract killings and threats to witnesses, was shot dead after an encounter with the UP STF in Muzaffarnagar early Monday, police said. Identified as Shahrukh Pathan, a close aide of slain mafia Sanjeev Jiva, the 34-year-old shooter had been out on bail and was absconding in a fresh criminal case filed in Sambhal. The Meerut unit of the Special Task Force (STF) held Pathan, a shooter-for-hire, in an injured condition during an encou ...Read More >
Kolkata, Jan 22 (VOICE) West Bengal government's hyperactive approach in seeking the death penalty for the RG Kar case convict is surely politically motivated, the father of the victim woman doctor said on Wednesday. The state government had moved to Calcutta High Court challenging the verdict of a special court in Kolkata on January 22 sentencing Sanjay Roy to life imprisonment and also seeking the death penalty for the sole convict. On Wednesday, the victim's father said that although they also want the death penalty for Roy, they feel that the state government's hurried approach to seekin ...Read More >
Bhubaneswar, May 28: The additional district and sessions judge (ADJ) court in Patnagarh, Balangir district of Odisha, on Wednesday pronounced the judgment in the sensational parcel bomb case in which a newlywed software engineer, Soumya Sekhar Sahu and his 85-year-old great-aunt, Jemamani Sahu died on February 23, 2018. The 26-year-old Soumya Sekhar's wife, Reema Sahu, 22, also sustained grievous injuries in the blast that shook the whole state as well as the country in 2018. As per the victims' lawyer Chittaranjan Kanungo, the accused Punjilal Meher was awarded life imprisonment by the cour ...Read More >
Srinagar- Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Saturday said foreign countries were told clearly during the post-Operation Sindoor diplomatic outreach that in case of a fresh provocation, India would repeat its action. Speaking at a discussion at the Ahmedabad Management Association, Tharoor said Indian delegations which visited foreign countries in the aftermath of Operation Sindoor managed to convey that India acted with restraint and responsibility. "In other places, we actually were able to get some very high-placed people to say not only that they respected and supported India's right of self- ...Read More >
New Delhi, July 7 (SocialNews.XYZ) Former Congress MP Sajjan Kumar on Monday pleaded his innocence in connection with alleged killings of two Sikhs, Sohan Singh and his son-in-law Avtar Singh in Delhi's Janakpuri, and another incident in Vikaspuri where one Gurcharan Singh was allegedly set ablaze, during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots. Deposing before Special Judge Digvijay Singh of the Rouse Avenue Courts, the 77-year-old Kumar stated that he was being falsely implicated and the cases against him were false and politically-motivated. "I am innocent. I was never involved in this crime, not even i ...Read More >
New Delhi: Communist Party of India Rajya Sabha MP P Sandosh Kumar on Thursday wrote to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, and urged him to use "every possible diplomatic and humanitarian channel" to secure a stay on the execution of Indian nurse Nimisha Priya in Yemen. In a letter to Jaishankar, Kumar said reports indicate that the execution may be carried out within days. "Nimisha's case has not only shaken the conscience of the public but also raised serious concerns about the lack of legal safeguards and the humanitarian dimensions of her ordeal," Kumar said. He said Priya travelled ...Read More >
Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala) [India], July 13 (ANI): Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging him to intervene in the matter related to Nimisha Priya facing the death penalty in Yemen. This comes amid reports of a 37-year-old Indian nurse from Kerala scheduled to be executed on July 16. The trial court convicted her of killing the Yemeni national, a decision that the country Supreme Judicial Council upheld in November 2023. Kindly find enclosed my letter dated March 24, 2025, to the Union Minister for External Affairs. It is learnt from the ...Read More >
Thane, Dec 26 (VOICE) A couple has been arrested in connection with the abduction, rape and murder of a 13-year-old girl in Maharashtra's Thane district. Coming barely after the Badlapur sexual assault on two nursery class girls in August, this is the second case that has sparked outrage with people demanding the noose for the alleged perpetrators - Vishal Gawli, 35 and his wife Sakshi Gawli, 25. Vishal Gawli is accused of kidnapping the girl from near her home, where she was playing on Monday, taking her to his house, assaulting, raping, killing and then dumping her body near a cemetery in ...Read More >
Kolkata: BJP's fact-finding team leaves after a visit to the premises of a law college where an alleged gang rape of a student took place last week, in Kolkata, Monday, June 30, 2025.Source : PTI The South Calcutta Law College has been shut for an indefinite period following the alleged gang rape of a first-year law student, with college authorities announcing a suspension of all BA LLB and LLM classes, according to a notification issued on Monday. The decision, taken by the college's governing body, comes as a Special Investigation Team (SIT) continues its probe into the incident that has ro ...Read More >
New Delhi, Jul 1 (PTI) The Delhi High Court on Tuesday set aside the decision of the sentence review board which had rejected a plea for premature release of Santosh Kumar Singh, who is serving life term for the 1996 rape and murder of law student Priyadarshini Mattoo. Justice Sanjeev Narula said there is an element of reformation in Singh and referred the matter back to the sentence review board (SRB) to consider afresh the convict's premature release plea. "I have found some element of reformation in him. The SRB decision is set aside and I have referred back the matter to SRB to consider ...Read More >
New Delhi [India], July 12 (ANI): Tomy Thomas, husband of Nimisha Priya, the 37-year-old Indian nurse from Kerala who faces execution in Yemen on July 16 after being convicted of murder in June 2018, informed about the ongoing efforts to save her life. Thomas met with the Kerala Governor, Rajendra Arlekar, recently, who offered support to Nimisha's mother through video conferencing. According to Thomas, the Central government, the State government, and the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) are making efforts to secure Nimisha's release. While speaking to ANI, Thomas said, 'I am in contact w ...Read More >
New Delhi, Jul 14 (PTI) The Centre on Monday informed the Supreme Court that the government could do "nothing much" in the case of an Indian nurse facing execution on July 16 for murder in Yemen. Attorney general R Venkataramani informed a bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta that the government was doing "utmost possible". "Having regard to the sensitivity and status of Yemen as a place, there is nothing much the Government of India can do," he said. He continued, "There is a point up to which the Government of India can go and we have reached that point." Venkataramani said the ...Read More >
Kolkata, June 26 (SocialNews.XYZ) The Calcutta High Court on Thursday directed the parents of the junior woman doctor of state-run R.G. Kar Medical College & Hospital in Kolkata, found raped and murdered within the hospital premises in August last year, to approach the trial court in the city where the matter is being heard in a parallel manner for permission to survey the crime scene. Earlier this week, the victim's parents made an appeal to the High Court's single-judge bench of Justice Tirthankar Ghosh with two pleas, the first being a fast-track hearing in the matter and the second being ...Read More >
Gurgaon: Two days after a law student died and his friend suffered critical injuries when a car knocked them down as they stood near railing on the service lane of Delhi-Jaipur highway in the early hours of Tuesday, a civil engineer was arrested on Thursday.Mohit (31), an employee of a private company in the city, told police that he got drowsy while driving. He is staying at a PG facility in Sector 14.The student who died, Harsh Singhal (25), was a resident of Om Nagar colony. His friend Abhishek Kumar (23), who is from Shanti Nagar in Sector 11, is undergoing treatment at a private hospital ...Read More >
Balasore: A POCSO court here Thursday sentenced a 60-yearold man to life imprisonment for raping a differently-abled girl, a government advocate said. POCSO Court Judge Indira Priyadarshini pronounced the sentence against Padmalochan Kamila, who raped the 13-year-old girl from his locality April 17, 2024, according to Special Public Prosecutor Pranab Panda. The court has also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on the convict. In case of failure to pay the fine, the convict will have to serve an additional one-year jail term, he added. The court pronounced the verdict after examining 20 witnesses and ...Read More >
New Delhi, Jun 28: The Supreme Court has ordered immediate release of a law student in Madhya Pradesh from preventive detention after being booked under the National Security Act (NSA), saying it is "wholly untenable". A bench of Justices Ujjal Bhuyan and K Vinod Chandran, which found fault with the July 11, 2024 detention order passed by District Magistrate of Betul in Madhya Pradesh said it will be passing a detailed reasoned order in the case. Petitioner Annu was booked by police following an altercation at a university campus in Betul, allegedly after he clashed with a professor. An FIR wa ...Read More >
New Delhi, July 13 (SocialNews.XYZ) The Supreme Court is slated to hear on Monday a plea seeking directions to the Centre to use diplomatic channels to save Kerala nurse Nimisha Priya from execution. Indian national Nimisha Priya, who has been sentenced to death in Yemen for the murder of a Yemeni national, Talal Abdo Mehd and has been in prison for the last three years, is tentatively set to be executed on July 16. As per the causelist published on the website of the apex court, a Bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta will take up the plea filed by "Save Nimisha Priya Action Counc ...Read More >
New Delhi, Jul 1 (PTI) The Delhi High Court on Tuesday set aside the decision refusing the premature release of the convict serving life term for the rape and murder of law student Priyadarshini Mattoo in 1996, saying the convict's reformative conduct was not considered. The high court said it found an element of reformation in convict Santosh Kumar Singh and referred the matter back to the sentence review board (SRB) to consider afresh his plea for premature release. "No effort was made to evaluate the petitioner's (Singh) demonstrable reformative progress, including advanced educational qu ...Read More >