Chamoli (Uttarakhand) [India], February 25 (ANI): The death toll in the Uttarakhand glacier burst incident has gone up to 71, according to the state government on Thursday.
“Out of 206 people missing in a flash flood, bodies of 71 people and 30 body parts have been recovered from Tapovan in Chamoli district,” the state government said.
Meanwhile, the rescue and search operation for 133 missing people is underway.
Earlier today, the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) personnel along with National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and other sister agencies have been conducting search and rescue operations in Chamoli district.
A glacier burst earlier in the Tapovan-Reni area of Chamoli District of Uttarakhand, which led to massive flooding in the Dhauliganga and Alaknanda rivers and damaged houses and the nearby Rishiganga power project. (ANI)

Gwalior (Madhya Pradesh) [India], February 25 (ANI): Madhya Pradesh Congress on Wednesday welcomed Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha leader Babulal Chaurasia into the fold.
Congress has been a vocal critic of the Hindu Mahasabha, who had time and again tried to project Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse as a ‘nationalist’ and ‘patriotic’ figure.
On November 15, 2017, Mahasabha installed an idol of Godse in its office and tried to convert it into a ‘temple’. Chaurasia was part of that event.

Offering an explanation, Chaurasia said that he was ‘framed’ into being part of the event.
“Hindu Mahasabha conspired against me to make me part of that event. I was at the event and they asked me to offer my prayers to all the pictures of great personalities around the hall. Then somebody gestured towards the Godse idol and without realising, I offered water to it. I was framed. They wanted to show that a former Congress member was supporting Godse. I lodged a strong protest after I realised what happened,” said the former Hindu Mahasabha leader.
He added that he had been keeping himself away from Hindu Mahasabha’s programmes since the event, as his “consciousness did not allow’ him to cater to the party’s ideology.
However, in another event organised on December 11, 2018, Chaurasia was heard saying that he “learned a lot from him (Godse)”

“I was born a Congressman,” said Chaurasia, and added, “I had contested and won an election on Congress’ ticket. In the next election, my ticket was given to someone else. I was in Delhi at that time and the Hindu Mahasabha chief there asked me to contest the election from his party. I filed for nomination immediately in Delhi itself.”
After joining Congress, he said he is ‘reunited with his family’. “I was stuck with Hindu Mahasabha,” the former Hindu Mahasabha leader added.
Chaurasia had joined the Congress ahead of the Madhya Pradesh civic body elections in presence of former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath. (ANI)

Washim (Maharashtra) [India] February 25 (ANI): As COVID-19 cases surge in Maharashtra, 229 school students and three staff members were found positive for the virus at a hostel in the Washim district of the state, said district authorities.
The students are mostly from Amravati (151).
A total of 327 students who reside in this hostel are mostly from Amravati, Hingoli, Nanded, Washim, Buldhana, and Akola.
Last week 26 students were found virus-positive at the hostel after that all the students were tested.
The school premises have reportedly been declared a containment zone.
Maharashtra reported 8,807 new COVID-19 cases and 80 deaths in the last 24 hours, the state health department said on Wednesday. The state has reported a total of 21,21,119 COVID-19 cases. (ANI)

New Delhi [India], February 25 (ANI): Supporting the ongoing farmer agitation, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) national spokesperson Sudhindra Bhadoria on Thursday warned the central government not to further delay in addressing the demands of farmers anymore.
Bhadoria told ANI that protesting farmers and members of the Kisan Union are ready to talk with the government, several rounds of conversation have already taken place between them but delaying the demands of the farmers should not be kept as an option.
“Members of Kisan Union and the protesting farmers are up in conversation with the government and they had conversation a dozen times too. I believe the government should not delay their demands otherwise the farmers of the country will give up on agriculture and it will lead to major trouble for everyone,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Union Home Ministry has extended the period of paramilitary forces in Haryana till February 26 to maintain law and order during farmers agitation.
Hundreds of thousands of farmers, from the northern Indian states of Punjab and Haryana, have been protesting against the newly enacted three farm laws. (ANI)

Pune (Maharashtra) [India], February 25 (ANI): As cases of COVID-19 surge in Maharashtra, samples from about eight districts have been sent to laboratories across the country, including the National Institute of Virology and National Center for Disease Control, to find out if any new variant is behind the increasing number of cases.
Speaking to ANI, the advisor to the state for COVID control Dr Subhash Salunke said, “The ICMR has not been able to clearly come out whether is there any new mutant virus or not, that study is being done at NIV and NCDC and other few laboratories in the country, 8 districts of Maharashtra have already sent the required number of 100 samples per district. Results of these studies will be available to us maximum by the end of this week or maybe in another 8 to 10 days. After that, we will be able to confidently state whether the mutation has taken place, if the indigenous strain has mutated and if it is there then what type of mutation it is etc.”
The transmission of cases has increased rapidly in some districts of the Vidarbha region. Districts such as Amravati have been reporting over 20 per cent positivity rate in the last few days.
“Our finding shows that transmission rate has increased, in some cases the whole locality or a family is affected. Even last time when cases were at the peak we could not see such a trend even in Pune or Mumbai, but we could see this picture in Amravati or Yavatmal this time. The positivity rate in Amravati and surrounding areas has gone up to 20% to 25% hence one thing is clear that something is wrong with the virus because the behaviour of the people is the same everywhere in every district. This change is the clear indication that some changes in the virus are there but exact details of the changes will be clear once we get the scientific data after study.” said Dr Salunke.
Earlier samples tested at BJ Medical college laboratory in Pune have shown that the UK and Africa strain are not the reason behind the sudden surge of cases in parts of Maharashtra, however, scientists at multiple laboratories across the country are also working to find out if any indigenous variant of the virus is behind the spike.
Dr Salunke also cautioned the authorities about the possible spread of this virus to other states if it is not controlled in time.
“It is also showing concentrated spur in some of the areas like Vidarbha region and now it is slowly getting transmitted to other districts such as Pune and even Mumbai. If we don’t control it right now it may spread to other states because the potential is there,” Dr Salunke said.
However, he said that proper treatment is available to patients and added that the present treatment strategy is working well.
He also added that clinicians across the country have treated lakhs of patients last year and are clear about the treatment for patients.
Dr Subhash Salunkhe also chairs the Maharashtra Communicable Diseases Prevention and Control Technical Committee. He was the former director general of health services, Maharashtra and WHO chief of Indonesia. (ANI)

New Delhi [India], February 25 (ANI): Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Thursday slammed the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government over the hike in prices of fuel and gas.
Taking to Twitter, the Congress leader commented that the Modi government’s pitch is full of high inflation for the common people.
“In the last three months, the price of domestic gas cylinders have increased by Rs 200. Petrol and diesel have already moved towards hitting a century. The pitch of the Modi government, who is batting for his billionaire friends at both ends of the economy, is full of high inflation for the common people,” Gandhi tweeted (roughly translated from Hindi).
The prices of petrol and diesel have been increasing continuously for more than 10 days and in some states, the price of petrol has even crossed Rs 100 in some states. Opposition parties also held protests in different parts of the country over the rise of prices of diesel and petrol.
Earlier on Sunday, Congress interim President Sonia Gandhi wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to convey “every citizen’s anguish and deep distress regarding the spiralling fuel and gas prices.” (ANI)