Cops thwart cattle smuggling bid; four arrested; animals rescued

Tirupati, Jul 5: The Karnataka government will soon build a massive pilgrim amenities complex and marriage hall at Tirumala, the hill abode of Lord Venkateswara, at an estimated cost of Rs 200 crore, a temple official said here on Saturday.

The state would soon submit a blueprint for the construction of the Rs 200 crore mega complexes to the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) that governs the hill shrine, the official said.

Consequently, based on the designs, TTD would construct the complexes with the given fund and after completion, they would be handed over to the Karnataka government, he said.

Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa would lay the foundation stone for the mammoth complexes on the hills some time next month, he said.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy is likely to take part in the programme, he added.

Bengaluru, Mar 11: Jyotiraditya Scindia has not betrayed the Congress, but he has been betrayed by the Congress and Kamal Nath, said on Wednesday Madhya Pradesh Congress MLAs who are camping here after tendering the resignations.

"It is not Jyotraditya Scindia who has betrayed. Instead, he has been betrayed by the Congress and Kamal Nath. Despite the fact that it was his hard work that enabled Congress to form the government in MP after 15 years, yet he was being sidelined. His people were sidelined," Mahendra Singh Sisodia was heard saying in a video.

Taking a veiled jibe at Chief Minister Nath, Sisodia said: "On one hand, you claim that treasury is empty and on the other, works worth Rs 12,000 crore is done in Chhindwara constituency. Are the rest of MLAs and ministers just killing time?"

He also warned other Congress MLAs that the party would be decimated in the state in the future.

"Did not the Congress trick people in MP? What happened to the farm loan waiver announced? When we go to our region, people ask us what happened to loan-waiver.
What happened to curb corruption, Vyapam? Whichever party Scindia joins, we will go with him," he said.

Former MP Minister Imarti Devi said that all 22 MLAs are in Bengaluru out of their own choice.

"All 22 MLAs are here (in Bengaluru) on their own will. We are happy Scindiaji has taken this decision. I will always stay with him even if I had to jump in a well. Kamal Nathji never heard us," she said.

Another leader dismissed talks of being in touch with anyone and said that they are happy with the decision of Scindia, who joined the BJP earlier today. He had resigned from the Congress on Tuesday.

New Delhi, May 3: The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has crossed over one million RT-PCR tests for COVID-19 on Saturday evening marking a big landmark, ICMR officials said.

"We have tested about 10,40000 tests till Saturday evening. In a few days, we have increased our testing capacity. ICMR has been doing more than 70,000 tests in the last two consecutive days," he said.

On Saturday, ICMR released that a total of 976363 samples have been tested till date. From May 1 till evening on Saturday, 1,37,346 tests were done.

The top three states which are doing vigorous testing includes--Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan. As on date, these three states have conducted more than one lakh test respectively.

However, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka and Delhi still need to ramp up their testing capacity.

ICMR has always emphasised that the confirmatory test for diagnosis of COVID-19 infection is RT-PCR test of the throat and/or nasal swab, which detects virus at an early stage. Recently, Dr GS Toteja, Additional Director General of ICMR had said that to contain coronavirus infection, RT-PCR tests must be continued vigorously as the principal diagnostic tests.

RT-PCR tests are now available in 310 government laboratories and 111 private set up across the country.

On Friday, the Centre informed that ICMR has ordered 21.35 lakh diagnostic kits. As on date, India has reported about 37,776 confirmed coronavirus cases and 1223 deaths.