Israel a 'cancerous tumour' established by west, says Iran's Rouhani

Kashmir, Jun 14: An Army personnel was killed and two others were injured as Pakistani troops opened fire and shelled areas along the Line of Control in Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir, officials said on Sunday.

This is the third fatality in the Pakistani firing and shelling on forward posts and villages in the twin districts of Poonch and Rajouri this month.

The officials said the latest firing and shelling from across the border took place in Shahpur-Kerni sector on Saturday night, drawing strong retaliation by the Indian Army.

Three Indian Army personnel were injured in the Pakistani firing and were immediately evacuated to hospital, where one of them succumbed to injuries, the officials said.

They said the casualties suffered by the Pakistani Army in the retaliatory action were not known immediately.

On June 4, havaldar P Mathiazhagan fell to Pakistani firing in Sunderbani sector of Rajouri district, while on June 10, Naik Gurcharan Singh lost his life in a similar incident in Rajouri sector.

Jun 4: Mahatma Gandhi’s statue outside the Indian Embassy in Washington DC was vandalised with graffiti and spray painting by unknown persons allegedly involved in the ongoing protests in the US against the custodial killing of African-American George Floyd.

This has prompted the mission officials to register a complaint with the local law enforcement agencies.

The incident is reported to have taken place on the intervening night of June 2 and 3 in Washington DC.

The Indian embassy has informed the State Department and registered a complaint with local law enforcement agencies, which are now conducting an investigation into the incident.

On Wednesday, a team of officials from Metropolitan Police in consultation with the Diplomatic Security Service and National Park Police visited the site and are conducting inquiries.

Efforts are on to clean up the site at the earliest.

Vandalism of the statue of the apostle of peace comes during the week of nationwide protests against the custodial killing of African-American George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.

Several of these protests have turned violent which many times has resulted in damage of some of the most prestigious and sacred American monuments.

In Washington DC, protestors this week burnt a historic church and damaged some of the prime properties and historic places like the national monument and Lincoln Memorial.

One of the few statues of a foreign leader on a federal land in Washington DC, the statue of Mahatma Gandhi was dedicated by the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, in the presence of the then US president Bill Clinton on September 16, 2000, during his state visit to the US.

In October 1998, the US Congress had authorised the government of India to establish and maintain a memorial “to honour Mahatma Gandhi on Federal land in the District of Columbia."

According to the Indian Embassy website, the sculpture of Mahatma Gandhi is cast in bronze as a statue to a height of 8 feet 8 inches. It shows Gandhi in stride, as a leader and man of action evoking memories of his 1930 protest march against salt-tax, and the many padyatras (long marches) he undertook throughout the length and breadth of the Indian sub-continent.

The statue, the design of which was created by Gautam Pal, is a gift from the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR). The pedestal for the statue of Mahatma Gandhi is a block of new Imperial Red also known as Ruby Red a block originally weighing 25 tonnes reduced to a size of 9'x7'x3'4". It now weighs 16 tonnes.

Jan 31: Twenty-three children aged between six months and 15 years, who had been taken hostage by a murder accused after inviting them to his daughter's birthday party, were rescued late on Thursday night after police killed their captor in a village here.

The hostage drama began at Kasaria village in the afternoon and continued for about eight hours.

"The accused was killed and there were about 23 children who were rescued safely," Additional Chief Secretary (Home) Awanish Awasthi told reporters at a hurriedly called press conference at 1.20 am.

"The accused had invited the children for the birthday party of his daughter and held them hostage. It started about 5.45 pm on January 30 and continued for about eight hours," Director General of Police (DGP) O P Singh said, adding that in the entire operation they had tried to "engage" the accused and were successful.

He said the accused, identified as Subhash Batham, had initially released a six-month-old girl by handing her over to his neighbour from a balcony.

Eyewitnesses said a restive crowd gathered outside the house where the children were kept with some women wailing and praying for their safe release.

The crowd broke open the door of the house to rescue the children, they said.

As the accused opened fire, the police retaliated killing him on the spot.

In the exchange of fire, the captor's wife was injured, but none of the children suffered any injury.

A man and two policemen also suffered bullet injuries.

The motive of the accused was not known immediately.

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath monitored the situation in Farrukhabad, which is nearly 200 km from state capital Lucknow.

"The CM as soon as he got to know about the incident called a meeting of the crisis management group and personally monitored the situation and ensured children are rescued safely," Awasthi said.

Earlier, a team of NSG (National Security Guard) commandos had taken a special aircraft to reach Farukhabad, a senior security official in Delhi said.

Police said Batham, a murder accused, seemed to be mentally unstable.

Inspector-General of Police, Kanpur Range, Mohit Agarwal, said, "The man called the children for a birthday party and held them hostage in the basement of the house. He fired six shots from inside the building."

Batham initially wanted to talk to the local MLA, but refused to speak to the leader when he arrived, Agarwal said.