New Delhi, Jul 18: Textiles Minister Smriti Irani was today given the additional charge of the Information and Broadcasting Ministry after M Venkaiah Naidu resigned from the Cabinet to contest the vice-presidential poll.
The portfolio of urban development, which too was with Naidu, was given to Narendra Singh Tomar, Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment, the PMO said.
The BJP had yesterday decided to field Naidu as NDA's candidate for the post of vice president.
New Delhi, May 25: India witnessed the highest ever spike of 6,977 positive cases in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of COVID-19 to 1,38,845, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
India is now among the top 10 countries in the world regarding the total number of COVID-19 cases.
With 154 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, the total number of deaths due to COVID-19 now stands at 4,021 in the country.
Out of the total number of cases, 77,103 are active cases and 57,721 have been cured/discharged/migrated.
Maharashtra continues to remain the worst affected state with 50,231 COVID-19 cases, followed by Tamil Nadu (16,277), Gujarat (14,056) and Delhi (13,418).
The fourth phase of the nationwide lockdown imposed as a precautionary measure to contain the spread of COVID-19 is scheduled to end on May 31.
New Delhi, Jun 6: Military commanders of India and China are scheduled to meet today at Moldo on the Chinese side of the Line of Actual Control (LAC), to discuss the ongoing dispute along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh.
The Commander of the Leh-based 14 Corps of the Indian Army Commander Lieutenant Gen Harinder Singh will meet his Chinese equivalent Maj Gen Liu Lin, who is the commander of South Xinjiang Military Region of Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) to address the ongoing tussle in Eastern Ladakh between the two countries over the heavy military build-up by the People's Liberation Army along the LAC there.
The two sides have held close to a dozen rounds of talks since the first week of May when the Chinese sent over 5,000 troops to the LAC.
On Friday, officials of India and China interacted through video-conferencing with the two sides agreeing that they should handle "their differences through peaceful discussion" while respecting each other's sensitivities and concerns and not allowing them to become disputes in accordance with the guidance provided by the leadership.
In the last few days, there has not been any major movement of the People's Liberation Army troops at the multiple sites where it has stationed itself along the LAC opposite Indian forces.
India and China have been locked in a dispute over the heavy military build-up by the People's Liberation Army (PLA) where they have brought in more than 5,000 troops along with the Eastern Ladakh sector.
The Chinese Army's intent to carry out deeper incursions was checked by the Indian security forces by quick deployment. The Chinese have also brought in heavy vehicles with artillery guns and infantry combat vehicles in their rear positions close to the Indian territory.
Hyderabad, Jun 30: Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech announced that it has successfully developed Covaxin, India's first vaccine candidate for Covid-19, in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and National Institute of Virology (NIV).
The Drug Controller General of India - CDSCO, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare granted permission to initiate Phase I & II Human clinical trials after the company submitted results generated from preclinical studies, demonstrating safety and immune response. Human clinical trials are scheduled to start across India in July 2020.
The SARS-CoV-2 strain was isolated in NIV, Pune and transferred to Bharat Biotech.
The indigenous, inactivated vaccine developed and manufactured in the company's Bio-Safety Level 3 (BSL-3) High Containment facility located in Genome Valley, Hyderabad.
Announcing the vaccine development milestone, Dr Krishna Ella, Chairman and Managing Director said: "We are proud to announce COVAXIN, India's first indigenous vaccine against COVID-19. The collaboration with ICMR and NIV was instrumental in the development of this vaccine."
Dr Ella added, "The proactive support and guidance from CDSCO has enabled approvals to this project. Our R&D and Manufacturing teams worked tirelessly to deploy our proprietary technologies towards this platform."
Expedited through national regulatory protocols, the company accelerated its objective in completing the comprehensive pre-clinical studies. Results from these studies have been promising and show extensive safety and effective immune responses.
Speaking about Bharat Biotech's prowess, Suchitra Ella, Joint Managing Director said, "Our ongoing research and expertise in forecasting epidemics has enabled us to successfully manufacture a vaccine for the H1N1 pandemic."
"Continuing our focus on creating the only BSL-3 containment facilities for manufacturing and testing in India, Bharat Biotech is committed to advancing vaccine development as a matter of national importance to demonstrate India's strength in handling future pandemics," she added.
Bharat Biotech's track record in developing vero cell culture platform technologies has been proven in several vaccines for Polio, Rabies, Rotavirus, Japanese Encephalitis, Chikungunya and Zika.
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We better prepare another list of those who got killed by saffron terrorists and send it to President of India.
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