U.S. media showing one-sided perspective on Kashmir: Indian envoy

New Delhi, Feb 5: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday announced that the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teertha Kshetra, set up by the government for construction of a temple in Ayodhya, will have 15 trustees and one of them will be from the Dalit community.

The statement comes a little over an hour after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced in Lok Sabha about the constitution of the trust.

"There will be 15 trustees in the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teertha Kshetra Trust out of which one trustee will always be from the Dalit society," he tweeted.

Shah congratulated Modi "for such an unprecedented decision" that strengthens social harmony.

The home minister said the trust will be independent to take every decision related to the temple and 67 acres of land will be transferred to it.

"I fully believe that the waiting of millions of people for centuries will be over soon and they will be able to pay obeisance to Lord Shri Ram in his grand temple at his birthplace," he said.

New Delhi, Jun 22: India's COVID-19 cases per lakh people is one of the lowest in the world despite its high population density, and the recovery rate has now reached almost 56 per cent, the Union Health Ministry said on Monday.

For every one lakh population, there are 30.04 coronavirus cases in India, while the global average is over three times at 114.67, the ministry said, referring to the WHO Situation Report 153, dated June 21.

“This low figure is thus a testimony to the graded, pre-emptive and pro-active approach the Government of India along with the states and UTs took for prevention, containment and management of COVID-19," the ministry said in a statement.

Citing the WHO Situation Report, the ministry said the US has 671.24 cases per lakh population, while Germany, Spain, Brazil and the UK have 583.88, 526.22, 489.42 and 448.86 cases per lakh population, respectively.

It said Russia has 400.82 cases per lakh people, while Italy, Canada, Iran and Turkey have 393.52, 268.98, 242.82 and 223.53, respectively.

Coming back to India, as on Monday morning, the total number of coronavirus cases stood at 4,25,282 and the death toll at 13,699, according to figures issued by the ministry.

In its update issued at 8 AM Monday, the ministry said 9,440 COVID-19 patients recovered in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of recoveries to 2,37,195, a recovery rate of 55.77 per cent.

Presently, there are 1,74,387 active cases and all are under medical supervision, it said.

"The difference between the recovered patients and the active COVID-19 cases continues to widen. Today, the number of recovered patients has crossed the number of active patients by 62,808," the ministry said.

The COVID-19 testing infrastructure is continuously being ramped up and number of government labs has been increased to 723 and the private labs to 262, adding up to a total of 985, it said.

According to the Indian Council of Medical Research, a total of 69,50,493 samples have been tested up to 21 June, 1,43,267 of them just on Sunday.

On Monday, the country added 14,821 new COVID-19 cases in a single day, pushing the tally to 4,25,282, while the death toll rose to 13,699 with 445 new fatalities reported till 8 am.

The country breached the four lakh-mark on Sunday, eight days after crossing three lakh COVID-19 cases. It has recorded 2,34,747 infections since June 1.

Monday was the 11th day in a row when the country registered over 10,000 cases.

New Delhi, Jan 31: The central government has decided that pensioners' life certificates will be collected from their doorstep, saving them from hassles of visiting pension disbursing banks.

The service will be charged an amount not exceeding Rs 60, according to a statement issued on Thursday by the Department of Pension and Pensioners' Welfare (DoPPW).

Every year a pensioner is required to give proof of him being alive to banks in order to ensure continued pension. These certificates can be submitted online or by visiting the bank.

"The department has taken a landmark step to make life easier for senior citizens to submit their annual life certificate for continued pension," it said.

Directions have been issued to all pension disbursing banks to send SMS or emails to all their pensioners on October 24, November 1, November 15 and November 25 every year reminding them to submit their annual life certificates by November 30, the statement said.

"The bank in addition will also ask such pensioners through SMS/email as to whether they are interested in submission of life certificate through a chargeable doorstep service, the charge not exceeding Rs 60, it said.

The department for stricter monitoring and in order to ensure that no pensioners are left out has also directed the banks to make an exception list on December 1 every year of those pensioners who fail to submit their life certificate and issue another SMS or email to them for submitting it.

The Central Pension Processing Cells (CPPC) of the pension disbursing banks shall now be duty bound to submit a report to the DoPPW in January, February and March.

The report will indicate the total number of pensioners who have not given their life certificate along with a breakup of the certificates submitted physically and through digital means, the statement said.

This is a landmark step from the side of the central government showing due care for pensioners, it said.

This step is in addition to the order issued in July last year, vide which all pensioners aged 80 years and above have been given an exclusive window to submit their life certificate w.e.f. 1st October every year instead of 1st November every year, the statement added.