Yogi govt to act against madrasas, where national anthem wasn't sung

New Delhi, Jan 7: A fringe right-wing group calling itself the Hindu Raksha Dal has purportedly taken responsibility for the attack on students of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) in a video posted on social media.

The video, which was posted on social media on Monday and has gone viral since then, shows a man identifying himself as Pinki Chaudhary saying that those who resort  to “anti-national activities” will be treated in the same way that JNU students and faculty were.

He later told news channels that others involved in "anti-national activities" would face similar attacks.

There was no immediate reaction from the police on Chaudhury's claims.

“For several years, JNU has been a bastion of communists and we will not tolerate it. Hindu Raksha Dal, Bhupendra Tomar, Pinki Chaudhury take the responsibility of what has happened in JNU...all of them were our volunteers. Those who cannot do such work for Mother India don't have the right to live in this country,” Chaudhary is seen saying in the video.

“We are always ready to sacrifice our lives for Mother India. We will not tolerate anyone who speaks against the religion,” he added.

Efforts to reach the man were unsuccessful: his phone was switched off.

More than 35 students were injured Sunday when a masked mob went on the rampage, attacking students and professors and vandalising property. The JNUSU has accused the RSS-affiliated ABVP volunteers of attacking the students.

New Delhi, Mar 25: The Indian Rail Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) on Wednesday appealed to the people not to cancel their e-tickets on their own in case of trains being cancelled by the national transporter due to nation-wide lockdown to help curb the spread of novel coronavirus pandemic.

Clearing the doubts of the railway passengers, IRCTC spokesperson Siddharth Singh said, "Doubts have been raised regarding cancellation of e-tickets subsequent to the halting of railway passenger trains.

"It may be submitted that for trains cancelled by the railways in its complete run, refund on e-tickets is full and automatic. In this case, no cancellation exercise is required to be done on the part of the user," he said.

The IRCTC official said that if user cancels his e-ticket in situations of train cancellations, there are chances he may get "less refund". "Hence passengers are advised not to cancel e-tickets on their own for those trains which have been cancelled by the railways," he said.

He also said that the refund amount will be credited to the user account used for booking e-tickets automatically and no charges will be deducted by the railways in case of train cancellation.

His remarks came as the national transporter announced the suspension of the passenger, mail and express services from March 23 till March 31. However, the railways extended the suspension of services till April 14 in the wake of the three week lockdown announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi from March 25 during his second special address to the nation on Tuesday night.

The railways has cancelled over 13,600 passengers trains across the country in a bid to combat the spread of novel coronavirus. Only freight trains are running to ensure the supply of essential services. About 9,000 freight trains are transporting essential items every day across the country.

On Wednesday, India recorded 562 cases of COVID-19 with 10 deaths.

New Delhi, May 1: The Centre has finalsed the criteria for delimitation of various zones after May 3. It has identified at least 130 districts as red zones, 284 orange zones and 319 green zones.

According to a letter written by Health Secretary Preeti Sudan to the Chief Secretaries of all States and UTs, all the states have to delineate the containment areas and buffer zones in the identified red and orange zone districts and notify the same.

The letter said, the national capital has at least 11 red zones, Uttar Pradesh 19 red zones, 36 orange zones and 20 green zones while, the state of Haryana has 2 red zones, 18 orange zones and 2 green zones.

The Gautam Buddha Nagar in Uttar Pradesh has been identified as a red zone district while, Ghaziabad has been designated as an orange zone. The national capital has no orange and green zone; there are only red zones according to the letter.

In Maharashtra, Mumbai, Pune, Thane, Nashik come in the red zone.

In West Bengal, Kolkata, Howrah, 24 Parganas -- both North and South have been identified as red zones while Hooghly, Nadia, Murshidabad etc have been marked as orange zones.

In the southern part of India, Kerala has 2 red zones and 10 orange zones, while Tamil Nadu has 12 red zones and 24 orange zones.

The Health Secretary said that the list will be revised on a weekly basis or earlier and communicated to states for further follow-up action in consonance with the directions issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs under the Disaster Management Act, 2005 based on field feedback and additional analysis at state level, states may designate additional red or orange zones as appropriate.

However, states may not relax the zonal classification of districts classified as red or orange as communicated by the Ministry. This classification is multi-factorial and takes into consideration incidence of cases, doubling rate, extent of testing and surveillance feedback to classify the districts.

A district will be considered under green zone, if there are no confirmed cases so far or there is no reported case since the last 21 days in the district.