Feb 9: The Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) used in Delhi Assembly polls are kept under tight security, in the 'Strong Room' located at Atal Adarsh Bengali Balika Vidyalaya in Gol Market.
Voting for Delhi Assembly elections took place on Saturday with voters turnout well short of the 2015 election mark.
Counting of the votes will be on February 11.
Earlier, Deputy Election Commissioner Sudip Jain had said the Delhi elections took place peacefully and smoothly.
Mumbai, Apr 22: Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh on Wednesday said none of the 101 people arrested in connection with the Palghar lynching case is a Muslim, and accused the opposition of giving a communal colour to the incident.
Terming the incident as unfortunate and a blot on humanity, Deshmukh in a Facebook address said this is not the time to play politics, and urged all to engage in collective efforts to defeat the deadly coronavirus.
Without naming any leader or party, Deshmukh, who is an NCP leader, said some people were seeing Mungerilal ke haseen sapne (referring to a fictional character from a TV show who daydreams) of returning to power in the state.
He said in the run up to the incident, a rumour did rounds in Palghar that some people were lifting children during night.
The entire episode is being investigated by a special inspector general and the probe has been handed over to the Crime Investigation Department (CID), he said.
"The police arrested 101 people in connection with the incident within eight hours after it took place. They had run into neighbouring jungles, but were caught by police. There is no Muslim brother among these 101 people, Deshmukh said.
The minister said someone was heard as saying oye bas (please stop) in the video clip of the incident, but it was allegedly distorted as Shoaib.
An attempt was made to give a political colour to the incident. And this is very unfortunate...communal politics is being played, Deshmukh alleged.
He said such politics is being played at a time when the entire state is engaged in a battle against coronavirus.
"It is not the time to play politics, but to fight coronavirus collectively. It is unfortunate some people are seeing 'Mungerilal ke haseen sapne' at this juncture, the minister said.
The incident took place on the night of April 16 when three men - two seers and their driver - were going from Mumbai in a car towards Surat in Gujarat to attend a funeral.
Their vehicle was stopped near a village in Palghar district where the three were dragged out of the car and beaten to death with sticks by a mob on suspicion that they were child-lifters.
The deceased were identified as Chikne Maharaj Kalpavrukshagiri (70), Sushilgiri Maharaj (35), and driver Nilesh Telgade (30).
The Maharashtra government earlier ordered a high- level probe into the incident, and two policemen from Palghar were suspended on Monday for alleged dereliction of duty.
New Delhi, May 17: Eight of the 10 most valued domestic firms suffered a combined erosion of Rs 1,37,311.31 crore in market valuation last week, with Reliance Industries (RIL) taking the biggest knock.
Only Bharti Airtel and ITC from the top-10 list managed to close the week with gains.
RIL's market cap plunged Rs 65,232.46 crore to Rs 9,24,855.56 crore.
The market valuation of HDFC Bank declined Rs 22,347.07 crore to Rs 4,87,083.88 crore and that of Hindustan Unilever Limited tanked Rs 13,192.26 crore to Rs 4,77,458.89 crore.
ICICI Bank's market cap dropped Rs 9,770.06 crore to Rs 2,08,900.79 crore.
Infosys witnessed a decline of Rs 9,518.84 crore in valuation to reach Rs 2,77,814.09 crore while that of HDFC tumbled Rs 9,370.38 crore to Rs 2,83,293.70 crore.
The m-cap of Kotak Mahindra Bank slipped by Rs 7,805.2 crore to Rs 2,25,327.22 crore.
Tata Consultancy Services' market valuation dipped Rs 75.04 crore to Rs 7,10,439 crore.
In contrast, Bharti Airtel added Rs 13,147.89 crore to its valuation to stand at Rs 3,02,292.43 crore.
ITC's valuation also rose by Rs 7,744.11 crore to Rs 2,02,330.13 crore.
In the ranking of top-10 firms, RIL retained the number one spot, followed by TCS, HDFC Bank, HUL, Airtel, HDFC, Infosys, Kotak Mahindra Bank, ICICI Bank and ITC.
During the last week, the Sensex declined 544.97 points or 1.72 per cent.
More than 50 million people in India do not have access to effective handwashing, putting them at a greater risk of acquiring and transmitting the novel coronavirus, according to a study.
Researchers from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington in the US found that without access to soap and clean water, over 2 billion people in low- and middle-income nations -- a quarter of the world's population -- have a greater likelihood of transmitting the coronavirus than those in wealthy countries.
According to the study, published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, more than 50 per cent of the people in sub-Saharan Africa and Oceania lacked access to effective handwashing.
"Handwashing is one of the key measures to prevent COVID transmission, yet it is distressing that access is unavailable in many countries that also have limited health care capacity," said Michael Brauer, a professor at IHME.
The study found that in 46 countries, more than half of people lacked access to soap and clean water.
In India, Pakistan, China, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Indonesia, more than 50 million persons in each country were estimated to be without handwashing access, according to the study.
"Temporary fixes, such as hand sanitizer or water trucks, are just that -- temporary fixes," Brauer said.
"But implementing long-term solutions is needed to protect against COVID and the more than 700,000 deaths each year due to poor handwashing access," Brauer said.
He noted that even with 25 per cent of the world's population lacking access to effective handwashing facilities, there have been "substantial improvements in many countries" between 1990 and 2019.
Those countries include Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Nepal, and Tanzania, which have improved their nations' sanitation, the researchers said.
The study does not estimate access to handwashing facilities in non-household settings such as schools, workplaces, health care facilities, and other public locations such as markets.
Earlier this month, the World Health Organization predicted 190,000 people in Africa could die of COVID-19 in the first year of the pandemic, and that upward of 44 million of the continent's 1.3 billion people could be infected with the coronavirus, the researchers said.
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