Zoramthanga sworn in as Mizoram CM for third time

Agencies
December 15, 2018

Aizawl, Dec 15: Mizo National Front (MNF) president Zoramthanga was Saturday sworn in as Mizoram's new chief minister, heading a 12-member ministry.

He was administered the oath of office and secrecy by Governor K Rajasekharan during a ceremony at the Raj Bhavan here.

The MNF came to power in the state winning 26 of the 40 seats in the state assembly uprooting the Congress from its last bastion in the Northeast.

This was Zoramthanga's third stint as chief minister of the northeastern state after having led the party's government in Mizoram in 1998 and 2003.

Along with Zoramthanga, 11 others -- five cabinet ministers and six ministers of state -- were also sworn in.

The five cabinet ministers are Tawnluia, R Lalthangliana, Lalchamliana, R Lalzirliana and Lalrinsanga.

Tawnluia has been designated as the deputy chief minister. He was the rehabilitation minister in the Laldenga government during 1987-88 and home minister for two terms in the Zoramthanga government in 1998 and 2003.

The six ministers of state are -- K Lalrinliana, Lalchhandama Ralte, Lalruatkima, K Beichhua, T J Lalnuntluanga and Robert Romawia Ralte.

Lalthangliana was a cabinet minister for two terms in Zoramthanga's previous government too.

Lalzirliana, who was inducted as a cabinet minister, was the home minister for two terms in the Congress government headed by Lal Thanhawla since 2008.

He had resigned from the Congress and was expelled from the party before the November polls.

After taking oath, Zoramthanga told reporters that the MNF has now no intention to leave the BJP-led NDA and the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) although it was under fire for joining hands with the Hindutva forces.

He said combating alcoholism and drug addiction would be among the top priorities of his government, besides taking up the development projects from day one.

"There is no intention at this juncture to leave the NDA and NEDA", he said.

Former chief minister Lal Thanhawla, besides former ministers, legislators and senior officials were present at the oath-taking ceremony.

Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma, Assam Water Resources Minister Keshab Mahanta and former Assam chief minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta were also present.

For the first time, the swearing-in ceremony of the government was marked by Bible reading, prayer and singing of a Christian gospel song.

Chairman of Mizoram Kohhran Hruaitute Committee (MKHC), a conglomerate of 16 major churches in the state, Rev R Lalhmingthanga, read out from the Bible and offered prayers.

The chief minister and the newly-inducted ministers took oath of office and oath of secrecy in Mizo language for the first time in Mizoram's history.

Lalchamliana, former assembly speaker who was sworn in as a minister, came to Raj Bhavan dressed in a traditional attire.

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News Network
January 28,2020

Jan 28: After Union minister Anurag Thakur, on Tuesday, BJP MP Parvesh Verma has stoked a controversy by saying that "Shaheen Bagh protesters will enter houses and rape sisters, daughters." The BJP MP even went on to say that if BJP is voted to power in Delhi, they "will clear Shaheen Bagh protest within an hour."

"If the BJP comes to power in Delhi on February 11, we will clear Shaheen Bagh of all protests and protesters within one hour. Not a single person will be visible," Parvesh Verma said during a meeting at Vikaspuri assembly constituency.

"Lakhs of people gather there [Shaheen Bagh]. People of Delhi will have to think and take a decision. They will enter your houses, rape your sisters and daughters, kill them. There's time today, Modi ji & Amit Shah won't come to save you tomorrow..." the BJP MP told news agency ANI.

"If our government is formed, then give me just a month after February 11, and I will remove all mosques built on government land in my Lok Sabha constituency," the BJP parliamentarian added.

Well, these statements didn't go down well with the netizens, who took to Twitter to express what they felt about the BJP leader's comments. A user wrote, "This is pure, unadulterated hate speech." While other user said, "Only when you thought BJP couldn't stoop any lower."

Earlier, on Monday, BJP leader and Union Minister Anurag Thakur triggered a row after he led the crowd to raise an incendiary slogan that "traitors should be shot". At the rally, Thakur, the Minister of State (MoS) for Finance, shouted: "desh ke gaddaron ko" to which the crowd responded, "goli maro saalo ko" (shoot down the traitors).

Addressing the meeting in support of BJP candidate from Rithala, Manish Chaudhary, Thakur raised the pitch of nationalism as he linked opposition parties with anti-CAA protests in Shaheen Bagh and with alleged anti-India slogans, and then asked the crowd to raise the controversial slogan.

For more than a month, over 200 women have been joined by hundreds of others every day at South East Delhi's Shaheen Bagh at a sit-in protest against the CAA which promises citizenship to only non-Muslim refugees from three neighbouring countries.

Protests have been ongoing in different parts of the country against the amended Citizenship Act (CAA) which grants citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Parsis, Buddhists and Christians fleeing religious persecution from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh if they entered India on or before December 31, 2014.

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News Network
May 19,2020

New Delhi, May 19: The number of coronavirus cases crossed the one lakh mark in the country on Tuesday, while the death toll due to the infection touched 3,163, according to the Union Health Ministry.

A total of 134 deaths and 4,970 COVID-19 cases were reported in the country in the past 24 hours since 8 pm on Monday, it said.

The total number of coronavirus cases has risen to 1,01,139, the ministry said.

The number of active COVID-19 cases stood at 58,802 while 39,173 people have recovered and one patient has migrated, it said.

"Thus, around 38.73 per cent patients have recovered so far," a senior health ministry official said.

The total confirmed cases include foreigners.

Of the 134 deaths reported since Monday morning, 51 were in Maharashtra, 35 in Gujarat, 14 in Uttar Pradesh, eight in Delhi, seven in Rajasthan, six in West Bengal, four in Madhya Pradesh, three in Tamil Nadu, two each in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir, and one each in Bihar and Telangana.

Of the 3,163 fatalities, Maharashtra tops tally with 1,249 deaths. Gujarat comes second with 694 deaths, followed by Madhya Pradesh at 252, West Bengal at 244, Delhi at 168, Rajasthan at 138, Uttar Pradesh at 118, Tamil Nadu at 81 and Andhra Pradesh at 50.

The death toll reached 37 each in Karnataka and Punjab and 35 in Telangana.

Jammu and Kashmir has reported 15 fatalities due to the disease, Haryana has 14 deaths while Bihar has registered nine and Kerala and Odisha each have reported four deaths.

Jharkhand, Chandigarh and Himachal Pradesh each have recorded three COVID-19 fatalities, while Assam has reported two deaths.

 Meghalaya, Uttarakhand and Puducherry have reported one fatality each, according to the data provided by the ministry.

According to the ministry's website, more than 70 per cent of the deaths are due to comorbidities, the existence of multiple disorders in the same person.

According to the health ministry's data updated in the morning, the highest number of confirmed cases in the country are from Maharashtra at 35,058, followed by Tamil Nadu at 11,760, Gujarat at 11,745, Delhi at 10,054, Rajasthan at 5,507, Madhya Pradesh at 5,236 and Uttar Pradesh at 4,605.

The number of COVID-19 cases has gone up to 2,825 in West Bengal, 2,474 in Andhra Pradesh and 1,980 in Punjab.

It has risen to 1,597 in Telangana, 1,391 in Bihar, 1,289 in Jammu and Kashmir, 1,246 in Karnataka and 928 in Haryana.

Odisha has reported 876 coronavirus infection cases so far, while Kerala has 630 cases. A total of 223 people have been infected with the virus in Jharkhand and 196 in Chandigarh.

Tripura has reported 167 cases, Assam has 107, Uttarakhand and Chhattisgarh have 93 cases each, Himachal Pradesh has 90 and Ladakh has registered 43 cases so far.

Goa has reported 38 COVID-19 cases, while the Andaman and Nicobar Islands has registered 33 infections.

Puducherry has registered 18 cases, Meghalaya has 13 and Manipur has seven cases. Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh and Dadar and Nagar Haveli have reported a case each till how.

"814 cases are being reassigned to states," the ministry said on its website, adding "our figures are being reconciled with the ICMR".

State-wise distribution is subject to further verification and reconciliation, it said.

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News Network
April 2,2020

Chandigarh, April 2: A 59-year-old woman and her 10-month-old granddaughter have tested positive for novel coronavirus in Chandigarh on Thursday.

According to the Chandigarh Health Department, they are family contacts of the NRI couple that tested positive for COVID-19 earlier.
With this, the total cases in the Union Territory rose to 18.

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the country climbed to 1,965 on Thursday, after as many as 328 new cases were reported, said the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. So far, at least 50 people have lost their lives due to the virus.

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