China’s former internet censor, who once held high-profile meetings with industry leaders such as Apple CEO Tim Cook and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, was standing trial on Friday on corruption allegations, state media reported. Lu Wei is accused of accepting 32 million yuan ($4.6 million) in bribes and has admitted …

Campaigners seek a referendum on the terms of the final Brexit deal between Britain and EU Tens of thousands of people, including London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan and politicians from across the political spectrum, are expected to attend a march, calling for a second referendum on Brexit in central London on …

India, Japan and the U.S. are set to elevate the bilateral ‘Cope India’ air exercise to a trilateral format. The three countries already conduct naval war games under the expanded Malabar naval exercise. The U.S. had proposed a trilateral air exercise between India, Japan and the U.S. For this, the …

A Class IX student in Bihar’s Lakhisarai was charred badly after she fell on a live high-voltage wire while fleeing from the roof of a three-storied building, where she was gang-raped, police said. The girl, who was admitted to a hospital, was battling for her life. Local police said the …

The Centre said it was weighing all options to implement the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Tripura but any decision would be taken only after considering the ramifications in other parts of the country. A senior government official said other provisions like the Citizenship Act, Foreigners Act and the …

Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi has urged political parties to set up internal complaints committees, which is mandatory under law for all workplaces. “I have requested the presidents/ in-charge of all recognised National and State political parties to constitute the Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) as mandated under the …

Indian researchers have developed a gel which, when applied on the skin, can inhibit some pesticides from getting absorbed into the body, thus averting serious adverse effects and even death. Organophosphate-based pesticides, which are commonly used by farmers in India, are toxic to the nervous system and heart, and can …

Farm equipment which can root out this practice not universally accessible despite govt. subsidy Between September 27 and October 14, the Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB) imposed Rs. 8,92,500 as fines — or “environmental compensation cess” as it is officially called — on farmers burning paddy stubble. However, they collected …

Despite a spell of rain or two, Dharwad witnessed grand Jamboo Savaris at two places in the city with a large number of people participating in them on both Thursday and Friday. The Jamboo Savaris involved caparisoned elephants carrying howdahs with portraits of Goddess Bhuvaneshwari and Chamundeshwari on the consecutive …

On a day of high drama, two young women, a journalist and an activist, were forced to abandon their attempt to enter the Sabarimala temple on Friday after protesting devotees blocked their path and the Tantri (chief priest) threatened to lock the doors to the sanctum sanctorum if the women …

The attack on a high-level meeting inside the Governor’s compound in southern Kandahar on Thursday, killing top security officials, is yet another reminder of the sharply deteriorating security situation in Afghanistan. In recent years, the Taliban had shown its capability to infiltrate official meetings and attack any government building, notwithstanding …

The immediate task is to dial downthe tensions over Sabarimala The riotous scenes in the pathways leading to the Sabarimala temple in Kerala in the last few days ought to persuade everyone, irrespective of where they stand on the Supreme Court’s recent verdict, of the importance of one thing: to …

The BJP must revisit the pages of Kashmir’s political history and avoid its maximalist approach for short-term gains It is a sign of how accustomed India has got to the perennial Kashmir crisis that the municipal elections held in Jammu and Kashmir recently, which saw near-zero voter turnout in the …

There are limits to Saudi Arabia’s defiance even within the ambit of narrow national interest The gory, gruesome and ghastly details of the last few moments in the life of Saudi Arabian journalist Jamal Khashoggi, as reported in the government-controlled Turkish media, have reaffirmed the continuing validity of the universal …

The colour of the setting sun matches the ferrous red of the porous laterite rock that dominates the terrain of Ratnagiri and Rajapur along Maharashtra’s Konkan coast. At a quarter past six in the evening, in the small village of Devache Gothane, when there is finally some respite from the …