Sunday, April 5, 2026
Home Blog Page 1317

Nepal: Around 400 Indians put under quarantine in Birgunj

New Delhi (NVI): Amid the coronavirus pandemic, around 400 Indian nationals in Nepal have been placed under quarantine in Birgunj, according to The Himalayan Times.

A large number of Indian citizens heading towards India via border in Parsa have been kept in an education faculty building, at a temporary quarantine facility, a Nepal police official was quoted as saying by the newspaper.

The Indian nationals were placed in quarantine following the directive issued by the Parsa’s Chief District Officer as per an agreement signed by Nepal and Indian governments.

Both sides have signed an agreement that stranded Nepali or Indian nationals will be taken care of by the host country during the lockdown.

Meanwhile, the Nepal government has extended the COVID-19 lockdown by a week, which will be in effect till April 7 now.

So far, five people have been infected from COVID-19 in Nepal, with no death case.

Over 200 stranded at Delhi Gurdwara shifted to Nehru Vihar school

Majnu Ka Tilla Gurdwara in Delhi (File)

New Delhi (NVI): Around 205 people, who were stranded at Majnu Ka Tilla Gurdwara in the National Capital have been shifted to a school in Nehru Vihar by Delhi Police, which has been turned into a quarantine center for them.

These people had walked to the Gurdwara which falls on Delhi Ring Road, from different places in Delhi and the NCR region. They were waiting for help from the administration or Government so that they can back to their homes in Punjab.

However, since the gathering of so many people at one place is highly risky during the coronavirus outbreak, Delhi Police shifted them to the Nehru Vihar school today in three buses, with each bus carrying 15 persons, in line with the protocols regarding social distancing amid Covid-19 outbreak.

Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee has made arrangements for food and shelter of the stranded persons who have been shifted to the school.

DSGMC President Manjinder Singh Sirsa also tweeted over the matter with a video message: “People belonging to Punjab from different places in Delhi had gathered at Gurdwara Majnu Ka Tilla Sahib. 205 of them have been shifted by the Delhi Government to Nehru Vihar School. We had requested the Delhi and Punjab Government to transport these people back to their homes so that their gathering at one place doesn’t increase the danger of Covid-19 spread.”

Coronavirus cases in India jump to 1,637; death toll at 38

New Delhi (NVI): As the country entered its eighth day of lockdown, the total number of positive COVID-19 cases rose to 1,637 while the death toll climbed to 38, with several states reporting new cases, according to Union Health Ministry.

The cases include 1,466 active coronavirus cases, while 132 people have been cured.

386 new cases of COVID-19 have been reported in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of cases to 1,637.

In addition to this, the government has named 10 “hotspots” around the country where an unusual transmission of the disease took place and several clusters were reported.

These places are namely Dilshad Garden, Delhi’s Nizamuddin, Noida-Meerut, Bhilwara, Ahmedabad, Kasargod, Pathanamthitta, Mumbai and Pune.

New casualties were reported from Gujarat, Punjab, Telangana and West Bengal.

Meanwhile, the number of positive COVID-19 cases in Andhra Pradesh today doubled, making the total count to 87. As many as 43 new cases from eight districts were reported.

In addition to this, the Nizamuddin Tablighi centre building was evacuated after a 36 hour-long operation. A total of 2,361 people were evacuated and 617 of them were sent to hospitals and 1,744 were sent to quarantine facilities, Delhi’s Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said.

Govt allows EPF withdrawal amid Covid-19 lockdown

New Delhi (NVI): The government has amended the Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) scheme to allow subscribers to withdraw non-refundable advance from their corpus in view of the deadly coronavirus pandemic.

In a statement on Sunday, the labour ministry notified the grant of permission to EPF members to withdraw up to 75 percent of the employee’s contribution to the corpus or the sum of basic wages and dearness allowance for a period of three months to ease the economic fallout from the coronavirus outbreak.

The notification came days after the government eased provident fund rules to help salaried individuals endure the financial impact of the coronavirus-induced lockdown.

The labour ministry said that the amendments to the EPF scheme came into force from March 28.

Retirement fund body EPFO or Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation has issued directions to its field offices for promptly processing any applications received from EPF subscribers “to help them fight the situation”, the labour ministry added.

The government has also decided to pay the EPF contribution on behalf of both the employer and the employee for the next three months under certain conditions. This benefit will be only extended to organizations with up to 100 employees with 90 percent of them earning less than Rs 15,000 per month.

Here’s how to apply for a Provident Fund (PF) withdrawal online:

  1. The user is required to log in to the EPF scheme’s member portal – unified portal- epfindia.gov.in. This is to apply for either 75 percent of the non-refundable advance component of an EPF account or three months of wages and dearness allowance, whichever is less.
  2. Once logged in, the member has to select the claim form 31 under the online services section of the website. In the next step, the user is prompted to verify the last four digits of savings bank account number linked with the PF account and click on “proceed”.
  3. The EPF subscriber is redirected to a withdrawal form. On the next page, the member selects the “PF Advance” form (Form 31) from the dropdown next to the text “I want to apply for”.
  4. In the next step, the user selects the purpose for withdrawal. The EPF portal has introduced a new option, called “outbreak of pandemic (Covid-19)”, in the dropdown menu.
  5. In the next step, the EPF subscriber is asked to provide a scanned copy of a cheque clearly showing the IFSC code and the account number. Only images in the JPEG format and size between 100 Kbs and 500 Kbs are accepted.

6, The user proceeds by agreeing to the self-declaration message.

  1. The member submits the request by verifying the Aadhaar number through an OTP- or One Time Passcode-based method.
  2. Once the request is made, the funds are credited to the EPF subscriber’s savings account within three working days, according to the EPF members’ portal.

Centre defines domicile of J&K

Mubashir Bukhari

Srinagar (NVI): Eight months after abolition of special status of Jammu and Kashmir, the central government today notified rules specifying criteria for domicile of the newly-created Union Territory, which will entitle them to UT government jobs.

According to the Gazette notification, “a person who has resided for a period of 15- years or has studied for a period of 7 years and appeared in Class 10th /12th examination in an educational institution in J&K, will be eligible to be the resident of Union Territory.”

Persons registered as migrant by the Relief and Rehabilitation Commissioner (Migrants) in the UT of J&K will also be included in the definition.

It also includes “Children of such residents of J&K as reside outside UT of J&K in connection with their employment or business or other professional or vocational reasons.”

The domiciles will also include children of those central government officials, All India services officers, officials of public sector undertaking and autonomous body of central government, public sector banks, officials of statutory bodies, officials of central universities and recognized research institutes of central government who have served in Jammu and Kashmir for a total period of 10 years.

“Subject to the provisions of this Act, no person shall be eligible for appointment to a post carrying a pay scale of not more than Level-4 (25500) unless he is a domicile of the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir,” reads section 5A of The Jammu and Kashmir Civil Services (Decentralization and Recruitment) Act.

The level 4 includes posts like Junior Assistant, Constable, which is considered as the lowest category of non-gazetted posts. This means domiciles of J&K UT would have exclusive right on class-4th and non-gazetted posts to be advertised by the Services.

The government has already repealed 29 laws of the erstwhile state while 109 have been amended. Section 5A states that no person shall be eligible for appointment to a post carrying a pay scale for not more than level 4 “unless he is a domicile of UT of J&K.”

Through the same order, the Centre has repealed the J&K civil services (special provisions) Act.

The decision comes eight months after the central government abolished the special status of J&K, granted under Article 370. The Centre also had scrapped Article 35A, which defined the Permanent Residents of J&K who were exclusively entitled to the state government jobs and admission to state-run professional educational institutions.

After that move, there was anxiety among local populace in Jammu and Kashmir that the abolition of special status would open floodgates and they would stand to lose special privileges in UT government jobs and professional educational institutions.

10 Public Sector Banks merge into 4 today

New Delhi (NVI): The merger of 10 Public Sector Undertaking (PSU) Banks, that was announced in August last year, comes into effect from today. With this, six banks will cease to exist.

The Union Cabinet had given final approval in this regard on March 4.

Reserve Bank of India has also revealed that the scheme of merging these 10 PSU banks into four bigger lenders is on schedule i.e., it will come into force from April 1, despite the country-wide coronavirus lockdown.

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had also announced that the mega bank consolidation plan will be executed as planned.

In the biggest consolidation exercise in the banking space, Sitharaman in her mega plan had announced the merger of 10 public sector lenders into four bigger and stronger banks in August 2019.

With this merger, the total number of public banks in India comes down to 12. The four banks which absorbed the smaller PSU banks are Punjab National Bank, Canara Bank, Union Bank of India and Indian Bank.

Following the merger, customers, including depositors of merging banks, will be treated as customers of the banks in which these banks have been merged.

Bank mergers have also taken place in the past as well. Last year, Dena Bank and Vijaya Bank were merged with the Bank of Baroda.

Kotak Mahindra Bank and ING Vysya Bank merger and amalgamation of Centurion Bank of Punjab Ltd. with HDFC Bank took place in 2014 and 2008, respectively.

How Indian celebrities are dealing with coronavirus lockdown

New Delhi (NVI): With the entire country under lockdown due to coronavirus pandemic, what are the celebrities doing while remaining indoors.

Actors, actresses and cricketers are indulging in various kinds of activities to pass time and several of them have shared videos and photographs to give an idea about these engagements.

While some are busy doing household chores like cleaning, cooking, etc., others are pursuing their passions or hobbies like a workout to remain fit, sketching, reading, cooking, etc., or spending their time in learning something new.

Salman Khan

Bollywood superstar Salman Khan is pursuing his passion for painting and sketching amid the lockdown phase. The actor shared a video on Instagram giving a sneak-peek into his sketching time. He can also be seen humming the “Kaho naa Pyaar hai” song while sketching.

Alia Bhatt

Actress Alia Bhatt is learning creative writing, her Instagram post reveals. She shared a picture on Instagram where she is taking down notes and a book titled – ‘The Craft of Plot’ is open on her laptop.

View this post on Instagram

Stay home & .. learn something new ?

A post shared by Alia Bhatt ☀️ (@aliaabhatt) on

Amitabh Bachchan

Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan, who has a massive social media fan following, is also spending his quarantine time to fullest amid the lockdown. The actor recently shared a poem by his father and renowned poet Harivansh Rai on Instagram.

While sharing the poem, he also mentioned its importance and relevance in today’s times. The actor also shared a beautiful caption with the poem.

Vicky Kaushal

Actor Vicky Kaushal is spending some ‘memorable moments’ with family amid quarantine. The ‘Masaan’ actor shared an adorable picture with his mom as they observe a sunset while staying indoors amid the countrywide lockdown.

View this post on Instagram

माँ-ए नी मेरीए ?

A post shared by Vicky Kaushal (@vickykaushal09) on

 

Shilpa Shetty

Actress Shilpa also shared a video where she is cleaning her lawn. In the instagram post, she can be seen using a broom to sweep leaves and later watering plants. “Cleaning and tending to the garden for last few days,” she says suggesting her fans that cleaning home during lockdown is the best workout.

View this post on Instagram

Cleaning and tending to the garden for these last few days. This lockdown time has made me realise and remember that having help in any form is one of those few things we should always appreciate. Our lives become so much easier because of all our house help/staff but unfortunately, sometimes we only realise this in times like these. Today, I’m grateful for every single person who has made life easier for us in their own way. It is because of them that we can enjoy the gift of time to go out and pursue our dreams. When life gets back to normal, don’t forget to let them know that you value them. . . . . . #20DaysOfGratefulness #SwasthRahoMastRaho #GetFit2020 #stayhome #staysafe #blessed #gratitude #quarantinelife #selfisolation

A post shared by Shilpa Shetty Kundra (@theshilpashetty) on

Anushka Sharma

Actress Anushka Sharma has turned hairstylist for her cricketer husband Virat Kohli. The couple popularly called Virushka, indulged in some customised salon treatment as Anushka shared the video on Instagram on Saturday. What’s interesting is that Anushka used a pair of kitchen scissors for Virat’s hair cut!

View this post on Instagram

Meanwhile, in quarantine.. ??‍♂??‍♀

A post shared by AnushkaSharma1588 (@anushkasharma) on

While getting his hair trimmed, Virat says: “This is what quarantine does to you. We allow things like this to happen. Getting a haircut with kitchen scissors! Can you see this gradual fade? Beautiful haircut by my wife.”

The couple has been active on Instagram, making frequent appearances while appealing their fans to stay home and stay safe.

Jacqueline Fernandes

Actress Jacqueline Fernandez has shared a video on Instagram of her doing Surya Namaskar while asking her fans to not quit physical activity despite the closure of gyms due to lockdown.

“This is 1 surya namaskar, 20 mins you can do 20 and it’s a great workout! I do 108. yoga to the rescue!!!,” she captioned a video which she shared on Instagram recently.

Malaika Arora

Bollywood celebrity Malaika Arora has been sharing her love for healthy food on social media. Amid the coronavirus pandemic, she is self-quarantining and is utilizing her time with family while cooking delicious food.

View this post on Instagram

I love to cook! I love cooking for my family and friends but with my busy schedule, I hardly get time to pursue this passion of mine. But with this self isolation upon us, I thought of utilising this time in a constructive and healthy way by cooking some sumptuous and delicious 'Malabari veg stew for the soul'. I have got this recipe from mom @joycearora and a bit from my friend Maunika @cookinacurry who's a lovely cook. Everyone at home simply loves this stew and we are going to have it with some white rice and some delicious gluten-free, vegan chickpea bread that my friend Raveena @iamayogisattva made for me. M in for a lovely treat, I hope you too utilise this time to do something positive and healthy. Stay calm and stay safe! #stayhome#quarantine #covid_19

A post shared by Malaika Arora (@malaikaaroraofficial) on

Recently, she shared a video on her social media account of herself cooking, with a caption that said, “I love to cook! I love cooking for my family and friends but with my busy schedule, I hardly get time to pursue this passion of mine.”

COVID-19: UT, state-wise breakdown of cases and fatalities

New Delhi (NVI): The novel coronavirus pandemic has created a situation of panic in the country, with a total of 1,397 confirmed cases of the disease and 35 fatalities, according to the Health Ministry data.

After the first confirmed case in India, which was reported on January 30, the contagion has tightened its grip in the entire nation.

Following is a list of the total number of cases and fatalities across the nation:

Death in States and UT’s

Maharashtra: 9
Gujarat: 6
Madhya Pradesh: 3
Karnataka: 3
Delhi: 2
Punjab: 3
Bihar: 1
Telangana: 1
West Bengal: 2
Tamil Nadu: 1
Jammu and Kashmir: 2
Kerala: 1
Himachal Pradesh- 1

Number of positive cases UT and state-wise

Andhra Pradesh- 57
Andaman and Nicobar Islands- 11
Bihar- 16
Chandigarh- 18
Chhattisgarh- 9
Delhi- 109
Goa- 5
Gujarat- 83
Haryana- 44
Himachal Pradesh- 4
Jammu and Kashmir- 62
Karnataka- 86
Kerala- 267
Ladakh- 13
Madhya Pradesh- 50
Maharashtra- 243
Manipur- 1
Mizoram- 1
Odisha- 3
Puducherry- 1
Punjab- 47
Rajasthan- 89
Tamil Nadu- 82
Telangana- 88
Uttarakhand- 7
Uttar Pradesh- 120
West Bengal- 32

A total of 123 people have been cured and discharged from hospitals in India. There are around 1,238 active cases currently.

Coronavirus cases surpass 8,50,000 globally

Coronavirus cases
(Representational/file photo)

New Delhi (NVI): The total number of infected cases due to the coronavirus have now reached 8,59,556 globally while the deadly virus has claimed more than 42,000 around the world, according to John Hopkins Universoty data.

The novel coronavirus pandemic is tightening its grip around the globe with cases being reported from more than 180 countries.

The United Nations chief, Antonio Guterres, has warned the coronavirus pandemic presents the world with its “worst crisis” since World War II.

Meanwhile, the number of casualties in the United States are now higher than in China, where US announced more than 800 deaths in the last 24 hours, taking the total death toll to more than 3,834, which is the third highest death toll after Italy and Spain.

The US has reported a total of 1,85,499 positive cases of COVID-19 across the country.

Both the US and Italy have recorded more than 1,00,000 cases, while Spain is nearing that figure. All have more cases than China, where the outbreak began, according to the media reports.

In addition to this, Spain, the United Kingdom and France, each reported their biggest overnight jump in deaths since the start of the pandemic.

A total of 1,789 patients have died in UK hospitals after testing positive, the country’s Department of Health and Social Care says.

Northwest India to witness rise in temperature

New Delhi (NVI): The plains of northwest India could experience a rise in their maximum daytime mercury levels for the next few days, according to weather forecasters.

According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), isolated parts over the northwest may also experience wet conditions, as rains and thunderstorms have been forecasted over parts of Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi and West Uttar Pradesh.

However, the weather conditions over the region are likely to get drier, as the induced cyclonic circulation over north Rajasthan fades.

Earlier on Tuesday evening, light drizzle was also witnessed in Delhi-NCR region.

While the eastern and southeastern states of Odisha, Telangana, interior Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh are likely to witness a gradual rise in their maximum daytime temperatures.

Apart from that, the west Indian states of Maharashtra and Gujarat will mark an increase in their respective daytime temperatures.

Meanwhile, in Delhi, the minimum temperature today was recorded at 17 degrees Celsius.

However, the maximum and minimum temperatures are expected to rise over the next few days, according to IMD.

1...1,3161,3171,318...1,569Page 1,317 of 1,569

MUST READ