Month: April 2022

Following the recovery of heroin worth over Rs 100 crore and other narcotic substances and Rs 30 lakh cash from a residential flat in southeast Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh on Thursday, the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) has raised the possibility of narco-terrorism module in the case.

Speaking to ANI, Director-General of NCB, SN Pradhan said, “There is every possibility of narco-terrorism module. The network is connected to Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Middle East. So there is every chance that there may be a narco-terrorism module. However, it is subject to investigation. The operation will go on all night today and there will be arrests.”
“This has been going on for several days. More people are involved in this case. We have been trying to catch the entire network. Pakistani nationals were caught in an operation a few days ago. Further, people were caught from Muzaffarnagar and Kairana in an ATS raid. During the investigation, the case of Shaheen Bagh’s apartment came to the fore. Not only heroin was being imported, but heroin was being made from opium at the apartment,” said the NCB chief.

He said the situation in Afghanistan is such that earlier opium was cultivated under the auspices of the Taliban. He mentioned that all the attempt is being made to capture the big market like India. The money acquired from heroin sold in India was being sent to Dubai through hawala.

“Recently, Afghanistan’s Taliban government announced a ban on cultivation. But in anticipation of the ban, there seems to be a rise in exports and illegal trafficking outside. There is demand in the Indian market. It is a huge market,” Pradhan stated.

He said heroin was earlier smuggled from Afghanistan through South Africa and Sri Lanka.

“These syndicates have been smuggling goods to India via maritime as well as land border routes wherein heroin was smuggled in alongside various goods. Heroin is smuggled to India concealed in liquorice, truck tyres, etc. Heroin was later extracted from those goods by Indian counterparts with the help of some Afghan nationals,” said the DG, NCB.

He emphasized that an international network of law enforcement agencies will have to be created to eliminate the international network of drugs.

In one of the biggest recent narcotics seizures, the NCB, Delhi Unit on Thursday busted an India-Afghanistan drug syndicate and recovered 50 kilograms of heroin worth over Rs 100 crore from a flat in southeast Delhi’s Jamia Nagar, Shaheen Bagh.

One person was arrested in this case. Along with the contraband, Rs 30 lakh of cash and 47 kilograms of some other narcotics substance, concealed in a tree trunk- yet to be identified, were also recovered.

The NCB and agencies concerned are now probing if the hawala money was for any other illegal purposes. In connection with the recovered narcotics to the massive recent drug haul in Kandla is also being looked into, sources said.

NCB Deputy Director General (operations) Sanjay Kumar Singh said that the probe so far has revealed an India-Afghan syndicate is based in Delhi and neighbouring states.

He said these syndicates have expertise in manufacturing and adulterating heroin locally.

“We received input from a liable source that a huge amount of heroin is stored in an apartment in Shaheen Bagh. Our team searched the apartment to recover 50 kg of heroin, 47kg of suspected narcotics, Rs 30 lakhs in cash and a note-counting machine. They smuggle it from abroad and manufacture it here. The supply is to Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, UP, Uttarakhand via sea route and land border that is Attari-Wagah border. They also mix it with legal goods being imported from Afghanistan and Pakistan,” Singh said.

He said many people of the network have been identified and searches are underway at various locations in Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana and Delhi.

He further said that the drugs were kept in backpacks and jute bags and were wrapped in packets of e-commerce companies.

“This is one of the biggest narcotics seizures in Delhi, that too from a residential area, in the recent past. Another 47 kg of “suspected” narcotics were also seized from the premises and has been sent to a laboratory for testing,” Singh said. (ANI)

Acknowledging power shortage across the state, Bihar’s Power Minister, Bijendra Prasad Yadav assured on Thursday that a power shortage of around 1000 Megawatt (MW) power will be resolved in a day or two.

“A power supply shortage of around 1000MW is presently going on in the state and it will be resolved in a day or two,” said Yadav.
Adding further Yadav said, “there is some problem all over the country and in Bihar. We are taking steps to overcome them.”

According to Yadav, a unit of Navinagar that started running on Thursday is capable of supplying approximately 500-600 MW power.

He also asserted that talks with the central government (regarding the shortage of power supply) are going on. The statement of the Power Minister of Bihar came when the country is facing ‘power crisis’ amid the reports of coal shortage at power plants in the country.

As per the central government’s data on Tuesday, the maximum all-India power demand met was recorded at 201.066 GW. The Union Ministry of Power said that the demand for power surpassed last year’s maximum demand 200.539 GW which occurred on 7 July 2021.

Earlier in March 2022, the growth in energy demand was observed around 8.9 per cent, and it is likely to reach about 215-220 GW in May-June.

In the month of March this year, the growth in energy demand has been around 8.9 per cent. Further, the demand is expected to reach about 215-220 GW in the months of May-June.

Meanwhile on Monday, RK Singh (Union Minister for Power) had met the Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw and discussed the measures to enhance efficiency in coal transport to power plants.

Indian Railways has ramped up the coal transportation resulting in 32 per cent more coal freight loading between September 2021 and March 2022. (ANI)

Seven people have been arrested by Ayodhya police on Thursday, all are accused of disturbing the peace and equanimity of the city by throwing objectionable posters and objects at several mosques in Ayodhya.

The arrested accused have been identified as Mahesh Kumar Mishra, Pratyush Srivastava, Nitin Kumar, Deepak Kumar Gaur alias Gunjan, Brijesh Pandey, Shatrughan Prajapati and Vimal Pandey, all are residents of Ayodhya.
Senior Superintendent of Police (Ayodhya), Shailesh Kumar Pandey said that the incident was carried out by 11 people out of which seven have been arrested while the other four are absconding.

“A total of eight persons on four motorcycles, led by Mahesh, threw objectionable posters and objects outside the mosques. The police recovered the objects, and a mobile phone and vehicles have been impounded. We have arrested seven people so far, four are absconding. We will arrest them soon. Action under the Gangsters Act and NSA will also be initiated against them,” said the SSP.

During the investigation, it was found that Mahesh Kumar Mishra was the main conspirator and along with his other accomplices, a conspiracy was hatched at Brijesh Pandey’s house in opposition to the recent incident in Jahangirpuri of Delhi. It also came to light that the accused on the night of Wednesday, first reached the Beniganj Tiraha where after seeing PRV’s car could not execute the plan on Beniganj Masjid and thus moved to other mosques. They threw the objectionable posters and objects at the Ayodhya’s Masjid Kashmiri Mohalla, Tatshah Mosque, Ghosiyana Ramnagar Masjid, Idgah Civil Line Mosque and Gulab Shah Dargah behind Dargah Jail.

Police also said that out of the four arrested three accused have previous criminal history.

“The accused Mahesh has four cases registered against him in Kotwali Police station Ayodhya. Apart from this, the accused Nitin and Vimal also have cases registered against them,” said a police officer.

Police said that all the seven accused have been booked under Sections 295 (injuring or defiling places of worship with intent to insult the religion of any class), and 295-A (deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs) of the Indian Penal Code. (ANI)

The national capital reported nearly 1,500 COVID cases in the last 24 hours, the highest after February 5 this year, said a health bulletin by the Delhi government on Thursday.

The active cases in the city rose to 5,250 which is the highest since February 10 when the active cases were 5,438.
The daily case positivity rate stands at 4.62 per cent.

As many as 1,070 COVID patients recovered from the disease in the last 24 hours. The total number of recoveries since the onset of the pandemic in the city rose to 18,48,526.

Two patients succumbed to the virus during this period taking the death toll in the national capital to 26,172.

A total of 32,248 COVID samples were tested in the last 24 hours.

As far as the vaccination is concerned in the city, 38,121 beneficiaries were jabbed with the COVID vaccine. The cumulative doses provided so far stand at 3,33,40,952.

Meanwhile, India on Thursday witnessed an uptick in the number of COVID-19 cases, with 3,303 fresh cases in the last 24 hours, the union health ministry reported. There were 39 fatalities over the same period. (ANI)

Kickstarting its preparations for the 2024 general elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has constituted a team to strengthen the booths where the party lacks strength under a campaign and reach out to the people ahead of the polls.

BJP national president JP Nadda will inaugurate the campaign.

However, the date for the inauguration of this campaign has not been decided yet. Representatives from various states are likely to join the campaign. The party has decided on three months from the date of commencement of the campaign as the deadline.

According to the sources, work is underway to deploy the MPs from all across the country in the campaign. Besides the MPs, the BJP chiefs of all the state units and the district presidents will be given roles in the campaign.

The party is planning to run the programme in three stages. The team formation would be done in the first phase. The booths to be strengthened would be identified in the second stage. Public outreach programme would be organised in the third phase. Efforts would be made to connect to the maximum number of people under the campaign, said the sources.

Earlier today, Nadda chaired a meeting of the Madhya Pradesh core group to chalk out the strategy for the 2023 state Assembly elections. (ANI)

The Delhi government has expressed its concern over the possible shortage of coal in power plants that supply electricity to the national capital and has written a letter to the Central Government urging it to ensure adequate coal supply.

Delhi Power Minister Satyendar Jain held an emergency meeting at Delhi Secretariat in this context on Thursday and also wrote a letter to the Central Government requesting its intervention so as to provide enough coal for the power plants supplying electricity to the national capital.

“At present, there is a shortage of coal in various thermal stations supplying electricity. National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC)’s Dadri-II and Jhajjar (Aravalli), both power plants were established primarily to meet the power requirement in Delhi. However, there is very little stock of coal left even in these power plants,” Jain said in a statement.

In NTPC’s Dadri-II power plant, only a day’s worth of stock left and in Jhajjar (Aravalli), only 7-8 days’ worth of stock is left, as per the Delhi government.

The Dadri-II, Unchahar, Kahalgaon, Farakka and Jhajjar power plants in Delhi supply 1751 MW of electricity per day, officials said in today’s emergency meeting.

Noting that Delhi gets the maximum supply of 728 MW from Dadri-II Power Station, while 100 MW from Unchahar Power Station, officials said that in such a situation, due to disruption of power supply from these two power stations, there may be a problem in 24 hours power supply to many essential institutions including Delhi Metro and Hospitals.

As per Delhi government data, the Unchahar power plant has two days’ worth of stock left, Kahalgaon has 3.5 days worth of stock left and Farakka has five days’ worth of stock left.

According to the daily coal report of the National Power Portal, there is an acute shortage of coal at these power stations of NTPC.

Jain said that the Delhi government is monitoring the situation closely and making every possible effort to ensure that people do not face power outages in some areas of the national capital.

Presently, 25 per cent to 30 per cent of the electricity demand in Delhi is being met through these power stations, which are facing a coal shortage, he added.

“These power stations play an important role in preventing blackouts in some parts of Delhi and are also essential to ensure the continuous supply of electricity to DMRC, hospitals, and to the people of Delhi in the upcoming summer season. The Delhi Government has made an appeal to the Center to intervene and provide for an adequate supply of coal in the power plants that supply electricity to Delhi in case there is a shortage, to ensure that people in Delhi receive an unrestricted 24 hour supply of electricity,” Jain said.

For the first time in April, Delhi’s peak power demand clocked 6000 megawatt (MW) as the unabated heatwave continues to push the power demand to newer highs.

On Wednesday, the power demand was 5786 MW and it has increased by around 3.7 per cent in just 24 hours. Peak power demand in the BRPL area of South and West Delhi today clocked 2549 MW and 1375 MW in the BYPL area of East and Central Delhi, as per the data by the discoms. (ANI)

Urfi Jawed, who often makes headlines for her bold sartorial choices, was recently seen in a viral video being caught red-handed by police while shooting for an adult film.

The video shared by content creator Rohit Gupta on his Instagram handle showed Urfi in an office where she had come to meet a director for a film. Telling her that this is a secret project, the director then starts describing it to her. He says that Ranbir Kapoor has been cast as a villain in this film, which makes Urfi excited about the project.

Later, she is also told that for the hero’s role they have cast a foreign actor and that Baadshah will be composing the music for this film. Then, Rohit, acting as another director, arrives in the office with the actor who has been cast as the lead. When Urfi enquires them about the male actor being a foreigner, she’s told that he’s from Uganda.

Following all of this, the director invites Urfi to audition with the actor and gives her weird dialogues to enact. Soon after that, a police officer arrives at the office and starts thrashing all the three men present there for filming an adult movie. They blame all of it on Urfi.

A shocked and angry Urfi then calls up her manager and starts shouting at him for scheduling such an audition for her. It’s at this point that her manager reveals to her on the phone that all of this was just a prank on her and not real.

For the unversed, Urfi rose to fame with her stint on ‘Bigg Boss OTT’, and ever since she has been making headlines for her peculiar fashion sense. (ANI)

The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) Delhi zone has seized 50 kg of “high-quality” heroin from a residential premise in the Jamia Nagar area of Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh, the agency informed on Thursday. A person of Indian origin has been arrested in the case.

As per Deputy Director General (DDG) Operations of NCB, Sanjay Singh, the seized heroin originated from Afghanistan and drug money is suspected to be channelled through hawala.
“NCB Delhi zone seized 50 kg high-quality heroin, 47 kg suspected narcotics, 30 lakhs drug money in cash counting machines and other incriminating materials from a residential premise in Jamia Nagar, Shaheen Bagh, yesterday (April 27),” Singh informed.

The 47 kgs of suspected narcotics have been sent to a laboratory for testing.

He further added that the drugs were kept in backpacks and jute bags and were wrapped in packets of e-commerce companies.

The agency has also raided locations in Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Haryana, due to suspected links with this international drug syndicate.

Singh informed that the syndicate smuggled goods to India through the sea, and border routes, wherein they would hide heroin in legitimate goods and cargo.

“The heroin was subsequently extracted from these goods by the Indian members of the syndicates,” he said. (ANI)

Terming the anti-terrorist operation in the Mitrigam area in which two militants were killed a big success, IGP Kashmir Vijay Kumar congratulated the joint forces for neutralizing the terrorists involved in the recent terror attacks on outside labourers.

Acting on specific information generated by Pulwama Police regarding the presence of terrorists in the Mitrigam area, the Army and CRPF jointly launched a search operation on Thursday.

During the search operation, as the joint search party proceeded towards the suspected spot, the hiding terrorists fired indiscriminately upon the search party which was retaliated leading to an encounter.

In the initial exchange of fire, one security force personnel received gunshot injuries. He was immediately evacuated to the hospital for treatment of his injuries. However, the operation was halted to ensure the safe evacuation of all the civilians trapped around the encounter site. Moreover, all due precautions were also taken to avoid any collateral damage, stated the police release.

After the evacuation of civilians was done, the operation was resumed. In the ensuing operation, two local terrorists identified as Aijaz Hafiz of Dalipora and Shahid Ayub of Dheeri Murran linked with proscribed terror outfit Al-Badr were killed and their bodies were retrieved from the site of the encounter.

As per police records both the killed terrorists were categorised terrorists and part of groups involved in a series of terror crimes including attacks on Police and Security Forces and civilian atrocities. Both the killed terrorists were involved in a series of recent terror attacks on outside labourers in Pulwama, said the police.

Terrorist Aijaz Ahmad Hafiz was involved in firing upon outside labourers namely Sonu Sharma son of Banarasi Dass resident of Pathankote at Yadder Pulwama, Mohammad Akram son of Ab Salam resident of Bijnor UP at Arihal Pulwama and Wishwajeet Kumar son of Parwas Mandal resident of Banka Bihar at Circular Road Gangoo, Pulwama.

He was also involved in firing upon bank guard namely Ab Hamid Wani resident of Tahab Pulwama and Sarpanch Gh Nabi Kumar of Panchayat Halqa Arihal B at Arihal Pulwama. Besides these terror crimes, terrorist Aijaz Hafiz was instrumental in recruiting Shahid Ayoub Sheikh into terrorist ranks, who too was neutralized in the said encounter.

Terrorist Shahid Ayoub was involved in firing upon two outside labourers namely Patlashwar Kumar son of Jako Choudary and Joko Choudary son of Thaugh Choudary, both residents of Bihar at Lajoora Pulwama. Before joining terrorist ranks, he was working as a terrorist associate & was involved in several other terror crimes.

Incriminating materials, arms & ammunition were recovered from the site of the encounter. All the recovered materials have been taken into case records for further investigation.

Pertinent to mention here that during the current year so far 62 terrorists linked with different proscribed terror outfits were neutralized in various encounters across the valley.

IGP Kashmir while sharing with media said that due to enhanced Humint, Techint and focused operations the surviving rate of terrorists is drastically decreasing. During the current year, 62 terrorists linked with different terror outfits have been neutralized in different encounters so far.

Out of these 62 killed terrorists, 32 terrorists got neutralised within just three months of their joining terror rank. Among the 62 killed terrorists, 39 were linked with terror outfit LeT, 15 with JeM, 06 with HM & 02 with Al-Badr. The killed terrorists include 47 local terrorists and 15 foreign terrorists.

IGP Kashmir once again reiterates his appeal to all misguided youth who have joined terror folds to shun the path of terrorism and return to the mainstream. He also appealed to the parents & elders of these terrorists to plead their wards to shun this reckless path of violence.

In this regard, a case under relevant sections of law has been registered and an investigation has been initiated.

People have been requested to cooperate with Police till the area at encounter site is completely sanitized and cleared of all the explosive materials. (ANI)

Power couple actor Anushka Sharma and Indian batter Virat Kohli marked their presence at the wedding reception of Glenn Maxwell and Vini Raman.

Bollywood star Anushka Sharma never misses treating the ‘Virushka’ fans with their adorable glimpses. On Thursday, the 33-year-old star took to her Instagram handle, and shared a couple of pictures of her with husband Virat Kohli, along with the picture she penned a ‘bubbly’ caption, “Wedding function in a bubble! Now I think I’ve seen and celebrated possibly every function and festival in a bubble! #BubbleLife”

In the photos, the ‘Jab Tak Hai Jaan’ star was seen donning a bright pink salwar suit, with a subtle make-up look accessorizing it with a pair of big heavy jhumka’s. On the other hand, Virat could be seen wearing a dark blue kurta pairing it with a white pyjama. ‘Virushka’ looked radiant and glowy together as they happily posed for the pictures.

In reaction to the post, fans, friends and family showered praise and love on the social media post. Fellow Dhanashree, wife of Yuzi Chahal dropped a couple of hearts in the comment section. Sister-in-law Bhawna Kohli Dhingra commented, “You both look awesome”, meanwhile a fan wrote, “Most awaited pictures “.

The two secretly got married in a fairytale wedding which was only attended by the couple’s close family and friends in December 2017.

The duo welcomed their first child ‘Vamika Kohli’ at Mumbai’s Breach Candy hospital in 2021.

Meanwhile, on the work front, Anushka has started filming for ‘Chakda Xpress’, inspired by cricketer Jhulan Goswami’s life and journey. Virat is currently taking part in the Indian Premier League 2022 for the Royal Challengers Bangalore. (ANI)