Live news updates: Fire breaks at AIIMS, fire tenders rush to the spot

Fire breaks out at an operation theatre in AIIMS (All India Institute of Medical Sciences) Trauma Center,4 fire tenders present. No one is stranded.

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Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Subramanian Swamy on Sunday revealed the reason as to why he did not add the prefix "Chowkidar" to his name on Twitter. In an interview to a Tamil Channel Swamy said I cannot add the Prefix of Chowkidar to my name as I am a Brahmin

Swamy revealed this reason after PM Modi as well as many other BJP leaders like Smriti Irani, Sambit Patra, Prakash Javadekar, Sushma Swaraj and Party President Amit Shah had added "Chowkidar" to their name on their Twitter accounts attempting to popularise the "Main Bhi Chowkidar" campaign.

A soldier was killed on Sunday when Pakistani troops violated the ceasefire by targeting forward posts and villages with heavy caliber weapons and rockets along the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir's Poonch and Rajouri districts, a defence spokesperson said.

The Indian Army retaliated in strong measure, inflicting adequate damage and casualties to Pakistani troops, Jammu-based Public Relations Officer (defence) Lt Col Devender Anand said.   He said grenadier Hari Bhakar, a resident of Rajasthan's Nagaur district, was seriously injured and admitted to the nearest field hospital, but succumbed later, taking the number of Army personnel killed since last week to three.

At least 10 students were injured in a clash between Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and Students Federation of India (SFI) members in the Himachal Pradesh University campus here on Sunday, police said.

The clash took place when the ABVP activists asked the SFI members to stop playing cricket on the ground where they wanted to hold an "RSS shakha", a police official told IANS.

Most of the injured were admitted to the Indira Gandhi Medical College and Hospital here.

If the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) returns to power after the Lok Sabha polls, it would turn India into a "fully religious nation", Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Central Committee member Bijan Dhar said on Sunday.

The BJP, which is backed by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), in its present five-year tenure embarked on a plan to turn India into a "religious nation" and after the 2019 Lok Sabha polls they would complete the mission to turn India into a "fully religious nation", Dhar said.

He said the BJP has started destroying India's traditional culture, heritage, language, history and education and blamed it for destroying secularism, economy, age-old social justice, federalism -- the pillars of the Indian Constitution.

BJP leader and Union minister Uma Bharti Sunday said it is for L K Advani to clear the "mist", after the veteran leader was not named as a party candidate for the Lok Sabha elections, and asserted that his stature was not affected by contesting or not contesting any poll.

Heaping praises on the 91-year-old leader, Bharti said it was Advani who played the central role in bringing the party to such a position that Narendra Modi is prime minister today and added that he never craved for any position in his long political career.

"The only person who should comment right now to clear the air, all these things- the mist around- is Advani ji," she said adding that it would not be proper for others, including her, to comment on the matter.

4 people killed, 45 people injured in a bus accident near Trimbakeshwar road in Palghar district of Maharashtra

The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) has removed a doctor from the post of Assistant Professor for not possessing the requisite qualification, following an order in this regard by the Delhi High Court.

An official letter issued by AIIMS Director Randeep Guleria, a copy of which has been accessed by IANS, said that subsequent to an order by the Delhi High Court, Kanika Jain's appointment "to the post of Assistant Professor of Hospital Administration hereby stands terminated with immediate effect".

Former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's condition had deteriorated in jail due to a kidney disease, a day after his family met him and expressed concern over his health, Pakistan media reported on Sunday.

The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo's daughter Maryam Nawaz tweeted about his worsening health on Saturday after she along with his personal physician Adnan Khan visited Sharif at the Kot Lakhpat jail here on receiving permission from the country's interior ministry, according to The Express Tribune newspaper.

Five Indian crew members of a cargo vessel arrived in Mumbai Sunday after spending 13 months in a jail in Greece.

They were on board merchant cargo vessel `MV Andromeda' that had set sail from Cyprus to Libya in December 2017.

The ship anchored in Turkey for repairs and then proceeded to its destination. However, in January 2018, when it reached Greece, authorities detained the ship on charges of carrying explosive material.

Addressing the media here, one of the five sailors said he had last seen his daughter when she was two months old.

"Now she is two years old and has started walking. And I was not there to see this," he said.

Thailand went to the polls on Sunday to vote in the first general elections after incumbent Prime Minister General Prayuth Chan-ocha came to power following a bloodless coup in 2014.

About 50 million people, including 7 million young Thais who will be participating in their first ever election, are eligible to cast their ballots to elect 500 members of the House of Representatives, the lower house, for a four-year term, reports Efe news.

Life across the Kashmir Valley was affected by the separatist-called shutdown on Sunday against the Centre's decision to ban the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) led by Muhammad Yasin Malik.

The Joint Resistance Leadership, a separatist conglomerate headed by Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umer Farooq and Yasin Malik, had called for the shutdown.

Shops, other business establishments and educational institutions were closed and public transport remained off the roads.

Inter-district transport and train services were also suspended

Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Sunday slammed Human Resource Development Minister Prakash Javadekar over a circular issued by his Ministry asking all departments to prepare "a shelf of projects" in line with "national priorities" for PhD scholars.

"Now, self-attested wise minister (Javadekar) of over intelligent Prime Minister (Narendra Modi) will tell the intellectuals of the country how should they do their work. It is perfectly said that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing," Rahul Gandhi wrote on his Facebook account.

The Congress President posted a picture of Javadekar below his comment and also pasted a website link of an article published in a newspaper on Sunday carrying headline "HRD says PhDs only on 'national priority' topics, Kerala Prof quits".

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Sunday that the country will hold a national remembrance service on March 29 for the 50 victims of the attack in the Christchurch mosques.

The service will provide an opportunity for New Zealanders and people around the world to come together as one to honour the victims of the attack carried out at two mosques on March 15.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has forgotten about his bonhomie with "chaiwalas", is now remembering "chowkidars", and will focus on somebody else the "next time" for political gains, senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal has said, taking a swipe at the PM's 'main bhi chowkidar' campaign.

The former Union minister also accused Modi of politicising the Balakot air strikes and asked whether the 'chowkidar' (watchman) was sleeping when terror attacks took place in Gurdaspur, Pathankot, Uri, Baramulla, and Pulwama.

On the prime minister's 'main bhi chowkidar' campaign to counter the Congress' 'chowkidar chor hai' barb, Sibal said: "First of all he has forgotten about the chaiwalas (tea sellers). He now remembers the chowkidars (watchmen). Next time he will remember somebody else and forget the chowkidars."

Two persons were injured on Sunday in a mysterious blast inside a mosque in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district.

Police said the explosion occurred in Chowgam village mosque when it was being cleaned.

"Two people were injured. The blast seems to have been caused due to the malfunctioning of pipes," a police officer said. "The injured have been shifted to a hospital."

The Unicef has urged the international community to provide assistance to the children affected by Cyclone Idai that has killed 417 people in Africa and has left over 1,500 displaced.

"We are in a race against time to help and protect children in the disaster-ravaged areas of Mozambique," Henrietta Fore, Executive Director, Unicef, said on Saturday after visiting Beira, one of the areas most affected by the cyclone.

Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Sunday attacked the Uttar Pradesh government over unpaid dues of sugarcane farmers and alleged that 'chowkidars' (watchmen) were only working for the rich, not for the poor.

She shared a media report on Twitter that claimed the dues of sugarcane farmers had crossed Rs 10,000 crore in the state.

"The families of sugarcane farmers toil day and night but the Uttar Pradesh government does not even take the responsibility of paying their dues," Priyanka Gandhi said.

"Rs 10,000 crore of farmers' dues means everything, including their children's education, food, health, and the next produce comes to a standstill. These chowkidars only work for the rich and do not care about the poor," she claimed.

The alleged purification of the site where Manohar Parrikar's mortal remains were kept for public veneration is the outcome of RSS's superstitious ideology that is being endorsed by the BJP government, Congress spokesperson Sunil Kawthankar said on Sunday.

He said the 'purification' controversy had opened a Pandora's box about performance of religious rituals and practices in government offices and at official functions and demanded that the state government come up with a comprehensive policy on the issue.

"The purification ceremony is the result of the same RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) mindset which is ruling the country, which is boosting superstitious beliefs. Yesterday's incident at the Kala Academy is an outcome of the same ideology," Kawthankar told IANS.

Ceasefire violation by Pakistan along LoC in Nowshera sector of Jammu and Kashmir at 11.50 am

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has ordered a probe into reports of abduction, forced conversion and underage marriages of two teenage Hindu girls in Sindh province and to take immediate steps for their recovery, Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry said on Sunday.

The two girls, Raveena (13) and Reena (15), were allegedly kidnapped by a group of "influential" men from their home in Ghotki district in Sindh on the eve of Holi. Soon after the kidnapping, a video went viral in which a cleric was purportedly shown solemnising the Nikah (marriage) of the two girls.

In a separate video, the minor girls can be seen saying that they accepted Islam of their own free will.