Tamil Nadu news live: AIADMK gears up for internal polls

The Centre has sanctioned Rs 800 crore to Tamil Nadu as part of Covid-19 relief package for managing second wave of the infection and preventing third wave, health minister Ma Subramanian said on Thursday. Read full story

NEET exam will be conducted in at least four more districts — Chengalpattu, Virudhunagar, Dindigul and Tirupur — in TN this year in addition to the 14 districts in which the test was conducted last year for the convenience of TN students, Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan said on Thursday. TN health minister Ma Subramanian, who met the Union minister in New Delhi, handed over the recommendations of the Justice AK Rajan panel and sought exemption from NEET. The Centre has promised to consider our demand, Ma Subramanian said. Read full story

A 21-year-old woman, who pushed a 40-year-old unidentified man to death to save herself from his attempt to sexually assault her in Minjur on Tuesday, was booked under Section 100 of the IPC (right of private defence of the body extends to causing death) and released without charge by police on Thursday. Read full story

After being tied down to their homes for months due to the pandemic, domestic backpackers’ ‘revenge travel’ plan may get a boost as the state will soon unveil a tourism policy that includes caravan rides and cruise ships to help people escape from the humdrum of city life. Read full story

A gaana song opens with a chillum being passed around by people smeared in ashes. The video plays on with the lyrics peppered with references to different types of intoxicants. Glimpses of joints being rolled flicker on the screen and the lyrics extol the “good effects” of smoking ganja. Songs like this are popular among adolescent children, many of whom fall prey to substance abuse, initially getting into it out of curiosity and because of peer pressure. Read full story

The Madras high court has suggested that Tamil Nadu government consider appointing a dedicated team headed by an IAS officer for proper upkeep of Marina beach. “The beach is not properly maintained and is often littered, and nobody cares about it,” a division bench of Justice N Kirubakaran and Justice T V Thamilselvi said on Thursday.

A Washermenpet police team monitoring the smuggling of ganja from Andhra Pradesh to Chennai on Wednesday arrested three men with114kg of the narcotic worth Rs 13 lakh near Thiruvottiyur. While Santhosh, Rajesh Rangoli Reddy and Suresh Siva Prasad, described as ‘couriers’ from Visakhapatnam, have been sent to jail, the police team has begun a hunt for Chinna, the ‘receiver’ believed to be one of the kingpins.

To create a repository on water bodies in Tamil Nadu so as to check future encroachments, the Madras high court on Thursday directed the state to collect GPS maps of water bodies along with drone photography and manual survey.

Fresh cases of Covid-19 in Tamil Nadu dropped further on Thursday, when the state reported 2,405 new cases compared to 2,458 on Wednesday. The state registered 49 deaths, pushing the cumulative death toll to 33,606. Since March 2020, TN has reported 25.28 lakh Covid cases. After discharging 3,006 people from the state registry, there were 29,950 people still under treatment for the viral infection.