A beneficiary gets inoculated against Covid-19 at a vaccination center in Navi Mumbai. (Express photo by Amit Chakravarty)Mumbai News and Live Updates: Easing curbs imposed to contain Covid-19, Maharashtra government on Wednesday said shopping complexes, restaurants, cinema and theatre halls in 14 districts, including Mumbai, will be allowed to operate at 100 per cent capacity. All shopping complexes, cinema halls, restaurants and bars, sports complexes, gyms, spas, swimming pools, religious places, drama theatres (natyagrihas), tourist places, entertainment parks etc are allowed to operate with 100 per cent capacity in these districts, a government notification said.
Meanwhile, Mumbai will face will 15 per cent water cut till further instructions. The water cut has been imposed after the 15-megawatt power station of Bhatasa dam, one of the lakes which supply water to Mumbai, has developed a technical snag. This has led to disruption in the water supply to Mumbai. According to the statement issued by the BMC on Tuesday evening, a 15 per cent water cut will be in effect till the problem at the power station gets resolved.
An Air India evacuation flight with 182 Indians who were stranded in Ukraine landed in Mumbai on Tuesday morning from Bucharest, the capital of Romania. This is the second evacuation aircraft, which has landed in Mumbai since the war broke out last Thursday.
Maharashtra Director General Sanjay Pandey has been appointed the Commissioner of Mumbai Police. (Express Photo: Ganesh Shirsekar)
Easing curbs imposed to contain Covid-19, Maharashtra government on Wednesday said shopping complexes, restaurants, cinema and theatre halls in 14 districts including Mumbai will be allowed to operate at 100 per cent capacity.
A government notification said these are districts where first vaccination dose is more than 90 per cent and second dose over 70 per cent. The 14 districts are: Mumbai city, Mumbai suburban, Pune, Bhandara, Sindhudurg, Nagpur, Raigad, Wardha, Ratnagiri, Satara, Sangli, Gondia, Chandrapur and Kolhapur.
All shopping complexes, cinema halls, restaurants and bars, sports complexes, gyms, spas, swimming pools, religious places, drama theatres (natyagrihas), tourist places, entertainment parks etc are allowed to operate with 100 per cent capacity in these districts, the notification said. (PTI)
Maharashtra Opposition leader Devendra Fadnavis has said the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government’s rallying around minister Nawab Malik, who was arrested over alleged links to Dawood Ibrahim, shows its “complete surrender” to the fugitive underworld don.
“What is really shocking is the MVA’s decision to rally around Malik, whose underworld links have been exposed. More appalling is the Shiv Sena’s stand,” the former chief minister said Wednesday. Read more
The Bombay High Court on Wednesday said the Maharashtra government's decision to continue with a rule making full vaccination mandatory for using public transport, including local trains, violated the fundamental rights.
A bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice M S Karnik said the high court should have extended its `suo motu jurisdiction' (power to act on its own) and struck down several Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) issued by the state.
"This is very unfortunate. You (the state government) are insisting that everyone should get vaccinated. There is no question of personal choice. On one hand you say it is voluntary, not compulsory, and on the other hand, you create such a situation that everyone must get vaccinated," the judges said. (PTI)
Maharashtra Congress leader Sachin Sawant on Wednesday claimed an NCB SIT report had said there was no evidence that actor Shah Rukh Khan's son Aryan Khan held in the cruise ship drugs case was part of a larger conspiracy of a drug syndicate and demanded an apology from the BJP.
Sawant, who is the state Congress spokesperson, said a BJP functionary was one of the witnesses (panch) used by the NCB, adding that those involved in the raid from the probe agency must be punished.
He also said allegations pertaining to extortion and other irregularities made against the NCB by NCP minister Nawab Malik may be true. (PTI)
Four persons have been arrested in connection with the firing on a medical shop owner in Maharashtra's Raigad district on February 11, a police official said on Wednesday.
Shubham Jaiswal (24) was going home after shutting his shop in the night when he was shot at and injured by two motorcycle-borne persons, the Mangaon police station official said.
"The two motorcycle-borne persons had fled in the direction of Indapur, We found the two-wheeler in Kalmaje village, and a probe revealed it had been stolen from Vashi police station limits in Navi Mumbai. A phone call made to Shubham's father demanding Rs 2 crore helped us zero in on the four accused," he said. (PTI)
The Bombay High Court on Wednesday directed the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to file its reply to Maharashtra minister Nawab Malik's petition challenging his arrest in a money laundering probe linked to fugitive gangster Dawood Ibrahim and his aides.
Malik was arrested by the ED last week and is in the central agency's custody till March 3. The minister would be produced before a special court on Thursday.
The NCP leader on Monday filed a petition in the high court seeking to quash the case and also the order passed by a special court remanding him to the ED's custody. Malik sought his immediate release and a direction from the high court to declare his arrest as illegal. (PTI)
Maharashtra Minister Yashomati Thakur has said that the state government has prepared a draft for the new women's empowerment policy that takes a holistic view of gender equality.
In a statement on Wednesday, the state minister for women and child development said recognising the importance of equal gender relations, the policy proposes to engage extensively with men and boys in promoting gender equality. The draft will be finalised after consultations with stakeholders, she said.
The policy focuses on social and economic development of women, girls and persons belonging to the LGBTQIA – lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex, asexual – community, Thakur said. (PTI)
Indian students in Ukraine may have miscalculated the gravity of the situation in that country although the Centre had issued an evacuation advisory for them before Russia actually launched an attack, senior BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis said on Wednesday. He was replying to a question whether there was a delay on the part of the Indian government in the evacuation of students stuck in Ukraine.
"The Indian government had issued an advisory days before the actual attack took place on some cities in Ukraine. However, Indian students may have miscalculated the gravity of the situation although an advisory to evacuate the cities was in place," the former Maharashtra chief minister told reporters.
The Union government has come under attack by the opposition parties after a student hailing from Karnataka got killed in Ukraine in the Russian attack. (PTI)
Ahead of the budget session of the Maharashtra legislative Assembly, NCP president Sharad Pawar on Wednesday chaired a review meeting with ministers and leaders of his party.
The four-week budget session of the Maharashtra Assembly will begin on Thursday in the shadow of NCP leader and minister Nawab Malik's arrest in a money laundering case.
Speaking to reporters, the party's state unit chief and MVA minister Jayant Patil said, 'No matter what the Opposition says, Malik will not be asked to resign from his ministerial post.” The opposition BJP has threatened to disrupt the proceedings of the legislature session if Malik continues as a minister. (PTI)
On the eve of the budget session of the Maharashtra legislature, senior BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis on Wednesday said his party is firm on its demand for the resignation of state minister Nawab Malik, who has been arrested by the ED in connection with a money laundering case.
Fadnavis was speaking to reporters here after chairing a meeting of the BJP's members of the legislative Assembly and Council as the budget session is set to begin from Thursday.
BJP's state unit chief Chandrakant Patil has earlier said that his party will not let the budget session of the state legislature function if Malik does not quit the cabinet. (PTI)
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is launching ward-wise helpline numbers to help citizens register civic complaints and resolve their local issues efficiently. The helpline numbers for each of the 24 wards will be issued after the current term of elected corporators ends on March 7.
“People can call and register their complaints. Also, the existing helpline number 1916 can be used for civic complaints,” said an official from the BMC.
Usually, citizens would approach their local corporators for help with civic issues. Read more
A day after the Bombay High court said that it was inclined to reject if not withdrawn a plea filed by dismissed Mumbai police officer Sachin Waze, who challenged two orders passed by the state-appointed Justice (retired) K U Chandiwal Commission, Waze’s lawyer Wednesday told the court that he was withdrawing it and had given written instructions for it.
The Chandiwal Commission is probing corruption allegations against former Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh. Read more
The Maharashtra BJP demanded the resignation of state minister and NCP leader Nawab Malik for his alleged links with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.
Malik had been summoned and later arrested in connection with a money laundering case involving Ibrahim. The leader of opposition Devendra Fadnavis said, "Nawab Malik engaged in a land deal with a 1993 serial bomb blast convict. This itself is a very serious issue and enough to demand his resignation."
Fadnavis further said the Maha Vikas Aghadi's adamant stand to express solidarity with Malik shows the "government's complete surrender to Dawood" and exposes the alliance's character.
The Bombay High Court Wednesday allowed activist Anand Teltumbde, an accused in the Elgaar Parishad case, to visit his nonagenarian mother in Chandrapur from March 8 to 10 following the death of his brother and top Maoist leader Milind Teltumbde.
It further said that the expenses of police escort and other necessary expenses shall be borne by the Maharashtra government. “It is made clear that this application has been allowed only for him to meet his mother at her house, and hence no other person except his mother is permitted to be met,” the High Court added. Read more
In its detailed order rejecting bail to an alleged drug peddler Abdul Kadar Shaikh, an accused in the cruise ship drug case, a special NDPS (Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances) court in Mumbai has stated there was sufficient evidence to show his complicity in a serious offence pertaining to commercial quantity of contraband.
Shaikh’s plea was rejected last month, while the detailed order was made available on Wednesday. The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) had claimed to have recovered commercial quantity of drugs, including 2.5-gram ecstasy and 54.3-gram mephedrone, from Abdul Kadar Shaikh. Read more
For 35-year-old Rajesh Munishwar, a space and defence engineer hailing from Maharashtra's Nagpur and settled in Kyiv for the last 17 years, it is a "painful experience" to see his city get devastated by the Russian forces.
Munishwar, who has managed to flee Kyiv with his wife and eight-year-old son and cross over to Ukraine's neighbouring country Romania, said Kyiv has been surrounded by the Russian forces from all sides and several buildings, including key establishments, have fallen prey to heavy bombing.
Face-to-face firing between the two sides on the streets has become quite normal in Kyiv, Munishwar said. "At Labanovska Street, 200 metres away from our home, a cruise missile hit a building and its ninth and tenth floor were completely destroyed. The road from our home to University of Defence is totally barricaded. Heavy firing between the natives and invasion forces is going on," he added. (PTI)
In its detailed order rejecting bail to the 21-year-old engineering student arrested in connection with the GitHub app case by the Mumbai police, the court has said he had created accounts on Twitter based on fake identities. It also said that the creators of the app tried to portray that they belong to a particular community.
“…it resulted in causing defamation, hurting the feelings of a particular community and dignity and modesty of women,” additional sessions judge Sanjashree J Gharat said in her order.
The police had alleged that the hate app hosted doctored photographs and objectionable comments targeting Muslim women in the country and the creators and followers had tried to portray themselves as belonging to the Sikh community.
Madhabi Puri Buch took over charge as the chief of Sebi from Ajay Tyagi on Wednesday. She is the first woman to head the regulatory body for securities and commodity market.
Buch was earlier a whole time member at SEBI.
Schools in Mumbai resumed normal operations from Wednesday after the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation's (BMC) education department gave the nod to go back to pre-Covid timings with 100 per cent capacity. More than the additional school hours, the students were excited about resuming extra-curricular activities such outdoor games, singing and dancing in groups, recess among others.
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Two men have been arrested in Maharashtra’s Palghar district for raping and intimidating a 20-year-old woman on the pretext of performing magic tricks to cure her of a “black magic spell” cast on her, the police have said.
The complainant in the case told the police that she was raped on February 26 in a chawl in Nalasopara (East) in Vasai taluka in the Palghar district. She said the two men told her she has been suffering because of a black magic spell cast on her by someone. The woman, who was going through some personal crisis in her life, believed them and agreed to follow their instructions.
On the pretext of curing her of the spell, the accused told her that they were performing some magic tricks and raped her. They later threatened her to keep quiet about the assault.