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Shrinking snow cover continues to haunt Himachal Pradesh Tourists arrive at koksar snow point in Lahaul and Spiti.ANI VIKAS VASUDEVA  CHANDIGARH The trend of gradual reduction in snow cover in ecologically fragile Himachal Pradesh continues to haunt the hill State. Also, the mean maximum and minimum average temperature is on the rise in the Himalayan region. In the past decade, Himachal Pradesh has been witnessing an erratic, inconsistent and decreasing trend of snowfall, besides a shift in its pattern and precipitation, triggered by climate change. In the 2022-23 winter period (October-April), there was an overall reduction of about 14.05% in…

Sedition and its roots in rudeness as an offence Shahrukh Alam practises law at the Supreme Court of India On March 30, the Lahore High Court annulled the offence of ‘sedition’ in the Pakistan Penal code. Embarrassingly, around the same time in India, the police registered a series of complaints in Delhi and in Ahmedabad, and also arrested several people, including owners of the printing presses involved, for posting anti-government (and specifically, anti-Modi) posters across town. The detainees were not accused of ‘sedition,’ but were booked for criminal conspiracy to cause public mischief and to deface public property. The printing…

Bulgarian writer wins International Booker Prize ASSOCIATED PRESS LONDON Bulgarian writer Georgi Gospodinov and translator Angela Rodel won the International Booker Prize on Tuesday for Time Shelter, a darkly comic novel about the dangerous appeal of nostalgia. The book beat five other finalists to the prize, which recognises fiction from around the world that has been translated into English. Time Shelter imagines a clinic that recreates the past, with each floor reproducing a different decade. Intended as a way to help people with dementia unlock their memories, it soon becomes a magnet for people eager to escape the modern world. Facts about…

New Parliament to house sceptre that symbolised transfer of power in 1947 VIJAITA SINGH NEW DELHI Prime Minister Narendra Modi will install the Sengol, a sceptre given by the British to India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to represent the transfer of power in 1947, in the new Parliament building, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Tuesday. The sceptre, kept in a museum in Prayagraj, formerly Allahabad, will be installed near the podium of the Lok Sabha Speaker. “Sengol makes the spirit of August 15, 1947 unforgettable and the Parliament House is the most appropriate and sacred place to install it,”…

India-Australia ties built on trust: Modi Strong bond: Prime Minister Narendra Modi with his Australian counterpart Anthony Albanese in Sydney. Getty Images PRESS TRUST OF INDIA SYDNEY Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said the foundation of India-Australia relations lies in mutual trust and respect, as he along with his Australian counterpart Anthony Albanese addressed the Indian diaspora at a mega event here. During the event, a suburb in Australia — Harris Park — was renamed “Little India”, reflecting the strong bond between the two strategic partners. Mr. Modi also announced that India would open a consulate in Brisbane to fulfil a…

It’s time to ensure safer skies Captain A. (Mohan) Ranganathan is a former airline instructor pilot and aviation safety adviser. He is also a former member of the Civil Aviation Safety Advisory Council, India In 1997, a Bangalore-based NGO called the Environment Support Group filed a public interest litigation (PIL) in the Karnataka High Court. A key concern of the group was that the second runway in Mangalore airport would not be able to meet the standards required while dealing with an emergency, particularly during landings and take-offs. The court dismissed the PIL. In a new PIL in 2002, the…

Tracking SDG progress the Bhopal way K.V.S. Choudary is Municipal Commissioner, Bhopal Municipal Corporation Parul Agarwala is Country Programme Manager, UN-Habitat India Pushkal Shivam is Urban Planner, UN-Habitat India Bhopal has become the first city in India to join the growing global movement on localisation of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) following the release of its Voluntary Local Review (VLR). In 2015, the 193 member-states of the United Nations adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which consists of 17 Sustainable Development Goals and 169 targets as a plan of action for ‘people’, ‘the planet’, and ‘prosperity’. The resolution specifies mechanisms…

Tamil Nadu’s amended law on jallikattu valid: SC Youngsters celebrating the Supreme Court verdict on jallikattu at Tamukkam in Madurai on Thursday. Ashok. R Court terms it a “type of bovine sport” existing in T.N. for at least a century; it also found similar laws passed by Karnataka and Maharashtra, allowing bullock cart races and buffalo racing, valid KRISHNADAS RAJAGOPAL NEW DELHI The Supreme Court on Thursday termed jallikattu a “type of bovine sport” existing in Tamil Nadu for at least a century, and did not interfere with the State legislature’s finding that the bull-taming event is part of the cultural…