NEWS

The sharp surge in Covid-19 infections in Kerala post Onam sent India’s cases in the week ending Sunday zooming to an eight-week high, with the southern state alone accounting for 66% of all cases in the country in this period.

India recorded more than 2.9 lakh fresh Covid cases in the week (August 23-29), a 32% jump from the tally in the preceding seven days. This was the highest number of weekly infections since the June 28-July 4 week when 3.05 lakh cases were recorded.

Kerala alone reported over 1.9 lakh cases, a massive 55% rise from the previous week’s tally of 1.25 lakh. This was the highest number of infections in the state in 14 weeks since May 16-23 and the highest in any Indian state in 13 weeks.

JD(U) on Sunday demanded formation of a coordination committee in the 15-party National Democratic Alliance (NDA) at the national level. JD(U) national secretary general KC Tyagi said a coordination committee, or convener, is needed in the NDA like the one in the era of former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee and JD(U) functionary George Fernandes.

Tyagi said such a committee would help maintain coordination among NDA allies and put a brake on unnecessary statements issued by different alliance partners. “When Vajpayee was NDA chairman, George Fernandes used to be its national convener. Fernandes served as NDA convener till 2008. He was replaced by Sharad Yadav, who resigned after JD(U) left the alliance,” a senior JD(U) politician told TOI.

Students may have settled in their virtual classrooms this year. But the new menace, say teachers, is early and primarylearners being fed when online classes are in progress. A survey of parents and teachers found that the virtualscreen, be it laptops or computers, have become the new ‘idiot box’. Over 65% of parents said they feed their children during online class. This is in addition to thetime spent in front of a television while eating.

Teachers surveyed said over 55% students in the virtual class are eating at the same time. Atleast one fourth of the surveyed parents were happy to feed hot meals to their children, who were otherwise carrying coldfood in their tiffin boxes. Interestingly, 7% of teachers surveyed too admitted to eating meals during class.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the renovated complex of the Jallianwala Bagh memorial in Punjab’s Amritsar on Saturday via video conferencing. The Prime Minister's Office (PMO) has said in a statement that PM Modi will also inaugurate museum galleries developed at the memorial in Amritsar. The virtual event will display multiple development initiatives taken by the government to upgrade the complex, it added.

The PMO said that Union minister of culture G Kishan Reddy, Union minister of housing and urban affairs Hardeep Singh Puri, ministers of state for culture, governors and chief ministers of Punjab, Haryana, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, all Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs from Punjab, and members of Jallianwala Bagh National Memorial Trust among others will be present on the occasion.