QUICK NEWS

Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Wednesday here inaugurated and laid foundation stones of 29 national highway projects worth Rs 4,000 crore in Punjab.

The projects included Ladhowal bypass in Ludhiana, six-lane flyover and two-lane road over bridge in Ludhiana, four laning of Jalandhar-Kapurthala section, and three bridges on the Jalandhar-Makhu road.

Gadkari laid the foundation stones of several projects, including four laning of Hoshiarpur-Phagwara road and four laning of Ferozepur bypass.

In view of “pressure” on students during placement season, the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) are considering not disclosing the highest annual packages in their placement reports, focussing on mean and median salary figures instead, The Indian Express has learnt.

This consensus emerged during a recent meeting of the All IITs Placement Committee (AIPC), where discussions included the IIT-Bombay placement report from last week which claimed over 85 offers surpassing an annual package of Rs 1 crore. In a corrigendum issued on Wednesday, IIT-Bombay, while citing a “technical error”, revised the number of Rs 1 crore-plus offers in the first phase of placement to 22.

Union minority affairs minister Smriti Irani, on January 8, led a rare non-Muslim Indian delegation, also comprising minister of state for external affairs V. Muraleedharan, to a historic visit of the holy city of Madinah in Saudi Arabia. 

Irani and Nirupama Kotru, joint secretary in the minority affairs ministry, were the two non-Muslim Indian women without headgear to be present in Madinah. The visit came after Irani signing the Bilateral Haj Agreement 2024 with Saudi minister of Hajj and Umrah Tawfiq bin Fawzan Al-Rabiah on January 7. India has been granted a quota of 175,025 pilgrims for this year's Hajj pilgrimage. 

A United States court, in its order, has urged the federal government to respond to a motion filed by lawyers of Nikhil Gupta, charged in Sikh separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun's murder plot. Gupta's lawyers have sought material relating to charges against him in the conspiracy.

"On January 4, 2024, defence counsel filed a motion to compel production of discovery, requesting that the Court enter an order directing the Government to begin providing defense counsel with discovery material. The Court hereby directs the government to file a reply to the Motion to Compel within three days of the date of this order," US District Judge Victor Marrero stated in the order.

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman S Somanath has said he would be ‘happy to see more IITians’ join the national space agency.

“My task is not only to identify people and leaders who will be able to execute the tasks, especially youngsters who will able to design those things in the coming 25 years. That's why I am excited to come IIT,” Somanath said recently at an event in Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Bombay.