1. As rescuers at the Telangana SLBC Tunnel are racing against time to save the trapped workers, the Silkyara rat miners team has joined the rescue operations. With them, L&T’s endoscopic and robotic cameras will also be used to locate the trapped workers. NDRF, too, has pressed its dog squad for rescue assistance. Speaking to the media, Telangana Minister Jupalli Krishna Rao said “Even if their survival chances are slim, we will try to save them.”
2. UK’s business and trade secretary Jonathan Reynolds is here in India to hold talks with his counterpart Piyush Goyal to reinitiate trade talks. This was the first such effort after the Labor Party came to power. The free trade agreement between India and the UK could not be reached earlier despite a dozen rounds of negotiations. Reynolds’s visit has renewed hopes for a deal that’s “balanced, ambitious and mutually beneficial”, as Goyal wrote on X.
3. PM Narendra Modi nominated 10 prominent personalities, including Jammu and Kashmir CM Omar Abdullah, Anand Mahindra, and Actor R Madhavan for his campaign against obesity. Thanking PM Modi and expressing happiness, J&K CM Omar Abdullah underlined why obesity must be fought and further nominated ten others. Anand Mahindra reiterated PM Modi’s call to cut cooking oil usage by 10% during his recent Mann Ki Baat address.
4. At the Raj Niwas in New Delhi, Delhi CM Rekha Gupta and her cabinet ministers then took oath as MLAs today. Later, BJP MLA Vijender Gupta was elected as the speaker. Ahead of the assembly session, AAP leader and Leader of the Opposition Atishi accused the BJP of betraying the voters by not rolling out the Rs 2,500-per-month scheme for women. However, CM Rekha Gupta said her administration is committed to implementing the scheme and accused the APP of leaving the state coffers empty.
5. American Airlines Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner (#AA292) from New York to Delhi was escorted mid-way by two Italian Eurofighter jets to Rome for safety. The diversion was due to a suspected explosive device in the plane, which had 199 passengers and 15 crew members flying. The airline in its statement said the flight took an abrupt U-turn owing to a “possible security issue.”
6. The Indian government has banned unapproved combinations of drugs, Tapentadol and Carisoprodol manufactured by Mumbai-based Aveo Pharmaceuticals. Reports say the said drugs were causing an opioid crisis in some West African countries. Further acting on an audit report by the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) on drug manufacturers covered by the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act 1985, a Stop Activity Order was issued to Aveo Pharmaceuticals.
7. Ranveer Allahbadia, who caused an uproar with his dirty comments in the YouTube show ‘India’s Got Latent’ and YouTuber Ashish Chanchlani visited the Maharashtra Cyber Cell headquarters on Monday to record their statements. A week back, on February 18, Supreme Court Justice Surya Kant, while granting an interim relief to Ranveer Allahbadia from arrest said, “We don’t want to say anything further but there is something very dirty in his mind.”
8. External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar asked the Bangladesh interim government to decide what kind of a relationship it wants with India. He also said blaming India for everything and stating you want good relations with us cannot go hand in hand. Meanwhile, Pakistan and Bangladesh resumed direct trade for the first time after 1971.
9. People of the naxal-hit Chhattisgarh village ‘Keralpenda’ created history by casting their votes in the state panchayat polls for the first time since India won independence. With tight security, poll visuals showed villagers lined up peacefully to register their democratic rights. It must be noted that during the second phase of the panchayat election, Bijapur, another insurgency-struck district, took part in the polls.
10. The Uttar Pradesh Police has filed over a dozen FIRs against 140 social media accounts for spreading misinformation about Mahakumbh. At least 34 of them are against handles with posts claiming a fire accident in a Mahakumbh-bound train on February 14, 2025, killing over 300 people, using an old video showing the 2022 fire in Bangladesh’s Parbat Express train.
References: Times of India | Hindustan Times | News18 | NDTV