News Highlights: Maharashtra CM Eknath Shinde vows strict action over Shivaji statue incident, urges unity instead of politics

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On the allegations levelled by the AAP against the BJP for allegedly kidnapping AAP councillor Ramchandra, BJP MP Manoj Tiwari says, "It does not seem possible but if it is, so they should file their complaint, we will get it investigated and if someone is found guilty then definitely action will be taken against him. It has become a habit of the Aam Aadmi Party that they make allegations and run away. People of Aam Aadmi Party have fallen in the eyes of the people of Delhi at this time, in such a situation they are upset and that is why they want to create all kinds of sensation."

Indian shuttler Suhas Yathiraj beat compatriot Sukant Kadam 21-17 21-12 to enter Paris Paralympics men's singles SL4 category final.

India's Yuki Bhambri and his partner Albano Olivetti lose in pre-quarterfinal 2-6, 2-6 to top seeds Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos

Shuttler Nitesh Kumar enters final of men's singles SL3 category after 21-16 21-12 win over Fujihara Daisuke of Japan in Paralympics, assured of silver

BJP leader Dilip Ghosh says, "Out of the people detained during the protest, 9 are here. I came to meet them. There will be an FIR in the court tomorrow. Secondly, not just the RG Kar case, such incidents are happening in Bengal in many places. A 7-year-old was raped and the same thing happened with a 13-year-old in Howrah... There is a woman CM but she cannot protect or respect women."

We will not sit quiet till the government in Maharashtra is changed in next two months: Sharad Pawar in Mumbai

World No. 1 archer Rakesh Kumar pips Ken Swagumilang of Indonesia in shootoff to make quarterfinals of Paris Paralympics.

"First of all, people don't know what happened and they are in confusion. But political parties are doing havoc, which is not good for the students. I want to establish the truth and that's why I want to constitute a committee of experts. All laptops and phones of the accused will be seized and the forensic evidence will be verified," says Andhra Pradesh CM N Chandrababu Naidu on reports that a hidden camera was found inside girls hostel at a private engineering college in Gudivada in Krishna district.

Maharashtra CM Eknath Shinde says "Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj is the biggest God for us, he is a worshipped deity, his effigy falling suddenly is a condemnable incident, strict action will be taken by the government against the person whose mistakes have caused this incident, but I want to say to the opposition party leaders that they should stop doing politics on this. You people should come together and cooperate in how to make this excellent effigy of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj again at the same place as soon as possible, do not do politics for this. The state government has involved big artists in this and soon we will make the effigy of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj again at the same place."

Heera Lal Verma, Joint Secretary of the Joint Association of Himachal Pradesh Government Employees, says, "Govt employees are getting affected financially the most. We keep waiting for our salaries until the end of the month...if there is a financial crisis. Govt should see the loophole and resolve that issue. When the yearly budget is formed, pension, salary, medical everything is included. Is the govt diverting this money. Stopping the salary is not a mature thing...they should probe the leakage and see where is this crisis coming from."

On the MVA (Maha Vikas Aghadi) protest over Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj's statue collapse incident, Maharashtra Minister Uday Samant says, "The politics that is happening over the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj's statue collapse incident is very bad...An investigation should be conducted. PM Modi has apologised for the incident and even after that, holding a protest is just politics"

Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud addressing the 2-day National Conference of District Judiciary, at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi, said, "The Committee on Reducing Arrears of Cases has skilfully laid out an action plan for reducing case pendency through case management. The three stages of the action plan include first, the preparatory stage of forming district-level case management committees to identify target cases, undated cases and reconstruction of records. The second stage, which is ongoing, aims to resolve cases which have been pending before the courts for 10 to 20 years, 20 to 30 years and more than 30 years. Third, from January to June 2025, the judiciary shall execute the third phase of clearing the backlogs of cases pending for over a decade in courts. This effort requires an intricate coordination of various applications and data management systems to plan and track our strategies. Some of the other strategies for dealing with the backlog include pre-litigation dispute resolution. The Supreme Court of India recently concluded its first-ever National Lok Adalat, at which almost 1,000 cases were disposed of amicably within a course of 5 working days."

PM Narendra Modi today held a telephonic conversation with the Indian medal winners in the Paralympic Games till now.

These included Mona Agarwal, Preethi Pal, Manish Narwal and Rubina Francis. He congratulated each of the winners and said they have made the country proud with their performances.

He also wished Avani Lekhara success in her other endeavours in the Games - she wasn’t able to join the call due to participation in a sporting event

India’s GST collections for August were Rs 1.75 lakh crore, down from Rs 1.82 lakh crore in July

GST revenue growth remained steady at around 10% compared to August 2023, when collections were Rs 1.59 lakh crore

"We need money and are doing reforms. Govt employees will get salaries, pensioners will get pensions. When we cleared arrears for 28,000 families, then we will do this as well. It is our right to ask for money from Centre - for NPS, PDNA, BBMB share. The BJP is doing politics over it. They are making unnecessary statements. They should read and then make comment," says Himachal Pradesh CM Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu on financial condition of the state.

Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin signed an MoU with Ohmium International for setting up a new green hydrogen and electrolyser gigafactory in Chengalpattu district with a cost of Rs 400 crores during his visit to the US in San Francisco. It is expected to create around 500 jobs.

Manisha Ramadass sets up semifinal clash with compatriot Thulasimathi Murugesan in women's singles SU5 to assure India of at least another medal in para badminton at Paris Paralympics.

“Arvind Kejriwal started from zero. He first built his own party and then he was elected as the CM of Delhi in the first election he contested. He carried out work that brought ripples in the politics of the entire country. PM Modi is jealous of Arvind Kejriwal’s work because he cannot do it. BJP government has not done anything in the past 10 years,” says Sunita Kejriwal, wife of Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, while addressing a public rally in Haryana’s Charkhi-Dadri.

"Certain NGOs who are on road for drop of an incident, drop of a hat, but they are in silence mode. We have to question them. Their silence is much worse than the culpable act of perpetrators of this heinous crime that happened on August 9 2024. Those who seek to play politics and brownie points, keep on writing letters to one another, are not responding to the call of their conscious," says Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar on Kolkata rape and murder incident.

"When humanity has been shamed, there are some stray voices, voices that cause concern. They only aggravate our excruciating pain. To put it mildly, they are adding salt to our injured conscience and what do they say, 'it is a symptomatic malaise, a frequent incident'. When it comes from someone who is the Member of Parliament, a senior advocate, then the culpability is of extreme degree. There can be no alibi for such kind of demonising thoughts. I call upon such misguided souls to revisit their thoughts and publicly tender apology. This is not an occasion where you should be looking through political prism. This political prism is dangerous one, it kill your objectivity. It calls for searching within," says Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar on Kolkata rape and murder incident.

West Bengal minister and TMC leader Chandrima Bhattacharya says, "On 28th August, our leader (Mamata Banerjee) had given directions to Trinamool Mahila Congress to stage a demonstration on 1st September in every block. CBI has not said a word about investigation so far, our demand is for them to tell us about the progress of the investigation and the build such a case that the rapist is hanged. There is no provision for capital punishment in Constitution...So, we are also demanding such a provision. Our Government has called a Special Session of Assembly on 2-3 September. We are bringing a Bill that will go to the President through the Governor. We believe that the President will sanction it and it will become a law."

On the alleged attempt of rape of a minor girl, Narayan Chattopadhyay, Superintendent of Howrah Government Hospital says "An FIR has been registered at Howrah Police Station and the accused has been arrested. We have asked for an explanation from the private partner who did the CT scan of the victim. We will send it to the higher authority and take action accordingly. The person who has been arrested was an employee of the private-public partner. We are providing security to the victim and her family members. There was repair work going on in the CT scan room but suddenly he started it in the evening. We were not aware of it."

“In the coming days, meetings will be held at every Assembly booth to strengthen the strategy. From today, ‘Aapka MLA, Aapke dwar’ initiative will begin at mandals where there are our MLAs and where there are not, meetings will be conducted under the banner of ‘Aapki sarkar, Aapke dwar’,” says senior AAP leader Dilip Pandey during a press conference in Delhi.

“One MLA from the ruling front made a statement today. He said that the ADGP of Kerala Police, who is considered a close confidante of the CM, is doing espionage through phone. He is leaking phone calls. We would like to know what the CM has to say on this. Why is Congress silent on this?” says former Union Minister and BJP leader V Muraleedharan.

“The report was submitted four-and-a-half years ago. Government chose to be silent on it. Government says that it does not want to reveal the names of the victims. I agree with them that they shouldn’t reveal the victims’ names but that doesn’t mean you should not proceed against those who committed the crimes. So, they are in fact protecting those people who committed the crime,” says former Union Minister and BJP leader V Muraleedharan.

India's Sriharsha Devaraddi fails to qualify for the final in Mixed 10m Air Rifle Prone (SH2) event after finishing 26th at the Paris Paralympics.

MHA in touch with senior officers of flood-affected states, will depute central teams to assess damage, say officials

Rajasthan CM Bhajanlal Sharma paid a courtesy visit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. "On this occasion, we received his valuable guidance regarding various schemes related to the overall development, progress and public welfare of Rajasthan. Under the successful leadership of the Prime Minister, assimilating the basic mantra of 'Sabka Sath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas and Sabka Prayas', our government is fully committed to achieving the ambitious goal of 'Developed India, Developed Rajasthan'," tweets Rajasthan CM

“You have come here in large numbers and with hope. This isn’t a political rally. It’s more of a kind of seminar. I am the CM of Punjab for three years. The issues that you have aren’t only yours. These issues were in Punjab and Delhi as well and are still there in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. I used to think that why these businessmen go with red bags carrying money to every political party. Now, I know that you don’t like any party’s agenda. You only go to them to request that if their party comes then they shouldn't bother you. I called the Punjab industrialist to understand their issues and he told me about a lot of problems you all face. I realised that there are many windows. 'Single window, single pen’. If work begins at a single window, it should end there by one signing it by one pen,” says Punjab CM Bhagwant Mann while addressing the business community of Haryana at an event organised in Panipat.

"Tomorrow, a decision will be made on how many seats we will contest and whether we will form an alliance with the BJP (or not). We will provide information about all these matters by tomorrow," says Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) Vice-President Arvind Kumar Bajpai.

BJP National General Secretary and J&K in-charge Tarun Chugh says "The people of Jammu and Kashmir love Prime Minister Modi. On the other hand, the confused leadership of National Conference, PDP and Congress, is hated by the people. It seems that Farooq Abdullah, Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti are the most confused leaders. If there is an award for the most confused leader, Omar Abdullah has established himself as the most confused leader in the world. Till now they have not been able to decide who will contest on which seat. The results coming on October 8 will teach a lesson to these parties. Due to their confusion, the public has rejected them. BJP will soon release the next list of its candidates."

A 15-year-old girl was molested by a rickshaw driver while going to school, in the Borivali area of ​​Mumbai. A case has been registered against the unknown rickshaw driver. An investigation has been taken up, and the police are searching for the concerned rickshaw driver: MHB Colony Police Station

Maharashtra BJP leader Prasad Lad says, "We are expressing the love and respect we have for Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. We are protesting against the manner in which Maha Vikas Aghadi is protesting over it and setting a narrative. If Opposition wants to benefit from it regarding elections, then it is a different matter."