1. Supreme Court Ends Centuries-Old Ban on Entry of Women Into Kerala’s Sabarimala Temple
Ending a centuries-old ban on the entry of women of menstruating age into the Sabarimala temple in Kerala, the Supreme Court said on Friday, 28 September, that exclusion on the basis of biological and physiological features was unconstitutional and discriminatory because it denied women the right to be treated as equals.
A Constitution Bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra in a 4:1 verdict held that restrictions on the entry of women in religious places for physiological reasons lowered her dignity. CJI Misra, Justices RF Nariman, AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud ruled against the restriction, declining to accept it as an essential practice of a denominated religious group and said it was a form of untouchability.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
2. Elgaar Parishad Case: Activists’ Arrest Not Due to Dissent, Says SC; Rejects Demand for SIT
The Supreme Court on Friday, 28 September, refused to interfere with the arrest of the five activists in Elgaar Parishad case and rejected the demand for a court-monitored probe in the matter. The five activists — Varavara Rao, Vernon Gonsalves, Arun Ferreira, Sudha Bharadwaj, and Gautam Navlakha — will continue to remain under house arrest for four more weeks. The court, however, said they move the trial court for relief.
The activists have been under house arrest since the Maharashtra Police arrested them on 28 August while probing an alleged Maoist link to a meeting of the Elgaar Parishad in Pune on the eve of the 1 January violence in Bhima Koregaon.
(Source: The Indian Express)
3. Facebook Says 50 Million Users Affected by Security Breach
Almost 50 million Facebook accounts were affected by a major cyber security breach, the social networking company said on Friday, 28 September. Facebook said it has already fixed the vulnerability and informed law enforcement.
The company said it had discovered a loophole in the “View As” feature which allowed cyber criminals to gain control of the affected accounts. “View As” is a popular Facebook feature that allows users to see what their profiles look like to others. As a precaution, Facebook has temporarily disabled the feature.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
4. Strikes Proved to World That India Will Not Tolerate Terrorists: Nirmala Sitharaman
Inaugurating an event to mark the second anniversary of the surgical strikes across the LoC, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday said that the armed forces had “adequately punished” those wanting to spread terror and proved to the world that India will not tolerate terrorists.
(Source: The Indian Express)
5. NCP in Damage Limitation Mode After Two Party Leaders Quit Over Pawar’s Rafale Remarks
The resignation of NCP’s founding member Tariq Anwar and general secretary Munaf Hakim following party supremo Sharad Pawar’s purported remarks favouring Prime Minister Narendra Modi over Rafale deal has left the party scrambling for damage control.
Announcing that he is giving up his Lok Sabha membership, Anwar said he left aggrieved by Pawar’s “clean chit” to PM Modi in the ongoing controversy surrounding the purchase of Rafale fighter jets. His move comes a day after media reports quoted Pawar having told a Marathi news channel that he did not think people had doubts over the prime minister’s intentions in the Rafale deal.
(Source: The Indian Express)
6. Action Against Pak? ‘Something Big Has Happened’, Says Rajnath
Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Friday indicated that Indian forces may have hit Pakistani targets across the border with heavy artillery to avenge the brutal killing of a BSF trooper in unprovoked firing by Pakistanis earlier this month.
Referring to the killing of Narendra Singh on the International Border (IB) in Samba district, the minister said, “Kuchh hua hai, main bataunga nahin. Theek thaak hua hai. Vishwas rakhna theek thaak hua hai do teen din pehle. Aur aage bhi dekhiyega kya hoga. (Something has happened. I won’t reveal it. Something big has happened. Trust me, something really big has happened two-three days ago. And you will also see what happens in future).”
(Source: The Times of India)
7. Iconic Taj Mansingh Hotel to Remain With Tata Group
The Taj Mahal Hotel on Mansingh Road in Lutyens’ Delhi will remain with the Tata Group’s Indian Hotels Company Limited (IHCL), which won the auction for a 33-year lease on Friday, the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) said.
The 33-year lease for the property at 1, Mansingh Road, had expired in 2011, but the auction had been pending due to litigation.
(Source: The Hindu)
8. Indian Warship Picks up Commander Abhilash Tomy From Remote Indian Ocean Island
Indian warship INS Satpura on Friday, 28 September, picked up champion sailor Commander Abhilash Tomy from Île Amsterdam, a remote island in the southern Indian Ocean where he was undergoing treatment for a back injury he suffered while negotiating a deadly storm that left his yacht crippled last week.
He was participating in this year’s Golden Globe Race (GGR), a circumnavigation race involving solo participants, and which bars the use of modern technology.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
9. Indonesian City Hit by Tsunami After 7.5 Magnitude Earthquake
A tsunami caused deaths when it hit a small city on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi on Friday, 28 September, after a major quake, collapsing buildings and cutting off power, officials said, although the exact number of casualties was not clear.
The tsunami up to 2 metres (six feet) high struck beaches as dusk fell in Palu, a sleepy but growing tourist resort, and the nearby fishing town of Donggala, closest to the epicentre of the quake 27 km away, officials said.
(Source: Hindustan Times)
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