Indian authorities seized over $20 million of heroin and detained seven Iranian men in a deep-sea drug bust off the country’s western coast, officials said yesterday.

With Covid-19 cases on a sharp decline over the last few months, India may soon allow foreign tourists for the first time in one and half years, the country’s home ministry officials said.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has questioned the “acceptability” of the Taliban rule in Afghanistan, saying it is not “inclusive”.

The head of the world’s largest vaccine maker said yesterday it was “unethical” to give third doses of the Covid-19 vaccine while developing nations are struggling to access first and second jabs.

Increasing extremism and radicalisation are the biggest threat to global peace, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said yesterday at the nine-member Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit, and drew attention to the Taliban’s takeover in Afghanistan.

India has told China that their bilateral relations will only develop when both countries pull their troops back from a confrontation on their disputed Himalayan border, the Indian foreign minister said.

India has told China to avoid viewing bilateral relations from the perspective of its ties with third countries and said Asian solidarity would depend on the example set by India-China relations.

Delhi remains India’s most unsafe city for women while Kolkata continues to be the safest metro for them, according to the latest National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB) report.

India’s National Investigation Agency today filed a supplementary chargesheet before a special court in Bengaluru against a person for his involvement in circulating fake Indian currency notes (FICN) after procuring them from two residents of Bangladesh, an official said.

India is worried that growing complacency as Covid-19 infection rates and deaths decline could lead to people skipping their second vaccine shots, leaving communities vulnerable to the coronavirus, said two health experts briefed on the matter.

The Indian government yesterday informed the Supreme Court that it is not going to file a detailed affidavit on petitions seeking inquiry into alleged use of spyware Pegasus. The government had asked for time to decide on filing the affidavit twice.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee today filed her nomination papers for the September 30 Bhabanipur assembly by-poll she must win to retain her executive post.

Indian authorities are restricting major religious festivals that start this week and attract huge crowds, warning that a new Covid-19 wave had already begun in the financial capital Mumbai.

As Covid-19 cases and deaths exploded in India in April and May, New Delhi’s premier Sir Ganga Ram Hospital and several others ran so short of oxygen that many patients in the capital suffocated.

Information Minister Hasan Mahmud inaugurated the Bangabandhu  Sheikh Mujibur Rahman media centre at the Press Club of India in New  Delhi yesterday.

More than 500,000 farmers gathered in India’s most populous state Uttar Pradesh yesterday, police said, the biggest rally yet in a months-long series of demonstrations to press government to repeal three new agricultural laws. 

TThe family of a separatist icon from Indian-administered Kashmir has been booked for police investigation under a sweeping

Hundreds of thousands of farmers gathered in India's most populous state Uttar Pradesh on Sunday, the biggest rally yet in a months-long series of demonstrations to press Narendra Modi's government to repeal three new agricultural laws.

Visas of foreigners stuck in India due to the Covid-19 pandemic for around one and a half years have been extended free of cost till September 30 this year, the Indian Home Ministry said last night.

INS Savitri, an Indian Navy offshore patrol vessel, arrived in Chattogram yesterday to deliver two mobile oxygen plants (MOP) each with a capacity of generating 960 litres of oxygen per minute.