Delhi

New Delhi, Mar 23 (PTI) Petrol and diesel prices on Wednesday were hiked by 80 paise a litre each for the second day in a row since the ending of an over four-and-half month election-related hiatus.

Petrol in Delhi will now cost Rs 97.01 per litre as against Rs 96.21 previously while the diesel rate has gone up from Rs 87.47 per litre to Rs 88.27, according to a price notification of state fuel retailers.

New Delhi, Mar 23 (PTI) Parliament on Wednesday approved the Rs 1.42-lakh-crore budget for the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir for 2022-23, with Rajya Sabha returning the relevant bills to the Lok Sabha.

The Lok Sabha had passed the bills on March 14.

The upper House returned the bills -- The Jammu and Kashmir Appropriation Bill, 2022, and The Jammu and Kashmir Appropriation (No.2) Bill, 2022.

New Delhi, Mar 21 (PTI) Walking bare feet in the palatial Darbar Hall of Rashtrapati Bhavan, 125-year-old Swami Sivananda received a standing ovation when he received the Padma Shri award from President Ram Nath Kovind on Monday.

Before receiving the award, the yoga practitioner prostrated first before Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then before the President, drawing another round of applause from the guest at the civil investiture ceremony.

Returning the greeting, Prime Minister Modi promptly bowed and touched the ground.

New Delhi, Mar 22 (PTI) Opposition parties protested in Lok Sabha on Tuesday against the increase in prices of fuel and cooking gas and staged a walkout demanding a rollback.

Raising the issue after Question Hour, Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said the opposition parties had been claiming that the prices of diesel and petrol would increase after the election process.

Members of the Congress, TMC, NCP, DMK and Left parties raised slogans from their seats against the fuel price hike and demanded a rollback.

New Delhi, Mar 20 (PTI) About 250 major students' organisations, youth bodies, and farmers' Unions, will participate in a two-day conference against unemployment which will be held this week here.

The National Employment Conference will see Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai as its chief guest and will be held on March 23 and 24 inside the Shah Auditorium.

It will be organised by Desh Ki Baat organisation, a body founded by Rai.

New Delhi, Mar 21 (PTI) A Supreme Court-appointed panel to study the three farm laws, which was scrapped by Parliament in November last year, had recommended that the three legislations should not be repealed saying they would be beneficial for farmers.

The report, which was submitted to the apex court on March 19, 2021, was made public on Monday.

The three-member committee had also suggested many changes in the laws, including giving freedom to states to make Minimum Support Price (MSP) system legal.

New Delhi, Mar 21 (PTI) The Centre on Monday said of the 1,080 industries causing pollution in Ganga in five states, 190 have been closed while 165 are still not complying with norms.

Of the 165, closure orders have been issued to nine and show-cause notices has been served to 156 grossly polluting industries, it said.

Responding to a question in Rajya Sabha, Minister of State for Jal Shakti Bishweswar Tudu said about 280.17 million litres per day (MLD) effluents is being discharged into river Ganga main stem having BOD load of 9.68 tons per day.

New Delhi, Mar 19 (PTI) As many as 52 students who studied at the Jamia Millia Islamia's Residential Coaching Academy have cleared the civil services mains exam, the varsity said.

These candidates will now appear for the personality test (interview), which will be held in April.

New Delhi, Mar 17 (PTI) India announced a USD 1 billion line of credit to Sri Lanka on Thursday as part of its financial assistance to help the island nation deal with its economic crisis.

After an agreement to extend the line of credit was inked, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said India has always stood with the people of Sri Lanka and will continue to extend all possible support to the country.

New Delhi, Mar 16 (PTI) Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), the nation's top oil firm, has bought as much as 3 million barrels of crude oil that Russia had offered at steep discount to prevailing international rates, sources said.

The purchase, made through a trader, is the first since Russia's February 24 invasion of Ukraine that brought international pressure for isolating Putin administration.

Sources aware of the matter said IOC bought Urals crude for May delivery at a discount of USD 20-25 a barrel to dated Brent.