About 100 murder cases pending before a judge of a fast-track court in Uttar Pradesh's Muzaffarnagar, who has sentenced 22 people to death in the last four months, have now been transferred to a different judge.

The cases, involving offences punishable with death or life imprisonment, were transferred from Additional District and Sessions Judge Ravi Kumar Diwakar to the court of District and Sessions Judge Virendra Kumar Singh, a government counsel told the news agency PTI.

District Bar Association president Pramod Tyagi said that there were apprehensions among the lawyers and litigants over the possibility of the court awarding capital punishment.

Who Is Judge Ravi Kumar Diwakar

Judge Ravi Kumar Diwakar, who was earlier in the news for passing the order to conduct a videography survey of Varanasi's Gyanvapi complex in 2022, is known for his strong verdicts.

A resident of Lucknow, the 46-year-old started as an additional civil judge in Azamgarh in 2009. He was then elevated as a civil judge in Sultanpur in May 2015 and as a judicial magistrate about five months later.

Judge Diwakar, who has a BCom and an LLM degree, has been serving as the additional district and sessions judge in Muzaffarnagar since November 2025.

22 Death Sentences In 10 Cases

Sentenced 4 to death in 12-year-old murder case

On August 13, he sentenced four people to death in a 12-year-old murder case. He also imposed a fine of Rs 1.70 lakh on the convicts -- Ramvir, Rajiv, Rahul and Harender Kumar -- after holding them guilty for the murder of Pawan Kumar. The accused had entered Kumar's house and opened fire during an attack allegedly stemming from old rivalry in Shamli district on July 14, 2014.

Kumar was killed in the firing, while his brother, Ashok Kumar, sustained bullet injuries.

Death penalty to man for killing wood trader for ransom in 1999

On August 12, he awarded the death penalty to a man for kidnapping and killing a wood trader for ransom nearly 27 years ago.

He held Shahnawaz, the convict, guilty for murdering Saleem in 1999. Saleem was kidnapped for a ransom of Rs 5 lakh and later killed by slitting his throat in a jungle in Chapar on December 9, 1999.

Sentenced 4 to death in 2011 farmer murder case

On July 17, he sentenced four men to death for the murder of a farmer in 2011 during an attempted robbery in the Shamli district.

The farmer, Raj Singh, was travelling on a motorcycle with his friend, Bijendra, to his sister's house on August 20, 2011, when they were intercepted by unidentified assailants. The accused attempted to rob them. Raj Singh was shot dead after he resisted, while Bijendra was tied up and thrown into a nearby sugarcane field.

Sentenced ex-village head, his associate to death in murder case

On July 6, he sentenced a former village head and his associate to death in a 2010 murder case. He observed that the case fell in the rarest of rare cases.

Rajbir Singh, 60, was shot dead over panchayat elections' enmity on August 24, 2010. The former village head, Pramod, and his associate, Sahdev, were later arrested for the murder.

Death penalty for killing home guard on duty

On July 2, Judge Ravi Kumar Diwakar convicted a man of murdering a home guard on duty and awarded him the death sentence, holding that the case fell in the "rarest of rare" category.

He observed that the murder was committed in circumstances warranting the maximum punishment. The incident took place on June 4, 2020, when the home guard, Ratiram, was on duty. He intervened to rescue the accused's mother after he allegedly assaulted her.

Enraged, the accused, Deepak, stabbed Ratiram to death.

2 sentenced to death in murder case

On June 20, he sentenced two persons -- Gajendra and Ramkiran -- to death in connection with the murder of Rajendra Saini.

He had observed that the case fell into the rarest of rare cases.

A 50-year-old man gets the death penalty in a 15-year-old double-murder case.

On May 30, his fast-track court awarded the death penalty to a 50-year-old man for killing a woman and her six-year-old son in a case dating back nearly 15 years.

He observed that the case fell in the "rarest of rare" category, warranting capital punishment.

The victims, Rajesh Devi (30) and her son Himanshu, were murdered in the Muzaffarnagar district on November 7, 2011. According to the prosecution, Rahis took Rajesh Devi and the child to a nearby sugarcane field and killed them by repeatedly hitting them with bricks after an argument. Their bodies were found on November 13.

Death sentence to woman, her 3 sons in 2019 murder case

On April 28, Judge Diwakar sentenced a woman and her three sons to death in a 2019 murder case.

Sentenced 3 to death in 2019 murder case

On April 6, the Muzaffarnagar fast-track court awarded a death sentence to three persons in connection with the kidnapping and murder of a lawyer in 2019.

According to the prosecution, the victim, lawyer Mohammad Sameer, was kidnapped and later killed over a monetary dispute of Rs 45 lakh on October 15, 2019.

During the investigation, police found that the accused had disposed of the body at another location with the help of one of the accused. The body was later recovered from a forest area in Sikri village.

On the morning of May 10, 2025, the Indian Air Force Air Marshal commanding the critical South West Air Command (SWAC) faced a dilemma.

India was striking Pakistani air bases extremely hard during Operation Sindoor - the air attacks had gone sharply up the escalation matrix, with one key mission all set to take off.

The target was Pakistan's Bholari Airbase, 520 kilometres north of Gandhinagar, where SWAC is headquartered.

A group of IAF pilots sat in the cockpits of their fighters, in one of the frontline bases under the Air Marshal's command - Bhuj, Jaisalmer, Phalodi, Naliya, Jamnagar, Jodhpur, Uttarlai/Barmer, and Pune.

The IAF will not identify where the jets were set to take off from.

In Bholari, there was a seemingly cutoff hangar. The IAF had a reasonable idea of what was in it - a Swedish-built SAAB Erieye, the Pakistan Air Force's most potent Airborne Early Warning and Control aircraft.

That's when the phone rang. It was the Air Chief.

Was there a change in plans? Would the pilots seated in their cockpits, all systems go, be asked to stand down?

Air Marshal Nagesh Kapoor was clear. There was no way his pilots would be denied a chance at carrying out their mission.

"There was a time when I had to lie to my Chief for this mission," said Air Marshal Kapoor on NDTV's podcast, #CtrlAltDefence.

"I had to, kind of, not tell him the truth. I won't say I lied to him - I didn't tell him the truth. And this is knowing fully well that he was seeing the same picture that I was seeing in my Ops room. He was seeing the same picture sitting at Air Headquarters Ops Centre. He asked me, 'Position of those aircraft?' I said, 'Sir, getting airborne now.' I knew for a fact that they were not going to get airborne for the next 15 minutes. So I lied to him inasmuch as time was concerned." The pilots in the jets had spent their entire careers waiting for this moment - years of drills would finally mean something. Weapons loaded. Aircraft fuelled to the last litre. Every checklist run once, then run again, because a mistake now would not just be a mistake - it would be a name on a wall.

Tension hung over the tarmac. In the cockpits, low voices moved back and forth between pilots and weapons systems operators - clipped, practiced, betraying nothing, though every man's pulse said otherwise. Canopies down. Systems live.

The aircraft picked for the mission was the Sukhoi-30 MKI - the mainstay of the Indian Air Force.

Designed in Russia and heavily modified in India, the fighter carried the IAF's weapon of choice - an air-launched version of the BrahMos - a Mach 3 air-to-surface missile with a 300-kilogram warhead.

"Where are they now?" asked the IAF Chief, Air Chief Marshal A.P. Singh. "I said, 'Half an hour from weapon launch.' I knew they were not there [yet]. But I had to let them go. Those pilots had been waiting with those weapons suspended for such a long time. It would have been criminal for me not to have let them go."

The mission was a go - the Sukhois lined up and blasted down the runway, headed to their launch zone. Weapons were being calibrated; air search radars would be scanning for threats from Pakistani Air Force fighters. Radar Warning Receivers in the cockpits of the jets would be chirping if enemy radar was being picked up.

"Finally, when the weapon launched, I told him, 'Sir, all gone, all aircraft returning.' He told me, 'Tell me when they land.'"

The mission was an overwhelming success. The IAF strike on the hangar in Bholari was perhaps the defining image of the IAF's attacks of May 10. Satellite images, broadcast first by NDTV, showed the hangar with a large, irregular hole punched through its roof, exposing a dark, collapsed interior. Debris was shown scattered across the apron between the hangar and the runway, suggesting material was ejected outward by the force of the strike. The strike appeared precise and localised to a single structure.

"Much later, the Honourable Raksha Mantri [Defence Minister Rajnath Singh] visited us, and we were sitting and having lunch together, and the Chief was at the same table also, and that is when I told him - in front of the Honourable Raksha Mantri - I said, 'Sir, I lied to you.'"

Air Chief Marshal AP Singh looked at Air Marshal Kapoor and replied with a smile - "Mujhe pata hai" ("Yes, I know.")

Public infrastructure attracts capital if users are ready to pay fair and transparent usage charges. In the case of NPCI’s UPI too, the user-pays principle should apply. Let the Reserve Bank of India’s e-rupee serve as the country’s digital cash.

A day after India’s finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman introduced the Taxation and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill in Parliament proposing changes to the Payment and Settlement Systems Act of 2007 that would let banks and payment system providers charge fees on UPI and RuPay debit-card payments, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Sanjay Malhotra made a pointed reference to such fees.

In response to a question posed at RBI’s post-policy conference, he pointed out that costs have to be borne by someone.

“Ultimately, it is the consumer, in some way or the other, who is paying [for] it already. It may not be the same consumer, it may be the general economy, and you don’t get to see it directly… Somehow, it is already getting passed on; it may not be directly on the user-pays principle.”

This principle applies to much public infrastructure, be it physical or digital.

Coincidentally, this week also saw Chief Economic Advisor V. Anantha Nageswaran call out free services, saying ‘free’ is “the most expensive word in public policy.” He pointed out that infrastructure built on the promise of free or below-cost services cannot attract patient capital.

The latter demands durable returns, which rest on two basic premises: a price that covers the economic cost of the service and users willing to pay a fair charge. Unfortunately, this point often gets lost in the context of public amenities. The country’s freebie culture, for example, fosters perceptions of the state owing people these.

Yet, there is no free lunch. It is thus imperative that the cost of public infrastructure (as distinct from pure public goods such as law-and-order and defence that need taxpayer money) is recoverable if we wish to sustain investment in India’s infra build-up.

The Unified Payments Interface (UPI), run by National Payments Corporation of India, would therefore need to recover costs too, be it the base platform’s digital expenses or bills borne by apps and the network of banks that transfer money from one account to another. Set up under RBI’s aegis, UPI was initially made charge-free for users to spur adoption, but it has achieved high penetration now.

Those who want UPI kept free forever argue that it is widely seen as a cash substitute, not a bank service, and should stay so. There is no denying its benefits at both the micro level (convenience) and macro level (transactions brought into the formal system), so a fee must not end up slowing down UPI usage.

Today, the government subsidizes payments of up to ₹2,000 made to small merchants through an incentive scheme to promote RuPay and low-value Bhim-UPI transactions. This public outlay goes to banks, payment service providers and third-party app providers.

But according to a March report by the Standing Committee on Finance, a parliamentary panel, the total subsidy paid from 2021-22 to 2024-25 at ₹8,730 crore was “only 11% of the cost incurred by the digital payment industry,” which implies an annual cost of about ₹20,000 crore. This is no trifle.

A good solution would be to charge a nominal merchant discount of 0.3-0.6% on UPI transactions for large merchants, who may pass it on to customers, while keeping transfers under a certain limit exempt. For vast multitudes, it would still be like cash. Once RBI’s e-rupee takes off as the currency’s de facto digital clone (it being a direct liability of the central bank), UPI could gradually be made a fully charged service.

The Centre has approved the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) proposal to begin field trials of polymer, or plastic, banknotes in the Rs 10 and Rs 20 denominations. The move has sparked curiosity, with many wondering whether India is preparing to phase out traditional paper currency.

The short answer is no. 

The government has made it clear that there is no proposal to replace existing paper banknotes. Instead, the polymer notes will be tested alongside paper notes to see how they perform in real-world conditions before any larger decision is taken. 

As part of the pilot, the RBI plans to issue 100 crore Rs 10 notes and 100 crore Rs 20 notes, taking the total trial to 200 crore polymer banknotes worth around Rs 3,000 crore. If the field trials are successful, the central bank may consider regular issuance of these denominations. 

Why Is RBI Trying Polymer Notes?

The biggest reason is durability.

Lower-denomination notes such as Rs 10 and Rs 20 change hands frequently. They wear out quickly, become dirty and need to be replaced often. Polymer notes are expected to last much longer than paper notes. They are also resistant to water, dirt and tearing.

Although polymer notes cost more to produce initially, governments around the world have found that they stay in circulation for much longer. That reduces replacement and printing costs over time. They also offer stronger protection against counterfeiting because they can incorporate advanced security features that are difficult to copy. 

Why Only Rs 10 And Rs 20?

These are among the most widely used notes in daily transactions. In terms of the number of banknotes in circulation, they account for nearly a quarter of all currency notes in India, even though their value share is relatively small. Their high usage makes them the ideal candidates for testing durability under everyday conditions. 

Which Countries Already Use Polymer Notes?

India is far from the first country to explore plastic currency. Countries including Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Singapore and Romania already use polymer banknotes. These countries report that the notes remain cleaner for longer, survive rough handling better and are harder to counterfeit than conventional paper currency. 

Will Digital Payments Be Affected?

Not immediately. The government told Parliament that the impact on digital payments can only be assessed after the notes are issued on a regular basis. For now, the proposal is limited to field trials. 

So, what should people do? Nothing.

Your existing paper Rs 10 and Rs 20 notes remain legal tender and will continue to circulate even after the polymer trial begins. The RBI's initiative is meant to test whether plastic notes are better suited for India's cash economy, not to replace paper currency overnight. 

The government’s seeming determination to proceed with a revised delimitation that drastically increases the size of the Lok Sabha to 824 or 850 seats marks a disastrous watershed in India’s institutional architecture. The underlying justification offered by the government is purely mathematical: The size of the Lower House cannot remain frozen at the 543-seat limit established in 1972, since when the nation’s population has more than doubled. Yet, beneath this seemingly democratic argument lies a profound hazard.

Amid all the other major challenges of the looming delimitation exercise — notably the severe political and federal friction caused by penalising southern states for successful population control, while disproportionately rewarding the northern Hindi heartland for its failures — a basic question remains unaddressed: Does it make any sense to have a legislature so massive and structurally unwieldy? No established democracy does.

Every mature democratic system recognises that a Parliament must be capped at a size that permits genuine legislative scrutiny, cohesive debate, and individual member participation. By choosing to push the Lok Sabha towards 850 seats (a size no other democratic legislature has), India is charting an anomalous and dangerous course. Democratic theory and global practice consistently show that beyond a threshold, a legislature ceases to function as a deliberative body and deteriorates into a chaotic colosseum where only a select few can speak, while the rest are reduced to passive spectators, mere numbers on voting machines.

After all, the United States House of Representatives was legally capped at 435 in 1929, when the United States population stood at 120 million. Today, the American population has tripled to over 335 million, yet the size of the House remains at 435. Americans recognise that increasing the number of representatives to match population growth would paralyse the legislative process. Instead, each member simply represents a larger number of voters, relying on robust local staff, modern communication, and a highly organised committee system to bridge the governance gap. Indian MPs can do that too.

The realities of an 850-member Lok Sabha are devastating for individual legislators. In a standard parliamentary session, time is an unyielding, scarce resource. Consider the daily Question Hour or a standard legislative debate on a complex bill. If a debate is allocated four hours, and time is distributed according to party strength, at most 15-20 MPs out of 850 will be able to participate. In practice, backbenchers and members of smaller parties will be mostly silenced.

With an oversized Parliament, a vast majority of MPs will never get to ask a question, initiate a private member’s bill, or participate in a substantive debate during their entire five-year tenure. They will be transformed into silent placeholders, raising their hands when the party commands. This will worsen an already distressing trend in Indian governance: The shrinking role (and systemic degradation) of Parliament. In recent years, the number of days Parliament meets annually has steadily declined, bills have been passed via voice vote within minutes without standing committee scrutiny, and the Opposition is frequently sidelined. Flooding the chamber with hundreds of additional members will accelerate this marginalisation, burying quality under the sheer weight of quantity.

An oversized legislature where the vast majority of members have no voice suits an executive that prefers compliance over scrutiny. When a Parliament becomes too large to debate, it naturally cedes its oversight power to the executive cabinet. The individual lawmaker loses leverage, and the House is reduced to a notice-board and a rubber-stamp.

This structural transformation bears an ominous resemblance to the authoritarian legislative model in Beijing or Pyongyang. Specifically, an 850-seat Lok Sabha risks becoming a desi version of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference or the North Korean Supreme People’s Assembly — enormous, unwieldy bodies designed to look grand, representative, and pluralistic, but reduced to applauding set speeches by the Great Leader. Their sheer size guarantees they cannot engage in real legislative negotiation or challenge the ruling executive. They exist to perform consensus, not to build it through debate. If India builds a massive legislature where MPs are stripped of their voices due to the arithmetic of time constraints, it will have successfully hollowed out its democracy, replacing a vibrant deliberative body with a performative pageant. Far better to save the extra expenditure on salaries, accommodation, travel and pensions for 300 more MPs and instead build a serious office building for the existing MPs near Parliament, as every other democracy provides its legislators.

The government’s primary defence — that a single MP cannot effectively represent two to three million citizens — is a fallacy that misinterprets the role of a national lawmaker. An MP’s constitutional duty is national legislation, foreign policy, macroeconomic governance, and holding the Union executive accountable. They are not municipal councillors or MLAs. If India established a sharp, institutional demarcation between the roles of Members of Legislative Assemblies (MLAs) and Members of Parliament (MPs), a smaller, focused group of MPs could easily represent large constituencies. Local grievances, municipal infrastructure, and civic amenities fall squarely within the domain of state legislatures and local panchayats or municipal corporations under the 73rd and 74th Amendments; as population increases, expand the number of MLAs! If local governance frameworks are empowered, the local citizen does not need to look to an MP for everyday civic needs. By keeping the Lok Sabha compact and focused on national governance, and leaving localised representation to state and municipal levels, India could maintain a highly efficient, effective, and truly participative federal structure, without ruining the functionality of Parliament.

The proposal to expand the Lok Sabha to 850 would create a House that is not a forum for governance but an echo chamber for the government. As we contemplate the future of our democracy, we must realise that true representation lies in the quality of debate, the rigour of legislative committee scrutiny, and the empowerment of local levels of government — not in creating an unwieldy mega-chamber that replaces democratic discourse with empty theatre.

A Delhi court on Monday acquitted former BJP MP and ex-Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh in the sexual harassment case filed by six women wrestlers.

Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (ACJM) Ashwini Panwar pronounced the judgment, acquitting Singh along with Vinod Tomar, the former Assistant Secretary of the Wrestling Federation of India, in the case.

The detailed judgment is awaited.

The case stemmed from allegations levelled by six women wrestlers, who accused Singh of sexual harassment during his tenure as the Wrestling Federation of India chief. The prosecution and defence had completed their final submissions before the trial court last month.

With Monday's verdict, the trial court has acquitted both accused of the charges levelled against them.

Notably, on July 2, the Court had reserved its verdict in the criminal case against the former WFI chief. The Rouse Avenue Courts reserved the matter after concluding final arguments advanced by the prosecution, the complainants, and the accused. The proceedings were conducted in camera. The court is scheduled to pronounce its judgment on August 3.

Senior Advocate Rebecca John had appeared on behalf of the women wrestlers, while Advocate Rajiv Mohan represented Brij Bhushan Singh.

The court had framed charges against Singh in May 2024 under provisions relating to sexual harassment. However, he was discharged in relation to the allegations made by one of the complainants (Victim No. 6). Co-accused Vinod Tomar, former Assistant Secretary of the Wrestling Federation of India, was charged only under Section 506 Part I (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code concerning one complainant, while he was discharged of the remaining allegations.

Earlier in the proceedings, the trial court had dismissed Singh's plea seeking further investigation and permission to make additional submissions at the stage of framing of charges. Singh had contended that he was not present in India on one of the dates when an alleged incident took place.

Both Singh and Tomar are currently out on bail.

The Delhi Police had filed a chargesheet against Singh under Sections 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty), 354A (sexual harassment), 354D (stalking), and 506(1) (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code. Tomar was additionally booked under Section 109 (abetment) of the IPC.

The allegations stem from complaints made by several women wrestlers, who accused Singh of sexual harassment between 2016 and 2019 at the Wrestling Federation of India office, his official residence, and during overseas events.

Separately, the Delhi Police had filed a cancellation report in the POCSO case registered against Singh based on allegations made by a minor wrestler.

With the trial now concluded, the court will determine on August 3 whether Singh and co-accused Vinod Tomar are to be convicted or acquitted in the case.

Background of the Case

In April 2023, seven wrestlers approached the Supreme Court to file an FIR against Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) President and BJP MP Brij Bhushan Singh for alleged sexual harassment. A bench led by CJI Chandrachud issued a notice to the NCT of Delhi in response to the plea. The Apex Court allowed the petitioners to submit additional documents in a sealed cover.

The top court had directed the Commissioner of Police (Delhi) to assess the threat level concerning the alleged minor victim in the Wrestling Foundation of India (WFI) sexual harassment case and take necessary security measures accordingly.

On June 15, 2023 the Delhi Police filed a chargesheet against Singh under Sections 354, 354A, 354D, and 506 of the IPC. His co-accused Vinod Tomar was charged under Sections 109, 354, 354A, and 506 of the IPC.

In what could be a landmark decision, the Raipur District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission has ruled in favour of a vehicle owner who alleged that the use of ethanol-blended petrol (E20) caused damaged to his vehicle.

This is India's first known consumer court order concerning the Centre's ethanol-blended petrol programme.

In its order, the commission has directed car maker Maruti Suzuki and the dealer to reimburse the vehicle owner's repair expenses. Additionally, it also compensated for mental agony and litigation costs incurred during the proceedings.

The order also specified a timeline for compliance and stated that interest would be payable if the compensation amount was not paid within the period — 45 days.

The petitioner claimed that his vehicle, Maruti Suzuki Grand Vitara Strong Hybrid Zeta Plus, manufactured in January 2023 started experiencing recurring engine problems after refuelling with the mandated E20 petrol. The problems included poor performance, misfiring and gradual decline in fuel efficiency. The complainant claimed that issues persisted even after repeated repairs and said that it eventually led to major engine expenses.

The vehicle manufacturer and the dealer protested against the claim that E20 petrol was responsible for mechanical problems. They said that the vehicle was fully compatible with E20 fuel and that the breakdowns were due to factors like routine wear and tear, maintenance issues or other unrelated causes.

However, the consumer commission, in its order, noted that the vehicle owner had repeatedly approached authorised workshops for repairs, but the vehicle continued to develop the same problems. It said that repeated repair attempts and persistence of problems strengthened the consumer's case that the issue had not been effectively resolved.

The commission observed that E20 petrol was the most commonly available fuel in petrol pumps, leaving consumers with little or no practical alternative, adding that motorists could not reasonably be expected to avoid E20 fuel where other options were unavailable.

The ruling could draw attention to the already heated up debate even as the government has mandated E20 petrol under its ethanol-blending programme.

This comes even as Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari continues to dismiss claims and concerns over engine damage due to E20 petrol, which contains 20% ethanol, saying it there is misinformation on social media and insisting that no complaints had been received by the government.

The Minister, however, has acknowledged that ethanol has a lower calorific value than petrol, and said the impact on fuel efficiency was marginal and largely noticeable during high-speed driving.

In a recent interview, Gadkari said vehicle owners can opt for 100% petrol but will have to shell out more money, while still defending the programme.

The government achieved the target of 20% ethanol blend ahead of schedule and claims that all E10-compliant petrol vehicles can safely run on E20 fuel. However, some drivers have reported concerns about reduced mileage because ethanol has a lower energy content than petrol.

The Centre has called reports of damage as "misinformation". Last week, it issued a detailed 10-point clarification about engine damage, water consumption, vehicle warranties, fuel efficiency and environmental impact.

The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas has said the E20 programme is backed by scientific studies, regulatory safeguards and international experience.

A case has been registered against four influencers, including Manish Kashyap, for allegedly conspiring to defame Union Minister Nitin Gadkari.

The Nagpur Cyber Police registered the FIR against them for spreading misleading information regarding the use of ethanol fuel (E20) and for tarnishing Gadkari's image by dragging his name into the matter "without any concrete basis".

Apart from Kashyap, who is a well-known YouTuber from Bihar, the others named in the FIR are Desi BoysNCR, Harshit Rathi and Anklesh Invate.

According to the police, these four influencers circulated controversial videos on popular social media platforms like YouTube and Instagram, claiming that large-scale fraud and bogus transactions were taking place involving ethanol usage.

Through these videos, they attempted to suggest that the law was being violated under the guise of the ethanol policy.

It is alleged that they deliberately misrepresented Gadkari's ethanol-related policies in their videos.

Terming this a calculated smear campaign, Shishir Tripathi, the head of the Bharatiya Janata Party's social media cell in Nagpur, lodged a formal complaint with the Nagpur Cyber Police.

The complaint states that, to lend an air of authenticity to the videos, the influencers resorted to using fake or misleading interviews with ordinary citizens, with the primary objective of damaging Gadkari's political and social reputation. Additionally, they have been accused of disrupting social harmony by spreading such misleading information.

The complaint explicitly stated that these influencers misused a senior Union Minister's name solely to garner views and followers.

An official said the Cyber Cell's investigation revealed that the information disseminated by the social media influencers was completely baseless, the videos sensationalised and endorsed illegal acts, and Gadkari had no connection whatsoever to the alleged fraud cases or incidents depicted in the videos, but his name was used.

The police are now conducting a technical investigation into the source of these videos and any potential conspiracy behind them.

A fresh political crisis appears to be unfolding within the Trinamool Congress (TMC) after expelled MLA Ritabrata Banerjee submitted a letter signed by 59 party legislators to West Bengal Assembly Speaker Rathindra Bose on Wednesday. The move has triggered a significant split in Mamata Banerjee’s party. The letter recognises Mamata Banerjee as the leader of the party, while Ritabrata has been appointed as the Leader of Opposition in the state assembly. Seuli Saha and Javed Ahmed Khan have been appointed as deputy leaders.

The rebel faction MLAs arrived at the Assembly in buses to attend the ongoing session, highlighting the growing strength of the rebel camp. According to sources, the faction led by Ritabrata now claims the backing of over 59 legislators.

MLAs who signed the letter

Among lawmakers who signed the letter are: Ritabrata Banerjee (Uluberia Purba), Sandipan Saha (Entally), Sabina Yeasmin (Sujapur), Chandranath Sinha (Bolpur), Niamot Sheikh (Hariharpara), Seuli Saha (Keshpur), Javed Ahmed Khan (Kasba), Mohammad Noor Alam (Samserganj), Samir Kumar Panja (Udaynarayanpur), Tapas Maity (Domjur), Arup Roy (Howrah Madhya), Md Ghulam Rabbani (Goalpokhar), Usha Rani Mondal (Minakhan), Priya Paul (Sankrail), Gulshan Mullick (Panchla), Rathin Ghosh (Madhyamgram), Subhasis Das (Maheshtala), Mustafizur Rahaman (Bharatpur), Akhruzzaman (Raghunathganj), Samar Mukherjee (Ratua), Prasun Banerjee (Chanchal)

Mamata yet to issue statement

Despite the dramatic developments, Mamata Banerjee has not issued an official response. Political observers are closely watching the situation, which could have major implications for the state's political landscape.

Meanwhile, senior TMC leader Kalyan Banerjee informed Assembly Speaker Rathindra Bose through a post on X about several key appointments within the party's legislative wing. He stated that Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay has been appointed as the Leader of the House. Ashima Patra and Nayana Bandopadhyay have been named deputy leaders in the Assembly, while Firhad Hakim has been appointed chief whip.

The latest developments come just days after the Trinamool Congress expelled MLAs Ritabrata Banerjee and Sandipan Saha. The party announced their removal with immediate effect on Monday, citing allegations of anti-party activities.

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Joseph Vijay has ordered the closure of 717 state-run liquor shops within 500 metres of temples, school, and bus stands across the state.

"With the welfare of the general public in mind, the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, C Joseph Vijay, has issued orders to close - within two weeks - 717 retail liquor shops situated within a 500-meter radius of places of worship, educational institutions, and bus stands."

TASMAC currently operates 4,765 liquor shops in the state, 276 are near places of worship, 186 are near educational institutions, and 255 are near bus stands," the government said.

The closure order echoes cross-party sentiment despite TASMAC liquor sales making up a large chunk of the state's revenue. In 2025, for example, total revenue was over Rs 48,000 crore.

And it is the first step in Vijay's promise for an 'addiction-free' Tamil Nadu.