Veteran journalist Narayan Bareth passed away here after suffering a cardiac arrest while undergoing treatment for pneumonia, a family member said on Saturday.. Former chief minister of Rajasthan Ashok Gehlot said Narayan Bareth had carved a distinct identity through public-interest journalism while working with reputed organisations such as the BBC. (X/@cpjoshiBJP). His funeral will be conducted later in the day in Jaipur.. “Bareth had been hospitalised for several days due to pneumonia and suffered a cardiac arrest on Friday night, leading to his death,” the family member said.. The veteran journalist had worked with the BBC and later served as the Rajasthan Information Commissioner.. Former chief minister Ashok Gehlot and other leaders expressed grief over his demise.. Gehlot said Bareth had carved a distinct identity through public-interest journalism while working with reputed organisations such as the BBC.. He said Bareth also left a lasting impression during his tenure as information commissioner and was known as an efficient administrator.. He prayed for peace for the departed soul and strength to the bereaved family to bear the loss. 

 Kochi, The Customs Commissionerate has arrested five persons from West Bengal and Assam in connection with the smuggling of high-end used cars from Bhutan, officials said on Saturday.. Kerala: Five held for smuggling high-end used cars from Bhutan; DTO among accused. In a statement, Customs said the arrested persons were Biswadip Das of Jaigaon in Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal, Dipak Patowary of Paltanbazar in Kamrup district, Ayub Ali of Jogighopa in Bongaigaon district, MD Mostafa Ahmed of Boladmari in Goalpara district and Jalal Mandal of Chapar in Dhubri district. All four belong to Assam.. Customs officials said Patowary was the District Transport Officer of Bongaigaon in Assam.. The arrests were made following a widespread investigation conducted in Assam and West Bengal, with the assistance of police and Customs formations in the northeastern states, officials said.. “During an investigation by Assam Police, they were found to have registered 460 such vehicles using forged documents. The vehicles include foreign-made cars as well as Indian-made vehicles that were exported earlier and later smuggled back into the country without payment of Customs duties. These were then illegally registered using forged documents,” Customs said.. The Customs Commissionerate, Kochi, launched “Operation Numkhor” last year after it was found that used vehicles, mostly high-end SUVs from Bhutan, were being illegally smuggled into India, re-registered in various states, and sold to buyers who claimed they were legally imported.. Last year, Customs seized several vehicles, including some belonging to film actors in Kerala, which had been sold to them by persons involved in the illegal smuggling of vehicles from Bhutan.. The Customs statement said Das, who was arrested on February 22 and is an employee of a major IT firm, was the mastermind behind the smuggling of vehicles from Bhutan.. He was apprehended near the India-Bhutan border and later brought to Kochi on a transit warrant before being remanded in judicial custody.. Customs will soon approach the court seeking the custody of the arrested persons for further investigation, officials said.. According to Customs, a recent report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India found that 15,849 vehicles with the same chassis and engine numbers were registered in multiple northeastern states.. This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text. 

 Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief and former Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal appeared before the Delhi assembly’s privileges committee on Friday in connection with the “Phansi Ghar” controversy, and later accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government of attempting to “insult the martyrs” by portraying the historic “execution chamber” as a “tiffin room”.. AAP also alleged that security was breached during Kejriwal’s visit as the Delhi Police did not allow his personal security officer to enter the assembly premises. (ANI). Besides Kejriwal, former Delhi speaker Ram Niwas Goel and then deputy speaker Rakhi Birla also appeared before the committee. However, former deputy CM Manish Sisodia skipped the proceedings again, officials said.. After the meeting, Kejriwal told reporters that it was the efforts of then speaker Goel in 2022 that brought to light the existence of a “Phansi Ghar” on the assembly premises, where the British allegedly executed freedom fighters.. “Delhi is reeling under rising water bills, contaminated water, increased school fees and a pollution crisis, but the government is not discussing these issues,” the former CM said.. He said since the BJP came to power in Delhi, it has been trying to prove that the chamber was not a “Phansi Ghar” but a “tiffin room”. He said Goel had decided to inaugurate the “Phansi Ghar” only after conducting a full inquiry.. “I asked the committee to tell me what evidence they have that it was a tiffin room. They have no evidence. This clearly means that they are deliberately trying to insult freedom fighters by claiming that it was a tiffin room,” he said.. “I would have been happy if a committee of the BJP government had asked me how to fix sewers or roads, so I could share my experience with them. I just want Delhi to improve. But the BJP does not want to run Delhi. Their aim is not to work but only to do politics,” Kejriwal said.. AAP also alleged that security was breached during Kejriwal’s visit as the Delhi Police did not allow his personal security officer to enter the assembly premises.. “This happened despite Kejriwal having Z+ security due to multiple past attacks on him,” the party said.. Pradyumn Singh Rajput, chairman of the privileges committee, asked how a decision to establish a “Phansi Ghar” was taken “without any foundational facts or historical basis”.. “It is deeply concerning that those who held such high constitutional offices could not present a single factual document or piece of evidence before the committee today to support their claims,” he said.. He said the committee will now deliberate on the next course of action based on Friday’s recorded versions.. Delhi speaker Vijender Gupta said the AAP leaders have committed contempt of the house and breached privilege by repeatedly failing to appear before the committee.. “The remarks made against the committee and the Constitution are condemnable and co 

 West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday said that she would “expose the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – Election Commission (EC) conspiracy to disenfranchise Bengali voters”, as she launched a dharna outside Kolkata’s Esplanade metro station to protest the alleged arbitrary deletion of several million people during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee stages a sit-in protest against the alleged arbitrary deletions from the post-SIR electoral rolls in the state. (PTI). “I will expose the BJP-EC conspiracy to disenfranchise Bengali voters,” she said in her speech.. “I will present those voters, who have been declared dead by the EC, at this protest site.”. During the dharna, Trinamool Congress (TMC) national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee exhorted voters to “boycott” the BJP in the upcoming state assembly polls.. “Boycott BJP. You may have reasons not to like TMC but Bengalis with the minimum sense of honour should not vote for BJP unless they don’t want something bad to happen to Bengal. I predicted earlier that BJP will not get more than 50 (of 294) seats. After what has happened in the name of SIR, their tally should not cross 40,” he said.. Also Read: ‘Subjected to some pressure’: Mamata Banerjee questions Bengal governor change ahead of polls. “In the 2024 Lok Sabha polls we said ‘No vote to BJP’. Now we are saying ‘Boycott BJP’. Boycott them socially,” he added.. On February 28, the EC published the first part of the final electoral roll for West Bengal, dropping 6.18 million names and keeping 70.46 million voters in the list after the SIR.. To be sure, another six million people were flagged under a controversial “logical discrepancy” category and their final status is currently being adjudicated by around 500 serving and former judicial officers.. The BJP hit back at Banerjee over the sit-in protest, saying she is holding such a demonstration to protect infiltrators.. “Banerjee is only interested in saving the infiltrators belonging to the Muslim community, which constitutes the bulk of her vote bank. She should be ashamed that she is holding a sit-in protest to save infiltrators, with whose help she managed to win the previous elections. But not any more,” said Union minister and BJP leader Giriraj Singh.. (With inputs from PTI). 

 The Karnataka government on Friday proposed the removal of state control over liquor pricing and a shift to a duty system based on alcohol content percentage.. Govt proposes shift to a duty system based on alcohol content percentage. Presenting the state budget in the assembly, chief minister Siddaramaiah said the reforms would modernise the state’s decades-old excise framework and introduce a taxation method commonly used internationally. The new model, called the Alcohol-in-Beverage (AIB) excise duty structure, links tax rates directly to the amount of alcohol in a drink.. “An Alcohol-in-Beverage based excise duty structure is globally recognised as the gold standard for alcohol taxation, as it directly targets the alcohol content which is the primary source of negative externalities,” he said.. The system is scheduled to come into force in April 2026.. The chief minister added that the transition from the existing duty structure will take place gradually over three to four years to prevent disruption in the market. Under the new framework, excise duty will be calculated on the alcohol content per litre rather than the total volume of the beverage.. The government also plans to change how liquor prices are determined. At present, the state plays a role in fixing retail prices, but that mechanism will be removed under the new policy. “Product placement within slabs will be left to the producers based on market considerations,” Siddaramaiah said.. The budget also proposes to simplify the pricing structure for alcoholic beverages by reducing the number of price categories. “Pricing slabs will be rationalised and reduced to eight slabs from the existing 16 slabs,” he added.. The excise department has been assigned a revenue target of ₹45,000 crore for the 2026–27 financial year.. The Brewers Association of India (BAI) hailed the shift to the new excise duty structure as transformative. “It (the new system) reflects the global gold standard in alcohol taxation, where the tax is levied on the alcohol content rather than the water in the beverage. No state has adopted such a structure so far. If implemented in line with this principle, beer and wine could become cheaper,” said Vinod Giri, BAI director general.