Daily News Dose: Dileep destroyed chat history with 12 contacts on his phone | Apr 5, 2022

Hello, this is your daily dose of news from Onmanorama. I'm Ajish Jimmy George, and these are the major news stories of the day:

1. Empower Mullaperiyar dam panel until new authority supersedes it, says Supreme Court

2. Dileep destroyed chat history with 12 contacts on his phone, says Crime Branch

3. Spotlight likely to be on Pinarayi Vijayan at the CPM Party Congress

4. VD Satheesan launches broadside against CPM on K-Rail project

5. Petrol, diesel prices hiked again; Rs 10 increased in 11 days

Let’s get into the details.

The supervisory committee on the Mullaperiyar dam could be authorised with all the duties falling under the purview of the newly introduced Dam Safety Act until a new authority comes into force based on the law, the Supreme Court proposed on Tuesday.

The apex court issued the directive after the central government informed that it would take one more year to set up a new Dam Safety Authority.

The top court made the proposal in response to a plea filed by Kothamangalam native Joe Joseph seeking the court's intervention to empower the supervisory panel further. The Kerala government had also made a similar request but Tamil Nadu had opposed.

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Actor Dileep, who is an accused in the 2017 actor assault case, was found to have destroyed the record of chats with 12 contacts on his phone. One of them was the Sharjah Cricket Association CEO, states a Crime Branch report.

The probe report, submitted before a court in Aluva, also stated the chats were erased with the help of cybersecurity expert Sai Shankar and were beyond recovery.

The deleted chats include those with his wife and actor Kavya Madhavan; his brother-in-law Suraj and three Dubai-based people.

The Crime Branch also suspects that some of the chats were deleted to divert the attention of the probe agency. The report claimed that the removal of these chats raises suspicion over Dileep's role in the case and it needs to conduct further investigation into the matter.

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At its 23rd Party Congress beginning on Wednesday, the Kerala unit of the CPM will be pushing for enlarging the participation of the party at the national level, besides seeking a nationwide publicity campaign highlighting the achievements of the first and second Pinarayi Vijayan governments in Kerala.

While the increased involvement in national politics would ensure Kerala's share from the Central government, the publicity campaign would be to secure Pinarayi Vijayan a place in the leadership of the opposition at the pan-India level.

"Save the LDF government in Kerala" is one of the 10 missions included in the draft political resolution, meant to be presented at the Party Congress. The political organisational report, approved by the CPM central committee's previous meeting, too, had highlighted the CPM-led Left Democratic Front's 2021 poll victory that enabled it to retain power in Kerala.

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Hours ahead of the CPM party congress in its stronghold Kannur district, Leader of Opposition in the Kerala Assembly V D Satheesan launched a broadside against the Left government on the K-Rail issue, alleging that it was adopting "an extreme right-wing" stand on the matter.

Briefing the reporters about the ongoing protests in the state over the SilverLine rail project, the Opposition leader said the agitation will grow further as a mass movement and become a "Waterloo" for the CPM in Kerala just as it lost its base in West Bengal after Nandigram struggle that put an end to the over three-decade old CPM rule in that state.

In 2007, many farmers were killed in police firing during an anti-land acquisition stir in Nandigram.

The Paravoor MLA dismissed the CPM allegation that the Congress and the BJP have joined hands to destabilise the Left government in Kerala.

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Plunging Indian households into deep crisis, fuel prices were hiked on Tuesday too. This was the 13th hike since March 22.

While petrol prices were increased by 87 paise, diesel rates went up by 84 paise in Kerala. In the last 11 days, price of petrol has increased by Rs 10.02 and diesel by Rs 9.41.

Currently, petrol costs Rs 116.32 and diesel Rs 103.13 in Thiruvananthapuram. Petrol price rose to Rs 114.33 in Kochi and diesel price increased to Rs 101.24. It is Rs 114.49 and Rs 101.42 respectively in Kozhikode.

Now, let’s check out the covid update:

With 795 new coronavirus infections reported in a day, India's total tally of COVID-19 cases rose to 4,30,29,839, while the active cases dipped to 12,054.

The death toll climbed to 5,21,416 with 58 fresh fatalities, according to the Union Health Ministry.

The daily positivity rate was recorded at 0.17 per cent and the weekly positivity rate was at 0.22 per cent.

That brings us to the end of this episode. Be sure to come back tomorrow. As always, thanks for listening to Daily News Dose.