Hello, this is your daily dose of news from Onmanorama. Tune in to get updated about the major news stories of the day.
Hello, this is your daily dose of news from Onmanorama. I'm your host, Vishnu, and these are the major news stories of the day:
1. K-Rail calls top SilverLine opponents for first-ever technical debate on the project
2. Yemeni family of Nimisha Priya's victim seeks Rs1.5cr blood money
3. Kerala Plus One exams postponed, says Education Minister V Sivankutty
4. Actress assault case: Trial court to hear plea to revoke Dileep's bail next week
5. Electric vehicle fires spur govt to press for recall of faulty batches
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Let's get into the details:
1. For the first time ever, the Kerala government has decided to officially listen to dissenting voices in the SilverLine issue. SilverLine is an ambitious semi high-speed rail project proposed by the Pinarayi government. The project, which will be carried out by the Kerala Rail Development Corporation Ltd, will connect Thiruvananthapuram in the south to Kasaragod in the north across 11 stations that pass through 11 districts. However, there have been widespread protests against the project by political parties, environmental activists, technical experts and the general public who are at risk of losing their land for the sake of SilverLine.
Three noted SilverLine opponents - former Indian Railways Service officer Alok Kumar Verma, who was also the lead consultant of the SilverLine preliminary feasibility study; environmental scientist R V G Menon; and IT expert and social commentator Joseph C Mathew - have been invited to the first ever debate on the technical aspects of SilverLine.
The debate will be organised by K-Rail in Thiruvananthapuram on April 28. If sources are to be believed, all three have accepted the invite. To achieve balance, the debate will also witness the participation of three proponents of the project namely Railway Board former member Subodh Jain, Digital University vice chancellor Saji Gopinath and the president of Thiruvananthapuram Chamber of Commerce and Industry, N S Raghuchandran Nair.
Meanwhile, Edakkad in Kannur on Friday witnessed protests against the laying of survey stones for the SilverLine project. The land owners alleged that the officials turned up to lay the survey stones without informing them. The protestors, who got into a scuffle with the police, uprooted and threw away the survey stone. However, officials said that the survey stone-laying was in accordance with the law.
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2. Talks are on to rescue Keralite woman Nimisha Priya who is on death row in a Yemeni jail over the 2017 murder of a national of that country. As per reports, the victim Talal Mehdi's family has demanded 50 million Yemeni rial as blood money. This amounts to Rs 1.52 crore as per current forex rates. Yemenese officials who met Nimisha in jail apprised her of the willingness of Mehdi's family to consider negotiations over blood money. A decision regarding the same is to be conveyed to them before the end of Ramzan, whch is before May 1.
Former Supreme Court judge Justice Kurian Joseph is leading the negotiations with the family of the Yemeni national for the release of Nimisha Priya. Palakkad native Nimisha Priya was a nurse in Yemen when she was convicted in 2020 for the murder of Yemeni national Talal Abdo Mahdi. He died in July 2017 allegedly of overdose after she injected him with sedatives to get her passport that was in his possession. According to Priya, Mahdi had also forged documents to show that she was married to him and even abused and tortured her. Though she had appealed against the death penalty, it was rejected. Her only hope to escape the death sentence was if the victim's family accepted blood money in accordance with Yemeni laws.
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3. Kerala Plus One exams have been postponed, Education Minister V Sivankutty announced on Friday. The new dates are from June 13 to 30. The Plus Two model exams will begin on June 2, the minister said. The Plus One and VHSE exams were earlier slated to be held from June 2 to 18. A grand opening day ceremony will be held in schools on June 1, the minister said. He urged all to follow Covid guidelines.
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4. The trial court will on April 26 hear again the petition filed by the prosecution to cancel the bail of actor and eighth accused Dileep in the 2017 actress assault case. A renowned Malayalam actress was abducted by goons and sexually assaulted in a moving car back in 2017. The conspirators filmed the entire incident to blackmail her. Actor Dileep had been arrested as the eighth accused for co-conspiring in the assault and was later let out on bail.
The prosecution filed such an application alleging that Dileep had tried to influence the witnesses and tamper with evidence in the case. The prosecution also alleged that Dileep had violated the bail conditions made applicable to him earlier by the court.
On the basis of the digital evidence and the statements of witnesses received during the further probe in the case, the prosecution had come to the conclusion that Dileep attempted to scuttle both the trial and deposition of witnesses with the connivance of his lawyers. Another petition filed by the prosecution urging the court to seek explanation from the defence on the issue of detection of secret court documents from Dileep's mobile phone is also pending before the trial court. The court, on April 26, will also consider the probe team's plea to allow taking the statement of some of the employees of the court in connection with the leaking of secret documents connected to the case.
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5. The unabated deadly fires in electric two-wheelers has shaken up the entire electric vehicle industry and its stakeholders, forcing the government to now press an emergency button and direct EV makers to immediately recall faulty batches that may trigger more such incidents.
After Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari said in a tweet thread that companies may take advance action to recall all defective batches of vehicles immediately, Hyderabad-based Pure EV said it has initiated the recall of 2,000 e-scooters to check any faults in batteries and chargers.
An 80-year-old man was killed and two others injured when the battery of a Pure EV electric two-wheeler exploded in their house in Telangana's Nizamabad district. According to police, the incident occurred on the night of April 19 in a house where the battery was being charged. This was the fifth incident of a fire in a Pure EV scooter.
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That brings us to the end of this episode. Be sure to come back tomorrow. As always, thanks for listening to Daily News Dose.