Olympics: First batch of Indian athletes reached Tokyo

The 52nd International Film Festival of India has called for entries for Indian Panorama, 2021. Indian Panorama is a flagship component of the International Film Festival of India, IFFI under which best of contemporary Indian films are selected for the promotion of film art. The 52nd edition of IFFI will be held in Goa from 20th to 28th November. The last date to submit applications online is 12th August.

-Successful trial of movement of train between Jaynagar in India and Kurtha in Nepal was undertaken on Sunday. The 34.50 km-long rail section is the first section of the rail line links between the two countries which connects  Jaynagar in Madhubani district of Bihar to Kurtha in Mahottari district of Nepal. The cost of this rail section is 619 crore. The Jayanagar – Kurtha Railway link has been set up by IRCON under India – Nepal friendship rail project with finance granted by the Indian government.The Chief Public Relations officer of East Central Railway Rajesh Kumar said that the train movement on this rail section will start soon after fulfilling technical and other formalities between two countries. Remaining 34 km rail line will be built in two phases.The 17-km-long second section will link Kurtha and Bhangaha while the third phase is 17-km-long and will extend from Bhangaha to Bardibas.

-Haryana Government has extended the Mahamaari Alert- Surakshit Haryana for another one week that is from morning of July 19 to morning of July 26 with some more relaxations. As per the orders issued on Sunday regarding extension of Covid restrictions, henceforth the night curfew will be imposed from 11 pm to 5 am on all days of the week. The restaurants and bars including in hotels and malls are allowed to open from 10 am to 11 pm with 50 percent of the seating capacity following Covid guidelines. The home delivery from hotels, restaurants and fast food joints is permitted upto 11 pm. The club houses, restaurants, bars of the golf Courses are allowed to open with 50 percent seating capacity from 10 am to 11 pm following Covid Appropriate Behaviour and guidelines. The gyms have also been allowed to open from 6 am to 9 pm with 50 percent capacity after adopting requisite social distancing norms, regular sanitisation and other Covid 19 related guidelines. The previously announced relaxation’s will also continue.

-The first batch of Indian athletes for the Tokyo Olympics have landed in the Japanese capital. The boxing team, led by the legendary MC Mary Kom, badminton ace PV Sindhu, archers Atanu Das and Deepika Kumari, along with the Men’s and Women’s Indian hockey teams, reached Tokyo today. So far, athletes and support staff of 13 different disciplines including badminton, archery, hockey, judo, swimming, weightlifting, gymnastics, shooting, boxing, rowing, sailing, weightlifting and table tennis, have reached Japan. The remaining contingent, including wrestling and athletics teams, are expected to join them soon. While most of the athletes flew out from New Delhi yesterday night, the boxing team made its way to Tokyo 2020 from their training base at Assisi in Italy through Amsterdam. The 15-member strong shooting team too reached the Games village on Friday from its camp in Croatia. The shooters are expected to hit the range tomorrow. National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) secretary Rajiv Bhatia said, the team have settled down at the Games village. There is no quarantine or any isolation required for them as they have arrived from Croatia.

-Minister of Earth Sciences Dr Jitendra Singh urged the scientists to further focus on more accurate forecasting. He asked the officials to step up people-oriented services, particularly for the agriculture sector and disaster areas like flash floods, cyclones and rain downpours, by using Apps and other such latest hi-tech options. Dr Singh on Sunday reviewed the Monsoon trends at the India Meteorological Department (IMD) headquarters in New Delhi. The officials of the Department informed the Minister that, at present, besides other state-of-art equipment, IMD has 27 radars spread across the country and the number of radars will go up to 50 in coming years. Director General, IMD Dr. Mrutyunja Mohapatra informed that this year the monsoon rainfall was 10 percent above normal in the month of June, but 26 percent deficient till date during July.