Coronavirus India LIVE Updates, Coronavirus Cases Today, COVID 19 Cases In India, Omicron Covid Cases, India Covid Cases October 5

COVID-19 LIVE: At least 15 new Covid-related deaths reported in India on Monday.

New Delhi:

India reported 1,968 new coronavirus infections on Tuesday, the lowest in 133 days, raising the tally to 4,45,99,466, according to the Union health ministry.

The country also reported 15 new Covid-related deaths in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of fatalities to 5,28,716.

The active cases comprise 0.08 per cent of the total infections, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate increased to 98.74 per cent, the health ministry said.

Here are the Live Updates on coronavirus cases in India:

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Bazaars swell, homes decked up as Hyderabad preparations for Dasara day | Hyderabad News

HYDERABAD: Hours before the city woke up to Dasara festivities, preparations hit a crescendo on Tuesday as hundreds of people were found crowding markets for last-minute shopping, while many were decorating their homes and making travel plans.
According to the Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC) over one lakh people took buses on Dasara eve to get to their home towns – in other districts of Telangana or neighbouring states – for the festival.

But while the city roads remained relatively empty with many driving out for a holiday, the popular shopping zones of Hyderabad – across Kukatpally, Ameerpet, Dilsukhnagar, Begum Bazaar, Abids – saw crowds swelling through the day. Malls and standalone stores in other parts of the city too witnessed a high footfall.
“Dasara means new clothes and shopping is a ritual which we could not enjoy for the last two years. So this year since we could shop freely without worrying about Covid, we went all out purchasing something for the whole family,” shared Sahitya K, from Kukatpally
If some indulged in retail hopping, many others were found queuing up outside temples in the city for Navami rituals. The sounds of Durga puja also reverberated from the dozens of pandals dotting Hyderabad’s landscape as devotees – cutting across ages – gathered here for the penultimate day of celebrations. The day also saw various places holding special Jammi pooja which is performed around the Jammi tree seen as the most holy plant for the Dasara festival. The streets across the city were dotted with flowers, pumpkin, and garlands.
As the day progressed, the excitement of ushering in Vijay Dashami and the grand Ravan Dahanam was palpable among revellers. Especially since the event is making a come back after a gap of two years. On Wednesday evening, several large grounds in Uppal, Amberpet, Saroornagar, Nampally will see the effigy of Ravana being burned along with grand firework shows and cultural events.
“This year we are getting orders from even bordering districts of Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh. Here we make effigies up to 40 feet high and as small as 5 feet as well. This year because prices of material have increased, we had to increase the price upto Rs 60,000 which is 10% higher than before,” shared Yadagiri, a worker from Nampally.
Wednesday will also see a grand procession of revellers heading towards Tank Bund, carrying the idols of Goddess Durga. Some of the popular Durga idols by various Bengali associations will be immersed on spot.

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Sony-Zee merger gets conditional CCI nod

MUMBAI: The country’s antitrust regulator has approved the merger between the local unit of Japan’s Sony and Zee Entertainment, but with certain conditions. The conditions were imposed to prevent the combined SonyZee, which will run more than 90 channels in India, from abusing its dominant position in the market.
The amalgamation has been approved subject to the parties carrying out certain modifications, read a statement from the Competition Commission of India (CCI). While both Sony and Zee welcomed the CCI nod, they didn’t share details on the modifications to be undertaken by them.

CCI was concerned about the impact the combined entity would have on competition in terms of advertising and channel pricing, particularly in the popular Hindi language segment.
Its preliminary assessment had shown that the combined entity would have a 45% share of the Hindi language category, which pulls the largest audience in India, with rival Walt Dis-ney-Star a distant No. 2. Its strong position would also enable it to enjoy unparalleled bargaining power and, as a result, could increase the price of advertisement and channel packages, the CCI had said in its initial review.
Zee said that the CCI has granted approval for the merger with Sony Pictures Networks India (now known as Culver Max Entertainment) after evaluating the legal and economic submissions made by the company. “Considering the immense value which the proposed merger will generate for all its stakeholders, it has offered the necessary remedies in accordance with the regulator’sguidelines. ” It didn’t share what the remedies were.
Media reports claimed that the proposed remedies include the merged entity offering pricing discounts and restructuring its bouquet of channels. The CCI nod takes Sony and Zee a step closer to the merger, which was announced in September last year. Zee will hold a shareholder meeting on October 14 to seek their approval on the amalgamation.
The contours of the proposed deal include the merger of Zee and Bangla Entertainment, an indirect 100% arm of Sony Corporation, into Culver Max Entertainment.

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Twitter Deal Is "Accelerant" To Creating "Everything App": Elon Musk

Elon Musk reacted after Twitter confirmed that billionaire agreed to buy company at original price.

San Francisco:

Elon Musk said on Tuesday buying Twitter Inc is an “accelerant to creating X, the everything app”, after the billionaire proposed to go ahead with his original offer of $44 billion to take the social media company private.

Buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 4, 2022

“Twitter probably accelerates X by 3 to 5 years, but I could be wrong,” he said in another tweet.

Twitter probably accelerates X by 3 to 5 years, but I could be wrong

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 4, 2022

Although Musk has not disclosed his plans for Twitter, he has said the service could charge business and government users.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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Ahmedabad: Dengue claims life of 7-year-old girl | Ahmedabad News

AHMEDABAD: As vector-borne diseases continue to increase in the city, dengue has claimed its first victim – a 7-year-old girl. Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation‘s (AMC) health department sources said that the girl who was diagnosed with dengue and under treatment at LG Hospital died in the last week of September.
A man, a suspected case of dengue, had lost his life in August. However, it was not confirmed as dengue death by the AMC as he had comorbidities.

An age-wise analysis of cases of vector-borne diseases reveals that 28.7% or 388 of the total 1,352 dengue patients, registered between January 1 and September 30, are children under 14 years of age. Most of the dengue cases, 70.2% or 949 of the total 1,352 cases reported between January and September, were registered in September.
AMC figures show that of the total dengue cases, 41 patients were under a year old, 76 were between 1 and 4 years of age, 103 were in the 5-8 years category and 168 patients in 9-14 category. The remaining 964 patients were aged 15 years and above.
The AMC data shows that the city hospitals reported 215 cases of malaria, 16 of falciparum, 949 of dengue and 42 of chikungunya cases in September.
Between January 1 and September 30, city hospitals recorded 692 cases of dengue in the eastern part of the city while the remaining 660 cases were reported in the western part. AMC data showed that most cases in the eastern part of the city were reported from Ramol-Hathijan ward.
In the western part of the city, 77 cases were registered in Bodakdev ward followed by 76 in Thaltej and 71 in Gota. The hospitals in Chandlodia registered 53 cases of dengue while the Jodhpur area registered 58 cases.
AMC figures showed that in September, the city hospitals registered 486 cases of diarrhoea, 206 cases of jaundice, 312 of typhoid and one case of cholera.

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Brainwaves to box office: IIT-Gandhinagar gets ticket to viewers' minds | Ahmedabad News

AHMEDABAD: If the face of Helen of Troy launched a thousand ships, the minds of cinemagoers have floated legions of studies. But filmmakers have received such muddled insights that metaphors can be justifiably mixed: audiences’ brains remain filmmakers’ Achilles heel.
However, this is where IIT-Gandhinagar (IIT-Gn) makes a heroic entry with work that uses the scientific script to produce a breakthrough thriller: the institute has devised a way to predict ‘audience connect’ with 72% accuracy.

IIT-Gn researchers analyzed brainwaves captured through electroencephalogram (EEG) from viewers to make sense of responses. Another study in the field of ‘neuro-cinematics’ monitored reactions to the ‘navarasas’, the nine common emotions evoked in an audience by an artistic work. The study determined that ‘raudra’ (anger) and ‘hasya’ (laughter) had the greatest provocative power among the rasas.
‘Understanding Consumer Preferences for Movie Trailers from EEG Using Machine Learning’ was recently published on the arXiv repository. The authors are Pankaj Pandey, Raunak Swarnkar, Shobhit Kakaria, and Krishna Prasad Miyapuram from the Centre for Cognitive & Brain Sciences at IIT-Gn. They took into consideration posters and trailers of 12 Hollywood movies.
The movies included “American Made”, “Battle of Sexes”, “Brad’s Status”, “The LEGO Ninjago Movie”, “Bye Bye Man”, “Murder on the Orient Express”, “Black Panther“, “Jungle Book”, and “Dunkirk”. The choices were made to cast the net across genres.
Respondents were asked to watch trailers and rate the movies based on that experience. They were also told to indicate their willingness to spend money to watch a particular film.
“Using machine learning (ML) techniques, we predicted the ‘audience connect’ with 72% accuracy. When viewers liked what they saw, a larger part of their brains was engaged, indicating interest,” said Prof Miyapuram.
“While this is a limited study, it can pave the way for an effective predictor of audience choices based on understanding consumer behaviour.”
Prof Miyapuram said that the study considered five brainwaves: delta, theta, alpha, beta, and gamma. The analysis was based on high-density EEG collected through a specially designed cap with electrodes to measure brain activity.
Such scientific endeavours are a hit with the film industry. Subhash Ghai, a well-known filmmaker, had visited the team. He told researchers that the box-office outcome is determined by factors such as storyline, cast, and budget. As for the project that focused on neural responses to the navarasas, the team factored in Indian sensibilities.
As part of a different study Dyutiman Mukhopadhyay, a postdoctoral researcher at IIT-Gn, showed viewers clips with the rasas from movies such as “Titanic”, “Modern Times”, “3 Idiots”, “Ghajini”, “Mr India”, “Braveheart”, and “Bhoot.”
The results suggested that among the negative rasas, anger captivated the audience the most, whereas laughter was the star among the positive emotions. ‘Raudra’ had the highest attention span (fixation) among all the rasas. Audience focused on eyes when negative rasas were displayed and on mouths when positive rasas played out.
Further studies are focused on eye movement patterns and emotional association with audio-visual stimuli, Prof Miyapuram said. Some of the data generated by the studies has been put into public domain for further research, he said.

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South Korea, US Fire 4 Missiles In Response To North Korea Test: Report

South Korea and the US each fired 2 Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) missiles, according to reports.

Seoul:

South Korea and the United States fired four ground-to-ground missiles into the East Sea, more commonly known as the Sea of Japan, the Yonhap news agency said Wednesday, citing South Korea’s military.

The launches were in response to North Korea firing a ballistic missile over Japan for the first time in five years on Tuesday, the South Korean military said.

South Korea and the United States each fired two Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) missiles, which hit mock targets, the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol called the North Korean launch a “provocation”, and vowed a “stern response”.

On Tuesday, South Korean and US fighter jets had carried out a bombing drill at a target in the Yellow Sea.

The last time Pyongyang fired a missile over Japan was in 2017, at the height of a period of “fire and fury” when North Korean leader Kim Jong Un traded insults with then-president Donald Trump of the United States.

United Nations chief Antonio Guterres condemned North Korea’s latest test as “clearly an escalation”, while US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida decried it “in the strongest terms”.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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Delhi: No smoke without fire? Focus on stubble amid early Diwali | Delhi News

NEW DELHI: Since Diwali comes early this year on October 24 and the monsoon has withdrawn from the capital, the System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR), the Union earth sciences forecaster, says the number of farm fires will play a key role in determining Delhi’s air quality in October and November.
Track the pollution level in your city
If the peak season of stubble burning is over by October-end or the fire counts reduce by half of what they were in 2021, there will likely be no ‘severe’ pollution days in October and November.

However, in another scenario, Delhi can suffer five-six ‘severe’ days and a rise in ‘very poor’ days in October and November if the fire count remains around 80,000 like last year, says SAFAR.
SAFAR ran its indigenously developed air quality framework model to analyse the overall winter long-range outlook for October and November based on the two scenarios. “Diwali is much earlier this time than last year. Delhi is still warm and this can cause less stagnation of firework pollutants. If stubble fire count is reduced by half or the peak is over by October-end, Delhi will not see any ‘severe’ days or extreme pollution events. ‘Very poor’ days will remain the same, but ‘satisfactory’ days will increase,” said SAFAR.
However, if stubble burning remains at the same level as last year (the active fire count was 80,000 in October and November), the combination of weather parameters, external intrusion and Diwali impact will still ensure fewer ‘severe’ days than last year. However, there may be five-six ‘severe’ days and more ‘very poor’ days. The ‘satisfactory’ days may be fewer while no ‘good’ days are likely, said SAFAR.
The Central Pollution Control Board’s data shows that Delhi saw its worst November air quality in 2021, with 11 ‘severe’ air days. In contrast, the city breathed its cleanest air last year in October, which had no ‘very poor’ or ‘severe’ days. Experts had said October last year fared better mainly due to intense rain and fewer farm fires.
SAFAR said farm fires hadn’t currently started impacting Delhi’s air quality. “Some scattered biomass-related fire counts are visible in Punjab (fire count was 10 on October 4), but they are insufficient to influence Delhi’s air quality,” said Gufran Beig, founder project director, SAFAR.
Delhi’s AQI is hovering in the ‘moderate’ category with an index of 150 on Tuesday. SAFAR said sporadic rain with warmer temperatures is likely to keep AQI in the ‘satisfactory’ and ‘moderate’ categories for three more days. “However, with the monsoon having withdrawn and calm winds prevailing, AQI will be in the ‘poor’ category from October 9. On October 4, however, the farm fire count at 10 was much lower than last year’s 80,” said Beig.

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3 physicists share Nobel for work on quantum science

NEW DELHI: Three scientists jointly won this year’s Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday for their work on quantum information science, a “totally crazy” field that has significant applications, including in the field of encryption.
Frenchman Alain Aspect, American John F Clauser and Austrian Anton Zeilinger were cited by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for discovering the way that unseen particles, such as photons, can be linked or “entangled”, with each other even when they are separated by large distances, a field that unsettled Albert Einstein himself, who once referred to it in a letter as “spooky action at a distance”.

What is Quantum Mechanics?
Classical physics tells us that two objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time. Until the early 20th century, it was believed that this was a fundamental law of physics followed by everything in nature. But then scientists began studying particles like atoms, electrons and light waves, which did not appear to obey these laws. And so, the field of quantum mechanics was born, pioneered by Max Planck, Neils Bohr and Albert Einstein, in an attempt to investigate the “quirky” laws that did bind such particles.
Quantum mechanics, for instance, tells us light can be both a particle and a wave – depending on how it is observed. But until it is observed, light is neither a particle nor a wave. This lack of definition led Einstein to remark, “God does not play dice with the universe”. Since then, physicists have been investigating the laws that govern this uncertainty.

A leap forward for Quantum Mechanics
Quantum mechanics, unlike classical physics, allows two or more particles to exist in an entangled state – what happens to one particle in an entangled pair determines what happens to the other, even if the particles are at a great distance from each other. Physicists initially believed that this coordination was the result of hidden variables – Einstein described it as “spooky action at a distance”.
But in the 1960s, John Stewart Bell found that there aren’t any hidden variables at play – in fact, the coordination between entangled particles is a matter of chance when measuring the properties of one of the particles.
Bell developed a mathematical inequality that says, “if there are hidden variables, the correlation between the results of a large number of measurements will never exceed a certain value”. However, quantum mechanics shows that it is possible to exceed this value, resulting in a greater correlation between the result than is possible through hidden variables.

Exceeding this value proves that there is no unexplained “spooky action” and that the world is governed by quantum mechanics.
Over a span of several decades, this year’s Nobel laureates have built on Bell’s work. American physicist John Clauser developed a realistic experiment by passing entangled photons through polarisation filters (commonly used in sunglasses to block light at certain angles) to test Bell’s inequality. His experiments showed a clear violation of Bell’s inequality, confirming that there were no hidden variables at play.
But Clauser’s experiment had its limitations — the settings for measuring the entangled photons passing through the polarisation filters were fixed, meaning it was possible that the experimental setup itself may have been unable to detect some particles that were controlled by hidden variables. Alain Aspect, a French physicist at the Universite Paris-Saclay, sought to develop an experiment that removed this potential bias by changing the measurement settings only after the entangled photons left their source so that the setup itself would not impact the results.

Anton Zeilinger, an Austrian physicist at the University of Vienna, was among the first to explore quantum systems that use more than two entangled particles, which now form the basis of quantum computation and allow entangled particles to be manipulated. Among his most notable achievements is the discovery of quantum teleportation, which allows particles to take on even unknown quantum characteristics from other particles over long distances.
But what do these advances in quantum mechanics mean for the world? Transistors and lasers were developed as a result of the first quantum revolution.
In this new era, the ability to manage and manipulate systems of entangled particles will give researchers better tools to “construct quantum computers, improve measurements, build quantum networks and establish secure quantum encrypted communication”. Quantum computers can perform complex calculations that are far beyond the capabilities of conventional computers, which rely on binary signals (1s and 0s) to store and process information. Already, quantum computing has shown promise in chemical and biological engineering and cybersecurity. Areas like artificial intelligence and Big Data also stand to benefit from computing systems that can handle large datasets and run complex simulations.

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2 Minor Girls Killed After Being Hit By Truck In UP: Cops

Another girl was also injured and was admitted to the hospital, the police said. (Representational)

Deoria, Uttar Pradesh:

Two minor girls were killed after being hit by a truck late on Tuesday night, police said.

The driver has been arrested and the truck has been seized, they said.

Superintendent of Police Sankalp Sharma said the truck was moving towards Mohalla Garulpar at Kotwali intersection where there was a huge crowd of devotees who had gathered for the Dussehra fair.

The truck lost control and hit Trisha Yadav (3) and her cousin Sakshi (13 years), killing them on the spot, the officer said.

Another girl was also injured and was admitted to the district hospital, the SP said, adding that about a dozen motorcycles were also damaged in the accident.

Some other people also received injuries, police said.

Angry over the incident, locals created a ruckus. Police reached the spot and pacified the locals. Mild force was also used, officials said.

The SP said police is taking legal action.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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Joe Biden Confirms US Surgeon General Dr Vivek Murthy To Join WHO Executive Board

Dr Vivek Murthy previously served as the 19th Surgeon General under President Barack Obama.

Washington:

US President Joe Biden nominated Dr Vivek Murthy to serve as America’s representative on the executive board of the World Health Organization.

Dr Murthy will serve in the new position alongside his continued duties as the Surgeon General, the White House said in a statement.

He was confirmed by the US Senate in March 2021 to serve as the 21st Surgeon General of the country. He previously served as the 19th Surgeon General under President Barack Obama.

As the nation’s doctor, the Surgeon General’s mission is to help lay the foundation for a healthier country, relying on the best scientific information available to provide clear, consistent and equitable guidance and resources for the public.

“While serving as the 21st Surgeon General, Dr Murthy is focused on drawing attention to and working across government to address a number of critical public health issues, including the growing proliferation of health misinformation, the ongoing youth mental health crisis, well-being and burnout in the health worker community, and social isolation and loneliness,” said the White House.

As the Vice Admiral of the US Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, Dr Murthy also commands a uniformed service of over 6,000 dedicated public health officers, serving the most underserved and vulnerable populations.

“The first Surgeon General of Indian descent, Dr Murthy, was raised in Miami and is a graduate of Harvard, the Yale School of Medicine, and the Yale School of Management. A renowned physician, research scientist, entrepreneur and author, he lives in Washington, DC with his wife Dr Alice Chen, and their two children,” the White House said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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Twitter Confirms Elon Musk Buyout Offer, Says Will Close At Original Price

Twitter told regulators on Tuesday that Elon Musk agreed to buy the tech firm for $44 billion.

San Francisco:

Twitter told regulators on Tuesday that Elon Musk sent a letter saying he will go through the with deal he inked early this year to buy the tech firm for $44 billion.

“The intention of the company is to close the transaction at $54.20 per share,” Twitter said in a tweet confirming the billionaire entrepreneur is apparently abandoning his legal battle to terminate the deal.

Conditions noted in the letter included that the court immediately halt all action in the lawsuit, with Musk poised to be deposed under oath later this week.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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Election Commission wants political parties to spell out poll promises | India News

NEW DELHI: In what could escalate the ongoing debate on the accountability of political parties in announcing freebies, the Election Commission on Tuesday proposed changes to its manifesto guidelines under the model code of conduct regarding poll promises, requiring political parties to specify how they would find resources for implementation of the pledges, the estimated impact on financial sustainability, and the number of beneficiaries expected to be targeted by schemes promised. The disclosures would be required to be made as per well-defined and quantifiable parameters.
Saying that the proposed disclosures about the promises and their implementation would help voters make informed choices, the EC has set October 19 as the deadline for submission of responses by the political parties, many of which immediately bristled at the move.
The proposal comes amid a raging debate over freebies, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi decrying what he has called an irresponsible culture of distributing sops like “revadi”. Many in the opposition criticised the suggestion for regulating freebies and have argued that they were needed to provide relief to the underprivileged.

The SC is also hearing a petition seeking regulation of freebies which has been opposed by parties and state governments.
The litigation is unlikely to have any impact on the EC’s move to build standardised disclosures on poll promises into the model code of conduct (MCC), which has no legal backing and is only a voluntary understanding between the EC and the political parties that comes into play during the election process. The EC will release the new guidelines once the consultations with the parties are over, though this may take some time as it is not unusual for parties to seek extension in the EC deadline to submit their opinion.

There is no existing law that regulates poll promises. But EC in 2015, as directed by Supreme Court in the Subramaniam Balaji case, did incorporate the guidelines on manifestos into the MCC. They require parties to reflect the rationale of the promises and broadly indicate ways and means to meet the financial requirements.
However, the EC over the years found the declarations to be ambiguous, routine and short on information that can help the voters make an informed choice.
At a full Commission meeting here on Tuesday, chief election commissioner Rajiv Kumar and election commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey agreed that the EC cannot remain a mute spectator to the “undesirable” impact of some of the poll promises and offers, on the conduct of free and fair elections and maintaining a level playing field. “A prescribed format for disclosure… is necessary to bring standardisation in the nature of information and for facilitating comparability,” it stated.
Keeping in view the parameters followed by Finance Commission, RBI guidelines, Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act, CAG principles and preparation of the general budget — all familiar domains for the CEC, a former Union finance secretary — the EC has proposed two sets of proformas to be filled up by the political parties. The first requires details like promise-wise expenditure and expanse of their coverage. In the second proforma, parties must disclose how the promises are to be financed, alongside pre-filled fiscal information furnished by Union finance secretary or state chief secretaries based on latest budgetary estimates or revised estimates in the election year. The official data, a senior functionary pointed out, will also help the voters gauge how the fiscal health has been under the party seeking a re-election.
The EC made it clear that it was agnostic to the “nature” of poll promises, not delving into what defines a “freebie” or what distinguishes it from a “poll promise” aimed at social welfare. It said that it agrees in principle that framing of manifestos is the right of the political parties.
Among the details sought to be captured by the proformas for poll manifesto disclosures are extent of coverage of the promise (as in individual, family, community, BPL or entire population); quantification of physical coverage; quantification of financial implications of the promise; and availability of financial resources. The parties will need to disclose the ways and means of raising the resources, like an increase in tax or non-tax revenues, rationalisation of expenditure in terms of withdrawal of an existing scheme or benefits, additional borrowings and the impact of additional resource raising plan on fiscal sustainability of the Union or state government including the sectoral impact.

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