NEW DELHI: For decades, the SC has lamented the erosion of public faith in judiciary because of the slow pace of justice delivery, especially for common citizens. This week, it closed a corruption case that had dragged on for nearly 32 years – six years in trial court, 14 years in HC and 11 years in SC, reports Dhananjay Mahapatra. The case related to the alleged siphoning of 400 cement bags meant for the public works division at Aurangabad on March 24, 1994. The trial court convicted the accused six years later on Apr 3, 2000. To concur with the trial court’s decision, the Bombay HC took more than 14 years.On appeal, the case remained pending for a decade in the SC before getting listed for final hearing before a bench of Justices B V Nagarathna and R Mahadevan, which reserved the verdict on Aug 21 last year. On Friday, after nearly six months, Justice Mahadevan pronounced the judgment acquitting the accused.Justice Mahadevan said, “Both the trial court and the high court held that the appellants (accused) failed to furnish any satisfactory explanation or documentary justification for such possession (of cement bags). These findings are essentially factual and are supported by the evidence on record.” Despite the evidence against the accused, the bench of Justices Nagarathna and Mahadevan acquitted the accused saying the prosecution charged them under provisions of Essential Commodities Act when on the date of siphoning off cement, it was not a commodity covered under that law.“That said, this was a case where the investigating agency ought to have invoked appropriate provisions of the Indian Penal Code, having regard to the nature of the allegations and the evidence collected,” it said and acquitted the accused saying, “The lapse, therefore, lies squarely at the door of the investigating agency.”

NEW DELHI: The Union Cabinet has approved infrastructure projects worth over Rs 31,000 crore, including construction of the country’s first road-cum-rail tunnel under the Brahmaputra in Assam. The twin-tube common tunnel with approach roads for movement of vehicles and trains, only the second in the world, would cost Rs 18,662 crore.It will connect Gohpur and Numaligarh in Assam and will cut travel time from about 6 hours to just 20 minutes. The project, to be fully funded by govt, will not just reduce the travel distance from 240 km to roughly 34 km improving connectivity but also has strategic significance, I&B minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said while announcing the Cabinet decision. This four-lane tunnel will ensure high-speed connectivity to Arunachal and provide “strategic resilience” for defence purposes. The minister said the twin tubes would be interconnected at intervals of 500 metres.Officials said the tunnel would be built around 32 metres beneath the Brahmaputra’s lowest bed level. One of the tubes will have provision for a single rail track and no vehicular movement will be allowed when trains run through this tube.

PM Modi called the Brahmaputra tunnel project as a “landmark boost to connectivity in the northeast”.In a post on X, he said, “…This transformative project will enhance connectivity, reduce logistics costs and accelerate growth across Assam and the entire Northeast.”TOI has learnt that originally govt had included the connectivity between Gohpur and Numaligarh as a part of the Special Accelerated Road Development Programme for North East in 2008 by constructing a bridge. But later a proposal was mooted to build a road tunnel beneath the Brahmaputra. Later, it was modified to have a common tunnel for both vehicles and trains.A similar 22-km road-cumrail tunnel passing through Chicken Neck corridor in the northeast is also in planning stage. Besides the tunnel, Cabinet approved three NH projects with a combined cost of over Rs 11,000 crore — a 107.7-km fourlane highway in Gujarat, a 154.6-km highway stretch in Maharashtra and an 80-km corridor of NH-167 in Telangana.In rail sector, three multitracking projects covering 12 districts across Delhi, Haryana, Maharashtra and Karnataka were approved at an estimated cost of Rs 18,509 crore. The approved projects will add 389 km to the existing network of railways. Multitracking works are scheduled for completion by March 2031. These include the laying of third and fourth line between Kasara and Manmad in Maharashtra, which will have the second longest tunnel on the rail network.

DIBRUGARH/GUWAHATI: PM Narendra Modi landed on the North-East’s first emergency landing facility, a highway airstrip at Moran in Assam’s Dibrugarh district, and rolled out a package of infrastructure projects worth more than Rs 5,500 crore across the pollbound state, spanning defence preparedness, connectivity, education and digital capacity.Modi flew in from Chabua airfield on Saturday aboard an IAF C-130J, touching down on the 4.2km-long specially reinforced stretch of the Moran bypass built at a cost of Rs 100 crore. Designed for dual civil-military use, the emergency landing facility doubles as a national highway and can serve as a backup to Dibrugarh airport during natural disasters or conflict.

Officials said the strip can handle fighter aircraft up to 40 tonnes and transport planes up to 74 tonnes maximum take-off weight, strengthening rapid de-ployment and relief operations in a sensitive region close to the Chinese border.The Prime Minister’s landing was followed by a 40-minute IAF aerial display underscoring the strip’s operational readiness. Sukhoi Su-30MKI and Rafale fighters conducted takeoffs and landings, An-32 transports showcased short-field operations, and advanced light helicopters simulated humanitarian assistance and disaster relief missions. Garud Commandos rappelled onto the strip in a demonstration.Later in Guwahati, Modi inaugurated the Kumar Bhaskar Varma Setu, a six-lane, 7.75km concrete bridge over the Brahmaputra built at a cost of Rs 3,030 crore. The bridge, the first of its kind in the North-east, cuts travel time between Guwahati and North Guwahati to about seven minutes from roughly 30 minutes via the Saraighat bridge. Designed for high seismicity, it uses friction pendulum bearings and a real-time bridge health monitoring system. Modi had laid the foundation stone in Feb 2019.At Lachit Ghat, the PM unveiled the temporary campus of IIM Guwahati, the region’s second IIM and India’s 22nd. The Rs 555-crore permanent campus will be built at Palasbari near Guwahati, with classes beginning from a transit campus at Tech City, Bongora, under mentorship of IIM Ahmedabad.He also inaugurated NE’s National Data Centre at Amingaon in Kamrup, a Rs 348-crore facility with an 8.5-MW sanctioned load and advanced rack capacity to host mission-critical govt applications and serve as a disaster recovery hub under Digital India. A fleet of electric buses and other connectivity projects were also launched.

NEW DELHI: Ahead of next week’s AI Impact Summit, Union information technology minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Saturday said that investments in the infrastructure layer of artificial intelligence may top $200 billion with commitments of around $90 billion already received.“We are working on all five layers of the AI stack. Conventionally, our strength has been providing IT services. Now, we have to convert this into providing AI-based services. The IT industry too has worked in recent years on this changing business model. It has invested in creating new tools and reskilling their workforce, so they can provide AI services,” Vaishnaw said, while addressing the ET NOW Global Business Summit.He added that after the UK, South Korea and France, India is set to host the biggest AI Impact summit next week, with more than 20 Heads of State and govts attending the event. “At the summit, we will be launching our bouquet of sovereign models. On so many parameters, the models are better than Open AI, Gemini Pro and Deep Seek, giving us confidence that India can develop models on very frugal resources,” said the minister, who is also in charge of railways and information and broadcasting ministries.Highlighting the development in the third layer of AI stack, Vaishnaw stressed that progress in semiconductor development — the “chip layer” — had been significant, with startups and research teams developing cutting-edge solutions that are expected to bear fruit in the coming years.Vaishnaw also noted electronic goods will be among the top two exported goods soon. “One of the key things Europeans wanted from India was electronic goods in the FTA. They wanted electronic items of all kinds for their industry and consumers, because we are a trusted country. India will become a trusted partner in the semiconductor and electronics value chain,” Vaishnaw said. The minister said AI is set to outpace all previous industrial revolutions and technological shifts, necessitating the need for industry and society to remain prepared for this swift transformation, as India’s coordinated push across talent, models, chips and applications will help position the country at the forefront of the global AI revolution. Sharing the progress on the first bullet train project, Vaishnaw said that the first section between Mumbai and Ahmedabad will open in 2027. He also said that the proposed Bengaluru–Chennai corridor could reduce travel time to just 73 minutes, thus bringing the two cities much closer and boosting economic activity. “Our engineers have really lived up to the challenge. Our industry too has gone through that learning curve and is practically self-sufficient in the entire high speed train technology. That is why Prime Minister Modi has announced seven new bullet train corridors, which will connect large parts of the country and transform the entire transportation industry. We are also going to standardise the entire system so that anyone in the world can come and participate. We will have a large role for the industry as well,” he added. On wider railway reforms, Vaishnaw said the ministry is working on “52 reforms in 52 weeks” in 2026, with two new reforms slated to be announced on the same day. Seven reforms have already been implemented and the rest are in progress.“These changes aim to improve overall travel experience, especially for daily passengers belonging to the low- and middle-income families. They remain our most important customers in the railways. We have been able to reduce accidents by about 90%. We want to further reduce it,” he said.

NEW DELHI: Delhi chief minister Rekha Gupta on Saturday inaugurated a statue of RSS founder K B Hedgewar in east Delhi, and said it would be a continuing source of inspiration embodying service, dedication and the spirit of ‘nation first’.The unveiling was organised at the Hedgewar Arogya Sansthan Hospital in Shahdara area, marking the 100th anniversary year of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).“Installation of the statue of such a tall personality on the completion of 100 years of the RSS by the Delhi government is an immense source of inspiration for us,” the chief minister said.The RSS was founded on September 27, 1925, in Nagpur by Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, a physician from Maharashtra. The outfit started small with one ‘shakha’ (branch) and evolved over the years to become a vast organisation in the country.Gupta said the vision and mission initiated by Hedgewar have today evolved into a “strong and expansive” organisation dedicated to the service of the nation.His approach of organising society through character-building has laid a “firm foundation” for India’s cultural awakening, she said, adding that the statue installed at the institute is not merely a memorial but a continuing source of inspiration embodying service, dedication and the spirit of ‘nation first’.The chief minister said the Hedgewar Hospital has been dedicated to serving the people of the trans-Yamuna area for decades. The government will work towards the extension of the hospital by adding another floor to its building and equipping it with the latest machines in the coming days, Gupta further said.Health minister Pankaj Kumar Singh and several BJP legislators, including Shahdara MLA Sanjay Goyal, along with other public representatives, doctors, paramedical staff and citizens, were present at the event.The chief minister further informed that all Delhi government hospitals have now been fully digitised. Each patient has a digital health record, online OPD appointment facilities have been introduced, and complete treatment histories can be accessed at the click of a button at any hospital, according to her.She expressed confidence that the statue of Dr Hedgewar will serve as inspiration for doctors and staff at the hospital, motivating them each day to work with renewed energy and a spirit of service.