LIVE news updates: Five suspects linked to Easter bombing mastermind arrested

Sri Lankan police on Friday arrested five suspects, allegedly having links with local Islamist group National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ) and its leader Zahran Cassim, the mastermind behind the Easter Sunday bombings.

The five suspects were arrested in Horowpathana area on the day when the Parliament passed the state of emergency with 22 lawmakers voting for it and eight Tamil National Alliance members voting against it, the Daily Mirror reported.

Gurugram police arrested seven persons, including the kingpin of a Mewati gang responsible for looting trucks and dumping their drivers and cleaners in the forests of Aravalli.

The activities of the gang came to the fore after a trucker whose driver and cleaner were taken away to the forests approached the police in Maneser.

Dinesh Singh Bhadoria, a resident of Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh, said in his complaint that the driver and cleaner were on their way from Haryana's Sonepat district to Gwalior via Agra.

In a suspected case of yet another gang war in the capital on Thursday night, half-a-dozen men fired at a man allegedly belonging to a rival gang.

The incident took place in Jahangirpuri's Mahendra Park, where a CCTV camera recorded six men chasing a victim identified as Naresh. The accused could be seen firing indiscriminately at Naresh who had run away into his house in a narrow lane.

The incident came a few days after another gang war in Dwarka, where two criminals were shot dead, one of them by a rival criminal and another by a policeman.

Congress President Rahul Gandhi expressed grief over Surat incident

A BrahMos Supersonic Cruise Missile was successfully test-fired in Nicobar Islands

A BrahMos Supersonic Cruise Missile was successfully test-fired, on a specially designed target chosen at a range of 270 Km, by a Unit of Eastern Command, Indian Army from Car Nicobar Islands, as part of joint training by Army, Indian Navy & Indian Air Force

A Customs Superintendent at Thiruvananthapuram International Airport was arrested here Friday for allegedly helping gold smugglers early this month.

Officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence arrested Radhakrishnan, suspecting that he had prior knowledge of an attempt by two people from Oman to smuggle in gold.

Mother Dairy on Friday hiked milk prices by up to Rs 2 per litre effective Saturday as it is paying more to farmers for procurement of milk from farmers due to rising cost of fodder.

The leading milk supplier in the national capital region has increased the prices for the first time in more than two years. It also comes days after Amul hiked milk prices by Rs 2 per litre.

Several students of a coaching class were seen jumping off from windows as a major fire broke out on the third and fourth floors of a commercial complex on Friday.

Fire engulfed the third and fourth floors of Taxshila Complex in Sarthana area, said an official at the Surat fire control room.

Around 30 students were present in the coaching, out of which 21 have been killed

At least one person was killed and over a dozen injured in a blast targeting a mosque during Friday prayers in Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province, police said.

The explosion targeted the Rehmania Mosque in Pashtunabad area of the provincial capital Quetta, it said, adding that the injured have been shifted to different hospitals for treatment.

“The death toll could rise as it was a big explosion,” said a security official. According to the police, the nature of the bombing was not known but it looked as if a planted device was detonated.

In an explosion at a mosque in Paktia Kot area in Kabul’s PD9 during Friday prayers, Mawlawi Samiullah Raihan, the imam of the mosque was killed and nine other people were wounded

Theresa May on Friday announced that she is quitting as UK Conservative leader on June 7, sparking a contest for Britain's new Prime Minister.

She stepped down after failing to win over her ministers with a revised strategy over her plans for the UK's withdrawal from the European Union.

Embattled British Prime Minister Theresa May is expected to step down soon after failing to win over her ministers with a revised strategy over her plans for the UK's withdrawal from the European union.

May is set for a meeting with the chair of the Conservative Party's influential 1922 Committee of backbench MPs on Friday during which she is expected to unveil her plans to step down as Tory leader, triggering a leadership contest within the ruling party by June 10.

Seven Indians have been arrested in Nepal following a shootout with the police near a temple on Thursday.

The accused, who hail from Bihar's Samastipur district, include one Ravi Mallik who has sustained a bullet injury in the ensuing gunbattle, the police said in a statement.

They were arrested as they gathered near the Bihar Kunda temple of Janakpur for committing loot, they said.

The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a plea of former Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar seeking extension of protection from arrest in the multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam case.

Kumar was earlier granted protection from arrest by the apex court for seven days which ends on Friday. A vacation bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra said Kumar can approach the Calcutta High Court or the trial court there for seeking relief.

At the outset, the bench told Kumar's counsel that a bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi had already passed an order in the matter and later the CJI had also declined urgent listing of an application filed by the IPS officer seeking extension of protection from arrest. "Is it maintainable (the writ petition)? You can go to the high court or the trial court a the courts are functional there," the bench told advocate Sunil Fernandes, who was representing Kumar. When Fernandes said the courts in Kolkata are not functioning due to ongoing lawyers' strike, the bench said, "You are wrong. The courts are sitting there.”

A 26-year-old man eloped with a woman here following which her family members allegedly set his house as well as that of his uncle on fire, police said on Friday.

The incident took place Thursday and 10 people, including four women, were booked under Indian Penal Code (IPC) section 436 that deals with mischief by fire or explosive substance with intent to destroy house, etc, Station House Officer (SHO), Miranpur, Pankaj Tyagi said.

A blast was reported at a place in Hailakandi district of Assam on Friday, partially damaging a place of worship, a police officer said.

No casualty has been reported so far, Hailakandi Superintendent of Police Mohneesh Mishra

A fire has been reported at the Bhilai steel plant in Chhattisgarh. 10 fire tenders at the spot

A blast was reported at a place in Hailakandi district of Assam on Friday, partially damaging a place of worship, a police officer said.

No casualty has been reported so far, Hailakandi Superintendent of Police Mohneesh Mishra told PTI.

A mosque, located at Kachurtal near the inter-state boundary with Mizoram, was partially damaged in the explosion that occurred at 2 am, Mishra said.

Over 5,000 voters opted for the none of the above (NOTA) button in elections to the Muzaffarnagar parliamentary constituency in Uttar Pradesh, election officials said.

Ten candidates were in the fray for Muzaffarnagar seat which was retained by BJP's Sanjeev Kumar Balyan, who defeated his nearest rival and Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) chief Ajit Singh by 6,526 votes. According to the election officials, 5,061 voters opted for NOTA here.

While Balyan secured 5,73,780 votes, Singh polled 5,67,254 votes. Independent candidate Neel Kumar got 4,884 votes -- less than what was polled for NOTA.

Curfew was imposed in parts of Kashmir on Friday, a day after Zakir Musa, the so-called chief of a group affiliated to the Al-Qaeda, was believed to have been killed in an encounter with security forces in Tral.

Educational institutions have been closed and curfew was imposed in places in Kashmir as a precautionary measure, following the Thursday incident, officials said.

Internet was also shutdown, they said.

Justices Aniruddha Bose, AS Bopanna, Bhushan Ramkrishna Gavai and Surya Kant sworn-in as the judges of the Supreme Court.

Zakir Musa, the so-called chief of Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind, a group affiliated with Al-Qaeda, was killed in an encounter with security forces in a village in South Kashmir's Tral, officials confirmed Friday.

A defence spokesman said one militant was killed in the operation at Dadsara in Tral area of Pulwama district Thursday night.

Rainfall in parts of Punjab and Haryana on Friday brought relief from the scorching heat prevailing over the region in the past few days.

After nocturnal protests in parts of Srinagar, Pulwama, Shopian and some other places in the Valley when the news about the killing of Zakir Musa, chief of Ansar Ghazwatul Hind, spread, Authorities on Friday imposed restrictions in parts of the Valley.

Six people have been confirmed dead and 12 others remained missing after a boat capsized on a river in southwest China's Guizhou Province on Thursday afternoon, the Xinhua news agency reported after local authorities confirmed the incident on Friday.