Cyclone alert issued for Odisha, Andhra Pradesh
Bhubaneswar, Sep 20 : The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) on Thursday issued a cyclone alert for Odisha and Andhra Pradesh.
The IMD in a statement said a depression over west-central and adjoining east-central Bay of Bengal is likely to intensify into a cyclonic storm during the next 12 hours.
"The depression over west-central and adjoining east-central Bay of Bengal moved nearly westwards with a speed about 15 kmph in the past six hours. It has intensified into a deep depression and lay centred at about 310 km east-southeast of Kalingapatnam (coastal Andhra Pradesh) and about 300 km east-southeast of Gopalpur (Odisha)," the statement said.
"It is likely to intensify into a cyclonic storm during the next 12 hours. It is very likely to move west-northwestwards and cross south Odisha - north Andhra Pradesh coasts between Kalingapatnam and Puri (Odisha), close to Gopalpur around midnight as a cyclonic storm with wind speed of 60-70 kmph gusting to 80 kmph."
Heavy to very heavy rain was predicted at a few places over Odisha and extremely heavy downpour at isolated places over south Odisha and north coastal Andhra Pradesh.
"Squally wind speed reaching 45-55 kmph gusting to 65 kmph is very likely along and off Odisha and north Andhra Pradesh coasts. It will gradually increase, becoming 60-70 kmph gusting 80 kmph from today (Thursday) evening for subsequent 12 hours," said the IMD statement.
Damage by the storm was expected in the districts of Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram and Srikakulam in Andhra Pradesh and Gajapati, Ganjam, Khurda, Nayagarh and Puri districts in Odisha.
Fishermen have been advised not to venture into the northwest Bay of Bengal and along and off the Odisha, West Bengal and north Andhra Pradesh coasts.
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Gurugram Police arrest BJP Yuva Morcha member for spreading fake murder story on social media
New Delhi: Gurugram Police have arrested BJP Yuva Morcha member Hariom Mishra, for allegedly spreading a fabricated and communally sensitive story on social media about the murder of a college student in Gurugram.
Mishra who is also known as Shaurya Mishra had shared a collage of four photographs on his X handle earlier this month. He claimed that a 24-year-old college student, identified as Nikita Agarwal, had been murdered by her classmate Arif Khan in Gurugram. In the post, he alleged that the woman was blackmailed, forced into prostitution, gangraped, and eventually killed. He also claimed that Arif dumped her body in a forest. The claims were presented as being based on police sources.
The post went viral and garnering over 1.5 lakh views, and was amplified by several right-wing social media handles across X, Facebook and Instagram. A verification of the claims revealed that no such incident had taken place in Gurugram. A search of credible news reports showed no record of any such murder. The police said this news would have inevitably attracted media attention if it were true.
On December 11, Gurugram Police publicly refuted the claims through their official X handle. They stated that the information which was being circulated was completely false. The police warned that legal action would be taken against those spreading misinformation. Despite the warning, Mishra neither deleted the post nor issued any clarification.
Police in Gurugram confirmed Mishra's arrest on December 16. The police said a FIR was filed after he continued to spread false information about the alleged murder of a Hindu woman by Muslim man. Police said Mishra, a resident of Uttar Pradesh's Kaushambi district, is now being investigated.
Gurugram Police spokesperson Sandeep Singh told The Print that the accused had deliberately misrepresented facts and used objectionable content to spread hatred along religious lines. “Such posts can create serious disturbances in society, and the police take these matters very seriously,” he said.
A reverse image search conducted by fact-checkers at Alt News, revealed that the photographs used in the viral post were unrelated to the claims, while two of the images were traced to a Pinterest account belonging to influencer Maulik Chopra and another image was sourced from an Instagram post by influencer Shivam Thakur featuring a woman named Deepanshi Rawat. The fourth image was found on an unrelated Instagram page. The images depicted different individuals and had no connection to any crime.
Police said they are also investigating Mishra’s motive behind sharing the false and provocative content.
