President Murmu to attend Navy Day celebrations in Kerala capital
Thiruvananthapuram (PTI): The Indian Navy will on Wednesday carry out operational demonstrations at the Shangumugham Beach here as part of the Navy Day celebrations.
President Droupadi Murmu will be the chief guest at the event where 19 major war vessels, including India's indigenous aircraft carrier, INS Vikrant, one submarine, four fast intervention boats, and 32 aircraft, both fighters and surveillance aircraft and helicopters, will demonstrate their prowess.
Murmu will arrive in the state capital at 4.20 pm and will be greeted with a guard of honor, official sources said.
She will attend the Navy Day celebrations and watch the naval exercises, after which she will go to the Lok Bhavan, the sources said.
The President will return to Delhi on Thursday morning, they said.
The Thiruvananthapuram International Airport Ltd (TIAL), in an advisory, has said that traffic restrictions will be in place near terminal 1 and 2 of the aerodrome due to the Navy Day celebrations.
The restrictions will be in place from afternoon till night and may result in additional travel time to the airport for passengers, it said and requested travellers to take precautions.
Navy Day is held to commemorate the Indian Navy missile boats' attack on Karachi harbour during the 1971 war.
A naval officer on Tuesday said that the "mega event" will provide a unique opportunity to all the citizens to witness the Indian Navy's state-of-the-art platforms and multi-domain operations.
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
