Bengaluru: Octogenarian dies in house fire
Bengaluru (PTI): An 80-year-old man was charred to death after a fire broke out at his residence in Mylasandra in the early hours of Thursday, police said.
The deceased, identified as Mailarappa, lived alone in a house near Thimmarayappa Circle, they added.
According to police, Mailarappa’s granddaughter Ramya told investigators that he lived alone in a house adjacent to their residence.
He had developed gangrene in his left leg and had undergone amputation, which left him unable to move around.
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Ramya used to take care of his daily needs and provide him with food.
According to the police statement, on the evening of February 18, Ramya visited to deliver dinner. He mentioned feeling unwell and requested medication, which she provided. Her elder brother was present at the time. She then returned home.
At around 2.20 am, a distant relative raised an alarm that Mailarappa’s house was on fire. Family members and neighbours rushed to the scene, extinguished the flames, and removed the roof sheets, a senior police officer said.
Ramya’s husband later entered the house and found that her grandfather had died from burn injuries, the officer added.
“A case of unnatural death has been registered, and we are investigating the cause of the fire,” the officer said, adding, “We are also examining whether there was any foul play.”
The body will be handed over to the family after a postmortem examination determines the exact cause of death, police said.
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Wangchuk not given videos which formed basis of his detention: Wife to SC
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New Delhi (PTI): Climate activist Sonam Wangchuk's wife Gitanjali J Angmo alleged in the Supreme Court on Thursday that four videos which formed the basis of her husband's detention were not shown to him and only the thumbnails on pen drive were displayed.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing in the court for Angmo, told a bench of justices Aravind Kumar and Prasanna B Varale that not supplying the videos violated Wangchuk's right to effective representation before the advisory board as well as the government.
"It is now alleged by the State that that DIG came with a laptop and shown four videos. The laptop was provided to detenue on October 5, 2025, but those four vidoes were not there.
"Let us assume they showed it to be, that is not the requirement of law. The requirement is to give it to me. They have to provide the document, I don't have to ask. It is there constitutional duty to supply. We have said that time and again that the four was never supplied," Sibal said.
Another lawyer assisting Sibal informed the court that the pen drive was inserted in the laptop before Wangchuk and he only saw the thumbnails.
"The videos were not actually played. None of the thumbnails were actually clicked," the lawyer said.
Additional Solicitor General KM Nataraj submitted that there is a video in which the conversation with the DIG and detenue will show everything.
The top court said it see the relevant video recordings, including a 40-minute video of the interaction between police officials and the detenue.
The matter is now posted for hearing on February 23.
On Monday, the apex court had questioned the Centre about the transcripts of videos submitted by it against Wangchuk and said the translations should be precise in the age of artificial intelligence.
It had told Nataraj that it wanted actual transcripts of Wangchuk's statements from the government after Sibal submitted that some of the words attributed to the activist were never said by him.
The top court was hearing a habeas corpus petition filed by Wangchuk's wife, Gitanjali Angmo, seeking a declaration that his detention under the National Security Act (NSA), 1980, is illegal.
The NSA empowers the Centre and the states to detain individuals to prevent them from acting in a manner "prejudicial to the defence of India."
The maximum detention period is 12 months, though it can be revoked earlier. Angmo said the violence in Leh on September 24 last year cannot be attributed in any manner to the actions or statements of Wangchuk.
Wangchuk himself condemned the violence through his social media handles and categorically said it would lead to the failure of Ladakh's "tapasya" and its peaceful pursuit of five years, Angmo said, adding that it was the saddest day of his life.
