Gadag: In a disturbing incident, four schoolgirls were hospitalised after a group of miscreants threw chemical-laced colours at them during Holi celebrations in Suvarnagiri Tanda near Lakshmeshwara, Gadag district, on Friday, the first day of the festival.
The group, which included some schoolboys from the same locality, targeted ten girls who were on their way to Uma Vidyalaya High School in Lakshmeshwara by bus. Despite the girls pleading that they had exams to attend, the youths disregarded their requests and doused them with adulterated colours, sources told The New Indian Express.
Additionally, they threw a mixture of water, egg, manure, and some juice at the girls, causing severe discomfort.
The girls, studying in Class 8 and 9, began vomiting, prompting the bus driver to halt and transfer them to another vehicle for immediate assistance. Upon reaching Lakshmeshwara, the condition of four girls deteriorated, and they developed breathing difficulties, the report added.
Their teachers rushed them to a nearby government hospital for urgent medical attention.
Authorities have since detained two boys in connection with the incident. Senior police officials visited the hospital and assured the victims' families that strict action would be taken against those responsible.
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Mumbai (PTI): Fugitive businessman Vijay Mallya, facing multiple cases of fraud and money laundering, told the Bombay High Court on Wednesday that he cannot say when he will return to India as he is legally barred from leaving the UK.
In a statement submitted through his counsel Amit Desai to the high court, Mallya said he did not have an active passport after it was revoked and hence, he cannot give a definite date of return to India.
The statement was submitted after a bench of Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar and Justice Gautam Ankhad made it clear last week that it would not hear Mallya's plea against the order declaring a fugitive economic offender until he returns to India.
The court had then asked the former liquor to clarify whether or not he intended to return to India.
Mallya, based in the United Kingdom since 2016, has filed two petitions in the HC -- one challenging an order declaring him a fugitive economic offender and the other questioning the constitutional validity of the Fugitive Economic Offenders Act.
The 70-year-old liquor baron is accused of defaulting on multiple loan repayments of several thousand crores and facing money laundering charges.
The businessman, in his statement to HC, said he cannot give a definite date for his return as he does not have his Indian passport, which was revoked by the government in 2016, and also because there are orders of courts in England and Wales that prohibit him from leaving the country.
"Mallya is not permitted to leave or attempt to leave England and Wales or apply for or be in possession of any international travel document. In any event, the petitioner is unable to precisely state when he will return to India," Desai read out the statement in the court.
The senior counsel reiterated that Mallya's presence was not required in the country for the court to hear his pleas against the fugitive tag and the provisions of the Act.
"If he (Mallya) were to appear in India, then all these proceedings would be rendered irrelevant as the statute says that once the offender appears in the concerned court of law, then all these orders would be set aside," Desai told the court.
The bench directed the Union government to file its reply to Mallya's statement and posted the matter for further hearing next month.
Mallya was declared a Fugitive Economic Offender in January 2019 by a special court hearing cases under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The businessman left India in March 2016.
