India will always strengthen any effort for sustainable development, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Tuesday after Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission described India as a key partner in combating climate change.

Prime Minister Modi again met Leyen during the COP26 Climate Summit here on Monday. President of the European Council Charles Michel and Leyen had met Modi in Rome on Friday on the sidelines of the G20 Summit.

India added 10,423 new coronavirus cases, the lowest in 259 days, while the active cases declined to 1,53,776, the lowest in 250 days, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Tuesday.

With the fresh cases, India's COVID-19 tally climbed to 3,42,96,237.

Sam D'Souza, whose name had cropped up in connection with the pay-off allegations surrounding the drugs-on-cruise case, on Monday claimed that he was told by NCB witness K P Gosavi that no drugs were found in possession of Aryan Khan, son of Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan, during the raid last month.

He also claimed that NCB officials were not corrupt as Gosavi and Prabhakar Sail, an independent witness, were calling each other over the phone by saving NCB Mumbai chief Sameer Wankhade's name in their mobile phones to pretend as if he was in touch with them.

Vice President Venkaiah Naidu on Monday emphasised the need to address the problem of manpower shortage in the medical profession.

He said that the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need for expansion of India's health infrastructure at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels.

Former Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukh was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) late Monday night after over 12 hours of questioning in a money-laundering case linked to an alleged extortion racket in the state police establishment, officials said.

They said Deshmukh, 71, has been arrested as per the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

Markets regulator Sebi on Monday restrained Proficient Research and its partners from accessing capital markets for four years for engaging in investment advisory services without obtaining requisite registration.

Such certification is mandatory under Investment Advisers Regulations, 2013.

Partners of partnership firm Proficient Research were Vidhi Singh Parihar, Mohd. Sohail Khan and Altamash Sheikh.

Facebook owner Meta Platforms on Tuesday denied a claim by the Kazakh government that it had been granted exclusive access to the social network's content reporting system.

In what it called a joint statement with Facebook, the Kazakh government had touted the move as a compromise solution on Monday, after the Central Asian nation threatened to block Facebook for millions of local users.

Post handing over of Air India to the Tatas, government officials will be free to book their travel with any airline that offers them the best price.

And, the Centre will not have a tie up with any carrier, department of investment and public asset management (DIPAM) Secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey said.

India's power consumption grew 4.8 per cent in October to 114.37 billion units (BU), indicating a good recovery amid coal shortages at electricity generation plants, according to power ministry data.

Last year in October, power consumption stood at 109.17 BU and in the same period in 2019, it was at 97.84 BU.

Australia's medicines and medical devices regulator on Monday formally recognised India's Covaxin, a vaccine against the coronavirus as the country's border was reopened for the first time in nearly 20 months.

Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech's Covaxin, and AstraZeneca and Oxford University's Covishield are the two widely used vaccines in India.

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