Several trains were cancelled, highways and key roads blocked and many thousands stranded for hours on Monday as a nationwide 10-hour shutdown against the Centre’s three agri laws disrupted lives across parts of India, particularly in the north.

The 6 am to 4 pm Bharat Bandh, which saw demonstrations and rallies in many places, passed off relatively peacefully with no reports of injuries or serious clashes.

Expressing support for protesting farmers, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday said the farmers' non-violent 'satyagraha' is still resolute but the exploitative government does not like this and that is why a 'Bharat Bandh' has been called.

The Congress has asked its workers, state unit chiefs and heads of frontal organisations to take part in the 'Bharat Bandh' called by farmer unions to protest against the Centre's three agri laws.

State-run Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and its subsidiary, Chennai Petroleum Corporation (CPCL), have started working on the Rs 31,580-crore refinery project at Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu.

While both the companies will hold 25 per cent each in the proposed 9 million tonne per annum (MTPA) refinery, the remaining 50 per cent will be held by a strategic or financial partner, for which talks are already on.

Byju’s, the world’s most valuable edtech company with a valuation of $16.5 billion, said it has appointed Puneet Bhirani as senior vice president-operations.

In his role, Bhirani will oversee the company’s overall operations strategy and build strong and innovative technological support to scale the business. Given the company’s growth across new products and platforms, he will strengthen internal capacity in line with the strategic objectives.

Pakistan has allowed an Afghan airline to operate its flights from Islamabad to Kabul, a Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) official said on Sunday.

Kam Air - Afghanistan's largest private airline - will operate three flights a week, becoming the first Afghan airline to operate outside Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover, Anadolu Agency reported quoting Irfan Sabir, director of CAA Air Transport, as saying.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission today via video conferencing.

According to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), the launching of the programme will be at 11 am on Monday. Prime Minister Modi will also hold an address on the occasion.

Hundreds of farmers on Monday blocked major highways, including National Highway 1 linking Delhi with parts of Haryana and Punjab, following a nationwide call by farmers' unions to demand scrapping of three Central farm laws.

Traffic across Punjab and Haryana is likely to hit badly and see traffic disruptions for several hours as farmers, farm labourers, commission agents, trade and employee unions and activists of political parties squatted on national highways till 4 pm.

India has emerged as Dubai's second biggest trading partner after China with the overall volume touching 38.5 billion dirham in the first half of 2021, according to official data released on Sunday.

According to a Dubai government statement, the emirate had a trade volume of 86.7 billion dirham with China in H1 (first half) of 2021, followed by India and the US at third position.

Glenmark Pharmaceuticals plans to test its upcoming nitric oxide nasal spray (NONS) that it has licensed from a Canadian Biotech firm as a preventive measure for Covid-19.

The firm, which has tasted success with its oral antiviral drug favipiravir, is now betting on the NONS to drive revenues from its Covid-19 portfolio.

Zee Entertainment Enterprises and its largest shareholder, Invesco Fund, are headed for a showdown with Invesco insisting the board hold the extraordinary general meeting (EGM) before going ahead with its merger deal with Sony’s India unit.

ZEEL board has three weeks to call the EGM. If it fails to do so, Invesco can call the meetings within six months. Legal experts said with both camps rigid on their positions, it might lead to a legal battle.

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