A time of distress: Amir gets bail, mulls legal action against his accusers and police The court directed him to appear again in May. Picture by Pranab DebnathSubhasish ChaudhuriAmir Chand Sekh, a school teacher who was arrested on what his supporters describe as fictitious charges of stealing his mother’s eyes, was granted bail by a Krishnanagar court on Thursday. Five of his family members, including three women who had also been arrested in connection with the case, were granted bail along with Amir. ADVERTISEMENTOn Thursday evening, shortly after his release from the Krishnanagar Correctional Home, Amir was felicitated by residents and social activists. Amir thanked those who stood by him during what he termed “a time of distress”.

A 25-year-old female nurse infected with the Nipah virus died on Thursday after being unconscious in hospital since January 6. After testing positive for Nipah in early January, she had tested negative on February 8. The health department official said this was the first death of a Nipah patient in Bengal since 2007, when the state had faced an outbreak of the virus. “The (female) patient had been under prolonged critical care for severe systemic complications, including sepsis with septic shock and autonomic dysfunction,” a hospital official said. The male nurse, who had been discharged earlier, has improved and visited the hospital for a checkup on Wednesday.

लेखक के बारे में राहिल सैयद राहिल सैयद, नवभारत टाइम्स में डिजिटल कंटेंट प्रोड्यूसर (स्पोर्ट्स सेक्शन) हैं। वे पिछले 2 साल से ज्यादा के समय से NBT में काम कर रहे हैं। वह क्रिकेट, फुटबॉल, बैडमिंटन, हॉकी जैसे तमाम स्पोर्ट्स को कवर करते हैं। डेस्क से ओलंपिक, एशियन गेम्स, आईपीएल, कॉमनवेल्थ गेम्स जैसे बड़े खेलों की रियल टाइम शानदार कवरेज कर चुके हैं। उन्होंने खेल पत्रकारिता करियर का आगाज स्पोर्ट्जविकी से किया। उन्होंने जामिया मिलिया इस्लामिया से टीवी जर्नलिज्म में डिप्लोमा किया है, जबकि वह दिल्ली यूनिवर्सिटी से ग्रेजुएट हैं।... और पढ़ें

Students who appeared for the higher secondary examinations on Thursday said they did not get adequate class days to prepare. The council president said bringing the examination schedule forward and teachers getting appointed as BLOs were “beyond our control”. At an examination centre in Salt Lake, some of the guardians said the delayed arrival of textbooks was responsible for the syllabus remaining incomplete. The council president denied the allegation. “Hand-held metal detectors were deployed in each examination centre, yet the candidate managed to enter with a mobile,” he said.

Multiple media tallies showed the BNP had won more than 151 seats in the 300-seat parliament. ADVERTISEMENTThe Election Commission (EC) is yet to make a formal announcement. An EC spokesperson said the results in several seats were still being processed and were likely to be announced in a few hours. The counting of votes began soon after voting concluded at 4:30 pm (local time). The Election Commission made elaborate security arrangements for the elections, deploying nearly 1 million security personnel -- the largest-ever in the country's electoral history.

India manages its prodigious demand for pulses using a mix of import policy, price stabilisation and conditional MSP procurement. India’s pulse output has hovered around 2.5 crore tonnes in recent years while demand is estimated to be three crore tonnes; imports fill the gap. Pulses account for roughly a quarter of non-cereal protein intake and support five crore farmers and their families. As a result, farmers are incentivised to underinvest in pulses, leading to a vicious cycle. All this is why the initial apparent inclusion of pulses in the U.S. documents, describing what India would open to American agri-imports, hit a raw nerve among India’s farmers.

Two years ago, astronomers noticed one of the brightest stars in the neighbouring Andromeda galaxy had vanished after fading for nearly a decade. ADVERTISEMENTDe and his colleagues have found evidence that the star bypassed the explosive death astronomers expect from massive stars, confirming a decades-old prediction that some stars can skip the supernova stage — a phenomenon never conclusively observed until now. “Instead, this massive star quietly collapsed into a black hole. “The combination of disappearance in visible light, the absence of any explosion, and the residual infrared glow supports our black hole interpretation,” De explained. Their work provides crucial evidence to understand why some massive stars explode as supernovae while others implode directly.

A day after he was removed from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) social media team in Assam, Ron Bikash Gaurav hailed the “Right Wing community” for expressing solidarity with him. On Wednesday (February 11, 2026), the State BJP sacked him as one of the four co-convenors of its social media team after outrage over an Artificial Intelligence-generated video that showed Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma symbolically shooting at Muslims. The controversial video was deleted hours after it was uploaded on the Assam BJP’s X handle and generated more than 5,00,000 views. “Our party is concerned about the issue of Bangladeshi immigrants in Assam, but we do not support the imagery used in the video. We got the video deleted from the X platform after noting that it was uploaded without permission,” he said.

अमेरिका में कंपनियों को स्पेशलाइज्ड काम के लिए विदेशी वर्कर्स को हायर करने की इजाजत दी गई है। कंपनियां H-1B वीजा प्रोग्राम के जरिए विदेशी वर्कर्स की हायरिंग करती हैं। ज्यादातर हायरिंग टेक, फाइनेंस, हेल्थकेयर जैसे सेक्टर्स में की जाती है। हर साल 85 हजार H-1B वीजा जारी होते हैं, जिसमें से 20 हजार अमेरिका से पढ़ने वाले स्टूडेंट्स को मिलते हैं। अमेरिका में लोगों का मानना है कि कंपनियां इस वीजा के जरिए विदेश से सस्ते वर्कर्स हायर करती हैं। इस वजह से उनकी नौकरियां जा रही हैं। यही विवाद की सबसे बड़ी वजह है। आइए अब उन चार बिलों के बारे में भी जान लेते हैं। (फोटो- Freepik)

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Dismissing BJP MP Nishikant Dubey’s move to initiate a “Substantive Motion” against Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, Congress general secretary K.C. If you want to hang us, we are ready for that also,” Mr. Venugopal told reporters in the Parliament complex. Mr. Venugopal linked the development to what Mr. Gandhi had said in the Lok Sabha during the Budget discussion on Wednesday, much of which has been expunged. ‘Double standards’On the expunction of Mr. Gandhi’s remarks, Mr. Venugopal accused the government of exerting pressure on the Chair and adopting “double standards”. Reacting to reports that the ruling alliance members will bring a Privilege Motion against Mr. Gandhi, he said the Opposition leader has not violated any privilege.

Former German chancellor Angela Merkel will deliver the first Dr Manmohan Singh Memorial Lecture in the national capital on February 26, sources said in New Delhi on Thursday (February 13, 2026). The lecture is being organised by the Dr. Manmohan Singh Trust. Merkel, who shared good ties with the former Prime Minister, will deliver the inaugural lecture series in memory of Singh. Manmohan Singh steered the country as Prime Minister for 10 years from 2004-2014 and helped set up the country’s economic framework as finance minister. The memorial trust was established by the family of the former Prime Minister to oversee the construction of his memorial at Rashtriya Smriti Sthal.

The joint strike call was given by the CTUs and the farm unions of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM). “In mining/manufacturing/service sectors, among the formal and informal labour, huge impact of the strike and mobilisation was witnessed,” they added. The defence sector employees held protest demonstrations with one hour cut of work in support of strike. Worker-peasant unityThe SKM congratulated farmers and workers for the successful strike. “The strike was a powerful expression of protest against a series of anti-worker, anti-farmer and pro-corporate policies being pursued by the Union Government,” he added.

Hundreds of Lufthansa flights were cancelled on Thursday as pilots and flight attendants went on strike at Germany's largest airline, which has for years struggled to rein in costs at its core brand. Departure boards for Frankfurt and Munich showed most Lufthansa flights were cancelled for the day, including to many overseas destinations. Strikes called as film fest, security conference openAt Frankfurt airport, Germany's largest, the situation was calm in the morning because many Lufthansa passengers, notified of the cancellations, did not show up. Marvin Kleist, another passenger in Frankfurt not booked on a Lufthansa flight, said the walkout would make everything a bit more expensive due to the unions' demands. "The simultaneous industrial action by pilots is a coincidence, but one that is welcome," said UFO union representative Harry Jaeger.

Environmentalists, including a former Secretary at the Centre, have written to the Union Environment Ministry over damage to greenery near the Yamuna floodplains at ITO ghat in central Delhi due to debris and rock dumping, reportedly for a riverfront project. When The Hindu visited the site on Thursday, several trees were found damaged. Large quantities of rocks had been dumped along a road running almost parallel to the river from ITO ghat up to Drain No. Workers at the site said the stones were being used to strengthen the road so it could function as a bund during floods. They added that the road, located within the floodplains, would also be widened as part of the project.