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In a shocking revelation in the probe into a Telangana man’s murder a month after his wedding, police have found that Tejeswar’s wife Aishwarya and her lover Tirumal Rao discussed the Raja Raghuvanshi honeymoon killing in Meghalaya and considered making a similar plan to eliminate Tejeswar and keep the cops guessing.

According to Gadwal police chief T Srinivasa Rao, Aishwarya and Tirumal Rao have told them during questioning that they had initially planned to kill Tejeswar in the same manner as Raja Raghuvanshi. The plan was simple: Aishwarya would convince Tejeswar to take her out on a bike. On the way, the killers would attack them. Tejeswar would be murdered and Aishwarya would flee with Tirumal Rao. The cops, they thought, would be confused and chase a murder-cum-kidnapping angle.

This is exactly how the Raja Raghuvanshi case played out, where Raja’s body was found and his wife, Sonam, remained missing for days before police eventually unearthed her role in the conspiracy. Aishwarya and Tirumal Rao, however, have said they discussed the plan but later shelved it and considered other options.

Police have also found that 23-year-old Aishwarya got a GPS device on her husband’s bike so that they could track his movements. They also hired a neighbour Mohan to monitor Tejeswar’s movements and report to them.

Eight people have been arrested in the case. These include Aishwarya, Tirumal Rao, her mother Sujatha, who is believed to have known about the plan to eliminate Tejeswar, Tirumal’s father, a former head constable who allegedly helped his son, three hired assassins Nagesh, Parshuram and Rajesh, the neighbour, who was tailing Tejeswar. 

Tejeshwar’s rotten body was found in a field at Panyam in Andhra Pradesh’s Nandyal district on June 21, three days after his family in Telangana’s Gadwal reported that he was missing. It was only on the basis of a tattoo ‘Amma’ in Telugu on his forearm that he was identified.

The family suspected his newly-wed wife Aishwarya’s involvement in the killing. “We warned Tejeswar not to marry Aishwarya as she was said to be in a relationship with a bank manager, but she convinced Tejeswar that she was in love with him,” said Tejavardhan, elder brother of Tejeswar. “When he went missing, I was observing her, she did not shed a tear, no sadness, so I told the police my suspicions and they investigated,” he said.

As police from the two adjoining states got to work, the probe revealed a grisly crime that snuffed out an unsuspecting young man’s life.

According to the officials part of the probe, there were as many as five failed attempts on Tejeswar’s life and he survived all, till luck ran out and he ended up dead in a canal.

A Mother-Daughter Love Triangle

Cops have found that Aishwarya’s mother, Sujatha, worked as a sweeper at a Non-Banking Financial Company. There, she met an officer, Tirumal Rao, and the two started a relationship in 2016. Later, when Sujatha went on leave, Aishwarya replaced her. She, too, had a relationship with Rao. The bank officer was married in 2019, and police found that he had also planned to get his wife killed.

When Sujatha found that her daughter was involved with Rao, she pressured her to end the relationship and marry Tejeswar, whom she had known for a while. Aishwarya refused. Sujatha managed to bring her around and reached out to Tejeswar. A wedding date was fixed, but Aishwarya went missing. Then she returned and told Tejeswar that she was incognito because her mother does not have the money to pay dowry. She insisted that she wanted to marry him. Tejeswar’s family advised him against this, but he agreed to the May 18 wedding.

The Plan — And The Murder

Tejeswar’s family members have said she was constantly on the phone with Rao, even during her wedding. Her call records revealed that they exchanged over 2,000 phone calls between February and June. District police chief T Srinivas Rao told NDTV the two would be on video calls for hours even when he was in office and even after she got married. Even on the day of Aishwarya’s wedding, they were on a video call.

The police said Tirumal found the killers to eliminate Tejeswar. Three people had approached him for obtaining loans, and he told them they would get the loan — and some more money — if they completed the hit job.

A police officer showed CCTV footage of Tejeswar, who worked as a land surveyor and dance teacher, getting into a car. “The killers took him in a car on the pretext of surveying a land. He was on the seat beside the driver when they hit him on the head, slit his throat and subsequently stabbed him in the stomach,” said Gadwal police chief T Srinivasa Rao. They pulled the body from the front to the back of the car and their clothes were bloodied. Tirumal Rao bought new clothes for them and they threw away the blood-stained clothes, the police said.

The killers, police said, showed the body to Tirumal Rao over the phone and then, on his instructions, disposed of it in the canal. “The plan was to bury him in the layout of a land they had gone to survey in Kurnool, but noticing some people there, they dumped it in a canal. But there wasn’t enough water in it. We used cell phone signals to track Tejeswar’s location. By the time we found the body, it was putrefied. A tattoo on his arm saying ‘amma’ in Telugu helped us identify the body,” said the district police chief.

Escape Plan That Did Not Work

Rao and Aishwarya had hoped that Tejeswar’s body would not be found and he would be reported missing. They also had an escape plan. According to reports, Rao had taken a Rs 20-lakh loan and booked tickets for himself and Aishwarya to flee to Ladakh. Andaman was also a destination they explored.

Even after Tejeswar was killed, Aishwarya stayed at her in-laws’ home, ostensibly to avoid raising suspicion. This did not work. As soon as Tejeswar went missing, his family approached the police and shared their suspicions about Aishwarya and Rao.

As Gadwal cops worked overtime to trace Tejeswar’s whereabouts, they got a tip-off from police at Kurnool in the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh that villagers had found a body in an agricultural field. The Telangana cops rushed to the spot and confirmed it was Tejeswar’s. Rao’s father, a retired cop allegedly tried to protect his son from the police, but to no avail.

The woman fell into the lift shaft of the building.

A young woman, out to party with friends, fell to her death from the 13th floor of an under-construction building in Bengaluru. 

Officials said the woman had gone to the building, under the jurisdiction of Parappana Agrahara police station, with a group of friends on Wednesday night. “They were partying and the woman fell into a shaft, where a lift was supposed to be installed in the future,” an official said. 

While some reports suggested that she was shooting a reel, the official said no such recording was recovered from her phone.

All angles are being investigated but the police, so far, believe that the woman fell accidentally. An unnatural death report has been registered. 

Mamdani has promised to “Trump-proof” New York City, as the President attempts to attack sanctuary cities, with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raiding immigrants in blue and red cities alike.

Zohran Mamdani, an Indian origin socialite set to become the Democratic nominee in New York City’s upcoming mayoral election, calls himself US President Donald Trump’s “worst nightmare.” Mamdani, who serves as a New York Assemblymember, presents himself as an anti-status quo alternative to his opponent, Andrew Cuomo, who, according to him, is funded by billionaires who put Donald Trump in Washington DC.

“I am Donald Trump’s worst nightmare as a progressive Muslim immigrant who actually fights for the things that I believe in,” Mamdani said during his final debate with Cuomo, making it clear that his candidacy is a direct response to Trump’s capitalist policies. 

“And the difference between myself and Andrew Cuomo is that my campaign is not funded by the very billionaires who put Donald Trump in DC. I don’t have to pick up the phone from Bill Ackman or Ken Langone. I have to pick up the phone for the more than 20,000 New Yorkers who contributed an average donation of about $80 to break fundraising records and put our campaign in second place,” he added.

The 33-year-old would be the first South Asian and first Muslim to lead the city, if elected in the November polls.

About Zohran Mamdani

Mamdani is the son of acclaimed Indian American filmmaker Mira Nair and an Indian-born Ugandan Marxist scholar, Mahmood Mamdani. He was born in Uganda and raised in New York City.

After graduation, he worked on his mother’s film sets and tried his hand at a rap career, releasing multiple songs, including Nani and Sidda Mukyaalo, during his brief music career.

In 2018, he became a US citizen and two years later, he ran for a seat in the New York State Assembly. He is in his third term representing New York’s 36th Assembly District, which includes the New York City neighborhoods of Astoria, Ditmars-Steinway, and Astoria Heights.

The Democrat also dabbled with activism while in office. In 2021, he sat on a 15-day hunger strike in support of taxi drivers in New York City, which helped taxi drivers in striking a deal with officials to help rescue the thousands of workers from their crushing loans. He also participated in a five-day hunger strike in 2023 for a ceasefire in the war in Gaza.

Mamdani’s Campaign 

Mamdani’s eye-catching policy proposals include freezing rent for many New Yorkers, free bus service, and universal childcare. In a city where a three-bedroom apartment can easily cost $6,000 a month, his message struck a chord.

His proposal also includes building a Department of Community Safety to “prevent violence before it happens.”

He promised to “Trump-proof” New York City, as the President attempts to attack sanctuary cities, with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raiding immigrants in blue and red cities alike. He also said that he will make New York City a safe city for LGBTQ+ Americans and those looking for reproductive healthcare.

The White House embraced the moniker of “daddy” for Donald Trump in a video that it released after NATO chief Mark Rutte used the term in a conversation with the US president.

The White House embraced the moniker of “daddy” for Donald Trump in a video that it released after NATO chief Mark Rutte used the term in a conversation with the U.S. president.

“Daddy’s home,” the White House posted on X, along with the video featuring the song “Hey Daddy (Daddy’s Home)” by Usher and images of Trump at the NATO summit in The Hague.

Rutte, the Dutch secretary general of the military alliance, used the word “daddy” in an appearance with Trump at Wednesday’s summit after the U.S. president berated Israel and Iran over violations of a ceasefire, which later appeared to be holding.

In response, Rutte laughed and said: “And then daddy has to sometimes use strong language to get (them to) stop.”

On Tuesday, Trump said Iran and Israel had been fighting “so long and so hard that they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing”.

In an interview with Reuters after the summit, Rutte said he had used the word “daddy” to describe how some allies seem to view the United States, rather than about Trump specifically.

“In Europe, I hear sometimes countries saying, ‘Hey, Mark, will the U.S. stay with us?’ And I said that sounds a little bit like a small child asking his daddy, ‘Hey, are you still staying with the family?’” Rutte said.

“So in that sense, I used daddy, (it’s) not that I was calling President Trump daddy.”

Asked if this meant other NATO members were like children who were now growing up after a pledge to spend more on defence, Rutte said they “already have grown up” but realised they had to step up and “equalise” defence spending with the United States.

Donald Trump launched a scathing critique of 33-year-old socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani, disparaging his appearance, vocal tone, and intellectual capacity.

Launching a personal attack on a 33-year-old self-declared socialist, Trump said Mamdani “looks TERRIBLE, his voice is grating, he’s not very smart, he’s got AOC+3, Dummies ALL, backing him, and even our Great Palestinian Senator, Cryin’ Chuck Schumer, is groveling over him. Yes, this is a big moment in the History of our Country!”

In another post, he said, presumably jesting, that Democrats should nominate “Low IQ Candidate, Jasmine Crockett, for President” to get back in play. He also said that democrats should put “AOC+3” – his term for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other progressive Squad members – in Cabinet positions.

Mamdani– an Indian origin Muslim, who is the son of acclaimed Indian American filmmaker Mira Nair and an Indian-born Ugandan Marxist scholar Mahmood Mamdani– won the democratic race after former New York governor Andrew Cuomo conceded New York City’s mayoral primary election. Mamdani won 43.5 per cent of the vote, and 90 per cent of the ballots counted.US Donald Trump has weighed in on the victory of Indian-origin leftist socialist Zohran Mamdani in New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary election, calling him a “100 per cent communist lunatic”.  Trump also criticised other progressive leaders who support Mamdani, including Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) and Senator Chuck Schumer, after former New York governor Andrew Cuomo conceded the election. 

“It’s finally happened, the Democrats have crossed the line. Zohran Mamdani, a 100% Communist Lunatic, has just won the Dem Primary, and is on his way to becoming Mayor. We’ve had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous,” the Republican said in a post on his Truth Social platform. 

The CEO claimed that while the middle class is struggling, artificial intelligence (AI) is quietly threatening white-collar jobs, and the ultra-rich have gained seven times in a decade.

A Bengaluru CEO’s LinkedIn post on “middle-class salaries” has sparked a discussion online. In his post, Ashish Singhal, co-founder and Group CEO of PeepalCo, said that with soaring expenses and stagnant salaries, the middle-class is quietly absorbing the economic shock, with no bailouts, no headlines and barely any conversation. “The biggest scam no one talks about? Middle-class salaries,” he wrote, explaining the crisis this group faces. 

“Over the past 10 years: – The group earning under Rs 5L saw a 4% CAGR – Rs 5L- Rs 1Cr income group has seen just 0.4% CAGR – Food prices? Up nearly 80% – Purchasing power? Cut almost in half – But spending? Up, funded by credit,” Mr Singhal wrote. “This isn’t a collapse. It’s a well-dressed decline. You’re still flying once a year. Still buying a phone. Still paying EMIs,” he continued. 

Further, the CEO claimed that while the middle class is struggling, artificial intelligence (AI) is quietly threatening white-collar jobs, and the ultra-rich have gained seven times in a decade.

“The poor are being supported. The rich are scaling. The middle class is just expected to absorb the shock, in silence. No complaints. No bailouts. Just inflation, EMIs, and quiet pressure,” he wrote. 

“It’s time we start talking about this group. Not as a vote bank or a spending class, but as a segment that’s powering the economy, yet getting squeezed out of it,” Mr Singhal expressed. 

Concluding his post, the CEO asked his followers if they think “it’s just an income issue, or even a money management issue?” 

Since being shared, Mr Singhal’s post has accumulated more than several comments and reports. It has sparked a debate on the silent crisis facing India’s middle class. 

Reacting to the post, one user wrote, “I am picking this signal consistently from a wide variety of sources. The middle class is quietly getting squeezed from both sides. But it’s also its own fault for choosing to stay quiet and naively hoping that just staying the course of 9 to 9 jobs, home loans and car loans will improve the situation. The middle class’s guilt is that it’s taken too much on its own self and asks too little from the government. As they say, excess of nothing is good – being excessively conforming and hard working – has led to being stuck between the devil and the deep sea.” 

“Well said! Middle class themself don’t allow to think but gets driven by Agenda’s set by others and keep draging thereby lost thier Willpower /Courage to Question,” commented another. 

“This is quite interesting to read and yes thanks for putting this up. Because there are multiple bread earners in middle class segment who think that no matter how much they work hard the savings pot still remains empty. Maybe that’s the reason middle class category stays in the same stage while the rich grow their wealth. I suppose there should be a system to help middle-class in upward mobility or atleast efforts should be made to balance the inflation,” said a third user. 

However, one user said, “Crying on any platform won’t make any difference. India was moving on like this and will continue like this. Nothing’s gonna change here. Even after so much tax, there is nothing in return. Whoever can and gets the opportunity, just leaves the country, that’s it. But again, salary alone can’t make anyone wealthy anywhere in the world.”

“Good one. But, as CEO, what was the pay rise you gave to your employees vis-a-vis yours? That should be interesting to know,” commented another. 

Naveen Chichkar (35) is wanted in multiple cases registered by the NCB, and would be brought to Mumbai on Thursday afternoon, an official said here.

The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) has arrested a Navi Mumbai resident, alleged to be the kingpin of a “transnational drug syndicate”, after securing his deportation from Malaysia, officials said on Wednesday.

Naveen Chichkar (35) is wanted in multiple cases registered by the NCB, and would be brought to Mumbai on Thursday afternoon, an official said here.

The cartel operated by Chichkar sold drugs worth Rs 1,128 crore in India, including cocaine and hybrid strain hydroponic weed that were sourced from the USA via cargo shipments, he said.

Chichkar was located and arrested in Malaysia following a red-corner notice issued by the NCB, he said.

A team led by NCB zonal director Amit Ghawate succeeded in securing his custody from Malaysia, the official added.

The involvement of the international drug syndicate came to light after the seizure of 200 grams of cocaine hidden in a projector from a parcel being sent from Mumbai to Australia through a courier firm on January 21 this year, he said.

In a follow-up operation of the case, the NCB seized 11.540 kilograms of cocaine, 4.9 kilograms of cannabis and 5.5 kilograms of cannabis gummies from the house of one of the members of the syndicate in Navi Mumbai, he said.

During the investigation, it came to light that a well-oiled international syndicate was involved in trafficking cocaine from the USA to India, and also in its distribution in India and outside, the official added.

The involvement of Clearing House Agents (CHA) and hawala operators also came to the surface during the probe.

“A total of eight accused persons were arrested in connection with the case, and Naveen Chichkar, the kingpin of the syndicate, was tracked in Thailand in 2021 after absconding in a previous case being probed by the NCB regarding trafficking of LSD,” he said.

The NCB had issued a red-corner notice against Chichkar, he said, adding he was subsequently located in Malaysia.

“Accordingly, a correspondence was made with the Malaysian authorities by the Indian government, and Chichkar was detained. A team of NCB officials led by Ghawate secured his custody with the assistance of other national and international agencies from Malaysia,” he said.

Chichkar has been brought to India, and will be taken to Mumbai on Thursday afternoon, where he will be produced before a court, he said.

During the investigation, it came to light that the syndicate was operating for at least one year, and multiple consignments of cocaine to air cargo were received in Mumbai during this period, he said.

“Interrogation of the kingpin brought from Malaysia is likely to reveal more details of his operations, including the source of drugs in the USA,” he said.

Financial investigation in the case has already led to identification of assets, including properties and bank accounts in Thailand, he said, adding efforts are on for attachment of these properties.

Last month, Gurunath Chichkar ended his life by shooting himself in the head with a pistol at his office.

He left a suicide note mentioning that he could not bear the mental stress caused by repeated summons by the NCB officials and the Navi Mumbai Police, as his two sons Naveen and Dhiraj were found to be involved in a drug syndicate.

During the investigation of his suicide, the role of two personnel of the Navi Mumbai police came to light, following which they were placed under arrest.

Besides the two constables, the Navi Mumbai police arrested a total of 10 accused persons, including a Customs superintendent and a former national hockey player, he said.

According to the official, Chichkar has studied criminal psychology in London besides completing a course in film and television.

Madhavi Latha, who has been involved with the Chenab Bridge for 17 years, spoke about the headlines that described her as the “woman behind the mission”

Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Chenab Bridge in Jammu and Kashmir, the world’s highest railway arch bridge, last Friday. As the nation celebrated the feat, Professor G Madhavi Latha, a long-time contributor, credited thousands of “unsung heroes” and urged people not to make her “unnecessarily famous.”

“I salute the millions of unsung heroes,” said Dr Latha, who was a geotechnical consultant to Afcons, the engineering firm that constructed the bridge. “My role was to help in developing slope stabilisation schemes and design of foundations on slope,” she added in a message on LinkedIn shared after the inauguration.

Dr Latha, who has been involved with the Chenab Bridge for 17 years, spoke about the headlines that described her as the “woman behind the mission” and one who performed “miracles to build the bridge”. She called them “baseless.”

“Please don’t make me unnecessarily famous,” she said. “I am one of the thousands who deserve appreciation for Chenab Bridge.”

Currently attending a conference in Spain, the professor from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, thanked those who sent congratulatory messages. “Many fathers have written to me saying that they want their daughters to become like me. Many young kids have written to me that they now want to take up Civil Engineering as their career choice,” she said.

“All glory belongs to Indian Railways,” she said and appreciated the Indian Railways and Afcons for their execution of what many called an impossible task.

A leading geotechnical engineer, Dr G Madhavi Latha is a Higher Administrative Grade (HAG) professor at the IISc, Bengaluru. 

Construction of the Chenab Bridge, part of the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Railway Link (USBRL), faced significant challenges due to difficult terrain, seismic risks, and unpredictable geology. Dr Latha and her team helped the project navigate these complexities with a “design-as-you-go” approach.

This meant adapting to real-time findings like fractured rocks and hidden cavities, factors that earlier surveys had missed. Dr Latha provided guidance on rock anchor design and slope stability, elements crucial for a structure of this scale.

She also detailed her technical journey in a paper titled ‘Design as You Go: The Case Study of Chenab Railway Bridge’, published in the Indian Geotechnical Journal’s special women’s issue.

Standing 359 metres above the Chenab River, the bridge rises 35 metres taller than the Eiffel Tower. Indian Railways built it at a cost of Rs 1,486 crore, making it the tallest railway arch bridge in the world. The government calls it the biggest civil-engineering challenge Indian Railways has ever tackled. Engineers expect the bridge to significantly boost connectivity in the Kashmir Valley, calling it a once-in-a-lifetime project.

The family — seven children born between 2007 and 2021, a father and a mother (pregnant at the time) — disappeared on May 15.

Finnish police said on Tuesday they have received more than 100 tips after appealing for information about a family of 10 missing for over a year, amid suspicions the parents absconded with their children who were in the care of child welfare services.

The family — seven children born between 2007 and 2021, a father and a mother who was pregnant at the time — disappeared on May 15, 2024 from the Ostrobothnia region in western Finland where they lived. 

Last week, local police notified the public about the unusual case, asking for information. 

The case has made headlines nationwide.

Police suspect the parents took their children, who at the time of their disappearance were in the care of local child welfare services, and left in a van.  

Police believe the family may have left the country and have issued an international warrant for them.

They are also cooperating with authorities in other Nordic countries, police said last week. 

On Tuesday, almost a week after the case was made public, police had received more than 100 tips. 

“Searches have been carried out in a few places, but so far they have not yielded any results,” the chief investigator, Tony Rauma, said in a statement on Tuesday. 

The family has not left any physical or digital trace, prompting police to suspect that someone with a relation to the family may be hiding them.

“It takes resources to support a family of 10, and the police suspect that a support network of some kind has formed around the family,” police said.

Yu-Kun, now aged 16, is not happy seeing his childhood pictures plastered all over the city. “I do not like it. I really do not,” he said.

A Japanese father is making headlines for spending 100 million yen (approximately Rs 5.8 crore) to get his young son’s photos plastered all over Tokyo. According to the South China Morning Post, the boy, known as Yu-kun, is well-known in the Adachi area of Tokyo and has been lovingly dubbed “the Landmark Kid” by residents. His smiling pictures are plastered everywhere, from footbridge banners to city buses to parking signs. His image even appears in convenience store windows. Yu-Kun’s father, a real estate company owner, puts the ads up because, according to him, his son is “absolutely adorable,” and the entire city deserves to see that.

“My son was just too adorable when he was little. I thought, all of Tokyo should know,” his father said, as per SCMP. 

The ad campaign features Yu-Kon’s funniest childhood pictures. One hilarious ad shows him bawling his eyes out after a street performer startled him. This embarrassing photo is now a two-meter-tall advertisement, displayed at the entrance of an underground station.

The father keeps updating the campaign with new pictures of his son. He asks photographers to take new “cute” shots of his son and even plans to feature recent pictures to promote new real estate projects. 

However, Yu-Kun, now aged 16, is not happy seeing his childhood pictures plastered all over the city. “I do not like it. I really do not,” he said, adding, “If you really think I am that cute, why not just transfer that 100 million yen into my bank account?” 

“People might not recognise my baby photos, but now that I am older, it is just embarrassing,” he said.

The story has gone viral on social media, especially in China. Reacting to it, one user wrote, “As the old Chinese proverb goes, ‘A father’s love is like a mountain,’ but this Japanese dad’s love is a bit too heavy, on billboards!”

“Parental love is often free, yet it can come at a high cost. Chinese parents are known for hiding their love, but it seems some Japanese parents go as far as plastering their child’s face all over the city,” commented anothe