Wednesday, Sep 9, 2026

• The Delhi High Court called the state of paying-guest accommodations "very, very pathetic" after a five-storey building collapsed in Satya Niketan on September 6, killing seven people, five of them students; the court ordered the Municipal Corporation of Delhi to inspect all such buildings within a week and report back within ten days. Scroll
• The World Health Organization's revised guidelines on kala-azar treatment, issued in July, cut back the use of miltefosine for post-kala-azar dermal leishmaniasis over blindness risk and set the first clear protocol for relapsing visceral leishmaniasis; India, which reached elimination status in December 2023, is now in what a WHO Guideline Development Group member called a "consolidation phase." IndiaSpend/ISignal
• India has more than three million elected panchayati raj representatives, nearly half of them women, but a piece in India Development Review argues that training programmes aimed only at the sarpanch leave the rest of the panchayat untouched; it notes the Sixteenth Finance Commission has recommended 4.35 lakh crore rupees for rural local bodies over 2026-31. India Development Review
• A Pune resident's campaign against loudspeakers during the Ganesh festival, begun after he was assaulted by a mandal member for objecting to amplified sound, has drawn hundreds of supporters into street marches for a public-space noise ban. The Wire
• The Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship approved a 735.70 crore rupee expansion of the PM-SETU programme to modernise Industrial Training Institutes, at the fifth meeting of its steering committee. PIB
• The Department of Atomic Energy announced a new day-care cancer facility at Vidisha Medical College in Madhya Pradesh, built through a collaboration between the department and the Tata Memorial Centre. PIB
• Delegates from sixteen states met in Delhi for a National Adivasi Convention, citing a 47% approval rate on Forest Rights Act claims and Scheduled Tribe representation in central government jobs falling from 8.55% in 2014 to 7.33% in 2022, with more than 12,000 Scheduled Tribe-reserved posts vacant. (Older: convention held September 6.) The Wire
• A two-day hearing by the National Human Rights Commission in Gujarat closed 27 of 45 cases with more than 3.7 crore rupees in compensation ordered, including for a wrongful-arrest case, and announced a new procedure for identifying bonded labour. (Older: hearing held September 2-3.) The Wire

• The Supreme Court asked whether the National Security Act can be invoked on the strength of a confession made in police custody, in the case of a man accused of organising the November 2024 violence in Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh; the bench said preventive detention "cannot be invoked as a mantra" and reserved its judgment. Scroll
• The Calcutta High Court said "enough is enough" and signalled it may require its own permission before any further First Information Reports are filed against Trinamool Congress leader Abhishek Banerjee, in a case over alleged irregularities at health camps; the police probe continues without coercive action, with the next hearing on November 23. Scroll
• The Bombay High Court refused to quash a defamation case against Rahul Gandhi over his 2018 remark calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi's associates "choron ke sardar" (leader of thieves) during the Rafale controversy, ruling the case can go to trial. Scroll
• The Allahabad High Court quashed the National Security Act detention of a 25-year-old activist held after April's Noida workers' protests, calling the Gautam Buddha Nagar district magistrate's conduct "worthy of derision" and ordering 5 lakh rupees in compensation deducted from the official's own salary; the activist remains jailed on separate charges. Scroll
• Uttar Pradesh police arrested an activist in Saharanpur after she called Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath a "criminal" over the demolition of a 150-year-old mosque. The Wire
• An amicus report to the Supreme Court found that Jharkhand's appointment of Tadasha Mishra as Director General of Police, one day before her scheduled retirement, extended her tenure through a same-day rule change that bypassed the Union Public Service Commission and violated the Supreme Court's 2006 Prakash Singh guidelines on police reform. LiveLaw
• The district magistrate of Doda in Jammu and Kashmir ordered a two-month ban on virtual private networks across the district, citing cybersecurity and public-order concerns; an earlier round of restrictions between December 2025 and January 2026 had identified 140 to 150 people for unauthorised VPN use. The Wire
• The official death toll from a spurious-liquor tragedy in Sagar, Madhya Pradesh rose to 15; opposition leader Jitu Patwari alleged the real toll exceeds 50, while Uttar Pradesh police rejected an earlier claim linking the case to neighbouring Lalitpur district, noting 19 of the 20 people arrested are from Madhya Pradesh. The Wire
• Newslaundry reported that a self-described influencer who boasted on a podcast of assaulting the father of a protester, leaving him needing "60 stitches," was arrested on September 4 and sent to 14-day judicial custody on charges that include provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act; he had claimed two Bharatiya Janata Party leaders as his "big brothers." Newslaundry
• Congress said the government is "scrambling" for the numbers to pass the Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill on delimitation, which fell short of the required two-thirds majority in April and was not listed in the Monsoon Session; Parliament has not been formally prorogued 25 days after it adjourned sine die. (Older: September 7.) Scroll
• Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann skipped the swearing-in of the Punjab and Haryana High Court's new chief justice after his cabinet objected that the centre had notified the appointment without consulting the state, a dispute over centre-state consultation ahead of Punjab's February 2027 election. (Older: September 7.) The Wire
• The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation's release calendar shows the next Consumer Price Index due September 12, the Periodic Labour Force Survey bulletin on September 15, and Index of Industrial Production data on September 28; no GDP estimate is scheduled this month, with the next quarterly figure due in November. (Upcoming.) MoSPI

• Eight legislators from the United Democratic Party (UDP), Meghalaya's coalition partner, are awaiting the Bharatiya Janata Party's central leadership approval to switch parties; the UDP has 12 of the assembly's 60 seats, and eight is the threshold needed to avoid disqualification under the anti-defection law. Union Home Minister Amit Shah met the legislators in Delhi, and Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma met Shah separately; UDP president Metbah Lyngdoh denied any split. The Shillong Times
• Deputy Chief Minister Sniawbhalang Dhar denied any rift within the National People's Party and said the Meghalaya Democratic Alliance's second term would run its full course to 2028, citing more than 400 crore rupees in projects for United Democratic Party constituencies and 384 crore rupees for the Hill State People's Democratic Party's Mawshynrut constituency. The Shillong Times
• Vice President C.P. Radhakrishnan unveiled projects worth 1,010.95 crore rupees in Shillong, including an 850.58 crore rupee second phase of the Shillong water supply scheme covering the city and 32 villages with the state's first city-scale smart metering system, a new bridge over the Umngot river, a road serving 21 Ri-Bhoi villages, a 30-bed AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy) wing at Shillong Civil Hospital, and a power substation at Mawkhanu. The Shillong Times
• The state government invited the Khasi Students' Union for talks with the chief secretary after the union's three-day ultimatum, demanding arrests over vandalism during protests against a limestone-mining public hearing in East Jaintia Hills, expired. The Shillong Times
• A right-to-information activist asked the chief minister for a Central Bureau of Investigation or Enforcement Directorate probe into alleged illegal coal trade, pointing to discrepancies between reported coal imports from Nagaland and the demand from local coke and cement factories. The Shillong Times
• Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma praised Air India Express for featuring traditional Khasi "Khneng" embroidery from Mustoh village in East Khasi Hills on its aircraft under the airline's "Tales of India" initiative. The Shillong Times
• The minister in charge of food, civil supplies and consumer affairs told a Shillong workshop on monitoring prices of 41 essential commodities that timely tracking is needed to prevent unjustified price rises; officials at the workshop flagged rural connectivity gaps that hamper monitoring. Hub News
• Assam officials met the All Khasi Meghalaya Tourist Taxi Association over complaints from Meghalaya taxi drivers at Guwahati airport and Kamakhya station, agreeing to provide designated parking, asking for 15 days to clear middlemen from three locations, and setting a follow-up meeting for September 28; the association's president called the outcome only partly satisfactory. Hub News

None of the standing searches (the Government Innovation Lab, the State Capability Enhancement Project, Sampath Kumar, the Foundation for Responsive Governance, Indus Action, the Centre for Policy Research, IDinsight, Inclusion Economics, Rocket Learning, or the named health and education schemes) turned up a verifiable new item today.

Bangladesh

• Bangladesh recorded its highest single-day dengue toll of 2026: at least 9 deaths and 1,571 hospitalisations in the 24 hours to 8am, taking the year's total to 130 deaths and 45,475 cases, with 3,218 patients still hospitalised, according to the Directorate General of Health Services. The Daily Star
• The High Court overturned death sentences for 14 of 16 people convicted in the murder of Nusrat Jahan, calling the trial judge's decision to sentence all 16 to death "mindless and irresponsible"; it upheld death sentences for two convicts, commuted four to life imprisonment, acquitted ten, and directed the law ministry to remove the judge from sessions jurisdiction. The Daily Star
• The Supreme Court's Appellate Division told the International Crimes Tribunal's chief prosecutor to stop commenting publicly on a pending appeal against a 2013 death sentence, adjourning the hearing four weeks. The Daily Star
• Nearly 7,900 depositors of a merged group of troubled Islamic banks withdrew 327 crore taka on the second day of repayments, after Bangladesh Bank's governor said withdrawals of principal could begin from September 1 and provided 5,000 crore taka to facilitate the payouts. The Daily Star
• Bangladesh will lodge a formal protest with Italy's foreign ministry after actress Azmeri Haque Badhon was pelted with water, drinks and eggs and struck near the ear at a film premiere in Venice. The Daily Star
• The National Citizen Party will contest upcoming local government elections independently of Jamaat-e-Islami, reversing a March pairing agreement, and will field its own candidates in Dhaka North, Dhaka South, Cumilla, Rajshahi and Sylhet. Prothom Alo
• The Chief Justice left the Appellate Division courtroom after the Supreme Court Bar Association's president suggested lawyers' incomes had fallen since his appointment, a remark the bench called contempt of court; the dispute traces to a 500,000 taka fine imposed in a case tied to a 2013 judicial appointment. Prothom Alo
• Police arrested the owner of a Gopalganj convention hall under the Anti-Terrorism Act after attendees at a concert there chanted slogans supporting former prime minister Sheikh Hasina; his father is a banned local Awami League official. Prothom Alo

Pakistan

• The government raised petrol prices by 5.58 rupees a litre to 364.35 rupees and diesel by 4.18 rupees to 385.95 rupees, effective September 9; taxes account for 114 rupees per litre on petrol and 100 rupees on diesel. Dawn
• Pakistan's Medical and Dental Council instructed colleges not to admit Afghan nationals for the current academic session and to facilitate the departure of those already enrolled; a Foreign Office spokesperson said undocumented foreigners face deportation under the Illegal Foreigner Repatriation Plan, which saw 1,155,221 Afghans deported in 2025. Dawn
• Human Rights Watch urged countries not to normalise ties with the Taliban without human rights benchmarks, as a United Nations special rapporteur reported that Taliban policy denies Afghan girls education beyond sixth grade and exposes children to forced marriage and gender-based violence. Dawn
• Sindh's advocate general objected to a family's questioning of a police surgeon during a judicial commission's hearings into the custodial death of 25-year-old Mir Raza Ali, whose second autopsy found a gunshot wound and ruled out suicide, contradicting the initial police account; the commission's head has issued notice to the provincial home minister. Dawn
• Pakistan announced its first national action plan for shark conservation, a ten-year programme running to 2035 that will need 3.8 to 5 million dollars in initial five-year funding; a 2021 assessment by the World Wildlife Fund's Pakistan chapter found shark landings had fallen more than 85% over five decades. Dawn

Sri Lanka

• The United States embassy in Colombo told Sri Lanka's foreign ministry about Iranian vessels in international waters near Sri Lanka and asked whether authorities were monitoring them. Daily Mirror
• India's defence minister Rajnath Singh arrived in Sri Lanka for a three-day visit aimed at strengthening defence cooperation between the two countries. Daily Mirror
• The Cabinet of Ministers approved publication of a new bill aimed at preventing and combating organised crime. Daily Mirror
• The Railway Controllers Union announced its support for a token strike called by the Railway Joint Trade Union Alliance, due to begin at midnight on September 17. (Upcoming.) Daily Mirror
• The Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption arrested the principal of a college in Galle over an alleged bribe of 250,000 rupees. Daily Mirror

Nepal

• Engineers are urging urgent stabilisation of a landslide-hit stretch of the Prithvi Highway at Krishnabhir, where about 70 metres collapsed into the Trishuli river on August 30 following floods on the Bhotekoshi river on August 26, with another 120 metres cracked; the highway normally carries about 12,000 vehicles a day, and a 2000 landslide at the same spot once shut it for 11 days. The Kathmandu Post
• Nepal opened a facility, via Cross River Bank, to convert cryptocurrency donations into dollars for the prime minister's disaster relief fund, since cryptocurrency itself is banned in the country; 500,000 dollars had reached the government fund by Monday, alongside 174,831 dollars raised through a separate crypto donation portal. The Kathmandu Post
• Tourism operators say bookings at Nepal's tourist hubs have dropped in what should be peak season, following negative coverage of the Bhotekoshi floods, road disruptions and travel advisories. The Kathmandu Post
• Prime Minister Balendra Shah reversed an earlier decision and will make a brief trip to New York from September 22-26 for the United Nations General Assembly's 81st session, to highlight the Bhotekoshi flood crisis. (Older, upcoming: reported September 7.) The Kathmandu Post

Asia Pacific

• Indonesia reopened five airports, including Jakarta's main international airport, after eruptions from Mount Anak Krakatau disrupted more than 340,000 travellers and roughly 2,900 flights; the transport minister said a full return to schedule "may take a bit" longer. Al Jazeera
• North Korea commissioned a new 5,000-tonne destroyer at Wonsan port, with Kim Jong Un saying it could deliver "annihilating retaliatory strikes on an enemy," a day before a joint US-South Korea-Japan military exercise began nearby. (Older: September 7.) Al Jazeera
• Australia's communications minister unveiled draft legislation to let users switch off algorithmic recommendation feeds on social platforms and to impose a "digital duty of care" on companies including Meta; the opposition leader called it a possible attempt "to censor social media." (Older: September 7.) Al Jazeera

Africa

• Lawyers for Human Rights filed a case in South Africa's Gauteng High Court challenging the apartheid-era Indemnity Act on behalf of more than 70 survivors and relatives of the 1960 Sharpeville massacre, seeking a class action 66 years after the killings. Al Jazeera
• Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) said 37% of Sudan's health facilities are nonoperational and the United Nations response plan is only 41% funded, amid a war that has killed more than 59,000 people and displaced 14 million since April 2023, and a 35.8% year-on-year drop in global humanitarian aid. Al Jazeera
• Kenya offered temporary legal status to undocumented East African migrants who register at their embassies, after hundreds of the roughly 16,000 Burundians in Kenya rushed their embassy for travel documents amid harassment following a government crackdown on foreign-run small businesses. Al Jazeera
• Mozambique's opposition figure Venancio Mondlane, runner-up in the disputed October 2024 election, will face trial on five charges including incitement to terrorism over post-election protests; a conviction could bar him from the 2029 election. Al Jazeera

Latin America

• US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington aims to finalise trade deals with Colombia, Peru and Ecuador during a tour of the three countries; an opposition figure in Colombia called the deals a surrender of sovereignty. Al Jazeera
• A Brazilian Supreme Court justice suspended the country's federal police chief and intelligence chief, alleging they produced "six illegal reports" on justices' activities, amid a feud between two justices ahead of October's presidential election. Al Jazeera
• The death toll from an explosion at a military barracks near La Paz, Bolivia rose to nine, mostly conscripts aged 18 to 19, with seven still missing; the president called it accidental, from improper handling of explosives. (Older: September 7.) Al Jazeera

Middle East

• The United Kingdom announced a ban on trade in goods from Israeli settlements in the West Bank, citing expanded settlement activity including 1,234 housing units recently opened for bidding; a minister said "this isn't intended to be a boycott of all Israeli goods," while the US ambassador called the move discrimination. Al Jazeera
• A report by the Israeli legal rights group Adalah documented more than 130 disciplinary inquiries against Palestinian students, more than 75% of them women, across roughly 40 Israeli academic institutions, which it called "a policy" that the institutions should end. Al Jazeera
• Nicaragua urged the International Court of Justice to reject Germany's bid to dismiss a case alleging Germany risked complicity in genocide in Gaza through arms exports to Israel, which Nicaragua said rose from 45 million dollars in early 2023 to 378 million dollars by late 2023; Germany contests the court's jurisdiction. Al Jazeera

Europe

• The far-right Alternative for Germany party won 43.8% of the vote in a Saxony-Anhalt state election, against 17.2% for Chancellor Friedrich Merz's Christian Democratic Union, the first time a far-right party has come this close to state power in Germany since the Second World War. Euronews
• Thousands rallied in Cologne against the Alternative for Germany after its Saxony-Anhalt result. Al Jazeera
• A technical fault in the United Kingdom's air traffic control system caused more than 1,000 flight delays and cancellations. Al Jazeera
• Protesters and police clashed in Tirana, Albania, in the latest of more than 100 days of demonstrations against a coastal resort project linked to Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner in a protected nature reserve; protesters chanted for the arrest of Prime Minister Edi Rama. Al Jazeera
• Fourteen men went on trial in Paris over the November 2021 capsizing in the English Channel that killed at least 31 migrants; prosecutors say the boat was "uncertified, unfit for navigation... overcrowded and lacking appropriate life jackets," and the trial is expected to run three weeks with 114 civil parties. Al Jazeera

North America

• Canada's retaliatory tariffs of 15% to 50% on 27.6 billion dollars of US goods took effect after trade talks collapsed and the US imposed 50% tariffs on about 20 billion dollars of Canadian goods; Prime Minister Mark Carney called the US terms "unfair, uneconomic." Yahoo Finance/AP
• The United States and Mexico launched a joint operation, deploying forces and anti-drone equipment along their border to ground cartel drone operations. Mexico News Daily

• GiveWell said it is strengthening how it verifies its own research as its grantmaking grows, including triangulating data sources such as dried-blood tests in Burkina Faso, setting independent-check and GPS-tracking standards for survey quality, and piloting artificial-intelligence tools to catch errors in cost-effectiveness models. (6 days old.) GiveWell
• Research summarised by the International Growth Centre found that small businesses in Kenya underuse record-keeping not from lack of awareness but an inability to extract insight from raw data; an automated analytics app that converts transaction data into simple charts and summaries significantly increased daily record-keeping, especially among time-constrained entrepreneurs. (7 days old.) International Growth Centre
• A World Bank research blog post argued that real exchange rates adjust faster than conventional wisdom holds, drawing on new evidence. (6 days old.) World Bank
• Coefficient Giving, formerly Open Philanthropy, named Amanda Glassman to lead its work on global health and development policy, overseeing its Global Aid Policy and Global Growth funds, with stated priorities including scaling established programmes and expanding work on health-aid transitions. (7 days old.) Coefficient Giving
• Germany's development agency GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit) reopened its country office in Damascus, Syria, having left in 2012 during the civil war; a GIZ vice-chair said the agency would help advance reforms tied to reconstruction, economic opportunity and lasting peace. (7 days old.) GIZ
• The European Union and Greenland signed a joint declaration committing 200 million euros in EU investment under a Global Gateway partnership package for Greenland, covering this year and next. European Commission

• The Panama Canal Authority will cut the daily transit limit from 34 to 32 ships from September 15, down from 36 in August, with a possible further cut to 29 by February or March 2027 as El Niño strengthens; each transit uses about 200 million litres of reservoir water, and Panama declared a nationwide emergency on August 26. Al Jazeera
• A United Nations Environment Programme report argued the Paris Agreement's 1.5-degree Celsius target is no longer attainable and proposed planning instead for temperatures to peak, potentially as high as 1.8 degrees under optimistic scenarios, before declining; the report noted fossil fuel use has risen since 2015 despite a 90% fall in solar costs. Al Jazeera
• BBVA Research said current policies put global warming on track for 2.8 degrees Celsius, with full implementation of national climate pledges only reaching 2.3 to 2.5 degrees, and called for the upcoming 31st United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye to turn commitments into verifiable action; it noted climate finance to developing countries reached about 130 billion dollars in 2023-24 against a 2035 target of 300 billion dollars a year. (Upcoming: COP31.) EuropaWire