Morning Brief: Over Five Lakh People May Attend Vajpayee’s Funeral; India, China Have Resolved Dispute Over A Segment Of Border: Report, And Other News

Here’s your morning news and views brief for today.

Over Five Lakh People Expected To Attend Vajpayee’s Funeral

The body of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was taken to his residence in the national capital where people paid their last respects to him throughout the night. The 93-year-old leader had passed away late on Thursday at AIIMS in New Delhi. His body would be taken to the Bharatiya Janata Party headquarters at Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg today from his official residence at Krishna Menon Marg. People can pay their respects today at the party headquarters starting 9 am. The former prime minister will be accorded a state funeral in the afternoon and the final rites will be performed at the Smriti Sthal on the banks of the Yamuna in New Delhi.

According to Delhi Police, over five lakh people will participate in the yatra before the last rites. The city has not prepared for a funeral of this scale in 27 years. The last time arrangements of this scale were made was in 1991, when former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated. Delhi traffic police have closed 25 arterial roads, starting at 8 am. Police are putting up CCTVs on the stretch.

India, China Have Resolved Dispute Over Large Segment Of Border: Report

India and China have resolved the dispute over the boundary in the eastern sector, which is made up of Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim, through Special Representative-level talks, National General Secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Party Ram Madhav has said. This statement came ahead of the 21st round of India-China boundary talks between National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi. India and China have so far held 20 rounds of Special Representative-level talks to resolve the dispute.

China claims Arunachal Pradesh as part of southern Tibet. People’s Liberation Army troops had captured parts of the state, including Tawang, during the 1962 war. However, the country withdrew after the deceleration of ceasefire. It is Tawang, bordering Tibet and Bhutan, which China is most interested in. The region houses the Tawang monastery, also called Galden Namgey Lhatse. It has the largest monastery in India, second only to the world’s largest, the Potala Palace in Lhasa. China fears the Dalai Lama may ordain his successor in Tawang.

Death Toll Rises To 97 In Flood-Hit Kerala, Condition Worsens

Conditions in Kerala, where 97 people have died in flash floods and landslides, have worsened after the state received ten times the normal rainfall in the last 24 hours. Thirteen of the 14 districts are on red alert. Idukki is the worst affected. For the first time in history, the state has opened 35 of its 39 dams. This is the worst flood in the state since 1924. Thirty five additional teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) were rushed to Kerala yesterday.

Indian Army, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard are conducting relief operations along with NDRF teams and state government departments. A large number of people have been moved to relief camps across the state with the help of the Indian Navy. Rescue operations have been slow as train services in the state have been disrupted and road transport services are in disarray. The Indian Meteorological Department has warned of heavy rains today.

PPP Route To Increase Hospital Beds Under Modicare

The government will take the public-private partnership route to add 160,000 hospital beds that PwC-Confederation of Indian Industry report says are needed to provide health cover under its Ayushman Bharat Health Mission, also called Modicare. The scheme, sometimes called the world’s largest health insurance project, aims to provide free health insurance of Rs 5 lakh per family to nearly 40 per cent of the country’s population or approximately 500 million people.

According to reports, around 33 per cent of the people covered by the scheme will have no previous health insurance. This part of the population will have a hospital admission incidence rate of 6 per cent with an average length of stay of three days. For this, as the report says, the government will need to improve the healthcare infrastructure in the country. There are 1.35 million hospital beds for around 180 million people under the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana.

Swarajya Special On Vajpayee

Atal Bihari Vajpayee (1924-2018): It is undeniable that there have been few men in India who have led a life as extraordinary as that of Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Vajpayee, The Man Who Mainstreamed BJP And Bharatiyata: What will Atal Bihari Vajpayee, India’s prime minister from 1998 to 2004, head of India’s first full-term non-Congress coalition at the Centre, be best remembered for.

Recalling The Iconic Strategic Leadership Of Vajpayee: Atal Bihari Vajpayee had a decisive and irreversible effect on India’s strategic thinking and was instrumental in the country’s many strategic victories.

How Vajpayee Government Was Defeated By A Single Vote In 1999: Vajpayee will go down in Indian history, among a lot of other things, as a prime minister who lost Parliament’s trust by a single vote. Here’s how that came about.

Vajpayee, A Great Statesman In The ‘Right’ Party: Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the ‘Pradhan Swayamsevak’ Indians looked up to, and are proud of.