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1 ! "# $ ! ! " ! % & & ! ! " '() ( 'Two back-to-back incidentsof lynching over attemptedsacrilege, in less than 24 hours,have sent shockwaves acrossPunjab. Hours after the shock-ing incident of an unidentifiedyouth being beaten to death forattempting sacrilege of theGuru Granth Sahib in theSikhs holiest shrine theGolden Temple, another per-son was killed on Sundaymorning by a mob at a villageGurdwara in Kapurthala forsuspected theft and attempted sacrilege, reported-ly in the presence of policemen,three of whom were left injuredin the the StateGovernment has set up aSpecial Investigation Team(SIT) to probe the GoldenTemple sacrilege incidentwith directions to submit itsreport within two days, thepolice officials on Sundayclaimed that there was novisible sign of sacrilege in thesecond incident at theKapurthala Gurdwara. There is no visible sign ofsacrilege at Gurdwara sahib.)

2 AnFIR registered under Sections295A of the IPC (Indian PenalCode) has been about the attack iswith the police, and the iden-tity of the man killed is beingverified. If it appears to be mur-der, then the FIR will be regis-tered accordingly, saidInspector-General (IG)Jalandhar Range, GurinderSingh Dhillon, while address-ing the Dhillon said that peo-ple s sentiments had been run-ning high after the GoldenTemple incident, and as itwas a sensitive issue, the policeused restraint. Those people,who managed to do this, weremore in number than thepolice. As per officials, theman was beaten to death by thelocals for allegedly disrespect-ing the Nishan Sahib (theSikh religious flag) at theGurdwara in village Nizampurin Kapurthala district. The res-idents claimed that the mandisrespected the sacred flagand tried to run away from per the informationavailable, soon after the youthwas caught by the people at theGurudwara in the morning, thepolice officials, includingKapurthala SeniorSuperintendent of Police (SSP)Harkamalpreet Singh Khakh,rushed to the spot.

3 The copsdirected the locals to handover the youth with the assur-ance that the police wouldinvestigate the matter, but theyrefused. Amidst several viralvideos of the incident, thepolice officials and the locals,mainly the Sikhs, were seenexchanging heated argumentsover the custody of the youth,who had been detained in aroom inside the , the police reported-ly entered the room forcefully,followed by the Sikh activistswho were staging a protestoutside the Gurdwara,demanding custody of the accused to teach him a les-son . However, a scuffle ensued,following which the moballegedly killed the youth witha Khakh later said thatthe mob had gathered after thevideo went viral. They killedthe youth even as the policetried their level best to handlethe situation. We will registera criminal case under chargesof murder against those whokilled the youth, said Khakhadding that the investigation, sofar, indicated that no sacrilegeof the Guru Granth Sahib incident took placemere hours after a man wasbeaten to death at the GoldenTemple in Amritsar forattempting sacrilege of theGuru Granth Sahib inside thesanctum , Punjab DeputyChief Minister-cum-HomeMinister Sukhjinder SinghRandhawa has issued direc-tions to the State DirectorGeneral of Police (DGP), allCommissioners of Police, andthe Senior Superintendents ofPolice (SSPs) to strengthenround-the-clock securityaround all Gurudwaras,Temples, Mosques, orChurches and other religiousplaces.

4 At religious places, theCCTVs should be functional inthe complexes where GuruGranth Sahib is placed besidesother religious scriptures in allreligious places, he Chief Ministeradded that the police shouldhave active liaison with theShiromani GurdwaraParbandhak Committee(SGPC), and all Gurudwarascommittees and ensure that Guru Granth Sahib should notbe left unattended at any time .Meanwhile, Chief MinisterCharanjit Singh Channi, whovisited the Golden Temple also known as Sri HarmandirSahib along with Randhawaon Sunday, reiterated the StateGovernment s firm commit-ment to thoroughly probe theentire matter to get to the bot-tom of the case to unmask thereal conspirators behind thisdistortedly the same time, the ChiefMinister appealed to the peo-ple to take due care and cautionto protect all the religiousplaces in order to foil nefariousdesigns of any agency or anti-social element in wake of theforthcoming Assembly elec-tions in the s politicians, cut-ting across party lines, havecome all out to condemn theattempts of sacrilege in theharshest words, but chose tomaintain a strategic silence onthe lynching apparently infear of losing votes.

5 *+ *,' North India remained inthe grip of severe cold onSunday as the chilly north-westerly winds with speeds ofup to 15 kmph brought theminimum temperature belowthe freezing point in severalcities for the second-consecu-tive cold wave condi-tions swept parts of Delhi,Uttar Pradesh (UP), Punjab,Haryana, Rajasthan, MadhyaPradesh (MP), Jammu andKashmir (J&K), Ladakh, Gilgit-Baltistan, Muzaffarabad,Uttarakhand and HimachalPradesh for the second day ina row. Delhi witnessed the sea-son s coldest morning onSunday with the city recordinga minimum temperature degrees Celsius, accordingto the weather maximum tempera-ture is likely to settle around 18degrees Celsius, said the IndiaMeteorological Department(IMD).According to the IMD,there would not be any let-upin the cold wave conditionover the next three days. Coldand dry north-westerly winds,gusting up to 15 kmph, are like-ly to continue over the plains ofnorthwest India till Tuesdayenhancing the adverse impactof the cold wave and cold dayconditions , it per the IMD data,Churu in Rajasthan reportedthe lowest minimum temper-ature of minus degreesCelsius in northwest India fol-lowed by Sikar (minus Celsius) and Amritsar(minus degree Celsius).

6 No significant change inminimum temperatures likelyover most parts of NorthwestIndia, Gujarat and Maharashtraduring the next two days andrise by two-three degreesCelsius thereafter. Gradual fallin minimum temperatures bytwo-three degrees Celsius verylikely over most parts of Eastand adjoining Central Indiaduring the next three days andno significant change there-after, said an IMD bulletinissued on fog is predicted in afew regions of Uttarakhandover the next two days and inPunjab and Haryana onDecember 23 and 24, it recorded a low ofminus six degrees Celsius onSunday night, same as the pre-vious night, which is the low-est minimum temperature ofthe season so far in the city. Theminimum was degreesbelow normal for this part ofthe season. The Gulmarg resortin north Kashmir s Baramulladistrict recorded a low of degrees Celsius. The offi-cials said Pahalgam, whichserves as the base camp for theannual Amarnath Yatra,recorded a low of minus Celsius.

7 The resortwas the coldest recorded placein the Valley. The mercury inKupwara in north Kashmirsettled at a low of minus to the Skymet,temperatures of MP,Chhattisgarh and Maharashtradropped by two to four degreesCelsius during the last 24hours. Biting cold is being feltover Gwalior, Nowgong, Guna,Rewa, Umariya where tem-peratures are in the range oftwo-three of Rajgarh,Shajapur, Bhopal, Sagar,Tikamgarh and Mandla arebetween three and five degreesCelsius. In fact, Gwalior andNowgong recorded degreeCelsius the plains, the IMDdeclares a cold wave if the min-imum temperature dips to fourdegrees Celsius. A cold wave isalso declared when the mini-mum temperature is 10 degreesCelsius or below and is less than normal. )*+ *,' India s Omicron count surgedto 147 on Sunday after twopeople, including a teenager,tested positive for the variantafter recently returning toGujarat from the UnitedKingdom.

8 Maharashtra withsix more Omicron patients onSunday tops the list of theworst-hit State taking its tally to54. As many as 22 active casesof Omicron are from Mumbai. Ringing the alarm bell,Bhramar Mukherjee, Professorof Epidemiology at theUniversity of Michigan, tweet-ed that Omicron being high-ly transmissible, vaccines (with-out booster), past infectionsprovide only modest protec-tion, so, a huge portion of theIndian population may be sus-ceptible again . Instead of just highlightingthe possibility of Omicron beingclinically mild, we need to recog-nise that a very large number ofinfections over a short period oftime may lead to the same num-ber of people needing hospitalbeds as the second wave: absolutenumbers matter, not just rates, she tweeted on WHO has alreadywarned that the Omicron coro-navirus variant cases are dou-bling in to 3 days in areaswith community reported the firsttwo cases of Omicron inKarnataka on December 2 afterthe heavily mutated variant ofthe coronavirus was firstreported in South Africa onNovember Delhi: Amid concernsthat cases of Omicron variantof Coronavirus may rapidlygrow, Delhi on Sunday report-ed 107 Covid-19 cases of coro-navirus in 24 hours.

9 This is thehighest daily spike in nearly June 25, the nationalCapital had recorded 115 casesin a day. So far, Delhi hasdetected 22 cases of Omicronwith a rise of 12 new infectedpatients on Sunday, Delhi alsoreported one related death - afirst in 10 days. -. ' The Police have arrested 11activists of the SocialDemocratic Party of India(SDPI), an Islamic extremistoutfit, and two BJP cadres inconnection with double mur-ders in a span of 12 hours inKerala s Alappuzha assas-sins hacked to deathSreenivasan, secretary of KeralaOBC Morcha, on Sundaymorning in his house. Thekillers struck when he waspreparing to go for a morningwalk. Around one dozen peo-ple barged into his house andcarved him with knives, swordsand visuals collectedfrom the neighborhood ofSreenivasan s residence showed12 persons riding towards hishouse in six motorbikes andleaving after the police suspected thatSreenivasan was murdered inretaliation for the killing ofShaan, an SDPI leader on lateSaturday night.

10 But KSurendran, president of KeralaBJP said his party has no rolein the murder of Shaan. The police are trying toimplicate BJP and RSS workersin this incident at the instanceof Chief Minister PinarayiVijayan, he said while speak-ing to reporters at Kozhikodeon Sunday. The police havetaken into custody two BJPworkers in connection with themurder of Shaan. Earlier in February, Nandu,a young district-level RSSleader was murdered byunidentified people. The policeare yet to arrest the Sreenivasan s murder, thenumber of RSS/ BJP activistswho were killed by the Islamicterrorists this year has gone upto four. Senior BJP leader andRajya Sabha member DrSubramanian Swamy, who wasin Palakkad on Sunday morn-ing, asked Union HomeMinister Amit Shah to dismissthe Kerala Government as lawand order in the State hastotally collapsed. The Popular Front ofIndia, the political arm of theSDPI, was trying to imple-ment Talibanism in Keralawhile the CPI(M) governmentwas offering all support to theIslamic extremists.