News18.com Daybreak : Facebook Data Leak Fallout, Akhilesh Yadav's Dinner and Other Stories You May Have Missed
In case you missed it
The website of Ovleno Business Intelligence, the partner company of Cambridge Analytica, has been taken down after a slugfest broke out between the BJP and the Congress over links to the tainted big data firm. The company’s website proclaimed that BJP, Congress and JD(U) were its clients, apart from ICICI bank and Airtel. The website of OBI said that it works on “political campaign management” and had photos of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on its homepage.
Meanwhile, India has warned Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg against "any data theft" and said that India will not stop short of taking stringent actions, even if it includes summoning him. Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said, "Mr Mark Zuckerberg you better know the observation of IT Minister of India, if any data theft of Indians is done with the collusion of FB systems, it will not be tolerated. We have got stringent powers in the IT Act including summoning you in India."
And, in a surprising tweet, WhatsApp Co-founder Brain Acton told his followers on Twitter to delete their Facebook accounts.
Eleven cow vigilantes, including a BJP leader, accused of lynching a Muslim meat trader in Jharkhand in June last year were convicted by a fast track court in Ramgarh and awarded life terms. The court is yet to decide on a twelfth accused, who is a juvenile.
A well-attended dinner hosted by Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav at a five-star hotel in Lucknow have brightened the Rajya Sabha hopes of his new tag team partner - Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati. Although she herself was not present, the presence of independent MLA from Kundla, Raghuraj Pratap Singh, or Raja Bhaiyya as he is more popularly known, at the dinner would have put a smile on her face. With just two days left before Uttar Pradesh MLAs vote to send 10 candidates to the Upper House, the BSP faces a close contest and Singh’s vote could swing the battle its way.
Attorney General KK Venugopal told the Supreme Court that data collected for Aadhaar was secure behind walls that are 13 feet high and five feet thick. Arguing that the scheme was a “serious effort to end corruption” and not a fly-by-night scheme to score brownie points, the top government lawyer said that all the details, including biometric data, are being kept at a complex in Manesar, near Delhi.
At the 36-hour marathon coding event organised by the Vasundhara Raje government in Rajasthan, 6,500 students from across the state has put together ideas to develop mobile application that could give Rajasthan's digital aim a bigger push. The event organised ahead of the state Assembly elections could boost the Raje government’s aim to make the people of Rajasthan realise the importance of technology and "bridge the rural and urban divide".
Post the Karnataka government’s decision to accord an independent religion tag to the Lingayats, another community from the state has demanded that they should also be declared as a religious minority.
Amid reports of China opening up a new route to reach south Doklam, Congress president Rahul Gandhi, on Twitter, asked whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi would react to the development through 'hugplomacy', by blaming the defence minister or crying in public.
Ex-Congress leader Sobhana George mounted a scathing attack on her former party and said that women in the grand old party could not rise through the organisational ranks unless they were “pets of someone”.
Agree or disagree?
An Indian airline has reported that only 34% of its flights were on time in February from one crowded airport. That means two out of every three flights were delayed. The traffic woes of Mumbai, Bengaluru residents are now legendary. As for trains, this fiscal year has seen even the marquee ones fail to meet their schedules. The figures gleaned from official data, underline an infrastructure emergency, which is not getting addressed fast enough. Our rail tracks, airports and roads are choked beyond capacity and there’s little relief in sight.