New Delhi, Feb 24: Vijender Gupta, BJP legislator from Rohini, was elected the Speaker of Delhi Assembly on Monday after his name was proposed by Chief Minister Rekha Gupta. Soon after his election, the proceedings of the House were adjourned due to disruptions by the Opposition legislators of the AAP.

During the House proceedings, conducted by pro-tem Speaker Arvinder Singh Lovely, Gupta was elected as the new Speaker with unanimity.

Soon after assuming the new role, Speaker Gupta faced the challenge of slogan shouting by the AAP legislators during the discussion on vote of thanks for the election of new the Speaker.

In his opening remark, he condemned the Leader of Opposition Atishi for trying to raise an issue without permission and disturb the proceedings.

“I want to warn the Opposition that they should not try to spread anarchy. They should let the proceedings to continue smoothly,” he said, expressing his displeasure over the behaviour of AAP legislators.

Earlier, while greeting Speaker Gupta on his election Atishi said photos of B.R. Ambedkar and Shaheed Bhagat Singh had allegedly been removed from the Chief Minister’s Office.

Her remarks, without the permission of the Chair, triggered noisy protests from the Treasury Benches with the Speaker censuring the LoP for speaking out of turn and context. When the AAP legislators continued to disrupt the proceedings, the Speaker adjourned the House proceedings.

Earlier, CM Gupta along with her Council of Ministers took oath as members of the Legislative Assembly. The first session of the House commenced on Monday morning and saw all newly-elected legislators taking oath.

There are 48 BJP legislators and 22 AAP legislators in the 70-member Assembly.

Along with Delhi CM, the BJP ministers namely Parvesh Verma, Ashish Sood, Kapil Mishra, Ravinder Singh Indraj, Pankaj Kumar Singh and Manjinder Singh Sirsa also took the oath.

AAP’s MLAs, including Leader of Opposition in the Assembly, Atishi, also took oath during the first session of the House.

With her appointment, Rekha Gupta has become the fourth woman Chief Minister of Delhi, following in the footsteps of Sheila Dikshit, Sushma Swaraj, and Atishi.

She is also the fourth BJP leader to hold the top post in the national Capital, succeeding Madan Lal Khurana, Sahib Singh Verma, and Sushma Swaraj.

The first session of the Delhi Assembly is set to last for three days.

The proceedings began with BJP MLA Lovely taking oath as the pro-tem Speaker, a temporary position responsible for conducting House proceedings until a full-time Speaker is elected. Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena administered the oath to Lovely at Raj Niwas.

Hyderabad, Feb 24: Two teams of construction major Larsen & Toubro with advanced equipment on Monday joined the operation to rescue eight trapped workers from an under-construction tunnel, a portion of which collapsed on February 22 in Telangana’s Nagarkurnool district.

L&T, which has the experience of the rescue operation in Uttarakhand, has brought endoscopic and robotic cameras

Nagarkurnool district Collector Badavath Santosh said the rescue teams had to cover a distance of another 40 meters to reach the point where the roof had collapsed. This stretch of the tunnel is filled with muck, making further advance of the rescue operations difficult.

The L&T teams will deploy endoscopic and robotic cameras to sift through the muck and communicate with survivors, if any, at the fag end of the tunnel.

The teams used the same equipment for rescue operations after the Silkyara Bend-Barkot tunnel collapsed in Uttarakhand, where 41 workers trapped inside were rescued after 17 days in 2023.

Multiple teams from the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), the Army and other agencies continued rescue operation on Monday.

More than 48 hours after a portion of the Srisailam Left Bank Canal (SLBC) tunnel collapsed, the fate of eight men, including two engineers and two machine operators, was not known.

Teams of the Indian Air Force and Navy are also reaching Srisailam in three helicopters from Visakhapatnam to join the rescue operation.

NDRF personnel managed to reach the tunnel boring machine at the 14th-km point but heaps of debris hampered the search operation.

The tunnel remained flooded with water for about two kilometres, making the rescue task more challenging for more than 300 rescue workers. Rescue teams deployed heavy motors for dewatering.

The operation encountered more problems as the loco train to move into the tunnel broke down at the 11th kilometre. Efforts were on to fix the problem.

NDRF, Army, Singareni Collieries Company Limited (SCCL) and Hyderabad Disaster Response and Asset Protection Agency (HYDRAA) were making intensive efforts to dewater and desilt the tunnel.

Ministers Uttam Kumar Reddy and Jupally Krishna Rao, who were supervising the rescue operation, went into the tunnel by a loco train on Sunday. Jupally Krishna Rao told media persons after coming out of the tunnel that the chances of finding the trapped persons alive were remote.

Irrigation Minister Uttam Kumar Reddy said all efforts were being made to pull out the trapped men safely. He said the possibility of reaching the spot by digging the tunnel from the top was being explored.

Two workers were injured and eight others were trapped when a portion of the tunnel was being dug as part of SLBC collapsed near Domalapenta.

A total of 50 persons were working on the left-side tunnel when the roof collapsed for three meters. The accident occurred at the 14th km point.

While 42 workers came out of the tunnel, the remaining eight were trapped. Those trapped include two engineers and two machine operators.

The trapped men are from Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Jammu & Kashmir.

Project manager Manoj Kumar (Uttar Pradesh), Machine engineer Srinivas (Uttar Pradesh) and machine operators Sunny Singh (J&K) and Gurpreet Singh (Punjab) are among those trapped. The four workers from Jharkhand are Sandeep Sahu, Santosh Sahu, Anju Sahu and Jagta Khes.

New Delhi, Feb 24: Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta along with her council of ministers took oath as members of the Legislative Assembly on Monday. The first session of the House commenced this morning and will see all newly-elected legislators taking oath.

Alongside Delhi CM, the BJP ministers namely Parvesh Verma, Ashish Sood, Kapil Mishra, Ravinder Singh Indraj, Pankaj Kumar Singh and Manjinder Singh Sirsa also took the oath.

AAP’s 22 MLAs, including Leader of Opposition in the Assembly, Atishi, also took oath during the first session of the House.

Rekha Gupta had taken the oath as Delhi’s Chief Minister on Thursday at a grand ceremony at Ramlila Maidan. The swearing-in event, marking BJP’s comeback after 27 years, was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, and several Chief Ministers from BJP-ruled states.

The event was not only a political milestone but also a show of strength for the National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

With her appointment, Rekha Gupta has become the fourth woman Chief Minister of Delhi, following in the footsteps of Sheila Dikshit, Sushma Swaraj, and Atishi.

She is also the fourth BJP leader to hold the top post in the capital, succeeding Madan Lal Khurana, Sahib Singh Verma, and Sushma Swaraj.

The first session of the Delhi Assembly is set to last for three days.

The proceedings began with BJP MLA Arvinder Singh Lovely taking oath as the pro-tem Speaker, a temporary position responsible for conducting House proceedings until a full-time Speaker is elected. Lieutenant Governor (L-G) Vinai Kumar Saxena administered the oath to Lovely at Raj Niwas.

The election for the Assembly Speaker is scheduled to take place at 2:00 p.m.

According to the Assembly bulletin, L-G Saxena will address the House on February 25, after which the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) reports will be tabled.