Ukraine and its allies are losing the race to secure the ammunition Kyiv needs to hold off Russian attacks.

The flow of western military aid into Ukraine has tailed off dramatically, according to officials from allied nations familiar with the latest on the front line, and some Ukrainian guns are firing just a single round a day in order to preserve their dwindling stocks.

That’s set allies scrambling to try to maintain the flow of supplies to Ukraine by scouring for shells around the world. But with these initiatives slow to get off the ground, it’s unclear whether they will yield enough in the short-term to keep Ukraine’s front line stable.

Spanish state news agency Efe and other media said that some 1,500 passengers were meanwhile on board the MSC Armony hoping to continue the cruise to Croatia.

A statement from the Bolivian Foreign Ministry on Tuesday said the Bolivian Embassy in Spain and the country’s consulate General in Barcelona “are carrying out the pertinent steps to address this case,” coordinating with Spanish authorities, as well as with the MSC Cruises Company.

MSC Cruises said in a statement the Bolivians included families and children.

It said the “passengers appeared to have proper documentation upon boarding in Brazil. We have been informed by the authorities that the visas are not valid for entry into the Schengen area.

As a result, passengers have not been able to disembark in Barcelona, which was their final destination.”

The company said the ship remained in port while it works with authorities to facilitate the process.

Often portrayed as a red citadel, the Kannur Lok Sabha constituency, known for its looms and lore, has been characterised by a series of nuanced shifts in the Lok Sabha elections.

For an extended period, Congress leader Mullappally Ramachandran dominated the political arena, winning five consecutive terms from 1984 to 1998. However, the emergence of A.P. Abdullakutty, then with the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)], diminished his influence. Mr. Abdullakutty went on to represent the constituency for a decade till 2009 — he defeated Mr. Ramachandran in the general elections in 1999 and 2004.

After delimitation

The delimitation process detached North Wayanad, now Mananthavady, from the Kannur constituency and since the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, electoral fortunes have oscillated between the Congress and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)].

While Congress leader K. Sudhakaran won in 2009, P.K. Sreemathy of the CPI(M) wrested the seat from him in 2014, albeit by a narrow margin of over 6,500 votes. The constituency again witnessed a dramatic reversal in 2019, with Mr. Sudhakaran trouncing Ms. Sreemathy by a huge margin of 94,559 votes.

The Congress has renominated sitting MP Mr. Sudhakaran this time as well despite his initial reluctance to enter the fray, citing his position as the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president. The CPI(M) has chosen its Kannur district secretary, M.V. Jayarajan, a two-time legislator who represented the erstwhile Edakkad segment, to wrest the seat from the Congress.

The BJP, which has come only in a distant third position in the Lok Sabha elections, is experimenting by fielding the former District Congress Committee general secretary C. Raghunath, who joined the party recently. Mr. Reghunath contested against Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan as the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) candidate in the Dharmadam Assembly constituency in the 2021 Assembly polls.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Mr. Sudhakaran benefitted from multiple factors, including Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s candidacy in Wayanad and a campaign against political violence, especially the murder of Youth Congress activist S.P. Shuhaib, allegedly reportedly by CPI(M) workers, near Mattannur in February 2018.

Of the seven Assembly segments in the constituency, Left Democratic Front members emerged victorious in five — Taliparamba, Azhikode, Kannur, Dharmadam, and Mattannur — in the 2021 polls. The remaining two, Irikkur and Peravoor, are represented by UDF members.

Campaign issues

A key campaign issue is the performance of Mr. Sudhakaran as a Parliamentarian. This apart, the development of Kannur International Airport and Kannur railway station and utilisation of funds of the Members of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme are among the issues being raised.

Although 60% of the voters in the constituency reside in urban areas, the consolidation of rural farmers’ votes generally favours Congress candidates. Kannur’s total electorate is 13,19,627, including 6,93,026 women, 6,26,595 men, and six transgender persons.

The School of Law at DY Patil Deemed to be University is proud to announce its role as the host of the 3rd Association of Indian Universities (AIU) National Moot Court Competition, which will take place from April 4th to 6th, 2024. This esteemed event, organised under the auspices of the AIU, underscores a commitment to advancing legal education and fostering academic excellence.
The Association of Indian Universities (AIU) serves as an Apex Advisory Body on Higher Education, with a mandate from the Ministry of Education spanning nearly a century. With a membership of 985 universities, including 16 overseas institutions, AIU plays a pivotal role in shaping the higher education landscape. Notable luminaries who have graced the organisation include Dr S. Radhakrishnan, Dr Zakir Hussain, and Dr Syama Prasad Mukherjee. The School of Law at DY Patil Deemed to be University, has been chosen from among these esteemed members to host this significant event.
This year’s competition will witness the participation of 50 universities from across India, each vying for top honours in the moot court arena. The event serves as a platform for students to showcase their legal acumen before eminent academicians, advocates, and judges, thereby setting the bar for excellence in legal education.
DY Patil Deemed to be University, School of Law, named after its visionary Founder Chancellor Padmashree Dr DY Patil, is led by the inspiring leadership of Dr Vijay D. Patil, Hon’ble Chancellor & President, and Dr Shivani Patil, Hon’ble Pro-Chancellor and Vice President. The institution is committed to providing holistic education to empower the youth in a rapidly evolving global economy. The School of Law, renowned for its academic rigour and industry-focused approach, nurtures future-ready legal professionals through comprehensive courses delivered by esteemed national and international faculties.
The theme of this year’s moot court competition revolves around Constitutional Law and the timely issue of Electoral Bonds, offering participants a platform to engage with contemporary legal challenges.
Prizes for the competition include:

In conclusion, the 3rd AIU National Moot Court Competition promises to be a hallmark event, bringing together universities from across India in a spirited display of legal acumen and intellectual prowess. DY Patil, Deemed to be University, School of Law, looks forward to welcoming participants, observers, and enthusiasts alike to witness the vibrant exchange of ideas and the pursuit of excellence in legal education.
For further information and inquiries, click here.
Disclaimer – The above content is non-editorial, and TIL hereby disclaims any and all warranties, expressed or implied, relating to it, and does not guarantee, vouch for or necessarily endorse any of the content.

Death has not extinguished the decades-long rivalry between two Indian leaders: both have now seemingly risen from the grave, in digital form, to rally their supporters ahead of national elections.

Political parties are harnessing powerful artificial intelligence tools to make deepfakes, reproducing famous faces and voices in ways that often appear authentic.

Both the government and campaigners have warned that the spread of such tools is a dangerous and growing threat to the integrity of elections in India.

With a marathon six-week general election starting on April 19, so-called “ghost appearances” — the use of dead leaders in videos — have become a popular mode of campaigning in the southern Tamil Nadu state.

Actress turned politician J Jayalalithaa died in 2016, but she has been featured in a voice message deeply critical of the state’s current governing party, once led by arch-rival M Karunanidhi.

“We have a corrupt and useless state government,” her digital avatar says. “Stand by me… we are for the people.”

Karunanidhi died in 2018 but has appeared in AI-generated videos — clad in his trademark black sunglasses — showering praise on his son MK Stalin, the state’s current chief minister.

Recycling “very charismatic” speakers offered a novel way to grab attention, said Senthil Nayagam, founder of Chennai-based firm Muonium, which made the AI video purporting to be Karunanidhi.

Resurrecting dead leaders is also a cost-effective way of campaigning compared to traditional rallies, which are time-consuming to organise and expensive to stage for voters accustomed to a grand spectacle.

“Bringing crowds is a difficult thing,” Nayagam told AFP. “And how many times can you do a laser or drone show?”

‘Very thin line’

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been an eager early adopter of technology in election campaigning.

In 2014, the year he swept to power, the party expanded Modi’s campaign reach by using 3D projections of the leader to make him appear virtually at rallies.

But harnessing technology that can clone a politician’s voice, and create videos so seemingly real that voters struggle to decipher reality from fiction, has naturally sparked concern.

Ashwini Vaishnaw, the communications minister, said in November that deepfakes were “a serious threat to democracy and social institutions”.

AI creator Divyendra Jadoun said he had received a “huge surge” of requests for content from his company, The Indian Deepfaker.

“There is a huge risk in this coming election, and I am pretty damn sure many people are using it for unethical activities”, the 30-year-old said.

Jadoun’s repertoire includes voice cloning, chatbots and mass dissemination of finished products through WhatsApp messaging, sharing content instantly with up to 400,000 people for 100,000 rupees ($1,200).

He insisted that he turned down offers that he disagreed with, but said it was a “very thin line” to determine whether or not a request for his services was unethical.

“Sometimes even we get confused,” he added.

Jadoun said the rapidly advancing technology was little understood by a “big part of the country”, and AI products were taken by many to be true.

“We only tend to fact-check videos which don’t align with our preconceived notions,” he warned.

‘Threat to democracy’

Most AI-generated campaign material has so far been used to lampoon rivals, especially through song.

This week a leader of the BJP’s youth wing posted an AI-generated video of Arvind Kejriwal, a leading opponent of PM Modi arrested last month in an allegation corruption case.

It shows him sitting behind bars, strumming a guitar and singing a verse from a popular Bollywood song: “Forget me, for you have to live without me now.”

Elsewhere, digitally altered videos purport to show lawmaker Asaduddin Owaisi, one of India’s most prominent Muslim politicians, singing devotional Hindu songs.

A caption alongside the video on Facebook jokes that “anything is possible” if BJP wins again.

Joyojeet Pal, an expert in the role of technology in democracy from the University of Michigan, said that ridiculing a political opponent was a more effective campaigning tool than “calling them a thug or a crook”.

Mocking opponents in political cartoons is a centuries-old tactic, but Pal warned that AI-generated images can easily be misinterpreted as real.

“It is a threat to what we can and cannot believe,” he said. “It is a threat to democracy as a whole.”

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Taipei, Taiwan CNN  — 

Rescuers in Taiwan scrambled to free dozens of people trapped in highway tunnels after the island was struck by its strongest earthquake in 25 years Wednesday, killing at least seven and injuring hundreds of others.

The powerful 7.4 magnitude tremor shook the island’s east coast, hitting at 7:58 a.m. local time 18 kilometers (11 miles) south of Hualien city and at a depth of 34.8 kilometers (21 miles), according to the US Geological Survey. It was followed by several strong aftershocks with tremors felt across the island, including by CNN staff in the capital Taipei.

Taiwan’s National Fire Agency (NFA) said at least seven people were killed, 736 injured and 77 others remain trapped in road tunnels following the quake. The severity of the injuries remains unclear.

All the deaths were in Hualien County, among them three hikers killed by falling rocks in the tourist hotspot Taroko Gorge, the NFA said. Falling rocks also killed a truck driver in front of a tunnel on the east coast’s Suhua Highway, it added.

Most of those trapped are in two road tunnels in northern Hualien County, the NFA said. Two German nationals are stranded in a third tunnel in the county, it said.

Meanwhile, rescuers were en route to 12 people, including two Canadians, stuck on a trail in the gorge.

Reports of extensive damage have also emerged, with collapsed buildings in Hualien County, thousands of homes left without power and a major highway closed due to landslides and rockfalls, according to Taiwanese officials.

Taiwan’s Central Weather Administration spokesperson warned that powerful aftershocks as high as magnitude 7 are expected to occur until the end of the week.

“There was really strong shaking… We quickly turned off the gas and electricity and opened the door. It was really strong. It felt like the house would fall down,” Taipei resident Chang Yu-lin told CNN affiliate Taiwan Plus.

Chen Nien-tzu, also in Taipei, said, “It was really wild.”

“It’s been a long time since we’ve had an earthquake so it felt really scary,” she told Taiwan Plus.

The quake prompted initial tsunami warnings in Taiwan, southern Japan and the Philippines, with waves less than half a meter observed along some coasts, and prompting airlines to suspend flights. All tsunami warnings were later lifted.

In Taiwan, military personnel were dispatched to help with disaster relief and schools and workplaces suspended operations as aftershocks hit the island, according to the Defense Ministry.

Taiwan’s outgoing President Tsai Ing-wen said Wednesday she had ordered her administration to “immediately” get “on top of the situation and understand local impacts as soon as possible.”

Tsai also told the administration to “provide necessary assistance, and work together with local governments to minimize the impact of the disaster.”

Taiwan, a self-ruled island east of mainland China, is home to about 23 million people, most of whom live in the industrialized cities of its west coast, including the capital.

The island is regularly rocked by earthquakes due to its location on the Pacific Ring of Fire, which runs around the edge of the Pacific Ocean and causes massive seismic and volcanic activity from Indonesia to Chile.

Wednesday’s quake is the strongest to hit Taiwan since 1999, according to the Central Weather Administration. That year, a 7.7 magnitude quake hit south of Taipei, killing 2,400 people and injuring 10,000 others.

Hualien County, parts of which are mountainous and remote, is home to about 300,000 people on the island’s sparsely populated east coast. A magnitude 6.2 quake hit near the area in 2018, killing at least 17 people and injuring more than 300 others.

The full extent of the damage is still being assessed, with road and rail closures curtailing access to the quake’s epicenter in Hualien County.

More than 100 buildings were damaged across the island, the National Fire Agency said, with about half of those in Hualien County.

Search and rescue operations were ongoing Wednesday afternoon at the nine-story Uranus Building that had partially collapsed, trapping residents, Hualien County Magistrate Hsu Chen-wei told reporters. So far, 22 people had been rescued from the building, according to the NFA.

More than 91,000 households are without electricity, according to Taiwan’s Central Emergency Command Center. The government-operated Taipower Company is working to restore power, it added.

Footage posted on social media showed several collapsed buildings in Hualien and residents helping trapped people escape through the window of a damaged apartment complex.

The quake struck during the morning rush hour, with videos showing vehicles bouncing on a vigorously shaking highway, an overpass swaying in Taipei, and commuters struggling to stand inside a juddering Taipei metro train.

Meanwhile, video broadcast by CNN affiliate TVBS showed cellphone and security camera footage of the moment tremors struck homes and businesses across the island. One clip showed power lines swaying violently above a street and another saw chandeliers shaking in a restaurant.

Large boulders could be seen strewn across the eastern Suhua Highway, with several tunnels broken — including one split in half, TVBS footage showed. CNN affiliate SET News shows the front of a car smashed by fallen rocks.

Transport authorities recorded at least nine rockfalls and landslides in the Suhua Road Corridor of Provincial Highway 9, which has been closed to traffic.

Another highway connecting the west coast with eastern Taiwan was also damaged by falling rocks, with at least 12 cars hit and nine people injured, TVBS reported.

The quake sparked tsunami warnings across the region as authorities ordered evacuations.

In Taiwan’s Chenggong, about 100 kilometers (62 miles) south of the quake’s epicenter, waves reached almost half a meter. The Central Weather Administration advised residents to evacuate to higher ground.

The Japan Meteorological Agency also issued a tsunami alert for the southern Miyakojima and Okinawa islands, warning of waves up to 3 meters (nearly 10 feet) high. A 30-centimeter (nearly 1 foot) wave impacted Okinawa, the first tsunami observed there in 26 years, the agency said.

Several hours later, the US Tsunami Warning Center said the tsunami threat had “largely passed” but people in coastal areas should remain alert.

All flights from Okinawa and Kagoshima prefectures were suspended following the tsunami warnings in the area, Japan Airlines said.

Okinawa’s Naha airport resumed flights after the tsunami warning was downgraded to an advisory, airport spokesperson Hideaki Tsurudo told CNN.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

TAIPEI –

At least seven people were killed and more than 700 injured Wednesday by a powerful earthquake in Taiwan that damaged dozens of buildings and prompted tsunami warnings that extended to Japan and the Philippines before being lifted.

Officials said the quake was the strongest to shake the island in decades, and warned of more tremors in the days ahead.

“The earthquake is close to land and it’s shallow. It’s felt all over Taiwan and offshore islands,” said Wu Chien-fu, director of Taipei’s Central Weather Administration’s Seismology Center.

Hongkongers can apply to change the gender markers on their identity cards from Wednesday without undergoing full sex reassignment surgical procedures, as part of revised criteria introduced in response to a landmark court ruling last year.

The Court of Final Appeal in February of last year ruled in favour of two transgender residents who sought to change their cards without undergoing the invasive procedure.

The city government said on Wednesday that the change was made after “prudently considering the objective of the policy, relevant legal and medical advice, as well as drawing reference from the relevant practices overseas”.

The revised criteria no longer consider the procedure necessary when a resident applies to the commissioner of registration to update their Hong Kong identity cards.

Under the new policy, applicants must have completed select surgical procedures to modify their sexual characteristics, along with presenting the relevant medical proof and supporting documents.

Applicants must make a statutory declaration to confirm they have gender dysphoria, which refers to psychological distress that a person may experience because of a mismatch between their biological sex and gender identity.

They are also required to show proof they have undergone hormonal treatment throughout the two years before applying.

Applications must include a declaration that the candidate will continue to undergo continuous hormonal treatments, as well as submit blood test reports for randomised checks.

The Immigration Department said it would take the initiative to follow up with all applications it received.

The journey toward the landmark victory started back in 2017, when activist Henry Edward Tse made a case against the department over its rejection of his application to change his card’s gender marker.

Tse and Q, a separate appellant, said they had undergone medical and surgical treatments later medically certified to be sufficient to ensure their social integration and psychological well-being, arguing additional invasive procedures were unnecessary.

Their applications to change their identity cards were previously rejected on the grounds they had not undergone full sex reassignment surgical treatments as required under the old policy.

Transgender activists call for approval of Hong Kong ID card sex change requests

They also separately argued their cards’ female gender marks had resulted in both facing discrimination and humiliation when confirming their identities with third parties.

The Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeal dismissed both cases, before the city’s top court heard the appeals together and unanimously ruled the old policy had breached their right to privacy under Article 14 of the Hong Kong Bill of Rights, declaring the requirement unconstitutional.

All eyes are on Mandya MP Sumalatha Ambareesh (centre) who will announce her next course of action on April 3, 2024. 
| Photo Credit: File photo

1. All eyes are on Mandya MP Sumalatha Ambareesh who will announce her next course of action today. As an independent in the last elections, she took on the JDS with support from the BJP. She was hoping to get the BJP ticket this time, but the party entered into a pre-poll alliance with the JD(S) leaving her in the lurch. JD(S) has nominated H.D. Kumaraswamy who has been reaching out, seeking her support. She had in the last election defeated his son Nikhil Kumaraswamy with the support of BJP.

2. Sugarcane farmers’ association is holding a conference in Mysuru to decide their next course of action as they allege that drought relief work has taken a back seat given that officials and the political parties are all focused on elections. Farmers in north Karnataka too expressed their ire over the last few days.

3. Tomorrow being the last day to file nominations for the first phase of elections in Karnataka on April 26, many are expected to file nominations today.

4. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah continues to campaign in his home turf in Old Mysore region, particularly in Mysuru and Chamarajanagar. His deputy D.K. Shivakumar will be in Chamarajanagar today to participate in filing of nomination by the party candidate.

5. Congress leaders, including the Chief Minister, will respond to allegations by Union Home Minister Amit Shah yesterday on drought relief and a host of other issues.

6. Department of Mass Communication and Journalism, Bengaluru City University and Karnataka Women Journalists’ Association, are jointly celebrating Women’s Day, and will present awards to journalists and achievers. Dr. Nagambika Devi, retired IAS officer, and Brunda Adige, women’s rights activist, will participate as chief guests. Lingaraj Gandhi, Vice-Chancellor of BCU, will preside over the event being held in Jnana Jyothi Auditorium, Bengaluru City University, Mysore Bank Circle, 10.30 a.m. onwards

7. School of Humanities and Sciences, Department of Psychology and Counselling, St. Joseph’s University, in collaboration with AINSW and Alliance India, is organising Karnataka stakeholders’ round table on the theme “Gender responsive services of women, girls and marginalised communities” today. The event will be held in Xavier’s Hall, St. Joseph’s University, on Lalbagh Road, between 10 a.m. and 1.30 p.m.

NEW DELHI: Construction of national highways (NH) touched around 12,300 km in 2023-24, almost 34 km per day. This is the second highest rate of NH construction in the country’s history. The highest so far has been 13,327 km in 2020-21 when construction touched 36.5 km per day.
TOI has also learnt that the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), which builds and maintains wider highways, recorded the maximum ever construction of NHs at 6,644 km against the target of 6,544 km.“This is an increase of around 20% compared to 5,544 km NHs built by NHAI in FY 2022-23,” said an official.
Sources said that the capital expenditure by NHAI in 2023-24 also reached an all-time high of little over Rs 2 crore, around 20% more compared to FY 22-23. The current trend of expenditure for highway development is likely to continue for the next one decade before it reaches saturation.
Meanwhile, the transport ministry has proposed to the PMO for setting up of a dedicated Corridor Management Unit (CMU) in the NHAI to focus on operation and maintenance of highway stretches considering a two-fold increase in the length of widened NH in the past 10 years. As per projection, this will touch 89,900 km by 2037 and 1.27 lakh km by 2047. This will require having trained manpower to manage the highway stretches efficiently.