The city Jamaath on Thursday strongly condemned the recent car explosion in front of a temple here and said Hindu-Muslim unity cannot be disturbed by anyone.

A 13-member delegation from the Coimbatore Jamaath, including Ulemas (Muslim scholars), visited the Kottai Eswaran temple here as part of efforts to strengthen communal harmony in the region and spoke to the priests and other authorities over the incident for nearly an hour.

Head priest Sundareshan and temple secretary Prabhakaran welcomed the members with shawls.

The gesture comes days after a cylinder explosion in a car in communally sensitive Ukkadam area left one person dead.

Jamaath president Inayatullah said Islam never supported violence and favoured only peace. The meeting with priests and others will serve as a platform to maintain communal harmony and peace, he said. PTI Karnataka High Court has taken serious note of children being forced to sell trinkets and toys at traffic signals and street corners and directed the stakeholders to meet and suggest ways to rehabilitate and provide education to such kids.

A division bench of the court headed by Chief Justice P.B. Varale directed the

meeting to be held on November 15 under the aegis of the Karnataka State Legal Services Authority (KSLSA). Stakeholders and organisations working for the protection of child rights would be part of the meeting.

The court was hearing a petition of a child rights foundation from Bangalore. The court noted it had, on earlier occasions, directed the authorities concerned to take

action.

It pointed to a February 18, 2021, direction following which a meeting of stakeholders was held. The state government also filed an action-taken report. But no suggestions on rehabilitation of such children were made, the court noted.

All stakeholders who were part of the earlier meeting would attend the November 15 meeting and make suggestions regarding the government’s report. The meeting would be organised in the high court itself.

2 die in Mathura hotel fire

Two employees were charred to death and at least four persons, including two guests, suffered burn injuries in a fire that broke out at a hotel in Mathura early on Thursday.

The deceased employees of Hotel Vrindavan Garden in Mathura city have been identified as Umesh Kumar, 30, and Veer Singh, 40. Police said they were sleeping in the storeroom of the hotel when the fire started there around 4.30am and engulfed the entire hotel within 15 minutes.

Police sources said around 100 devotees from Haryana and Punjab had been staying in 25 rooms of the hotel since Tuesday.

Piyush Srivastava

Court live-stream plan

Chief Justice of India-designate Justice D.Y. Chandrachud on Thursday said a national infrastructure plan was being formulated to enable live streaming of all court proceedings.

“The Supreme Court is working hard to institutionalise live streaming of court proceedings…. We are trying to have a national infrastructure so that it becomes easy for even high courts and others can utilise it,” Justice Chandrachud said.

R. Balaji