To counter UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav’s charisma among the youth, the Bharatiya Yuva Janata Morcha (BJYM) will use the latest technology and go online to woo the youth.

Orissa chief minister Naveen Patnaik’s ignorance of Oriya is slowly becoming a major political issue with the Opposition Congress and the BJP raking up the matter often in recent times.

A debate on food security and Hindutva will begin in the coming days with the Congress and the BJP going to the people with these issues ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.

Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh on Tuesday accused Mr Narendra Modi, the RSS and the BJP of spreading “blatant lies” and painting him as “anti-Hindu”. Maintaining that he is a “good practising Hindu”, he said that it was his duty to stand up to all “falsehood the sanghis and their paid professionals are spreading” against Muslims, Christians and other minority groups.

Legislators across party lines in the Legislative Council on Tuesday resolved that dance bars would remain banned in the state. Though the legislators refrained from making comments on the SC judgment, they all demanded that the state either draft a new law, which will not violate constitutional rights or file a review petition in the SC.

A 40-year-old former bar girl, who quit the profession in the year 2000, said that she never regretted taking up the job.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday gave the go-ahead to “dance bars” to operate in Maharashtra, over seven years after they were banned by the state government on the ground that the performances by women at such bars were vulgar and derogatory to society.

In a shocking instance of the utter lack of security in Bihar’s courts and daring lawlessness, criminals on Tuesday exploded two bombs on the premises of a civil court near Patna to free an under-trial dacoit, causing injuries to three people but ultimately failing in their purpose.

Leader of the Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly Surjya Kanta Mishra said: “If a Central minister is not safe in Bengal, then you can understand what the condition of law and order in the state is.”

Strong differences between the Air India management and a section of the airline’s pilots belonging to the erstwhile Indian Airlines appears to have emerged over the airline’s purported directive to reduce the two-engine acceleration altitude from 1,500 feet above ground level to 800 feet above ground level in case of some of the narrow-body Airbus aircraft from certain airports, even as Air India said “the changes in flight operation procedures, notified by the Airline recently, fully comply with all operating standards and do not in any way compromise air safety”.