Daily briefing: Massive crowd at Ayodhya Ram Temple; socialist icon Karpoori Thakur gets the Bharat Ratna; and more

Ayodhya woke up on Tuesday morning to a sea of people at the gates of the Ram temple, with queues beginning to form as early as 3 am. By evening, around 5 lakh people had paid obeisance to the Ram idol, a day after the consecration ceremony. We take a look at the scenes from the ground, a day after the inauguration of the Ram Mandir.

⚡Only in the Express

As French President Emmanuel Macron visits India this week as the chief guest for the Republic Day parade, C Raja Mohan writes in today’s Opinion section: “For Macron, struggling to reinvent his presidency, the enthusiastic reception in India would be a relief. For Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is riding high at home, Macron’s visit marks continuing high-level political engagement from the Western chancelleries at a time when the Anglo-Saxon media is going ballistic about his temple project.”

📰 From the Front Page

President Droupadi Murmu on Tuesday announced that the Bharat Ratna would be awarded to socialist icon Karpoori Thakur, posthumously. This comes at a time when three-day celebrations are being held in Bihar to mark the birth centenary of the former Bihar CM. We delve into the life of the two-time Bihar CM and socialist icon to understand his contributions.

An FIR has been registered against Rahul Gandhi and other Congress leaders after a scuffle broke out between people taking part in the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra and the Assam Police when the yatra tried to enter Guwahati city. Several people were injured in the incident, including Congress’s Assam chief Bhupen Borah.

Two days after a clash broke out between members of two communities in Mira Bhayander, a city in Maharashtra’s Thane district, the Mira Bhayander Municipal Corporation used bulldozers to demolish about 15 structures in the Muslim-dominated Haidary Chowk area in Mira Road. On Sunday night, a group passing by in vehicles with saffron flags and chanting “Jai Shri Ram”, was stopped by some local people from another community. An argument broke out, leading to violence.

👩🏻‍💻Must Read

“We always sleep by the roadside…I don’t have an Aadhaar card nor does my son. Only my husband has it, but that is not enough to get us entry.”

At a few night shelters in Gurgaon, this was a common complaint — that entry was only for those with Aadhaar cards. As the National Capital continues to battle the bitter cold, The Indian Express visited a few of these shelters to ascertain if anyone was being denied entry. Here’s what we found.

The Centre’s ambitious artificial intelligence (AI) Mission may soon head for Cabinet approval and could have an outlay of more than Rs 10,000 crore. What’s on the cards? Well, the government wants to develop its own ‘sovereign AI’, build computational capacity in the country, and offer compute-as-a-service to India’s startups.

Shortly after returning from the Pran Pratishtha ceremony at the Ram Temple in Ayodhya on Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the launch of a new programme to install rooftop solar systems on 1 crore houses. Although the 1-crore-households target is new, the installation of solar systems on rooftops has been an ongoing government programme for more than a decade. But it is running far behind schedule. We break down India’s solar power capacity, target, and the way forward.

⏳And Finally

As he lay in bed at Mumbai’s Tata Memorial Centre in 2018, weak after a round of chemotherapy to treat a tumour that had rendered him visually impaired, Jaganbeer, 4, refused to believe that actor Salman Khan was sitting next to him, on his hospital bed. Until he ran his little fingers first over the actor’s chiselled face and then, Khan’s bracelet. During their 30-minute meeting, Salman made Jaganbeer a promise: they would meet again if he fought cancer like a champion. Five years later, both Salman and Jaganbeer kept their word. Read about their heartwarming reunion.

Delhi Confidential: The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) had declared a half-day leave on January 22 on account of the inauguration of the Ram Mandir. The tribunal chairperson, Justice Ashok Bhushan — one of the five Supreme Court judges who authored the 2019 Ayodhya judgment — attended the event.

In today’s episode of the ‘3 things’ podcast, we take a look at the history of the Ram temple movement, the many hurdles faced by the Congress during its Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra in Assam, and the local municipal corporation in Mumbai carrying out the demolitions of nearly a dozen structures in the Muslim-dominated Haidary Chowk area of Mira Road.

Until tomorrow,
Rounak Bagchi and Rahel Philipose

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