Bengaluru: Gauri Lankesh laid to rest with full state honours

Udupi, Nov 11: A traveller reportedly lost ₹4.1 lakh after attempting to book a cab online in Udupi. 

At around 1:30 PM on November 7, the man from West Bengal searched for car rentals on Google and selected a website named "Shakti Car Rentals." Shortly after, he was contacted by someone claiming to be "Rohit Sharma," who directed him to pay a registration fee of ₹150 on the site.

After unsuccessful payment attempts via both his Canara Bank debit card and SBI credit card (without receiving an OTP), "Rohit Sharma" instructed him to pay the driver directly. But at 1:47 PM, he received messages showing deductions of ₹3.3 lakh from his SBI credit card and ₹80,056 from his Canara Bank debit card, totaling ₹4.1 lakh.

The complainant alleges fraud through a deceptive link disguised as a booking token fee. A case has been registered at Udupi Town Police Station.

Mangaluru: A tragic incident unfolded on Sunday, November 17, at Vazco Resort (VAZCO), situated at Battappadi Cross Road in Someshwara on the outskirts of the city, when three young women drowned in the resort’s swimming pool. 

Disturbingly, an iPhone recording and CCTV footage captured their final moments, providing insights into the heartbreaking accident.

According to City Police Commissioner Anupam Agrawal, the tragedy occurred at approximately 10:05 AM. The victims were identified as:

Keerthana N (21) from Devaraj Mohalla, Hebbal Second Stage, Vijayanagar Post.
Nishitha M.D (21) from 4th Cross, Kuribarahalli, Mysuru.
Parvathi S (20) from Ramanuja Road, K.R. Mohalla, Mysuru.

Sequence of Events

The three women had checked into Room No. 2 of the resort on the morning of November 16 and stayed overnight. On Sunday morning, around 10 AM, they entered the swimming pool to play. Reports suggest that they placed their clothes poolside and set an iPhone to record the activity.

Initial findings indicate one woman slipped underwater and began to struggle. When the second attempted a rescue, she too drowned, followed by the third woman. Within minutes, the tragedy claimed all three lives. CCTV footage from the resort corroborates the sequence, showing the young women struggling before succumbing to the water.

Investigation Underway

The resort staff discovered the lifeless bodies and immediately raised the alarm. Ullal Police Inspector H N Balakrishna and his team are conducting an investigation. Preliminary reports suggest the women were non-swimmers, and the lack of safety measures contributed to the tragedy.

The resort is owned by Manohar, as per police records. While the formal case is yet to be registered, the incident has raised serious questions about safety protocols at resorts offering pool facilities.

The media office in the Gaza Strip, where the Israeli regime has been waging a genocidal war since last October, says as many as 188 Palestinian journalists have been killed since the onset of the brutal military onslaught.

The office provided the figure on Saturday, naming four journalists as the most recent victims of the onslaught.

It identified the foursome as Zahraa Mohammad Abu Sukheil, Ahmad Mohammad Abu Sukheil, Mustafa Khadr Bahar, and Abdel Rahman Khadr Bahar.

The office said it “strongly condemns the targeting, killing, and assassination of Palestinian journalists by the Israeli occupation and holds it fully responsible for committing this heinous crime.”

“We call on the international community, international organizations, and those involved in journalistic work worldwide to take action against the occupation, pursue it in international courts for its ongoing crimes, and pressure it to halt the genocide and the targeted killings of Palestinian journalists,” it said.

Earlier in the day, the office said the Israeli regime had bombed the tents sheltering journalists and displaced persons at the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Hospital in the city of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza for the ninth consecutive time.

The atrocity that claimed the lives of two people and injured 26 others came as part of “the genocidal crimes committed by the Israeli occupation army against hospitals, civilians, and displaced persons,” it said.

The media office held the regime and the United States, its biggest ally, as well as other countries aiding the genocide fully responsible for such systematic crimes.

At least 43,552 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed and 102,765 others wounded since the launch of the war that followed a retaliatory operation by Gaza’s resistance groups.

The fatalities include 44 people, who were killed across the coastal sliver, in the most recent phase of the military onslaught.

As many as 24 of the victims were killed in the northern part of the territory, where the regime has markedly intensified its deadly attacks for weeks.

They included an eight-year-old child and a five-year-old one, who lost their lives after Israeli warplanes targeted a group of minors filling up jerry cans with water alongside their mother at the Jabalia Refugee camp.

Gaza’s heath ministry, meanwhile, said a number of victims remained under the rubble and in the streets following Israeli airstrikes, saying ambulances and civil defense teams could not reach them due to the sheer extent of the destruction caused by the raids and obstruction caused by the regime.

Also on Saturday, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report, a United Nations-backed assessment, warned that famine was looming in northern Gaza amid escalated Israeli aggression and the regime’s near-total siege of the targeted areas.

The alert from the Famine Review Committee warned of "an imminent and substantial likelihood of famine occurring, due to the rapidly deteriorating situation in the Gaza Strip."

On October 17, the body projected that the number of people in Gaza facing "catastrophic" food insecurity between November and April 2025 would reach 345,000, or 16 percent of the population.

The IPC report classified that figure as Phase 5 -- a situation when "starvation, death, destitution, and extremely critical acute malnutrition levels are evident."

The Israeli military, however, questioned the report's credibility.

"To date, all assessments by the IPC have proven incorrect and inconsistent with the situation on the ground," the army said in a statement, denouncing "partial, biased data and superficial sources with vested interests."