Jan 17 news LIVE! IndiGo fined Rs 22 crore for mass cancellations: Reports

Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut on Friday (January 16) said Mumbai would not have seen a BJP mayor had Maharashtra Deputy Chief Eknath Shinde not betrayed the party.

In a post on X, Raut drew parallel to Jaichand, a historical character reviled for betrayal.

"Had Eknath Shinde not been a Jaichand to Shiv Sena, Mumbai would not have seen a BJP mayor. Marathi people will always remember Shinde as Jaichand," Raut said.

Shinde, along with 39 MPs, revolted against the party leadership of Uddhav Thackeray and dislodged his government in 2022. Since then, the Shiv Sena (UBT) leader has routinely labelled Shinde as a traitor.

The BJP wins 89 seats in the BMC elections, results of which were announced on Friday. Its ally Shiv Sena got 29. The two parties crossed the halfway mark in the 227-member civic body.

The undivided Shiv Sena controlled the BMC from 1997 to 2022.

The Palestinian committee set to govern Gaza under US supervision met for the first time on Friday (January 16) in Cairo, as its leader pledged to get to work quickly to improve conditions there.

Ali Shaath, an engineer and former Palestinian Authority official from Gaza, expects reconstruction and recovery to take about three years. He plans to focus first on immediate needs, including shelter.

“The Palestinian people were looking forward to this committee, its establishment and its work to rescue them,” Shaath said after the meeting, in a television interview with Egypt's state-owned Al-Qahera News.

US President Donald Trump supports the group's efforts to lead Gaza after the two-year war between Israel and Hamas. Israeli troops withdrew from parts of Gaza after the ceasefire took effect on October 10, and are now behind the so-called Yellow Line, while thousands of displaced Palestinians have returned to what is left of their homes.

“I am backing a newly appointed Palestinian Technocratic Committee, the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, supported by the Board's High Representative, to govern Gaza during its transition,” Trump said on Thursday (January 15) in a social media post.

The committee will run day-to-day affairs in Gaza, under the oversight of a Trump-led “Board of Peace,” whose members have not yet been named.

As Iran returned to uneasy calm after a wave of protests that drew a bloody crackdown, a senior hard-line cleric called on Friday (January 16) for the death penalty for detained demonstrators and directly threatened US President Donald Trump — evidence of the rage gripping authorities in the Islamic Republic.

Trump, though, struck a conciliatory note, thanking Iran's leaders for not executing hundreds of detained protesters, in a further sign he may be backing away from a military strike. Executions, as well as the killing of peaceful protesters, are two of the red lines laid down by Trump for possible action against Iran.

Harsh repression that has left several thousand people dead appears to have succeeded in stifling demonstrations that began on December 28 over Iran's ailing economy and morphed into protests directly challenging the country's theocracy.

There have been no signs of protests for days in Tehran, where shopping and street life have returned to outward normality, though a week-old internet blackout continued. Authorities have not reported any unrest elsewhere in the country.

“Iran cancelled the hanging of over 800 people,” Trump told reporters in Washington, adding that "I greatly respect the fact that they cancelled.” Trump did not clarify who he spoke to in Iran to confirm the state of any planned executions.

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency on Friday put the death toll at 3,090. The number, which exceeds that of any other round of protest or unrest in Iran in decades and recalls the chaos surrounding the 1979 revolution, continues to rise.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be visiting Assam for two days from Saturday (January 17), during which he will flag off two Amrit Bharat trains and lay the foundation stone for the Kaziranga elevated corridor, officials said.

Modi's visit to the northeastern state, where assembly elections are due in the first half of 2026, will be his second tour in less than a month.

Soon after the PM's arrival in Guwahati in the evening, he is scheduled to witness the Bodo folk dance 'Bagurumba' by 10,000 performers at the Arjun Bhogeswar Barua Sports Complex in the city.

In a post on X, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said, "The PM has witnessed Bihu with us, he has witnessed Jhumoir with us and in a few hours from now, Adarniya @narendramodi ji will also witness the biggest ever #BagurumbaDwhou performance as over 10,000 performers enthral the world with their breath-taking performance. Are you ready?” The PM will spend the night at the state guest house at Koinadhara in Guwahati, the officials said.

He will leave for Kaliabor on Sunday morning to lay the foundation stone for the Rs 6,957 crore Kaziranga elevated corridor, they said.

Modi is also scheduled to virtually flag off two Amrit Bharat Express trains, the Dibrugarh-Gomti Nagar (Lucknow) and the Kamakhya-Rohtak, and address a public meeting at Kaliabor before leaving for West Bengal.

Reduced visibility due to dense fog in most parts of Delhi on Saturday morning (January 17) led to several flights being delayed at Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI) as cold wave conditions persisted in the national capital.

Since flight operations are expected to be disrupted further due to the weather conditions, passengers are asked to clarify the status of their flights with the respective airlines before proceeding to the airport.

There has been some improvement in the minimum temperature in Delhi with the India Meteorological Department (IMD) recording 7 degrees Celsius on Saturday morning. The minimum temperature was 4 degrees Celsius on Friday (January 16).