New Delhi, November 1
A 24-year-old woman allegedly strangled one of her twin infant girls, dumped her body inside a gutter at Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Hospital and fabricated a story to mislead the police.

The woman was arrested today and she has been identified as Gudiya. She is a resident of Madhubani district in Bihar. She lives with her husband Sameer in north-east Delhi. She gave birth to twin baby girls three months ago.

"Gudiya told us that she was upset with the birth of her twin girls and after their crying became unbearable for her, she hatched a plan to get rid of one of them," said a police officer.

On October 29, Gudiya learnt that one of her daughters was suffering from high fever. She went to the Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Hospital, where doctors diagnosed her daughter with pneumonia and admitted her.

According to the police, she decided to rid herself of her second daughter. She first allegedly strangled her and then dumped her body inside a gutter located at the rear side of the Child Care Unit Ward of the hospital. She then fled.

After receiving a complaint of blockage in the main pipeline, the housekeeping department of the hospital sent its staff to fix the problem. A sanitation worker, Mukesh, spotted the body lying inside the gutter after which the police was informed.

The police reached the site of the incident. They informed people at the hospital about the body. Gudiya appeared and recognised the body of her daughter.

When the police questioned her, she allegedly fabricated a story, saying her daughter was kidnapped by a woman. She claimed to have asked the woman to look after her child, while she went to the bathroom.

The post-mortem report confirmed that the baby was strangled before being thrown into the gutter. Her mother was detained. According to the police, she broke down and confessed to murdering her child.

New Delhi, November 1
Ahead of the Diwali while extra manpower has been pressed into service at various hospitals emergencies in Delhi with elaborate stock of treatment material for patients with burns the fascination of Diwali celebration with firecrackers has resulted with patients in the casualties.

For a girl who was rushed to the burns emergency of Safdarjung Hospital last night it turned out to be fatal.

"She was lighting a cracker bomb when her clothes and surroundings caught fire. She had suffered 80 per cent burns and succumbed to it last night itself," said Dr Karoon Agarwal, senior consultant at burns and plastics department of the hospital.

In another case of an 18-year-old boy who suffered deep burns on his hands while lighting flower pot cracker (anar) last night and reached Dr Ganga Ram Hospital's burns casualty it was his prompt and wise act of putting his burnt hand in water for 30 minutes (rule of thumb in burns) that reduced the damage, said Dr Mahesh Mangal, chairperson of burns and plastic department of the private hospital.

"The boy came this morning with a major hand injury but he did not require admission. The best thing was that he kept his burnt hand in water for 30 minutes which helped. If done immediately, this reduces the heat's intensity and does the depth of the burn based on which it is either superficial or severe - degrees of burns," added Dr Mahesh.

Sounding a word of caution for people while playing crackers, he stressed, "People generally come with hand and face burns and so people should be careful while lighting them. In case of children, it should be ensured that they are not wearing synthetic and loose clothes and they play under supervision of parents." Besides, people should not apply toothpastes and burnt oil on wounds and come to hospitals straight, he added.

According to Dr Karoon, people this time have started coming with burns due to crackers a bit early. "We have received 11 patients in total in the last three days which is not a good sign. Generally patients start coming pre-Diwali, though more people come on DIwali and post-Diwali," he noted.

As per experience of previous years, he further said, extra staff has been deputed on the job from tomorrow at the burns department and casualty, which receives a major chunk of burns patients from Delhi and nearby areas during the three-day Diwali period when all designated government hospitals revoke a disaster management protocol to deal with rush of patients with firecrackers and related injuries.

New Delhi, November 1
The timings for the Delhi Metro rail services have been altered for the upcoming festival day of Diwali while special arrangements are being made to handle the rush on Bhai Duj on November 5, officials said.

On Diwali, which falls on November 3, the last Metro train will leave at 8 pm from terminal stations for all Metro lines, including the Airport Express service.

The services would, however, begin as usual on November 3 from 6 am onwards on all lines and from 4.45 am onwards on the Airport Express Line, a DMRC official said.

On Bhai Duj an expected rise in the number of commuters using the Metro services would see two extra trains kept on standby for each line in order to clear passenger rush, the official added.

On November 5, the DMRC will also deploy more customer facilitation agents to help commuters at busy Metro stations and will also operate additional ticket counters, if required, to handle the increased load on the ticketing system, the official said.

The Metro rail services on Bhai Duj will be available as usual from 6 am to 11 pm on all lines and from 4.45 am to 11.30 pm on the Airport Express Line, the official added.

New Delhi, November 1
The Election Commission of India (ECI) and Office of the Chief Electoral Officer, Delhi, organized a training-cum-briefing session of all the Returning Officers (RO) and Assistant Returning Officers (AROs) regarding the Delhi Assembly elections.

The session was chaired by Vinod Jutshi, DEC, ECI, and Vijay Dev, Delhi Chief Electoral Officer.

While addressing the gathering of ROs and AROs, Jutshi emphasized the importance of proper training of ROs and AROs and their familiarization with the instructions issued by the ECI and various other directions of the Supreme Court relating to "None of the Above", filing of affidavits and recent amendment to the 
RP Act 1951 on the status of a person as an elector, if he is under police custody.

S.K. Mendiratta, Legal Adviser, ECI and K.F. Wilfred, Principal Secretary, ECI, dealing with the legal matters of the ECI cited various court rulings on the matters relating to nomination, scrutiny, etc. The officers from Rajasthan were invited as a resource person apart from the officers of the ECI and the CEO office.

The ROs and AROs were also given demonstrations of the functioning of Electronic Voting Machines and various steps involved to ensure that they are correctly commissioned and handled as per the laid down procedure.

Dev said that every officer should be equipped with the knowledge of various statutes, instructions and process on the matter of conduct of elections.

"It is towards this goal that repeated training sessions have been organized at various levels. So far, 1,805 senior officers, including DEOs, police officers, ROs, AROs and sector officers have been trained," he added.

The CEO informed that the training has also been percolated down to the Inspectors to head constables. It was informed that the training of presiding officers will be held in three phases commencing from November 4 and will be concluded by December 3.

New Delhi, November 1
Five alleged robbers have been arrested for being involved in a dozen robberies and dacoities in Delhi.

Haru Khan, Amarjit, Taiyyab, Babu Shaikh and Mohammad Zafar were arrested by the Crime Branch of the Delhi Police.

The police were tipped off yesterday that Haru would be coming with his associates in an auto-rickshaw at the Wazirpur depot. The police intercepted the auto-rickshaw and arrested five persons.

A country-made pistol with two cartridges of .315 bore was seized from Haru. He said that he had allegedly murdered a man named Suresh in Geeta Colony, east Delhi, last March. "The attack took place after Suresh and his friends had a scuffle with Haru and his associates," said Additional Commissioner of Police (Crime Branch) Ravindra Yadav.

Suresh had reported the matter to the police on which Haru's associate Alam was arrested. In retaliation, Haru, along with his associates, armed with knives and lathis allegedly attacked Suresh's family. Suresh was shifted to a hospital, where he succumbed to his injuries. A case under murder and riot was registered at the Geeta Colony police station, but Haru was evading arrest.

Haru allegedly said that on September 25 he with his associates went to Shahbad Dairy and entered a godown by scaling the wall and then overpowered the guard and other labourers. They had robbed a large quantity of copper scrap.

Two days after the incident, the gang again went to Shahbad Dairy and noticed police patrolling the area. Thereafter, some members of the gang entered the premises of Jindal Public School and overpowered the staff.

"They took away cash, mobile phones and jewellery," Yadav added. The gang members also disclosed their involvement in more than a dozen incidents of burglary in the Mori Gate area and several other parts of Delhi.