Twitter on Thursday suffered a major outage as signing in to its web version was difficult for a lot of users who were greeted with an error message when they tried signing in, according to Al Jazeera.

In the early hours of Thursday, when users attempted to access the microblogging service, they were met with an error notice.

More than 8,700 users reported problems with the site as of 7:30 am EST (12:30 pm GMT), Al Jazeera reported citing Downdetector, which tracks website outages.

“User reports indicate Twitter is having problems since 7:13 EST,” Downdetector said in a tweet.

The outage occurs two months after Elon Musk acquired Twitter in a USD 44 billion deal.

One of the richest men in the world and Tesla CEO Elon Musk has significantly decreased the platform’s personnel, introduced a paid membership service, and overseen divisive modifications to its moderation procedures.

In the latest move, Musk has decided to reform Twitter policies and said that the new Twitter policy will follow and question science.

Following the release of former Maharashtra Home minister Anil Deshmukh in a money laundering case, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar said that he will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah to prevent anyone going through a similar situation in the future.

The NCP chief also termed the arrest of Deshmukh and Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut as an example of “misuse of power” by investigating agencies. Speaking to media persons in Pune after Deshmukh was released on bail, the NCP chief said, “The best example of how the agency can be misused is the arrest of Anil Deshmukh, Sanjay Raut and many co-workers.”

Deshmukh on Wednesday was released from Arthur Road jail in Mumbai. He was released after formalities for his release were completed and sureties furnished.

“Whatever the order of the court has come, it is going to be appropriate to consider and make changes if the people present in today’s government have good sense. The court has clearly said in its order that there is no evidence against him. The court has clearly said in its order that the accusations were made of about Rs 100 crores but in the chargesheet, the figure was reduced to Rs 1 crore,” Pawar said.

He further said that Deshmukh has finally got justice.

“So it is clear that there has been an abuse of power and a dutiful and cultured person has been put in jail for almost 13 months. Today finally the judiciary has given justice. But the Prime Minister and Home Minister should think about the people who have created this situation,” the NCP chief said.

Pawar said that he will meet the Prime Minister and the Home Minister so that the torture some of his co-workers had to endure should be prevented in future.

“After gathering some more information about the agencies involved in this case, I and some of my colleagues will meet the Prime Minister and the Home Minister and talk about it. Our effort will be to prevent such a situation in future as our co-workers had suffered a lot,” he further said.

On the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, Pawar also said that his party is working on what changes can be brought in this law and he also plans to raise the issue of taking its review in the parliament.

Deshmukh advocate Aniket Nikam said CBI had moved another application yesterday for extension of stay on order granting him bail.

“Yesterday one more application was moved on behalf of CBI seeking further extension of the stay order. The application was rejected by the High Court,” Nikam said.

According to the conditions imposed by the court, Deshmukh cannot leave the jurisdiction of Mumbai without the prior approval of the trial court and must cooperate with the investigation.

Anil Deshmukh was granted conditional bail by the Bombay High Court on December 12 on a bond of Rs 1 lakh but the CBI filed an application for a stay order to challenge it in Supreme Court which was granted by Bombay HC. A stay of 10 days was granted, and later it was extended till December 27.

On Tuesday the plea for its further extension days was rejected by the Bombay High Court.

The CBI had filed a corruption case against the NCP leader.

NEW DELHI, Dec 28: The Delhi High Court has imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on the Union home and personnel ministries and others for their failure to file response to a petition filed by more than 500 CISF inspectors, who have not been promoted for 19 years as compared to the stipulated five.
A bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Neena Bansal Krishna issued an order on December 21, giving a “last opportunity to the respondents to file the written submissions within four weeks subject to costs of Rs 10,000 to be deposited with the Delhi High Court Legal Services Committee.” The respondents in the case include the Union home ministry, under whose command the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) functions, the CISF director general, the chairman of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) and the personnel ministry.
More than 540 inspectors of the CISF filed a writ petition before the court early this year alleging “deprivation” in their career progression as they got only one promotion (from sub-inspector to inspector) in more than 34 years of service and they have no “future prospects” to look forward to for their next promotion to the officer rank of Assistant Commandant (AC).
The petition of the inspectors, recruited in the central force between 1987 and 2005, has provided figures and data to apprise the court about their grievance.
“As on date, the senior-most inspectors (executive) who joined the CISF in 1987 as direct sub-inspector have earned only one promotion (from SI to inspector) in 28 years and the reduction in promotion quota (from 50 per cent to 33 per cent) has further brought down their chances of promotion,” the petition stated.
They stated that while their contemporaries in other central forces (like CRPF and BSF) got due promotion to the officer rank of Assistant Commandant and even beyond, they are stuck at the sub-officer ranks of inspector despite serving for over 30 years.
The promotion ladder in the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) in the sub-officer ranks move from SI to inspector followed by a promotion in the officer rank of Assistant Commandant.
The group of inspectors alleged in their petition to the court that no cadre review for promoting them has been undertaken in the CISF since 1990.
They claimed that the Union home ministry and the CISF DG also “misguided” a Parliamentary Committee, saying that inspectors were being promoted after five years.
“The same material fact is false and vexatious, having no credible relevancy because the cadre of inspector executive is not getting promotion to the next rank of AC even after completion of more than 19 years of service, however, counterparts of other CAPFs are getting promotion in time-bound manner…,” the petition accessed by PTI submitted.
The paramilitary force, in its reply before the court, had said promotions in this force cannot be compared with other CAPFs as the CISF is a “need-based force mainly deployed in PSU/other installations and the post of Assistant Commandant in CISF is created only as per needs of the client organisation”.
The petitioners rejected the statement made by their force, contending they were suffering as adequate number of Assistant Commandant posts were not created coupled with “adverse recruitment rules, non compliance of standard rules and concealment of facts from the Parliamentary committee that was sheer illegal, arbitrary and discriminatory.” They submitted that the sanctioned manpower in the CISF has increased from 95,863 in the year 1988-99 to 1,63,590 (2021) but “no career progression particularly to the extent of time-bound promotion was ever done to petitioners who are well equipped with more experience, skills, education, discipline and length of service and are badly affected by the illegal, arbitrary act of the respondents.” The inspectors have knocked at the court’s door seeking its direction to the respondents for giving them their due promotion to the rank of AC along with consequential benefits with a retrospective benefit (from when they were supposed to be promoted as per rules).
The court is stipulated to hear the matter next on February 3. The CISF guards major civil airports of the country apart from the Delhi Metro, historical monuments like Taj Mahal and Red Fort, government ministries in Delhi and a number of sensitive installations in the aerospace and nuclear domain. (AGENCIES)

Ahmedabad: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s mother Heeraben Modi has been hospitalised after her health deteriorated last night.
Heeraben Modi, who turned 99 in June this year, has been admitted to a hospital in Ahmedabad. A statement from UN Mehta Institute of Cardiology and Research Centre has said that her condition is stable. The hospital has not shared any other piece of information.

The BJP’s Gujarat MLAs Darshanaben Vaghela and Kaushik Jain have reached the hospital.

The Prime Minister, who has often spoken of his bond with his mother, visited her recently when he was in Gujarat to campaign for the recently held Assembly polls. Visuals of the Prime Minister chatting and having tea with Heeraben Modi had then emerged on social media.

The Prime Minister had also visited her on her 99th birthday in June. To mark her centenary entry, the Prime Minister had also written an emotional blog titled ‘Mother’.

The news of Heeraben Modi’s hospitalisation comes shortly after the Prime Minister’s brother Prahlad Modi and other family members were injured in a car accident at Mysuru in Karnataka.