News Dabba for 19 December 2022: Five stories for a balanced news diet

Indie Journal brings you the daily updates that the internet is talking about through various news websites. Here's a glance through some of the National and International news updates, from the Maharashtra-Karnataka border dispute flaring up, Thailand warship capsising, to govt planning to raise duty on non-essential goods.

Thailand warship capsises leaving 31 sailors missing, BBC reports

The Thai Navy says 31 sailors are missing after a warship carrying over 100 crew capsised and sank during a storm in the Gulf of Thailand. BBC reported that the HTMAS Sukhotai sank after water flooded its power controls on Sunday night. Authorities said on Monday they had rescued 75 crew but 31 were still missing in rough seas. "It's been more than 12 hours but we will keep looking," a navy spokesman said in a BBC report. The navy also announced an investigation into the cause of the disaster. Read the full report here.

NDTV reports Karnataka-Maharashtra row: Belagavi turns fortress

Nationalist Congress Party and Shiv Sena leaders were detained and taken into preventive custody amid simmering tension at the Karnataka-Maharashtra border where huge protests were planned today. NCP's Hasan Mushrif, and Shiv Sena's Kolhapur district president Vijay Devane, were detained today while trying to enter Karnataka's Belagavi, NDTV reported. The 10-day winter session of the Karnataka Assembly is being held in Belgavi. More than 300 members of Shiv Sena, Congress, and NCP were stopped at the border and sent back by Karnataka, and some were detained by the Maharashtra police. Read the full report here.

Elon Musk polls Twitter users about whether he should step down, The Hindu

Elon Musk is asking Twitter’s users to decide if he should stay in charge of the social media platform, The Hindu reports. He acknowledged that he made a mistake on Sunday in launching new speech restrictions that banned mentions of rival social media websites. In yet another drastic policy change, Twitter had announced that users will no longer be able to link to Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon and other platforms the company described as “prohibited.” But the move generated immediate criticism, including from past defenders of Twitter's new billionaire owner. Read the full report here.

IE reports govt plans to raise duty on non-essential goods

The government is planning to regulate imports of “non-essential items” through hikes in import duties, the Indian Express reports, with a slowdown in exports being seen as a cause of concern in the context of a widening trade deficit. The economic ministries in the Central government are in the process of carrying out an exercise to select a list of items on a granular basis to ensure that the proposed duty hikes are restricted to those items for which there is enough manufacturing capacity in the country, but not for other items in the categories that come under the same Harmonised System of Nomenclature (HSN) code.  Read the full report here.

Israel draws condemnation as deported human rights lawyer arrives in Paris

France has condemned Israel’s expulsion of French Palestinian human rights lawyer Salah Hamouri. Arab News reports he had been held in an Israeli prison without charge since March after being accused of security offenses. Hamouri, 37, had been held in Israel under a controversial practice known as administrative detention, which allows suspects to be detained for renewable periods of up to six months. He arrived at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport on Sunday morning, the report adds. Read the full report here.