• Hafiz Talha Saeed, the son of 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks mastermind and LeT founder Hafiz Saeed, has been declared a terrorist by the government.
• In a notification, the Union home ministry said that Hafiz Talha Saeed, 46, has been actively involved in recruitment, fund collection, and planning and executing attacks by the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) in India and Indian interests in Afghanistan.
• He has also been actively visiting various LeT centres across Pakistan, and during his sermons propagating for jihad against India, Israel, the United States of America and Indian interests in other western countries, it stated.
• Hafiz Saeed was the brain behind the Mumbai terror attacks of November 26, 2008, in which 166 people were killed.
• He had been declared a terrorist under the same law a few years ago and is currently serving a jail term in Pakistan on terror charges.
• India has been consistently seeking Hafiz Saeed's custody but Pakistan has refused to do so.
• Apart from the 26/11 attacks, the LeT has been responsible for a series of deadly attacks in India, mostly in Jammu and Kashmir, in which scores of civilians and security personnel have been killed over the years.

• In a boost to the Aam Aadmi Party's plan to strengthen its base in Jammu and Kashmir, a former state minister, an ex-MLA and a former Congress leader joined the party.
• Along with them, more than hundred local leaders including village heads, block development council (BDC) members and district development council (DDC) members also joined the party.
• They were officially inducted into the AAP by Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and Environment Minister Gopal Rai in the presence of Durgesh Pathak, in-charge of party's political affairs in Jammu and Kashmir, and other leaders at the party headquarters.
• Former Jammu and Kashmir minister Yash Paul Kundal, ex-legislator Balwant Singh Mankotia, DDC member Taranjit Singh Tony and former Congress leader Surinder Singh Shingari were among the prominent faces who joined the Arvind Kejriwal-led party.
• Tony had defeated former BJP minister Sham Lal Choudhary in the DDC election in Suchetgarh constituency in 2020.

• Just a day after a huge controversy erupted over the viral pictures of protesting theatre artists and a scribe being kept inside a police station lock-up in their undergarments in MP's Sidhi district, the state's DGP Sudhir Kumar Saxena tasked a senior IPS officer to probe the entire episode.
• The 2009 batch MP cadre IPS officer, hailing from adjoining UP, is presently posted as the senior police superintendent (SSP) of the Radio division of the state police in Bhopal.
• Till now, two cops, including the Sidhi Kotwali police station in-charge Mukesh Soni and sub-inspector Abhishek Singh, have been sent to district police lines post the incident.
• The controversy erupted when a group of theatre artists, protesting the arrest of local theatre personality Neeraj Kunder on the evening of April 2 for an alleged abusive social media post about local BJP MLA Kedarnath Shukla and son Gurudutt, were detained by Sidhi Kotwali police along with local scribe Kanishk Tiwari, who was covering the protest.
• Kanishk Tiwari, who claimed he was targeted for his stories against the BJP MLA in the past, alleged that he and the protestors were beaten by cops and then forced to strip and remain in their underclothing in the police lock-up from April 2 till the night of April 3, before being released after furnishing personal surety bonds on April 3.
• The episode has not only exposed the inhuman face of MP police, but also proved that the state police is yet to learn from its past mistakes.
• Back in October 2017. a group of farmers, violently protesting in Tikamgarh district as part of opposition Congress' Khet Bachao-Kisan Bachao Andolan, were rounded up, thrashed mercilessly and then stripped in custody at the Tikamgarh Dehat police station.

• A self-styled commander of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) outfit, who was involved in several attacks on civilians including non-locals and security personnel, was killed in an encounter in Anantnag district of Jammu and Kashmir.
• The slain terrorist was identified as Nisar Ahmad Dar alias Musaib, resident of Redwani Bala, Kulgam.

• Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) president Shehbaz Sharif  has nominated himself for the post of prime minister after the unceremonious ouster of Imran Khan.
• The move came hours after Khan was removed from office through a no-confidence vote held on April 10 , becoming the first premier in the country's history to be sent home after losing the trust of the House.
• In accordance with the deadline of the submission stipulated by the National Assembly, 70-year-old Shehbaz submitted nomination papers for the new leader of the house .
• Former president and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) co-chair Asif Ali Zardari had proposed Shehbaz's name for the Prime Minister's position in a joint opposition's meeting last month.
• PML-N senior leaders Khawaja Asif and Rana Tanveer will act as endorsers for Shehbaz.
• Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party nominated 65-year-old former foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi as its candidate for the premier's post.
• PTI leaders Aamir Dogar and Ali Muhammad Khan will serve as endorsers for the party's vice-chairman.
• The National Assembly Secretariat had earlier announced the time for the submission of nomination papers and scrutiny for the election of premier and leader of the house.

• The government informed that it has granted a one-time window to surrender non-operational coal mines without any penalty. The decision, taken by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs provides three months to the Central and State PSUs to surrender non-operational mines without penalty (forfeiture of bank guarantee) and without citing any reason.
• The ministry said post cancellation of coal blocks by the Supreme Court in 2014, to prevent immediate disruption of coal supplies to thermal power plants, the government has allotted many cancelled coal blocks to state and central PSUs on the allotment route.
• The allocation route was expeditious and it was expected that the coal requirement of State GENCOs would be met from those blocks. Till December-2021, 45 mines out of 73 coal mines allotted PSUs, remained non-operational and the due date of commencement of mining operations in case of 19 coal mines has already passed. 

• Yields on 10-year government bonds breached 7% levels for the first time since June 2019 after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said that it is now prioritizing inflation over growth. The 10-year bonds closed the day at 7.12% gaining almost 20 basis points from its  Apr 7 close of 6.914%. Bond yields rise in expectation of a likely increase in interest rates or withdrawal of excess liquidity from the market.
• The RBI governor said that the central bank is finally changing its long-held policy stance of growth over inflation to inflation over growth, given the geopolitical tensions prevalent in Europe. Though rise in government bond yields is significant as several small savings schemes are linked to these rates. However, it is unlikely that it will have any bearings on deposit or lending rates immediately as transmission takes time.
• The RBI governor also said that the government is gradually moving away from an ultra-accommodative stance to an accommodative stance. As a step towards this, the introduced Standing Deposit Facility (SDF) – a tool through which it can absorb excess cash from banks without having to give them government securities in collateral.
• The SDF rate will be 25 bps below the policy rate (repo rate of 4%). The Marginal Standing Facility (MSF) rate will continue to be 25 bps above the policy repo rate.

‘No rupee-rouble payment platform yet’

The RBI has refuted reports that it is facilitating any rupee-rouble payment platform. The RBI governor Shaktikanta Das said that it is not working on any such payment system, and that it will not do anything that goes against the global sanctions on Russia. The governor reiterated that the Central bank will have to be sensitive to the sanctions. The governor, however, admitted both importers and exporters are facing problems in making payment (for trades with Russia) and they have made representation with both the government and the RBI. He said as and when any (alternate) system is worked out, it will make an announcement, but for now no such system has been in place. The government has in parliament said that an inter-ministerial group led by the finance ministry is seeing how the payments issue can be addressed. 

Former England head coach Chris Silverwood is all set to take charge of the Sri Lankan national team, the country's cricket board announced.

The former England pacer's first competitive assignment with the Sri Lanka national team will be the upcoming away Test series in Bangladesh.

He is contracted for a two-year period.

Silverwood was appointed as the head coach of England men's team in October 2019.

He had previously served as the team's bowling coach, working under then head coach Trevor Bayliss when England won the ICC Men's ODI World Cup in 2019.

Silverwood featured in six Tests and seven ODIs for England and played county cricket for Yorkshire and Middlesex.