Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar attended a fair disguised as a watchman in Panchkula on Tuesday evening. A video showing him taking a stroll in the Sector-5 Dussehra Ground had gone viral on social media.

The Chief Minister’s media secretary later confirmed that it was indeed Mr Khattar who showed up at the mela grounds in the attire of a watchman.

There was no security cordon for the Chief Minister as he roamed freely.

He used a scarf to hide his identity and a cap that completed his watchman attire. He made rounds in the mela grounds – sometimes holding a packet of chips and sometimes engrossed into his phone.

The plan seemed successful as no one could be seen approaching him at the fair.

Chief Ministers are guarded by the state police and get central security cover based on their threat perception.

New Delhi’s pollution levels continue to be in the severe category forcing authorities to impose emergency measures, including traffic curbs and shutting schools. The drastic air quality is a result of a cocktail of factors, the chief contributors being vehicular emissions and smoke from crop burning in neighbouring states.

NASA’s Worldview satellite has captured how the toxic smog extends from Pakistan to the Bay of Bengal. The smog is coupled with a sharp rise in farm fires in North India, shows the satellite data.

NASA data shows that the number of farm fires has seen a sharp rise since October 29. The state saw a 740 per cent increase on October 29 with 1,068 farm fire incidents – the highest in a single day in the current harvesting season.

With the air quality index as high as 500 in some areas on Wednesday morning, New Delhi has topped the chart of the world’s most polluted cities for the last six days. Stage 4 of the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP), a set of anti-pollution guidelines, has been invoked and diesel trucks and construction activities have been banned in the national capital.

The Supreme Court has asked the governments of Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan to urgently discuss with the Centre how to stop the farm fires. The court has said it cannot allow this to become a political battle, stressing that the choking air quality is responsible for the “murder of people’s health”.

G7 foreign ministers sought Wednesday to hammer out a common line on the Israel-Hamas war while vowing there would be no let-up in their support for Ukraine in its war with Russia.

The ministers were expected to call in a joint statement to be issued later in Tokyo for “humanitarian pauses” in Gaza, while stopping short of urging a ceasefire.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, arriving for the talks from his latest whirlwind Middle East tour, called Tuesday for the G7 to speak “in one clear voice” on the conflict.

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamiwaka said late Tuesday that the G7 ministers “need to call on the relevant countries to take humanitarian pauses and ensure humanitarian access, which is a pre-condition for sufficient and continued humanitarian assistance”.

A diplomatic source said after a working dinner the same day focusing on Gaza that there was “great unity that in view of the humanitarian emergency in Gaza, humanitarian care for the Palestinian civilian population needs to be urgently expanded”.

The source added that there were “constructive exchanges” about humanitarian pauses, as well as the need for discussions among the G7 and other countries in the region about the future of Gaza and how to stop the conflict from spreading.

‘Overall security’ 

The Israeli military has relentlessly bombarded Gaza since October 7, when Hamas operatives launched an attack that left 1,400 dead in Israel, most of them civilians, according to Israeli authorities.

The Hamas-run health ministry says the death number in Gaza has surpassed 10,300 people.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday there would be no fuel delivered to Gaza and no ceasefire unless the more than 240 Israeli hostages seized by Hamas were freed.

He also said Israel would assume “overall security” in Gaza after the war ends while allowing for possible “tactical pauses” before then to free captives and deliver aid to the besieged territory of 2.4 million people.

However, Washington said Tuesday it opposed a new long-term occupation of Gaza by Israel.

“Our viewpoint is that Palestinians must be at the forefront of these decisions and Gaza is Palestinian land and it will remain Palestinian land,” said State Department spokesman Vedant Patel.

“Generally speaking, we do not support the reoccupation of Gaza and neither does Israel.”

While agreeing Palestinian leadership was part of the “route towards a sustainable, peaceful two-state solution,” British foreign minister James Cleverly on Tuesday also conceded a military presence would remain after the fighting, at least temporarily.

“At some point after the immediate conflict and before the creation of civilian leadership, it is inevitable that the military forces on the ground would have to take over security control,” he said.

Ukraine fatigue 

On the Ukraine war, Japan said Wednesday after their talks that the G7 was “united” in their resolve to continue providing “strong support” to Kyiv and imposing “severe sanctions” on Russia.

Kamikawa added that “even as tensions increase in the Middle East, it is important for the G7 to be united in sending a clear message to the international community that our steadfast commitment to supporting Ukraine will never waver”.

With the war there now in its 20th month and Ukraine’s counteroffensive struggling to gain ground, President Volodymyr Zelensky has regularly met Western leaders to try to stave off fatigue over the conflict.

Ukraine’s most senior military official, General Valery Zaluzhny, was quoted last week as saying the two sides had hit a “stalemate”, an assessment rejected by both Zelensky and the Kremlin.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said earlier that G7 countries were working on providing help to Ukraine as the country braced for a second full winter of Russian attacks on energy facilities.

Systematic strikes by Moscow’s forces last year targeted Ukraine’s energy grid, leaving thousands without heating or electricity in freezing temperatures for long periods.

“It is clear, particularly at this moment, that around the world some (parties) are watching very closely how we will continue to support Ukraine,” Baerbock told reporters.

“We will do that with everything we are doing.”

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba was set to join the G7 meeting by video conference.