Shah Rukh Khan took on a mentoring role rather than a romantic one with Alia Bhatt in Gauri Shinde’s Dear Zindagi, marking a shift in dynamics in the industry. Fast forward seven years, and now Akshay Kumar and Ananya Panday are set to portray a mentor-pupil relationship in Karan Johar’s The Untold Story Of C. Sankaran Nair. Directed by Karan Singh Tyagi, the biopic casts Akshay Kumar in the lead role of Nair, known for his battle against the British empire concerning the Jallianwala Bagh massacre.

According to insiders close to the project, Akshay Kumar and Ananya Panday assume the roles of lawyers. Akshay portrays a seasoned and highly esteemed lawyer, while Ananya’s character is a newcomer seeking guidance from Akshay’s character. 

Akshay Kumar was last seen in Tinu Suresh Desai’s Mission Raniganj: The Great Bharat Rescue, which premiered in October. The film centred around the remarkable efforts of Jaswant Singh Gill, who rescued a substantial number of miners trapped in a flooded mine in Raniganj in 1989. In the movie, Akshay portrayed Gill, sharing the screen with talents like Parineeti Chopra, Kumud Mishra, Pavan Malhotra, and more. Recently, the film began streaming on Netflix.

A Nicaragua-bound plane carrying more than 300 Indian passengers has been grounded in France over suspected “human trafficking”, authorities said Friday.

The aircraft carrying passengers “likely to be victims of human trafficking” was detained on Thursday after an anonymous tipoff, the Paris public prosecutor’s office told AFP.

The plane had taken off from the United Arab Emirates.

The national anti-organised crime unit JUNALCO has taken over the investigation, prosecutors said.

The prefecture in the northeastern department of Marne said the A340, operated by Romanian company Legend Airlines, “remained grounded on the tarmac at Vatry airport following its landing”.

The plane had been due to refuel and was carrying 303 Indian nationals, it said.

According to a source familiar with the case, the Indian passengers might have planned to travel to Central America in order to attempt illegal entry into the United States or Canada.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Following reports of the International Monetary Fund cautioning India on alleged government debt vulnerabilities, the Centre on Friday said that certain presumptions have been made, which do not reflect the factual position.

One of the key points that the finance ministry has raised is that a majority of India’s general government debt, which includes those of the Centre and states, is in rupees, and external borrowings make up only a small portion. It pointed out that the rollover risk is low for domestic debt.

In its Article IV consultations with India, the IMF had said that, under adverse shocks, the country’s general government debt could be 100% of debt to GDP ratio by FY 2028. The ministry has clarified that this was mentioned as an extreme possibility like “once-in-a-century Covid-19” and was among various favourable and unfavourable scenarios that were listed. The ministry has emphasised that in that instance, the IMF was talking only of a worst-case scenario and this is not a “fait accompli”.

The finance ministry also pointed out that IMF reports for other countries showed a much higher extreme scenario for them, with the figures being 160% for the US, 140% for the UK and 200% for China. 

The IMF report for India also indicates that, under favourable circumstances, the General Government Debt to GDP ratio may decline to below 70 per cent in the same period, the ministry said.

The ministry said that shocks like Covid-19 and the Russia-Ukraine war have uniformly impacted the global economy. Despite this, it said, India has done relatively well and is still below the debt level of 2002.

It also emphasised that the general government debt has reduced significantly from approximately 88% in FY 2020-21 to about 81% in 2022-23 and that the Centre is on track to “achieve its stated fiscal consolidation target (to reduce fiscal deficit below 4.5 per cent of GDP by FY 2025-26)”.