A residents’ body in Noida on Monday said it will move the Supreme Court against the Allahabad High Court’s recent order acquitting domestic help Surendra Koli and his employer Moninder Singh Pandher in the 2006 Nithari serial killings.

The District Development Residents Welfare Association (DDRWA) is consulting legal experts and has met the victim families to take the case further.

“We first thought of extending financial assistance to the victim families but after discussions, it was decided that we will take up the case and bear the legal expenses of the case in the Supreme Court,” DDRWA president N P Singh told news agency PTI.

“We have taken the consent of the victim families, and are consulting lawyers who are studying the high court’s order. They will guide us on the way ahead in this case. We are hoping to move the Supreme Court within a week,” Mr Singh added.

Ashok, who had lost his five-year-old son in the Nithari serial killings, said he has spoken to the residents’ body about the case.

“I have given them my go head for taking up this case in the top court. Let’s see what happens next,” Ashok, who runs a footwear shop, told PTI.

Businessman Moninder Singh Pandher, 65, who was arrested in the sensational case, walked out of Luksar jail in Greater Noida on Friday.

The Allahabad High Court on October 16 acquitted him and his domestic help Koli in the case after noting that the prosecution had failed to prove guilt “beyond reasonable doubt” and that the investigation was botched up.

The two were charged with rape and murder and sentenced to death by a lower court in the killings in Nithari, Noida, that horrified the nation with the details of sexual assault, brutal murder and hints of possible cannibalism.

The Congress on Monday night declared its candidate for the last remaining assembly constituency in Madhya Pradesh, Amla in Betul district, but with a bureaucrat who was tipped to be the party nominee not getting government’s nod in time to quit service, the ticket has gone to someone else for the next month’s polls.

The opposition party fielded its member Manoj Malve from Amla and with this, it has completed the process of putting up nominees on all the 230 assembly seats for the November 17 elections.

The Congress, in two separate lists, had declared 229 candidates with only the Amla seat left out.

Earlier, Betul deputy collector Nisha Bangre, whose resignation is awaiting the state government’s approval, was tipped to be the Congress candidate from the constituency.

However, after the announcement of Mr Malve’s candidature, suspense over Ms Bangre’s entry into poll fray has ended.

Ms Bangre has approached the Madhya Pradesh High Court seeking direction to the government for speedy acceptance of her resignation, which she tendered on June 22.

However, the bureaucrat’s petition had been pending as she faces disciplinary proceedings, her counsel, senior advocate Brian De Silva, had said earlier.

While hearing her petition, the High Court in Jabalpur earlier last week directed the state government to take a decision by October 23 on her resignation from service and disciplinary proceedings against her.

With the Congress fielding candidates on all the 230 seats in MP, it is clear the national outfit has not entered into any tie-up with its two allies in the INDIA bloc, the Samajwadi Party (SP) or the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

The SP and the AAP have come out with separate lists of candidates for the polls in the BJP-ruled state.

Israel bombarded Gaza with air strikes early today killing at least 70 people, Hamas officials said as the military said it had struck some 320 targets in the Palestinian enclave in 24 hours.

The Israeli military said Monday it had hit “over 320 military targets in the Gaza Strip” over the past 24 hours.

“The terror targets struck included tunnels containing Hamas terrorists, dozens of operational command centres… and Islamic Jihad terrorists, military compounds, and observation posts,” the army said in a statement.

Israel’s attacks concentrated on the Gaza Strip’s centre and north, Palestinian media reported. A strike on a house near the Jabalia refugee camp, in northern Gaza, killed several Palestinians and wounded others, according to media reports.

Health authorities in Gaza said at least 4,600 people were killed in Israel’s two-week bombardment that began after a Hamas Oct. 7 rampage on southern Israeli communities in which 1,400 people were killed and 212 were taken into Gaza as hostages.

Here are the live updates on the Israel-Hamas war: