Maharashtra | Pakistan

The deputy chief minister of India’s wealthiest state of Maharashtra, Ajit Pawar, was killed on Wednesday, along with four people on board his charter aircraft that went down in flames, the aviation regulator said. Pawar, who hailed from a top political family, was en route to his home region to canvass in local body elections, media said. Two of his staff and two crew were also aboard the aircraft, the directorate general of civil aviation said. “No person on board has survived,” it added in an initial statement. Pawar backed Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party in the state government, leading a faction that split in 2023 from the opposition Nationalist Congress Party. Video showed billows of smoke rising from some of the burning wreckage of the plane, scattered across an open field. Media said Pawar’s aircraft, travelling from the financial capital of Mumbai, tried to make an emergency landing in the family stronghold of Baramati, 250 km away, where he was set to canvass in the elections. ...

India’s Maharashtra state, home to the financial hub Mumbai, will be the first to roll out Elon Musk’s Starlink internet service in the world’s most populous country, the state’s chief minister said. The launch of Starlink, which provides high-speed internet to remote locations using low-orbit satellites, has sparked fierce debate in India over issues ranging from predatory pricing to spectrum allocation. India — projected to have more than 900 million internet users by year’s end — granted Starlink a licence in June. Maharashtra was “poised to become the first Indian state to formally collaborate with Starlink”, the state’s Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said on the Musk-owned platform X late Wednesday. “This collaboration … will ensure the state leads India in satellite-enabled digital infrastructure.” In March, India’s biggest telecom service providers — Jio Platforms and its rival Bharti Airtel — announced deals with SpaceX to offer Starlink internet to their customers. Starlink’s business operations Vi...