News in Short

• Nimmagada Ramesh Kumar was reinstated as State Election Commissioner (SEC) by the state government, which was ordered by the Andhra Pradesh High court.
• Ramesh Kumar's restoration as SEC is in compliance with the High Court judgment delivered on May 29 wherein it struck down the AP Panchayat Raj (Second Amendment) Ordinance (No. 5 of 2020) which resulted in the sudden termination of his services.
• The government has maintained that the ordinance which curtailed the tenure of SEC from five to three years was part of the election reforms and not meant to expel Ramesh Kumar.

• The government has extended the deadline for filing income tax returns for the financial year 2018-19 by two months to September 30.
• The government had earlier announced the extension of the due date from March 31 to June 30 and had further extended it till July 31.
• This is the third extension by the Income Tax Department for assessees to file both original and revised income tax returns for the financial year 2018-19.

• Malayalam actor Anil Murali passed away in Kochi. He was 56. The actor died due to liver-related ailments.
• After a stint on the small screen, Anil Murali made his silver screen debut with Kanyakumariyil Oru Kavitha in 1993. He went on to star in over 200 movies across Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu film industries.
• In a career spanning nearly 30 years, Anil Murali portrayed several varied characters. He was particularly popular for his villainous roles.

• Images of Lord Ram and 3D portraits of the grand Ram Temple in Ayodhya will be beamed across the giant billboards in the iconic Times Square on August 5.
• This has been done to celebrate the temple’s ground-breaking ceremony, with organizers describing the commemoration as one-of-a-kind and historic events.
• Prime Minister Modi had announced the formation of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teertha Kshetra Trust in February. The Trust has invited Modi to lay the foundation stone of the grand Ram Temple.

• NASA's next-generation Mars rover Perseverance blasted off from Florida's Cape Canaveral on July 30 atop an Atlas 5 rocket on a mission to search for traces of potential past life on Earth's planetary neighbour.
• Perseverance rover is aiming to land at the base of an 820-foot-deep crater called Jezero, site of a former lake and water system from 3.5 billion years ago that scientists suspect could bear evidence of potential past microbial life.
• The next-generation robotic rover - a car-sized six-wheeled vehicle carrying seven scientific instruments - also is scheduled to deploy a mini-helicopter on Mars and try out equipment for future human treks to the fourth planet from the sun. Its arrival at Mars is planned for Feb. 18 at the site of an ancient river delta.