New York Gov. Kathy Hochul unveils plan to offer free tuition at city, state colleges
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, announced Tuesday a plan to offer free tuition for certain degree programs at state and city colleges. The governor announced the education proposal during her state of the state address, in which she also vowed to give students free meals at schools, make it more difficult for hedge funds to buy homes, cut taxes for middle-class earners and expand the child tax credit. Under the free tuition plan, New York residents between the ages of 25 and 55 who enroll in associate degree programs in nursing, teaching, technology, engineering and other fields at colleges operated by the State University of New York and the City University of New York would have their tuition covered. NEW YORK GOV. KATHY HOCHUL SEEKS EXPANDED INVOLUNTARY COMMITMENT LAWS OVER VIOLENT CRIMES ON SUBWAY The state would also cover the cost of books and other college fees. “When my dad got a college education, our whole family got a shot at a better life — and I want every New Yorker to have that opportunity,” Hochul said in a statement. “Under my plan, every New Yorker will have the opportunity to pursue a free degree at SUNY and CUNY community colleges to help fill the in-demand jobs of tomorrow.” Other states have similar tuition programs, and several others offer various discounted tuitions for state colleges. New York residents already receive discounted tuition at the vast network of state and city colleges, which consists of nearly 90 schools, and a program that already provides free tuition at the institutions for residents who make less than $125,000 a year. Hochul also said she wants to address the problem of smartphones in K-12 schools by creating a statewide standard for distraction-free learning in the state. Additionally, Hochul said she will work to address crime, expand mental health treatment services and to strengthen security in the New York City subway system after a surge in violent crimes on the subway. This would include plans to add police patrols on overnight trains and install barriers and better lighting on platforms. NY LAWMAKERS DEMAND SUBWAY CHIEF’S OUSTER AFTER COMMENT DISMISSIVE OF CRIME ISSUE: ‘IN PEOPLE’S HEADS’ The governor’s proposals will be debated in the Democrat-controlled state legislature. She is expected to face a contested Democratic primary election next year. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
2025 as the year of defence reforms: Not rank, status but optimisation, change and re-establishing deterrence
Additionally, recent strategic developments, such as those seen in Balakot and Kailash, have shifted defense considerations into a more prominent role within foreign policy discussions.
Indian Navy warships INS Surat, INS Nilgiri, INS Vaghsheer commissioned in Mumbai; PM Modi attends event
The Navy described the commissioning of the three major combatants as a historic occasion. INS Nilgiri, the lead ship of the Project 17A stealth frigate class, represents a significant advancement over the Shivalik-class frigates.
India’s disappearing camels: How a law to save them is wiping them out
Rajasthan, India – Jeetu Singh’s camel stands calm, munching the leaves of a Khejri tree in the Jaisalmer district of India’s desert state of Rajasthan. Her calf occasionally suckles on her mother’s breasts. While the newborn is the latest addition to Singh’s herd, sadness is palpable on his face. His otherwise sparkling eyes have turned gloomy, gawping at the grazing camels. When Jeetu, 65, was a teenager, his family had more than 200 camels. Today, that number has gone down to 25. “Rearing camels was no less than a competitive affair when we were children,” he tells Al Jazeera. “I used to think my camels should be more beautiful than those reared by my peers.” He would groom them, apply mustard oil to their bodies, trim their brown and blackish hair, and decorate them with colourful beads from head to tail. The camels would then adorn the landscape with the festooned frieze of symmetry they form while walking in herds as the “ships of the desert”. “All that is memory now,” he says. “I only keep camels now because I am attached to them. Otherwise, there is no financial benefit from them.” Conservationist Hanuwant Singh Sadri kisses a camel in Pali district, Rajasthan [Amir Malik/Al Jazeera] Across the world, the camel population rose from nearly 13 million in the 1960s to more than 35 million now, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, which declared 2024 as the International Year of Camelids to highlight the key role the animal plays in the lives of millions of households in more than 90 countries. Advertisement But their numbers are on a drastic decline in India – from nearly a million camels in 1961 to just approximately 200,000 today. And the fall has been particularly sharp in recent years. The livestock census conducted by India’s federal government in 2007 revealed that Rajasthan, one of a few Indian states where camels are reared, had about 420,000 camels. In 2012, they reduced to about 325,000, while in 2019, their population dipped further to a little more than 210,000 – a 35 percent downfall in seven years. That decline in Rajasthan’s camel population is being felt across the vast state – India’s largest by area. Some 330km (205 miles) from Jeetu’s home lies the Anji Ki Dhani village. In the 1990s, the hamlet was home to more than 7,000 camels. “Only 200 of them are present now; the rest are extinct,” says Hanuwant Singh Sadri, a camel conservationist for more than three decades. And in the Barmer district’s Dandi village, Bhanwarlal Chaudhary has lost nearly 150 of his camels since the beginning of the 2000s. He is left with just 30 now. As the 45-year-old walks with his herd, a camel leans towards him and kisses him. “Camels are connected to the language of our survival, our cultural heritage and our everyday life,” Chaudhary said. “Without them, our language, our being has no meaning at all.” Chaudhary with his herd in Dandi village of the Barmer district, Rajasthan [Amir Malik/Al Jazeera] 2015 law the biggest blow Camel-keepers and experts cite various reasons for the dwindling number of camels in India. Tractors have replaced their need on farms, while cars and trucks have taken over the roads to transport goods. Advertisement Camels have also struggled because of the shrinking grazing lands. Since they cannot be stall-fed like cows or pigs, camels must be left for grazing in open areas – like Jeetu’s camel eating the leaves of the Khejri tree. “That open set-up is hardly available now,” Sadri says. But the biggest blow came in 2015, when the Rajasthan government under the Hindu majoritarian Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) passed the Rajasthan Camel (Prohibition of Slaughter and Regulation of Temporary Migration or Export) Act. The law prohibits the transport, illegal possession and slaughtering of camels. “Even decorating them could amount to causing them hurt, as the definition of causing them harm is loosely worded,” Chaudhary tells Al Jazeera. Punishment under the law ranges from a prison term between six months and five years, and penalties between 3,000 rupees ($35) and 20,000 rupees ($235). Unlike all other laws – where the accused is innocent until proven guilty – this law flips conventional jurisprudence. “The burden to prove innocence rests with the person prosecuted under this act,” it reads. The dark and light brown camels stand together in water in Pokhran. Called khadeen, the waterbody is a lifeline for both people and animals in the area [Radheshyam Pemani Bishnoi/Al Jazeera] With the enforcement of the act, the camel market was outlawed – and so were camel breeders if they intended to sell their animals. Buyers suddenly became “smugglers” under the law. The act was crafted on the assumption that the slaughter of camels was behind the decline in their population in Rajasthan. It banned camel transport to other states, says Chaudhary, thinking it would serve three purposes: the camel population would increase, the livelihood of the breeders would increase and the camel slaughter would stop. Advertisement “Well, it missed its first two targets,” Chaudhary says. ‘Suddenly, there were no buyers’ Sumit Dookia, an ecologist from Rajasthan who teaches at a university in New Delhi, has a question for the government over the law. “Why is it that the camel population is still shrinking,” he asks, if a law meant to revive their numbers is in force? Chaudhary has the answer. “We rear animals to sustain our lives,” he says, adding that without a market or a fair price, keeping such huge animals is not an easy task. “The law locked horns with our traditional system where we used to take our male camels to Pushkar, Nagore or Tilwara – three of the biggest fairs for camels,” adds Sadri. Sadri says the breeders used to get good money for their camels in those fairs. “Before the law was passed, our camels were sold from 40,000 ($466) to 80,000 rupees ($932),” he says. “But as soon as
TikTok users in US flock to ‘China’s Instagram’ ahead of ban
Taipei, Taiwan – As a TikTok ban looms in the United States, young Americans are flocking to the Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu as “TikTok refugees” in search of a similar experience. The app has risen to the top spot on the iOS and Google Play stores in the US in recent days as users prepare for TikTok to be banned on national security grounds from Sunday unless Chinese parent company ByteDance divests its ownership. Chinese lifestyle app Lemon8, which is also owned by ByteDance, has ranked as the second most downloaded app. Xiaohongshu, which has been described as China’s answer to Instagram, allows users to post photos, videos and text and is known for its female-heavy user base. While boasting about 300 million monthly active users, Xiaohongshu’s reach is smaller than that of other popular apps in China, such as Sina Weibo and WeChat, which claim 1.2 billion-plus users. A surge in new users, some of them describing themselves as “TikTok refugees,” is now flooding the app’s “Discover” page with videos seeking tips on how to use “RedNote,” the app’s new nickname in the US. Advertisement “Hello. I don’t know what’s happening any more. Americans are coming here. So sorry if y’all hate us. I promise we’ll do our best,” a female user calling herself “Star404” said in a short-form video posted on Tuesday. “Don’t even worry, we’re going to do so great. This is so much better than TikTok. Just not Meta. Instagram reels, I can kind of dig. Facebook and YouTube shorts, no shot. Never happening,” she said. The irony of many users moving from one Chinese-owned app to another has not been lost on observers like Ryan Broderick, the author of Garbage Day, a newsletter that covers the internet. “It’s definitely funny that American teenagers are protesting the looming TikTok ban by using a much more culturally Chinese app,” Broderick told Al Jazeera. “At the moment, RedNote doesn’t seem to be siloing Chinese content or requiring users to have a Chinese phone number, so it’s turned into a sort of fun cultural chaos on the app, an experience that never really even happened on TikTok,” he said. The post by “Star404” racked up more than 4,000 comments in 24 hours, mostly from Chinese users welcoming her to the platform or joking about language challenges. Another user, “Fern,” expressed her gratitude to the flood of Chinese followers that came her way after joining the platform. “We need to talk about you guys blowing up my video about moving to Rednote to 50,000 new followers in less than 24 hours. You guys are insane,” she said. “But thank you so much for all the support, I really appreciate it.” Advertisement While amusing to many Chinese Xiaohongshu users, the surge in American users has reportedly put the app’s owner in an awkward spot. Chinese media outlet PConline on Tuesday reported that Xiaohongshu employees have been instructed to “not discuss, not promote, and not share” news about their new US user base, citing sources within the company. “This wave of traffic has become the sword of Damocles hanging over Xiaohongshu’s head. In fact, for Xiaohongshu, which inexplicably received this traffic, the risks far outweigh the opportunities,” the report said. Those potential risks include regulatory complications. Chinese social media platforms typically require users to register with a Chinese phone number, while content is subject to government censorship. For this reason, Chinese tech companies often create domestic and foreign versions of their apps, said Yiwen Lu, a researcher at ChinaTalk, a newsletter and podcast focusing on Chinese technology. TikTok is an international version of Douyin, while Lemon8 was specifically designed by ByteDance for the foreign market. For now, Chinese and American users are seeing the same content on Xiaohongshu. However, some users have reminded their American counterparts that the app comes with its own set of rules. “Friendly reminder: On Chinese social media platforms, please do not mention sensitive topics such as politics, religion, and drugs!!! Please adhere to the One China policy and reject pornography, gambling, and drugs,” one user wrote under Star404’s post. Advertisement “[You] can say everything here, except the history [of China] from 1949-2025,” another user said. ChinaTalk’s Lu said that American users will have a hard time replicating their TikTok experience on the app – especially when it comes to monetising content. “The monetisation models vary greatly – XHS positions itself as a shopping platform, with most creators earning revenue through paid partnerships. This difference makes it challenging for creators to fully transition their work and income streams to XHS in the short term,” Lu told Al Jazeera. Livestream shopping, a hugely popular form of e-commerce in China, has taken off on Xiahongshu in recent months. In the US, many TikTok users still shop through links to Amazon or the shopping platform LTK, short for “Like to Know.” Lu and Broderick both expressed doubt that the influx of US users would last due to differences between the platforms and the fact many users had joined as an act of protest. Still, the migration to Xiaohongshu should serve as a warning to the US government and Big Tech, Broderick said. “It’s a funny way to hopefully make US politicians realize that Chinese apps are coming for the US whether they like it or not,” he said. “And, similarly, it’s a good way of letting Silicon Valley know that their products are stagnating and no amount of federal bans are going to make young people excited about Meta products again.” Adblock test (Why?)
Olympic champion Zheng ousted as Australian Open 2025 delivers first shock
Zheng exits after second round loss to unseeded Siegemund as former champions Sabalenka and Osaka battle through. Zheng Qinwen has become the first big name to exit the women’s draw at the Australian Open after the Olympic champion was stunned by Laura Siegemund while top seed Aryna Sabalenka made heavy weather of her second-round match before going through. Jessica Pegula, who lost to Sabalenka in last year’s US Open final, safely advanced while Tokyo Olympics champion Belinda Bencic moved on after a brief spell of rain delayed proceedings on the outer courts on the fourth day. China’s Zheng had been bidding to emulate compatriot Li Na’s 2014 triumph at Melbourne Park but her hopes evaporated at John Cain Arena, where unseeded German Siegemund pulled off a stunning 7-6(3), 6-3 victory. The fifth seed left the court looking like she was about to burst into tears while world number 97 Siegemund was beaming from ear to ear after a famous win. “I knew I just had to play more than my best tennis – you have nothing to lose so I told myself to swing free,” Siegemund said on court. “She’s an amazing player, she’s one of the best players now. But I know I can play and I wanted to make it a tough fight.” Advertisement Zheng said it was just not her day. “I had a lot of chances to break her in the first set, but you know in that moment maybe my concentration wasn’t there,” the 22-year-old said. “At the same time, I felt she was playing really good. It’s tennis, nothing more.” Defending champion Aryna Sabalenka had to dig deep against Jessica Bouzas Maneiro during their second-round match, January 15, 2025 [William West/AFP] Sabalenka is bidding to become the first woman to win three straight titles at Melbourne Park since Martina Hingis, from 1997 to 1999, and while the Belarusian beat Jessica Bouzas Maneiro 6-3, 7-5, she did not have it all her own way. After easing through the first two games of the match on Rod Laver Arena, Sabalenka twice swapped breaks with the world number 54 before taking control for a 5-2 lead and closing out the opening set on serve. The three-time Grand Slam champion’s serve came under intense pressure in the next set and she found herself trailing 4-1 as an inspired Bouzas Maneiro began hitting stinging winners on both sides of the court. Sabalenka found a spark from somewhere and fought back from 5-2 to level at 5-5 and fired a backhand winner to break again in the next game before wrapping up the contest to extend her win streak at the hardcourt major to 16. “She played incredible tennis today and it was a really tough one,” Sabalenka said. “I mean, I expected this tennis from her, so I’m really glad that I was able to win this match. “In the second set … I wasn’t rushing too much after 5-2, I was like, ‘OK, whatever, we just leave this second set and we move on. And yeah, I was able to turn it around. “I’m super happy with the win in straight sets, especially against someone like her, who makes you work for every point.” American seventh seed Pegula beat Belgian Elise Mertens 6-4, 6-2 on Margaret Court Arena while Bencic beat Suzan Lamens 6-1, 7-6(3) after Olga Danilovic stunned 25th seed Liudmila Samsonova 6-1, 6-2. Advertisement Former world number one Osaka, the 2019 and 2021 champion in Australia but now unseeded, stormed back to defeat 20th seed Karolina Muchova 1-6, 6-1, 6-3. Naomi Osaka celebrates after beating Karolina Muchova, January 15, 2025 [Paul Crock/AFP] Adblock test (Why?)
Adani-built Drishti 10 Starliner drone crashes off Porbandar coast in Gujarat, here’s what happened
The drone lost command mid-flight and plunged into the water. No injuries or collateral damage were reported
How to choose the perfect gift for your boyfriend based on his personality
Finding the perfect gift for boyfriend can be quite an exciting challenge, especially when you want to make it as unique as the bond you share. Choosing the right present can be one of the best ways to be thoughtful and affectionate towards him, depending on his personality, hobbies, and preferences
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy says state will stockpile abortion pills ahead of Trump’s return to White House
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, said Tuesday that the state is going to stockpile abortion medication in preparation for President-elect Trump’s return to the White House next week with GOP control of both chambers of Congress. The governor made comments about protecting abortion drugs like mifepristone during his state of the state address, when he vowed to work with Trump on issues where they share priorities, but also stressed that the state is ready to push back against the incoming administration in areas where they are opposed. Murphy is one of a handful of Democrat governors who say they are open to cooperation with Trump’s administration. But Murphy emphasized that he will not back down from challenging “anti-choice” policies backed by the Republican-led House and Senate in Washington and said the state will stockpile mifepristone “so every woman can access this crucial form of reproductive care.” “I will never back away from partnering with the Trump Administration where our priorities align,” Murphy said. “But just as importantly, I will never back down from defending our New Jersey values — if and when they are tested.” MONTANA AG ASKS SUPREME COURT TO UPHOLD LAW REQUIRING PARENTAL CONSENT FOR A MINOR’S ABORTION New Jersey is the latest Democrat-led state to announce plans to stockpile mifepristone, one of two drugs used in combination to end pregnancies. Trump, who will be inaugurated on Jan. 20, said last month he does not plan to restrict abortion drugs, but he also admitted that “things change.” Pro-choice groups have expressed concern that Pam Bondi, who Trump nominated for attorney general, may bring back the Comstock Act, a law passed by Congress in 1873 that banned the mailing of medication or instruments used in abortion. PLANNED PARENTHOOD CHAPTER PROVIDED HARRIS CAMPAIGN WORKSPACE, VIOLATING TAX LAW: IRS COMPLAINT In June, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled to preserve access to mifepristone. The case sought to restrict access to the drug, including in states where abortion is legal. Abortion is banned, with some exceptions, at all stages of pregnancy in 14 states, and after about six weeks of pregnancy in three others. In Murphy’s Tuesday state of the state address, which was his second-to-last, he emphasized his reluctance to become a lame-duck governor before his second term ends, unveiling several proposals for the year. The term-limited governor will be leaving office in a year after November’s gubernatorial election. New Jersey and Virginia are the only two states regularly scheduled with gubernatorial races this year. “During this final chapter of our journey, our absolute top priority — as it has been since Day One — is delivering economic security and opportunity to every New Jerseyan,” Murphy said. Other proposals Murphy announced include directing schools to ban cellphones in grades K-12. “Our children are inundated with screens,” he said. “And they are making it incredibly difficult for our kids, not only to learn, but to retain the substance of what they learn.” The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Big setback for Arvind Kejriwal as Home Ministry grants ED sanction to prosecute ex-Delhi CM in liquor scam case
The development comes ahead of the Delhi Assembly on February 5. Kejriwal has been made an accused in his personal capacity as well as in the capacity of being the national convenor of his political party AAP.