Dense fog and low visibility on Thursday morning affected the flight schedule at the Shaheed Bhagat Singh International Airport, Chandigarh.

One flight was cancelled, while three departures were delayed till 10 am.

The departure to Delhi (6:55 am) was cancelled while to Chennai (7:20 am), Mumbai (9 am) and Delhi (7:40 am) were delayed.

The Delhi flight (7 am) arrival here touched down at 8:35 am.

Meanwhile, temperatures plummeted across North India, with the people of Chandigarh and neighbouring regions woke up to light rain on Thursday.

Punjab Information and Public Relations Department today organized third religious congregation and Guru Ka Langar dedicated to the birth anniversary of the Tenth Guru, Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji and for the universal welfare, on the advent of the new year.

During the event, which was held with profound devotion and religious fervour at Gurdwara Sahib, Punjab Civil Secretariat-1 here, Gurdwara Sahib Sector-11's Granthi Bhai Kashmir Singh recitated path of Sri Sukhmani Sahib. Subsequently, the renowned preacher Bhai Gurmeet Singh Shant performed soul-stirring Gurbani Kirtan in the Basant ragas.

60 new buses purchased by Chandigarh Transport Undertaking (CTU) are ready to ply on the roads of Chandigarh on Tuesday. The operation of these buses will pave the way for better connectivity to Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and other neighboring states. Many new routes will be started, which will directly benefit the people.

Punjab Governor and Chandigarh Administrator Gulab Chand Kataria flagged off these buses during a program organized at ISBT-17 on Tuesday. These 60 buses will run on 31 routes. Many of which are new and the number of buses has been increased on some old routes. Trial runs on these routes have been successful.

Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research’s (PGIMER) Department of Hepatology here on Friday announced the launch of a special walk-in OPD service to streamline the follow-up process for patients attending its liver clinic, taking care of approximately 1,000 patients weekly.

While commending on the initiative that aims to alleviate long waiting time, PGIMER Director Prof. Vivek Lal said this new online system is a step forward in patient care, enabling "us to provide timely consultations and reducing the pressure on our outpatient department".

Hospital Deputy Director (Administration) Pankaj Rai said the goal is to link this service with common service centres like e-Sampark and Lok Mitra Kendras in adjoining states to assist non-tech-savvy patients.

"We want to make this facility accessible to everyone, irrespective of their technological proficiency," he said.

A five-decade-old commercial building near the Deputy Commissioner’s office in Chandigarh's Sector 17, which had been declared unsafe earlier, collapsed on Monday morning.

However, there was no causality in the building collapse located in the heart of the city.

Eyewitnesses said the building collapsed at around 7 a.m. The adjoining building, which was once running the famed Mehfil restaurant, has also developed cracks and is partially damaged by the caving-in of the building.

Police and fire brigade teams have arrived at the spot.

The local administration had earlier declared the building unsafe and sealed it.

A BMW car met with an accident in Chandigarh. The car was speeding, due to which the driver lost control and the car collided with a tree. A 10-year-old child died in the accident.

Once again, the havoc of high speed has been seen in Chandigarh. Late Thursday night, a high-speed BMW car met with an accident. An innocent child riding in the car died in the accident. This accident happened near the airport light point. Late Thursday night at 1.30 am, a high-speed BMW car went out of control and collided with a tree. The car was badly damaged in the accident. 10-year-old Amen Verma, who was driving the car, died of head injury.

At the same time, Amen's father Awake Verma, a resident of Sector-27, has suffered serious injuries. Sector-31 police station has registered a case of negligent driving against Awake Verma. Awake Verma told the police that suddenly there was some problem in the brake of the car, due to which the brake did not work and the accident happened.

A thick blanket of fog engulfed Chandigarh on Friday morning, as visibility dropped to zero in some areas, with the weather department predicting cloudy skies for the day.

Four flights were delayed due to fog and poor visibility conditions at the Shaheed Bhagat Singh International Airport, Chandigarh, on Friday morning.

The early morning arrival from Pune (7:55am) was delayed by more than two hours, while three departures to Delhi, Mumbai, and Goa were delayed till 10:30am today.

The Smart Bike Mobility Pvt Ltd, the company catering to the Chandigarh Smart City Limited (CSCL) project, has announced to add a fleet of 500 more smart bikes (cycles) to the existing public bike sharing (PBS) system in Chandigarh. Despite facing several challenges, the company decided to increase the fleet in order to promote the venture, claimed the company representatives.

“The company has procured 500 new smart bikes and will be deploying these at various dockings stations this week. This is to make up for the 1,400 bikes which have been damaged by miscreants, are under repair or stolen,” said Animesh, general manager, operations and marketing of the project. He further revealed that the company is also planning to relaunch the e-bikes (operated with battery) for local residents.

Christmas cheer turned into horror for the parents of a four-year-old girl when around 20 festive lights put up at Elante Mall came crashing down on her yesterday afternoon.

A major tragedy was averted as the girl escaped with a minor injury to the forehead.

This is the third mishap to have taken place at Elante this year. Three months ago, a woman and her niece had suffered injuries when a large granite slab came off a pillar and fell on them. An 11-year-old had lost his life after a toy train overturned mid-tour in the mall courtyard in June.

In yesterday incident, Navneet Thakur, a resident of Sector 50, visited the mall with his wife and four- year-old daughter, Avni, to celebrate Christmas. The family purchased tickets for the make-shift “Winter Wonderland”, set up in the mall’s courtyard.

there was a designated dance floor for children. The area was adorned with hanging lights, some of which suddenly fell and hit Avni on the forehead.

It is very cold in Punjab and Chandigarh. Due to snowfall in Himachal, the weather of the area has become cold. Fog is also being seen in many areas in the morning and evening. The Meteorological Department has issued a cold wave and fog alert in 15 districts of Punjab today.

However, the temperature has increased to 4.7 degrees in the last 24 hours in the state. It has now reached close to normal. The highest temperature was recorded in Hoshiarpur at 21.6 degrees. Similarly, the temperature of Chandigarh has been recorded at 20.1 degrees. The temperature has increased by 6.4 degrees. While the lowest temperature has been recorded in Gurdaspur at 4.6 degrees.