Rahul Gandhi FIRs, Election Commission Probe, Market Slide and Nobel Literature Win Highlight Turbulent Week

During a third consecutive day of demonstrations by the INDIA bloc, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi were each named in three first one outlet's reports for allegedly assaulting police officers and hindering their duties at a rally held at Delhi's Raj Ghat. The FIRs cite sections of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita covering assault, obstruction of government work, and misconduct with police. The protests target Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, whom the opposition accuses of mishandling the electoral roll revision process.

Congress also claimed that the Election Commission's online voter-registration portal was engineered to centralise deletions and additions for the BJP, a claim that follows a July report by security researcher Nisarga Adhikary highlighting multiple vulnerabilities; CERT-In confirmed one fix and ongoing work on the rest. On the economic front, Indian markets fell 1.4%, with the Sensex dropping more than 1,040 points to 71,500 and the Nifty 50 sliding to 22,200, marking an 18-month low and triggering a Rs 10 lakh crore loss for investors. In cultural news, the Swedish Academy awarded the 2026 Nobel Prize in Literature to 76-year-old Canadian poet, essayist and translator Anne Carson, making her the second Canadian laureate after Alice Munro.