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In the run-up to the state assembly election in Assam, India, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is employing a strategy that combines Hindu nationalism with welfare schemes to woo voters.The party, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has been accused of pursuing a hardline Hindu supremacist agenda in Assam, coupled with a xenophobic campaign targeting the state's Muslim population, which constitutes 34% of Assam's 31 million people.At a recent election rally in Morigaon district, BJP leaders highlighted the welfare schemes launched by Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma's government, including a direct benefit transfer scheme called Orunodoi, which provides financial aid to women. Nitin Nabin, the BJP's national president, claimed these schemes benefited the Assamese people, especially women.The BJP's strategy in Assam has been described as a 'cocktail of Hindutva and welfarism' by Akhil Ranjan Dutta, a political science professor at Assam's Gauhati University. 'The BJP is experimenting with a brand of Hindutva by co-opting Indigenous armed struggle and cultural nationalism, while solidifying Hindu identity and othering the Bengali Muslims.'The party's election promises have heightened anxiety among Bengali-speaking Muslims, who fear more crackdowns on their community, including a proposal to implement a Uniform Civil Code, which critics say will override Muslim personal laws.Opposition parties and analysts argue that the BJP is mainly milking two cash transfer schemes – Orunodoi and Udyamita – to influence voters in this election. Economist Joydeep Baruah estimates that at least 10 to 15% of the scheme's four million women beneficiaries could vote for the BJP.The BJP's tactics have been criticized by opposition parties and human rights groups, who accuse the party of vote buying and polarizing the electorate along communal lines.

Monday, 6 April 2026 marks the most consequential day for human spaceflight in over half a century, as NASA’s Artemis II mission prepares to eclipse the Apollo 13 distance record.At 13:56 EDT (17:56 GMT) the Orion spacecraft will pass the 400,171 km (248,655 mi) mark set by Apollo 13, and by 19:07 EDT (23:07 GMT) it is slated to reach a maximum of 406,773 km (252,760 mi) from Earth – roughly 6,600 km farther than any human has ever traveled.The Artemis programme is NASA’s multi‑decade effort to return people to the Moon, establish a sustainable presence there, and use the lunar foothold as a springboard to Mars. The initiative currently comprises five missions (Artemis I‑V).Artemis I, an uncrewed test flight launched on 16 November 2022, spent 25 days orbiting Earth and validating Orion’s performance, paving the way for the crewed flight.Artemis II lifted off from Kennedy Space Centre on 1 April 2026 at 18:35 EDT (22:35 GMT) with a four‑astronaut crew for a ten‑day deep‑space test.Crew members:Reid Wiseman (50), commander – veteran ISS commander and test pilot.Victor Glover (49), pilot – first Black astronaut assigned to a lunar mission; previously flew on SpaceX Crew‑1.Christina Koch (47), mission specialist – holds the record for longest single women’s spaceflight (328 days) and has extensive EVA experience.Jeremy Hansen (50), mission specialist – Canada’s first astronaut to travel to the Moon, former fighter pilot.The crew will manually pilot Orion at key phases, verify life‑support, propulsion, power, thermal control, navigation and proximity‑operations systems, and rehearse critical procedures such as course corrections, long‑range communications, re‑entry and splashdown.Scientific work will include lunar observations, human‑health experiments, and extensive photography. On 2 April, Commander Wiseman captured a striking “Hello, World” image of Earth from Orion, showing upside‑down continents, vivid auroras, city lights across Africa, Europe and South America, and a faint zodiacal glow.Nutrition for the ten‑day flight comes from a fixed menu of 189 shelf‑stable items – tortillas, nuts, beef brisket, macaroni‑and‑cheese, cookies, chocolate, and rehydratable drinks – all prepared without a refrigerator, using a water dispenser and a small heater to keep crumbs from floating in microgravity.NASA plans the splashdown in the Pacific Ocean near San Diego at about 20:07 EDT on 10 April 2026. Recovery helicopters will retrieve the crew for medical checks aboard the USS John P Murtha before they return to Johnson Space Center in Houston.The Moon lies an average 384,400 km (238,855 mi) from Earth – roughly ten Earth‑equator circumferences. Its diameter is about one‑third that of Earth; if Earth were a basketball, the Moon would be a tennis ball. Surface temperatures swing from –173 °C (–180 °F) at night to 127 °C (260 °F) in daylight, and gravity is only one‑sixth of Earth’s, so a 60 kg person would feel the weight of a 10 kg mass.Between 1961 and 1972 NASA’s Apollo programme conducted 33 missions (11 crewed, 22 uncrewed), achieving six successful lunar landings. The last humans to walk on the Moon were Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt on 14 December 1972 (Apollo 17).Other nations have also left their mark: the Soviet Luna 9 (1966) delivered the first soft‑landing images, China’s Chang’e 4 (2019) explored the far side, and India’s Chandrayaan‑3 (2023) achieved the first soft landing near the lunar south pole – a region rich in permanently shadowed craters that may hold water ice.Looking ahead, Artemis III (targeted for 2027) will test integrated operations in low Earth orbit with commercial landers, Artemis IV (early 2028) aims for the first crewed lunar landing since Apollo 17 at the south pole, and Artemis V (late 2028) will begin construction of a lunar base.

At least ten displaced Palestinians were killed and dozens more wounded, including six in critical condition, after Israeli drones launched two missiles near a school housing refugees in the central Gaza Maghazi refugee camp, health officials reported. The strike occurred amid clashes between residents and an Israeli‑backed militia that had allegedly attempted to abduct people from the school. Witnesses said the militia’s leader later claimed to have killed five Hamas members, a statement that could not be independently verified. According to Al‑Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, the victims were struck east of the camp, where residents were trying to defend their homes. "The residents tried to defend their homes, but the occupation forces targeted them directly," said Ahmed al‑Maghazi to Reuters. The Maghazi camp, once one of the smallest Palestinian refugee enclaves with roughly 30,000 residents, has seen its population more than triple since the war began, according to UNRWA. Despite being designated by the Israeli military as a "safe zone," the area has suffered multiple lethal attacks, including a December 2023 strike that killed over 100 civilians, primarily women and children. Earlier on the same day, a World Health Organization (WHO) staff member was killed and several others injured when Israeli forces opened fire on a WHO vehicle, underscoring the broader risk to humanitarian personnel in the region. The latest incident highlights the fragility of ceasefire arrangements reached in October and raises urgent questions about the protection of civilians in areas purportedly shielded from conflict.

Chelsea FC Women have advanced to the Women's FA Cup semi-finals after a hard-fought 2-1 win against Tottenham Hotspur Women. The Blues' manager, Sonia Bompastor, expressed relief and pride in her team's performance, despite the grueling schedule they have faced. The match at Kingsmeadow was an intense, end-to-end battle, with both teams creating scoring opportunities. Sam Kerr opened the scoring in the 40th minute, heading Keira Walsh's cross past Lize Kop. However, Tottenham responded well, and Eveliina Summanen equalized seven minutes after halftime with a free-kick that floated over the Chelsea defense. The game seemed destined for extra time, but Veerle Buurman's stunning, rising strike with just four minutes of normal time remaining secured the win for Chelsea. This goal sparked wild celebrations among the home fans and Buurman's teammates. Bompastor praised her players' resilience and highlighted the importance of communication with national team coaches to manage the players' workload effectively. With their Women's Super League title hopes all but extinguished and the League Cup already won, Chelsea is now focused on securing a domestic cup double. Tottenham's manager, Martin Ho, was pleased with his team's performance, noting that they showed character and grit despite the defeat. He emphasized that the team can take positives from the match as they look to bounce back in their next game against Manchester United.

Fans flooded Madison Square Garden on April 6, 2026, to witness the Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL) shatter the United States' women's hockey attendance record. The packed arena highlighted a surge in interest for the sport, with spectators filling every available seat.According to The Guardian, the event not only set a new benchmark for attendance but also demonstrated the league's expanding market appeal. Breaking previous records signals a pivotal moment for women's professional hockey, suggesting stronger commercial opportunities and increased media coverage.League officials and players hailed the milestone as a testament to years of grassroots development and strategic promotion. The record‑setting crowd reflects broader trends of rising viewership for women's sports across the United States.While exact figures were not disclosed in the brief report, the achievement is expected to influence future venue selections, sponsorship deals, and broadcast negotiations for the PWHL.

Elvira Notari—Italy’s first and most prolific female filmmaker—crafted a vivid portrait of early‑20th‑century Naples through melodramas such as È piccerella (1922). The film opens with bustling pilgrimage scenes at the Candelora festival, juxtaposing flamboyant revelry with stark images of poverty, a visual strategy that challenged the sanitized narratives favored by the fascist regime.According to film scholar Giuliana Bruno, Notari’s work was driven by a desire to document reality, exposing class tensions and gendered oppression that Mussolini’s censors deemed unacceptable. A 1928 censorship law explicitly banned Neapolitan films featuring “stallholders, beggars, urchins, dirty alleyways,” effectively silencing Notari’s authentic street‑level storytelling.Despite directing around 60 feature films—many hand‑coloured—alongside her husband Nicola at Dora Film, only three titles (A Santanotte, È piccerella, Fantasia ‘e surdato) and fragments survive today, a loss directly attributable to fascist suppression and the prohibitive cost of sound‑film conversion.The newly released documentary Elvira Notari: Beyond Silence, produced by Antonella Di Nocera and directed by Valerio Ciriaci, reconstructs Notari’s fragmented career by collaborating with contemporary “artisans”—photographers, visual artists, novelists, and musicians who reinterpret her silent‑film aesthetics. Ciriaci notes that the absence of personal archives made the film’s investigative approach essential, turning Notari’s silence into a creative catalyst.Critics emphasize Notari’s lasting influence on Italian‑American auteurs such as Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese. Elements of her chaotic street festivals anticipate the wedding scenes in *The Godfather* and *Goodfellas*, while her raw urban tableaux echo the gritty New York sequences of *Taxi Driver*.Beyond cinematic technique, scholars like Cristina Jandelli argue that Notari’s intertitles reveal a pronounced class consciousness and a critique of women’s marginalisation in early 20th‑century Italy. Her use of Neapolitan dialect and unvarnished depictions of squalor directly opposed the regime’s propaganda‑driven vision of a unified, pristine Italy.After Dora Film collapsed in 1930, Notari retired to Cava de’ Tirreni and died in 1946, largely forgotten until recent scholarly revival. The documentary positions her as a “symbol of the right to memories,” underscoring the ongoing relevance of silenced female voices in cultural history.*Elvira Notari: Beyond Silence* will premiere at New York’s Film Forum on 6 April 2026 and tour the United Kingdom throughout April and May, offering audiences a chance to reconnect with a pioneering filmmaker whose work was once erased by fascism.

Guy Singh-Watson, founder of organic veg box company Riverford, has expressed deep regret for the decades he spent confined by traditional masculinity. On International Women's Day, he found himself in a crowd of mostly women, listening to his wife discuss her experiences. This encounter made him realize that many issues discussed on IWD relate to male behavior, and men should be paying attention. Challenging Traditional Masculinity: Singh-Watson notes that success in farming and most businesses depends on building and maintaining relationships. He recalls that when Riverford first measured its gender pay gap in 2017, women earned an average of 91p an hour compared to their male colleagues' £1. Despite efforts to address the issue, progress was slow until a new, younger female farm manager, Maddie, took charge and transformed the workplace culture. Under Maddie's leadership, Riverford became one of the few veg farms with a waiting list for pickers. The company achieved this by creating a fun, emotionally safe, and fulfilling work environment. Singh-Watson acknowledges that he and other men in leadership roles often struggle with sensitive issues and tend to turn to women for resolution. A Shift Towards Inclusivity: The cultural shift at Riverford began with its transition to employee ownership in 2018. This process required introspection and evaluation of decision-making processes. With the help of a business change coach and the company's head of HR, a genuinely inclusive culture was built. As a result, Riverford now has a negative gender pay gap, with women earning 1.56% more per hour than men. Singh-Watson emphasizes that men can change and that embracing emotional literacy – kindness, openness, empathy, and compassion – makes them stronger. He encourages men to cast off limiting beliefs around what it means to be a man and to support each other and the women in their lives. Ultimately, inclusivity benefits everyone, and men must take responsibility for creating a more equitable and compassionate work environment.

Cole Palmer captained Chelsea for the first time in their 7-0 rout of Port Vale, showcasing his leadership qualities. Meanwhile, Arsenal suffered a loss to Southampton, raising concerns ahead of their upcoming matches.

From Monday, the United Kingdom’s statutory sick‑pay system will shift to pay employees from the first day of illness, a change that the Trades Union Congress (TUC) says will benefit up to 9.6 million workers. The reform is part of the first tranche of the Employment Rights Act 2025, which also introduces new safeguards on sexual harassment, parental leave and trade‑union recognition. Under the new rules, roughly 8.4 million employees who already receive statutory sick pay will see their entitlement start on day one rather than after a three‑day waiting period. In addition, about 1.2 million workers previously excluded because they earned less than the £125‑a‑week threshold will now qualify for the benefit. The expansion is expected to aid groups that are over‑represented in low‑paid or part‑time roles – notably women, disabled staff, and younger or older workers. The TUC argues that the measure will ease the financial pressure on lower‑income households, which often face a choice between extending their illness or forfeiting essential income. A TUC‑commissioned poll found that 76 % of respondents support sick pay from day one, indicating broad public approval across party lines. Business representatives, however, warn that the policy adds to a string of cost pressures already hitting firms. Neil Carberry, chief executive of the Recruitment and Employment Confederation, highlighted that employers are simultaneously coping with higher national‑minimum wages, increased payroll taxes and rising energy costs linked to the ongoing war with Iran. He cautioned that the new sick‑pay rules could force some companies to cut staff or raise prices, describing the situation as a "tipping point". Carberry also warned of potential abuse, saying a small minority of workers might attempt to exploit the system unless clear guidance is issued quickly. "The changes to statutory sick pay introduced this week will also cause chaos if not coupled swiftly with better guidance for firms," he said.