India accounted for 26 per cent of Asia‑Pacific healthcare private equity (PE) deal volume in 2024, making it the largest PE market in the region by volume, a report said on Thursday.

The report from Bain & Company said that the global healthcare PE deal value hit a record $191 billion in 2025.

India was the largest market in the region by volume as buyout activity shifted away from China toward India, Japan, and South Korea due to the countries’ macroeconomic fundamentals, the report said.

OpenAI has introduced ChatGPT Health, a dedicated experience to securely connect people’s medical records and wellness apps.

The San Francisco-based artificial intelligence (AI) giant has developed the new experience, with close collaboration from more than 260 physicians practicing across 60 countries.

In a tragic road accident, two persons, including a church priest, were killed on the spot, while another priest sustained serious injuries in Jharkhand’s Khunti district, officials said on Thursday.

The accident occurred around 11 p.m. on Wednesday near Dodma Bazaar Tand on the Khunti-Simdega main road under Torpa police station limits.

The victims were travelling in a car that reportedly rammed into a truck from behind.

The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday held a conference of Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) as part of preparations for the India International Conference on Democracy and Election Management (IICDEM)-2026.

The three-day global conference is scheduled to be held from January 21 to 23 at Bharat Mandapam here.

Silver prices fell sharply on Thursday as selling pressure increased ahead of the annual rebalancing of global commodity indexes and the release of key US economic data.

On the Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX), silver dropped nearly 3.5 per cent to trade below Rs 2,42,000 per kilogram during the session.

India’s GDP will grow around 6.6 per cent by FY27, driven by growth engines including digital economy, AI, quick commerce, tourism, the silver economy, and green ports, a report said on Thursday.

The report Business data analytics firm Dun & Bradstreet said the digital economy is expected to grow almost twice as fast as the overall economy and account for nearly 20 per cent of gross value added by 203.

Excess funds held by South Korean households rose in the third quarter, driven mainly by an increase in income and tightened lending regulations, the central bank said on Thursday.

Net financial funds -- the difference between financial assets and financial liabilities -- held by households and nonprofit organizations reached 58 trillion won (US$40 billion) in the third quarter, up from 51.3 trillion won in the previous quarter, according to preliminary data from the Bank of Korea (BOK).

The Election Commission of India (ECI) has clarified that the precise deployment of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) for the forthcoming Assembly elections in West Bengal will be determined by the extent to which state police personnel can be deployed for poll-related security.

The determining factor will also be on how and where the available state police personnel will be deployed by the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), West Bengal, for election-related security.

As promised, the makers of Yash's much-discussed period gangster drama, "Toxic: A Fairy Tale for Grown-Ups" have unveiled the first glimpse of his character Raya from the movie, that too on his 40th birthday.

After witnessing the power-packed preview, filmmaker Karan Johar couldn't help but congratulate Yash on a fabulous birthday announcement.

KJo called the latest sneak peek into "Toxic" simply kick ass.

 As rockstar Yash rang in his 40th birthday on Thursday, the makers of his upcoming film Toxic: A Fairytale for Grown-Ups marked the occasion by revealing a striking glimpse of his character, Raya raw, bold and unapologetically intense.

The star took to Instagram and X to unveil a gripping clip introducing his character, Raya. Set against the eerie silence of a cemetery, the video opens with a burial in progress before cutting to Yash’s character seated in a car with a woman in an intimate moment. Behind them, a bomb is placed, yet the two remain completely unfazed.

India’s economic growth is expected to outpace the National Statistical Office’s (NSO) first advance estimate, reflecting "buoyant high‑frequency data since September 2025 led by policy impetus," a new report has said.

The report from Morgan Stanley estimated real GDP growth at 7.6 per cent year‑on‑year for FY26 -- above the NSO’s first advance estimate which pegged real GDP growth at 7.4 per cent YoY.

The consensus estimate for FY26 growth is at 7.5 per cent and the Reserve Bank of India’s estimate is 7.3 per cent, the report said.

Birthday celebrations turned tragic as four students were killed and another critically injured when an SUV in which they were travelling rammed into a tree near Hyderabad early Thursday, police said.

The accident occurred near Mirzapur in Mokila of Rangareddy district.

According to police, the group of students were returning to Hyderabad from Mokila following birthday celebrations of one of the deceased.

People who eat more industrially processed foods and beverages laced with preservatives, widely used to extend shelf-life, may increase the risk of cancer, according to a study.

The study, published in The BMJ, showed that higher intakes of several preservatives (mostly non-antioxidants, including potassium sorbate, potassium metabisulfite, sodium nitrite, potassium nitrate, and acetic acid) were associated with a higher risk of cancers, compared with risks in non-consumers or lower consumers.

Capital markets regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has found that a Bank of America (BofA) unit improperly shared material non‑public information about a $180 million block sale and misled investigators, a report has claimed.

SEBI’s November show‑cause notice alleges the bank’s deal team disclosed price‑sensitive details of a 2024 sale of Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC shares to employees outside the execution team and later provided inaccurate statements to investigators, the report from the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Crucial documents related to Special Intensive Revision (SIR) were gutted as fire broke out at the SDO office in West Bengal's Siliguri district.

According to the police, a fire suddenly broke out at the Sub-Divisional Officer (SDO) office on Hill Cart Road in Mallaguri early on Thursday.

As a result of the fire, two rooms of the SDO office have been completely gutted.

Tamil Nadu has reported the highest number of dengue cases in the country in 2025, even as the death toll has remained relatively low due to early detection and prompt medical intervention, according to the latest data released by the Union Health Ministry.

Between January and November 2025, the state recorded 20,866 dengue cases and 12 deaths. Health officials attributed the high case count not to an uncontrolled outbreak, but to the strength of Tamil Nadu’s disease surveillance and reporting system, which tracks infections from the primary health centre (PHC) level to secondary and tertiary care hospitals.

 With minus 5.1 degrees Celsius as the minimum temperature, Jammu and Kashmir's Srinagar city recorded this season’s coldest night on Thursday.

Mukhtar Ahmed, director of the local Meteorological (MeT) Department, told, “At minus 5.1 degrees Celsius as the minimum temperature, Srinagar city recorded this season’s lowest minimum temperature today.”

Gulmarg recorded minus 9.2 degrees Celsius, and Pahalgam recorded minus 8.6 as the minimum temperature.

The Indian benchmark indices posted mild losses on Thursday amid profit booking, rising geopolitical tensions and muted sentiment from the Asian markets.

As of 9.23 am, Sensex slipped 108 points, or 0.13 per cent to 84,852 and Nifty eased 46 points, or 0.18 per cent to 26,094.

Delhi’s air quality showed a marginal improvement on Thursday morning, with the Air Quality Index (AQI) recorded at 279 at 7.05 a.m., placing it in the ‘poor’ category, according to data from the Central Pollution Control Board’s (CPCB) Sameer app. Despite the slight relief in pollution levels, Delhi-NCR continued to reel under severe cold wave conditions for the second consecutive day, as dense fog and chilly winds led to a sharp drop in temperatures across the region.

This marked a slight improvement from Wednesday, when the national capital recorded an AQI of 302 at the same time, categorising the air quality as ‘very poor’.