1) At least 200 Indians arrived in India from Iraq this morning. 400 more people will return home over the next 48 hours, as the situation has gone out of control in the strife-torn Iraq.

2) As the BJP is reluctant to confer the Opposition Party status on the Congress in Lok Sabha, the grand old party has threatened to move the court to seek justice. With just 44 MPs, the Congress falls short of the 10 percent mark — 55 members in the 545-member House.

3) RJD supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav has hinted at an alliance with Nitish Kumar’s JD(U) in the 2015 assembly polls in Bihar to keep the BJP at bay.

4) The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has made mobile number and email address mandatory for filing income-tax returns, in order to improve efficiency and more security to the e-filing system.

5) Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has requested the Finance Minister to increase the VAT on Tobacco to 50 per cent so that people are discouraged to smoke cigarettes.