Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen Sunday hosted a farewell lunch for outgoing Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Vikram Kumar Doraiswami. During the farewell speech, the foreign secretary called him a true friend of Bangladesh. "A career-defining honour to have served my country in this most vital and vibrant relationship," said Doraiswami. Read: PM likely to attend Queen’s state funeral The envoy added that the foreign secretary has been a "gracious and helpful" partner, whose gentle humour and friendship he will miss. Pranay Kumar Verma, now the Indian ambassador to Vietnam, has been appointed as the next high commissioner of the country to Bangladesh. Verma is expected to take up the assignment shortly.

After all of the many tributes to Serena Williams were done, the celebratory words and the video montages, the standing ovations and the shouts of her name, it seemed appropriate that she herself would provide the defining look at her legacy. So the last question at the news conference after her last match of the U.S. Open — and, it seems clear, of her career — offered Williams the chance to say how she’d most like to be remembered. “I feel like I really brought something, and bring something, to tennis. The different looks. The fist pumps. The just crazy intensity. ... ‘Passion,’ I think, is a really good word. Just continuing through ups and downs,” she responded Friday night. “I could go on and on. But I just honestly am so grateful that I had this moment — and that I’m Serena.” That captures so much about her so well. And to think: Williams, who turns 41 this month, did not even mention anything about being an elite athlete or any of the statistics that help define what she did with a racket in her hand. The 23 championships at the Grand Slam tournaments that have come to define success in her sport. Another 50 singles titles elsewhere. The 14 majors in doubles with her sister, Venus. The 319 weeks at No. 1. The four Olympic gold medals. So, sure, it’s impossible to assess Williams without considering her place in the pantheon of superstars, as worthy as anyone — woman or man, this generation or any other, this sport or any other — of the honorific “Greatest of All Time” (one clever spectator at Williams’ 7-5, 6-7 (4), 6-1 loss to Ajla Tomljanovic held up a poster with, simply, a drawing of a goat). “She is an all-time great. Obviously, that’s an understatement,” said Martina Navratilova, an 18-time major winner who certainly is part of that whole conversation. But Williams is also about a lot more than that. No Black woman had won a Slam title since Althea Gibson in the 1950s until Williams came along and collected her first at the 1999 U.S. Open at age 17. Over the more than two decades since, Williams and Venus, who earned seven major singles trophies of her own, get credit for inspiring Coco Gauff and Naomi Osaka and countless of others to play tennis, yes, but also for pushing plenty of others to change their views about what can be done and what can’t. Read: Serena Williams loses to Tomljanovic in US Open farewell “She embodies that no dream is too big,” Tomljanovic said. “You can do anything if you believe in yourself, you love what you do and you have an incredible support system around you.” There’s more. She won a Grand Slam title while pregnant, went through scary health complications after giving birth to her daughter, Olympia, in 2017, and would return to the tour and reach four more major finals. She has a venture capital firm that raised more than $100 million. “Everyone looks at her and tries to be like Serena,” said Caroline Garcia, a Frenchwoman seeded 17th and into the fourth round at the U.S. Open. “And I’m sure that’s going to be for years to come.” Williams wore what she wanted on a tennis court. She reacted how she wanted, during and away from her matches. She said what she wanted, sometimes addressing social issues, sometimes not, but there always was a sense that she was the one who decided. There were those who criticized her, of course. Those who wondered whether she was doing things the right way. Just as there were those who thought it was a mistake for her father, Richard, to keep his young daughters away from the junior tennis circuit. Um, seems as if that worked out, huh? “I will definitely (be) missing her on the courts,” Tomljanovic said, surely echoing the thoughts of many. “It will not be the same.” No, tennis most definitely will not be the same without Williams. Not even close. That’s OK, though. It’s time, as Williams famously wrote, for her to be “evolving” away from her days as a player. It’s time for her to devote extra energy to being a mom and a businesswomen and whatever else life brings her way. As Williams observed after hitting one last shot: “I have such a bright future ahead of me.”

Raheem Sterling edged closer to a move to Chelsea as he bid farewell to Manchester City on Wednesday. Sterling is on the cusp of completing a transfer of around 50 million pounds ($60 million) to City’s Premier League rival and he has reportedly flown out to Los Angeles to join up with Chelsea on its preseason tour and put pen to paper on a five-year deal. The England attacking midfielder posted an emotional message on social media, along with a video of highlights of his time at City. Read: Erling Haaland Transfer: Five Interesting Facts About Manchester City's New Signing “Seven seasons, eleven major trophies, a lifetime of memories,” it read. “To the coaching staff who have played a massive role in my development over the years, to my teammates who have become more than just those I share a pitch with, to the backroom staff, to the office staff, to the fans who have tirelessly supported the team, and to everyone involved with Manchester City, my respect for you couldn’t be greater. “What a ride it’s been.” Sterling joined City from Liverpool in 2015 for a fee of nearly 50 million pounds, making him then the most expensive English player of all time. The 27-year-old Sterling helped City to win four league titles and scored 131 goals in 339 games across all competitions. He was in-and-out of the team last season and did not start either leg of the Champions League semifinal loss to Real Madrid or the Premier League title-clincher against Aston Villa on the final day. Also read: Manchester City vs Real Madrid 2022: Champions League Semi-Final Match Preview “I am thankful for the ups and the downs,” Sterling added in his post. “As it’s the downs that have, at times, tested my strength and resolve, and enabled me to stand here in front of you as the best possible version of myself. “I arrived in Manchester a 20-year-old, today, I leave as a man.”

India on Friday bid an emotional farewell to the country's first military chief General Bipin Rawat, his wife and 11 other armed forces personnel who died in a chopper crash in the southern state of Tamil Nadu on Wednesday. In Delhi, the 63-year-old Chief of Defence Staff and his wife Madhulika were cremated with full military honours this evening, as political leaders cutting across party lines, senior Indian defence officials as well as top military commanders from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Nepal thronged the Brar Square crematorium to pay silent tribute to the departed souls. Read: India orders tri-services probe into military chief's chopper crash The bodies of General Rawat and his wife were laid side by side on the same funeral pyre that was lit by their two daughters, Kritika and Tarin, as per Hindu tradition. Some 800 Indian defence personnel witnessed the funeral, which was telecast live on all Indian channels. The bodies of the 13 chopper crash victims were brought to the Indian capital on Thursday night on a special Air Force transport aircraft. After the plane landed at Palam airport, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and top military officials paid tributes to the departed souls in a brief ceremony. General Rawat, a four-star General, was on his way to deliver a lecture at Defence Services Staff College in Wellington when the Mi-17 V5 chopper crashed in the hilly terrain of the Nilgiris in Tamil Nadu's Coonoor district and burst into flames around noon on Wednesday. Of a total of 14 people on board the ill-fated chopper, 13 were charred to death. Read:India's first military chief among 13 dead in chopper crash The lone survivor of the crash -- senior Air Force officer Group Captain Varun Singh -- was on Thursday evening airlifted to a state-of-the-art military hospital in the neighbouring state of Karnataka's capital Bengaluru from a medical facility in Wellington. The Indian government on Thursday only ordered a tri-services probe -- an investigation by the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force -- into the chopper crash. "The investigation will be led by Air Marshal Manavendra Singh (Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief Training Command)," the Defense Minister told the Indian Parliament. General Rawat has had a chequered career in the armed forces spanning over 40 years, rising from the rank of a junior commissioned officer to the Indian Army chief and eventually the first head of the tri-services. He reported directly to the Indian Prime Minister.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky bid farewell to 11 Ukrainians killed in a plane mistakenly shot down by Iran earlier this month, the presidential office said Sunday.

Walter Mercado lay in his coffin Wednesday wearing a velvet suit that ranged in color from his favorite violet to dark blue as a teary woman stood nearby, transfixed by a screen that showed pictures of the legendary Puerto Rican astrologer surrounded by friends, family and his dog, Runo.