0 b2ˆ’ 1 ˛ ˚˛ c ˘ ˚˛ c c · 1 day ago  · sensational claim: “like in ... ghulam nabi...

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D elhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday launched a mobile application and a web-based online OPD registration and appointment system of the Dada Dev mater- nity hospital through video- conferencing. H said work is uenderway on the Delhi Government’s hospital management infor- mation system, and it will be completed within a year. “Women patients will no longer need to wait in long queues and now, can register and get doctors’ appointments through this app. There should be no crowding during the coronavirus pandemic,” he said. Continued on Page 2 Chandigarh: Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, Assembly Speaker Gian Chand Gupta and two BJP MLAs test- ed positive for Covid-19 on Monday, two days before the Monsoon Session of the Assembly is set to begin here. Khattar’s test report came positive on Monday, six days after he had attended a meet- ing with Union Jal Shakti Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, who was later found infected with the virus. Khattar was taken to the PGIMER hospital here for a detailed check-up in the evening, an official said, adding that his condition was stable. Continued on Page 2 Seoul: North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is reportedly in a coma, according to Chang Song-min, a former aide to South Korea’s late president Kim Dae-jung. Kim Jong-un’s sister Kim Yo Jong is poised to take up the reins of North Korea, the South Korean diplomat speculated, according to media reports. “A complete succession structure has not been formed, so Kim Yo-jong is being brought to the fore as the vac- uum cannot be maintained for a prolonged period,” said Chang, as reported in the New York Post. Kim was last seen presid- ing over a Workers’ Party polit- buro meeting on April 1. Kim Yo-jung came into prominence when she became the first member of the Kim family to visit South Korea as part of the delegation for the winter Olympics. S till to get a clear picture of the circumstances leading to Sushant Singh Rajput’s death at his flat, the CBI sleuths on Monday grilled the late actor’s flatmate-friend Siddharath Pithani and cook Neeraj Singh to comprehend the “inconsis- tencies” in their statements, even as they opened a new probe front by visiting a city resort where the actor had reportedly undergoing “spiri- tual healing” for two months. On a day when the elec- tronic media went to town speculating on when the CBI would question Sushant’s girl- friend Rhea Chakraborty in the case, the late actor’s family lawyer Vikas Singh said that he expected the CBI officials to summon Rhea for questioning only after they complete their “spade work” and anticipated her arrest in the event of her “not cooperating” with the investigators. On his part, Rhea’s lawyer Satish Maneshinde said that her client and her family had not received any summons for questioning from the CBI. “If they receive summons, they will appear before the CBI” Maneshinde said. Giving a new spin to the ongoing investigations into the Sushant Singh Rajput death, BJP’s Rajya Sabha member Subramanian Swamy made a sensational claim: “Like in Sunanda Pushkar case the real giveaway was what was found in her stomach during post- mortem by AIIMS doctors. This was not done for Sridevi or Sushant. In Sushant case, a Dubai compliant drug dealer Ayash Khan had met Sushant on the day of Sushant’s murder. Why?” Through another tweet, Swamy predicted: “If Rhea Chakraborty keeps giving evi- dence which contradicts her conversation with Mahesh Bhatt then CBI will have no alternative but to arrest her and subject her to custodial inter- rogation to get at the truth”. Continued on Page 2 T he Centre is expected to allow the operation of Metro trains across the coun- try in the forthcoming Unlockdown-4 guidelines. According to sources, Ministry of Home Affairs is expected to issue new guidelines allowing the running of Metro trains in the next few days. The officials said the final decision will be taken after con- sulting Chief Ministers of the States having Metro trains namely Delhi, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Kerala. According to sources, new Unlockdown-4 guidelines starting from September 1 would not consider the open- ing of schools immediately. First universities, colleges will be opened and then senior classes in schools namely 11th and 12th classes, said sources adding that junior classes open- ing will take place later. With the opening of Metro trains, the majority of the transportation issues are expected to be solved and bring the city life back to nor- mal. The CISF which oversee the security in Metro trains have already conducted checks and mock operations. Metro trains are for the past three weeks running on tracks on test basis. There will be a limit on passengers in each Metro trains to keep the social distancing, said officials. On Sunday, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said the Centre should allow the resumption of the Metro train services in Delhi in a phased manner as the Covid-19 the sit- uation was improving in the city. T he turmoil within the Congress following a letter bomb dropped by 23 senior leaders ended on a note of rec- onciliation on Monday with the CWC members persuading Sonia Gandhi to continue lead- ing the party for at least six more months after which the process will start for the search of a new president. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh moved a resolution asking Sonia Gandhi to continue till the AICC ses- sion is called within six months to initiate the process for the search for a new chief. An overwhelming num- bers of members of the extend- ed CWC said that if Sonia Gandhi did not want to con- tinue, Rahul Gandhi should return to the post as president. The CWC deliberation and its outcome showed that major- ity of the senior Congressmen wanted the party to be led by a Gandhi. Even the signatory of the “letter bomb” seeking a “visible and full-time presi- dent”, said nothing in the meet- ing to question Sonia’s leader- ship. The CWC may have endorsed Sonia Gandhi’s lead- ership, but in the days ahead the Congress could see major churning because a section within the party is growing restless due to Sonia’s “ inac- cessibility” and “inactivity.” These leaders feel that their existence and the party’s sur- vival are at stake and the mat- ter should be dealt with a sense of urgency. With Rahul Gandhi’s dis- like for “several of the old guards” a public knowledge, Sonia will have to do tight ropewalk to carry everyone together while restructuring the party. The CWC has decided to set up a committee to assist Sonia Gandhi to look into the issues raised in the letter by leaders. Announcing the reso- lution passed by the CWC, the party’s general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal later said at a Press conference that the CWC unanimously requested Sonia Gandhi to continue to “lead the Indian National Congress until such time as circumstances will per- mit an AICC session to be con- vened.” While senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel said at CWC that Rahul Gandhi should be elevated to the post of the party chief, former Union Minister P Chidambaram suggested hold- ing of a virtual AICC session to start the process of holding elections for a new party chief. The CWC also authorised Sonia to effect necessary organ- isational changes to take on various challenges before the party. The party further said the CWC unanimously resolved to strengthen hands of Sonia and former party chief Rahul Gandhi in every possi- ble way, while it also made it clear no one will be permitted to undermine or weaken the party and its leadership. The CWC also resolved that inner-party issues cannot be deliberated through media or in public fora and all such issues must be raised within the party “in the interest of pro- priety and discipline”. Continued on Page 2 A ctivist-lawyer Prashant Bhushan refused to offer an apology to the Supreme Court on Monday for his two tweets against the judiciary saying what he expressed rep- resented his bona fide belief which he continued to hold. “An apology for expression of these beliefs, conditional or unconditional, would be insin- cere,” and it would amount to the contempt of my conscience and of an institution, Bhushan said in his supplementary state- ment filed in the suo motu con- tempt case against him by the SC, taking note of advocate Anuj Saxena’s complaint. Continued on Page 2 A purported comment by former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi that some of the party leaders had colluded with the BJP to tarnish the image of the grand old party by ques- tioning the party leadership, created a flutter when the Congress Working Committee (CWC) met to deliberate on the leadership issue after the incumbent head Sonia Gandhi announced her decision to call it a day. Senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal and Ghulam Nabi Azad were so upset with the “so-called” comment that the former countered it with a tweet narrating his credentials and Azad vowed to quit the party if the charges of BJP link were established. Late in the evening after the marathon CWC meet, Congress leaders Manish Tewari, Shashi Tharoor and Kapil Sibal reached residence of Ghulam Nabi Azad to sort out the differences in the wake of such allegations against him which he himself denied. In his tweet Sibal said, “Rahul says ‘we are colluding with BJP’. Succeeded in Rajasthan High Court defend- ing the Congress party. Defending party in Manipur to bring down the BJP Government. Last 30 years have never made a statement in favour of the BJP on any issue. Yet we are colluding with the BJP.” Soon after this, Rahul Gandhi personally telephoned Sibal to clarify that he never made any “colluding with BJP” remarks and the Congress also officially blamed a section of media for trying to malign the image of the party. Sibal withdrew his tweet and confirmed Rahul had informed him personally that he had never made the “col- luding with the BJP” remark. Continued on Page 2

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Page 1: 0 B2ˆ’ 1 ˛ ˚˛ C ˘ ˚˛ C C · 1 day ago  · sensational claim: “Like in ... Ghulam Nabi Azad to sort out ... get closer to the truth. (The writer is an author specialising

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Delhi Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal on Monday

launched a mobile applicationand a web-based online OPDregistration and appointmentsystem of the Dada Dev mater-nity hospital through video-conferencing.

H said work is uenderwayon the Delhi Government’shospital management infor-mation system, and it will becompleted within a year.

“Women patients will nolonger need to wait in longqueues and now, can registerand get doctors’ appointmentsthrough this app. There shouldbe no crowding during thecoronavirus pandemic,” he said.

Continued on Page 2

Chandigarh: Haryana ChiefMinister Manohar Lal Khattar,Assembly Speaker Gian ChandGupta and two BJP MLAs test-ed positive for Covid-19 onMonday, two days before theMonsoon Session of theAssembly is set to begin here.

Khattar’s test report camepositive on Monday, six daysafter he had attended a meet-ing with Union Jal ShaktiMinister Gajendra SinghShekhawat, who was laterfound infected with the virus.Khattar was taken to thePGIMER hospital here for adetailed check-up in theevening, an official said, addingthat his condition was stable.

Continued on Page 2

Seoul: North Korean leaderKim Jong-un is reportedly in acoma, according to ChangSong-min, a former aide toSouth Korea’s late presidentKim Dae-jung.

Kim Jong-un’s sister KimYo Jong is poised to take up thereins of North Korea, the SouthKorean diplomat speculated,according to media reports.

“A complete successionstructure has not been formed,so Kim Yo-jong is being

brought to the fore as the vac-uum cannot be maintained fora prolonged period,” saidChang, as reported in the NewYork Post.

Kim was last seen presid-ing over a Workers’ Party polit-buro meeting on April 1. KimYo-jung came into prominencewhen she became the firstmember of the Kim family tovisit South Korea as part of thedelegation for the winterOlympics.

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Still to get a clear picture ofthe circumstances leading to

Sushant Singh Rajput’s death athis flat, the CBI sleuths onMonday grilled the late actor’sflatmate-friend SiddharathPithani and cook Neeraj Singhto comprehend the “inconsis-tencies” in their statements,even as they opened a newprobe front by visiting a cityresort where the actor hadreportedly undergoing “spiri-tual healing” for two months.

On a day when the elec-tronic media went to townspeculating on when the CBI

would question Sushant’s girl-friend Rhea Chakraborty in thecase, the late actor’s familylawyer Vikas Singh said that heexpected the CBI officials tosummon Rhea for questioningonly after they complete their“spade work” and anticipatedher arrest in the event of her“not cooperating” with theinvestigators.

On his part, Rhea’s lawyerSatish Maneshinde said that herclient and her family had notreceived any summons forquestioning from the CBI. “Ifthey receive summons, theywill appear before the CBI”Maneshinde said.

Giving a new spin to theongoing investigations into theSushant Singh Rajput death,BJP’s Rajya Sabha memberSubramanian Swamy made asensational claim: “Like inSunanda Pushkar case the real

giveaway was what was foundin her stomach during post-mortem by AIIMS doctors.This was not done for Sridevior Sushant. In Sushant case, aDubai compliant drug dealerAyash Khan had met Sushanton the day of Sushant’s murder.Why?”

Through another tweet,Swamy predicted: “If RheaChakraborty keeps giving evi-dence which contradicts herconversation with MaheshBhatt then CBI will have noalternative but to arrest her andsubject her to custodial inter-rogation to get at the truth”.

Continued on Page 2

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The Centre is expected toallow the operation of

Metro trains across the coun-try in the forthcomingUnlockdown-4 guidelines.According to sources, Ministryof Home Affairs is expected toissue new guidelines allowingthe running of Metro trains inthe next few days.

The officials said the finaldecision will be taken after con-sulting Chief Ministers of theStates having Metro trainsnamely Delhi, Maharashtra,Karnataka, Tamil Nadu,Haryana, Uttar Pradesh andKerala.

According to sources, newUnlockdown-4 guidelinesstarting from September 1

would not consider the open-ing of schools immediately.First universities, colleges willbe opened and then seniorclasses in schools namely 11thand 12th classes, said sourcesadding that junior classes open-ing will take place later.

With the opening of Metrotrains, the majority of thetransportation issues are

expected to be solved andbring the city life back to nor-mal. The CISF which overseethe security in Metro trainshave already conducted checksand mock operations. Metrotrains are for the past threeweeks running on tracks on testbasis. There will be a limit onpassengers in each Metro trainsto keep the social distancing,said officials.

On Sunday, Delhi ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal saidthe Centre should allow theresumption of the Metro trainservices in Delhi in a phasedmanner as the Covid-19 the sit-uation was improving in the city.

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The turmoil within theCongress following a letter

bomb dropped by 23 seniorleaders ended on a note of rec-onciliation on Monday with theCWC members persuadingSonia Gandhi to continue lead-ing the party for at least sixmore months after which theprocess will start for the searchof a new president.

Former Prime MinisterManmohan Singh moved aresolution asking Sonia Gandhito continue till the AICC ses-sion is called within six monthsto initiate the process for thesearch for a new chief.

An overwhelming num-bers of members of the extend-ed CWC said that if SoniaGandhi did not want to con-tinue, Rahul Gandhi shouldreturn to the post as president.

The CWC deliberation andits outcome showed that major-ity of the senior Congressmenwanted the party to be led bya Gandhi. Even the signatory ofthe “letter bomb” seeking a“visible and full-time presi-dent”, said nothing in the meet-ing to question Sonia’s leader-ship.

The CWC may haveendorsed Sonia Gandhi’s lead-ership, but in the days aheadthe Congress could see majorchurning because a sectionwithin the party is growingrestless due to Sonia’s “ inac-cessibility” and “inactivity.”

These leaders feel that theirexistence and the party’s sur-vival are at stake and the mat-ter should be dealt with asense of urgency.

With Rahul Gandhi’s dis-like for “several of the oldguards” a public knowledge,Sonia will have to do tightropewalk to carry everyonetogether while restructuringthe party.

The CWC has decided toset up a committee to assistSonia Gandhi to look into theissues raised in the letter byleaders. Announcing the reso-lution passed by the CWC, theparty’s general secretary(organisation) KC Venugopallater said at a Press conferencethat the CWC unanimouslyrequested Sonia Gandhi tocontinue to “lead the IndianNational Congress until suchtime as circumstances will per-mit an AICC session to be con-vened.”

While senior Congressleader Ahmed Patel said atCWC that Rahul Gandhishould be elevated to the postof the party chief, formerUnion Minister PChidambaram suggested hold-ing of a virtual AICC session tostart the process of holdingelections for a new party chief.

The CWC also authorisedSonia to effect necessary organ-isational changes to take onvarious challenges before theparty. The party further saidthe CWC unanimously

resolved to strengthen hands ofSonia and former party chiefRahul Gandhi in every possi-ble way, while it also made itclear no one will be permittedto undermine or weaken theparty and its leadership.

The CWC also resolvedthat inner-party issues cannotbe deliberated through mediaor in public fora and all suchissues must be raised within theparty “in the interest of pro-priety and discipline”.

Continued on Page 2

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Activist-lawyer PrashantBhushan refused to offer

an apology to the SupremeCourt on Monday for his twotweets against the judiciarysaying what he expressed rep-resented his bona fide beliefwhich he continued to hold.

“An apology for expressionof these beliefs, conditional orunconditional, would be insin-cere,” and it would amount tothe contempt of my conscienceand of an institution, Bhushansaid in his supplementary state-ment filed in the suo motu con-tempt case against him by theSC, taking note of advocateAnuj Saxena’s complaint.

Continued on Page 2

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Apurported comment byformer Congress chief

Rahul Gandhi that some of theparty leaders had colluded withthe BJP to tarnish the image ofthe grand old party by ques-tioning the party leadership,created a flutter when theCongress Working Committee(CWC) met to deliberate on theleadership issue after theincumbent head Sonia Gandhiannounced her decision to callit a day.

Senior Congress leaderKapil Sibal and Ghulam NabiAzad were so upset with the“so-called” comment that the

former countered it with atweet narrating his credentialsand Azad vowed to quit theparty if the charges of BJP linkwere established.

Late in the evening afterthe marathon CWC meet,Congress leaders ManishTewari, Shashi Tharoor andKapil Sibal reached residence ofGhulam Nabi Azad to sort outthe differences in the wake ofsuch allegations against himwhich he himself denied.

In his tweet Sibal said,“Rahul says ‘we are colludingwith BJP’. Succeeded inRajasthan High Court defend-ing the Congress party.Defending party in Manipur to

bring down the BJPGovernment. Last 30 yearshave never made a statement infavour of the BJP on any issue.Yet we are colluding with theBJP.”

Soon after this, RahulGandhi personally telephonedSibal to clarify that he nevermade any “colluding with BJP”remarks and the Congress alsoofficially blamed a section ofmedia for trying to malign theimage of the party.

Sibal withdrew his tweetand confirmed Rahul hadinformed him personally thathe had never made the “col-luding with the BJP” remark.

Continued on Page 2

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As many as 25 people wererescued while “70 to 80”

more people were fearedtrapped under the debris, as afive-storey building caved inlike a proverbial pack of cardsat Mahad in Raigad district onMonday evening.

Fortunately, there was noreport of any casualty in themishap till late in the night.

“Tarique Garden”, a resi-dential building located atMahad’s Kajalpura locality col-lapsed all of a sudden at around7 pm. The building had 45 flats.It was occupied by more than100 residents.

While 25 persons were res-cued during the initial phase ofrescue and relief operationsundertaken by the local firebrigade personnel, the localpeople apprehended that “70 to80” were still trapped under thedebris. A National DisasterResponse Force (NDRF)NDRF team rushed to the spotfrom Pune later in the eveningand began the rescue operation.

The building that collapsedwas a–year-old structure, con-structed by two Mumbai basedbuilders.

Meanwhile, Maharashtrachief minister UddhavThackeray took stock of themishap by speaking to Raigad

district collector NidhiChowdhary and local MLABharat Gagowale.

In a related development,Union Home Minister AmitShah tweeted: “The collapse ofa building in Raigad,Maharashtra is very tragic.Have spoken to DG@NDRFHQ to provide all pos-sible assistance, teams are onthe way and will be assistingwith the rescue operations assoon as possible. Praying foreveryone’s safety”.

Leader of Opposition(Assembly) Devendra Fadnavisexpressed shock over thetragedy and prayed for thesafety of the people.

New Delhi: The SupremeCourt on Monday declined topass direction to the CentralGovernment to hold theNational Eligibility CumEntrance Test (NEET)Undergraduate (UG) 2020examination in Gulf countries,but asked the Government toallow students to come viaVande Bharat Mission flights togive the exams.

A bench of Justice LNageswara Rao said that thequarantine norms are manda-tory for students who wouldcome from the Middle East

countries to give exam butallowed petitioners to approachState authorities to seek relax-ation.

The bench said the examwill be offline and the studentswho fly in will have to maintainthe 14 days quarantine in viewof public health.

The top court askedSolicitor General Tushar Mehtato speak to ministries con-cerned to ensure aspirants, forthe NEET scheduled onSeptember 13, residing in theMiddle East are permitted tocome to India in Vande Bharat

Mission flights.Recently, the Medical

Council of India has told theapex court that postponementof the NEET UG 2020 exami-nation of this year any furthershall be a "drastic deviation"

from the academic schedulewhich may affect the subse-quent academic years of thestudents.

The MCI, in an affidavit,had said plea for overseasexamination centres for NEET(UG) does not deserve indul-gence from the top court inview of the fact that theGovernment of India has per-mitted travel to and from othercountries, through VandeBharat Mission.

The Central government,under the Vande BharatMission, has permitted Indiancitizens, including overseas cit-izens of India, to come to Indiaby special flights, the affidavithas added while seeking dis-missal of the plea.

The top court was hearingplea filed by parents of nearly4,000 NEET (UG) candidates,who sought to alternativelypostpone the examination until

the COVID-19 pandemic nor-malises.

The parents of these can-didates, who reside in Doha,Qatar, Oman, and UAE, haveapproached the apex courtchallenging the Kerala HighCourt June 30 order which haddismissed their plea.

In their appeal against theKerala High Court order, thegeneral secretary of KeralaMuslim Culture Centre inQatar, Abdul Azeez said thatthe National Testing Agency(NTA) had the capability andwillingness to open exam cen-tres in Gulf countries as theyhad been doing so for theJoint Entrance Examination(JEE) (Main).

Earlier, the NTA had toldthe court that it is not possibleto have overseas examinationcentres NEET (UG) 2020 as theexamination is conducted inpaper book format. PTI

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The Covid 19-triggereddeaths dropped further in

Maharashtra on Monday, as212 people succumbed to thepandemic, while 11,015 otherstested positive for Coronavirusin various parts of the state.

In a significant develop-ment, as many as 14,219patients were discharged fromhospitals in the state after fullrecovery, taking the total num-ber of patients dischargedfrom various hospitals after fullrecovery since the second weekof March this year to 5,02,490.The recovery rate stood at72.47 per cent. The mortalityrate in the state is 3.24 per cent.The state health authoritiespegged the number of “activecases” in the state at 1,68,126.

With fresh deaths andinfections, the Covid-19 deathtoll rose to 22,465, while thetotal infected cases inched clos-er to 5 lakh figure, to touch6.93,398.

Pune with 1,52,511 infec-tions continued to stay aheadof Mumbai where the totalcases rose to 1,37,096.

Of the 212 deaths report-ed on Monday, Thane account-ed for a highest of 33 deaths,followed by 24 deaths in Pune,20 deaths in Mumbai, 18 deaths

each in Jalgaon and Nagpur, 10deaths each in Solapur andSatara.

On the lower side, therewere 9 deaths in Ahmednagar,7 each in Nashik, Kolhapur,Sangli, Latur and Beed, 6 eachin Dhule and Aurangabad, 5 inRaigad, 4 in Nanded, 2 each inPalghar, Ratnagiri and Gondiaand one death each in Jalna,Parbhani, Osmanabad,Washim, Bhandara andChandrapur.

For the eleventh consecu-tive day, the death tally inMumbai dropped below 50

mark. With 20 deaths whichincidentally is the lowest in thelast several weeks, Mumbai’stoll increased from 7,422 to7442, while the infected casesin the metropolis rose by 991to touch 137096.

Meanwhile, out of 36,63,488 samples sent to laborato-ries, 6,93,398 have tested pos-itive (18.86 per cent) forCOVID-19 inthe state untilMonday.

Currently, 12,44,024 peopleare in home quarantine while34,922 people are in institu-tional quarantine.

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The Centre has asked the UPGovernment to expedite

process of land acquisition forthe UP Defence Corridor,which is expected to span near-ly 5,000 hectares across sixnodes, namely, Aligarh, Agra,Jhansi, Chitrakoot, Kanpur andLucknow.

So far, the state has takenpossession of over 1,300hectares, while projects withinvestments totalling �3,732crore have been launched.These include � 1,077 crore byHindustan AeronauticsLimited (HAL), �1,200 crore byBharat Electronic Limited(BEL), �240 crore PTCIndustries, �200 crore Bharat

Forge and ` 900 crore byKanpur-based MKU.

Presiding over a virtualconference, defence ministerRajnath Singh asked the UPgovernment to complete allongoing projects according totheir timelines, while forgingclose coordination withinvestors to redress their griev-ances.

Meanwhile, Singh said thatthe cabinet note on the newdefence manufacturing policywas ready and would bereleased next month.

Singh said that the StateGovernment should maintainregular contact with investorsand take prompt action ontheir issues. Singh also asked tospeed up the work of land

acquisition in Lucknow andAgra nodes.

Recently, Indian Navy hadsigned a memorandum ofunderstanding (MoU) with UPExpressway IndustrialDevelopment Authority(UPEIDA) for setting up a‘Centre of Excellence’ in theDefence Corridor to promoteresearch and innovation indefence sector.

UP chief secretary RKTiwari said that 6 nodes havebeen developed in Aligarh,Agra, Jhansi, Chitrakoot,Kanpur and Lucknow.

Tiwari said that the stategovernment has assigned1461.0579 hectares land for thepurpose, of which 1310.2532hectare land has been acquired,

which is over 90 percent of theassigned land.

Giving details of theacquired land, Tiwari said1025.4672 hectares of landhas been acquired in Jhansi,95.9340 hectares inChitrakoot, 47.8440 hectaresin Aligarh and 141.0080hectares in Kanpur has beenacquired. In Agra, land outsideTTZ is being explored, whilein Lucknow the land aroundRing Road is being considered.He also assured the Minister that works would beexpedited.

Meanwhile, UP additionalchief secretary and UPEIDACEO Awanish Kumar Awasthiinformed the defence ministerthat the state had speeded up

projects under the Corridorand new policies had also beenframed, including Defence andAerospace ManufacturingEmployment Promotion Policy2018.

He said Titan Aviation andAerospace India Limited willinvest more than ̀ 36,000 crorein Jhansi, for which the detailedproject report (DPR) had beensubmitted. He said so far, 32MoUs have been signed relat-ing to the UP defence corridorthe state has received propos-als from investors based inSouth Korea and Ukraine.

Recently, German militaryand security hardware/tech-nology major Rheinmetall hadalso evinced interest in the UPdefence corridor.

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From Page 1Sibal is among the 23 party

leaders who have written toSonia Gandhi seeking “full-time” leadership that is activein the field and “visible” inparty offices, devolution ofpowers to State units andrevamping of the CWC in linewith the party constitutionamong other changes.

Azad also came forward toundertake damage controlexercise saying a section ofmedia is “wrongly attributingthat Rahul Gandhi said the let-ter to Sonia regarding overhaulin organisation was written bysome Congress leaders in col-lusion with the BJP”.

The Congress also deniedthat Rahul had accused anyparty leader of “colluding withthe BJP”, saying he has not saida word of that nature noralluded to it.

Tagging Sibal’s earliertweet, Congress’ chiefspokesperson RandeepSurjewala said that RahulGandhi hasn’t said a word ofthis nature nor alluded to it.“Please don’t be misled by falsemedia discourse or misinfor-mation being spread. But yes,we all need to work together infighting the draconian Modirule rather than fighting andhurting each other and theCongress,” Surjewala tweeted.

AICC sources said in hisspeech at the CWC, Rahul hadthough questioned the timingof the letter, which was sentwhen Sonia Gandhi was hos-pitalised and when the partywas plagued with internal cri-sis in Rajasthan. The letterwas sent to the Congress pres-ident three weeks ago.

Unlike other virtual CWCmeetings, the Congress onMonday took extra precau-tions and changed from Zoomto WebEx application as thisapplication has more restrictivefeatures to record the pro-ceedings and prevent frommisusing.

Azad, who is one of thesignatories read out the con-tents of the letter, saying theleaders are not questioning theleadership of Sonia Gandhi butonly wanted organisationalreform in the larger interest ofthe party. Rahul also saidSonia Gandhi had acceptedthe party presidentship onlyafter the CWC last year urgedher to take responsibility. Hetook on the leaders who wentpublic with their complaintssaying, “It is the CWC wherewe discuss our differences andput out our thoughts, not themedia”.

From Page 1Kejriwal said the Delhi

government was integratingits hospitals, Mohalla clinicsand polyclinics through thehospital management infor-mation system (HMIS), and theprocess will be completed with-in a year. Once established, theHMIS will do away with longqueues and crowds at the gov-ernment hospitals, he said.

The chief minister alsosaid the bed capacity at theDada Dev hospital was beingincreased from 106 to 281, andthis would be completed soon.

“The Delhi governmentis bringing together all hospi-tals in Delhi through theHMIS including MohallaClinic, polyclinic, multi-spe-cialty and super-specialty hos-pitals. This is a very ambitiousproject and will be completedwithin one year. I have shownthe app to many people and

the app has various features,and we will integrate all thosefeatures with our HMIS toimprove the system’s efficien-cy,” he said.

In order to operate theapp, one needs to click on pro-ceed and then click on new reg-istration and fill the requiredfields, he said, adding that forOPD registration, click on theonline OPD registration onthe app and fill the requiredfields to get an OPD registra-tion number via SMS.

From Page 1Along with Venugopal,

party chief spokesmanRandeep Surjewala briefed themedia about the resolutionadopted by the panel in themeeting. In the resolution,CWC hailed Sonia and RahulGandhi for being the “twovoices” in the forefront ofexposing Central Government’s

“inadequate responses” to thecrisis the nation faced in thepast six months.

“The CWC, reflecting theoverwhelming view and desireof the rank and file of theCongress, unanimouslyresolved to strengthen thehands of Sonia Gandhi andRahul Gandhi in every possi-ble way,” Surjewala quotedfrom the resolution.

Earlier in the day Soniaoffered to quit, asking theCWC to initiate the process forselecting a new party chief. Inher opening remarks at themeeting, called in the wake ofa section of leaders seeking a“full time and visible” Congress(interim) president, Soniamade the offer to quit sayingshe had given a detailed replyon the issue to AICC generalsecretary KC Venugopal.

Former Prime MinisterManmohan Singh, who spoke

after Sonia, urged her to con-tinue, so did former DefenceMinister AK Antony, with boththe veterans criticising the let-ter by some party leaders,including Ghulam Nabi Azad,Anand Sharma, Mukul Wasnikwho are a part of the CWC, theparty’s highest decision-makingbody.

Sources said Sonia referredto Azad and others twice dur-ing her brief address and theissues raised by them. She alsohanded over a detailed reply toVenugopal, who read out itscontents at the CWC meetingin which Sonia sought to berelieved from the post.

In her concluding remarks,Sonia also stated that she was“hurt” but there were no ill feel-ings towards those who hadwritten the letter.”I am hurt butthey are my colleagues so letsforget and work together,”sources quoted her. Sonia alsoconveyed that an AICC sessionshould be held within the nextsix months to elect the nextparty chief.

AICC sources said thatRahul in his speech also ques-tioned the timing of the letter,which was sent to SoniaGandhi when she was in hos-pital and under medication. “Itis the CWC and not the mediawhere we put out our thoughtsand discuss,” Rahul is learnt tohave said at the meeting. Theparty is divided on the leader-ship matter with a sectiondemanding collective leader-ship and another reposing faithin the Gandhi family.

The crucial meeting of theCWC started here amid divi-sions in the party over the lead-ership issue with a sectiondemanding collective leader-ship and another reposing faithin the Gandhi family. Almost

all Lok Sabha members of theparty have written to SoniaGandhi expressing solidarityand urging her to continue inher post or install RahulGandhi.

Several State units includ-ing Delhi and Rajasthan passedresolutions favouring the lead-ership of Gandhis after a letterfrom a section of senior partyleaders demanded sweepingreforms in the party and wentto the extent of questioning thecurrent CWC’s ability to guidethe party in the fight against theBJP.

Several party leaders, whilesupporting the continuationof Gandhis at the helm, accusedthose behind the letter of play-ing into the hands of the BJPand attempting to weaken theparty at a time when there wasa need to close ranks againstthe NDA Government.

The dissenting leaders,meanwhile, also said that theparty has failed to conduct anhonest introspection of its loss-es in 2014 and 2019, addingthat the uncertainty over lead-ership has demoralised work-ers.

This is the second chal-lenge to Sonia Gandhi’s lead-ership after the one in 1999when the then Leader ofOpposition in the Lok SabhaSharad Pawar challenged herforeign origins in order tokeep her away from beingnamed the party’s prime min-isterial face in the general elec-tions that year. Sonia hadresigned in the CWC, whichrejected her move unanimouslybringing her back as partypresident. While Sonia went onto become the longest servingCongress president, Pawar andrebels had to quit to form theNCP.

From Page 1Swamy’s claim has sparked

a new angle whether the lateactor was taking drugs and ifNeeraj was helping him fetchand prepare smoking drugs.The investigators have notbeen able to examine theCCTV footage of the buildingwhere the actor was living, asunconfirmed reports said thatboth the footage had gonemissing.

In a related development,the CBI officials on Mondayvisited Waterstone Resort atAndheri in north Mumbaiwhere Sushant had reported-ly stayed for nearly twomonths and undergone “spir-itual healing” at the hands ofThane-based spiritual healerMohan Joshi. The investigatorsquestioned the resort man-agement and employees dur-ing their visit. Rhea had intro-duced Sushant to the spiritu-al healer. On his part Joshi hasadmitted to having done“touch healing” exercises forthe late actor on a few occa-sions. The CBI is likely to

question Joshi in the comingdays.

Meanwhile, the CBI grilledthe actor’s cook Neeraj for thefourth consecutive day, whilethey questioned Siddharth forthe third consecutive day.Through their continuousquestioning, the investigatorsare trying to nail the “incon-sistencies” in their statementsand decipher as to what hadactually happened on the inter-vening night of June 13 and 14,when the actor died and themorning of June 14 whenSushant’s body was found in hisclosed room.

Besides Siddharth andNeeraj, the CBI have also ques-tioned Sushant’s formeraccountant Rajat Mewati anddomestic help Deepesh Sawantat the Defence Research andDevelopment Organisation(DRDO) at Santa Cruz’s Kalinaarea in north-west Mumbai,where the investigating agencyteam is staying.

The CBI had questionedMewati on Sunday, while it hadgrilled Sawant on Saturday andSunday. Mewati had knownSushant long before the actorbefriended Rhea, but their rela-tions had soured after Rhea

became Sushant’s girlfriend.The investigators may questionthe actor’s chartered accoun-tants in the coming days.

Meanwhile, the CBI con-ducted a “dummy test” in theactor’s room during the week-end as part of the recreation ofthe crime scene carried out atthe late actor’s duplex flat in“Mont Blanc” building atBandra’s Carter Road area innorth-west Mumbai. The testwas to ascertain if Sushantcould have hanged himselfthrough a cloth tied to a ceil-ing fan. However, the CBI hasnot come to any conclusion asto whether it was suicide or amurder.

The CBI team will be ableto come to a conclusion afterthe AIIMS team of forensicdoctors will examine the actor’sviscera and post-mortemreports and correlate themwith circumstantial evidence.

In another development,the CBI’s forensic team visitedthe Cooper Hospital - wherethe actor’s post-mortem wasconducted -- for the secondtime ever since they took overthe investigations into theSushant Singh Rajput deathcase on August 20.

From Page 1On August 20, the top

court had granted time tillAugust 24 to Bhushan to recon-sider his “defiant statement”refusing to apologise and ten-der “unconditional apology”for contemptuous tweetsagainst the judiciary and reject-ed his submission that quan-tum of punishment be decid-ed by another bench.

Bhushan said as an officerof court he believes as a duty tospeak up when he believesthere is a deviation from itssterling record. “Therefore Iexpressed myself in good faith,not to malign the SupremeCourt or any particular ChiefJustice, but to offer constructivecriticism so that the court canarrest any drift away from its

long-standing role as aguardian of the Constitutionand custodian of peoples’rights,” he said.

He said, “My tweets repre-sented this bona fide belief thatI continue to hold. Publicexpression of these beliefs wasI believe, in line with my high-er obligations as a citizen anda loyal officer of this court.Therefore, an apology forexpression of these beliefs,conditional or unconditional,would be insincere.”

Bhushan further said thatan apology cannot be a mereincantation and any apologyhas to, as the court has itself putit, be sincerely made.

“This is especially so whenI have made the statementsbona fide and pleaded truthswith full details, which have notbeen dealt with by the Court.

If I retract a statement beforethis court that I otherwisebelieve to be true or offer aninsincere apology that in myeyes would amount to the con-tempt of my conscience and ofan institution that I hold inhighest esteem,” he said.

Bhushan said he believesthe Supreme Court is the lastbastion of hope for the protec-tion of fundamental rights, thewatchdog institutions andindeed for constitutionaldemocracy itself. “It hasrightly been called the mostpowerful court in the democ-ratic world, and often an exem-plar for courts across the globe.Today in these troubling times,the hopes of the people of Indiavest in this Court to ensure therule of law and the Constitutionand not an untrammelled ruleof the executive,” he said.

From Page 1“I was tested for novel coro-

navirus today. My test report hasreturned positive. I appeal to allcolleagues and associates whocame in my contact over the lastweek to get themselves tested. Irequest my close contacts tomove into strict quarantineimmediately,” Khattar weeted.Khattar’s earlier test report camenegative for Covid-19 onThursday, two days after hehad attended the meeting withShekhawat over the SutlejYamuna Link canal issue inNew Delhi. Speaker Gupta (73)and BJP MLAs Aseem Goel andRam Kumar also tested positivefor COVID-19, Health MinisterAnil Vij said. Six Assemblystaffers have also tested positivefor the disease, officials said.

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Taking a cue from the DelhiModel of battling

Coronavirus, the federalGovernment of the UnitedStates of America ( USA ) hasalso adopted the model of con-valescent plasma therapy forthe treatment of criticallyCOVID-19 patients in theUSA.

Interestingly, the USPresident Donald Trumpannounced it on Monday.

Reacting on this, ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal con-gratulated Delhiites and tweet-ed, “They used to say, back inthe day - what America doestoday, India would do tomor-row. Delhi has changed it. Now- what Delhi did yesterday,America does today.Congratulations Delhiites forachieving this for our country."

Earlier in the day, Trumpannounced, "Today I ampleased to make a truly historicannouncement, in our battle

against China virus, that willsave countless lives. The FDA(Food and DrugAdministration) has issued anemergency use authorisationfor a treatment known as con-valescent plasma."

Back in April 2020, theDelhi Government was thefirst in the country to apply forpermission from Centre tocarry out trials of Plasma ther-apy in Delhi govt's LNJP hos-pital. Following encouragingresults of the initial trials ofplasma therapy in criticalCOVID patients, Delhi gov-ernment then requested theCentre to allow plasma thera-py in Delhi, which was grant-ed to the Delhi government.

The first plasma bank in

the country was subsequentlystarted in ILBS by the Delhigovernment on July 2, with anobjective to provide free of costconvalescent plasma topatients. Subsequently, anoth-er plasma bank was launchedat the LNJP Hospital in Delhi.This system has been a crucialelement in the Delhi Model ofCOVID response and is beingadopted by other states too.

The establishment of theplasma bank by the ArvindKejriwal-led Delhi government

was done to put forward anefficient system for the recov-ery of patients and reduce thenumber of COVID-19 deathsto zero. During the launch ofthe plasma bank, CM ArvindKejriwal had requestedCOVID-19 recovered patientsto donate plasma in huge num-bers and be effective contribu-tors in Delhi's fight againstCorona, which is the essence ofthe Delhi model of COVIDresponse.

He added that plasma has

an important role in the declin-ing death rate of Covid-19patients and until a vaccinecomes, the convalescent plas-ma therapy should be looked atas an effective treatment forCovid-19.

The convalescent plasmahas been provided to patientsof all blood groups, includingthe rare blood group type AB,B, and O. The plasma therapyhas shown encouraging resultsin the recovery of critically illpatients.

As on August 11, a total of921 COVID-19 recoveredpatients have donated plasmaat the ILBS plasma bank,including 86 healthcare work-ers, 209 entrepreneurs, 8 mediapersonnel, 28 police officials, 50students, 32 government offi-cials, and 508 recovered peopleincluding servicemen, self-employed professionals, non-residents of Delhi, etc. Around14 recovered patients havedonated plasma more thanonce.

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The Delhi LegislativeAssembly’s committee on

Peace and Harmony hasreceived multiple complaintsaddressed to its ChairmanRaghav Chadha underscoringthe alleged instances of inten-tional and deliberate inaction byFacebook officials against hate-ful content in India out of vest-ed interests.

The complainants have alsorequested the Committee tointerfere and ask Facebook toenforce its policies againstinflammatory and hateful con-tents and alleged larger con-spiracy involving said socialmedia platform, with respect tothe certain information obtainedfrom the news report publishedby The Wall Street Journal onAugust 14.

“It is alleged in the com-plaints that the Facebook,despite its comprehensive poli-cies and regulations on curbingunabated dissemination of hate-ful and offensive content, hasbeen turning a blind eye to massmanufacturing and propaga-tion of vile, hateful communalcontent which are not only badin taste but have potential toerupt violence and riot like sit-uation,” the Committee said ina statement.

“It is imperative to mention

here that the conception of thiscommittee was very muchinduced by the alleged horrificremarks irresponsibly made bythe BJP leader in Delhi, earlierthis year which invoked violentagitation and then reportedlygrievously led to the communalriots in Delhi,” it said.

Significantly, the sameleader has been mentioned inthe Wall Street Article, as anoth-er hate-monger spared byFacebook, it said.

The committee aimed atclamping down these instancesleading to communal violence inorder to ensure public safety andinfuse peace and harmony in thecity and country since its incep-tion.

Interestingly, in a video fea-turing Mark Zuckerberg, quot-ed the contents of that person’spost as categorically offensiveand hateful, it said, adding thatin view thereof, it compels thecommittee to take immediatenotice and get to the root of thisissue with a view to painstak-ingly discern if there is any roleor complicity of Facebook offi-cial too in the orchestration ofDelhi riots.

With a view to sub serve itsfundamental objective and ratio-nale to maintain peace and har-mony across Delhi and obviateany attempt or overtures by thevested interests to create dis-

ruption or engender communaldisharmony across Delhi, theCommittee has decided to delveinto the issue and apprehend anydevious conspiracy and unholynexus of rabble- rousers withoblique motives to wreak havocin the country and more par-ticularly in the NCT of Delhi bydisturbing peace and tranquili-ty as well as instigating intensecommunal disharmony, it said.

The committee after vettingthe complaints and giving a care-ful deliberation upon the alle-gations set out therein is of theprima facie view that the alle-gations against the concernedFacebook officials are extreme-ly serious in nature which ifremain unchecked and unhin-dered may lead to seriousadverse fallouts, having therebythe dubious distinction to inten-sify an already volatile and vul-nerable situation.

In view thereof, the com-mittee took prompt cognizanceof the issue, pursuant to whichthe committee in order to dis-cern the veracity of com-plainants and allegations setout in the complaint has sent thenotice for appearance to certainindependent and expert wit-nesses as well as complainants toensure their presence beforethe committee for participatingin the relevant proceedings, itadded.

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Delhi Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal on Monday inter-

acted with the representativesof banquet halls associationsand said we will have to worktogether to revive the economyof Delhi.

Kejriwal thanked the ban-quet hall associations for coop-erating with the Delhi gov-ernment during the rise inCorona cases in June, by let-ting the banquet halls beingattached with the hospitalstreating the patients. "Delhi issuffering from the Coronapandemic. There were manycases of Corona in Delhi at onepoint, but with the efforts ofthe two crore people of Delhi,

we have been able to controlthe Corona situation. I praythat the number of cases doesnot rise again. I always say thatthe two crore people of Delhiare like a family, and thisfamily has overcome manybig challenges,” Kejriwal said,“We have reduced the pollu-tion in Delhi by 25 percent inthe last five years. Last year, wecontrolled Dengue in thenational capital, and this year,we controlled the Corona pan-demic.”

Kejriwal said that when thepoor were suffering fromhunger during the lockdown,some of the banquet hall own-ers individually came forwardto feed the poor and arrangedfor cooked and raw food. Hethanked the owners on behalf

of the people of Delhi for self-lessly helping the poor at thetime of need.

Lauding the efforts ofhotel industry in corona times,Kejriwal said,”Now is the timeto bring the economy back ontrack, and if we do not do itquickly, we might recoverfrom Corona but we wouldnot be able to recover fromeconomic slowdown. In themiddle, when the Central gov-ernment issued guidelines thatthe banquets can be openedacross the country but not inDelhi, I explained the situationto them. The banquet hallshave opened in states wherethe Corona cases are higherand remain shut in Delhiwhere the cases are lower.Then, they permitted us to

open the banquet halls afterAugust 15."

"I agree that an SOP mustbe made on the policy and itwill be done soon. I will holdanother meeting with the rep-resentatives of the banquethalls in few days to discussissues such as environmentaland parking issues as well. Ihope and pray that your busi-nesses grow in the future," headded.

CM Smany job-seekers didnot know the right platform tofind the right jobs, and manyjob-providers did not knowwhere to find the right labour.“Therefore, we have created ajob portal which will bridge thegap between the two and manyyoungsters are getting the ben-efit,” Kejriwal said..

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A49-year-old man, who worked asthe chief financial officer of a

multinational company, was killed ina road accident in Gurugram after aspeeding Ford Figo car first rammeda divider and crossed over to thewrong side of the road, hitting himwhile he was on his way to GreaterNoida on his Harley Davidson bike.

According to police, the incidentoccurred around 6 am near the Phase2 Rapid Metro Station. The victimidentified as Alok Gupta, was a resi-dent of BPTP Park Life in Sector 57.

Police are investigating if the carwas being driven by a minor. Twoyouths were inside the vehicle and theytoo were injured in the accident.

According to police,Gupta wasriding his black Harley Davidsonmotorcycle and was accompanied bya friend on another bike. The two wereon their way to Greater Noida in UttarPradesh.

Rahul Malik the victim’s friend inhis complaint to police said they lefttheir homes around 5.45 am to trav-el to Greater Noida on their bikes, andwere wearing “protective gear”.

“As they crossed the Phase 2Rapid Metro Station, however, a FordFigo car that was speeding on the other

side of the road, from the direction ofShankar Chowk towards Golf CourseRoad, rammed the divider and, break-ing through the fencing, entered theother carriageway, before ramminginto the victim’s bike,” said Malik.

Malik, who was on his bike behindthe victim, said the bike fell down dueto the impact and Gupta sustainedserious injuries. Malik called for anambulance and took his friend as wellas two people from the car to a hos-pital. “I saw the car in the air. It fell onthe ground and hit the motorcyclist,before turning turtle thrice. The carwas being driven at least 120 km/hour,he said.

“The victim succumbed to hisinjuries during the treatment, whilethe two from the car are still beingtreated. If the car was being driven bya minor a case will also be registeredagainst the parents," said ChanderMohan, DCP (east).

The body of the victim has beenhanded over to the family memberafter an autopsy. Strict action will beinitiated against the culprits as per thelaw,” he said.

The police have registered a caseunder Section 279 (rash driving) and304 A (causing death by negligence)of Indian Penal Code (IPC) at DLFPhase 2 police station.

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A49-year-old man was arrest-ed by the Delhi Police for

allegedly plotting a false robberybid of Rs eight lakh in Delhi’sSeemapuri area. The accusedwas employed with a moneyexchange company in NationalCapital.

The accused identified asHarvinder, a resident of Delhi’sMaujpur area.

According to Amit Sharma,the Deputy Commissioner ofPolice (DCP), Shahdara dis-trict, on August 18, police con-trol room (PCR) call regardingrobbery of Rs eight lakhs nearKaruna Hospital in DilshadGarden area.

“Harvinder, who works as acash collection agent, told policethat two bike-borne persons hithis bike and made him engagedin arguments. During this thepillion rider asked him to dropto GTB hospital. On the way, pil-lion rider forced him to changethe route towards HindonAirforce Station in Ghaziabadand in between robbed his bagcontaining Rs 12 lakhs approx-imately,” said the DCP.

“On Harvinder’s statementa case under appropriate sec-tions was registered. Duringthe investigation, the team sus-pected foul playof the com-plainant as no such incident wasfound took place and no eye-witness was spotted during theanalyzing the footages ofCCTV,” said the DCP.

“When the team askedHarvinder in detail about theincident, he could not provideany satisfactory answer. Furtherduring interrogation teamgrilled him where he brokedown and confessed to com-mitting the self-planned rob-bery,” said the DCP.

“Harvinder disclosed that hewas working as a Cash Agent.The accused further stated thathe required cash for the admis-sion of his daughter in a reput-ed institute. He always feltavarice to see the huge amountcollected by him on regularbasis, so he concocted a falsestory of robbery to usurp themoney of his employer,” theDCP added.

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With the arrest of a 26-year-old man fromDelhi’s Chankyapuri area, the Delhi Police

has claimed to have busted a syndicate involvedin supplying illicit arms to criminals in Delhi andits peripherals. Police said that they have alsorecovered one USA made pistol, one Italy madepistol, four country-made pistols along with 60cartridges recovered from the possession of theaccused.

The accused has been identified as IqbalAhmed, a resident of Jafrabad area. Police said thatthe accused is also found involved in 30 casesincluding robbery, snatching, dacoity and Armsact registered across the National Capital.

According to Dr Eish Singhal, the DeputyCommissioner of Police (DCP), New Delhi dis-trict, on August 22, specific inputs regarding Iqbalcarrying illegal weapons was received followingwhich a trap was laid and the accused was nabbednear the Vandematram Marg near Dhaula Kuan.

“During interrogation, the accused revealedthat he is an associate of notorious Chhenu ofNorth-East and he was going to IFFCO Chowkin Gurugram (Haryana) to meet some of the crim-inals. He was going to supply illegal weapons tothe gang members, who were planning to com-mit some big crime in Haryana but his luck ranout and he was apprehended,” said the DCP.

“A First Information Report (FIR) under sec-tion 25/27/54/59 Arms Act has been registeredat Chankyapuri police station. The accused IqbalAhmed is in police custody. All out efforts arebeing made to identify the source and receiversof illicit arms and weapons. Police teams have ini-tiated manhunt to nab the co-accused of IqbalAhmed,” the DCP added.

NEW DELHI: The DelhiGovernment will be hiringagencies to run its mentalhealth units at its childcareinstitutions aimed at providingmental health services for chil-dren, a Government officialsaid on Monday.

The Women and ChildDevelopment departmentissued a notice last week invit-ing ''Expression of Interest''from interested agencies to setup such centres.

The deadline for submis-sion of Expression of Interestoffer is September 10 while apre-bid meeting will be held onAugust 28.

The mental health unitswill be set up at different insti-

tutional complexes in Delhiand categorised into three clus-ters, the notice added.

According to the govern-ment official, the mental healthunits were there earlier as wellbut their functioning will bewell-defined now. The depart-ment is hiring fresh agenciesand the existing ones that weredoing well will be allowed tocontinue their services, headded.

There are 23 childcareinstitutions that have beendivided area-wise into threeclusters. The children staying inthese centres come from dif-ferent social backgrounds andget counselling and psycho-logical help. PTI

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With six fresh cases reported last week, thenumber of people suffering from malar-

ia in the National Capital has reached 81 thisyear. Although the number of cases reported thisyear has reduced compared to last year 349 tillAugust 22.

According to South Delhi MunicipalCorporation (SDMC), mosquito-breeding hasbeen reported in at least 37,935 households and30,590 legal notices have been issued this year.The dengue breeding checkers have checked11982757 houses and also issued challans to1133 numbers of office and residential premis-es till 22 August.

Besides, at least 90 cases of dengue and 36cases of Chikungunya also reported this year.

A senior South Corporation official said thatall the preventive steps have been taken to reducethe cases. “The key to prevention of Dengue isensuring there is no clean stagnant water inhomes and around, which does not allow theAedes mosquitoes to breed, and thereforedengue cannot spread,” he said, adding that zonalofficials have been instructed to keep makingpeople aware by organizing seminars, functionsin schools and colleges.

The regarding district health officials havebeen directed to conduct regular checks forbreeding and regular spraying and fogging arealso being done to control mosquito menace,”he said, adding that besides it, zonal officials havealso been instructed to keep making peopleaware by organizing seminars, functions inschools and colleges.

This year, Delhi Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal in his address on ‘Independence Day’

announced that the government will launch amega dengue prevention awareness campaignfrom next month to combat vector borne dis-eases. Kejriwal had launched a similar campaignlast year which garnered massive support fromthe public and several other well-known per-sonalities across the country.

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Delhi Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal on Monday

launched a mobile applicationand a web-based online OPDregistration and appointmentsystem of the Dada Dev mater-nity hospital through video-conferencing.

The Chief Minister saidthat work is underway on theDelhi government's hospital

management information sys-tem, and it will be completedwithin a year.

"Women patients will nolonger need to wait in longqueues and now, can registerand get doctors' appointmentsthrough this app. There shouldbe no crowding in the wake ofthe coronavirus pandemic, andsocial distancing needs to bemaintained," he said.

Kejriwal said the Delhi gov-

ernment was integrating itshospitals, Mohalla clinics andpolyclinics through the hospi-tal management informationsystem (HMIS), and the processwill be completed within a year.

Once established, the HMISwill do away with long queuesand crowds at the governmenthospitals, he said.

The chief minister also saidthe bed capacity at the DadaDev hospital was being

increased from 106 to 281, andthis would be completed soon.“The Delhi government isbringing together all hospitals inDelhi through the HMISincluding Mohalla Clinic, poly-clinic, multi-specialty andsuper-specialty hospitals. This isa very ambitious project and willbe completed within one year.I have shown the app to manypeople and the app has variousfeatures, and we will integrate all

those features with our HMIS toimprove the system's efficiency,”he said.

In order to operate the app,one needs to click on proceedand then click on new registra-tion and fill the required fields,he said, adding that for OPDregistration, click on the onlineOPD registration on the appand fill the required fields to getan OPD registration number viaSMS.

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The water level of theYamuna River on Monday

rose to 204.38 metres, per-ilously close to the dangermark, with Delhi's WaterMinister Satyendar Jain sayingthe Government is ready to dealwith any flood-like situation.

An official said 5,883 cusecwater was released from theHathinikund Barrage inHaryana's Yamunanagar dis-trict at 8 am, leading to rise inwater levels.

The water level of the riverwas recorded at 204.38 metresat 8 am, which is just below the

danger mark of 205.33 metres.At 8 pm on Sunday, the

water level was recorded at204.18 metres.

At 3.30 pm on Monday, thewater level was at 204.32metres, officials said.

One cusec is equivalent to28.317 litre per second. Jainsaid the government was keep-ing a close watch and was fullyprepared to deal with anyflood-like situation.

"We have a flood-controlsystem ready and it will be acti-vated when any situationdemands it," he said. The gov-ernment has a plan ready for allthe areas along the Yamuna,right from Palla village toOkhla, he said.

The water level of the riverrose due to heavy rainfall in itscatchment area over the last fewdays.

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Several critically-endangeredgorillas, orangutans, gib-

bons, gray whales and bot-tlenose dolphins as well asChinese hamsters are at risk ofgetting infected by the deadlyCovid-19, researchers havewarned.

However, in what hascome as a relief domestic ani-mals such as cats, cattle andsheep have been found tohave a medium risk and dogs,horses and pigs were found tohave a low risk for contractingthe disease to date.

According to a new studyfrom the University ofCalifornia, Davis (UC Davis),endangered species are pre-dicted to be at Covid-19 risk.

An international team ofscientists used genomic analy-sis to compare the main cel-lular receptor for the virus inhumans called angiotensinconverting enzyme-2 (ACE2)in 410 different species ofvertebrates, including birds,fish, amphibians, reptiles andmammals.

ACE2 is normally foundon many different types of cellsand tissues, including epithe-lial cells in the nose, mouthand lungs. In humans, 25amino acids of the ACE2 pro-

tein are important for thevirus to bind and gain entryinto cells.

The researchers used these25 amino acid sequences of theACE2 protein, and modelingof its predicted protein struc-ture together with the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, to eval-uate how many of these aminoacids are found in the ACE2protein of the different species.

“Animals with all 25amino acid residues matchingthe human protein are pre-dicted to be at the highest riskfor contracting SARS-CoV-2via ACE2,” said Joana Damas,first author for the paper anda postdoctoral research asso-ciate at UC Davis.

“The risk is predicted todecrease the more the species’ACE2 binding residues differfrom humans,” Damas said ina paper published in the jour-nal Proceedings of theNational Academy of Sciences.

Research has shown thatthe immediate ancestor ofSARS-CoV-2 likely originatedin a species of bat.

“The data provide animportant starting point foridentifying vulnerable andthreatened animal popula-tions at risk of SARS-CoV-2infection,” said Harris Lewin,lead author for the study and

a distinguished professor ofevolution and ecology at UCDavis.

In fact some of the zoos

across the countries likeVirunga National Park in theDemocratic Republic ofCongo had shut its doors to

tourists with an aim to protectits great apes from possiblybeing infected by the novelcoronavirus.

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At a time when the debateover the linkage of bats

with the novel coronaviruspandemic continues, scientistshave identified as many as 32species of the flying mammalsin the picturesque westernHimalayan region inUttarakhand. The finding isimportant given that the ultra-sonic echolocation calls ofnine bats were recorded for thefirst time in the world.

One was documented forthe first time in South Asia, asper the study, a first to docu-ment echolocation calls of batsin Himalayas. The finding hasbeen published in the recentedition of journal ActaChiropterologica.

Additionally, theresearchers also sequencedgenes belonging to 13 species,of which eight had never beensequenced before in the region.One such species was record-ed for the first time in theIndian subcontinent.

There are over 1,400species of bats worldwide whilein India at least 128 species ofbats have been recorded,belonging to nine families andMeghalaya is home to abouthalf of the recorded bat speciesin India, according to the

Zoological Survey of India.The identification of bats

species in Himalayan regionwill help the scientists to mon-itor populations, understandbehaviour, and better under-stand natural history, said theresearchers.

The study conducted joint-ly by researchers from theNature Science Initiative inDehradun, the Indian Instituteof Science in Bengaluru, andthe Natural History Museumof Geneva has been publishedin the.

Chiroperologist RohitChakravarty-led study wasconducted between 2015 and2018 at 22 sites in Dehradun,Mussoorie, Devalsari,Dhanaulti, Chamba,Kedarnath Wildlife Sanctuary,Lansdowne, and Pangot inNainital district in Kumaonregion. These were locations atelevations from 600-3,000 mabove sea level.

Individuals from a total of35 species were humanelytrapped and studied beforebeing released back into thewild, according to theresearchers. The study wasconducted much before theCovid-19 happened leavingthe world to the standstill.

This group of mammals inthe past several decades, have

been repeatedly linked to theemergence of viral diseases,including SARS, MERS, andmost recently, Covid-19 whichhas swept the world. However,in a statement released onApril 24, 2020, 64 chiropterol-ogists from six South Asiannations have debunked mythson Covid-19 and bats.

“Bats are caught using mistnets and harp traps,” explainedChakravarty. “Wetypically han-dle bats wearing leather gloves(to prevent being bitten andalsoto not come in direct con-tact with them), except whenthey are handled from thebackbecause it’s impossible to get agood grip on them withgloves.”

Bats play a crucial role ina number of varied ecosystemsbesides being as indicator ofthe impact of climate changeand human activity on theenvironment, as their sensitiv-ity to environmental changes isvery high.

In the present situation(COVID-19) because of themisconception on bats andCOVID-19 linkages, we arereceiving calls for removingbats from trees and also cuttingtrees,” R. Sharath Babu, wildlifeadvisor to Bruhat BengaluruMahanagara Palike said, asper reports.

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India’s Covid-19 recoverieshave crossed 23 lakh and are

more than three times thenumber of active cases of theinfection in the country, whilethe case fatality rate, main-taining a steady downwardtrajectory, has further droppedto 1.85 per cent, the UnionHealth Ministry said onMonday.

With 57,469 patients hav-ing recuperated in a day, totalrecoveries have surged to23,38,035, pushing the recov-ery rate to 75.27 per cent as ondate. This exceeded the activecases by 16,27,264. “This hasbeen made possible because ofeffective implementation ofthe policy of testing aggres-sively, tracking comprehen-sively through surveillanceand contact-tracing and treat-ing efficiently,” the ministryunderlined. India’s total Covid-19 caseload has now crossed 31lakh mark.

The Ministry also said thatcountry’s Covid-19 tests permillion have surged to 26,016as cumulative tests rose to 3.59crore.

“A key component in India’sresponse to the Covid-19 pan-demic has been early identifi-cation of positive cases by time-ly and aggressive testing,” theMinistry said in a statement.

Prompt identification andisolation synced with efficienttreatment have led to the risingnumber of recoveries, and low

and declining mortality due toCovid-19, it said.

A cumulative 3,59,02,137samples have been tested up toAugust 23 with 6,09,917 beingtested on Sunday. Easy access totesting through expanded diag-nostic lab network across thecountry has given a substantialboost to the figures.

“As a result of thesefocussed actions, tests per mil-lion (TPM) have seen a sharpincrease to 26,016. TPM con-tinues to maintain a constant

upward trend,” the ministrysaid.

India has also seen a rise inthe tests per million per day, asadvised by WHO in its guid-ance note on ‘Public HealthCriteria to Adjust Public Healthand Social Measures in theContext of Covid-19’.

WHO has advised that acountry needs 140 tests per dayper million population as ameasure for comprehensivesurveillance for suspected infec-tions, it stated.

A prominent determinantof the evolving testing strategyis the steadily widening diag-nostic lab network in the coun-try.

This has significantlygrown to 1520 labs, whichincluded 984 in the governmentsector and 536 private labs.

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In a major relief to MBA aspi-rants, the All India Council

of Technical Education(AICTE) has allowed businessschools and institutions offer-ing MBA and PGDM coursesto admit students based onmarks obtained in qualifyingundergraduate exams as severalentrance tests could not be con-ducted due to COVID-19. Thetechnical education regulatorhas also clarified that the relax-ation is being made availableonly for the 2020-21 academ-ic session and should not beseen as a precedent for futureacademic years.

“All-India tests like CAT,XAT, CMAT, ATMA, MAT,GMAT and the CommonEntrance Test of respectivestates are the qualifying tests foradmission to MBA or the PostGraduate Diploma inManagement (PGDM) course.In many states, some of theseentrance tests could not be con-ducted due to the fear of coro-navirus spread, and there is noindication as to whether thesetests are postponed or likely tobe held or cancelled,” AICTEMember Secretary RajiveKumar said.

“AICTE, being more afacilitator than a regulator,

considered alternative propo-sition through which selec-tion of students could be madefor admission to the PGDMcourse which will benefit boththe institutions as well as thestudents. Therefore, in the cur-rent scenario, the PGDM andMBA institutions are allowed toadmit students on the basis ofmarks obtained in qualifyingexaminations by preparing amerit list in a transparent man-ner. However, first preferencewill be given to candidateswho have appeared in any ofthe entrance tests and havequalified, irrespective of theirmarks secured at degree levelas long as minimum marks aresecured,” Kumar added.

The council has directedinstitutions to select candi-dates based on merit in thequalifying UG exams if thereare vacant seats available.“The states may also use thisrelaxation while allotting seats

through counselling. It maybe noted that this relaxationto the PGDM and MBA insti-tutions shall be applicableonly for the academic year2020-21, this cannot be takenas a precedent for the futureacademic years,” Kumar said.

Universities and schoolsacross the country have beenclosed since March 16, whenthe Centre announced acountrywide classroom shut-down as part of measures tocontain COVID-19. Anationwide lockdown wasimposed on March 25. Whileseveral restrictions have beeneased, schools and collegescontinue to be closed.

Many MBA entranceexams, including MAT andATMA, have moved to theInternet Based Testing (IBT)platform. Global MBAentrance exam, GMAT, too isbeing conducted in IBTmode.

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On the first death anniver-sary of former Finance

Minister Arun Jaitley, the BJPon Monday paid rich tributesto the party stalwart with PrimeMinister Narendra Modi sayingthat he misses his friend and hislate Cabinet colleague whodiligently served India.

Jaitley, the key strategist forthe BJP who articulated partypolicies effectively and for longwas seen as an urbane face of theparty, passed away at AIIMS lastyear at an age of 66 after pro-longed illness.

Top BJP leaders, includingHome Minister Amit Shah,Defence Minister Rajnath Singhand party president J P Nadda,remembered Jaitley, who was aknown trouble shooter for theBJP since in his several decades-long inning in the BJP since hisABVP days .

The prime minister tweet-ed, “On this day, last year, welost Shri Arun Jaitley Ji. I missmy friend a lot. Arun Ji dili-gently served India. His wit,intellect, legal acumen andwarm personality were

legendary. Here is what Ihad said during a prayer meet-ing in his memory.”

The Prime Minister post-

ed a video of his speech at thecondolence meeting held forJaitley last year.

Recollecting his days withJaitley, Shah said he was an out-standing politician, prolific ora-tor and a great human beingwho had “no parallels” in Indianpolity.

He was multifaceted and afriend of friends, who willalways be remembered for histowering legacy, transforma-tive vision and devotion to thenation, said the former BJPpresident who credits the lateleader for guiding him duringthe days of his distress.

Nadda said Jaitley’s hugecontribution in nation-buildingwill always be remembered.

He also inaugurated a blooddonation camp organised atAIIMS in Jaitley’s memory andsaid that the late leader’s fami-ly members areserving societyas he did.

Defence Minister RajnathSingh tweeted, “RememberingArun Jaitleyji on his punyatithi.Jaitleyji was a stalwart whomade a big contribution towardsBJP’s growth and rise to power.”

“He made a mark as a suc-cessful lawyer, seasoned parlia-mentarian and effective admin-istrator. I offer my heartfelttributes to him,” Rajnath said.

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The BJP on Monday hit backat Congress leader Rahul

Gandhi for his “collusion withthe BJP” accusation againsthis party’s dissenters.

Madhya Pradesh ChiefMinister Shivraj SinghChouhan responded sayingwhenever Congress ran intocrisis, it sought to point fingersat the BJP.

“When (Jyotiraditya)Scindiaji raised his voice, hewas accused of colluding with

BJP. Now, when leaders likeGhulam Nabi Azad and KapilSibal are demanding a full-timeparty chief, they’re also beingaccused of colluding with BJP.No one can save such a party,”Chouhan tweeted.

Chouhan’s comment cameamid reports that an incensedRahul had hit out at the dis-senting Congress leaders andaccused them of being in col-lusion with the BJP

Chouhan’s predecessorUma Bharti also spoke out,declaring that the “political

dominance” of the Nehru-Gandhi family “over” and theparty itself as “finished”.

“Gandhi-Nehru family’sexistence is in crisis; their polit-ical dominance is over.Congress is finished.

So who stays in what posi-tion hardly matters now.Congress should return toGandhi, the real ‘swadeshi’Gandhi without any foreignelement,” Uma Bharti told newsagency , throwing in a swipe atSonia Gandhi’s Italian roots forgood measure.

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The Prime Minister’s Office(PMO) on Monday

announced that the PM CaresFund will finance two 500-bedCovid-19 makeshift hospitals inBihar where Assembly polls willbe held in November.Announcing the decision, thePMO tweeted, “PM-CARESFund Trust has decided to allo-cate funds for fight againstCOVID-19 by way of establish-ment of 500-bed COVID-19Makeshift Hospitals at Patna andMuzaffarpur, Bihar by DRDO.”

In a series of tweets, thePMO also said while the 500-bed hospital at Bihta, Patna willbe inaugurated on Monday , the500-bed hospital at Muzaffarpurwill be inaugurated very soon.These hospitals have 125 ICUbeds with ventilators and 375normal beds each, it said, addingthat each bed also has oxygensupply.

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Telangana UrbanDevelopment and

Information TechnologyMinister K. T. Rama Rao onMonday met Union Housingand Urban Affairs ministerHardeep Singh Puri and request-ed him to release funds worth�2,537.81 crore for various cen-tral Government schemes.

Telangana State PlanningBoard vice chairman B VinodKumar and Dr. Gaurav Uppal,Resident Commissioner,Telangana Bhavan accompa-nied KTR.

According to officials, KTRalso appraised Puri of issuesrelated to MunicipalAdministration and UrbanDevelopment and briefed himabout the ongoing projectsincluding Prime Minister AwasYojana (PMAY) Swachh BharatMission (SBM) and Atal

Mission for Rejuvenation andUrban Transformation(AMRUT).

Detailed discussions wereheld on the release of fundsunder PMAY (urban) of �1184.8crores, Releases of pendinggrants under Swachh BharatMission (SBM - urban) of�217.49 crores, AMRUT projectfund of �351.77, releases under15th Finance Commission forGHMC (million plus city) andalso non million plus city of�783.75 crores.

He has explained the vari-ous projects, which are in com-pletion stage, taken up by theState Government to providebasic amenities (public toilets,dump yard, sewage treatmentplant) in urban bodies.

KTR also requested Puri,also the Union Civil AviationMinister, to expedite theWarangal airport work underthe UDAAN scheme.

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New Delhi: The SupremeCourt on Monday refused toentertain a plea seeking for-mulation of a national policyfor uniform compensation forfamilies of those who havedied due the coronavirus dis-ease.

A bench of Justices AshokBhushan and R S Reddy dis-missed the plea saying thatevery state has a different pol-icy and gives compensation asper its financial power.

Advocate Deepak Prakash,appearing for petitioner HashikThayikandy, said that all he isasking for is a national policy

to be formulated that wouldprovide for uniform compen-sation throughout the country.

So many people have diedin India due to COVID-19 andthe victims are not gettingequal compensation, he said.

Prakash said that in somecases, the Delhi Governmenthas given �1 crore as compen-sation, while some states aregiving �1 lakh.There is no uni-form policy on compensation,he said.

The bench said it is dis-missing the plea, after whichthe counsel sought to withdrawit.

The petitioner, has alsosought a direction to the Centre

as well as State Governments toformulate an appropriate “com-

pensation plan” to provide ex-gratia monetary compensationto the kin of essential workersand healthcare workers whohave succumbed to COVID-19.

It has urged the court toseek a status report from stateGovernments on the totalnumber of COVID-19-relatedcausalties and measures takenby authorities for compensat-ing for loss of life due to theco-ronavirus pandemic.

The petition claimed that amajority of the country’s pop-ulation belong to financiallyweaker sections. PTI

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New Delhi: The SupremeCourt Monday disposed of as“infructuous” a BJP MLA’s pleaseeking stay on RajasthanSpeaker’s decision, whichallowed six BSP MLAs tomerge with the Congress, inview of the High Court order.

A bench of Justices ArunMishra, Vineet Saran and M RShah was informed by senioradvocate Kapil Sibal, appearing

for the Speaker, that earlier inthe day that the RajasthanHigh Court has passed anorder on the plea filed by BJPMLA Madan Dilawar. He saidthe high court has asked theSpeaker to decide on merit, theplea against the merger of sixBSP MLAs with the rulingCongress.

Sibal said the high courthad also asked the speaker to

decide on the matter withinthree months. The bench saidthe plea before it was against aninterim order of the high court,and has now become infructu-ous.

On August 17, the topcourt had deferred the hearingon Dilawar’s plea after it wasinformed that the Chief Justiceof the High Court has report-edly tested positive. PTI

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In an apparent bid to steminterest-grouping in the party

the BJP has decided not to pro-ject any chief ministerial facefor the next year’s Assemblyelections in Bengal.

Saying that projecting achief ministerial face for theAssembly elections was too“pre-mature” senior partyleader and former MeghalayaGovernor Tathagato Roy onMonday said that the partywould instead work together to

win the elections after whichthe decision would be taken bythe central leadership.

“At present the main func-tion of the party is to identifyareas of weakness and strengthand work together to achievethe goal … after the electionsthe decision would be taken bythe central leadership followingwhich the legislators woulddecide on the issue,” Roy whoalong with senior leader MukulRoy met BJP’s observer forBengal Kailash Vijaybargiyasaid. Inside sources said that

the Bengal BJP is currently suf-fering from a problem of plen-ty with competing lobbies ledby State president Dilip Ghosh,his predecessor Rahul Sinhaand Mukul Roy were vying forthe prestigious post.

In fact Tathagato Roy him-self is being projected as aviable candidate for the toppost. “Till then the party wantsto avoid bickering which will becounterproductive for an aspiring outfit,” a senior leadersaid.

Earlier Vijaybargiya said

that the party would fightunder the leadership of PrimeMinister Narendra Modi. “As ofnow, it has been decided thatwe won't project anyone as ourchief ministerial face. We willfight under the leadership ofPrime Minister Narendra Modiand win the election. Oncevoted to power, the legislativeparty in consultation with cen-tral leadership will decide on itschief ministerial choice,” hesaid.

When asked to speculateabout an able candidate who

could counter the heavy weightof Chief Minister MamataBanerjee he said “Right now,our target is to win 220-230seats in the 294-memberAssembly. We will achieve ourtarget as we did in the LokSabha polls. The issue of pro-jecting a CM face won't be afactor.”

The BJP last year shovedthe Left Front to come up as thesecond force in the State win-ning 19 out of 42 parliamentaryseats and conceding other seatsby wafer-thin margins.

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After the Congress leadershipBengal Chief Minister Mamata

Banerjee too has come out openlyfor postponing the NationalEligibility cum Entrance Test(NEET) and Joint EntranceExamination (JEE) exams sched-uled to be held in September.

The Chief Minister on Mondayrequested the Centre to postponethe NEET --- for admission inmedical undergraduate course ---and JEE --- for getting admissionin premium engineering colleges --- exams to avoid infecting morenumber of people with corona.

Chief Minister on Mondaytweeted, “In our last video confer-ence with the Hon'ble PM ShriNarendramodiJi, I had been vocal

against the UGC guidelines man-dating completion of terminalexaminations inUniversities/Colleges by the end ofSeptember 2020, which had a hugepotential to put student lives atrisk…” Appealing to the Centre toput off the exams for now she wrote“Now with the directive ofEducation Ministry of India to con-duct NEET, JEE 2020 in Sep, Iwould again appeal to the Centreto assess the risk and

postpone these examinationsuntil the situation is conduciveagain. Itis our duty to ensure a safeenvironment for all our students.”

The Supreme Court had earli-er dismissed a plea seeking thepostponement of JEE (Main) April,2020 and NEET (Undergraduate)examinations.

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In what the Bengal ruling outfit sniffed “game planahead of next year’s Assembly elections” the

Enforcement Directorate has slapped notices on fiveTrinamool Congress leaders for failing to producetheir property details.

The notices have been served in connection tothe Narada pay off case in which a number of partyleaders were seen accepting cash from a decoy busi-nessman (journalist) for favour.

The leaders thus notified include party MPSaugato Roy, Kajoli Ghoshdastidar and former MPAparupa Poddar. Senior Minister andpowerfulparty satrap Subhendu Adhikary too has beenissued a notice,sources said.

While Ghoshdastidar said she would cooper-ate as soon as she got the notice Roy too said hehad not received the letter as yet and would pro-duce his details. Adhikary said he had already sub-mitted property details in June adding that he hadnot received any further notice.

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Tamil Nadu recorded 5, 967 newpersons who were diagnosed

with Covid-19 on Monday while 97persons lost their lives across theState on account of the pandemic.Except for a few districts in theState, number of people testedpositive for Covid-19 has comedown in many districts though it istoo early to tell that situation isencouraging.

But Tamil Nadu is showingimprovement , according to manyphysicians in the State.

The number of Covid-19patients across the State touched 53,282 mark while 6, 129 patientscured of the pandemic were dis-charged from hospitals.

The cluster of four districts thatinclude Chennai, Chengalpet,

Kancheepuram and Thiruvallurcontinued with high number ofpatients, the southern districts likeVirudhunagar showed a consider-able fall in the covid-19 cases.

Chennai diagnosed 1,278 newpatients on Monday while situationin Chengalpet (306) ,Kancheepuram ( 226) andThiruvallur ( 320) remainedunchanged. “Situation in Chennaicontinues to be a matter of con-cern,” said Dr C V Krishnaswami,leading physician.

Coimbatore (387) andCuddalore ( 370) were the only twodistricts which showed unprece-dented number of Covid-19 caseswhile it has to said that the rest ofthe districts have shown consider-able improvement though the num-bers are yet to come to the levelwhere the State can breath easy.

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Multilingual phenomenonhas always been an integral

part of human society but thenature of plurality of languagediffers greatly, said Prof EAnnamalai, Visiting Professor,Department of South AsianLanguages and Civilization,University of Chicago, USA.

He was delivering a web talkon 'Plurality of Languages in thePost Liberal World' organised bythe Department of Linguistics,Aligarh Muslim University(AMU). The web talk was thesecond lecture in the series ofongoing online Web Talks.

Speaking on the role ofsocial, political and economicfactors for the promotion ofmultilingualism, ProfAnnamalai gave an overview ofmultilingualism in society andeducation.

He delineated multilingual-ism in a historical context andalso discussed how the chal-lenges it poses are neither newnor insuperable. Prof Annamalaistressed the social, political andeconomic factors for multilin-gualism promotion, while advo-cating that there have been var-ious perspectives on 'plurality oflanguage' in different periods.

Discussing the situation inthe post-liberal World, he saidthat as colonisation ended;newly independent countriesprovided their citizens withconstitutional rights for speak-ing their mother tongues, whicheventually promoted multilin-gualism.

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The habit of throwing garbagehere and there may create a

problem now. Smart cameras areinstalled at intersections in thecity and have started surveil-lance. The Integrated Commandand Control (ICCC) located atSewa Bhawan will monitor thegarbage throwers. They will befined and prosecuted.

Apart from this, MaterialRecovery Facility (MRF) centershave been started by finishing 10big garbage collection points.Municipal CommissionerSatyaprakash Patel said that the

surveillance system has beenstarted with cameras installed at22 points. An area of ??500meters can be covered from eachpoint. The cameras are installedat Kishanpur Tiraha, EtahChungi, Lal Diggi, ControlRoom, Maris Road, Achal Tal,Gonda Bridge, Barhadwari,Mamu Bhanja, Mirimal Pyau,Kela Nagar, Deewani, GondaModh, Zakaria Market, MedicalRoad, Collectorate, Sabzi Mandi,Uparkot, OLF and Abdul Karimintersection.

In the first phase of sanita-tion wards, 10 complete collec-tion points are being eliminat-

ed. MRF Center has been start-ed near Abdullah College. Apartfrom this, mini MRF centers willbe started near Ramghat RoadPolice Outpost, Jeevangarh,Zakaria Market, Indira Nagar,near Iglas Road PumpingStation, Kundan Nagar BhujpuraBypass, Baradwari and Kotwali.With the ICCC, the system ofmonitoring the people throwinggarbage on the roads has beenmade effective.

After collection of garbageat the collection point, thegarbage will not be thrownagain whether it is a commonman or a sweeper.

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With the migration oflabourers to lockdown,

the kiln industry has collapsed.And the advance money givento the migrant laborers by thekiln owners has sunk and theyhave suffered a huge loss. Notonly this, there is a shortage oflabores for the coming seasonand the new season is notbeing started. Aligarh has morethan 30,000 laborers at 400kilns.

They come from Bihar,Bengal, Odisha and EasternUP's Jaunpur, Ballia etc to workon kilns in Aligarh. Theselaborers are paid advance pay-ment by the contractor, andthey come to work only afterthe advance payment for theentire season has been done.Owing to the financial crisis,the owner of the kiln is unableto give advance to the laborers.

The previous season wasbadly beaten due to coron-avirus. Now there is a worryabout the new season. How tocall Brick kiln laborers comingfrom other states and other dis-tricts of the state. Workers'contractors are demanding a

rough advance. On the otherhand there is infection that isstill spreading its legs rapidly.The number of positive patientsis increasing day by day.Hamendra is a brick maker, hehas lost Rs 15 to 20 lakhs on onekiln in the previous season. Thisis the position of most manu-facturers in the district. 400kilns are registered in the dis-trict. After the Janata curfewfrom 22 March, the situation ofAligarh also started deteriorat-ing.

During the country lock-down, everything was closed tillApril. Blowing of the kilnsalong with the brick slab alsostopped. The laborers them-selves went home. Some weresent via train. The manufac-turers also arranged for the fareof train and food for the labor-ers. Now the brick makers arepreparing for the new season.Brick making will starts fromOctober.

The economic condition ofthe kiln owners is already bad.Most of the businessmen havenot deposited the loan takenfrom the bank. And they areafraid that the laborers will notcome without paying advance.

Bengaluru: BJP MP fromGulbarga Dr Umesh Jadhavand his MLA son AvinashJadhav are among the 12 in hisfamily and staff who havetested positive for coronavirus.

“Till now 12 people weretested #COVID19 positive inmy family & personal staff.Yesterday my family members,including my wife, daughter,daughter-in-law & my driverwere admitted in Bangalore'sGovt #BowringHospital,” TheMP tweeted on Sunday.

The senior Jadhav said histwo personal assistants andhis sons personal assistant and

a driver were infected.Jadhav was the first rebel

Congress MLA of the currentKarnataka Vidhana Sabha toquit the party and join the BJPonly to defeat Congress leaderMallikarjun Kharge in the 2019Lok Sabha elections.

Jadhav also managed to geta BJP ticket for his son to con-test from Chincholi Assemblysegment, which fell vacant fol-lowing his resignation from theKarnataka Assembly.

As on Sunday, there were2.78 lakh coronavirus cases,including 1.9 lakh discharged,83,551 active cases and 4,683coronavirus-related deaths. PTI

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Kerala Legislative Assemblyon Monday witnessed a

rare spectacle of the ruling LeftDemocratic Front led by theCPI(M) and the OppositionUnited Democratic Front(UDF) led by the Congressjoining hands in the morningto pass a unanimous resolu-tion against the BJP-led UnionGovernment and immediate-ly thereafter the Oppositionintroducing a no-confidencemotion against the Pinarayi Vijayan ledGovernment accusing it ofcorruption.

The LDF which enjoys abrutal majority in the Houseis all set to defeat the motion.But the discussion on themotion is continuing evenafter 8 hours as Vijayan is yetto wind up his reply.Cacophony prevailed in theHouse as Opposition mem-bers were standing in the“well “ and shouting slogansdemanding the chief minister’s

resignation at the time ofgoing to Press.

While the Congress, led byRamesh Chennithala, repeat-ed the allegations raised by theKerala BJP president KSurendran outside the House,the ruling LDF dismissed theallegations as ‘mere dampsquib’ and much ado aboutnothing.

The no-confidencemotion focussed more on therecent scams like gold smug-gling through diplomaticchannels and the role of theChief Minister’s Office in thescam and also on the LIFEMission project to build hous-es for the poor who lost theirhouses in the 2018 floods.

What stood out in the daywas the unanimous resolutioncondemning the Centre forawarding the contract foroperating, managing anddeveloping the

Thiruvananthapuram Airportto the Adani Group overlook-ing the interests of the State.

The lone BJP member inthe House O Rajagopal, whowill turn 91 next month,missed the chance to speak asthe Chair failed to take note ofhis request for a chance tospeak.

Ramesh Chennaithala,who described the ChiefMinister’s Office as the epi-centre of corruption in hisspeech during the no-confi-dence motion lambastedVijayan for the government’s unholy collu-sion with the Adani Group inthe bidding for the airport’scontract.

E Chandraseskharan,Revenue Minister, said thegold scam and other allega-tions were a ploy to take thesheen off the governmentwhich has done excellent jobduring the last four years.“The NIA or the ED could notfind anything with which theycould incriminate theGovernment. The allegationsare fizzling out by the day,” saidthe minister.

Chief Minister Vijayanwho answered the allegationsraised by the Opposition saidthat the LDF had won 91outof the 140 seats in the 2016assembly election but itincreased its tally to 93 by win-ning the by-election whichshowed that the Front had thesupport of the people.

“The BJP-ruled Centre iscreating all problems for thisGovernment. The Congresswhich is struggling to find apresident to lead the party isignoring the real issuesbecause party leaders are wait-ing for signal from the BJP tojoin the saffron brigade,” saidVijayan. The Chief Ministerused most part of his speechto highlight the achievementsmade by his government dur-ing the last four years.

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Incidence of seasonal dis-eases like malaria, chikun-

gunya, swine flu, dengue hasapparently witnessed a drasticfall as Agra district battles theCovid-19 pandemic.

“Very few cases of season-al diseases are being reportedthese days, primarily becausethere is better awareness,improved level of hygiene,reduced mobility and period-ic sanitation,” a state healthdepartment official said.

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�"5 �������8��� � ������������������A���%������� Patna: The flood situation

remained Stable in Bihar forthe second consecutive dayand the number of people hit bythe deluge is 83.62 lakh across16 districts, the DisasterManagement Department saidon Monday.

The number of flood vic-tims and affected areasremained the same sinceSaturday, the department's bul-letin said adding that 83,62,451people in 1,333 panchayats of130 blocks are reeling under the

impact of the calamity.Flood-related deaths also

remained unchanged at 27.The highest 11 casualties

were registered in Darbhangadistrict, followed by six inMuzaffarpur, four in WestChamparan and two each inSaran, Siwan and Khagaria.

However, the number ofpeople being served cookedfood has come down to 1.60lakh on Monday from 1.78lakh the previous day. Thenumber of community kitchens

also reduced by 21 since Sundayto reach 198, the bulletin said.

It said that about 5.50 lakhpeople have been evacuated sofar by 26 teams of NationalDisaster Response Force andState Disaster Response Force.

Meanwhile, the Ganga con-tinued to flow above the dan-ger mark at three places in thestate -- Gandhi Ghat andHathidah in Patna andKahalgaon in Bhagalpur dis-trict, the Water ResourcesDepartment said. PTI

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KOCHI: After a marathonspeech delivered in 3hours and45 minutes by Chief MinisterPinarayi Vijayan, the LegislativeAssembly on Monday trouncedthe no-confidence motionagainst the Kerala Governmentmoved by the Congress-ledOpposition.

While 87 members votedagainst the motion, it foundfavour with just 40 members.There was no confusion regard-ing the final outcome of the no-confidence motion as theGovernment enjoyed a brutalmajority of 93 members in theHouse of 140. Vijayan's speechentered the record books as thelongest ever speech made inKerala Legislative Assembly

Vijayan made use of thespeech to highlight the achieve-ments of his government and toattack the communal agenda ofthe BJP and RSS including theRam Janmabhumi Temple issuethough the motion was againstthe gold smuggling scamthrough the diplomatic channelof Thiruvananthapuram Airportand the unauthorized dealingsbetween higher education min-ister K T Jaleel and the UAEConsulate atThiruvananthapuram. PNS

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Page 6: 0 B2ˆ’ 1 ˛ ˚˛ C ˘ ˚˛ C C · 1 day ago  · sensational claim: “Like in ... Ghulam Nabi Azad to sort out ... get closer to the truth. (The writer is an author specialising

Arecently publishedbook by the NetajiSubhash Bose INATrust and released byVice President

Venkaiah Naidu on the eve ofIndia’s 74th independence dayprovides a fresh perspective to theevents leading up to the BritishGovernment’s decision to quitIndia in August 1947.

The British Raj, which wascruising along majestically for200 years, suddenly developedserious doubts about its ability torule the sub-continent in 1946 andhurriedly began the process ofpacking up. What hastened its exitfrom India? The book, Netaji —India’s Independence and BritishArchives, authored by KalyanKumar De, has put together sev-eral key reports and documentswhich throw light on the suddenchange of mood in the Britishcamp. These reports, primarilyfrom the Governors of the variousprovinces and from theIntelligence Bureau (IB), indicatethat by the mid-1940s, the Britishgot into a panic mode because ofthe tremendous popularity ofSubhas Chandra Bose and thenationwide appreciation and sym-pathy for the Indian NationalArmy (INA), which he had estab-lished to militarily oust the colo-nial power. This, in turn, triggereda Naval mutiny in Bombay (nowMumbai) and several other sta-tions and rebellions in some Armycamps, including in Madras (nowChennai) and Poona (now Pune).

Historians have often won-dered as to what brought about asudden change in the mood in theBritish camp. The answer to thisquestion was not easily availablein the decades after indepen-dence for two reasons. The first isthat the archival material wasnot available. The second reasonis that since the 1950s, theCongress made every effort todownplay the popularity of Netajiand the INA. If it had come intothe public domain that the Britishchose to hastily wind up opera-tions for fear of a mutiny withinthe Indian Army and a generalrevolt among the masses, it wouldhave spoiled the narrative vis-à-visthe non-violent struggle to gainindependence. This process ofsuppressio veri (suppressing truth),which began in the days of formerPrime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru,was carried on by the Nehru-Gandhis — Indira Gandhi and

Rajiv Gandhi — because itsuited the “history” the familywanted to popularise.

Subhas Chandra Bose’sdetermination, stamina andvision can be gauged from thefact that thousands of men andwomen responded to his call,joined the INA in India and inthe South-east Asian coun-tries and sacrificed their livesin order to liberate the country.In his book, De reproduces anIB report of November 1945,which warns the BritishGovernment that there wasenormous sympathy for thesoldiers of the INA across theland and that this was not justconfined to the cities. It saidthat if the Government did nottake cognisance of this senti-ment, the consequence wouldbe a mass agitation and blood-shed.

Going by the fear and anx-iety displayed by severalGovernors in their reports tothe then Viceroy, Lord Wavellin late 1945 and early 1946, thelatter had little choice but tobegin winding up operations.The Governors — one moreworried than the other —expressed their trepidation atthe ongoing INA trials andtheir repercussions. Almostevery Governor warned theViceroy that the Governmentwould be playing with fire if ittargetted the INA because it

was seen as an organisation ofbrave freedom fighters. Theywarned that this could result ina mutiny in the Indian Armyand they were not very muchoff the mark.

The Viceroy, in turn, keptKing George-VI informed ofthe growing popularity of theINA and the mass protests itwas generating in Calcutta andelsewhere. He said there wasgrowing interest in the INA tri-als and it was bound to havepolitical implications. InFebruary 1946, he wrote to thethen Prime Minister, ClementAttlee, and gave him an updateon the naval mutiny in Bombayand other stations. He said itwas now under control but therioting by the mobs was still onin Bombay.

These fears forced theBritish to commute the sen-tences of deportation for lifegiven in the court-martial tothe most prominent three INAsoldiers on trial — PremKumar Sehgal, Shah NawazKhan and Gurbaksh SinghDhillon.

This is corroborated byGeneral CJ Auchinleck’s “strict-ly personal and secret” letter tothe Army Commanders onFebruary 12, 1946, in which hetalks about the reasons thatprompted him to commutethe sentences of deportation forthe life of Sehgal, Dhillon and

Khan. He says, confirmation ofthe sentences would have led toviolent internal conflict. Therewas a “genuine feeling thatthey were patriots and nation-alists” and, therefore, even ifthey were misled, “they shouldbe treated with clemency astrue sons of India.”

Officers in the IndianArmy, he said, were glad andrelieved at the final outcomebecause if the sentence hadbeen enforced, “it would haveled to chaos in the country andprobably to mutiny and dissen-sion in the Army...” Along withthis, the Naval mutiny and themutiny in the Army camps inJabalpur, Madras and Poonaconvinced the British that theycould no longer rely on theIndian armed forces to keep theBritish flag flying on the sub-continent. Once this realisationdawned on them, action wasswift. The British Governmenttook a formal decision to endthe colonisation of India inMarch 1946.

Sir Twynam, Governor,Central Provinces and Berar,wrote a secret letter to LordWavell on November 26, 1945,in which he confessed that hehad just 17 European officers,including three judicial, and 19European members of theIndian Police (total 36) tomanage a population of 18million over an area of one lakh

square miles. These figures, given by Sir

Twynam, indeed sums up thetragedy of India’s colonisationby the British. At the best oftimes, it is said that there werejust a few thousand Europeansin the bureaucracy, police andArmy and they had coloniseda nation of India’s size with apopulation of about 400 millionpeople.

Every Indian today will bestunned by these figures. Howdid millions of Indians allowthemselves to be subjugated bya handful of Europeans? Lackof unity and self-confidencewere certainly two factors thatled to this dreadful tale ofcolonisation.

The work of De should alsomake us reflect over the workof other historians over the last70 years who diligently prac-tised suppressio veri and kept somany truths away from thepeople. We must re-examine allthat they have written andchallenge the postulates con-structed on half-truths. Manyindividuals have worked forseveral years to dredge up hid-den facts, including KalyanKumar De. All of them deserveour gratitude for enabling us toget closer to the truth.

(The writer is an authorspecialising in democracy stud-ies. Views expressed are personal.)

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Sir — The COVID-19 pandem-ic has changed the way we livewith many of us confined toworking from home and livingin isolation. In several nationsacross the world, the number ofcases per day has risen to thou-sands. It appears that wearinga very large, rather ornate maskprobably isn’t enough to stopthe infection. The outcome of amedical crisis depends, to alarge degree, on social rules andour ability to follow them.Much also depends on the rulesformulated by Governments,which make for tricky business.

Under lockdowns, peopleknew what they have to do. Butwith it easing, we remaindependent on the set of rulesannounced by Governmentsthat keep changing frequentlyand are often very poorly com-municated and executed. Withthe winters approaching, thetask to keep the infection ratedown will get tougher.Nevertheless, we need to worktogether, separately and wearour masks to get out of the pan-demic.

Dennis FitzgeraldMelbourne

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Sir — This refers to the edito-rial, “Is Bihar poll-ready?”

(August 22). The ElectionCommission (EC)’s initiative tohold the Assembly elections inBihar on time is welcome. In theabsence of any hope of relief

from the pandemic or a credi-ble vaccine in the near future,indefinite postponement ofelections doesn’t augur well forthe people or the democracy.

Bihar Chief Minister NitishKumar’s preference to go forelections to sustain his credibil-ity or the Opposition parties’reluctance to face the electionsfor their own reasons don’tcount here. The EC is planningto allow public rallies but withlimited physical presence; per-mit online filing of nomina-tions; allow limited door-to-door campaigning; and reducethe number of people in pollingin each polling booth andcounting hall. All these mea-sures are legitimate in the con-text of the pandemic.

N Sadhasiva ReddyBengaluru

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Sir — It is appreciable that theGovernment has decided not topostpone the JEE and NEETexaminations. Postponement ofexams would have delayed theupcoming academic year.Results and counselling alsotake time. The Governmentmust now ensure safety.

SrinivasVia email

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Page 7: 0 B2ˆ’ 1 ˛ ˚˛ C ˘ ˚˛ C C · 1 day ago  · sensational claim: “Like in ... Ghulam Nabi Azad to sort out ... get closer to the truth. (The writer is an author specialising

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Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman hasannounced the broad contours of the NarendraModi Government’s plans on privatisation of

Central Public Sector Undertakings (CPSUs). ACPSU is defined as an undertaking in which theUnion Government has shareholding of morethan 50 per cent and by virtue of this, exercisesmajority ownership and control (there were 249operating CPSUs as on March 31, 2019). Its privati-sation means the shareholding of the Centre will bebrought down to below 50 per cent. Before we lookat the plan and how the Government goes aboutimplementing it, it may be worthwhile to reviewwhat it has already done on this front and its out-come. Under the Modi dispensation, this is not thefirst time that the privatisation of CPSUs has beenput on the table.

In early 2016, the NITI Aayog had recommend-ed to the Government a “strategic” sale (a sophis-ticated nomenclature for selling more than 50 percent of the Government’s shareholding) of over twodozen CPSUs. Meanwhile, the then FM, Arun Jaitley,had set targets for sale proceeds from this route at�28,500 crore (2015-16) and �20,500 crore (2016-17). Against this, during 2015-16, there was not evena single case of strategic sale whereas for 2016-17,the target itself was lowered to a meagre �5,500 crore.During 2017-18, the Government sold 51.11 per centof its shareholding in Hindustan PetroleumCorporation Limited (HPCL) to Oil and Natural GasCorporation (ONGC), yielding about �37,000crore. In 2018-19, it sold 52.63 per cent of its stakein Rural Electrification Corporation (REC) toPower Finance Corporation (PFC) to yield �13,000crore. But, the sale of shares in HPCL to ONGC orin REC to PFC (i.e. from one PSU to another) can-not be termed as strategic as even after relinquish-ing 51 per cent plus shareholding, the Governmentcontinues to exercise full control (albeit indirectly)over HPCL/REC by virtue of being majority ownerin the acquirer, namely ONGC/PFC.

During 2018-19, Air India (and its subsidiaries)were also put on the block but didn’t elicit any inter-est. During 2019-20, besides resurrecting thatoffer, the Government also took up sale of all of itsshareholding in Bharat Petroleum CorporationLimited (BPCL) at 53.29 per cent; ContainersCorporation of India (ConCor) at 30 per cent;Shipping Corporation of India (SCI) at 63.75 percent; North Eastern Electric Power Corporation(NEEPCO) at 100 per cent and THDC India Limitedat 75 per cent. Sans NEEPCO and THDCIL, whichwere sold to National Thermal Power Corporation(NTPC) — a CPSU in the power sector — othersmade no progress.

In January 2020, even as the Finance Ministrywas pretty confident that the sale of BPCL, ConCorand SCI, besides Air India et al, would materialiseduring 2020-21 (this is also reflected in the ambi-tious target of divestment proceeds at �2,10,000 croreof which the revenue from strategic sale is over�1,00,000 crore), the devastation triggered byCOVID-19 changed everything. From the above, itis abundantly clear that the privatisation initiativepursued during the last five years has not taken off.There are two major reasons for this failure.

First, the exercise all through has been linkedto garnering revenue (albeit non-tax) to meet fis-cal targets, which drives the efforts and not privati-sation per se which ought to be the way forward.Second, the Government’s moves in this directionare hamstrung by an inherent desire to remain inthe driver’s seat even after the so-called strategicdivestment. A clear indication of this is available from

what Sitharaman said in her Budgetspeech for 2019-20. She stated that theintent was to change the extant policy ofthe Government “directly” holding 51 percent or above in a CPSU to one wherebyits total holding, “direct” plus “indirect”,is maintained at 51 per cent.

To illustrate, let us take the case ofIndian Oil Corporation Limited (IOCL).In addition to its direct stake of 51.5 percent, the Union Government holds morethan above 51 per cent in other PSUs,which in turn, hold shares in IOCL. Thus,Life Insurance Corporation (LIC), whichis 100 per cent owned by the Government,holds 6.5 per cent shares in IOCL. Oil andNatural Gas Corporation (ONGC), whichis 63 per cent Government-owned, holds14 per cent shares in IOCL. Likewise, OilIndia Limited (OIL), which is 60 per centowned by the Union Government, holdsfive per cent shares in IOCL.

The “indirect” stake of the UnionGovernment in IOCL viaLIC/ONGC/OIL being 25.5 per cent, it canreduce its direct stake in IOCL to 25.5 percent (sending a message that it has beenprivatised) and yet, including the “indi-rect” control, it will still have majority stakeof 51 per cent. This approach can be a bigbottleneck in the way of successfully exe-cuting strategic divestment plans.

Now, under a big bang approach toprivatisation, CPSUs are divided into twobroad categories viz. “strategic sector” and“non-strategic.” In strategic, theGovernment has identified 16 sectors,including among others petroleum refin-ing and marketing, crude exploration,power generation, coal and metals, atom-ic energy, space, heavy and mediumengineering sector and so on. On the otherhand, the non-strategic sectors includehotel and tourist services, transportationvehicle and equipment, industrial and con-sumer goods, trading and marketing andtransport and logistics and so on.

As per the plan, all PSUs in the non-strategic sector will be privatised. In thestrategic sector, too, the Governmentwill be open to privatisation with thecaveat that at least one undertaking (anda maximum of four) will be retained in thepublic sector.

When seen in the backdrop of theUnion Government having made anindiscriminate entry in almost everyconceivable business activity, includingareas such as hotel and tourist services,where it had no business to be present(look at the Indian Tourism andDevelopment Corporation which runs achain of hotels and restaurants), any ini-tiative aimed at exiting from all of theseis welcome. This has the potential tounlock value and generate huge revenuebecause of the high valuation that the realestate and properties — many of these inprime locations — under these PSUs com-mand.

Coming to the strategic sector, thoughthe Government does not rule out privati-sation, the caveat of retaining a maximumof four undertakings in the public sectorcan defeat the purpose. For instance, cur-rently there are around 12 oil PSUs rang-ing from upstream oil producers, likeONGC and OIL, to downstream oilrefining and fuel marketing firms, likeIOC, BPCL and HPCL to gas transporterGAIL India Limited and engineering firmEngineers India Limited. These 12 couldbe consolidated into four behemothsthrough a process of merger and amalga-mation leaving no space for privatisationwhatsoever. Why does the Governmentwant to put this caveat? What does it fearfrom? Sans this, will it compromisenational interest? In the above example,consider an extreme scenario, in whichthere is not even one PSU and the entireoil and gas space is occupied by privateenterprises. Are we to infer that this willcompromise India’s energy security? If this

were to be the case, then why not reservethis sector exclusively for PSUs? Why alloweven one private company? This line ofargument is bizarre.

For ensuring security in strategicitems, the critical requirement is to havea minimum number of companies toensure there is adequate competitionand supplies in the market. Who thosefirms are — whether owned by privatepromoters or the Government — shouldnot matter. In the 70s and the 80s, whenIndia needed to develop these sectors andthe private sector was unwilling to come,it made eminent sense for the Governmentto take the lead. Since then, a lot of waterhas flown down the river Ganga.Currently, there is considerable interestamong private investors and theGovernment itself is inviting them.Therefore, any arbitrary restriction shouldbe avoided.

In the present scenario, instead of get-ting bogged down with drawing a linebetween strategic and non-strategic sec-tors, any decision to privatise a PSU shouldbe taken on the merit of each individualcase. It should come from the manage-ment of an individual PSU instead of beingthrust on them under a top-downapproach. For coordination at the macrolevel and providing guidance, theGovernment may constitute a panel ofeminent professionals.

The process of strategic sale should bedelinked from the Centre’s resource-mobilisation exercise. This will give themuch-needed flexibility to the PSU man-agement to decide the contours and tim-ing of the divestment, taking into accountmarket conditions so as to maximise theproceeds from sales.

The only way to avoid delay and expe-dite the process of privatisation is tounshackle it from bureaucratic red tape.

(The writer is a Delhi-based policy ana-lyst)

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The world has been watching withconcern the ingress of Chinesetroops along the Line of Actual

Control (LAC) into Indian territory andthe long-drawn stand-off between thetwo countries that were on the verge ofa war in June. India and China are notonly the two biggest countries popula-tion-wise but they are also two friend-ly, ancient civilisations. After the 1962War, the Chinese had occupied morethan 40,000 km of Indian territory andthe ties between the two countries werefrozen. The ice was broken by the thenExternal Affairs Minister AB Vajpayee,when he visited China in February1979, and met the then Chinese supre-mo Deng Xiaoping.

India has always shown greatmaturity in the overall interest ofpeace despite being a victim of Chineseaggression. Hence, late Prime MinisterRajiv Gandhi, too, visited China despiteBeijing propping up Pakistan in inter-national fora and the relationshipbetween the two nations continued toflourish. In international dialogues onclimate change, New Delhi and Beijingput up a joint front until China signeda treaty with the US on reduction ofemissions. For boundary disputes, thetwo nations had set up a mechanismbut it was resolved that the territorialconflict must not hold better relationshostage.

However, China suddenly uppedthe ante against India on May 5through its incursions into Indian ter-ritory. The worst happened on June 15when the Indian and Chinese troopsfiercely clashed for six hours in GalwanValley resulting in casualties on bothsides. Since then, India and China haveheld several rounds of military anddiplomatic talks but no significantheadway has been made in resolution

of the border row. Last week, India andChina held a fresh round of diplomat-ic talks to resolve the border row as theChinese have not retreated complete-ly even after agreeing to do so. TheChinese intentions are to redraw theLAC by occupying vantage points.Understandably, the public mood inIndia has completely turned against theXi Jinping regime. Let us examine thecurrent imbroglio with China from thepoint of Indian intellectuals and thecommon man.

The Indian leadership, for the last30-35 years, has been building bridgesin the hope of forging sustainable tiesmutually beneficial for the two neigh-bours. The Indian leadership remainedin a fool’s paradise for a long time andignored developing infrastructure alongthe borders and defence fortificationuntil Narendra Modi took over as thePrime Minister.

The Government started creatinga road network along the Chinese bor-der and fortified defence preparedness,including weapon procurements keep-ing the Chinese and Pakistani threat in

mind. The approach was purely defen-sive. However, the Chinese leadershipsaw this as a challenge to its ambitionsof emerging as a global superpower.

Xi, though attending summitswith Modi, was getting impatient withIndia challenging Chinese hegemony bynot joining the Belt and Road Initiative.Plus, the fact that India did not join the11-nation Regional ComprehensiveEconomic Partnership as it fearedmore trade deficit with these groups,further enraged Xi. The Galwan attackwas a premeditated strategy authorisedby the Chinese Military Commissionat the highest level and the trigger pointwas the construction of infrastructurealong the LAC, particularly the DurbukShyok road.

India is giving a fitting response toChinese temerity and a stern messagehas gone that it is not an unpreparedIndia of 1962. It is 2020 and has anexcellent mountain combat force readyto meet the aggressor head on. In themidst of mounting tensions, the ques-tion is how the contours of the relation-ship between the two countries should

develop. Are we ready for a war? Theanswer is that mature nations abhor warand opt for reconciliation. All mustknow that the time of bullying nationsand expansionist policies is gone. Xi andhis associates need to know that esca-lating tension with India will costboth the nations dearly, militarily as wellas economically. China and its cohortsmust junk the misconceptions that bybullying India, Pakistan and otherneighbouring countries will getimpressed by Chinese prowess.

The time is ripe for the Chineseleadership to think of the Confucianprinciples of humanity, righteousness,loyalty, social propriety and filial piety.These are the virtues of Indian societyas well and are reflected in our inter-national diplomacy. It is due to thesesimilarities that we had a great bond-ing in the past. The Communist ideol-ogy must get these virtues back andmust learn a lesson from modern his-tory of aggressors getting defeated inVietnam, Cambodia, Afghanistan andso on.

The Chinese leadership should

read the quotes of Hu Shih, the Chinesephilosopher, liberal and diplomat on theIndia-China relationship. He said,“India conquered and dominated Chinaculturally for 20 centuries withoutever having to send a single soldieracross her border.” In today’s world itis ridiculous to spoil relations betweentwo emerging powers when the focusshould be mutual economic gains andfighting the pandemic.

Modi stressed on the necessity tobuild up ties between the two nationswhen he said, “Our relationship hasbeen complex in recent decades. But wehave a historic responsibility to turn thisrelationship into a source of strength foreach other and a force of good for theworld”.

Xi could have delved into the his-toric past and forged a massive partner-ship with India to bring much-neededworld peace for poverty eradication.War is a destructive prescription andsuicidal. China must wake up, have faithin its ancient Confucian wisdom andmake more friends than foes.

(The writer is a retired civil servant)

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Islamabad: A high-level dele-gation from the Taliban’s polit-ical office in Doha arrived inPakistan on Monday to discussthe way forward in the Afghanpeace process with the Pakistanileadership.

The Taliban delegation ledby their political chief MullahAbdul Ghani Baradar is visitingIslamabad at the invitation ofthe country’s foreign office.

Pakistan’s Foreign MinisterShah Mahmood Qureshi toldreporters that he would meet theTaliban delegation on Tuesday.

He said that Pakistan wasplaying a facilitating role on theAfghan issue which led to apeace agreement between theUS and the Taliban and now it’sup to Afghans to decide the wayforward.

“The next logical step isintra-Afghan dialogue, whichshould be started at the earliest,”he said, adding that China wasalso supporting the Afghanpeace process. “The majority ofAfghans believe the only wayforward is through reconcilia-tion but the decision to recon-cile has to be taken by Afghans

themselves,” Qureshi said.He said the people in

Afghanistan desire peace andstability but “there are somespoilers, who want to disturbpeace in Afghanistan”. TheAfghan Taliban spokespersonalso confirmed that a delegationled by Mullah Baradar is visit-ing Islamabad and other capitalsto discuss the Afghan peaceefforts. This is the second visitof Mullah Baradar to Pakistanin the last 10 months.

He visited Islamabad inOctober last year whenPresident Donald Trumpabruptly called off the peacetalks with the Taliban, citing themilitant group’s continuedattacks against the US-led for-eign forces in Afghanistan.

Pakistan at that time hadarranged a meeting between theTaliban delegation led byMullah Baradar and US specialenvoy Zalmay Khalilzad.

That meeting had helpedthe process to be back on track,which eventually culminatedin the landmark deal signedbetween the US and the Talibanon February 29. PTI

Beijing/Islamabad: China haslaunched first of the fouradvanced naval warships it isbuilding for Pakistan, amiddeepening economic anddefence ties between the two all-weather allies.

The launching ceremonyfor the first warship was held atthe Hudong Zhonghua Shipyardin Shanghai on Sunday.

Pakistan-China defence tiesturn a new chapter with thelaunch of the first ship of Type-054 class frigate, Pakistan’s state-run APP news agency reported.

The Type-054 class,equipped with the latest surface,subsurface, anti-air weapons,combat management system,and sensors will be one of thetechnologically advanced surfaceplatforms of the Pakistan Navyfleet, the report said.

Pakistan signed a contractwith the China ShipbuildingTrading Company Ltd. (CSTC)for the delivery of two Type-054A/P frigates in 2017. Last year,the Chinese official mediareported that under a majorarms deal between the two all-weather allies, China wouldbuild four advanced frigates forPakistan Navy.

The terms of the deal andthe price of the ships were notrevealed.

The launching of the shipcoincided with the 2nd strategicdialogue between ForeignMinister of China Wang Yi andhis Pakistani counterpart ShahMahmood Qureshi held at theChinese holiday resort ofHainan on August 21.

Meanwhile in Islamabad,Foreign Minister Qureshi saidon Monday that China andPakistan were strategic part-ners. He said the cooperativerelationship between Pakistanand China was an answer toobjections regarding the ambi-tious USD 60 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor(CPEC).

Addressing the media on hisreturn from China, Qureshi

said Pakistan and China werepursuing the project and itspace of implementation wouldincrease and it would benefit theentire region.

The CPEC, which connectsGwadar Port in Pakistan’sBalochistan with China’sXinjiang province, is the flagshipproject of China’s ambitiousmulti-billion-dollar Belt andRoad Initiative (BRI).

The CPEC is a collection ofinfrastructure and other projectsunder construction throughoutPakistan since 2013. Originallyvalued at USD 46 billion, theprojects were worth USD 62 bil-lion as of 2017.

India has protested to Chinaover the CPEC as it is being laidthrough Pakistan-occupiedKashmir.

The BRI was launched byChinese President Xi Jinpingwhen he came to power in2013. It aims to link SoutheastAsia, Central Asia, the Gulfregion, Africa and Europe witha network of land and sea routes.It is seen as an attempt byChina to further its influenceabroad with infrastructure pro-jects funded by Chinese invest-ments all over the world. PTI

Manila: Muslim militants alliedwith the Islamic State group setoff a powerful motorcycle explo-sive followed by a suicide bomb-ing that together killed 14 peo-ple on Monday, many of themsoldiers, in the worst extremistattack in the Philippines thisyear, military officials said.

At least 75 soldiers, policeand civilians were wounded inthe midday bombings in Jolotown in southern Sulu province,regional military commanderLt. Gen. Corleto Vinluan said.The bombings were staged asthe government grapples withthe highest number of coron-avirus infections in SoutheastAsia.

Vinluan said most of thevictims, including children,were killed and wounded in thefirst attack, when a bombattached to a motorcycleexploded near two parked armytrucks in front of a grocery store

and computer shop in Jolo.“It was a vehicle-borne

improvised explosive devicewhich exploded while our sol-diers were on a marketing run,”Vinluan told reporters.

A second blast, apparentlyfrom a female suicide attacker,occurred about an hour laterand killed the bomber, a soldier,a police commando andwounded several others, a mil-itary report said. It said the sus-pected bomber walked out of asnack shop, approached soldierswho were securing a RomanCatholic cathedral and “sud-denly blew herself up.”

Snipers were deployed inthe area to guard against morebombers as the victims werecarried to an ambulance.

A third unexploded bombwas reportedly found in a pub-lic market. Jolo was immediatelyplaced in a security lockdown bytroops and police. AP

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Kenosha: Police in the south-eastern Wisconsin city ofKenosha shot and wounded aBlack man, apparently in theback, after responding to a callabout a domestic dispute, set-ting off a night of protests andunrest in which officers firedtear gas and demonstratorsapparently hurled objects andset fire to parked cars.

The shooting happened ataround 5 pm Sunday and wascaptured on cellphone videothat was posted online.

In that clip, which was

taken from across the street, theBlack man, who was laterreferred to by the governor asJacob Blake, walks from thesidewalk around the front of hisSUV to his driver-side door asofficers follow him with theirguns pointed and shout at him.

As Blake opens the doorand leans into the SUV, an offi-cer grabs his shirt from behindand opens fire while Blake hashis back turned. Seven shotscan be heard, though it isn’tclear how many struck Blake orhow many of the three officers

who were at the scene firedshots.

During the shooting, aBlack woman can be seenscreaming in the street andjumping up and down.

Blake was taken to aMilwaukee hospital and was inserious condition, the policedepartment said in a newsrelease in which it didn’t referto him by name. The three offi-cers were placed on adminis-trative leave, as is standardpractice in any officer-involvedshooting. AP

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#!������ )�/.���� � ���&�&��������������������������� Jerusalem: US Secretary of

State Mike Pompeo said hehoped other Arab countrieswould also establish diplomat-ic relations with Israel as hekicked off a Mideast tour onMonday to press the momen-tum of the Trump administra-tion’s Arab-Israeli peace push.

Pompeo spoke at a jointpress conference with IsraeliPrime Minister BenjaminNetanyahu in Jerusalem, thefirst stop on a multi-countrytour of the region following theAugust 13 announcement ofthe historic agreement betweenIsrael and the United ArabEmirates, brokered by

Washington, to establish diplo-matic ties.

“I am hopeful that we willsee other Arab nations join inthis,” Pompeo said.

“The opportunity for themto work alongside, to recognisethe state of Israel and to workalongside them will not onlyincrease Middle East stability,but it will improve the lives forthe people of their own coun-tries as well.”

The Israel-UAE agreementdelivered a key foreign policyvictory to President DonaldTrump as he seeks reelectionand reflected a changingMiddle East in which shared

concerns about archenemy Iranhave largely overtaken tradi-tional Arab support for thePalestinians.

Earlier this month, the US,Israel and the UAE announcedthe deal to establish full diplo-matic relations, which alsorequires Israel to freeze itsplans to annex parts of theoccupied West Bank sought bythe Palestinians as part of theirfuture state.

Later in the trip, Pompeowas to meet with Netanyahu’spartner in the government andDefense Minister Benny Gantz,as well as Foreign MinisterGabi Ashkenazi. AP

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Tehran: Iran’s constitutionalwatchdog on Monday set June18 as date for the country’s nextpresidential election, a votethat will choose the successorto President Hassan Rouhaniwho has served two four-yearterms in office.

The watchdog, theGuardian Council, approvedthe date, Iranian electionheadquarters chief Jamal Orftold the official IRNA newsagency.

Candidates hoping to runin the balloting are to apply inearly April for approval; thefinal list is to be announced inearly June. AP

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Minsk (Belarus): Belarusianauthorities on Monday detainedthree leading opposition activistswho have helped spearhead awave of protests demanding theresignation of the country’sauthoritarian president of 26years following his reelectionthat opponents say was rigged.

The Coordination Councilestablished by the opposition tonegotiate a transfer of powersaid police detained membersSergei Dylevsky and OlgaKovalkova in Belarus’ capital,Minsk. Later in the day, theopposition also reported thedetention of AlexanderLavrinovich, the leader of strik-ing workers at a major indus-

trial plant. The police actionssignal President AlexanderLukashenko’s determination tostifle massive post-electiondemonstrations that haveentered their third week. The65-year-old Belarusian leadertoted an assault rifle in a showof force as he arrived at his res-idence by helicopter on Sundaywhile protesters rallied nearby.

Last week, Lukashenko’swarned that the oppositioncouncil’s members could facecriminal accusations for creat-ing what he described as a par-allel government. AP

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Bamako: The military juntathat overthrew Mali’s presidentwants to put off new electionsfor three years, an official saidMonday, as the internationalcommunity pressed for animmediate return to civilianrule.

The coup leaders want toprepare a new constitutionbefore holding any vote, said anofficial in the talks who spokeon condition of anonymitybecause they were not autho-rised to talk to journalists.

The junta’s proposal willlikely be rejected by WestAfrican regional mediators andformer colonizer France: It’smore than double the time ittook to hold a vote after a sim-ilar coup in 2012, and wouldallow the soldiers who over-threw a democratically electedpresident to remain in powerfor years. A mediation teamfrom the 15-nation regionalbloc known as ECOWAS hasbeen pressing the junta to handover power to a civilian transi-tional government. Initially,they called for ousted PresidentIbrahim Boubacar Keita to bereinstalled as president, butthat prospect has become

unlikely amid an outpouring ofpublic support in Mali for thecoup d’etat.

The official taking part inthe talks indicated there hadbeen some movement towardreleasing Keita, who has beendetained along with Mali’sprime minister since the coupa week ago. Among the optionsis allowing him to stay at hisresidence in Bamako undersurveillance instead of at themilitary barracks in Kati, hesaid.

African countries and thewider international communi-ty have expressed alarm overthe coup d’etat, which deposedKeita three years before his finalterm was due to end.

Mali has been fightingagainst Islamic extremists withheavy international support formore than seven years, andjihadists have previously usedpower vacuums in the countryto expand their territory.

The high-level regional del-egation, led by Nigeria’s formerpresident, Goodluck Jonathan,held talks with the junta,including Col. Assimi Goita,who has declared himself thegroup’s leader. AP

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The US health watchdog hasgiven emergency authori-

sation for the use of bloodplasma to treat coronaviruspatients in the country, sayingthe benefits of the treatmentoutweighed any potential risks.

The US Food and DrugAdministration (FDA) said onSunday that over 70,000 patientsin the country had been treat-ed with convalescent plasma,which is made using the bloodof people who have recoveredfrom coronavirus infections.

President Donald Trumpwelcomed the move by theFDA on the eve of the four-dayRepublican NationalConvention which will renom-inate him to be the party’s can-didate in the November 3 pres-idential election.

“Today I am pleased tomake a truly historic announce-ment in our battle against theChina virus that will save count-less lives,” Trump said at aWhite House briefing, referringto the coronavirus that causesCovid-19.

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The country’s second largestlender Punjab National

Bank on Monday said it expectsto restructure loans worthabout �40,000 crore as perRBI-approved guidelines,scheduled to be out soon.

The Reserve Bank ofIndia (RBI) had earlier thismonth allowed one-timerestructuring of corporate andpersonal loans to help entitiesamid the Covid-19 crisis.

“Our total loan book is �7.21 lakh crore at June end.MSME (loan book) stands at Rs1.27 lakh crore.

Out of this, 14 per cent isunder NPA.

Now with respect to thebook that we are looking at (forloan restructuring), a roughestimate what we are seeing isthat anything around 5-6 percent of the credit book may beeligible under the restructuringprofile.

“This 5-6 per cent comesto about �40,000 crore.

Major composition of this,of about 50 per cent, would becorporate books,” PNBManaging Director and ChiefExecutive Officer S SMallikarjuna Rao toldreporters at a virtual newsconference. The corporateloans will be restructuredbased on the recommenda-tions of the K V Kamath com-mittee.

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The FMCG sector has wit-nessed the highest discrep-

ancies in information provid-ed by job aspirants duringbackground checks in theApril-June quarter, accordingto a report.

Discrepancies -- the mis-match between informationgiven by a candidate and theactual facts found out by anorganisation through back-ground check -- in the FMCGsector was at 15.3 per cent asagainst the industry average of9.7 per cent, according to thereport ‘Employment ScreeningTrends Report: India’ by com-prehensive background screen-ing solutions provider FirstAdvantage. The report is basedon data available with FirstAdvantage.

The report said that whilemany companies have reducedhiring or implemented a hiringfreeze, there are organisationshiring as usual and in the sec-ond quarter of 2020.

Other industries like

healthcare, banking, BPO, e-commerce and logistics, finan-cial services, manufacturing,pharma and telecom also dis-play discrepancy percentagesway above the industry averageof 9.7 per cent in the secondquarter of 2020, the reportsaid. Almost all the industrieslike consulting, engineeringand infrastructure, financialservices, healthcare, IT, andtelecom increased their per-centages in terms of alternativemode of verification in theemployment component dur-ing April-June, it added.

Causes of discrepanciescan barely be controlled, how-ever, discrepancy cases cansurely be curbed with smarterrecruitment systems, plannedprocesses and an unbiasedautonomous backgroundscreening provider, the reportobserved.

“In the wake of COVID-19 outbreak, serious implica-tions are not just towards peo-ple’s health and healthcare ser-vices but there is a growingimpact on employment and

hiring across industries.Recruitment is taking place inmost of the industries that aredigitizing and automating theirwork processes.

“Few industries that areactively hiring during this timeare industries working direct-ly with the vulnerable catego-ry of people—health care,transportation, and food orgrocery delivery—where back-ground check is a critical safe-ty step in the hiring process,”First Advantage India Head -Commercial, Amit Singh said.

He said although back-ground screening in India isnot a mandate like in the USand other developed coun-tries, the awareness and impor-tance of screening backgroundsis vastly growing in the coun-try. “The 2020 backgroundscreening data from acrossindustries has clearly shownthat desperate times need des-perate measures which need tobe sustainable, auditable andethical and will further becomethe foundation of 2021,” heopined.

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Equity benchmarks Sensexand Nifty closed near six-

month highs on Monday asinvestors scooped up bankingand financial stocks amid sup-portive global cues.

A sharp rebound in therupee - which soared 52 paiseagainst the US dollar - alsobuoyed market sentiment,traders said. The BSE Sensexopened in the green and gainedfurther momentum as the ses-sion progressed. It finallyclosed at 38,799.08, up 364.36points or 0.95 per cent.

Similarly, the NSE Niftyjumped 94.85 points or 0.83 percent to finish at 11,466.45.

This is the highest closingfor both the benchmarks sincelate-February this year.

Kotak Bank was the topgainer in the Sensex pack,spurting 3.53 per cent, fol-

lowed by IndusInd Bank, BajajFinance, HDFC Bank, ICICIBank, Bajaj Finserv, SBI, Marutiand HDFC. On the otherhand, PowerGrid, M&M, TechMahindra, Titan, NTPC, BajajAuto, HUL and UltraTechCement were among the lag-gards, dropping up to 2.06 percent.

Global equities advancedon hopes for a coronavirustreatment after the USFDAallowed use of blood plasmafrom recovered patients fortreating COVID-19 cases.Reports also said the Trumpadministration is mulling relax-ation of certain norms to allowan experimental COVID-19vaccine from the UK to be usedin the US ahead of the presi-dential elections in November.

“Key indices rallied asfinancials led the charge, ablysupported by select pivotalsacross the BFSI space. Thebroader market too depictedstrength as smart investorswere seen buying select smalland midcap stocks across sec-tors which lent considerablesteam to the rally today,” saidS Ranganathan, Head of

Research at LKP Securities.BSE bankex, finance, tele-

com, basic materials, energyand industrials indices surgedas much as 2.45 per cent, whilerealty, utilities,

metal and IT closed withlosses. Broader BSE mid-capand small-cap indices rallied upto 1.57 per cent. In rest of Asia,bourses in Shanghai, HongKong, Tokyo and Seoul endedwith significant gains.

Stock exchanges in Europetoo opened on a strong note. Inthe forex market, the rupeesoared 52 paise to settle at 74.32against the US dollar.

Meanwhile, global oilbenchmark Brent crude wastrading 0.71 per cent higher atUSD 45.25 per barrel.

A single-day spike of61,408 COVID-19 cases tookIndia’s virus caseload past the31-lakh mark on Monday, a dayafter it crossed 30 lakh, whilerecoveries surged to 23,38,035,according to the Union HealthMinistry data.

India’s COVID-19 case-load mounted to 31,06,348,while the death toll climbed to57,542, the data showed.

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Toll collections on highwaysare on the road to recovery,

reaching 85 per cent of the pre-Covid-19 levels in July and ifthe trend continues the reduc-tion in collections could bebelow 10 per cent in 2020-21,rating agency ICRA said onMonday.

It said there were encour-aging trends in traffic in Julyand about 85 per cent of ICRArated toll road projects havedebt service reserve greaterthan or equal to one quarter ofdebt obligation and are resilientenough to absorb the Covid-19induced revenue shock.

“Overall, the traffic in 4MFY2021 has rebounded quitewell, which is encouraging.This is also corroborated by thee-way bills generated. Thispace of recovery, if sustained,the overall reduction in toll col-lections for national highwayprojects could be less than10% in FY2021,” ICRA said ina statement. Post the resump-tion of tolling on nationalhighways from April 20, themovement of commercial vehi-cles picked up at significantpace over the last three monthsand reached near 90 per cent ofthe pre-COVID-19 levels.

However, the movement inpassenger vehicles is yet torecover fully, it said. The

unabated rise in coronavirusinfections in the unlock phase,localised reimposition of lock-downs in several states, andheavy monsoons in many partsof the country had interruptedthis recovery in the first fort-night of July, the rating agencysaid adding that nevertheless,toll collections reached 87% ofthe pre-Covid-19 levels in thesecond fortnight of the month.

“Majority of the nationalhighway stretches being arter-ial routes have 70-75 per centof toll collections from com-mercial vehicles; passengervehicles account for less than aquarter of toll collections.While 90 per cent of commer-cial vehicles are back on roads,the passenger vehicle move-ment is less than 60 per cent ofpre-COVID-19 levels,”Rajeshwar Burla, VicePresident, Corporate Ratings,ICRA said.The rating agencysaid the sample considered forthe analysis is spread across 11states with Tamil Nadu,Rajasthan, Maharashtra andTelangana accounting for 63per cent of the total sample.

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The Covid-19 disruptionshave changed the structure

of the country’s oil and gas sec-tor with the share of OPECcrude in Indian oil importsfalling to a decade-low level inJuly.

As per data with industrysources, the oil cartel’s share inIndia’s oil imports fell to about67 per cent in July as againsthighs of 75-80 per cent main-tained earlier. While the shareof OPEC crude has been reduc-ing for some time in wake ofIndia expanding its oil importbasket to include newer terri-tories in Africa, South andNorth America, the fall in Julyhas come in wake of Covid-19which has squeezed demand inthe domestic market.

In July, India’s oil importshad also fallen by 36.6 per cent(YoY) to 12.3 million tonnes,the lowest in a decade. Thedemand is also low on accountof restricted movement of vehi-cles that is the case during themonsoon months.

The lower domesticdemand has also pushed Indianrefiners to operate their refiner-ies at 70-80 per cent capacity.This means they are using lesscrude to produce products.This has also impacted importsof crude. Iraq and Saudi Arabiaare the two of country’s largestoil sourcing markets. Iraq cur-rently enjoys the top positionamong markets that supplycrude to India.

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The Finance Ministry onMonday said the GST

regime has reduced the rate atwhich people have to pay tax,helped increase complianceand doubled the taxpayer baseto 1.24 crore.

In a series of tweets onMonday, also the first deathanniversary of former FinanceMinister Arun Jaitley, the min-istry said before goods and ser-vices tax (GST) was intro-duced, the combination ofvalue-added tax (VAT), excise,sales tax and their cascadingeffect resulted in high standardtax rate of up to 31 per cent.

“It is now widely acknowl-edged that GST is both con-sumer and taxpayer-friendly.While the high tax rates of thepre-GST era acted as a disin-centive to paying tax, the lowerrates under GST helped toincrease tax compliance,” theMinistry said. The number ofassessees covered by the GST atthe time of its inception wasabout 65 lakh. Now the assesseebase exceeds 1.24 crore.

GST, which sub-

sumed 17 local levies and 13cesses, was rolled out on July 1,2017. Jaitley held the financeportfolio in the first term of theModi government since 2014and was the finance ministerwhen the GST regime cameinto force. “As we rememberArun Jaitley today, let usacknowledge the key role heplayed in the implementationof GST, which will go down inhistory as one of the most fun-damental landmark reformsin Indian taxation,” theMinistry tweeted.

The multiple marketsacross India, with each statecharging a different rate oftax, led to huge inefficienciesand costs of compliance.

“GST has reduced the rateat which people have to pay tax.The revenue neutral rate as perthe RNR (Revenue NeutralRate) Committee was 15.3 percent. Compared to this, theweighted GST rate at present,according to the RBI, is only11.6 per cent,” the ministrysaid.

Businesses with an annualturnover of up to Rs 40 lakh areGST exempt. Initially, this limit

was �20 lakh. Additionally,those with a turnover of up to�1.5 crore can opt for theComposition Scheme and payonly 1 per cent tax. For ser-vices, businesses with turnoverof up to �20 lakh in a year areGST exempt. A serviceprovider having turnover of upto �50 lakh in a year can opt forcomposition scheme for ser-vices and pay only 6 per centtax.

“Once GST was imple-mented, the tax rate on a largenumber of items was broughtdown. As of now, the 28 percent rate is almost solelyrestricted to sin and luxuryitems. Out of a total of about230 items in the 28 per centslab, about 200 items havebeen shifted to lower slabs,” theministry said.

In an article on the firstdeath anniversary of Jaitley,Finance Minister NirmalaSitharaman said, “From mid-night, July 1, 2017, the unimag-inable happened — all of Indiabecame one market, interstatebarriers disappeared, multipletaxes were subsumed tobecome one,

Kolkata:The fire fightingarrangements of Metro Railwayare being constantly upgraded.Metro authorities have pro-cured 500 additional fire extin-guishers for emergency use atstations, inside rakes and alsoat other vital installations.

During the lockdown, 100full face masks and 100 helmetsfitted with lights have also

been procured and provided todifferent stations. All stationstaff have also been impartedtraining on how to use the firefighting equipment.

Already a total of 207Metro staff have been trainedat Fire Institute of West Bengal.This will strengthen the firefighting arrangements of MetroRailway.

New Delhi: A promotion-cum-pipping ceremony of CISF wasorganised at CISF HQrs, NewDelhi and simultaneously at allthe Sectors/ZonalHeadquarters across the India.Total 2862 non-gazetted per-sonnel have been promoted.Shri Rajesh Ranjan, DirectorGeneral, CISF, Shri M AGanapathy, SDG (APS), ShriSudhir Kumar Saxena, ADG(HQrs), Shri Arvind Deep,ADG, Shri Prateek Mohanty,IG (Pers) and other SeniorOfficers of CISF were presentduring the ceremony at CISF

Headquarters. The ceremonywitnessed immense pride &enthusiasm amongst the pro-moted personnel

During this COVID pan-demic phase, Shri RajeshRanjan, DG, CISF took welfareinitiatives for the force per-sonnel and gave directions topromote the force personnel(NGOs) to their next rank. Toexecute this motivational step,the officers and staff of CISFHQrs put their best effortsand maintained liaison & coor-dination with MHA, for pro-moting the force personnel.

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The rupee soared by 52paise to close at a more

than five-month high of 74.32against the US dollar onMonday in line with upbeatdomestic equities and sus-tained foreign fund inflows.Besides, a weaker Americancurrency against global peersalso supported the Indianunit to log its best single-daygain in one-and-a-halfmonths.

At the interbank forexmarket, the rupee openedlower at 74.91 against the USdollar but regained strengthas the session progressed. Itoscillated between a high of74.31 and low of 74.91 duringthe day.

It finally closed at 74.32,

gaining 52 paise over its pre-vious close. This is the high-est closing level since March18 when the unit had settledat 74.26. Jateen Trivedi,Senior Research Analyst(Commodity & Currency) atLKP Securities said, “Rupeeended higher on Monday onlikely overseas inflows intolocal stocks amid a weakgreenback after the US drugregulator authorised the useof blood plasma from recov-ered patients as a treatmentoption for COVID-19.

“Foreign banks wereall on sell side. FII inflowslined up into domestic stockswhich supported rupeedemand. The broad trendremains weak with resistanceat 74.65 and support at 73.70-73.95”.

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The Centre on Monday saidthat public transport may

be modernised which is basedon biofuels, CNG and electric-ity as fuel. Union RoadTransport Minister NitinGadkari said most of the StateRoad Transport Undertakings(SRTUs) are incurring hugeexpenditure on conventionalfuels which are expensive. TheMinister called for moving onto biofuels, Gadkari said alsourged the bus operators toconsider providing better ser-vices like good attendants, pro-vision for entertainment toolslike audio music, video films,etc which can fetch betterreturns. “CNG and Electricityas transportation fuel. It willnot only save on fuel bill butalso contribute to economyand pollution reduction. Atpresent country is spendinghuge amounts on import ofcrude oil/hydrocarbons, whichneed to be reduced,” Gadkarisaid addressing a Webinar - 4thUITP India Bus Seminar.

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Working out is a solution tomany problems, howeverwalking an extra mile to

bring out the best in your body cando more harm than good. A case inpoint is 18-year-old Lakshay Bindra,an avid gymming enthusiast, whohankered for working out during thelockdown, and as soon as it was lift-ed he rushed to the nearest gym tomake up for all the lost time.However, it didn’t go as planned forBindra who came home with severemuscle ache.

“He came home and complainedof having stiff muscles and pain. Wethought it was because of hitting thegym after a long hault. By theevening, his pain got worse and hehad problem in even lifting his arms.To add to our worries, his urineturned brown. That’s when we rushedhim to the nearby hospital who afterconducting certain tests asked us totake him to a big hospital. To hear thatwas disheartening. It was like theworld starting falling apart for us.That is when we took our son to MaxSuper Speciality Hospital, Patparganj,”Lakshay’s mother, Pooja Bindra, tellsyou.

Heavy workout without warm-uplead to loss of kidney function inBindra and that resulted in yellowurine.

“Because of the aggressive work-

out, his muscles couldn’t take the loadand hence the breakdown happened.The condition is called rhabdomyol-ysis. As soon as I got to know aboutthe dark coloured urine, derangedkidney and liver function, I knewwhat was the problem. Our teamimmediately admitted him and westarted the treatment,” Dr Abbas AliKhatai, Attending Consultant,Emergency Medicine, Max SuperSpeciality Hospital, Patparganj, NewDelhi, says.

Dr Dilip Bhalla, SeniorConsultant, Dept. of Renal & KidneyTransplant, Max Super SpecialityHospital, Patparganj, New Delhi,tells you that the patient was imme-diately started on IV fluids and he hadto undergo two sessions of dialysis.“We immediately shifted the patientto the ICU and gave him kidney safemedicine, lots of fluids and kidneysupport. He underwent dialysis andhis urinary function improved. Wethen gave him muscle tonic to reducethe stiffness and he started to recov-er. Another session of dialysis wasrequired to further improve the urinefunction. After three-four days he wasperfectly fine was sent back home,”Bhalla explains.

It is important for people tounderstand that there are no short-cuts in life and hence doubling theworkout to achieve that perfect body

is a big no-no. “There are absolutelyno shortcuts. One has to go slowlyand steadily. The same applies forexercising. Sudden and aggressiveworkout puts extra pressrure on themuscles. Also everyone should exer-cise according to their limits. Whenwe push our body, the problems arise.Always hire a good personal trainerwho understands your body type andlimit. Go slowly and consistently andthen build your muscle capacity.And staying hydrated at all times isthe key,” Bhalla explains.

He adds that taking pain killersin such cases could be harmful.“People usually take to painkillerswhen it comes to muscle pain, how-ever it is not a good idea. In case ofneed, always take kidney-safepainkillers that are easily available inthe market. Don’t go for brufen at allbecause in case of any kidney prob-lem, it can further elevate the issue,”Bhalla tells you.

The symptoms that one shouldlook out for in case of exercise gonewrong events are extreme musclestiffness and pain. “Muscle pain andstiffness is a part and parcel of work-ing out, however if the pain gets worseit is good to consult a doctor. In caseof severe abdomen pain, dark or cocacola-coloured urine and kidney dis-function one should immediatelyvisit a doctor,” Bhalla says.

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Monsoon is the worst season of the year in terms of healththough the rains bring in so much happiness to everyone,

everything around looks so beautiful and lush green but rainsalways get diseases along. Cold, cough, flu, viral, dengue, malar-ia all are on a rise, so it’s very important to take care of yourself.‘Precaution is better than cure’ is a known fact but how manyof us practice this? In today’s time when we are already fightinga pandemic, we are not ready for any other problem. This canbe as small as the flu or a dental cavity

Coming to the dental cavity and another dental issue whichhas never been a priority suddenly have become a concern asvisiting a dentist is now a challenge. Dental health is now draw-ing attention and we don’t want that after the recovery from fluyou end up in a dental office due to mere negligence during theflu.

So let’s start with taking very good care of your oral cavityfollowing five small steps when sick.

Drinking water: Keep your self hydrated as much with goodfluids and water always tops the chart. It is the first choice to keepyour self hydrated and wash away extra particles from the teeth,it improves the quality of the saliva, avoids dryness of the mouth

in turns fights bad breath andcavities so one solution to alloral health problems. One canalso drink fresh sugar-free fruitand vegetable juices, lemonwater, ice tea preferably mint,etc but avoid high sugar andaerated drinks.

Maintain a proper oralhealth regime: You might beunwell, under the effect of theflu, exhausted, tired nauseaand acidity due to medicationmust be bothering you butyou don't have a choice.Brushing twice a day is a must.

You have to keep yourteeth clean at all time andespecially your tongue. There isa bacterial coating on yourtongue during any flu it has tobe cleaned daily with glycerineand cotton swab. You will def-initely feel fresh and your oralcavity will be bacteria-free.

Oral rinsing: Make a goodmouth wash at home. Boil ginger turmeric and basil in waterfor a while and store it in a bottle for a day. This will give an extrashort of Vitamin C to boost your immunity and keep your oralcavity clean. Rinse three-four times a day and swirl for at least30 secs for maximum effect.

You can warm and use for gargles too in order to give a sooth-ing effect to your throat, can also add aloe Vera for extra bene-fits.

Avoid sugar-loaded cough and cold syrups: Always flu isassociated with cold and cough. Believe me, every time you areprescribed sugary loaded cough syrups. These can cause cavi-ties and further damage to the oral cavity as they will stick all-around your mouth and cause an influx of bacteria. Please avoid,ask for sugar-free ones.

Diet: Vitamins and minerals both in the form of diet andsupplements. Any problem can be sorted or worsened with diet.Above all, it is very important to take care of your diet whichshould be rich in calcium, minerals, and Vitamin C. At the sametime, it should be non-sticky and non-starchy. Actually munch-ing crispy fruits and vegetables like apple which is also callednatural toothbrush can keep teeth clean and help remove the extralayer of plaque around teeth keeping them healthy.

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���� � Tomatoes containlycopene, which is also usedfor facial cleansers. Apart fromeating them as salad, one canalso peel the tomatoes, and usethe skin as a mask on your face.It cleanses and refreshes theskin. The lycopene in tomatoesis also reported to control thegrowth of cancer cells,especially prostate, stomach,and colorectal cancer.

Tomatoes are loadedwith Vitamin A, Vitamin Band potassium in whichhelp to decrease the cho-lesterol levels. In the longrun, it can prevent heartrelated diseases.

They also help toimprove the digestive system,and the liver. They are loadedwith fibre which helps preventsconstipation too.

Loaded with Vitamin C,fresh tomato juice is brilliantwhen it comes to boosting theimmunity levels. The Vitamin Cin it also controls the increase ofstress hormones, and helps yourbody to remain energised in thescorching summer, and keepsyou healthy.

Oily and shiny facedoesn’t just lead toacne, it also gives

the skin a dull, grey andtired look. While some peo-ple are blessed withgood skin genes,others need tofollow a regi-men toachieve thesame. Hereare a fewi n g r e d i -ents that

can help.O n e

of the bestremedies foropen pores is icecubes. Take an icecube, wrap it in a handker-chief and rub all over theface gently. Do this twice aday.

Aloe vera is yet anoth-er ingredient that works

wonders. Take aloe vera gel— you can use a fresh oneif you have the plant athome, otherwise pure gelwill work too. Apply gel on

the face and leave itovernight. Wash in

the morning.Aloe vera

is also goodfor oilyskin. Applyit on theface. Notonly will ittake care of

the oil but itwill make

your facebright.Make a paste

using fresh tomato pureemixed with a teaspoon ofbesan. Apply the same onthe face. Leave it on for 15-20 minutes. Then wash off.Use this mask daily.

Monsoon sure wreaks havocwith the skin, be it open pores

or oily T-zone. However,there are home ingredientsthat can take care of both.

ROSHANI DEVI shares tipsthat can help

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The COVID-19 pandemic has made theworld far more uncertain. It has impact-

ed our work and finances, our relationships,and of course, our physical and mentalhealth. Finding the sense of surety we allcrave is almost impossible, which leads tostress, anxiety and powerlessness that drainsus emotionally. These feelings of helplessnesscan be traumatic, putting our body and mindin a constant “flight or fight” state. Stayingin this tense state for too long not only hurtsour quality of life but makes our immune sys-tems more vulnerable.

It is important to recognise that stress isa natural response to what’s happening in theworld. After being gentle with ourselves, wealso need to find a self-care routine that treatsboth the body and the mind, helping us breakthe cycle of endless “What-ifs” about tomor-row’s challenges.

Kundalini yoga is an ancient practice thatincorporates movement, dynamic breathingtechniques, meditation and mantras tochannel our body’s energy. While most formsof exercise produce endorphins that makeus feel better, kundalini yoga releases tensionand anxiety that builds up over time in yourglands and nerves.

This is supported by a growing body ofevidence indicating that contemplative prac-tices such as yoga and meditation are effec-tive at treating anxiety.

One of the many beautiful aspects ofyoga is that it requires no special equipment,though a yoga mat is helpful. One can sit inand easy pose, on the floor. A pillow or cush-ion can be used for comfort. One shouldcross legs in a comfortable and relaxed wayand place hands on knees, with palms down,closed eyes and observe the sensations of thebody and mind. One should place hands onthe centre of chest at heart level. Begin byresting the back of the left hand in the palmof the right hand. Gently grab left hand withright, so that the right thumb is nestled inleft palm. Cross left thumb over the right.Curve the fingers of right hand around theoutside of left hand and hold it gently withthe four fingers of the left hand remainingstraight. Bring the hands to the heart cen-ter, resting them against the chest.

With closed eyes, one should inhaledeeply and relax. Breathe slowly for 10-30minutes. In daily life we typically breathe 15times a minute. Try slowing down to fourbreaths per minute by inhaling to thecount of 10 and exhaling to the count of 10.A slow breath will slow heartbeat, reducestress response, and give one a peaceful,secure feeling. The mind will begin with alot of chatter and anxiety. That is normal!One should not try to suppress the thoughts,let them come and go until the mind ispeaceful. If one has a particularly persistentthought, try naming it. It is difficult at first,but if one does this breathing technique reg-ularly, one will find that the mind will wel-come the silence and start to relax. Soon, heor she will build the habit and capacity tokeep mind calm in challenging environ-ments.

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In the prevailing situation of COVID-19 pan-demic, face masks have become a pivotal partof our lives. With human activities coming

back to the track, the role of a mask is not justrestricted as a safety gear anymore but a must-have accessory to ensure protection and well-being. Analysing the whole scenario, UniMaskhas introduced a revolutionary mask whichcomes with antiviral treatment in the market.Made using 100 per cent cotton fabric, thesemasks are not only skin-friendly, but also sus-tainable and environment friendly.

These newly launched masks are madeusing 100 per cent breathable cotton fabric withanti-viral treatment on fabric. The mask isprocessed using the healthguard technologyfrom Australia which is well known for destroy-ing SARS-CoV-2, H1N1, bacteria and otherharmful viruses within minutes of coming incontact with the fabric. This technology is effec-tive in destroying 99.94 per cent of the virus thatcomes in contact with the fabric.

Kapil Bhatia, CEO, UniMask speaking onthe launch of the new line-up said: “We are veryhappy to contribute to the health and wellnessof our customers with our new range of maskswhich are superiorly designed keeping the envi-ronmental conditions in mind. These newlylaunched masks are made of rich cotton fabricand don’t leach any harmful components likeother similar category masks. Powered by rev-olutionary healthguard technology fromAustralia and these masks ensure the utmostprotection against the SARS-CoV-2 virus.”

Crafted and designed with comfortable earloop fasteners, adjustable nose bridge, and com-fortable chin elastic making the mask perfectfor every face type and size.

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operated a 52-year-old lady for what isknown to be the largest ovarian tumour everto be operated in the world. A resident ofNew Delhi, Mrs Lakshmi (name changed),had been gaining weight for the last fewmonths and weighed a total of 106 kgs. Shehad recently started experiencing difficul-ty in breathing, acute pain in her lowerabdomen and consequently difficulty inwalking and sleeping.

With rapid weight gain and increasingcomplications, the family consulted a localsurgeon, who then referred the patient toIndraprastha Apollo Hospitals. Upon inves-tigation, it was revealed that the lady had agiant, progressively expanding tumour inher ovary and this was putting pressure onher intestine causing acute stomachache andinability to digest food. Additionally, thehemoglobin of the patient had dropped tosix that causing severe anemia.

A team of surgeons led by Dr ArunPrasad, Senior Consultant, SurgicalGastroenterology & Bariatric Surgery con-ducted a three-and-a-half-hour successfulsurgery for extraction of this 50 kg tumour.

Elaborating on the case, Prasad, said:“Extraction of a 50 kg tumour was a chal-lenge for the team. More so because thepatient had exceptionally low hemoglobinand had to undergo six units of blood trans-fusion (in total) before, during and after theprocedure. This procedure was a perfectexample of how important it is to under-stand the traditional methods of surgerywhile evolving with new minimal accessprocedures. Here, there was no space in theabdomen for insertion of equipment vialaparoscopy or robot assisted methods,hence we had to resort to traditional meth-ods of surgery. With the combined effort ofexperts several teams, the extraction wasdone successfully.”

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In the throes of the century’sworst-ever pandemic that

has left a deep scar on human-ity, India’s intellectual eliteurged a new direction for theworld at a symposium onBuddhist philosopher andpeace activist, Daisaku Ikeda’sannual peace proposal to theUnited Nations.

Drawing from a reposito-ry of ancient wisdom and com-passion that originated in India,Ikeda’s latest peace proposal —Towards Our Shared Future:Constructing an Era of HumanSolidarity — urges nations toconfront issues like naturaldisasters and climate change.

Ikeda, President of SokaGakkai International (SGI),submits a peace proposal to theUN every year, outlining prag-matic solutions to vexing glob-al issues such as the impact ofglobal warming and trade fric-tions. Bharat Soka Gakkai(BSG), the Indian arm of SGI,conducted the peace sympo-sium through a first-ever webi-nar.

“The basis for the con-scious pursuit of shared livingis found in an appreciation thatpeople who live under theshadow of severe threats areessentially no different fromourselves,” said Ikeda.

Speakers at the sympo-sium said such global solidar-ity must begin with rekindlingcore human values. “The worldtoday needs youth imbibing theuniversal human values oftruth, love and compassion,holding the spirit of inclusion,embracing the ones who havefallen down, being sensitive tothe environment around, youthwho promote harmony andworld peace, youth who are

good human beings,” said pro-fessor Aditya Shastri, vice-chancellor, BanasthaliVidyapith. He emphasisedupon the need for universaleducation to help bridge anygaps in society.

Keynote speaker PadmaVibhushan Dr RaghunathMashelkar said, “Disruptiveinclusive innovation, whichcan create the magic of accessequality despite incomeinequality, will be the way tobuild our peaceful future.”

In his peace proposal,

Ikeda said that the world needsto take a holistic approach toissues such as natural disastersand climate change which forcepeople to abandon their long-accustomed homes.

“Loss of connection to theland and the associated feelingsof grief have been aninescapable aspect of majordisasters such as earthquakesand tsunami. The pain, com-pounded by the sudden loss offriends and family, can be trulyunbearable and responding tothis depth of anguish is an

imperative for society as awhole,” he said.

Echoing these thoughts,Rajendra Abhyankar, formerambassador and professor,Indiana University,Bloomington said, “Only ashared sense of crisis will cre-ate conditions for nations andpeople to work together.”

Reflecting on Ikeda’s con-cern for affected people, ShlokaNath, executive director ofIndian Climate Collaborativeand Head of Sustainability, said,purposeful change requires ashared vision and goal.

“You have to ensure every-one you bring on board is gaz-ing outward, in the same direc-tion. That is the task before usin combating climate change. Itexemplifies what we know —no one is protected and every-one has a responsibility. Thetime is now and we have tocome together,” she said.

Vishesh Gupta,Chairperson, BSG highlightedthe importance of sensitisingyouth as an imperative to bringabout a change. “Young peopleare the game changers and nat-ural peacemakers. Their powerand passion can ignite the pathto limitless growth and devel-opment for entire humanitytowards the endless future,” hesaid.

The wait for the much-awaitedsecond season of Mirzapur is

finally over as Amazon Prime Videoannounced its release date.

The OTT platform posted,“Matter internal hai, ajao. Link in bio#Mirzapur2” and shared the linkwith the audience.

Set in Mirzapur, the hinterlandof North India, season 1 of the crimedrama had taken the audience intoa dark, complex world of guns,drugs and lawlessness. It’s relentlesspace, well etched-out characters andnuanced narrative had left the fanswanting more. With Season 2, thecanvas of the series gets bigger butthe rules remain the same.

With a stellar cast featuringPankaj Tripathi, Ali Fazal,Divyenndu, Shweta Tripathi Sharma,Rasika Dugal, Harshita ShekharGaur, Amit Sial, Anjum Sharma,Sheeba Chaddha, Manu RishiChadha and Rajesh Tailang return-ing to the action-packed series, getready for a journey into the stylishyet rustic world, where crime, drugsand violence rule and one needs tofight to survive. The sequel of theshow will also feature Vijay Varma,

Priyanshu Painyuli and Isha Talwar. It is created and produced by

Excel Media and Entertainment.Speaking on this announcement,Aparna Purohit, Head of IndiaOriginals, Amazon Prime Video,commented, “Mirzapur has trulybeen a game-changer title for us. Theshow heralded a new idiom of sto-rytelling for Indian audience — itscharacters have become a part of thepopular culture. We are certain thatthe riveting narrative of season 2 willleave our audience mesmerised.”

Ritesh Sidhwani, Producer, ExcelEntertainment said, “It was not justabout breaking boundaries for theaudience but also for ourselves ascontent creators. Bringing thrillingand untold stories from India’s hin-terland without losing authenticityhas been our biggest win.”

“The love and appreciation thatthe show has garnered since itslaunch has been simply overwhelm-ing. Taking it a notch higher, we’recertain that the audience are in fora visual treat in the sequel,” said cre-ator Puneet Krishna.

(The series releases on AmazonPrime Video on October 23.)

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Stupas are among the earli-est Indian monuments tosurvive — both of the

Buddhist and Jaina traditions.Recent excavations nearNalanda have also unearthed alarge stupa made between the8th and the 10th centuriesBCE.

In Indic thought, the finaltruth which is sought is form-less, arupa or nirguna. The con-cept of the stupa (of Buddhist,Jaina and Ajivika worship) isexplained in the Chitrasutra, theoldest-known treatise on imagemaking.

It is mentioned in this trea-

tise that the best way in whichthe eternal is to be imagined iswithout form. Stupas can bemeditated upon, withoutreminding the devotee of anyforms of the illusory world. Thefollowers of Gautama Buddhaenshrined his mortal remainsin a number of stupas. Thus,

began a tradition which spreadto many countries and contin-ues even today. Stupas alsohoused mantras, the remains ofother revered teachers andtheir personal belongings. Itbecame the symbol of liberationfrom the attachments of thematerial world.

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Senior India off-spinnerRavichandran Ashwin on

Monday suggested the intro-duction of a “free ball” forbowlers if non-strikers back uptoo far, sticking to his stand thatthere was nothing wrong withrunning such batsmen out.

Ashwin ran out Jos Buttlerduring an IPL match betweenKings XI Punjab and RajasthanRoyals in 2019 when theEnglishman left the non-strik-er’s end much before the deliv-ery was bowled, triggering an

age old ‘spirit of the game’debate.

While what Ashwin didwas well within the rules of thegame, his new IPL team coachRicky Ponting of the DelhiCapitals doesn’t agree with thisparticular mode of dismissal.

“Make it a free ball for thebowler. If the batsmen gets outof that ball, the batting teamwill be docked 5 runs. Free hitadds to the drama for a batter,let’s give a chance to thebowlers too,” Ashwin tweetedin response to Dinesh Karthik’sassertion that it was unfair to

link the dismissal to spirit of thegame or call it ‘Mankading’ asit is permitted by laws of thegame.

“As of now everyonewatches the game hoping that‘the bowlers will get smacked

today’,” the off-spinner said.His suggestion is similar to

the concept of free hit, whichallows the batsmen to score themaximum without the fear ofbeing dismissed if the bowlerdelivers a front-foot no ball.

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Top-seeded Karolina Pliskova and No 2Sofia Kenin crashed out of the Western

& Southern Open on Sunday, falling in theiropening matches at the National TennisCenter in New York.

Veronika Kudermetova, ranked 41st inthe world, toppled world No 3 Pliskova 7-5, 6-4 in their second-round clash.

Kudermetova, who labored to a three-set first-round victory over Ajla Tomljanovicon Saturday, rallied from a 1-4 deficit in the

first set, and reeled off the last three gamesof the match to score the upset.

Alize Cornet also notched her first winover a top-five player in two years when sheshocked Australian Open champion Kenin6-1, 7-6 (9/7) to reach the round of 16.

Cornet next faces either two-timeAustralian Open champion VictoriaAzarenka or Caroline Garcia, who defeat-ed 2017 US Open champion SloaneStephens 6-3, 7-6 (7/4) in a first-round clash.

Men’s fourth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas leadthe way into the round of 16 with a 6-1, 6-3 victory over two-time Grand Slam final-ist Kevin Anderson. He was the first of thetop eight men’s seeds to see action as allenjoyed first-round byes.

World number one and top seed Novak

Djokovic was scheduled to open his cam-paign on Monday against qualifier RicardasBerankis. US star Serena Williams, seededthird, is also set to open her campaign onMonday with a second-round clash withArantxa Rus — a 6-2, 6-3 winner over AlisonVan Uytvanck.

Tsitsipas, seeking his sixth ATP title, nextfaces either 16th seeded American JohnIsner or Australian John Millman, both first-round winners on Sunday.

Isner beat his doubles partner HubertHurkacz of Poland 7-5, 6-4. Millman ralliedto beat France’s Adrian Mannarino 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (7/2).

In other first-round action, Argentina’sDiego Schwartzman defeated Casper Ruud7-6 (7/2), 6-3 to advance.

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England pace-man Jimmy

Anderson wasstranded on 599wickets as Pakistan took a giant steptoward securing a draw in the thirdand final test with a disciplined battingdisplay either side of a long rain breakon Monday.

Anderson started Day 4 need-ing two wickets to become the firstfast bowler to reach 600, and man-aged to take one - that of AbidAli (42) - during a lengthythird session at the RoseBowl.

However, fading lightsoon forced England toonly deploy spin andeventually stopped playaltogether, with Pakistanon 100-2 at stumps.

The tourists, whowere asked to follow onafter scoring 273 intheir first innings inreply to England'smammoth 583-8declared, trailed by210 runs with oneday remaining.

England appears destined to winthe series, leading 1-0 after its three-wicket victory in the first test beforethe second match was drawn. It

would clinch a first series win overPakistan in 10 years, and a secondseries this summer after beating

the West Indies 2-1 in July.Knowing a draw is the best they

can hope for, Pakistan's batsmen dugin and have gone along at just 1.78 runsper over. Azhar Ali, a century-makerin the first innings, was unbeaten on29 and Babar Abam was on 4.

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Bayern Munich becamekings of Europe for thesixth time on Sunday as

Kingsley Coman’s goal gavethem a 1-0 victory over ParisSaint-Germain in theChampions League final inLisbon, completing a fantasticseason for the German giantsand leaving their opponentsstill searching for the trophythey covet more than anything.

It was often a cagey final,with a bit of needle, but chancestoo, especially before formerPSG player Coman appeared atthe back post to head in JoshuaKimmich’s inviting 59th-minutecross and wrap up a treble fora team who had already won theBundesliga and German Cup.

PSG will regret not takingany of the chances that wereoffered up to them on a surre-al occasion at an empty Estadioda Luz, but it is an extraordi-

nary success for Hansi Flick,who was only appointed lastNovember to replace thesacked Niko Kovac.

“I am proud of the team.When I started in November,all the headlines were about ‘nomore respect for Bayern’, butthe way the team has developedhas been sensational,” he toldSky Germany.

“PSG have really goodforwards, but we deserved towin the final.”

However, the outcomemight have been different hadKylian Mbappe done betterthan shoot straight at ManuelNeuer just before half-time.

The World Cup-winningforward had spoken of hisdetermination to go down inhis country’s history by helpingPSG become just the secondFrench winners of Europeanfootball’s greatest prize. Butthey will have to wait for thechance to match Marseille,

winners in 1993.“We gave all our heart on

the field. You can expect thatfrom your team, but you can’tcontrol the result,” PSG coachThomas Tuchel told Frenchbroadcaster RMC.

ONE THAT GOT AWAYPSG’s Qatari owners spent

a combined 402 million euros($474m) on Neymar andMbappe in 2017 to win thiscompetition. Yet in the end itwas one who got away fromParis who denied them.

Coman was born in Parisand started his career at ParisSaint-Germain, but left aged18 in 2014 for Juventus, sens-ing he wouldn’t get regularfootball if he stayed put.

“It is an extraordinary feel-ing. I’m so happy but I’m also abit sad for Paris,” Coman said.

The winger had been on thebench in the semi-final againstLyon but was promoted to the

starting line-up for the final.Now he may not be wel-

come back in his home cityagain.

Bayern were last Europeanchampions in 2013. Their tallyof six victories puts them backlevel with Liverpool, winnerslast year. Only Real Madrid andAC Milan have won more.

NOT NEYMAR’S NIGHTFlick’s team ended the sea-

son with 21 straight wins andare unbeaten in 30 matches.

They deserved to be crowned ina full stadium.

However, only a few hun-dred invitees were insideBenfica’s ground to seethe denouement of the‘Final Eight’, at the end ofa competition so longdelayed by the coron-avirus pandemic.

The strangest offinals pitted together two clubswho have taken very differentroutes to becoming part ofEurope’s elite, with Bayern the

traditional German powerhouseand PSG transformed by theQatari takeover of 2011.

But on and off the pitchright now they arealmost perfectly bal-anced, and that translat-ed into the kind of prop-er match-up on the fieldthat neither side oftenexperiences these days.

Bayern almost opened thescoring midway through thefirst half when Lewandowski —looking for his 56th goal of the

season — turned and shotagainst the post.

He also came close with aheader that was saved by KeylorNavas, but PSG should havepunished them at the otherend in the first half.

Neymar was denied byNeuer after being set up byMbappe, while Mbappe con-trived to fire straight at the goal-keeper after David Alaba giftedhim possession in the box.

Alaba earlier saw his cen-tral defensive colleague,Jerome Boateng, limp outinjured. The giant Niklas Sülereplaced him and helped con-tain the Paris attack as Bayernsaw out their lead.

They had broken thedeadlock just before the hourmark in a move that beganwith a sprayed ThiagoAlcantara pass forward, andended with Coman arrivingfrom the left to head inKimmich’s delivery.

Neymar ended the gamewith a yellow card for chop-ping down Lewandowski, anda runners-up medal, whileBayern celebrated.

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Almost 150 people werearrested as Paris Saint-

Germain fans set cars ablaze,smashed shop windows andclashed with police in the Frenchcapital after the team’sChampions League final defeatto Bayern Munich, police saidon Monday.

The violence occurredaround the Parc des Princes sta-dium and on the Champs-Elysees avenue during and afterthe match on Sunday night,police said on Twitter.

Thousands of supportershad gathered at the Parc desPrinces to cheer on PSG, light-ing flares and chanting as theywatched the 1-0 defeat in Lisbonon a big screen.

The trouble lasted severalhours, as groups of fans threwbottles and fireworks at police,who responded with tear gasand rubber bullets.

On the Champs-Elysees,vehicles were set on fire, win-dows broken and shops van-dalised. Police said 148 peoplewere arrested “in particular fordamage, violence or throwing

projectiles”.Interior Minister Gerald

Darmanin said 16 police wereinjured, 12 shops attacked andabout 15 vehicles damagedovernight.

In a tweet on Sundaynight, he condemned the“unacceptable” violence andthanked the police who arrest-ed “small violent groups, trou-blemakers.”

Social distancing measureswere ignored inside and out-side the Parc des Princesamong fans who had hoped tosee their Qatar-owned team’sfirst triumph in Europe’s topclub competition.

Police said 404 peoplewere stopped for not wearingface masks as part of regula-tions aimed at curbing thecoronavirus outbreak.

�"� ��&� Former all-rounder Irfan Pathanbelieves current Team India skipper Virat Kohlihas the ability and the fitness to break MasterBlaster Sachin Tendulkar’s record of 100 inter-national centuries.

“I am sure 100 hundreds, he (Kohli) mightnot be talking about it but you know if anyonecould achieve that feat after Sachin Tendulkar,he is the one,” said Pathan speaking on Star Sportsshow Cricket Connected show while talking aboutthe records Kohli would be thinking of break-ing in the next few years.

“He has achieved so much in such a littletime and I hope if anyone breaks the records of100 hundreds, he has to be an Indian and Virathas the ability and fitness, which is themost important thing to beable to achieve that feat,”he added.

Kohli, 31, has so far hit70 international hundreds(43 in 248 ODIs and 27 in 86Tests). Tendulkar, who retiredfrom international cricket in2013, had scored 51 Test cen-turies and 49 ODI hundreds.

“I think he (Kohli) is 30short of that 100 hundreds, Ithink he will be able to achieveit before he retires and I hope soand that’s the target he will havein his mind,” Pathan added.

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Sunrisers Hyderabad’s bat-ting mentor VVS Laxman

is confident the quality ofcricket will not suffer even ifthe matches of the upcomingIPL are played in front ofempty stands owing to theCovid-19 pandemic.

“I can assure all thefans of the gamethat they willreally enjoy thec o m p e t i t i o neven thoughthere won’t beany crowd orany spectators onthe ground,”Laxman said in a video

released by the franchise.“Don’t ever think that the

energy or the quality of crick-et will come down.”

Instead, the former Indiabatsman seemed a bit wary of

the nature of pitches thatwill be on offer in the UAE.

“Probably the wicketsmay be on the slower sidebut we have to just wait andsee because we may just besurprised with the efforts

put in by the groundstaff.

“The outfieldwill be fantastic but

the wickets are somethingthat I hope will be welltaken care of by theground staff.”

�+�/�%�(;�����!���������.*� (��+�(��)�����������*���*����������������New York: Back in action after fivemonths, Rohan Bopanna and his Canadianpartner Denis Shapovalov lost in theopening round of the Western andSouthern Open men’s doubles event butnot before making it as tough as possiblefor Marcel Granollers and HoracioZeballos here. Bopanna and Shapovalovlost 4-6, 6-7(1) to 2019 US Open runners-ups in the first round match of the $42,22,190 hard court tournament.

It was the first competitive match for

Bopanna since the Davis Cup tie againstCroatia in March, along side veteranLeander Paes.

“It was indeed a very close match. I amvery satisfied, to be honest, with the waywe played, especially after five months,coming straight into a tournament. (Wewere) playing against a very good team outthere,” Bopanna said.

“I thought I would be little rusty butplayed pretty good, we had some chances,”he addedd. PTI

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James Anderson is England’sGreatest of All Time (GOAT) ,

said off-spinner Dom Bessafter the veteran pacer closedin on an unprecedented 600Test wickets with just two

more to get in the Pakistansecond innings.

Only MuttiahMuralitharan (800), ShaneWarne (708) and Anil Kumble

(619) have crossed the 600wicket mark but no fast bowlerhas ever breached the markwhich is a testimony to

Anderson’s longevity in interna-tional cricket.

The 38-year-old Andersonreturned with his 29th five-wick-

et haul (5-56) on day three of theongoing third Test againstPakistan to achieve 598 wickets inred-ball cricket.

“He’s the GOAT (greatest of alltime) isn’t he? He’s the GOAT ofbowling and England’s greatest,”Bess was quoted as saying byPress Association.

“Myself, Dom Sibley, OlliePope and Zak Crawley have allgrown up watching him play. It’sphenomenal to stand there atpoint watching him nick peopleoff and hit people on the shins, towatch him take as many poles ashe does and do it so consistently.”

“It’s an amazing thing for anindividual but I think when Jimmydoes his business, he does it for theteam.

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