T he much-vaunted Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) is losing its appeal as the number of farmers under the scheme has fallen by 1.05 crore in BJP-ruled States — Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. The numbers of farmers who had availed the insurance cover stood at 5.7 crore in 2016-17, but it came down to 4.9 crore in 2017-18. Despite the fall in the number of farmers insured and coverage area, the profit of the insurance companies has not fallen. In 2016-17, these companies paid a compensa- tion of 17,902.47 crore and earned a profit of 6,459.64 crore. In 2017-18, they paid over 2,000 crore less in com- pensation. This made their profits swell to 9,335.62 crore. The outgo in compensa- tion during 2017-18 stood at just 15,710.25 crore. For the 2017-18, as many as 3.73 crore farmers have applied under the PMFBY for the Kharif crops, while 1.52 crore farmers applied for rabi crops. According to a RTI reply by the Ministry of Agriculture, BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh witnessed the maximum fall in the number of beneficiaries, registering a decline of 40.47 lakh in 2017-18, followed by Rajasthan which saw reduction of 31.25 beneficiaries. Maharashtra registered a decline of 19.47 lakh, from 1.09 crore in 2016-17 to 89.53 lakh in 2017-18. Uttar Pradesh came next, where the numbers dipped by 14.69 lakh, from 37.17 lakh to 22.48 lakh during the time period. The RTI was filed by Jalandhar-based activist PP Kapoor. Officials of the Agriculture Ministry said the scheme suf- fered setback from waiver of farm loans in different States as the farmer who whose loans were waived did not insure their crops. The number of farmers also declined due to cumbersome process of settle- ment of insurance claims. Officials said time-taking process of physical verification of insured crop is the major reason which deprived the farmers of the benefit from the scheme. In many cases, insur- ance companies did not inves- tigate losses due to a local- calamity, and therefore, did not pay claims. Another reason for the low claim settlement could be delay in States releas- ing their share of the subsidy. As per rules under the PMFBY, farmers need to be paid 12 per cent interest by insurance companies for any delay in settlement of claims beyond two months of the prescribed cut-off date, while States will have to pay 12 per cent interest for the delay in release of their share of premi- um beyond three months. This penalty provisions came into effect on October 1 and will be applicable for all seasons in the future. In Madhya Pradesh, the insurance companies had insured over 71.81 lakh farmers in 2016-17 and earned a profit of 1,862.32 crore. The follow- ing year, over 2.90 lakh fewer farmers insured their crops and the profit of these companies plummeted to just 39.21 crore. In Maharashtra, nearly 1.20 crore farmers were insured in 2016-17 and the companies made a profit of 2,424.23 crore for the year. In 2017-18, only about one crore farmers were insured. Yet the companies made a profit of 1617.94 crore. Gujarat was probably the only State where the number of farmers who insured their crops increased during these two years. In 2016-17, the fig- ure was 5.20 lakh but it grew exponentially to over 17.63 lakh the following year. Simultaneously, the profits of the insurers also shot up from 40.07 crore in 2016-17 to 2,222.58 crore in 2017-18. The period also saw the num- ber of farmers insuring their crops and profits of insurers ris- ing in Haryana. While 13.36 lakh farmers had insured their cops in 2016-17, as many as 13.51 lakh got them insured the next year. The profits of the insurance companies rose even more sharply from 71.83 crore to 95 crore in these two years. According to data, the num- ber of beneficiaries under the PMFBY in West Bengal declined from 41.17 lakh in 2016-17 to 39.09 lakh in 2017-18. The net profit of insur- ance companies was Rs 321. 26 crore in 2016-17 which is rose to Rs 547.87 crore in 2017-18. In Tamil Nadu, insurance companies incurred Rs 2128 crore in 2016-17.The number of farmers under the scheme declined from 14.11 lakh in 2016-17 to 13.85 lakh in 2017-18. A fter coming to know that six African nationals, including four Tanzanian women and two Nigerian men, were being harassed by a hos- tile crowd gathered outside their homes in Hari Vihar in Dwarka following rumours that they were cannibals and abducting children, police landed at the spot and rescued the embattled Africans, police said Friday. A call was made to the Police Control Room by the mother of a 16-year-old boy about his disappearance and subsequent fear that he was eaten by the Africans residing on rent for the last two months in the area. Police’s timely interven- tion saved the situation from turning violent. During inves- tigation, police found out that the woman, who had called up PCR alleging that her son was kidnapped by two Nigerians, lied to us, and the canabalism charge was nothing but a mis- chievous rumour. The woman turned off her phone after son was found in a hale and hearty condition, police said. Police said there was no evidence or information with the locals about the Africans’ involvement in the alleged kid- napping. Police dismissed alle- gations of foreign nationals being assaulted or mob van- dalising their house and stated that no injury was reported on their rescue. “After receiving five calls on the PCR, local police rushed to the spot. Although there was no assault on the foreign nationals, police brought them to police station for their safe- ty. The rumour of kidnapping was later verified and found false,” Deputy Commissioner of Police Anto Alphonse stated. No family members of the woman who complaint about kidnapping came forward to the police station to take cog- nizance of the PCR call. The Tanzanian women were identified as Assifa, Riziki, Fatima and Esta Joshva. The Nigerians are named Nwaogu (38) and Ogbuewu (34). Nwaogu does not possess an Indian visa, hence will be deported accordingly, said a police official. “Though they do not want any case to be registered but we have decided to take suo motu action and lodge an FIR and investigate it”, said Madhup Tiwari, Joint Commissioner of Police. “We have in so many ways championed for society devoid of prejudices, it is disheartening to hear such occurrences. Although there’s been a drastic fall in such cases, we believe there is need to do more. We appreciate the assistance of police,” said Merveil Ntambwe Ngongo, president of Association of African students in India, Delhi NCR Chapter. U ttar Pradesh Congress in- charge Raj Babbar kicked up a controversy by comparing the slump in rupee’s value against US Dollar to Prime Minister’s nonagenarian moth- er’s age. The BJP has demanded an apology from the Opposition party's president Rahul Gandhi. Babbar made the contro- versial remark while addressing a rally in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh's Indore city on Thursday. Madhya Pradesh goes to polls on November 28 and results will be declared on December 11. The film actor-turned- politician Babbar also called PM Narendra Modi Manhoos (ill-omened) over steep rise in fuel prices. He also sought to remind PM his remarks around 2014 elections that I am lucky so petrol-diesel prices would fall once I am in power and those who ruled earlier were badkismat (unlucky) as fuel prices were high in their times. “Main to kahunga aap mahamanhoos hain jo aapke raaj me petrol-diesel ke daam itne badh gaye,” quipped Babbar. “He (PM) used to say that the falling rupee against US dollar was nearing the age of the Prime Minister (Manmohan Singh). I would say presently the rupee has started to slide towards your respected mother’s age,” said Babbar during election cam- paigning in Indore on Thursday. A seething BJP took strong objection to his remarks and accused the Congress of low- ering the dignity of political speeches. BJP general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya reacting to Babbar’s remarks said, “Unhone kuchh jyada le li hogi (Perhaps he was too drunk). He is an actor and often slips into acting mode so should not be taken seriously, he added. The party's national spokesperson Sambit Patra said it was not proper to use unpar- liamentary words or drag any person's mother into politics. "But the Congress' attitude against the Prime Minister's mother has been improper from the beginning and such language was used even against the Prime Minister," Patra claimed. He demanded that Rahul Gandhi should apologise and he should clarify whether he endorses such controversial statements. T aking a dig at the Congress for not declaring its Chief Ministerial face for the November 28 Madhya Pradesh Assembly polls, BJP chief Amit Shah on Friday said the Opposition party was an army without a commander in the State. Shah also slammed former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over his recent criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and claimed that the lat- ter had enhanced the country's prestige in the world. "In Madhya Pradesh, the BJP is contesting the election under the leadership of Shivraj Singh Chouhan. But who is the chief ministerial face of the Congress?...It is an army with- out a commander," the BJP chief said at an election rally in Seoni district's Lakhnadon. "Who is the commander of the (Congress) army? A king, an emperor and a tired indus- trialist...Rahul (Gandhi) should tell which of these is the com- mander of the army," Shah said, in an apparent reference to Congress leaders Digvijaya Singh, Jyotiraditya Scindia and Kamal Nath respectively. Targeting Manmohan Singh, he claimed that the for- mer Prime Minister visited more foreign countries than Modi, but the latter's visits get noticed as he is warmly welcomed by the Indian diaspora abroad. "I heard Kamal Nath was saying that Modiji goes abroad quite often. Even I felt that he goes very often. But then I thought I must check the record of the prime minister's visits abroad and I found that he has visited fewer countries than Singh," Shah said. "A journalist then informed me that when Singh used to go abroad, he used to carry two typed speeches in English and sometimes he used to read in Malaysia the speech meant to be read in Thailand and the one meant for Malaysia in Thailand. Neither the peo- ple of that country, nor the peo- ple here would get to know about it," he added. RNI Regn. No. MPENG/2004/13703, Regd. No. L-2/BPLON/41/2006-2008 C M Y K C M Y K
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The much-vaunted PradhanMantri Fasal Bima Yojana
(PMFBY) is losing its appeal asthe number of farmers underthe scheme has fallen by 1.05crore in BJP-ruled States —Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh,Rajasthan and MadhyaPradesh.
The numbers of farmerswho had availed the insurancecover stood at 5.7 crore in2016-17, but it came down to4.9 crore in 2017-18.
Despite the fall in thenumber of farmers insuredand coverage area, the profit ofthe insurance companies hasnot fallen. In 2016-17, thesecompanies paid a compensa-tion of �17,902.47 crore andearned a profit of �6,459.64crore. In 2017-18, they paidover �2,000 crore less in com-pensation. This made theirprofits swell to �9,335.62 crore.
The outgo in compensa-tion during 2017-18 stood atjust �15,710.25 crore. For the2017-18, as many as 3.73 crorefarmers have applied underthe PMFBY for the Kharifcrops, while 1.52 crore farmersapplied for rabi crops.
According to a RTI replyby the Ministry of Agriculture,BJP-ruled Madhya Pradeshwitnessed the maximum fall inthe number of beneficiaries,registering a decline of 40.47lakh in 2017-18, followed byRajasthan which saw reductionof 31.25 beneficiaries.Maharashtra registered a
decline of 19.47 lakh, from 1.09crore in 2016-17 to 89.53 lakhin 2017-18. Uttar Pradesh camenext, where the numbersdipped by 14.69 lakh, from37.17 lakh to 22.48 lakh duringthe time period. The RTI wasfiled by Jalandhar-based activistPP Kapoor.
Officials of the AgricultureMinistry said the scheme suf-fered setback from waiver offarm loans in different States asthe farmer who whose loanswere waived did not insuretheir crops. The number offarmers also declined due tocumbersome process of settle-ment of insurance claims.
Officials said time-takingprocess of physical verificationof insured crop is the majorreason which deprived thefarmers of the benefit from thescheme. In many cases, insur-ance companies did not inves-tigate losses due to a local-calamity, and therefore, did notpay claims. Another reasonfor the low claim settlementcould be delay in States releas-ing their share of the subsidy.
As per rules under thePMFBY, farmers need to bepaid 12 per cent interest byinsurance companies for anydelay in settlement of claimsbeyond two months of the
prescribed cut-off date, whileStates will have to pay 12 percent interest for the delay inrelease of their share of premi-um beyond three months.
This penalty provisionscame into effect on October 1and will be applicable for allseasons in the future.
In Madhya Pradesh, theinsurance companies hadinsured over 71.81 lakh farmersin 2016-17 and earned a profitof �1,862.32 crore. The follow-ing year, over 2.90 lakh fewerfarmers insured their crops andthe profit of these companiesplummeted to just �39.21 crore.
In Maharashtra, nearly 1.20
crore farmers were insured in2016-17 and the companiesmade a profit of �2,424.23crore for the year. In 2017-18,only about one crore farmerswere insured. Yet the companiesmade a profit of �1617.94 crore.
Gujarat was probably theonly State where the number offarmers who insured theircrops increased during thesetwo years. In 2016-17, the fig-ure was 5.20 lakh but it grewexponentially to over 17.63lakh the following year.
Simultaneously, the profitsof the insurers also shot upfrom �40.07 crore in 2016-17to �2,222.58 crore in 2017-18.The period also saw the num-ber of farmers insuring theircrops and profits of insurers ris-ing in Haryana. While 13.36lakh farmers had insured theircops in 2016-17, as many as13.51 lakh got them insured thenext year. The profits of theinsurance companies rose evenmore sharply from 71.83 croreto �95 crore in these two years.
According to data, the num-ber of beneficiaries under thePMFBY in West Bengal declinedfrom 41.17 lakh in 2016-17 to39.09 lakh in 2017-18.
The net profit of insur-ance companies was Rs 321.26 crore in 2016-17 which isrose to Rs 547.87 crore in2017-18. In Tamil Nadu,insurance companies incurredRs 2128 crore in 2016-17.Thenumber of farmers under thescheme declined from 14.11lakh in 2016-17 to 13.85 lakhin 2017-18.
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After coming to know thatsix African nationals,
including four Tanzanianwomen and two Nigerian men,were being harassed by a hos-tile crowd gathered outsidetheir homes in Hari Vihar inDwarka following rumoursthat they were cannibals andabducting children, policelanded at the spot and rescuedthe embattled Africans, policesaid Friday.
A call was made to thePolice Control Room by themother of a 16-year-old boyabout his disappearance andsubsequent fear that he waseaten by the Africans residingon rent for the last two monthsin the area.
Police’s timely interven-tion saved the situation fromturning violent. During inves-tigation, police found out thatthe woman, who had called upPCR alleging that her son waskidnapped by two Nigerians,lied to us, and the canabalismcharge was nothing but a mis-chievous rumour. The womanturned off her phone after sonwas found in a hale and heartycondition, police said.
Police said there was no
evidence or information withthe locals about the Africans’involvement in the alleged kid-napping. Police dismissed alle-gations of foreign nationalsbeing assaulted or mob van-dalising their house and statedthat no injury was reported ontheir rescue.
“After receiving five callson the PCR, local police rushedto the spot. Although there wasno assault on the foreignnationals, police brought themto police station for their safe-ty. The rumour of kidnappingwas later verified and foundfalse,” Deputy Commissioner ofPolice Anto Alphonse stated.
No family members of thewoman who complaint aboutkidnapping came forward tothe police station to take cog-nizance of the PCR call.
The Tanzanian womenwere identified as Assifa, Riziki,
Fatima and Esta Joshva. TheNigerians are named Nwaogu(38) and Ogbuewu (34).Nwaogu does not possess anIndian visa, hence will bedeported accordingly, said apolice official.
“Though they do not wantany case to be registered but wehave decided to take suo motuaction and lodge an FIR andinvestigate it”, said MadhupTiwari, Joint Commissioner ofPolice.
“We have in so many wayschampioned for society devoidof prejudices, it is dishearteningto hear such occurrences.Although there’s been a drasticfall in such cases, we believethere is need to do more. Weappreciate the assistance ofpolice,” said Merveil NtambweNgongo, president ofAssociation of African studentsin India, Delhi NCR Chapter.
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Uttar Pradesh Congress in-charge Raj Babbar kicked
up a controversy by comparingthe slump in rupee’s valueagainst US Dollar to PrimeMinister’s nonagenarian moth-er’s age.
The BJP has demanded anapology from the Oppositionparty's president Rahul Gandhi.
Babbar made the contro-versial remark while addressinga rally in poll-bound MadhyaPradesh's Indore city onThursday. Madhya Pradeshgoes to polls on November 28and results will be declared onDecember 11.
The film actor-turned-politician Babbar also calledPM Narendra Modi Manhoos(ill-omened) over steep rise infuel prices.
He also sought to remindPM his remarks around 2014elections that I am lucky sopetrol-diesel prices would fall once I am in powerand those who ruled earlierwere badkismat (unlucky) asfuel prices were high in theirtimes.
“Main to kahunga aapmahamanhoos hain jo aapkeraaj me petrol-diesel ke daamitne badh gaye,” quippedBabbar.
“He (PM) used to say that
the falling rupee against USdollar was nearing the age ofthe Prime Minister(Manmohan Singh). I wouldsay presently the rupee hasstarted to slide towards yourrespected mother’s age,” saidBabbar during election cam-paigning in Indore onThursday.
A seething BJP took strongobjection to his remarks andaccused the Congress of low-ering the dignity of politicalspeeches.
BJP general secretaryKailash Vijayvargiya reacting toBabbar’s remarks said,“Unhone kuchh jyada le li hogi(Perhaps he was too drunk). Heis an actor and often slips intoacting mode so should not betaken seriously, he added.
The party's nationalspokesperson Sambit Patra saidit was not proper to use unpar-liamentary words or drag anyperson's mother into politics."But the Congress' attitudeagainst the Prime Minister'smother has been improperfrom the beginning and suchlanguage was used even againstthe Prime Minister," Patraclaimed.
He demanded that RahulGandhi should apologise andhe should clarify whether heendorses such controversialstatements.
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Taking a dig at the Congressfor not declaring its Chief
Ministerial face for theNovember 28 Madhya PradeshAssembly polls, BJP chief AmitShah on Friday said theOpposition party was an armywithout a commander in theState.
Shah also slammed formerPrime Minister ManmohanSingh over his recent criticismof Prime Minister NarendraModi, and claimed that the lat-ter had enhanced the country'sprestige in the world.
"In Madhya Pradesh, theBJP is contesting the electionunder the leadership of ShivrajSingh Chouhan. But who is thechief ministerial face of theCongress?...It is an army with-out a commander," the BJPchief said at an election rally inSeoni district's Lakhnadon.
"Who is the commander ofthe (Congress) army? A king,an emperor and a tired indus-trialist...Rahul (Gandhi) shouldtell which of these is the com-mander of the army," Shah said,in an apparent reference toCongress leaders DigvijayaSingh, Jyotiraditya Scindia and
Kamal Nath respectively.Targeting Manmohan
Singh, he claimed that the for-mer Prime Minister visited moreforeign countries than Modi, butthe latter's visits get noticed as heis warmly welcomed by theIndian diaspora abroad.
"I heard Kamal Nath wassaying that Modiji goes abroadquite often. Even I felt that hegoes very often. But then Ithought I must check therecord of the prime minister'svisits abroad and I found thathe has visited fewer countriesthan Singh," Shah said.
"A journalist theninformed me that when Singhused to go abroad, he used tocarry two typed speeches inEnglish and sometimes he usedto read in Malaysia the speechmeant to be read in Thailandand the one meant for Malaysiain Thailand. Neither the peo-ple of that country, nor the peo-ple here would get to knowabout it," he added.
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The Congress on Fridayalleged Prime Minister
Narendra Modi continues tofollow his childhood habit oftelling lies, as he (Modi) hasclaimed that the KarnatakaGovernment was arrestingindebted farmers.
While talking to mediapersons here on Friday,Congress spokespersonRandeep Surjewala said thatit hurts when a person hold-ing the prime minister's postl ies . "Prime MinisterNarendra Modi has a badhabit of speaking lies. It seemshe is not able to get rid of hischildhood habit," he said,when asked about Modi'sallegation.
The prime minister,addressing campaign rallies inMadhya Pradesh andChhattisgarh, had pooh-poohed Congress chief RahulGandhi's promise of farmloan waiver in the two states.He claimed the party hadmade the same promise dur-ing the Karnataka polls butdid not fulfill it.
The coalition governmentconsisting of Congress inKarnataka was, instead, issu-ing warrants and arrestingfarmers for defaulting on loanrepayments, the prime min-ister alleged.
Surjewala asked about theloan waiver that wasannounced by the BJP-ledgovernment in Maharashtra.
"About 50,000 farmers
marched to Mumbai askingthe Devendra Fadnavis gov-ernment what happened toloan waiver promise.
The implementation ofloan waiver in Punjab andKarnataka (where theCongress is in power) has setan example. The PM shouldvisit these areas," Surjewalasaid.
He alleged the Modi-ledgovernment had written offloans worth � 2.63 lakh croreof industrialists but hadrefused relief to indebtedfarmers.
The Congress spokesper-son also accused the BJP gov-ernment in Madhya Pradeshof misleading people on theinvestment attracted by theState from 2007 to 2016.
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Religious leader ComputerBaba here on Friday
declared to support theCongress party in theNovember 28 Assembly elec-tions in Madhya Pradesh.
Notably, Computer Babawas one of the saints who wasaccorded status of State minis-ter. Later, he had quit the postalleging that Chief MinisterShivraj Singh Chouhan did notfulfill his promises to safe-guard the holy Narmada river.
This decision of ComputerBaba is being considered a rad-ical change in the politicalstand of Swami Namdev Tyagi,known as Computer Baba, whohad been anointed as a minis-ter of State by the BJP govern-ment.
Computer Baba had organ-ised ̀ Narmade Sansad', a gath-ering of like-minded religiousleaders from various statesincluding Uttar Pradesh, hereFriday to decide which party
they should support in thepolls. "The saints will supportthe Congress," he said at thegathering.
"When we can give fifteenyears to them (the BharatiyaJanata Party), then we can sure-ly give five years to Congress,"he said, adding if Congressupholds dharma, we will gowith them in future or else wewill withdraw the support.
In April, the BJP govern-ment in the state accorded himthe status of Minister of Statealong with five others byappointing him on a commit-tee for conservation of the riverNarmada. Before that, he hadannounced a `yatra' (proces-sion) to expose illegal sandmining in the Narmada.
He resigned in October,accusing Chief Minister ShivrajSingh Chouhan of being ahypocrite and not fulfillingthe promises made to him. TheBJP government did little tostop illegal mining in the river,he alleged.
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During the ongoing elections in Madhya Pradesh the circu-lation of fake currency has given an alarm bell to the Indore
police as the police in Mhow caught three youths carrying �20,000 cash fake currency and trying to circulate in gram pan-chayat kodariya area.
Mhow ASP Nagendra Singh told The Pioneer that infor-mation was received about these youths that was immediatelypassed on to DIG Indore Harinarayanchari Mishra and SP WestIndore Siddharth Bahuguna. SDOP Mhow Vinod Sharma formeda team under the TI Badgonda Mhow Arun Solanki.
The team caught the three youths Abdul Wahab alias Laluage 45 years of Hammal Mohalla in Mhow, Mohd Asif, 35 ofGangalakhedi Mhow and third is Nihal, 33 of Ujjain district. Allthe fake notes were in the form of Rs 100. Abdul Wahab andAbdul Aziz told the police that few days back they have gone toUjjain where they met Nihal who supplied them these notes tocirculate in local areas and village markets.
The police are investigating the matter thoroughly. All thethree accused are booked under IPC section 420, 467, 468, 471,489 A 489 b and 489 C.
ASP Mhow Nagendra Singh told that we are trying to findthat who are the masterminds and whether these accused havebeen supplied these fake currency from across the border or theyprint themselves with the portable high quality printingmachine. The water mark displaying the image of MahatamGandhi is missing from these fake Currency notes and the ver-tical line towards the right hand side of currency doesn’t changecolour in light. The paper used for the fake currency is little thinthen the original currency note.
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Alleging that the Delhi ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal
concocted a fake chilli attackon himself, Delhi BJP presidentManoj Tiwari said thatKejriwal was creating anatmosphere of hate againsthim in order to get him killedin a mob attack.
While talking to mediapersons here on Friday, Tiwari,said that he would initiatebreach of privilege motionagainst AAP MLAAmanatullah Khan forSignature Bridge incident.Claiming that Delhi DeputyCM Manish Sisodia had invit-ed him for the said inaugura-tion via twitter he alleged laterhe was almost thrown off thebridge.
“Since, I assumed office asDelhi BJP president, weexposed Delhi government onincidents such as people gettingshot dead over water, three girlsdying of hunger on a same dayand this has turned themagainst me. “Kejriwal had engi-neered this fake chilli attack sothat he could create an atmos-phere against me and eliminate
me in a mob attack,” allegedTiwari the noted Bhojpurisinger turned politician.
The MP however made itclear he did not fear for his lifeand had pledged to exposethese corrupt politicians theday he joined PM NarendraModi.
The signature bridge wassanctioned by late BJP CMSaheb Singh Verma, heclaimed.
The BJP MP also camedown heavily on the sealingdrive going on in Delhi sayingthe drive has left the city in aSyria like situation. “People are
seen kneeling down to author-ities seeking few hours ofrelaxations whenever sealingofficer approach them amidmarriages and other func-tions,” said Tiwari adding thosewho live in unauthorizedcolonies only know the pain ofthese residential areas.
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Congress president RahulGandhi on Friday said
Indians have realised thatthere is no substance in whatPrime Minister NarendraModi speaks, adding the lat-ter is mum on the issues hespoke about before the 2014elections.
Addressing a campaignrally here for the November 28Madhya Pradesh Assemblypolls, Gandhi said Modi'sspeeches used to be about cor-ruption, farmers and unem-ployment.
"Today, he doesn't sayanything on these issues.People of the country haverealised that there is no sub-stance in what Modi speaks.All his assurances are false,"Gandhi said, adding, "Before2014, Narendra Modipromised loan waiver, bonusand better price for farmers'produce; I want to ask himwhy were the assurances notfulfilled.”
When the Congress forms
the next government inMadhya Pradesh, the chiefminister will work for 18hours a day to provideemployment to youth, Gandhi
said."Unemployment and
farm crisis are rampant in allthe poll-bound states," hesaid, adding the government
has told Parliament that only450 youth get jobs per day inIndia, as against 50,000 inChina in the same period.
Gandhi promised loan
waiver to farmers "within 10days of coming to power" inMadhya Pradesh and makingthe state an "agriculture hub"of the country.
The Congress leader saidthe Shivraj Singh Chouhangovernment in the statedestroyed the education sec-tor with Vyapam, the entranceexamination, admission andrecruitment scam unearthedin Madhya Pradesh in 2013.
On the Rafale deal,Gandhi said Modi gave Rs30,000 crore benefit to indus-trialist Anil Ambani by takingaway the contract from thestate-owned aerospace com-pany Hindustan AeronauticsLimited (HAL).
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Defence Minister NirmalaSitharaman here on
Friday alleged that questionsposed by Congress PresidentRahul Gandhi make it appearas if he either deliberatelywishes to not comprehend theRafale issue or does not pos-sess the capacity to under-stand the matter.
“The Centre is providingthe Congress detai ledresponses to every query vis-a-vis the fighter aircraft. Priorto asking Rafale-related ques-tions, Gandhi should proper-ly understand the defencepurchase procedure fromformer Defence Minister AKAntony.
The Congress President isunable to fathom the differ-ence between basic price andthe cost of the plane equipped
with weapons,” the visitingpolitician told media personshere.
The Government is reply-ing to Parliament and thejudiciary, she averred andexpressed surprise over theCongress raising the Rafaleissue amid the MadhyaPradesh polls.
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Avista of vibrant colours,dazzling lights, charm-
ing music and amazing per-formance of toddler Sagaritescommenced the two-dayannual fest of Sagar PublicSchool, Saket Nagar.
The two day annual festi-val comprise of Junior andSenior Wing in which over2000 Sagarites will exhibittheir talent. The Junior WingAnnual Function is based onthe theme ‘Tales of Humanity.’The festival began with wel-coming of guests on variousenchanting tunes and a grandsalute performed by theschool band followed by light-ing of lamp and seeking bless-ings of Goddess Saraswati byesteemed chief guest ProfDisha Nawani, Dean, School
of Education, The TataInstitute of Social Sciences,Chairman, Sagar Group,Sudhir Kumar Agrawal inpresence of School PrincipalPankaj Sharma. Governingmembers of Sagar PublicSchool and SISTec, parents,distinguished guests were pre-sent on the occasion.
A colourful programmewas staged by toddlerSagarites with a welcome song‘See the Moon Shining in
Window, Time to Start aBeautiful Day’ began the gor-geous journey of ‘Tales ofHumanity’. Dressed in Brunoand Pepper Sagarites present-ed Fables of Courtesy show-casing good habits and itsimportance. ‘A Treasure Troveof Books’… ‘KitabeKarti HaiBaten’ presented the evolution,revolution and importance ofbooks in our lives as bestfriends. To share, care and notto be lazy was presentedcharmingly by tiny toddlersbeautifully dressed in attires ofant and grasshoppers in ‘AnAccount of Industriousness’with the message work todayto reap benefits tomorrow.
A memento was present-ed to chief guest Prof DishaNawani by Sudhir KumarAgrawal, Chairman, SagarGroup.
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Pratibha Syntex, a textilecompany in Indore was
awarded with Dare to DreamAward for EmergingCompany of the Year inTextile sector. The award waspresented by Federation ofMadhya Pradesh Chamberof Commerce and Industries.The group was felicitatedduring an event held inBhopal.
The SAP, along with theFederat ion of MadhyaPradesh Chamber ofCommerce and Industry(FMPCI), has come up witha new identity to variouscompanies and traders com-ing from MP areas, who havecome across many aspects ofbusiness to realise theirthinking and dreams. Dare toDream Award has beenlaunched for the purpose ofgetting it. Satish Sachdeva,
MIS and IT General Manager,Company, received theEmerging Company of theYear Award for PratibhaSyntax.
Apart from this, PratibhaSyntax was also awarded withthe renowned brand N.Taylor for the highest quali-ty of innovation and innova-tion award for her novelty.Innovation Award CompanyCEO Ashwani Pallah andMarket ing BusinessDevelopment andSustainability Vice PresidentSamir Bhandh received.
In addition to this, theinstitution was also awardedfor outstanding work donetowards social welfare.Pratibha Syntax was alsofelicitated with the SarvaShiksha Abhiyan. It is worthmentioning that the institu-tion has also been working toreward the meritorious stu-dents of Government School
for the last two years with asubsidy of 1000 rupees.
Expressing his gratitudetowards it Shreyas ChandraChaudhar y, Director,Pratibha Syntax said that heis very pleased with therespect given by his innova-tion and Emerging Companyof the Year Awards and SarvaShiksha Abhiyan. “We areconstantly working hard tomake innovative fabrics avail-able to our customers.”
The organisation recent-ly organized a special sessionkeeping in mind the prob-lems related to puberty forthe girls of a governmentschool in Sagaura under theservice campaign of theirself-reliance. During this ses-sion, about 650 girls fromclass 7 to class VII recordedtheir presence. During thisperiod, a pack of six sanitarynapkins was a lso givenamong the girls.
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Amobile app ‘Mat %’ hasbeen prepared by the
Chief Electoral Officer inorder to provide informationregarding voting percentage ofpolling centers to commonman in Vidhan SabhaElection-2018.
The app will be used bythe presiding officer, electionofficer no; 1 and sector officer.People are required to logintheir mobiles by downloadingthe app from the play store ofandroid phone. Mapping ofmobile numbers of each pre-siding officer/election officerno. 1 will be done with theirrespective polling centre. Inthis manner, the above men-tioned app can be used by theregistered mobile number foreach polling centre.
On the day of polling, sta-tistical information of malesand females voters will be reg-istered and send each hourafter the beginning of pollingat 9 am, 10 am, 11 am, 12noon, 1 pm 2 pm, 3 pm, 4 and5 pm finally by the concernedpresiding officer/ electionofficer no; 1 or sector magis-trate for their respectivepolling centers, which will beaccumulated on the serversituated at BhopalHeadquarters. This informa-tion will be displayed in vot-ing percentage at the promi-nent places.
Normally, the mobile appwill work in the online modebut in case of non-availabili-ty of internet network, the reg-istered data on mobile app canbe accumulated on the serv-er situated at BhopalHeadquarters by offline modethrough SMS service. In thisway, the updated informa-tion from all the polling cen-ters will be received andmobile app will prove usefulin apprising common manwith election update fromtime to time.
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The Madhya PradeshGovernment Culture
Department is organising thetwo-day 'MahabodhiMahotsav', a concentrated twoday festival on the Buddhistidea in art, in the year-end.
This year this event will beheld on November 24-25 at7.00 pm in the Srama BhawanComplex, Sanchi. Every yearthe dramatic presentationsbased on Jataka tales of LordBuddha are being preparedand presented by the depart-ment every year. This yearalso a dramatic presentationbased on two caste stories willbe established.
On November 24, the firstday of the festival will bestaged in the play directed byPreeti Jha Tiwari (Bhopal).After this Balo Dancing will be
an 'Ashok' centered presenta-tion by the Artistic ArtCommittee (Bhopal).
On the second day, onNovember 25, in the directionof K.G. Trivedi (Bhopal) thepresentation of 'Integrated'drama on the Jataka story willbe performed. After this,Kavita Dwivedi (New Delhi)will present Odissi groupdance with her fellow artistsand Yamamoto Michio (Japan)will present 'Folk Music' withfellow artists. The timing ofthis program is 7.00 a.m.Admission to the program isfree.
This programme is beingorganised by the Directorate ofCulture, Madhya Pradesh, incollaboration with TribalPublic Art and BidDevelopment Academy andin the cooperation of DistrictAdministration-Rais
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In a joint action on Friday,Excise department and
Bhopal police have seized ille-gal liquor over 1,750 litresworth � 3.78 lakh from sevenconstituencies of Bhopal tillNovember 15.
Official sources said thatthe teams of these depart-ments raided 505 premisesand registered 820 FIRs andarrested a 611 persons in thisregard.
Besides, the off icialsseized 5,980 KG raw materialused in making illegal liquorand four vehicles in theseraids in the same period. Themaximum quantity of illegalliquor was seized from Huzurconstituency, which was 402
litres. But, maximum numbersof raids were conducted inNarela constituency, where134 raids were conducted.
While maximum 184 FIRwas registered in Govindpuraconstituency, maximum 149persons were arrested fromNarela with 2,000 kilograms ofmanufacturing material wasseized. However, two vehicles
were seized from Berasia andNarela.
On Fr iday dur ing achecking point at BhanpuraSquare, Cholla Mandir policewhile checking a Indigo car(MP-04-TA-6471) recovered72 litres country liquor in400 quarters worth Rs 20,000and arrested car dr iverPramod Lodhi (45) againstwhom a case under section34 (2) of Excise Act was reg-istered.
Aishbagh police seized2.5 kilogram cannabis (ganja)worth � 25,000 and 70 litresillegal spirit worth � 20,000and arrested four persons inseparate cases and seized aActiva scooter and a bikefrom them on interveningnight of Thursday and Friday.
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A16-year-old schoolgirl waskilled in a road accident
after she was hit by a rashly dri-ven truck in Berasia on Friday.
Police said the deceasedalong with her two friends waswalking home, when the incidenttook place. Her two friends hada narrow escape in the accident.
According to the Berasiapolice, the deceased has beenidentified as Pinki Kushwaha,16, daughter of Mor Singh, aresident of Kulhore village whostudied in 10th standard in astate government-run school atImalia in Bairasia.
SHO Pandey said that the
incident took place onThursday evening while thedeceased girl Pinki and two ofher friends were on their wayto home from school at around4 pm when a speeding truckcoming from Vidisha hit herfrom behind and then thetruck driver fled from the area.
The girl received seriousinjuries after being hit by thetruck while two of her friendsescaped unhurt.
After the road mishap, shewas then taken to Bairasia hos-pital where she died duringtreatment and police wereinformed regarding the incident.
After her death a caseunder section 304-A of the IPChas been registered by thepolice against errant truck dri-ver while search has beenintensified to nab him.
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Huge participations of lawstudents from across the
country marked the first dayof 7th NLIU-INADRInternational Law SchoolTournament. The tournamentwas inaugurated by Justice(Retd.) G. Raghuram(Director National JudicialAcademy. The tournament isbeing hosted at NLIU, Bhopal.
Here on Friday, it was thefirst day of three day long, 7thNLIU-INADR InternationalLaw School Tournament,organised by AlternateDispute Resolution Cell(ADRC) at NLIU, Bhopal incollaboration with INADR.
It is to be noted that theevent aims to spread aware-ness about importance ofAlternative DisputeResolution in the country.The day began with the open-ing ceremony graced byJustice (Retd.) G. Raghuram(Director National Judicial
Academy, Bhopal) Who alongwith the Prof. V. Vijayakumar,(Director NLIU) lit the cere-monial lamp and declaredthe tournament open.
The inaugural session wasfollowed by a number of
informative workshops forthe participants. These work-shops were conducted by pro-fessional mediators fromIndia and abroad designed toaid the students with skillsrequired in the field of medi-ation. It is noteworthy that theworkshop comprised of threesessions, dealing with basicsof Mediation, relationshipbetween Client and Counseland general trips and tricksthat will help make the waterseasier to navigate for the bud-ding mediators.
Besides, this will be help-ful for the preliminary roundsof the tournament, which willbe held on Saturday. At thistournament, participants aretaught the art of identifyingthe real issues involved and ofdealing them in the course ofmediation session. Thesetraining sessions are designedto prepare the participants notonly for the competition butalso to train them for real lifesituations.
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An array of vibrant coloursand new designs is being put
up at the handloom exhibitionwherein the fashion freaks of thecity are exploring the mostenchanting attire for themselves.
A Chanderi Utsav, hand-loom exhibition cum sale show-casing the most trendy andbeautiful dress materials is beingput up at Hindi Bhavan hall. TheChanderi Utsav exhibition cumsale is experiencing a greatresponse by the shopaholics ofthe city.
On Friday, female buyerswere seen buying not only thedress materials, but also theimitation jewellery being put up.
The Chanderi Utsav is amust visit for those looking outfor a fashionable and stylishlook for the weddings and festi-vals. It not only showcases a vari-
ety of fusion dresses, but also dis-plays traditional designs.
Notably, Chanderi is one ofthe most wanted dress materialsfor the fiestas. This exhibitioncum sale has a variety of morethan 1000 designs in suits whichare captivating the interest of theshopaholics of the city. Thesesuits have been designed in dif-ferent patterns and prints. Thereare printed materials beautiful-ly embroidered with Batik Print,Dabu Print, Hand-Block Printand one of the most renownedand loved in all seasons, BaghPrint.
There is also a range of sarisin different varieties as well. Onecould find the price of the suitsand dress materials lowest from� 700 till � 15000. Besides, thereis a huge collection in Mulberrysilk, crape, chiffon silk and cot-ton silk as well at the emporiumfor regular shopping.
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Punjab Chief Minister CaptAmarinder Singh on Friday
congratulated all Punjabis onthe Centre’s decision to devel-op the Kartarpur corridor say-ing that a long pendingdemand of Punjab was on theverge of fulfilment onNovember 26, when he wouldjoin the President of India tolay the foundation stone for thecorridor.
At the same time, he alsothanked the Government ofPakistan for reciprocating onthe issue saying that hisGovernment will also con-tribute, as may be required, toensure timely completion of theproject.
Capt Amarinder hadtweeted, “Happy to share thatI'll be joining President RamNath Kovind ji in laying foun-dation stone for KartarpurCorridor to InternationalBorder at Dera Baba Nanak,Gurdaspur, on November 26. Itwill be a great moment indeedfor all devotees of Sri GuruNanak Dev.”
A day before, the UnionCabinet on Thursday decidedto develop the corridor fromGurdaspur in Punjab to theinternational border (IB) tofacilitate the passage of pilgrimsto the Kartarpur Sahib gurud-wara in Pakistan as part of the550th birth anniversary cele-brations of the founder ofSikhism, Guru Nanak Dev,
next year.However, the Centre clar-
ified that India's decision wasnot in response to any propos-al from Pakistan.
The resolution was passedafter many weeks of internalconsultations and preparationswithin the government. The
gurdwara is significant for theSikh community since GuruNanak Dev spent 18 years ofhis life in Kartarpur till he diedin 1539. It is located aroundthree km from the internationalborder between both coun-tries and can be seen from theIndian side.
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Chandigarh: Former Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal onFriday asked all the political parties to “rise above the tempta-tion of engaging in a race for credit on this shared aspirationof every Sikh because this is a great achievement for all and ithas happened because of the blessings of the Gurus”.
Badal, after paying obeisance at Gurdwara Ber Sahib atSultanpur Lodhi on the 550th parkash utsav of Guru Nanak Dev,asked one and all, “Let us all celebrate this achievement togeth-er without getting into a race for credit, even though I knowthat this has been one of the longest standing demands of theSAD and the SGPC and they have waged struggle for it.”
“But this occasion transcends politics. It is a victory of theKhalsa Panth and it is something beyond party lines,” said Badal.
Badal said that the credit for the opening of the corridorto Kartarpur Sahib must go mainly to every member of the‘Nanak Nam Leva Sangat’ who had been praying daily for thepast over 70 years for khulle darshan deedar and seva samb-hal (free access and service) of all the Gurdhams from whichthe Sikh sangat (community) had been weaned away.
“Everyone among us is free to take credit, but the true cred-it goes to akal purakh and the great Guru Sahiban who answeredthe prayers of Sikh Sangat in this regard,” he said.
“But since the final official and formal decision in this regardhas to be taken by the government of the day, I must expressmy gratitude for the official decision to the NDA Governmentand especially to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi who tookthe initiative to announce the construction of a state-of-the-art corridor on the Indian side of the access. However, even thePrime Minister would be the first to give credit for this to thegreat Gurus,” he added. PNS
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Along with Union ministerfor Drinking Water and
Sanitation, Uma Bharti, chiefminister Trivendra SinghRawat inaugurated theVaikunth Chaturdashi Melaand development exhibitionat Srinagar on Friday.
On this occasion , 11,000people took an oath to main-tain the cleanliness of theGanga river.
The CM also unveiled theAlkeshwar bathing ghat andMoksha ghat constructed at acost of Rs 11 crore at Srinagaralong with ITI Moksha Ghatbuilt at a cost of Rs 2.97 crore.The CM also announced vari-ous developmental works in thearea on the occasion.
Speaking at GangaSwachchhta Sammelan on theoccasion, the Union ministerappreciated the state govern-ment making all the villages sit-uated on riverbanks open defe-cation free (ODF). She con-gratulated the chief minister forimposing a ban on polythene inthe state.
Banning polythene willsave the Himalayas and alsoconserve fertile land. Sheemphasised the need for girleducation and said that edu-cated girls would help in devel-oping the society and take itahead. Chief MinisterTrivendra Singh Rawat saidthat an ancient fair is held at theSamadhi of Mata Sita in Kotblock of the district.
The people have great faithin the Samadhi and the state
government will prepare a solidwork plan to bring the placebefore the entire world.He saidthat the state government iscommitted to develop it as agreat centre of faith in the com-ing days.
He said that 22 lakh fam-ilies of the state will be bene-fitted by Atal AyushmanUttarakhand Yojana fromDecember 25 on the birthanniversary of former PrimeMinister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.Uttarakhand will be the firststate to offer such facilities tosuch a large number of people.
Chief Minister said thatUttarakhand has become thefirst state which has issuedgovernment order for the envi-ronmental flow of Ganga'scontinuous stream.
He said that if any projectin the state is formulated, thenit will be necessary to have 15per cent environmental flowaccording to scientificapproach.
The minister of State forHigher Education and localMLA Dhan Singh Rawat alsoexpressed his views on theoccasion. Stressing that NITwould not be shifted out ofSrinagar, he also demandedconstruction of auditorium, a52-bed hospital and a newbridge in Srinagar.
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International Gita Mahotsav2018 will be organised from
December 7-23 in Haryana’sKurukshetra city.
Announcing this, HaryanaChief Minister Manohar Lal onFriday said for the first time,Gita Mahotsav will also beorganized in Mauritius in themonth of February 2019.Besides, Mauritius will be thepartner country in the cele-brations of upcomingInternational Gita Mahotsav2018 at Kurukshetra, he said.
The State Government'sefforts to promote the teachingof sacred 'Srimad BhagavadGita' at the global level hasstarted yielding fruitful resultswith countries showing inter-est to partner with Haryana forcelebrations of Gita Mahotsav,Manohar Lal said while talkingto the mediapersons at NewDelhi.
While national BJPPresident Amit Shah would bethe chief guest on inauguralprogramme on December 13,External Affairs MinisterSushma Swaraj and formerPresident Pranab Mukherjeewould remain present onDecember 18.
He said that the presentState Government has beenorganising the Gita Mahotsav atinternational level since 2016.
This, year, the InternationalGita Mahotsav -2018 to beorganised from December 7 to23, would have Mauritius aspartner country and Gujarat aspartner state.
The International GitaMahotsav, an annual event, isorganized every year in collab-oration with KurukshetraDevelopment Board (KDB) atKurukshetra.On this occasion,he also greeted the people on theauspicious occasion of KartikPurnima and 550th PrakashParv of Guru Nanak Dev.
He said the KDB who hasbeen organizing programmesand events for the promotionof Gita has also completed its50 years on November 23.
The programme of GitaJayanti started in the year 1989.Gradually, the Gita jayantiMohtsav was started organizingat national level. However, thepresent State Government hasbeen organizing Gita Mahotsavof international level since2016, he added.
The Chief Minister saidthat the main event would beorganized from December 13to December 18. HaryanaGovernor Satyadeo Narain,Tripura Governor Prof KaptanSingh Solnaki, OdishaGovernor Prof. Ganeshi Laland other prominent person-alities would also grace theevent with their presence.
He said that besides the Artand Culture Minister ofMauritius, the event would beattended by diplomats of 15 dif-ferent countries.
While underlining the sig-nificance of Gita in the mentaland spiritual development ofhuman being, he said that theLord Krishna had delivered thecelestial message of Gita on theholy land of Kurukshetra 5156years ago.The episode wasunique in itself as the battlefieldsaw simultaneous use ofweapons and scripture. Variousprominent personalities includ-ing the astronaut SunitaWilliams has acknowledgedthe significance of this holybook, Manohar Lal said.
The Chief Minister furthersaid that the International GitaMahotsav which would saw theparticipation from prominentsaints like Shri Shri RaviShankar, Swami Ramdev, andShankracharya and varioussocial and religious organiza-tions would also be organizedat district and block level.
For the first time, it hasbeen decided to organize “GitaSansad” in more than 30 col-leges of the state in which dis-cussion would be held on thesacred scripture so as to effec-tively disseminate the messageof Gita among the students.Apart from this, to spread themessage of global peace andharmony.
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The Mahagathbandhan orgrand alliance comprising
Congress, JMM, JVM, RJDand the Left in the State has topass through some testingtimes ahead of the main bat-tles, i.e. Lok Sabha andAssembly polls due next year.
Coming together in thename of anti-BJP bloc it had areadymade opportunity in the
form of Kolebira Assemblybypoll but it seems the partieshave let it go. Both the majorcomponents of the grandalliance- JMM and Congress-are jostling to get the seat fortheir candidate and seek sup-port from the rest to securewin in the bypoll without evenlooking at Menon Ekka.
The wife of unseated three-time MLA Enosh Ekka ideal-ly could have been the first
candidate of the grand alliancein the State with better chancesto win it, admit leaders fromboth the parties. “She couldhave been a good candidate tosupport to but it was per-ceived within the party lead-ership that tainted trail ofEnosh Ekka could prove cost-ly for us in future. He is namedin several corruption casesand very recently got convict-ed in a murder case.
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Members of Sikh commu-nity celebrated birth
anniversary of their first guruGuru Nanak Dev with devo-t ion andenthusiasm.Thousands ofdevotees took part in a "nagarkirtan" organised under theaegis of the Central GurdwaraParbhandak Committee,Jamshedpur. Devotees par-ticipating in the processionrecited Japji Sahib, shabad"Sat Guru Nanak pargatya"and "Ooncha dar babe Nanakda".
In view of the birthanniversary of Guru NanakDev j i most of theGurudwaras have been deco-rated nicely and massive pro-cessions are being taken outon this occasion. SpecialArdas prayers are being per-formed and lungers commu-nity feast are being organisedto mark the occasion.Theprocession started fromRamdas Bhatta gurudwaraand passed through variousparts of the town
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India on Friday lodged aprotest with Pakistan over the
alleged harassment of IndianHigh Commission officials inIslamabad and the denial ofaccess to Indian Sikh pilgrimsvisiting that country. NewDelhi also expressed "graveconcern" over reportedattempts to "incite" communaldisharmony and "promotesecessionist tendencies" duringthe ongoing visit of pilgrimswith an aim to undermineIndia's sovereignty and terri-torial integrity during theongoing visit of pilgrims there.
This development signal-ing further worsening of bilat-eral ties took place a day afterIndia and Pakistan agreed todevelop a corridor on theirrespective sides of the interna-tional border to link a historicSikh shrine in Kartarpur inPakistan. Meanwhile, PunjabMinister Navjot Singh Sidhuthanked the Government fordeveloping the infrastructurefor the pilgrims for theKartarpur shrine. The decision
to develop infrastructure wastaken in a Union Cabinet meet-ing on Thursday.
As regards the protest, anExternal Ministry statementsaid here "India has todaylodged a strong protest with theGovernment of Pakistan thatdespite having been grantedprior travel permission by theMinistry of Foreign Affairs ofPakistan, the Consular officialsof the High Commission ofIndia in Islamabad wereharassed and denied access onNovember 21 and 22 atGurudwara Nankana Sahiband Gurudwara Sacha Sauda."There were reports that pro-
Khalistani banners were shownto the Indian pilgrims whilethey were on their way to thetwo Sikh shrines.
"Pakistan has been calledupon to take all measures to notallow its territory to be used forany hostile propaganda andsupport for secessionist ten-dencies against India in keep-ing with the commitmentsmade under the SimlaAgreement, 1972 and endorsedin the Lahore Declaration,1999," the statement said. TheIndian pilgrims are visitingPakistan under a bilateral pro-tocol.
"Pakistan has been remind-
ed that such actions are not inconsonance with the statedintentions of Pakistan to facil-itate the visits of Indian Sikhpilgrims, especially as we com-memorate the 550th BirthAnniversary of Guru NanakDevji," the statement said.
On the issue of denial ofaccess, it said the access wasdenied despite the PakistanForeign Ministry granting theIndian officials prior travelpermission. As a result of the
harassment, the officials werecompelled to return toIslamabad without performingtheir diplomatic and consularduties vis-a-vis Indian pil-grims, it added. Indian officialssaid this is the third consecu-tive visit of Indian Sikh pil-grims when Pakistan has pre-vented the Indian HighCommission officials frommeeting the Indian nationalson the pretext of security.
The External AffairsMinistry termed the denial ofaccess an attempt to deflectattention from Pakistan's vio-lation of international legalinstruments and conventionslike the Vienna Convention onDiplomatic Relations and theVienna Convention onConsular Relations.
Pakistan has been remind-ed that this is in contrast to thetreatment meted out to theirHigh Commissioner and theConsular officials in New Delhiwho have been provided fullaccess to meet the Pakistani pil-grims who are currently inIndia on pilgrimage to KalyarSharif, the statement said.
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Chief Election CommissionerOP Rawat on Friday said
that Assembly elections inJammu & Kashmir will be heldwithin the next six months.Rawat did not rule out the pos-sibility of holding polls in theState before the Lok Sabha pollsscheduled to be held next year.The EC is expected to meet nextweek to this effect.
"SC has ruled wheneversuch dissolution takes place, theCommission should hold elec-tions on 1st occasion and in nocase, later than 6 months. Forcommission, 6 months is goodenough for getting preparednessat satisfactory level. Law andorder situation in Jammu &Kashmir will also be kept inmind," Chief ElectionCommissioner OP Rawat said.
The CEC said that theCommission came to knowabout dissolution of J&K
assembly on November 21. "Now commission will have
to gather all other facts relatingto the State. Next week we'lldeliberate upon as to howshould we go about planning forelections to that house", theCEC said.
The Jammu & KashmirGovernor Satya Pal Malik dis-solved the Assembly onWednesday evening, afterPeople's Democratic Partyleader Mehbooba Mufti stakedclaim to form Governmentalong with her arch-rival OmarAbdullah's National Conference(NC) and the Congress. Theyclaimed the support of 56 law-makers in the 87-member StateAssembly.
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An year after obtaininglicense for cultivation of
cannabis (marijuana) inJammu & Kashmir to studytheir medicinal properties, theCouncil of Scientific andIndustrial Research (CSIR) hasnow an ambitious plan to con-duct clinical trials of the drugson terminally ill patients ofcancer, epilepsy and sickle cellanemia— a blood disorder dis-ease that afflicts over 2 crorepeople, particularly in tribalareas in the country.
"We want to conduct clin-ical trials of the drugs on ter-minally ill patients at the TataMemorial Hospital for cancer,at AIIMS for epilepsy andSickle Cell InstituteChhattisgarh (SCIC) for sick-le cell anaemia to find its effi-cacy," said Dr RamVishwakarma , director of theIndian Institute of IntegrativeMedicine (IIIM), a J&K basedlab of the CSIR.
He was speaking at anevent 'Cannabis R&D in India:A Scientific, Medical & LegalPerspective' held here onFriday. Last year, the CSIR-IIIMgot research approval to growcannabis for medicinal usage inJammu & Kashmir in collabo-ration with Bombay HempCompany (BOHECO), a
Mumbai-based firm.Dr Vishwakarma said that
not all cannabis plants can beused for medical purpose. Wehave already started collectingand cultivating selected breedof cannabis. Trials are alsobeing conducted on animalsand once it is completed, wewill place it for approval fromthe Drug Controller General ofIndia for trial on humans.
The IIIM Directorexplained that all drugsobtained from marijuana planthave an important medicalingredient called cannabidiol,but the plant itself has beenbanned because of anothercomponent, called tetrahydro-cannabinol (THC). In otherwords, Cannabidiol is one ofmore than 80 active cannabi-noid chemicals, yet unlikeTHC, it does not produce a
high.Also the IIIM, Indian
Council of Medical Research(ICMR) and Department ofBiotechnology (DBT) will soonsign an agreement to carryahead the research programmeon a larger scale.
While India is yet to startany human trial, the US drugregulator has already approveda cannabis-based drugEpidiolex recently for the firsttime to treat epileptic syn-dromes.
Experts including scientistsat the event called for tweakingthe legal regulatory system onthe lines of countries likeCanada and the Netherlands toexpand the interpretation anddefinition of cannabis and itsby-products so that cannabis-based medicines become morewidely available.
The cannabis plant and itscommonly used forms likeganja, bhang, charas etc. con-tain many chemicals whichare not psychoactive, and areseen to have opposite actions tothat of THC(Tetrahydrocannabinol) , DrVivek Benegal, Professor,Centre for Addiction Medicine,NIMHANS said.
"One such chemical,Cannabidiol, is arousing inter-est in the scientific communi-ty due to its medical and ther-apeutic capabilities. But themolecule must be subject tostringent and scientifically rig-orous testing. This is difficultdue to its current ambiguousposition under the law in India,especially the NDPS Act," hesaid.
Earlier, Minister of Statefor Prime Minister's Office DrJitendra Singh too favouredthe medical usage of cannabisnoting that there have beenseveral indications of its ben-efits for the management ofchronic diseases like diabeteswhich cause excruciating neu-rological pain and for whichcurrently there is hardly anyrelief.
"There is a very thin linebetween use, misuse and abuseof a substance, and it is ourresponsibility to draw thatline," the Minister said.
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The Left parties on Fridaycondemned the dissolu-
tion of Jammu & KashmirAssembly, "at the behest" of BJPand RSS. The CPI(M) PolitBureau in statement thatGovernor Satya Pal Malik hasno business to decide on theideologies of political parties inthe valley even as CPI GeneralSecretary Sudhakar Reddyaccused the Governor ofbecoming a tool in the handsof Sangh Parivar.
"The action of the Jammu& Kashmir Governor, dissolv-ing the legislative Assembly, atthe behest of the Centre, is anillegal and unconstitutionalstep. The Governor has nobusiness to decide that partieswith "opposing ideologies" can-not form a suitableGovernment. By this yardstick,the PDP-BJP Governmentshould not have been allowedto be formed after the elections.All that the Governor can do isto ask the leader who is stak-ing claim with majority supportto prove that majority on thefloor of the house," saidCPI(M) Polit Bureau.
"Governor Malik actingunder Modi-Shah dictates notonly switched off the faxmachine but also switched offdemocracy in J&K. The Modiadministration has shown scantrespect for democratic institu-tions and this act has onlyshown that they will go to anyextent to retain power. Shameon the anti-democratic atti-tudes of Modi-BJP-RSSbrigade," said Sudhakar Reddy.
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Against the backdrop of thedeadliest deluge in Kerala,
the IMD on Friday said a newtechnology has been developedto assess the rise of water levelin rivers and reservoirs by rainand which can help StateGovernments to minutely mon-itor the impact of rainfall. Thetechnology called the 'ImpactBased Forecasting Approach'shows "pre-event scenario" thatcan help authorities in takingreal-time decisions.
At an event organised by theCentre for Science andEnvironment, IMD DirectorGeneral KJ Ramesh said thenew technology will be helpful
for every state authority to takedecision. "We can run this sys-tem in pre-event scenario. Weare now in a position to use tothis technology into service. Weshould be able to generate a sce-nario where we can take deci-sions to release water or notrelease it," he said. The IMD DGadmitted that excessive rainfallthat led to floods in Kerala were
a result of climate change and interms of rainfall it was veryheavy.
The heavy downpour thatravaged Kerala for a fortnightending August 21 caused deathof around 500 people and eco-nomic damages worth over Rs40,000 crore. Kerala ChiefMinister Pinarayi Vijayan hadsaid in the State Assembly thatthere were "lapses" on the partof the IMD's rain forecast.
The IMD had forecast anestimated 98.5 mm rain in thestate between 9 and 15 August,but Kerala received was 352.2mm of rainfall, Vijayan said.
"The number of cycloneshave increased from 10 to 18every year as reported in Nature
magazine and secondly quan-tum of precipitation which was13 days has come down to 10days," he said.
IMD issues its forecast forthe June-September monsoonseason in April, which is basedon the Ensemble StatisticalForecasting System that uses fivepredictors. These predictorsalong with some equations areused by scientists to carry out astatistical analysis to finallycome out with a forecast.
The problem is that thismethod uses data from the past100 years to come up with aforecast when many of the rela-tionships between global climatefactors have changed.
The dynamical forecast sys-
tem, on the other hand, is basedon current physical observationsof the atmosphere, cloud prop-erties and oceans, which canthen be used to get a forecast.The observations are used torun the model on a supercom-puter at IITM Pune to arrive ata rainfall forecast
There is another technolo-gy which would help in identi-fying warm ocean segmentsthat are contributing to therapid intensification of the sys-tems.
Cyclone Ockhi's unpre-dictability was due to suchwarm ocean segments, follow-ing which the technology wasdeveloped in October, Rameshsaid.
Ockhi is the first severecyclonic storm in almost 40years to have travelled about2,400 kilometres from the Bayof Bengal to as far as the Gujaratcoast, a senior Met Departmentofficial said.
CSE Director GeneralSunita Narain stressed on theneed to plan "deliberately fordrainage" to prevent disasterslike Kerala floods.
"Every river, pond, paddyfield and city should be mappedand protected at all costs,"Narain said.
"Every home, institution,village and city must be requiredto do rainwater harvesting sothat rain can be channelised andrecharged," she said.
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Haryana Chief MinisterManohar Lal Khattar, who
was here to announce the 17-day-long Gita Jubilee festival inKurukshetra from December 7,said on Friday that there was noscope for an ordinance on build-ing Ram Temple at the disput-ed site in Ayodhya.
He, however, asserted thatthe temple should be con-structed at the birth place ofLord Ram and efforts werethere to build consensus on theissue.
Addressing a press confer-ence at the Red Fort, the ChiefMinister said a number of dig-nitaries, including BJP presidentAmit Shah, External AffairsMinister Sushma Swaraj andformer President Pranab
Mukherjee attend the event."The Haryana
Government's efforts to pro-mote the teachings of holy bookat the global level has startedyielding results as for the firsttime the festival will be organ-ised in Mauritius in Februarynext year. Mauritius will be thepartner country in the celebra-tions of upcoming InternationalGita Mahotsav," Khattar said.
To an question on buildingRam temple in Ayodhya, hesaid, "The temple should be builtat the birth place of Lord Ram.Efforts are being made to buildconsensus on this issue toensure that temple is built at thebirth place of Lord Ram."
"There is no scope for ordi-nance on it," he said.
On the Gita Jubilee Festival,Khattar said the main event
would be organised fromDecember 13 to December 18,which would be attended byHaryana Governor SatyadeoNarain, Tripura GovernorKaptan Singh Solnaki, OdishaGovernor Ganeshi Lal and oth-ers.
Shri Shri Ravi Shankar,Swami Ramdev, Shankracharya,various foreign dignitaries,including the Art and CultureMinister of Mauritius and diplo-mats of 15 countries wouldattend the event, he said.
The Haryana chief ministeralso informed reporters that'Gita Sansad' would be held inmore than 30 colleges of thestate for the first time, in whichdiscussion would be held on thescripture to effectively dissem-inate the message of the Gitaamong students.
New Delhi: A man, who wason death row after being con-victed by the High Court ofraping and murdering aneight-year-old girl in Rajasthanover five years ago, has got areduced sentence of life termfrom the Supreme Courtwhich acquitted him of thecharge of sexually assaultingthe minor.
The court observed thatsince the man was acquittedfor offence of raping the girlunder provisions of theProtection of Children fromSexual Offences (POCSO) Act,it was not a "fit case" to imposedeath penalty on him as hewas neither a habitual offend-er nor having any criminalbackground.
"Be that as it may, sincethe offence of rape is notproved and as the offence ofmurder is proved beyond rea-sonable doubt, the accused(Prahlad) is liable to be con-victed for the offence undersection 302 (murder) IPC," abench of justices N V Ramana, MMShantanagoudar and M RShah said.
Prahlad was awarded cap-ital punishment by the trialcourt in September 2015 afterbeing convicted for theoffences of sexual assault underthe POCSO Act and murderunder the Indian Penal Code(IPC).
The Rajasthan High Courtin September 2016 had con-firmed the trial court's judge-ment and upheld the deathpenalty given to him in thecase which was lodged in July2013. PTI
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New Delhi: Global rights body Amnestyand a group of activists on Friday allegedthat individuals declared as "irregularforeigners" were living in "deplorableconditions" in detention centres in Assam,and sought introduction of a "statutorytime limit" on their confinement.
Amnesty India Friday also released areport here titled — 'Between Fear andHatred: Surviving Migration Detention inAssam' and urged the Assam Governmentto ensure that an "operations manual" fordetention centres is created that address-es the specific circumstances of detainees.
Asmita Basu, Amnesty India'sPrograms Director, said, the nearly 30-pagereport draws from "empirical data gatheredthrough semi-structured interviews withkey stakeholders and informants, includ-ing six individuals who had been former-ly detained, and families of seven indi-viduals who had been or are in detention".
"There is no statutory limit on the peri-od for which individuals declared as'irregular foreigners' can be detained.Also, such people are kept inside criminalprisons along with convicts and undertrialprisoners," Amnesty India has alleged inits report.
The circumstances and conditions ofdetention "cause harm" to individuals'mental and physical health, and the for-
eigners tribunals, which adjudicate citi-zenship cases, "follow flawed processes" toidentify "irregular foreigners", it alleged.
As on September 25, 2018, there are1,037 people detained for being "irregularforeigners" in detention centres housedinside prisons in Assam, Basu said.
"There are children who grow up withtheir mothers inside prison. Manydetainees suffer from mental and physicalhealth issues associated with the conditionsof their detention. Healthcare services areinadequate, and there are few avenues forrecreation," according to the report.
Amnesty India researchers also inter-viewed two persons who visited detentioncentres as part of a mission conducted bythe NHRC, two doctors who have workedin detention centres, three academiciansworking on the political economy ofAssam and representatives of three civilsociety organisations in Assam who workon land rights, minority rights and cor-ruption, Basu said.
The rights body in the report has urgedthe Centre to "ensure, that in any givencase, migration detention is lawful, nec-essary, proportionate and used only as alast resort and a statutory time limit fordetaining irregular foreigners be intro-duced".
It has also asked to "significantly
reduce" the use of detention for 'irregularforeigners', ensuring that far fewer peopleare detained and that anyone who isdetained is held for a far shorter time.
"The Government of Assam shouldensure that persons detained under theprovisions of the Foreigners Act, 1946, aresegregated from convicts and undertrials,and housed in separate detention centreswith basic amenities," the report said.
It also asked to "ensure that an oper-ations manual for detention centres is cre-ated that addresses the specific circum-stances of detainees".
"Ensure the right to the highest attain-able standard of medical care to alldetainees, including access to appropriatemental health care through psychiatrists,psychologists and torture and traumacounsellors," the report said.
The Amnesty India also urged theAssam Government to "permit periodicaudits of detention centres by independentauditors".
Social activist Harsh Mander, and afew other activists, at an interaction host-ed by the rights body here after thelaunch of the report, also alleged that thecondition of the detention camps in thestate were "extremely bad" and system issuch that it means practically an "infinitedetention" for them. PTI
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New Delhi: A group of citizensunder the banner of 'HinduCharter' demanded on Fridaythe Government earmark�10,000 crore for restoration ofdilapidated temples and heritageof the country, and put a banexport of beef.
A workshop was held herewhere participants discussedan eight-point charter ofdemands, including equal rightsfor practitioners of various reli-gions in the country.
Addressing the gathering,former Delhi Minister and rebelAAP legislator Kapil Mishraalleged Hindus have been treat-ed as "second class citizen" in thecountry by successiveGovernments. He demanded acomplete ban on export of beef.Speakers at the workshopdemanded the Government setup a body with a seed money ofat least �10,000 crore for restora-tion of dilapidated temples andheritage institutions. PTI
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At the time of writing, BikramjitSingh alias Bikram, one of thetwo alleged perpetrators of thegrenade attack on a Nirankaricongregation which left three
dead and 20 wounded in Amritsar onNovember 18, has been arrested. The other,Avtar Singh, remains at large, with secu-rity personnel assiduously looking forhim. Simultaneously, efforts are reported-ly afoot to squelch any attempt to revive theviolence that terrorist groups, created,trained, armed and provisioned byPakistan’s Inter-Services IntelligenceDirectorate (ISI), had unleashed to carvePunjab, and some adjoining territories, outof India and establish thereon a sovereignState called Khalistan (Land of the Pure).Those suspected of association with terror-ist outfits are being questioned. Guest hous-es have been searched to ferret out suspi-cious new arrivals. Highway patrolling hasbeen intensified, as has been surveillanceof key installations and public places.
All this is hardly surprising. The vio-lence, that had raged for more than adecade, had consumed as many as 21,469lives and plunged Punjab into a nightmarebefore being comprehensively defeated in1993 by the Punjab Police under the inspi-rational leadership of its director-general,KPS Gill. There have, however, been cred-ible reports over several years that the ISIwas trying to revive Khalistani terrorismand link it with Pakistan’s unconventionalwar against India in Jammu & Kashmir.Indeed, shortly after the Amritsar outrage,Punjab Chief Minister, Captain AmarinderSingh had stated that it marked an attemptby the ISI to disturb the peace in the State.
His statement gains credence from thefact that the Austria-made Arges Type 84fragmentation hand grenade, used in theAmritsar attack, is widely used by thePakistani army. Not just that, such agrenade was reportedly to be used in an ISI-backed terror attack which was foiled withthe arrest on November 1, 2018, of oneShabnamdeep Singh alias MohinderLahoria. The grenade, reportedly provid-ed by an ISI contact, was found in Lahoria’spossession. The latter, who had beenasked to target police posts and publicplaces, confessed to have been receivinginstructions from his handlers in Pakistan.
As pointed by Kamal Davar in Trystwith Perfidy: The Deep State of Pakistan,which provides a comprehensive overviewof the ISI’s activities in India, the outfit “hasbeen crafting its strategy for fanningsecessionism in Punjab since decadesand deviously tapping some politically dis-gruntled elements to forge them into apotent force.” It stepped up its activities inthe early 1980s when it began coordinat-ing the Afghan jihad against the Sovietforces with funds and weapons receivedfrom the United States and Saudi Arabia.
In Bin Laden: The Man WhoDeclared War on America,Yossef Bodansky, then Directorof the Congressional TaskForce on Terrorism andUnconventional Warfare inthe US, wrote, “The ISI capi-talised on the rapidly expand-ing and lavishly funded train-ing and support system for theAfghan Mujaheedin as coverfor expanded sponsorship ofand support for other insur-gent groups dedicated to sub-versive activities in India.”
Bodansky further stated,“The main reason the ISIdecided to keep the CIA out ofthe [training] camps was theextent of training and supportnon-Afghan ‘volunteers’ andothers were getting in thesecamps. Most numerous werethe thousands of Islamisttrainees from Indian Kashmirand to a lesser extent the Sikhsfrom the Punjab.” He adds thatin “1985 and 1986, as thequantity and quality of theweapons improved, Sikh ter-rorism and subversion in thePunjab and throughout Indiashowed increased militarisa-tion and radicalisation.”
The ISI did not abandonits sinister efforts even after theKhalistan movement wascrushed in 1993. Its attempts,however, drew a blank for along time as Punjab hadenough of murder, forciblemarriages, rape and extortionby the terrorists and the collat-eral consequences of the cam-paign against terrorism,including the virtual collapseof normal life. Things havebeen changing in the past sev-eral years.
What warrants particularconcern is the fact that the lat-est incidents are part of a con-tinuum of the renewed terror-ist violence in — and flow ofarms to — Punjab since 2015.The arms seized includeChinese-made AK-47 andmodified MP9 rifles, 7.62mm pistols, .32 bore revolversand hand grenades.Enormous quantities ofammunition have also beenapprehended. There are alsoindications of an increase insupport among people.
The reasons include farm-ers’ discontent, perceived injus-tice to Sikhs and uneasinessover the rise of an assertiveHindu right. If all this facilitatesthe recruitment of militants,propaganda by pro-Khalistangroups flourishing in countrieslike Canada, the United States,Britain, Germany, Malaysiaand Thailand, keeps the move-ment alive among the Sikhs ofdiaspora. To cite an example, abody which calls itself Sikhs forJustice organised in TrafalgarSquare, London, on August 12,2018, a rally demanding aglobal referendum amongSikhs in 2020 on the creationof a sovereign Khalistan.
Funds from such elements,supplementing the massiveamounts from the ISI, reachKhalistani terror groups inIndia, as does their anti-Indiaand pro-Khalistan propagan-da. These and those generat-ed by the ISI and indigenousterrorist sources, spread rapid-ly through social media, particularly WhatsApp andFacebook Messenger groups,spurring separatism.
The question is: What is tobe done? The first and mostimportant effort should be toaddress the genuine griev-ances and apprehensions Sikhsharbour. Only a few of thosewho murdered, maimed andlooted during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots have been pun-ished. The rest have to bebrought to book. Seriousattempts should be made toameliorate the plight of farm-ers, which is acute in mostparts of India and not merelyPunjab. Equally, the spread ofmajoritarianism, intolerant ofminorities and determined tosmother India’s rich diversityand fit the entire country intothe cultural straitjacket advo-cated by its protagonists, mustbe halted and reversed.
Simultaneously attemptsto revive terrorism and insur-gency have to be defeated onthe ground. Efforts to stanchthe flow of funds and propa-ganda from abroad must bestepped up and pro-Khalistanpropaganda abroad coun-tered. The most importantelement here is intelligencewithout which no terroristmovement can be defeated.Efforts to further improve itmust receive a thrust, as mustthose to enhance the ability ofthe security forces to act onthe information received.Finally, terrorists must befirmly dealt with. The mes-sage to the world must beclear: Attempts to reviveinsurgency and terrorism inPunjab will be crushed.
(The writer is ConsultantEditor, The Pioneer, and anauthor)
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Sir — This refers to the editorial,“Manhandling J&K” (November23). Jammu & Kashmir GovernorSatya Pal Malik’s decision to dis-solve the Assembly at the stage wasillegal. The Jammu & KashmirAssembly could have been justifi-ably dissolved right at the fall of thePDP-BJP Government. Now, whenthe NC, PDP and Congress havejoined hands in Jammu & Kashmirto form an alliance Governmentand staked claim, the Governorabruptly decided for the dissolu-tion of the Assembly, citing themost unconvincing reasons:Political parties of opposing ideolo-gies were coming together to forma Government and the move wasto check horse-trading.
Malik is a former BJP leader,appointed as Governor here afterimposition of President’s Rule inthe State following the fall of theMehbooba Mufti-led PDP-BJPGovernment. He should havechecked his facts. The alliancebetween the PDP and the BJP, too,was one of two parties havingopposing ideologies.
By this episode, it has onceagain been proved that formerpoliticians, appointed as Governors
by the Government at the helm, actas party agents and are morewatchful of the interest of the partythan of the State.
MC JoshiLucknow
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Sir — This refers to the editorial,“Storm in Tweecup” (November
22). It will be wrong to treatTwitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s hold-ing up of a poster, which read‘Smash Brahmanical Patriarchy,’ asa minor matter. It represents amalicious mindset that deliberate-ly attempts to malign Hinduism,particularly, Brahmins.
It is unfortunate that somerefuse to acknowledge the pioneer-ing efforts of upper caste Hindus,including Brahmins, who rejected
age-old evils of casteism and castediscrimination while drafting theConstitution for a democraticrepublic in independent India andintroduced reservations for sched-uled castes and tribes inGovernment jobs and education.Impressive advances have beenmade but much still remains to bedone.
M RatanVia mail
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Sir — This refers to the editor-ial, “Savaging the civilised”(November 23). John AllenChau, an American nationalwho tried to enter the NorthSentinel Island in the Andaman,was killed by the tribesmen. Asa matter of fact, inhabitants ofthe Sentinel islands, as also theJarawas, have remained hostileto outsiders. They are believedto be cut off from the rest of theworld, and have expressed stiffresistance to any outside intru-sion too.
Chau tried to enter theisland to establish contact withthe tribesmen in a bid to civilisethem. It was his unrequitedlove for humanity that usurpedhis life. The Sentinelese tribemust be transformed into cul-tured citizens by providing themeducation. If being an outsider,Chau had shown such a sympa-thy for the inhabitants, howmuch more can be done forthese tribesmen?
TK NandananKochi
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In 1986, I went with a college friendto what was called Panorama Centrein Saddar, Karachi. Panorama at that
time was a ‘posh’ place with lavishoffices and high-end clothing shops.When we were about to enter one ofthe elevators in the building, the dooropened and a moustachioed manemerged carrying a five or six-year-oldboy. They were followed by threemore burly men who seemed to be hisassistants. As they were stepping out ofthe lift, the child announced: “Duniyagol hai (the world is round).” The assis-tants smiled and clapped, saying“zabardast, zabardast (wonderful).”
After few minutes of loitering onthe second floor, we pressed the ‘down’button on the lift. The door slid open,and out came the same posse. Lo and
behold, the kid announced: “Duniya golhai.” Again, the assistants praised thekid. Some time later when we wereabout to exit the building from a glassdoor near a clothes outlet, we clearlyheard it again: “Duniya gol hai.” It camefrom inside the shop. But this time itwasn’t followed by any claps or praise.
This irrelevant memory came tomind when recently I read “VerbalConditioning and Behaviour”, a bookby psychologist JP Das. According toDas, when a word or phrase is vigor-ously repeated, it loses its meaning tothe listener, who then begins to perceiveit as meaningless. In 1962, Leon James,a professor of psychology, called thisphenomenon “semantic satiation.”Interestingly, though conducteddecades ago, James’ work on the sub-ject is only now being fully absorbedby an active service industry, which foryears, underlined the importance ofrepeated messages. That industry isadvertising.
Author and journalist ZacharyPetit, in his 2015 article for Mental Floss,wrote: “Marketers are rethinking theirsales ploys, thanks to Leon’s ideas.” For
example, the term “Black Friday” onceheld a unique meaning for shoppers,but according to Petit, “thanks to itsoveruse, Black Friday is no longer thevaluable hook it once was.” Anotherinteresting example can be the word‘revolution’. In 1995, a journalist col-league of mine and I took up a projectafter noticing the frequency of the wordrevolution/revolutionary in Press ads.We scanned various editions of Dawn(at the daily’s library) from 1950 till1995. Our findings indicated that theword ‘revolution’ was only sparsely usedtill the late 1960s, mainly for actualpolitical revolutions.
However, by the late 1960s, theword was frequently repeated byboth, Left and Right mainstreampolitical parties, and even some youthgroups. Then in a mid-1970s editionof Dawn, we came across a Press adof a furniture brand that claimed itsoffice chairs were made with “revolu-tionary Swedish technology.” After thatwe came across ad after ad for elec-tronics, medicines, chocolates, milk,cooking oils and detergent brands, allclaiming that their ways of manufac-
turing were “revolutionary.”By the 1990s, not only the politi-
cal context of the word ‘revolution’ haddisintegrated, so had its marketing con-text. It meant absolutely nothing. It hadreached semantic satiation. There arethree more words/phrases in the con-text of Pakistan, which I believe, havereached semantic satiation. The first is“Islam khatre mein hai” (Islam is in dan-ger). This was repeatedly used duringthe 1946 election in British India inwhich the All-India Muslim Leaguewas contesting to claim a separateMuslim majority country. According tohistorian Dr Mubarak Ali, this phrasewas first used during the KhilafatMovement (1919-1924) by Islamicactivists trying to resurrect theOttoman Caliphate.
After the country’s creation, the“Islam khatre mein hai”mantra becameassociated with religious parties whohave often repeated it during variouspolitical and social episodes, such asAyub Khan’s ‘secular’ policies, the riseof Bhutto’s ‘socialist’ PPP, the emergenceof ethno-nationalism in former EastPakistan, the election of Benazir Bhutto
as Prime Minister, the growth of popmusic and concerts in the 1990s, all theway to the authoring of a NationalAction Plan (NAP) in 2015 and thealleged reforms suggested in the coun-try’s blasphemy laws.
Not only has the phrase lost itsmeaning, it has come down to evokea comical image of an enraged and con-tradictory cleric, foaming at the mouth.The other term that has reachedsemantic satiation is, “Pakistan aiknaazuk morr par kharra hai”(Pakistanis standing at a critical crossroads). Itmeant something when Ayub used it,after coming to power, because itdirectly alluded to the political chaosof the 1950s. It meant somethingwhen Bhutto used it in 1971, becauseEast Pakistan had broken away after acivil war. But ever since Gen Zia usedit to justify his reactionary 1977 mili-tary coup, the phrase has gradually lostits veracity.
Almost every Pakistani ruler hasused it, consequently detaching itfrom any convincing context other thanone that has now become an uninten-tional self-parody. ‘Corruption’ as a
word, too, has been overused. Eversince the 1990s, it has been repeated sooften that it now holds different mean-ings for different segments. In the1990s, when it was repeatedly used bythe PML-N, it meant the “corrupt PPP”.When used by the PPP, it meant the“corrupt PML-N” and now when usedby the PTI, it means the “corruptPPP/PML-N mafia.” When used by thePPP and the PML-N, it means the cor-rupt “electables” in the PTI.
Semantic satiation is also a classthing. A friend was having tea at atrendy “dhaba”, which was situatedright beside an actual dhaba.Incidentally, both had the same newschannel on their TV sets. My friendsaid that when a clip came on of PrimeMinister Imran Khan lamenting cor-ruption, he noticed that some youngpeople at the trendy dhaba raised theirheads to casually watch, whereas the‘working-class’ folk kept having theirtea without even glancing at the TV.Probably to them, the word ‘corruption’had lost its meaning. It had becomeinsignificant background noise.
(Courtesy: Dawn)
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Six months ahead of the General Election,three black swans reared their head,putting the first Government to havewon with a majority in 30 years on thedefensive. What is unprecedented is the
timing of these serial optics wherein the CentralBureau of Investigation (CBI) and ReserveBank of India (RBI) issues need resolution andthe Ram Mandir row needs closure. The firstblack swan event was the macabre feudingamong senior officials of the CBI, revealing thedark underbelly of the premier investigationagency at war with itself. Casting a shadow onthe institutional integrity of the CBI diminish-es the credibility of an independent entitywhose reports are crucial on multiple scams,which have political ramifications in the run-upto the forthcoming Lok Sabha election.
The second precursor for a Government atunease with its institutions was of the RBI at warwith the Union Government. Both events haveembarrassed the GOI by sending distressing sig-nals of eroding Central authority.
Subsequently came the third dark swan, aneven bigger fait accompli: The procrastination ofthe Supreme Court hearing on Ayodhya, rele-gating its priority to a civil suit. Prime MinisterNarendra Modi’s signature style has been hisassertive and decisive modus of governance.What the Modi dispensation now confronts isnavigating through three independent institu-tions — the CBI, RBI and the judiciary — whereany Government writ runs scant as these insti-tutions are mandated to function on objectiveand evidence-based facts in the public interest.
The Modi Government, now in an election-mode, needs to retrieve its primacy by not push-ing inconvenient decisions under the carpet. Yet,it must be seen upholding the autonomous func-tioning of independent institutions, like the judi-ciary, Election Commission, Central VigilanceCommission, Comptroller and Auditor Generalof India, CBI and the Central Bank, which arevital to the functionality of vibrant democracies,allowing for an impartial executive to functionwith prudence. However, it is in the SupremeCourt’s deferment of the crucial Ayodhya hear-ing that the biggest silver lining lies for the PrimeMinister to turn critical momentum back in theBJP’s favour. Fulfilment of the Ayodhya promiseis as vital to Modi’s core ideological constituen-cy as is the promise of development.
Conflict between Mint Street and NorthBlock on policy matters was fraught with dis-agreements even during UPA years, with the apexbank remaining conservative on growth versusinflation. Such dissensions are equally prevalentin the US between the Trump Administrationand the Federal Reserve Bank. At the heart ofthe unease between the Government and the RBIwas the hint at invocation of Article 7 of the RBIAct of 1934 that was never been enforced in 83years, which empowers the Government toinstruct the RBI Governor to act on issues theGOI considers in the public interest. Fortunately,this move was averted after the recent RBI meeton November 19. The Central bank’s decisionswill now be board-driven by 13 directors whoare more sensitive to eco-political concerns ofthe Government.
The Government believes the RBIis sitting on higher reserves thanneeded as a buffer for contingencies.Central banks globally provisionaround 14 per cent of their assets asreserves, compared to RBI’s 27 percent. So as the RBI has been over-strin-gent in its risk-reserve assessmentbeyond global norms, the FinanceMinistry rightly claims for transferringthe extra capital that can be put to pro-ductive use to stimulate the economywith more public spending. It can alsoincrease credit flow to the micro, smalland medium enterprises (MSMEs)sector that accounts for millions ofjobs. Spurring growth is all the morecrucial in an election year and publicinterest rightly remains the absoluteprerogative of the sovereign, rangingfrom addressing the need to boost liq-uidity for non-banking finance com-panies (NBFCs) or MSMEs, to provi-sioning for adequate capital require-ments for weak banks.
While the CBI and RBI are sys-temic issues, it is the third issue at theforefront that has enormous emotiveramifications: The Supreme Court’sdecision to defer hearings on the2010 Allahabad High Court order onthe title suit that divided the disput-ed land trilaterally, with one-thirdassigned to the Sunni Wakf Board, andtwo-thirds apportioned to the NirmohiAkhara and the deity. Religious polar-isation is now expected to play out forthe fourth time in the electoral histo-ry as a major theme in the 2019 elec-tion. The BJP has the Ram temple onits political manifesto and hence itmust explore every constitutionaloption to break the impasse. Theconsensus through back-channelnegotiations for an amicable resolutionhas clearly failed.
There is a popular mood of indig-
nation against the apex court’s per-ceived indifference to the majoritycommunity’s sentiments. The vox pop-uli is aggrieved that the court had allthe time to give verdicts within amonth on the film Padmavati, Diwalicrackers, entry of women intoSabarimala temple and even prioritis-ing the PIL on Rafale by asking theGovernment to submit the pricing andstrategic details of the deal within 10days. But it did not take up an emo-tive issue. The judiciary has often beenaccused of overreach. But it is in theselective prioritisation of the apexcourt of deferring the hearing on RamMandir that strikes at the heart ofIndian sentiments, which is clearly acase of judicial underreach.
If the Government could pursuethe SC/ST Act, Triple Talaq and LGBTAct through Ordinance, what stops amajority Government with 282 MPs inthe Lok Sabha and 100 in the RajyaSabha, from “rewriting theConstitution on Indic values?” Theproblem of short-circuiting the judi-cial process through the Ordinanceroute is that it has legal ramifications.The matter is sub-judice, and to jus-tify the Ordinance route by subscrib-ing to ‘faith above law’, overrides theConstitution.
The reason ascribed to deferringthe case, even attempting to push itbeyond the General Election, is thatthe court fears a severe backlash fromeither of the communities if the judge-ment is delivered in anyone’s favour,especially before the poll. A verdictadverse to the building of the mandir,if delivered early next year, could makeit the BJP’s ‘Shah Bano moment’ if itopts to overturn an adverse SupremeCourt judgement.
To turn the tide in its favour, theBJP must al low the Rashtriya
Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and its footsoldiers to gauge the public mood inorder to rebuild momentum for theRam Mandir before the poll. Ofcourse, the legal advice to theGovernment would be against promul-gation of an Ordinance. So, only a lawcan be enacted in Parliament througha joint sitting of both Houses, given theNational Democratic Alliance’s (NDA)poor numbers in the Rajya Sabha. Thisdoes not preclude that the same willnot be subject to appeal, even thoughParliament is the ultimate in law-mak-ing, while the court is supreme in lawinterpretation. It is a foregone conclu-sion that neither ‘Shiv bhakt’ RahulGandhi nor secular parties at ideolog-ical divergence will accede to a con-sensus for a legislation.
However, the decisive optionwould be considering the viability ofa referendum within the next twomonths on the Ayodhya issue. And theposer for the referendum is: “Shouldthe Ram Mandir be built/ or should aMasjid be built/ or should we wait forthe judicial pronouncement?” Becausein a democracy, the peoples’ will issupreme, and all other institutionsmust respect that, as status quoism isnot the solution.
The majority community knows alltoo well that if this feat of building theRam Mandir is not achieved during thisregime, the case will languish in thecourts ad infinitum. While the ModiSarkar will be primarily judged ondevelopment and economic issues, reli-gious sentiments, especially in the Hindiheartland, continue to hold weightage inthe decision-making process of theBJP’s core ideological voter base.
(The writer is author, columnist andChairperson for National Committee onFinancial Inclusion and Literacy forWomen constituted at NITI Aayog)
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The southern city ofMysuru inks its indelible
mark on the ongoingAssembly elections in fiveStates. The Mysuru-basedState owned Mysore Paints &Varnish Ltd has suppliedindelible ink which is popu-larly called election ink to theelection commission of Indiafor the five States which aregoing to polls.
Chhattisgarh has alreadycompleted the election processand the other four StatesMizoram, Rajasthan, MadhyaPradesh and Telangana havealready received the inkthrough election commissionof India. The four States willcomplete election process byDecember 2018.
According to an emailcommunication received fromA. Harakumar, GeneralManager of the Mysuru basedcompany, Mysore Paints &
Varnish Ltd has supplied indeli-ble ink to five States at a cost of�5.20 crores.
In his reply he said thatthey have supplied 10 ml phialsof ink to these States and a totalof 4,12,940 (10 ml) phials forthe ensuing elections. In thisMizoram has received 2,500phials, Chhattisgarh 52,000phials, Madhya Pradesh1,45,000 phials and TelanganaState received 1,27,440 phials ofindelible ink to the process of
democracy in the country. An ISO 9001-2015 and
14001- 2015 certified compa-ny is part of the history ofMysore kings. NalwadiKrishnaraja Wodeyar whoruled the State giving impetusto industry and developmenthas founded this company in1937 to give jobs to local youth.The election commission ofIndia has authorised theMysore Paints to supply elec-tion ink for the elections in the
country. This is the only com-pany in the country which isproducing election ink sincedecades. The election ink tech-nology is developed by CSIR.The company is also develop-ing marker pen for the elec-tions which is in R&D stage.
In addition, the companymanufactures Lead Free (EcoFriendly) paint, Road MarkingPaint, Polyurethane Paint. TheCompany has been rated as“High Performance Capacityand High Financial Unit” bythe National Small Industries
Corporation Ltd. TheGovernment of Karnataka hasawarded the “Annual ChiefMinister’s Ratna Award for theyear 2010-11 and for the year2015-16” for its PerformanceExcellence.
The rationale behind theestablishment of the factory wasto provide employment oppor-tunities locally and for effectiveutilization of the naturalresources of the forest nearby.Since 1962 the company issupplying indelible ink to elec-tions in the country and abroad.
According to officialsources the formula of the inkis a closely guarded secret andhave been sending ink to 30countries, including India,Thailand, Singapore, Nigeria,Malaysia, Cambodia, andSouth Africa. The company hasaround 100 employees andmaking profit since 1995. Madein Karnataka ink is an indeli-ble component in the electionprocess of the country.
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Even as Bihar AssemblySpeaker Vijay Kumar
Choudhary is trying to bringreforms in the functioning ofthe House and come up to theexpectations of the peoples’representatives and the publicat large he is not gettingrequired cooperation from thebureaucrats.
Choudhary who has intro-duced many reforms in bid tostreamline the functioning ofthe parliamentary practiceshas introduced the system ofreceiving questions from themembers online and replyingthem through same channel.The questions received are for-warded to the departmentsconcerned online and the offi-cials are supposed to providereplies online. It has beennamed as Question ReplyManagement System
But what shockedChoudhary was that severaldepartments who had beenforwarded questions did nottake them seriously and almostavoided them. This angered theSpeaker who pulled up thebureaucrats.
Choudhary said for thefive days session beginning onMonday, 471 questions hadbeen filed online by the mem-bers but reply to 310 questions
were yet to be received from tenmajor departments includingeducation, water resources andenergy. He directed theDevelopment Commissionerto take the issue with the offi-cials concerned and himselfmonitor the compliance.
The Speaker said that inorder to bring transparency inthe recruitment policy, some
changes have been affected andthat now the Speaker and theAssembly Secretariat will nolonger have any role in theappointments. Earlier there hadbeen practice of appointment inthe Assembly by the Speaker andhundreds of cases are lying in thecourts against the decisions.
Now the recruitment jobhas been awarded to a Centralagency, which is also responsi-ble for recruitments in theParliament, which has adver-tised posts and sought appli-cations. For 70 vacant posts ofassistants more than 1.68 lakhand for 70 vacancies of GroupC grade over 5.07 lakh appli-cations have been receivedonline. For 60 posts of juniorclerks 70,120 and for 55 postsof reporters 6379 applicationshave come.
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Six local terrorists, includinga top Lashkar-e-Tayyeba
(LeT) commander, were killedin a surgical operation by thesecurity forces in southKashmir’s Bijbehara pocket onFriday morning. There was nocasualty on the security forcesside in the operation that trig-gered protests and shutdown inthe area.
Commander of Srinagarbased XV Corps Lt Gen AKBhatt described the encounteras “big achievement” as therewas no collateral damage in the“surgical operation.”
The operation was carriedout in Setkipora-Shalagund areaof Bijbehara in Anantnag district,around 45 kilometers from here.
The slain terrorists includ-ed Azad Malik alias DadaMalik, a top commander of LeToutfit. The other five terroristswere also locals from Bijbehara,Anantnag, Awantipora andPulwama areas of southKashmir. Malik was amongthree terrorists who wereaccused by the police for con-spiring and executing the killingplot of noted journalist ShujaatBukhari in June this year.
Police had said thatPakistani Lashkar CommanderNaveed Jutt was also involvedin the killing. Jutt had escapedfrom police custody from a civilhospital in Srinagar after killingtwo policemen who were
escorting him. He surfaced insouth Kashmir with a group ofterrorists later.
Talking to media persons inBaramulla Gen Bhatt said thatthe encounter was a “surgicaloperation and is a big achieve-ment for security agencies” asthere were no casualties of forcesor civilians in this operation.
Sources said the gunfighterupted in midnight hours assecurity forces' joint teamlaunched cordon and searchoperation (CASO) on the basisof specific input about thepresence of terrorists in thearea. They said as the forceszeroed in on the suspectedplace and the terrorists hidinginside the area fired indis-criminately towards the forcestriggering gunfight.
Police said there was nocollateral damage in thecounter terrorist operation.“Incriminating materialsincluding huge quantity ofarms and ammunition wererecovered from the site ofencounter. Police has regis-tered a case and initiated inves-tigation in the matter,” policesaid in a statement. “Citizensare requested not to ventureinside the encounter zone sincesuch an area can prove dan-gerous due to stray explosivematerials. People are request-ed to cooperate with police tillthe area is completely sanitizedand cleared of all the explosivesmaterials,” police said.
Reports said multiplerounds of funeral prayers wereheld for slain LeT commander
Azad Malik at his native villageArwani. Reports said that thou-sands of people from variousareas of the south Kashmirreached Arwani and partici-pated in the funeral prayers.Some terrorists reportedlyappeared in the funeral andoffered gun salute to the slaincommander.
Sources said that Bijbeharaand Anantnag towns observedshutdown while the authoritiessuspended train services inthe area.
Clashes between protestersand security forces were alsoreported near encounter siteand Anantnag town. At leastthree persons were injured inthe violent incidents. Themobile internet services alsoremained affected in manyparts of Anantnag district as aprecautionary measure.
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BJP general secretary KSurendran on Friday
alleged that the office of ChiefMinister Pinarayi Vijayan hasbeen “unleashing” an “orches-trated” campaign to keep himbehind bars.
Surendran was speakingto reporters at a court complexat Raanni in Pathanamthittadistrict from where he wasremanded to 14-days judicialcustody for his alleged involve-ment in the protests atSabarimala.
"This is a false case. ChiefMinister 's of f ice hasunleashed an orchestratedattack on me. They are plan-ning to put me in the KannurCentral jail where dreadedcriminals are lodged,"Surendran said.
He was taken into custodyearlier this week from Nilackal,the base camp of Sabarimala,after he refused to go backdespite the police request.
He was arrested for violat-ing prohibitory orders and pre-venting the officers from doingtheir duty.
Surendran was grantedbail on Wednesday in one ofthe cases, but another non-bailable warrant in Kannur,pending against him, prevent-ed his release.
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The Gujarat Anti-TerroristSquad on Friday nabbed a
"hardcore naxal" who wasinvolved in the killing 10 CRPFcommandos in Aurangabad dis-trict of Bihar in 2016 and wasnow working as a factory labour-er in Valsad district by conceal-ing his identity, police said.
The 33-year-old RajeshRavidas, who was declared'wanted' by the Bihar govern-ment, was arrested from Vapitown in Valsad district, theGujarat ATS said.
Among other crimes,Ravidas, a key member of thebanned Communist Party ofIndia (Maoist) outfit, wasinvolved in the killing of 10 com-mandos of the Central ReservePolice Force (CRPF) in a Naxalambush in the Aurangabadforests in 2016, the anti-terrorsquad said in a statement.
Based on a specific tip-off,an ATS team nabbed him fromthe industrial town of Vapi inSouth Gujarat, where he wasworking as a labourer in a fac-tory by concealing his realidentity, said police officials.
According to the ATS,Ravidas, also known as Uttamji,is a "hardcore naxal" involvedin over 50 crimes, includingattacks on security forces, andthe Bihar government haddeclared a reward of �50,000for information on him.
Ravidas was consideredthe 'right hand' for PradyumanSharma, the head of 'specialarea committee' of the CPI(Maoist), Bihar and Jharkhand,the agency said.
The ATS claimed Sharmahad appointed Ravidas as the
'Zonal Commander' of Rajgirarea of Bihar.
Ravidas, a native ofBahorma village in Gaya districtof Bihar, fled to Gujarat earlierthis year, said the statement.
As per the ATS, Ravidascame in contact with Naxals atthe age of 17 in 2002 followinga land dispute among his fam-ily members.
After resolving the landrow with the help of Naxals, hebecame an active member ofthe banned outfit and startedengaging in anti-national activ-ities, the statement said.
In March 2017, Ravidas wasinjured in a retaliatory fire byCRPF commandos in the forestsof Gaya district. In that opera-tion, four Maoists were gunneddown. However, he managed toflee with injuries, the ATS said.
He changed is name to'Gopal Prasad' and startedworking as a security guard ata factory in the Union Territoryof Daman near Gujarat in thebeginning of 2018. Later, hecame to Vapi, which is close toDaman, and started working ata factory, the statement said.
Before handing him over tothe Bihar police, the ATS isquestioning him to find outmore about his works inGujarat and whether he was incontact with Sharma during hisstay in the State, it added.
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The Tamil NaduGovernment Friday urged
the Railway Ministry to waivefreight charges for relief mate-rial meant for cyclone Gajaaffected districts in the state.
Chief Minister Edappadi K.Palaniswami wrote to RailwayMinister Piyush Goyal, sayingthis "has been done in the caseof recent Kerala floods."
"I request the Railways towaive the freight charges col-lected from donors for the reliefmaterials sent to the stations indisaster affected areas addressedto the District Collectors, as hasbeen done in the case of recentKerala floods," Palaniswamisaid in his letter to Goyal.
He told the Union Ministerthat seeing the plight of the
'hapless victims,' relief mater-ial were being mobilised fromall over the country.
He said the cyclone, whichcrossed the Tamil Nadu coaston November 16, has 'devas-tated' the affected districts,with people having lost theirhomes, livestock, plantationand livelihood.
Cyclone 'Gaja' had crossedthe Tamil Nadu coast early on
November 16 betweenNagapattinam andVedaranyam, about 300 kmfrom Chennai. It left behind atrail of destruction inNagapattinam district and alsoin several other districts.
The cyclone has claimed 63lives, with Nagapattinam,Tiruvarur, Thanjavur andPudukottai being the worstaffected districts.
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Citizens may have to shellout a maximum fine of �1
lakh for littering in publicplaces, as the West BengalAssembly passed a Bill toenhance the penalty foroffenders.The penalty has been raisedthrough an amendment tosection 338 of the KolkataMunicipal Corporation (sec-ond amendment) Act whichwas passed in the Assemblyon Thursday.The move comes after ChiefMinister Mamata Banerjeeexpressed her displeasureafter finding out the newlyinaugurated Dakshineswarskywalk was stained withbetel juice.
The Bill proposed toimpose a minimum fine of�5,000 and a maximumpenalty of �1 lakh fine on lit-terbugs.
The earlier law stipulatedthat minimum penalty fordumping garbage was �50and the maximum fine was�5,000.
It also came on a day, stateUrban DevelopmentMunicipal Affairs MinisterFirhad Hakim was electedthe new mayor of Kolkataafter the exit of SovanChatterjee, on the directionsof Chief Minister and TMCchief Mamata Banerjee.
Banerjee had formed a11-member committee onWednesday to check spittingand littering in public places.
Hakim said, he will takeup a major awareness drive tokeep the city clean.
A senior citizen, who didnot wish to be named, said"The city had earlier failed toimpose a fine of �50 for lit-ter ing, I am not sure how effective it will be this time."
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The Madras High Court hasobserved that free PDS rice
given to ration card holdersshould be restricted only tofamilies below the poverty line,noting that doling out freebiesto all sections of people havemade people "lazy".
While it was obligatory onthe part of the government toprovide bare necessities likerice and other groceries to theneedy and poor people, suc-cessive governments hadextended such benefits to allpeople for political benefits, itsaid.
"Consequently, peoplebegan to expect everything forfree from the Government. Asa result, they have becomelazy, and migrant workers werebeing brought for even menialworks," a bench comprising
Justices N Kirubakaran andAbdul Quddhose lamented.
It made the observationsThursday on a petition chal-lenging detention under theGoondas Act of a personaccused of smuggling and sell-ing PDS rice, while takingnote of the government's sub-mission that free rice wasgiven to all holders of rationcards, irrespective of their eco-nomic status.
In the year 2017-18, �2,110crore had been spent for dis-tribution of free rice, theGovernment said.
The judges said it was hightime to restrict the distributionof free rice only to BPL fami-lies and directed AdvocateGeneral Vijay Narayan to getinstructions from theGovernment as to whether thepublic distribution schemecould be amended so that oth-
ers could be excluded.In its interim order, the
bench also sought to know ifany survey had been con-ducted to identify BPL fami-lies, and if so, the number ofBPL families and the volumeof rice required for supply onlyto the BPL people and the
value of the rice.Observing that the amount
spent on free rice scheme washuge, the bench said, "Thiscourt is not against the distri-bution of rice to the reallydeserving, economically back-ward and poor people.However, it should not be
given to people irrespective oftheir economic status."
The Government spentmore than �2,000 crore whichwould be like "capital loss"and the expenditure occursevery year and it is "recurringcapital loss", the bench added.
"If the scheme benefitspeople other than poor peo-ple/BPL family, it wouldamount to unjustly enrichingother people at the cost ofpublic exchequer," the court said.
"The free rice should begiven to the families which arebelow the poverty line aloneand they have to be the bene-ficiaries," it said.
The bench directed the theTamil Nadu Civil SuppliesCorporation to file its annualreports for the past 10 years andposted the matter for furtherhearing to November 30.
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Chennai: DMK PresidentMK Stalin Friday alleged therelief activity was "not satis-factory" in the Cauvery deltaareas that were ravaged byCyclone Gaja last week.
The Leader of theOpposit ion in the stateassembly demanded thatChief Minister K Palaniswamiconvene a meeting of stake-holders from the region totake for ward the rel ief activities in an effective manner.
He also said Palaniswamishould stay put in the deltaregion to oversee the reliefwork.
"The people in the deltaregion have lost their liveli-hood. The relief work is notsatisfactor y for them.Palaniswami should actuallystay there and expedite and
regulate the relief activities,"he told reporters here.
Further, Palaniswamishould convene a meeting ofstakeholders in the deltaregion--farmers' and politicalparties' representatives andwelfare organisations, anddiscuss further streamliningand expediting the relief andrehabilitation efforts, headded.
Cyclone Gaja had crossedthe Tamil Nadu coast betweenNagapatt inam andVedaranyam on November16, claiming 63 lives and leav-ing behind a trail of destruc-tion, severely affecting thefarming, fishing and powersectors.
Nagapattinam, Thanjavur,Tiruvarur and Pudukottai dis-tricts had suffered the worstdamage. PTI
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Hot on the heels of thehumiliation of Pon
Radhakrishnan, UnionMinister of State for Finance,Shipping and Surface Transportby a junior police official atSabarimala on Wednesdaywhere the former had gone forpilgrimage, Kerala has resumedthe “waste war” on neighbour-ing Tamil Nadu.
Officials of the Tamil NaduRegional Transport Authorityand the Department of Healthon Thursday seized 27 truckscarrying hazardous hospitaland plastic waste from Keralameant for dumping inTirunelveli district. Local resi-dents and people in Kerala areworried that this could be a kindof biological warfare by Keralabecause of the callousness withwhich hazardous waste isdumped in Tamil Nadu.
The drivers of these trucksrefused to divulge the details ofthe sources from where thesewastes were brought to TamilNadu, said the RegionalTransport officials.
“We found surgical wastes,
used syringes medical dressingsand expired drugs in the con-signments. These wastes havethe potential to cause HepatitisA , B and even AIDS, “ said SSenthil Kumar, deputy director,Health Services. He disclosedthat the department has takenenough steps to prevent thespreading of any contagiousdiseases from these wastes.
The Transport officials haveslapped a tine of Rs 27 lakh onthese vehicles and said that theywould write to their counter-parts in Kerala to cancel thepermit of these vehicles. Localresidents said that dumping ofmedical and hospital wastesgenerated in Kerala has becomea major nuisance in Tirunelveliand surrounding areas.
“The hospitals in Keralashould set up arrangements todispose their medical waste asper biomedical waste manage-ment rules. These hospitalshave chosen the easy way outby dumping it in Tamil Nadu,”said Senthil Kumar.
Tamil Nadu farmers havebeen accusing Kerala of waginga waste war against them forquite sometime nw. ThePioneer had reported in
November 2016 about seizureof 27 trucks laden with hospi-tal and medical waste whichwere on their way toCoimbatore and Erode dis-tricts f Tamil Nadu. “Theregion was undergoing one ofthe worst farm crisis thosedays and the hospital owners inKerala chose the villages inthese districts to dump thewaste. The hapless farmerswere told by these agents thatthe waste would make thefarm land fertile and they fellfor their words. But we stagedrelentless campaign againstsuch dumping and the Keralapeople made a hasty retreat,”said G K Nagaraj, a farm leaderfrom the South Western TamilNadu who staged a relentlesscampaign against dumping oftoxic and hazardous hospitalwaste from Kerala.
He said since there was suf-ficient rain in the region , thefarmers are back in their fieldsand they have formed com-mittees to monitor the preda-tors from Kerala who havenow opted for the dry lands ofsouthern Tamil Nadu.
Nandita Krishna, director,CPR environmental
Foundation decried the attitudeof Kerala hospitals. “Previouslythey were trans shipping truck-loads of stray dogs from Keralato Tamil Nadu. Kerala author-ities should set up their ownwaste management systeminstead of dumping it in TamilNadu,” said Nanditha Krishna.
Social activists in Keralablamed the State governmentand the local bodies for theirfailure in establishing wastemanagement system. “Kerala,which is described as God’sOwn Country has becomeDevils Own Hell. Residentsdump their household waste innearby alleys without bother-ing about the inconvenience itcauses to others,” said M S Giri,writer and social activist basedat Thiruvananthapuram
PG Gopalakrishnan, aschool teacher at Kottayamtoo echoed the words of Giri.“Even swanky cars are used totransport the waste includingthe waste from slaughter hous-es and dumped it near our res-idences. Since the operationstake place during night hiurs,it is difficult to catch the cul-prits,” said Gopalakrishnan.
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The Vishwa Hindu Parishadwants to replicate 1992.
Twenty-six years ago, itmobilised kar sevaks to bringdown Babri mosque, and thistime around, it has asked Rambhakts to join Dharma Sabha onNovember 25 so as to pressurethe Union Government andthe Supreme Court into pavingthe way for the construction ofRam temple at Ayodhya.
“This will be the last con-gregation before the construc-tion of Ram temple at Ayodhyabegins. The Dharma Sabha isaimed at conveying to theSupreme Court that they cannottake Hindus lightly. We havewaited for long for the con-struction of a Ram temple. Ourpatience is running out,” VHPspokesman Sharad Sharma said.
Immaculate planning hasgone into making the DharmaSabha a success and volunteershave been recruited. Silentwhisper campaign has startedin villages where women areholding Sandhya aarti for theconstruction of Ram temple.With the BJP in power both atthe Centre and UP and RSSbacking it, the VHP is goingfull throttle to lead a decisivepush to Ram temple campaign.
It all started a couple ofmonths back when over a lakhBajrang Dal volunteers wererecruited in a vigorous threeweek drive. Incharge of recruit-ment and training of BajrangDal volunteers in the Awadhregion Bholendra said that theywere the sipahi (warriors) ofHindu Samaj and were ready todo anything for the religion andculture. “It is very natural thatwe are focusing on the youth.Even in family, at the time ofcrisis, members look towardsthe youth. Now, the pride of
Hindu Samaj is at stake. TheseBajrang Dal workers will definethis agitation,” he said
Bajrang Dal activist fromSitapur, Shekhar Pandey said:“We consider ourselves as dis-ciplined soldiers who are readyto go to any length to protectour Hindu heritage.”
VHP leader DevendraMishra told this reporter: “Themain issue for us is to makeHindu Samaj aware of theproblems staring at us. Youhave seen how the court isdelaying the construction ofRam temple. The time hascome to show the world wherewe stand,” he said.
Words are spreading thickand fast asking Ram bhakts toparticipate in the DharmaSabha at Ayodhya. Messageslike ‘Hindu Samaj beingignored by Supreme Court’forms the crux of the campaignand people were being swayedby these talks.
Devesh (19), pursuing atechnical course in IndustrialTraining Institute in Lucknow,said that he was unaware of thevastness of the Hindu religion.“I respect all religions but it
does not mean that Hindusshould bow down to thedemands of people from otherreligion,” he said.
In small village congrega-tions, people are being toldabout the Ram temple and itsstruggle. Interestingly, lecturesin these meetings are not overt-ly anti-Muslim but veersaround how Hindus havealways remained divided.
Villagers are told that his-tory is replete with examples asto how a number of templeswere demolished to buildmosques but not a single tem-ple was built after razing amosque. Volunteers haveensured that wherever suchmeetings take place, the pres-ence of women is substantial asthey intently listen to sermonsand agree with the speaker.
In fact, the RSS started thewhisper campaign. Smallevening prayer meetings arebeing held in villages wherewomen light lamps (diya) atprominent temples and pray forthe early construction of Ramtemple. It started with 7-10women and the same has nowsubstantially gone up.
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In a far-reaching decision,the Jammu and Kashmir
bank has been brought underthe purview of the Right toInformation (RTI) act, theChief Vigi lanceCommissioner (CVC) guide-lines and the State Legislature,an official said Friday.
The State AdministrativeCouncil (SAC) which methere Thursday evening underthe chairmanship of GovernorSatya Pal Malik approved theproposal for treating the J&KBank Limited as a PublicSector Undertaking (PSU),the official said.
The SAC approved that theprovisions of the Jammu andKashmir Right to InformationAct, 2009 shall be applicable tothe bank like other PSUs.Besides, the bank shall followCVC guidelines, he added.
The J&K Bank Ltd shallbe accountable to the StateLegislature like other statePSUs, he said, adding that theAnnual Report of the bankshall be placed before theState Legislature through theState Finance Department.
Established in 1938, theJ&K Bank Ltd is the only stategovernment promoted bankin the country, with theJammu and KashmirGovernment currently hold-ing 59.3 per cent of the shares.
Being the major sharehold-er, the government felt that thebank should have a character ofa PSU which is subject to gen-eral supervision and access forenhanced transparency in the transaction of its business to pro-mote public trust, the official said.
The purpose of the SAC'sdecision was not to question theday to day activities of the bankmanagement but a step towardsstrengthening better corporategovernance, he added.
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The preparations for trans-forming Asia’s largest slum
area of the world into an inte-grated planned township gotunderway on Friday, as theMaharashtra Governmentfloated global tenders for theambitious �22,000-croreDharavi RedevelopmentProject (DRP).
Spread over 240-hectarearea, Dharavi has remainedan ugly face and a dark under-belly of Mumbai – a largestslum which has been romanti-cised in Indian films over theyears. It has also been a cottageindustry hub for decades onend.
The DRP is being seen asthe biggest redevelopmenteffort undertaken for the regionsince 1972, after which therehave been slum improvementProject in 1976, SlumUpgradation project in 1985,Slum Rehabilitation Schemein 1995, and then the DharaviRedevelopment Project of2004.
In an apparent effort toderive political mileage in therun-up to the May 2019 LokSabha and the subsequentOctober 2019 State Assemblypolls, the BJP-led saffronalliance government has
embarked upon the DRP. In advertisements seeking
international bids for the DRPput out in major news papers,the Slum RedevelopmentAuthority (SRA) stated thatthe last date for submittingthe bids for the project isDecember 28.
As per the guidelines not-fied in the tender, the selectedlead partner has to form a spe-cial purpose vehicle (SPV) with80 per cent equity ( Rs 400crore), while the Maharashtragovernment will hold 20 percent equity ( Rs 100 crore) inthe project.
The SPV will constructfree houses for the eligibleslum dwellers with amenitiesand infrastructure. The SPVwill be entitle to constructhouses in the free sale area andsell them in open market. Thestate government has fixed 4 asFloor Space Index (FSI) for the
project.Located between Western
Railway’s Bandra-Matunga andCentral Railway’s Sion-Matunga stations in north-central Mumbai, Dharavi hasthe highest density of popula-tion. The Mithi River slicesthrough a portion of Dharaviinto the Mahim Creek andthen onto the Arabian Sea.Currently, it is home to overanywhere from 60,000 to70,000 families
A mini-India of sortswhere people belonging to dif-ferent faiths live, Dharavi has s28 temples, 11 mosques, sixchurches, 50 banks, 60 gov-ernment schools, a mobiledesign museum, several slumtourism outfits, thriving crim-inal groups, and a tiny dilapi-dated fort.
Dharavi also has a smallfort known as the Riwa Fort.Better known as Kala Qilla or
Black Fort, it is currently in adilapidated condition. It wasbuilt by the first Governor ofBombay, Gerald Aungier(1669–1677).
It was part of the largerBombay Castle, and markedthe northern portion ofBritish-held Bombay in the17th century. The castle wasalso used as a watchtower,guarding the territory againstthe Portuguese-held (and laterMaratha-held) Salsette Island.
At that time, the entirearea was a large swamp andprimarily inhabited by Kolifishermen who made a livingfrom the waters.
As the legend goes, theBritish built a dam on theMithi river because of whichthere was no water to feed theswamp and it dried off.
The fishermen near thesea and a community of pottersmoved in here. In fact they
could be called the first settlersof the region.
As Mumbai turned into ahub for textiles in the postIndependence era, thousandsof men from north Indiamoved in as well and theslum as we know it started totake shape. Slowly and slowsince the sixties, migrants –particularly those from southIndia started moving in –making what Dharavi is today.
Dharavi has several busi-ness units -- right from textilesto pottery to fabrication toleather industry. Plastic recy-cling and garbage segregationtoo is done here.
Mainly a hub of cottageindustries, it has an estimated5,000 business entities and15,000 single-room factories.Goods produced here go toMiddle East, South-East Asia,United States and Europe andseveral other places.
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In another re-christening cer-emony, Mumbai’s Jewish out-
reach centre and one of 26/11targets Chabad House --betterknown in the past as NarimanHouse – will be renamed asNariman Light House’ on theoccasion of the 10th anniver-sary of the mayhem.
Announcing this, presentRabbi Israel Kozlovsky, whoalso heads the Chabad Trust inIndia, said here on Friday thatthe renaming ceremony wouldtake place on November 25, theeve of 26/11 attacks, at the mainJewish social-cultural-religioushub at Colaba in south Mumbai.
The event, which comes 10months after Israeli PrimeMinister Benjamin Netanyahuvisited the place, will also markthe unveiling of a memorial onthe Nariman House terrace tohonour all the victims of theterror strikes.
The Chabad House wasone of the main chosen targetsof 10 Pakistani terrorists whosneaked into south Mumbai,through the Arabian Sea routeand disembarked at a Colabafishing jetty, barely a stone’sthrow away.
The Chabad House is apartially re-built five-storeystructure, a grey colouredbuilding at Colaba in SouthMumbai – which had sufferedheavy damage owing to anintense firing indulged in bythe two Pakistani terroristsholed up on its premises dur-ing the 26/11 attacks.
Rabbi Gavriel and thenpregnant Rivka Holtzberg, twoother Israelis, an Americanand a Mexican, all Jews, besidesIndian security officials wereamong 166 people killed in theNovember 26-29, 2008Pakistani fidayeen attacks onfive Mumbai terror targets,including two five-star hotels,a popular café, a train terminusand the Jewish learning centre.
Moshe, son of RabbiGavriel and Rivka Holtzberg,survived the attacks. For thetime after he lost his parents inthe 26/11 attacks under trau-matic circumstances, then BabyMoshe and now 11-year-oldMoshe Holtzberg visitedChabad House in January thisyear, to revive his babyhoodmemories.
Nearly six years after thePakistani terrorists wreakedmayhem on its premises killingsix persons, the Chabad Househad formally been thrown openby Jewish group Chabad-Lubavitch on August 26, 2014in the presence of RabbiGavriel Holtzberg’s parents and25 Rabbis from across Asia.
Rebuilt at the cost of 2.5million US dollars with con-tributions from the Rohr fam-ily in the US and the globalJewish community, theNariman House now houses arestaurant on the first floor, asynagogue on the second floor,and a community hall on thethird floor.
After the Mumbai siege,Moshe had left for Israel alongwith his nanny Sandra to livewith his grandparents.
Moshe used to live with hisparents on the fifth floor of
Chabad House. The fourthand fifth floors of the building,which once housed the guestrooms and the Rabbi’s resi-dence respectively, have beenconverted into a museum,while a memorial has been setup on the roof top to honour26/11 terror attack victims.
The second floor whichhouses a small synagogue onthe right side has a plaqueinstalled showing the exactspots where Rabbi Gabriel andtwo other Rabbis guests wereshot dead when the Pakistanigunmen stormed the centrearound 9.45 pm on the night ofNov 26, 2008.
A memorial of sorts hasbeen created at the place whereMoshe’s slain father RabbiGavriel’s body lay after he wasgunned down by Pakistani ter-rorists with a message thatreads: “Here was slain
Emissary Rabbi Gavriel NoachHoltzberg, May Hashemavenge his blood, May his soulbe bound up in the bond oflife.”
Eight bullet marks on thewall next to it have been keptintact as the grim reminder ofthe killings. The Rabbi’s wifeRivka was on the top floor withthree other guests who wereheld hostage by the two gun-men and eventually killed.
The fourth floor, which has
been refurbished, is scarredwith hundreds of bullet markson its roof, a reminder of thefierce gun battle that ensuedhere. However, a collapsed sidewall has been rebuilt.
On the fifth floor livingquarters, baby Moshe’s roomstill bears his name in Hebrewon the wall lovingly decoratedwith bright paintings by hisparents. One wall shows theblue markings which mea-sured his height as he grew up.
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Lucknow: Cocking a snook atthe Indian Constitution, BJPMLA from Bairia (Ballia)Surendra Singh said that theConstitution meant nothingbefore Ram temple and, ifrequired, people could break thelaw as they did while demolish-ing Babri mosque in 1992. “Ramtemple will be constructed at anycost. No force on the earth canstop it. If required, the peoplewould break the law like they didin 1992. It is a matter of our faith,which is above the law and theConstitution,” he told reportersin Ballia on Friday.
The Ballia MLA said: “Iwill go to Ayodhya along with10,000 supporters on Sunday.I am ready to break the law, ifrequired. Whatever will be the
order of saints and seers, I willfollow.”
Singh made thisannouncement in his Assemblyconstituency while leading aprocession to appeal to the peo-ple to join Dharma Sabha to beheld in Ayodhya on November25. There saints and seers areexpected to demand the earlyconstruction of Ram temple.
Singh also exhorted peoplein his constituency to partici-pate in a big way at the VHP-sponsored Dharma Sabha. “It isonce in a lifetime opportunity.A majority of youths were notwitness to the 1992 event. Forthem, November 25 will be abig event and they will realisewhat exactly happened in 1992,”the BJP MLA said. PNS
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Attacking the Narendra ModiGovernment at the Centre,
Shiv Sena Rajya Sabha memberSanjay Raut sought to know thatat a time when the BJP held swayfrom Rashtrapati Bhawan toLok Sabha, why there was inor-dinate delay in passing a law infavour of the construction ofRam temple at Ayodhya .
Talking to mediapersons atAyodhya on Friday, Raut saidthat the BJP was given fouryears to construct Ram templebut they did nothing. “Now wewill not give any more time andforce them to bring about a leg-islation for the early construc-tion of Ram temple atAyodhya,” the Sena leader said.
Raut said that before thedeclaration of 2019 Lok Sabha
elections, the path for the con-struction of Ram temple shouldbe cleared.
“What is more intriguing isthat when Shiv Sainiks coulddemolish the controversialBabri mosque in just 17 min-utes, why was the Union gov-ernment taking so long toenact a law even when it enjoysmajority in the Lok Sabha andhas its man in RashtrapatiBhawan,” he said.
When told that the BJP andits allies were in minority inRajya Sabha, Raut said thatmany parties were in favour ofthe construction of Ram tem-ple. “Whosoever opposes thislegislation will be exposed.Leaders of that party will findit difficult in move across Indiaas Shiv Sainiks will protestagainst them,” he said.
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The Finance Ministry wouldnot curtail its capital infu-
sion plan for this financialyear even as State-owned bankswould be needing fewer fundsfollowing the RBI’s decision todefer the deadline to meetBasel III norms by a year,according to sources.
Under the new dispensa-tion, the capital infusion by thegovernment in public sectorbanks for meeting the capitalbuffer norms would comedown to around �15,000-20,000 crore, sources said.
However, there will not beany reduction in the capitalfunding plan as announced inOctober last year despite alower requirement due to theextension of the deadline formeeting the CCB of 2.5 percent until March 2020, sourcessaid.
The capital infusion wouldhelp improve the financialhealth of banks, sources said,adding that some banks would
get necessary regulatory capi-tal while others would get it forfueling growth, they clarified.
Earlier this week, the RBIin the central board meetingdecided to extend the imple-mentation of the last tranche of0.625 per cent of capital con-servation buffer by a year toMarch 2020.
However, the board decid-ed to retain the capital ade-quacy ratio or CRAR at 9 percent, against 8 per cent pre-scribed by Basel III norms.
The CCB currently stands at1.875 per cent and the remain-ing 0.625 per cent was to be metby March 2019, as per the earli-er deadline fixed by the RBI.
The extension of the time-line for the implementation ofthe last tranche of the CCBunder Basel-III capital regula-tions could reduce the burdenof public sector banks (PSBs)by �35,000 crore this fiscal,according to rating agencyCrisil.
Generally, there is a lever-age of 10 times on the capital,sources said adding that thelending capacity wouldincrease by �3.5 lakh crore.
After assessing the require-ment of each bank, the min-istry is expected to finalise thecapital infusion of about�54,000 crore by this month-
end or by the first half of thenext month.
The ministry had earlierthis year provided a capitalinfusion of �11,336 crore to fivePSBs to help them meet theirinterest payment commit-ments.
Punjab National Bank(PNB), hit by the Nirav Modiscam, got the highest amountof �2,816 crore, whileAllahabad Bank received�1,790 crore. Andhra Bankgot the capital support of�2,019 crore, Indian OverseasBank received �2,157 croreand Corporation Bank got�2,555 crore.
The infusion was part ofthe remaining �65,000 croreout of �2.11 lakh crore capitalinfusion over two financialyears.
The Governmentannounced the �2.11 lakh crorecapital infusion programme inOctober last year. As per theplan, the PSBs were to get �1.35lakh crore through re-capitali-sation bonds, and the balance�58,000 crore through the rais-ing of capital from the market.
Out of the �1.35 lakh crore,the government has alreadyinfused about �82,000 crorethrough recap bonds and thebalance would be done duringthis fiscal.
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We have set an ambitiousgoal for ourselves — the
goal of providing access to24x7power for all in the coun-try. Access to power here rep-resents not only the connec-tivity to the network but alsoincludes availability of requisiteinfrastructure across the powersector value chain to ensuresupply of quality and reliable-power. And we are well on ourway to achieve our goal. Andthe scale of the transition issuch as has not been seen any-where in the world.
The country achieved100% village electrification on28th April 2018, a major land-mark towards universal elec-trification. It was not merelyconnecting the remaining18,500 odd villages to the elec-tricity network but to reach outto the poorest of poor who hadremained in darkness for morethan 70 years after indepen-dence. The challenges involvedwere huge — these challengeshad stood as a barrier toextending electricity to thesevillages for such a long period.Most of these villages werelocated in remote inaccessibleareas with difficult terrain inhilly areas, forest areas, areas
severely affected with LWEactivities etc. and transporta-tion of material/equipment andmobilisation of manpower forexecution of works requireddetermination and persever-ance. The difficulty level kepton increasing as the work pro-gressed further. About 350 vil-lages in Arunachal Pradesh(272), J&K (54), Meghalaya (9)and Manipur(12) located inremote and difficult terrainrequired head loading of mate-rials and trekking up to 10 days.Materials in somevillages ofJ&K and Arunachal Pradeshhad to be transported by heli-copter. In 2762 villages, extend-ing grid network was not fea-sible due to remote and inac-cessible locations, Solar basedstandalone systems were pro-vided. Enormous challengeswere confronted in electrifica-tion of 7614 LWE villages inBihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh,Madhya Pradesh and Odisha.The electrification of theseremaining villages have pavedthe path for their socio-eco-nomic growth. We have the sat-isfaction of having achieved thetarget before the target date.This program has also set anexample of effective coopera-tive federalism wherein UnionGovernment, StateGovernments, DistributionCompanies and administra-tion synergised their efforts forcommon goal.
The next step was to lightup every household. The PrimeMinister launched the ‘PradhanMantri Sahaj Bijli Har GharYojana’ — Saubhagya in Sept.2017 with the aim to achieveuniversal household electrifi-cation. Achievement of this
within targeted timeline ofMarch 2019 is the challenge wehave given to ourselves. As thename of the scheme itself sug-gests, it has inherent features of‘Sahaj’ i.e.Simple/Easy/Effortless and‘Har Ghar’ i.e. inclusive uni-versal household electrifica-tion. A targeted program ofsuch a scale has never beenattempted in the world. Theprogress is again exemplary interms of speed and innovation.We are lighting up an averageof a hundred thousand housesevery day. No country has wit-nessed anything on such ascale. The happiness on the faceof the people when their hous-es are lighted up with electric-ity is something to be seen. Iam sharing some photographs.
We crossed the milestoneof lighting the lights to 2 crorehouseholds under theSaubhagya scheme (whichstarted in Oct. 2017) on the19th of November 2018.
In addition to providinglast mile connectivity, strength-ening of backup system net-work in distribution and sub-transmission segment alongwith metering, IT enablementand automation etc. is equallyimportant to ensure supply ofadequate power with desiredquality and reliability. For thispurpose also, Government ofIndia has been providing finan-cial assistance to the Statesunder Deen Dayal UpadhyayaGram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY)and Integrated PowerDevelopment Scheme (IPDS)for rural and urban areasrespectively. Projects worth�1,40,000 Crore have beenrolled out under these schemes.
Under these schemes, creationof 1204 nos. of new sub-sta-tions, augmentation of capac-ity in 1601 nos. existing sub-stations, erection of 1,61,101nos. new distribution trans-formers, 1,11,734 Kms of HTlines and 98028 Kms of LT linehas been completed. Systemstrengthening works underthese schemescoupled withreforms adopted under UjwalDISCOM Assurance Yojana(UDAY) would facilitate 24x7quality and reliable power sup-ply for all in sustainable man-ner. UDAY interventions haveresulted in (i) reduction inAggregate Technical andCommercial Losses (AT&C)losses from 20.77% to 18.72%(ii) reduction in ACS-ARR(Average Cost of Supply -Average Revenue Realization)gap from 60 paisa/unit to 17paisa/unit (iii) savings on inter-est cost of about �31,800 croresto utilities/statesand reductionin losses from �51575 crore to�15132 crore. NTPC and othermajor Gencos need to be con-gratulated for keeping thepower purchase costs almostconstant in spite of increase incost of coal, freight and othercosts.
The initiatives of theGovernment have helped ourcountry in achieving 24th rankin 2018 on World Bank’s Easeof Getting Electricity in theworld as against 111th rank in2014. This is a quantum leapand shows the result orientedapproach of the Government.
At the backend of thepower value chain, we haveachieved ‘One Nation OneGrid’. The pace of grid con-struction has been enhanced to
an average of 24908 Kms peryear in the last four and halfyears from an average of 4385Kms in previous years. Thisensures power transfers acrossthe country. About 2.96 LakhMVA transformation capacityhas been added during theyears 2014-18. Tariff basedCompetitive Bidding hasbrought in transparency andefficiency in the system.
The huge addition in theconsumer base at the rate ofone lac per day, coupled withgrowth in the economy hasmeant that our electricitydemand has been growing atthe rate of more than 10% inthese months. The change weare making are unparalleled inscale. But we have more to do.But our vision is clear. And ourdetermination is firm. Ourestimates are that the numberof households left would be lessthan 50 lacs. At this rate, almost50 more days required toachieve 100% household elec-trification. If we do it faster, lessdays to achieve the goal. Theworld has looked on ourprogress with amazement andadmiration. The InternationalEnergy Agency has called it oneof the greatest success stories ofthe year.
In order to meet the grow-ing demand of electricity in thecountry which is expected toincrease further, addition to thegeneration capacity is impor-tant. During the last 4 years thetotal installed capacity hasincreased by 1 Lakh MW.Thishas helped in wiping out ener-gy deficit from 4.2% to almostzero at 0.7%. India has for thefirst time become an exporterof electricity after meeting its
internal demand. We havehelped our neighbours likeNepal, Bangladesh andMyanmar by exporting 7203MUs of electricity.
In order to make our elec-tricity clean and green, wehave placed a roadmap toachieve 175 GW capacity in therenewable energy sector by2022, which includes 100 GWof solar power and 60 GW ofwind power. The overallinstalled capacity of RenewableEnergy has been more thandoubled in the last four andhalf years — from 34,000 MWto 72,000 MW, solar capacityincreased 8 times in last 4years. We are on the way toachieve our commitment atinternational fora.
While we continue toincrease our capabilities forpower generation, we recognizethe need to explore avenuesthat promote energy efficiency.Concerted efforts are beingmade to efficiently use theenergy in the demand sidethrough various innovative andvisionary policy measures.UJALA, Star labelling pro-gram, energy conservationbuilding code, energy efficien-cy measures through Perform,Achieve and Trade (PAT)arefew initiatives in this area. Thefirst cycle of the PAT for indus-try achieved savings of morethan 8.6 million tonnes of oilequivalent which is almost 1.23percent of primary energy sup-ply of India.The second cycle isestimated to achieve even high-er savings.
(The writer is Minister ofPower, Government of India.Views expressed in the article arepersonal.)
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The Reserve Bankof India is expect-
ed to keep the keypolicy ratesunchanged at its ensu-ing policy review meetnext month, amid eas-ing global crude oilprices and robust agri-culture production, says areport.
According to Dun &Bradstreet Economy forecast,the robust agriculture produc-tion and softening of vegetablesand fruits prices will also helpin keeping the food inflationunder check.
The report further saidthat the Government’s newprocurement policy will sup-port prices of agricultural pro-duce going ahead.
D&B expects the CPI infla-tion to be in the range of 2.8-3 per cent and WPI inflation tobe in the range of 4.8-5 per centduring November this year.
“The risks emanating fromglobal crude oil prices haveeased to an extent as oil pricesare likely to fall or remain sub-dued in the near term. This haspartially dispelled concernsover one of the primary factorsaffecting India’s currentaccount deficit, fiscal slippage
and inflationary dynamics,”Dun & Bradstreet India LeadEconomist Arun Singh said.
Singh further said thereturn of foreign investors inIndian markets, stability inrupee, strengthening of indus-trial production and benigninflation have provided muchrequired support to expecta-tions of economic growthrevival.
However, bad assets in thebanking system continue toincrease and concerns overprobable tightening of regula-tions in the non-banking seg-ment will also lead to some dis-ruption in the overall financialsystem in the near-term tillclarity emerges, he noted.
“It would be interesting toknow the decision taken by theRBI in its upcoming monetarypolicy review. Our assessmentis that RBI will maintain a sta-tus quo in the policy rate,”Singh added.
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Domestic automobile retailsales in the festive season
declined by 11 per cent thisyear due to dip in offtake ofpassenger vehicles and two-wheelers, according to FADA.
The Federation ofAutomobile DealersAssociations (FADA) said thatwith retail sales, calculated onthe basis of total number of reg-istrations, witnessing declinespecially in two-wheeler andpassenger vehicles (PV) seg-ments, a substantially highamount of inventory hasbecome “a matter of great con-cern”.
According to FADA, totalregistrations during the 42-day festive period, which fellbetween October 10 andNovember 20 this year, stood at20,49,391 units.
Last year, the period wasbetween September 21 andNovember 1, and the industrywitnessed total registrations of23,01,986 units, it said.
PV registrations in thisyear’s festive period stood at2,87,717 units as against3,33,456 units in the corre-sponding period last year,down 14 per cent, FADA said.
Two-wheeler registrationsalso fell by 13 per cent to15,83,276 units as against18,11,703 units in the year-agoperiod.
“We have not seen such a
dull fes-tive sea-son inthe pastfew years,as manynegativef a c t o r sc a m einto playd u r i n gthis sea-s o nw h i c hweakened the consumer senti-ment and postponed their pur-chase decision,” FADAPresident Ashish HarsharajKale said in a statement.
High fuel prices and insur-ance costs along with liquidityissues faced by non-bankingfinancial companies (NBFCs)had affected consumer senti-ment.
“Overall, we have seenunusual de-growth during thecombined festive period, bothin two-wheelers and PVs.Dealer inventory levels in boththese segments have risen sub-stantially as a result of this andis a matter of great concern,”FADA said.
The inventory levels beforethe festivals began, were ataround 60 days and 50 days fortwo-wheelers and passengervehicles, respectively.
“The same merely camedown to around 50 and 45 dayspost festivities and still remainhigher than normal,” it added.
The automotive dealers’body asked the Governmentand the Reserve Bank of India(RBI) for further ease of liq-uidity for auto non-bankingfinancial companies (NBFCs)saying “they are one of the keygrowth drivers in auto retailand are also operating in a lessriskier business environment...”
Kale, however, said thedealers remain hopeful ofrecovery as overall inquiriesduring the festive period wererobust, and postponement ofpurchase was the main reasonfor muted sales.
During the festive period,three-wheelers and commercialvehicles sales, however, grew 10per cent and 16 per cent,respectively.
Meanwhile, FADA alsosaid in the April 1 to November20 period this fiscal, total vehi-cle registrations stood at1,19,89,705 units as against1,12,54,305 units in the year-ago period, up 6.5 per cent.
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Commerce and IndustryMinister Suresh Prabhu
on Friday said he has taken upwith the Finance Ministry theissue concerning credit to thegems and jewellery sector toensure adequate availabilityof funds for them.
Prabhu also said the min-istries are looking at the indus-try’s demand of cutting importduty on gold to 4 per centfrom the current 10 per cent.
The industry also wants areduction in the duty on dia-mond to 2.5 per cent from 7.5per cent.
“This is one of the impor-tant issues...For the industrythat is export-oriented... Ifyou have import duties, theworking capital gets blockedup. So, we are already workingon that.
“At the same time, theMinistry of Finance has aresponsibility to curtail CAD(current account deficit),therefore they are also tryingto find out how we can keepthe imports under control.So, we have to balance bothtogether,” the minister told
reporters here.On financing issues of the
sector, Prabhu said meetingswere held with bankers toaddress the matter as the gen-uine needs of the industryshould be looked at.
“I have again taken upthe issue with the financeministry and we will makesure that the industry is notstar ved of necessar yfinances,” he added.
The gems and jewelerysector, especially the diamondindustry, is facing creditcrunch as banks have tight-ened their hands followingthe �14,000-crore Nirav Modiscam in Punjab National Bank.
The Minister also statedthat the Government wouldsoon come out with a gold pol-icy and set up a domesticgold council to promote thegrowth of the sector.
The country’s annual gemsand jewelery exports stand atabout $40 billion. The sector,which contributes 13.5 percent to India’s total merchan-dise exports, employs aboutfive million people. It alsoaccounts for 7 per cent of thecountry’s gross domestic prod-
uct (GDP).Commerce Secretary
Anup Wadhawan said variousstakeholders are being con-sulted on formulation of thepolicy and setting up of thecouncil.
“I hope to reach a logicaloutcome very soon,” he said.
The secretary also askedthe industry for self regula-tion, so that rules and reg-ulations could not be vio-lated.
Further, he said the indus-try needs to look at innovativeideas to exploit India’s hugegold reserves to containimports.
India imports about 1,000tonne of gold every year. Theimports, which have a bearingon CAD, increased by 22.31per cent to $33.65 billion in2017-18.
T h e c ou nt r y i s t h elargest importer of gold,which mainly caters to thedemand of the jewelleryindustry.
CAD, the differencebetween outflow and inflow offoreign exchange, widened to2.4 per cent of the GDP in thefirst quarter of 2018-19.
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NTPC Limited and ArcheryAssociation of India (AAI)
have announced a landmarkthree-year partnership, whichincludes the title rights acrossall National ArcheryChampionships (NACs),National Ranking ArcheryTournaments (NRATs) andexclusive right to providekits/apparels to Indian Archeryteam for international partici-pation.
A three-year agreementwas signed between SYQuraishi, Administrator of theAAI and Former Chief ElectionCommissioner and Shri MSD,Bhattamishra, ExecutiveDirector (CSR/R&R/SD/LA),NTPC on 22nd November,2018 at the NTPC EngineeringOffice, Noida.This title part-nership is the biggest ever of itskind in Indian Archery andnow onwards all the NationalArchery Championships and
National Ranking ArcheryTournaments will be namedafter NTPC for a period ofthree years.
While thanking and appre-ciating NTPC for coming for-ward to support Archery,Quraishi said, “we are proud tohave support of one of theMaharatana Company as apartner and look forward toproductive working relation-ship with them for a commonvision and goal of winningmedals in Olympic Games,Asian Games and other toplevel international events ofArchery.”
On this occasion,Bhattamishra said, “NTPCalways stands in the front rowto address the issues ofCorporate SocialResponsibility since its incep-tion.
This partnership with AAIwill go a long way in nurturingthe potential of hidden talentsin Archery.
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Nissan’s disgraced formerchairman Carlos Ghosn
under-reported his income bya total of $71 million — muchmore than initially suspected —Japanese media reportedFriday.
The Brazil-born tycoon isnow reportedly set to face a newcharge from prosecutors, afterhe was sacked as Nissan chair-man Thursday to top a spec-tacular fall from grace for theonce-revered boss whose fallhas stunned the business world.
Prosecutors arrested GhosnMonday, accusing him and fel-low executive Greg Kelly ofunderstating the former chair-man’s income by around five bil-lion yen ($44 million) betweenJune 2011 and June 2015.
But Ghosn is now sus-pected of under-reporting hisincome by another three billionyen for the following three fis-cal years, the Asahi Shimbunand the Nikkei business dailyreported.
Prosecutors are now planingto re-arrest him on charges ofunderstating his income by a totalof eight billion yen ($71 million)since June 2011, the Asahi said.
Immediate confirmationof the reports was not available.
Under Japanese law, sus-pects in jail can face addition-al arrest warrants, which canimpose heavier charges.
Ghosn is also suspected offailing to report a profit of fourbillion yen through stockappreciation rights — a methodfor firms to give managementa bonus on strong earnings, theNikkei said.
Separately, the Kyodo newsagency has reported thatNissan had paid $100,000 ayear since 2002 to Ghosn’s sis-ter who had no record of doingadvisory work for the group.
Deputy chief prosecutorShin Kukimoto said the Ghosncase is “one of the most serioustypes of crime” under Japan’sFinancial Instruments Act, andGhosn could face a 10-yearprison sentence.
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Budget carrier SpiceJet onFriday launched a daily
direct flight service to HongKong from New Delhi, seekingto tap the growing business andleisure travel demand, besideseyeing the Indian studentscommunity there.
Following the introductionof the new service, SpiceJet offersover 2,500 seats per week on theDelhi-Hong Kong-Delhi route,which will be serviced by the lat-est 189-seater Boeing 737 Maxplane, the airline said in a release.
With this, SpiceJet hasbecome the only domestic bud-get carrier operating a directflight on the route, it added.
“We are delighted to launchour direct flight on the Delhi-Hong Kong route. We seetremendous potential in thissector. We have already wit-nessed a huge demand on thissector and foresee that this willonly grow in the coming days,”said Shilpa Bhatia, chief salesand revenue officer, SpiceJet.
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State-owned Oil India Ltdwill buy back 5.04 crore of
its shares for a little over Rs1,085 crore as part of theGovernment’s push to cash-rich PSUs to part with theirsurplus either by paying high-er dividends or through sharebuybacks so as to help meetrevenue targets.
In a regulatory filing, OILsaid its board has approvedbuyback of shares at an aggre-gate of no more than 10 percent of the fully paid-up equi-ty share capital and freereserves of the company.
The board approved “thebuyback by the company of itsfully paid-up equity shares ofRs 10 each not exceeding 5.05crore equity shares (represent-ing about 4.45 per cent of thetotal number of equity sharesin the paid-up share capital ofthe company) at a price of �215per equity share payable in cashfor an aggregate consideration
not exceeding �1085.72 crore,”it said.
The nation’s second largeoil explorer had a little less than�20,000 crore of reserves.
OIL shares closed at�218.78 on the BSE onThursday. Friday was a tradingholiday on account ofGurunanak Jayanti.
The Government is target-ing a minimum �5,000 crorethrough share buyback offers ofstate-owned firms like CoalIndia and BHEL.
Besides OIL, at least halfa dozen other central PSUshave disclosed share buy-back programmes. Prominentamong these include NHPC,BHEL, NALCO, NLC,Cochin Shipyard and KIOCLthat could fetch theGovernment a little over�3,000 crore.
OIL said the Governmentholds 66.13 per cent stake inthe company and has offered totender 5.04 crore shares in thebuyback offer.
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At least 32 people, includingthree Pakistani-Sikhs, were
killed and more than 40 othersinjured on Friday when a sui-cide bomber triggered a pow-erful bomb blast at a busymarket outside a religious sem-inary in the country’s restiveKhyber Pakhtunkhwaprovince, police said.
According to initial inves-tigation, an improvised explo-sive device was planted in abike that was used for trans-porting vegetables to the pop-ular Friday Market (JumaBazar) near an imambargah, aShia religious place, in Orakzaitribal district’s Kalaya area,bordering Afghanistan.
“This is a Friday bazaar,where hundreds of people hadgathered for groceries,” DeputyCommissioner Khalid Iqbalsaid.
“The ground is then usedfor Friday prayers as well,” headded.
At least 32 people werekilled while more than 40 oth-ers injured, Dawn news quot-ed district administration offi-cials as saying.
“Three Sikh traders andthree children were also amongthe dead in the Orakzai blast,”Iqbal told PTI.
The minority Sikh com-munity in the area was previ-ously displaced by the Talibanthat controlled the region priorto the military operation in2010, Samaa TV reported.
Officials said that most ofthe victims were minority ShiaMuslims, who in the past werealso targeted in the area.
“Three children wereamong those killed. Theremote-controlled bomb wasattached to a motorcycle,” offi-cials said.
“I was buying vegetables ata distance from bomb site,”Karam Khan, who accompa-nied an injured person to thehospital in Kohat, said.
“There was a huge explo-sion and I woke up with bloodsplashed all over the place andthere were body parts every-where,” he said about the goryscene.
The area has been cor-doned off and investigationinto the incident is under way.
An emergency has beendeclared in the region’s hospi-tals to handle the situation.
The explosion in lowerOrakzai is the second terrorattack in Pakistan on Friday.Earlier this morning, an attacktargeting the Chinese con-sulate in Karachi’s Clifton areawas foiled by security forces.Four people, including twosecurity personnel and twocivilians were killed in theattack. Three terrorists werealso gunned down.
Prime Minister ImranKhan strongly condemned theterrorist attack in Orakzai trib-al area and said: “My prayers goto the victims & their families”.
“Let there be no doubt inanyone’s mind that we willcrush the terrorists, whatever it
takes,” he said in a tweet.Human Rights Minister
Shireen Mazari blamed the USfailure in Afghanistan for theattack and warned Pakistan tobe prepared for more suchincidents.
She condemned the hor-rific terror attack.
“As the US fails inAfghanistan, Pakistan shouldbe prepared for fallout and wemust ensure greater security forour tribal areas especially pro-tection of our people,” shetweeted.
No group claimed respon-sibility of the attack so far butthe Taliban terrorists oftencarry out such attacks.
“Our enemies are nothappy with peace in theprovince,” provincial ChiefMinister Mehmood Khan saidwhile condemning the attack.
In 2011, 30 people includ-ing 10 cops, were killed andover 50 injured when a suicidebomber rammed his explo-sive-laden van into the build-ing of the Communication andWorks Department.
Orakzai, a terror hotbed, isone of the seven semi-autonomous tribal regions ofPakistan which has a porusborder with Afghanistan.
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An explosion rippedthrough a mosque inside
an Afghan Army base in thecountry’s volatile eastern Khostprovince as Friday prayers weredrawing to a close, killing 27soldiers and wounding 57, themilitary said.
The blast may have beenset off by a suicide bomber ora remotely detonated bomb butnothing was officially con-firmed and details were sketchy.No group immediately claimedresponsibility for the explosion.
It was the latest in a relent-less, near-daily onslaughts inAfghanistan, where the Talibanregularly target Afghan militaryand police forces throughoutthe country.
“There were soldiers lyingeverywhere and the smoke wasso thick, it was difficult to see,”said Abdullah, a spokesman atthe base. Like most Afghans, he
uses only one name. He spoketo The Associated Press overthe phone from the base.
The dead and woundedwere rushed to a clinic withinthe army base, while the moreseriously wounded were takento a nearby hospital.
Sakhi Sardar, head of thehospital in Khost said most ofthe wounded were being treat-ed for devastating shrapnelwounds.
The explosion came justdays after a suicide bomberkilled 55 religious scholarsgathered in the Afghan capital,Kabul, to celebrate the holidaymarking the birth of Islam’sProphet Muhammad. TheTaliban denied involvement inthat bombing, which alsowounded 94 people.
After 17 years and billionsof dollars spent training andarming Afghanistan’s military,it is struggling against anemboldened Taliban insur-gency that holds sway in near-ly half of the country. As wellas the Taliban, Afghan troopsare also battling an audaciousIslamic State affiliate whichhas been particularly brutal in
its attacks against Afghanistan’sminority Shiites.
Elsewhere in Afghanistanon Friday, hundreds of pro-testers blocked roads in north-ern Parwan province todenounce the death of threepeople who they say were civil-ians, killed in an operationagainst the Taliban earlier onFriday.
The protesters said theoperation by Afghan specialforces involved a NATOairstrike in the Jebul Siraj dis-trict that killed the three.
However, NATO spokes-woman US Sgt 1st Class DebraRichardson said no NATO orAmerican activity took place inParwan in the past three days.The provincial governor’sspokewoman, Wahida Sakhar,said Parwan officials werenegotiating with the protestersand promised an investigationinto the incident.
Afghan special forcescalled in a NATO airstrikeduring an operationWednesday against the Talibanin eastern Logar province. Tenpeople died but it’s unclear howmany were civilians.
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The World Health Organisation says a worrying numberof the newest Ebola cases amid Congo’s ongoing outbreak
are in patients not usually known to catch the disease: babies.In an update published this week, the UN health agency
reported 36 new confirmed cases of Ebola, including sevenin newborn babies and infants younger than 2 years old. Sixcases were reported in children aged between 2 and 17 andone case was in a pregnant woman.
While Ebola typically infects adults, as they are most like-ly to be exposed to the lethal virus, children have been knownin some instances to catch the disease when they act as care-givers. Few cases of Ebola in babies have been reported, butexperts suspect transmission might happen via breast milkor close contact with infected parents. Ebola is typically spreadby infected bodily fluids.
WHO noted that health centers have been identified asa source of Ebola transmission, with injections of medica-tions “a notable cause.” WHO called Congo’s current epidemic“complex and challenging.”
Congo’s health ministry says there are 346 confirmedcases, including 175 deaths, in what has become the worstEbola outbreak in the country’s recorded history.
The outbreak has been plagued by security problems, withhealth workers attacked by rebels in districts where the virushas been spreading.
Earlier this month, Ebola containment operations werepaused after seven UN peacekeepers and 12 Congolese sol-diers were killed, but all activities have resumed.
The increasing number of cases in children and healthworkers — 39 health workers have been infected to date —suggests outbreak responders are having major problemsstopping the virus in health clinics and convincing peopleto seek help when they develop symptoms. This is the firsttime this part of Congo has faced an Ebola outbreak.
WHO said the risk of the outbreak spreading to neigh-bouring countries remains “very high” but it does not rec-ommend travel restrictions. Uganda this month started vac-cinating health workers against Ebola in a heavily traveledborder district near the outbreak.
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Turkey on Friday said USPresident Donald Trump
intended to turn a “blind eye”to Saudi journalist JamalKhashoggi’s murder after hesaid it would not affectWashington’s ties with Riyadh.
Trump’s backing of SaudiArabia, his key ally againstIran, comes despite global out-rage over the grisly October 2killing that has tarnished theimage of both the kingdom andits de facto ruler Crown PrinceMohammed bin Salman.
“In one sense, Trump issaying ‘I will turn a blind eye’no matter what happens,”Turkish Foreign MinisterMevlut Cavusoglu said in aninterview with CNN Turkbroadcaster.
“This is not the rightapproach. Money doesn’t meaneverything,” Cavusoglu said,referring to Trump’s continuedsupport for Saudi Arabia,which has committed billionsof dollars in US weapons con-tracts.
Trump on Tuesday glossedover the Central IntelligenceAgency’s reported conclusionthat the crown prince hadauthorised the killing.
“Maybe he did and maybehe didn’t!” Trump said, imply-ing Prince Mohammed’s cul-pability in Khashoggi’s killingin the Saudi mission inIstanbul.
Trump was widely pilloried
for what critics called his mer-cantile priorities that madehim appear more like a lobby-ist for Riyadh.
A former Saudi royal insid-er who became a critic of thecrown prince, Khashoggi waskilled and dismembered inwhat Riyadh — after weeks ofdenial — said was a “rogue”operation.
The 59-year-old had gonethere for documents he need-ed to marry his Turkish fiancee.
Saudi Arabia has held 21people in custody over themurder but shielded the pow-erful crown prince.
Washington earlier thismonth placed sanctions on 17Saudis, which also targeted thetwo top aides to the crownprince by freezing assets underUS jurisdiction and forbid-ding US companies from doingbusiness with them.
The killing and Riyadh’sexplanations have angered its
Western partners.Germany on Monday said
Berlin would bar 18 Saudisfrom entering its territory andEurope’s Schengen passport-free zone over their allegedlinks to the murder.
In October, Germanycalled for EU countries to fol-low its lead and suspend armssales to Saudi Arabia, prompt-ing a dismissive response fromFrance, the kingdom’s second-biggest customer after India.
But Denmark on Thursdayfollowed suit, freezing all salesof weapons and military equip-ment to Riyadh.
Cavusoglu said “artificialmeasures” would not help solvethe crisis.
“They (Europe) say theydon’t want to upset ties withSaudi Arabia. We do not wantto upset our relations either,” hesaid, but added Ankara woulddo anything to shed light on themurder.
Turkey insists the murderwas premeditated, sharing evi-dence with Riyadh as well aswith the US and Western alliesbut stops short of pointing thefinger of blame at the prince.
President Recep TayyipErdogan has said the ordercame from “the highest levels”but not from King Salman.
Ankara has not ruled outthe possibility of a meetingbetween Erdogan and PrinceMohammed on the sidelines ofthe G20 meeting in Argentinanext week.
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Hundreds of Central Americanmigrants staged a boisterous
demonstration on the US Mexico bor-der on Thursday, screaming forPresident Donald Trump to let them inas US soldiers and riot police put on amenacing show of force.
The increased tension over thepresence of a thousands-strong migrantcaravan came as Trump markedThanksgiving Day by threatening toclose the border if he thinks Mexico haslost control of it. Vehicle and pedestri-an traffic at the busy San Ysidro cross-ing came to a halt for 40 minutes asdozens of US police wearing helmetsand holding rifles formed a line facingthe Mexican side of the frontier.
Separately, riot police rehearseddeployment movements. US Customsand Border Protection called all of thisa “large-scale readiness exercise.”
American soldiers in khaki-coloured uniforms set off rockets thatexploded with a pungent-smelling whitesmoke. Helicopters hovered overhead.
Trump has already deployed near-ly 6,000 troops along the border and hethreatened to go even further.
“If we find that it gets to a levelwhere we are going to lose control orwhere people are going to start gettinghurt, we will close entry into the coun-try for a period of time until we can getit under control,” Trump told reporters,before firing a warning to Mexico.
“The whole border. I mean thewhole border,” he said, adding that“Mexico will not be able to sell their carsinto the United States.”
At almost the same time as thepolice and troop exercise, at anothernearby border crossing called ElChaparral, Central American migrantsfrom the caravan emptying into Tijuanadefied the president with a loud rally.
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Ousted Sri Lankan PrimeMinister Ranil
Wickeremesinghe’s alliance onFriday won control of a pow-erful panel in Parliament, deal-ing a major blow to PresidentMaithripala Sirisena and hisprime ministerial appointeeMahinda Rajapaksa.
Sirisena’s party memberswalked out of Parliament,which resumed its session onFriday after being adjourned onMonday, protesting against Speaker KaruJayasuriya’s move to appointfive members of the UnitedPeople’s Freedom Alliance(UPFA) which is led by thePresident.
The Speaker named fivemembers from the UnitedNational Front (UNF) ofWickeremesinghe, and oneeach from the Tamil National Alliance (TNA)and the Janatha VimukthiPeramuna (JVP).
This is in continuation ofthe political unrest plaguing thecountry since October 26.
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:A�3��) ���9�����,������-�� �,'� ������B�8�Geneva: Hopes for peace inAfghanistan are better thanthey have been in many years,despite a grave humanitariancrisis and persistent violence, asenior United Nations officialsaid on Friday. The UN’shumanitarian chief in the coun-try, Toby Lanzer, told reportersthat even though some 3.6 mil-lion people are “one step awayfrom famine” and the worstdrought in decades has devas-tated crops, the situation was
not entirely bleak.“Despite all of this, there
are new-found opportunities inAfghanistan, and there are verywell-founded hopes for peace,”Lanzer said in Geneva, aheadof an international conferenceon Afghanistan in the Swiss citynext week.
“It sounds like a paradox,but there are better opportu-nities today then there havebeen in many years forAfghanistan,” he added. AFP
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The second T2O Internationalbetween India and Australia
was called off due to intermittentrain on Friday, undoing the vis-itors' good work with the ball anddenying them an opportunity tolevel the three-match series.
India were naturally disap-pointed at not getting a go at thetarget which was revised thricedue to rain. Australia had scored132 for seven in 19 overs whenthe first spell of rain arrived at theMelbourne Cricket Ground.
India's target was initiallyrevised to 137 runs in 19 oversbefore more rain made it 90 runsfrom 11 overs and then 46 fromfive overs. Nearly 90 minuteswere lost due to the fickle weath-er before the game was eventu-ally called off at 10.02 pm localtime.
Rain playing hide and seekwas not just frustrating for theplayers but also for the 60,000plus crowd gathered at the icon-
ic venue.With the match not produc-
ing a result, India now can onlylevel the series in the final gamein Sydney on Sunday.
Virat Kohli and his team hadcome into the T20 series afterwinning six bilateral contests ina row.
India put up a muchimproved with the ball on Friday,following the disappointment ofthe series opener at the Gabba onWednesday.
Bhuvneshwar Kumar (2-20)and Khaleel Ahmed (2-39)shared four wickets to rock theAustralian top-order and reducethem to 41-4 at one stage.
This was after India won thetoss and opted to bowl. The vis-itors went in with an unchangedside while Australia made onechange, bringing in NathanCoulter-Nile for Billy Stanlakewho picked up an ankle niggleduring warm-up.
Kumar then struck with hissecond delivery, dismissing
Aaron Finch (0) caught behind.From there onwards, India exert-ed themselves on the field andthere was never any let up.
But there were hiccups. Theswing bowler should have had atleast a couple of more wickets,but was twice unlucky in thethird over.
First, Rishabh Pant spilled adifficult diving catch behind thewickets with D'Arcy Short (14)getting a life on 7. Two balls later,Chris Lynn (13), on nought,should have been caught at fineleg, only for Jasprit Bumrah (1-20) to spill it over the rope andfor a six.
Ahmed did strike in thefourth over and pegged Australiaback as Lynn was caught in thedeep going for another big one.Two overs later, he bowled Shortand India's missed chances did-n't cost them too much.
The longer boundaries fur-ther aided India as Bumrah hadMarcus Stoinis (4) caught in thedeep in the seventh over to put
the hosts under more pressure.Glenn Maxwell (19) and Ben
McDermott (32 not out) added21 runs for the fifth wicket tostem the rot, but Krunal Pandya(1-26) struck to remove danger-man Maxwell.
The spinner found somegrip and a hint of turn as Maxwellwas bowled in the 11th over.
Kuldeep Yadav (1-23) toomade his presence felt, chippingin with Alex Carey's (4) dismissal,sending the prominently Indiancrowd into raptures.
Australia somehow man-aged to cross the 100-mark in the16th over, thanks to a 27-runpartnership between NathanCoulter-Nile (18) andMcDermott.
Coulter-Nile hit two sixesand a four during his nine-ballstay. McDermott held one endtogether and put on 31 runs off20 balls with Andrew Tye (12 notout), providing a little impetus tothe innings before rain haltedproceedings.
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India's dreams of winning a maidenglobal title lay in tatters after a ques-tionable omission and an inexplic-
able batting collapse saw them crash toan eight-wicket defeat against Englandin the semi-finals of the ICC Women'sWorld T20.
Reigning ODI World WorldChampions England will now meetAustralia in the summit clash after theSouthern Stars beat defending cham-pions West Indies by 72 runs.
India decided to leave their seniormost player Mithali Raj, a move thatwill certainly be questioned, after Indialost their last eight wickets for 24 runsto end up scoring a below-par 112 in19.3 overs.
It was a walk in the park forEngland as seasoned campaigners AmyJones (53 no, 47 balls) and Natalie Sciver(52 off 40 balls) added 92 runs for theunbroken third-wicket stand to finishthe match in only 17.1 overs.
It was yet another story of Indianwomen not showing enough tempera-ment during big match days, having lostthe 50-over World Cup final to Englandat Lord's last year and the Asia Cup T20final to Bangladesh, earlier this year.
As many as seven players failed toget double digit scores and the spin-attack was unable to adapt to a differ-ent surface at the Sir Vivian RichardsStadium after playing all their match-es at Providence in Guyana.
On a track where the ball wasn'tcoming on to the bat, it was theEnglishwomen, who came up trumpswith left-arm spinners Kirstie Gordon(2/20 in 4 overs) and Sophie Ecclestone
(2/22 in 3.2 overs) varied the pace oftheir deliveries, something theirIndian counterparts completelyfailed.
Skipper Heather Knight's off-breaks also came in handy as shehad the best figures of 3 for 9 intwo overs as none of India's mid-dle and lower-order batters could forcethe pace.
Once Smriti Mandhana (33, 24balls), Jemimah Rodriguez (26 off 26balls) and skipper Harmanpreet Kaur(16, 20 balls) were dismissed, there was-n't any Plan B with VedaKrishnamurthy completely out of formand Deepti Sharma (7, 10 balls) inca-
pable of hitting big shots.Poor game sense of not read-
ing the pitch also played its partas most of the Indian batswomen
charged at the deliveries ratherthan playing deep inside thecrease.
That was the ploy thatJones and Sciver deployed while facingthe Indian spin quartet, who were belowaverage on the day.
At Guyana, it was a slow trackwhere the ploy of taking pace off thedeliveries worked for the likes ofPoonam Yadav (0/29 in 4 overs),Deepti (1/24 in 4 overs) and Anuja Patil(0/27 in 3.1 overs).
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The decision to drop a play-er of Mithali Raj's calibre
backfired during India's humil-iating semi-final loss to Englandin the World T20 but skipperHarmanpreet Kaur said thatshe has "no regrets" as it wasdecision taken keeping team'sinterests in mind.
At the toss, Harmanpreetsaid:"It's not about not selectingMithali, it's about keeping a win-ning combination."
The decision was ques-tioned by former England cap-tain Nasser Hussain and formerIndian Test player SanjayManjrekar on air.
However the Indian skipperdefended her decision.
"Whatever we decided, wedecided for the team. Sometimesit works, sometimes it doesn't,no regrets. I'm proud of the waymy girls played through thetournament," Harmanpreet saidat the post-match presentationceremony.
Mithali's strike-rate wasalways an issue but consideringthat Taniya Bhatia hasn't beenable to acclerate and VedaKrishnamurthy in poor form,the decision to drop a seasonedcampaigner boomeranged onIndia.
The skipper said that shewanted someone to bat in themiddle-order as Mithali's pre-ferred position is opening andshe didn't want to tinker with thecombination that won againstAustralia.
"We did really well againstAustralia, and that is the reasonwe just wanted to go with thesame combination," sheexplained at the press confer-ence.
"She (Mithali) opens. Weneed someone after Smriti(Mandhana) and me who can
bat for us. Sometimes you click,sometimes it doesn't click."
Harmanpreet agreed thatthe team was at least 30 runsshort of what could possiblyhave been a winning target.
"Definitely, it was notenough to tell you, but still I hadenough faith that, if we couldhave bowled better, we could'vewon the game," said Kaur.
"But it's part of the gamesometimes. I think if we had140-150 then definitely wewould have won the game."
The Indian captain termedit as a learning curve for heryoung team.
"This is a learning for usbecause we are a young team.Sometimes you have to changeyour game according to thewicket. England bowled reallywell, read the wicket really well.It was not an easy total to chase,and our bowlers bowled reallywell. We stretched the match tillthe 18th over," Harmanpreetexplained.
She did admit that mentalstrength in big games is anissue and her young team needsto garner a bit more of it.
"I think we are a young teamand we still need to work on ourmental strength. If we can workon how to play under pressure,that will change how we playthese games."
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Jonny Bairstow laid down a marker to beEngland's permanent number three on
Friday but Sri Lanka clawed their way backinto the final Test with late wickets.
At stumps on day one,England, 2-0 up in the series, were312-7, Bairstow having made 110after valuable partnerships withJoe Root and Ben Stokes,who made a half-century.
Batting after Rootwon his eighth straighttoss, England lost bothopeners cheaply in themorning.
Rory Burns disap-pointed again, bowledby Dilruwan Perera for 14as he tried to cut. KeatonJennings fell three overslater, caught at leg slip offMalinda Pushpakumarafor 13.
But Root and Bairstow,England's fourth differentnumber three in the series,steadied the ship, survivingone review each to steerthe visitors to 102-2 atlunch.
Bairstow and Root puton a 100-run stand beforethe captain fell to left-armwrist spinner LakshanSandakan after lunch, top-edging an attempted slogsweep on 46.
Sri Lanka should have
had Stokes as well, with umpire ChrisGaffaney incorrectly turning down Perera'slbw appeal when the Durham allrounderwas yet to get off the mark.
Stokes and Bairstow then made hay,Stokes hitting five fours and two sixesbefore Sandakan got the Durham all-rounder to edge to slip, sending him backto the pavillion for 57 off 88 balls.
Bairstow, playing his first Test of theseries having been injured at Galle
and left out at Kandy, thenpassed his century, removing
his helmet and celebratingwith gusto.
But he fell for 110,bowled by Sandakan, andwas soon followed byButtler for 16, caught and
bowled by Sandakan, and by BenFoakes who nicked Malinda
Pushpakumara to the keeper for 13.Moeen Ali, who has had a
woeful tour with the bat — in con-trast to with ball in hand — thensurvived an lbw review. He endedon 23 and Adil Rashid not out on13.
England have rested fast bowlerJames Anderson to give StuartBroad his first Test of the series.
Sri Lanka also made twochanges, bringing in left-arm wristspinner Lakshan Sandakan toreplace Akila Dananjaya who is inBrisbane having his bowling actiontested.
Under-performing openerKaushal Silva was left out in favour ofDanushka Gunathilaka.
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Teenage Bangladesh off-spinnerNayeem Hasan became the
youngest ever player to take five wick-ets on debut but West Indies' spinnersmatched him to restore parity in thefirst Test in Chittagong on Friday.
Nayeem, who was 17 years 355days old at the start of the game, fin-ished with 5-61, as Bangladesh bowledout the West Indies for 246 to take a78-run first innings lead.
But the hosts were unable to cashin on the advantage, slumping to 55 for
five in their second innings at stumpson the second day for a lead of just 133runs.
Jomel Warrican and Roston Chaseeach took two wickets to help the WestIndies claw their way back into thecontest.
Mushfiqur Rahim remainedunbeaten on 11 alongside MehidyHasan, on what looked like a battingminefield at the Zahur AhmedChowdhury Stadium.
Nayeem, who surpassedAustralian Pat Cummins's five-wick-et haul on debut at 18 years and 193
days, took care of the West Indieslower middle-order after senior spin-ners provided the initial break-throughs.
Skipper Shakib Al Hasan, who fin-ished with 3-43, dismissed Shai Hopeand Kraigg Brathwaite at the start ofhis spell after Taijul Islam removedKieran Powell for 14 to help the hostsreduce West Indies to 31-3.
Roston Chase and Sunil Ambristried to rebuild the innings butNayeem soon struck, removing bothbatsmen in successive overs for 31 and19 runs respectively.
Shimron Hetmyer then launcheda counter-attack to score 63 off 47 ballswith five fours and four sixes for a briefrespite from the spin onslaught.
Hetmyer shared 92 runs withShane Dowrich to lift West Indies froma precarious 88-5 but the side collapsedagain once Mehidy broke the stand.
Nayeem then dismissed DevendraBishoo, Kemar Roach and Warrican tocomplete his five-for before Sakibremoved Shannon Gabriel to wrap upthe West Indies innings.
Dowrich held one end firm to stayunbeaten on 63, his third Test fiftywhich came off 101 balls with the helpof two fours and three sixes.
Earlier in the day, Bangladesh werebowled out quickly for 324 in their firstinnings after resuming on theirovernight score of 315-8.
Left-arm spinner Warrican tookthe remaining two Bangladeshi wick-ets as the hosts added just nine runs.
Bangladesh owed their first-innings score to Mominul Haque, whostruck 120 off 167 balls while ImrulKayes and Shakib made 44 and 34respectively.
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Australia dethroned the WestIndies and booked a place in
Saturday's Women's WorldTwenty20 final with a crushing 71-run victory in the first semi-final onThursday at the Sir Vivian RichardsStadium in Antigua.
Stunned by the Caribbean sidein the 2016 final in Kolkata, thethree-time champions were at theirmost ruthless to the dismay of ahuge home crowd as they reached142 for five batting first on a turgidpitch and then routed the WestIndies for just 71 off 17.3 overs.
Australia will face England inSaturday's championship match atthe same venue.
Put in to bat on a pitch wherethe experienced three-time formerchampions found free scoring dif-ficult, the Aussies were indebtedagain to the prolific Alyssa Healy, theopening batter top-scoring with 46to earn her fourth 'Player of theMatch' award in five games so far inthis tournament.
Healy and captain Meg Lanningproduced the best partnership of theinnings, putting on 51 for the sec-ond wicket.
After Healy fell to leg-spinnerAfy Fletcher and Lanning wasbowled by all-rounder Deandra
Dottin, Rachael Haynes struck aflurry of boundaries to reach anunbeaten 25 off 15 balls to give herside a fighting chance against thetitle-holders.
West Indian hopes of a strongreply evaporated in the early oversof their innings with openers HayleyMatthews and Dottin dismissedcheaply.
Matthews was run out by wick-etkeeper Healy while championseamer Ellyse Perry accounted forDottin, adding the scalp ofShemaine Campbelle to finish withthe outstanding figures of two fortwo from two overs.
She was not required byLanning to return to the attack as therest of the West Indies batting fold-ed meekly, only captain StafanieTaylor (16) getting into double-fig-ures as all the bowlers shared in therout, with seamer Delissa Kimminceand spinner Ashleigh Gardner alsotaking two wickets each.
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Laziness has killed careers,futures, relationships, families,friendships. Laziness is a nastylittle affliction that afflicts every-one from time to time. Everyone
wonders to themselves from time to time“How can I stop being so lazy?Overcoming laziness, or the ability to dothings that we do not want to do, is a cru-cial part of gaining success. Things sim-ply have to get done and we have to dothem or make sure they are done. Whenwe come to terms with this fact, that wewill have to do unpleasant tasks tobecome successful, it makes it a whole loteasier to just ‘buckle down’ and do thetasks we know we will have to do at somepoint anyway.
Why is it that we fail as often as wedo? The simplest answer would be thatwe fail because we make mistakes. Yetthat does not seem quite right. We fail inendeavours before many a time and fewif any were a result of mistakes. The occa-sional slip or mishap is of course com-monplace, but they are only a part of theprocess and not the reason behind ourfailures.
The reason why we fail is much sim-pler than that: we fail because we are lazy,we don’t put in an effort.
Success is the result of a few big tasksdone and accomplished and a wholebunch of miniscule tasks done andaccomplished. Today we are going tofocus on how to get all those small tasksdone that we just don’t have the desire todo. Lazy people let the small tasks gounfinished for far too long. Successfulpeople make sure those small tasks getdone as quick, painless and efficiently aspossible. Here is how successful peopleovercame laziness.
Don’t be fooled into believing thatthat those you admire or look up to, thosethat have made that money, achievedwhat they wanted to achieve and havefound love in their lives are any betterthan you; they’re not. The only differencebetween them and the rest of us is thatwe are too lazy to put in a true effort. Weare all on an equal playing field — luck-ily for those on top and unluckily for therest, not everyone decides to play.
You either want to experience, toenjoy, to explore and to live, or you’drather watch as things happen. Youeither want to be a part of the world oryou want to watch from the sidelines —there’s no middle ground. Many of usattempt at reasoning with ourselves,telling ourselves that we are only half lazy,that we can be agile if we would so wish.
Everyone can get into a rut. Whatstarts as one day where you don’t getmuch done, can turn into a week or two.Avoiding these streaks of laziness is thebest solution, but what can you do whenyou’re stuck?
The best way to get unstuck is to fig-ure out how you got stuck in the firstplace.
There are many ways you can getyourself into a streak of laziness. But I’vefound there are three big culprits thatoften cause you to get stuck, even thoughmost people only blame one of them.
LOW ENERGYA common source of laziness is sim-
ply being drained. This is a silent causeof getting stuck, because human’s aren’tequipped with a fuel gauge. Until you’vebeen running on empty for miles, it’soften hard to see that your procrastina-tion is caused by a lack of fuel.
Whenever I’ve been stuck for morethan a few days in a row, there are a fewquestions I try to ask myself to seewhether a lack of energy is the problem:
Have my eating or exercising habitschanged in the last month? Even smallchanges can lead to an impact in yourenergy levels that you might not noticeimmediately.
Have my sleeping patterns changed
in the last month? Fewer hours of sleepor lower quality sleep can mean you starteach day with less energy.
Have other areas of my lifeadded extra stress?Unfortunately, you’re onlydrawing fuel out ofone tank, so if onearea of your lifeis siphon-ing it
away, you won’t have much left.The solution to a low energy crisis is
to fix whatever is the source of the drain.This isn’t always easy to do, but some-times it is necessary. If you’re not gettingenough sleep, you might need to set thatas a priority before you try to drive outof your slump.
FORGOTTEN MOTIVATIONWhy are you doing this again? Every
project usually begins with inspiration.However, if you’re working the same tasksfor months, some of the initial motiva-tion for starting might be gone. Your bigplans get replaced with smaller frustra-tions and it can be hard to find the moti-vation to keep going.
If there were good reasons to getstarted, there are probably good reasonsto continue. Spending time to go throughthose reasons again can help youbring back your past motivation. Ifyou’ve been stuck for more
than a few days,this is
a step that can’t be easily washed over. I’dsuggest spending at least an hour or twogoing through your plans, long-termvision and initial motivation before youtry to get unstuck.
We believe its life’s fault for being bor-ing, for not exciting us. The trick is thatthe world can never excite you. It’s theway you experience the world that can beexciting, not the world itself. You caneither live life following one philosophyor the other, not both because such a lifewould be one of contradiction — whichis even dumber.
Why is it thatso few of
us eventually realise our true potential?Why haven’t you made plans or takenaction on a side venture or passion pro-ject? How many of your ideas have beenstifled before they’ve had the chance tobloom?
The harsh reality and answer to thesequestions is, much of your losses andinadequacies are a result of whom youassociate with.
Successful people create accountabil-ity systems that boost important but noturgent items to the top oftheir priority lists — ide-ally in a way thatmakes failure reallyuncomfortable.
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It has to have spirit and thatalone will call out to me,”says sagely singer, song-writer, composer and actorLucky Ali about the reason
why he decided to sing a song.He is dressed in a long blackovercoat with a matching T-shirt inside, brown trousersand grey shoes, while hisshoulder length salt and pep-per hair blows in the windas he stands on the terraceof a radio channel.
For anyone growingup in the 90s, Ali’s songsfeatured prominently inthe play list. But it wasthis preponderance thatmade the gaps when hedropped off the radarfelt more acutely. Ali,
who was namedMaqsood Ali by his actor
father Mehmood, says,“For me, music is not aprofession. It is a serioushobby and I want to keep
it like that. Because themoment it becomes a business,
you lose the love of it. You startworking for different purposes andI don’t want to do that. The joy thatI get from what I do and the formthat I do gives me that energy thatI wanted in the first place whenI started out.” So in betweenmaking music, he could be goingto the mountains, travellingabroad and ‘chin wagging’.
“I like to talk about thingsthat are relevant. There is a lot todo and very less time,” he says ashe places his hand on his headto tame his unruly hair which isswept by the wind.
While travel does influencehis music and he is often on aglobe trot, he feels that he hasnot gone around the globe asmuch as he wants to. “I haven’tgone to Antarctica or the Arcticregion. But travelling opens upyour perspective even if you go
from your home to the next vil-lage.”
Ali believes that his songs arenot about nostalgia. “They are
about what I hope to see, what I willsee and what I will make possible tosee because that is what I have told
myself,” he says. The 60-year-old, who will be
playing at the two-day RidersMusic Festival in the capital is not
a hardcore biker but does like rid-ing as was often seen in many of his
music videos. He says, “The kindof music that I play here or anyother concert depends on themood. There is no set format.Our music changes from con-cert to concert.” Just like his set
list is not fixed, neither is hisprocess of composing music. “There is no
process that I will sit down andwrite. It can happen any time,even just now. It depends on themoment. It mainly happens whenI am in love,” he says.
And that is one of the reasonswhy he disappears time to timefrom the scene of music-making.“If I find that there is no love ina place, I just leave.”
While his last film collabora-tion was Safarnama fromTamasha, he is currently workingon an Indian-Israeli collaboration.“These guys researched me. I did-n’t even understand that they lis-ten to our music but they did.They sent one of their top artistsand we recorded an album calledHimala which is set for releaseworld over.”
Ali has his reasons from stay-ing away from the music industry,especially the Hindi film industry,which he thinks has “devolved”rather than evolving. “I was notthere to see the changes but Iknow whatever they are doing isnot working for anyone thereprobably because of the way theyperceive it. It is not organic. If itwas, people would subsist and alot more musicians would comeout to express themselves. Thereis so much of great music outsidewhich has not been discoveredand I am fortunate to be playingwith them.”
His special grouse is reservedespecially for film music which hefeels is ‘dead’. Ali says, “They killedall the musicians, the violiniststhat formed a part of the indus-try. Everything is a cut and pastejob which is stolen from here andthere. If the music belongs tosomeone else’s spirit, you can’t justtake it,” says Ali and goes on toadd, “Art is not about money. Thatis just a by-product. It is about themusic whether we are gettingbetter while playing a riff orwhile practising.”
Ali does not find the Hindifilm industry bundled off asBollywood acceptable to him.“My family was never a part ofBollywood. It was the Hindi filmindustry that they were part ofwhich died or is half dying. Byreferring to it as such, people aremaking it dirtier,” says Ali whomade his debut with Chote Nawabin 1962 directed by his father.
Besides his father, his pater-nal aunt Minu Mumtaz andmaternal aunt Meena Kumariwere actors. So didn’t acting everoccur to him as a natural choiceof career? Ali, who acted in Surand Kaante, says, “Of course myfamily background impacted me.I did not get a break till I was 36.Everywhere that I went, peoplesaid that I was Mehmood’s son so
I didn’t need any work. But myfather was a disciplinarian and hedid not believe that I was entitledto anything, including drivinghis cars. I travelled in buses andat the end of the day even gavehim details of the money that Ispent.”
But Ali looks back fondly atthe earlier era of film-making. Hesays, “Some of the current moviesare exploring issues and newerideas but the grandeur of the cin-ema, where you can get abreast oftechnologies or ideas, does nothappen any more. It happenedvery early during the time ofBombay Talkies when you hadGerman film directors, directingHindi films. And look where wehave landed now — in KaranJohar’s lap.”
So while he stays away frommusic, “the project that I work onmainly is taking care of things thatI have. There is a farm and thenthere are children (he has fivefrom three marriages). You giveyour time to certain things,” hesays trailing off.
When asked about his inter-est in organic farming, Ali replies,“There is nothing organic in mycountry now. If you are goingorganic and your neighbour isputting pesticide and that pollencomes on to your farm, how canit be organic? I think our countryneeds education for us to graspthe potential that we have.” Aligoes on to quote the example ofGanga which is only five metresdeep now in places while it was100 metres some 10 years ago. Heis concerned about the rapiddegradation that is taking place inthe country. “The change is veryfast and drastic. I walked intoDelhi and smelt smoke. I look atthis not from a general point ofview but as an artiste and it dis-turbs me sometimes to see thedirection that we are headed to.Where are we going? To me, thisseems like the end of Kalyug,” saysthe singer who first capturedpopular imagination with OSanam from the album Sunoh,which featured his first wife.
But he does not believe in justexpressing his disenchantmentbut suggesting solutions. Alibelieves that the power of chang-ing what is going wrong lies with-in us. “While the newer things arecalling you to the malls, moviesand bikes, there is an older selfinside you that is telling youabout the weather. Nature givesyou the best of itself to you butyou abuse it, get drunk, do drugsand litter the place.” His mantrato break out of it is not to loseyour humanity and do thingsethically.
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The Flash is a fast-paced super-hero series that follows thehigh-speed adventures of Barry
Allen (played by Grant Gustin).With season five about to premiere,we catch up with actor HartleySawyer — who plays Ralph Dibny inthe show — to find out what fans canexpect from the epic DC Comicsdrama…
What is Ralph’s main focus in sea-son five of The Flash?In season five, I think Ralph’s mainfocus will be finding his place in theteam. Last year, it was all about, ‘AmI a hero? Can I do this? Can I not dothis?’ This year, it’s about finding hisplace and finding out what thatmeans to him and what he can bringto the table.
Where do we find Ralph at the startof the season?Every year, it’s immediately back tobusiness for the team. It’s exactly thesame for Ralph, too. He’s an extreme-ly resilient guy and he’s been througha lot but he’s going to spend a lot oftime figuring out, ‘Okay, who am Inow?’ Who he was last year is verydifferent from who he is now. It was-n’t a development from boyhood tomanhood but there was definitelysome kind of development. It’s going
to be fun to see where he goes next.
Ralph evolved from a down-on-his-luck private detective into afull-on superhero in season four.What challenges will he face now?Even though he’s come so far, peo-ple still don’t take him seriously, andthat’s fair. He understands whypeople don’t take him seriously, buthe’s going to struggle with thatbecause he will want to be takenmore seriously as a hero and also asa member of the team. It’s easy towrite him off, but he has a lot tobring to the table that we haven’texplored yet. For example, thedetective aspect of the character.That’s something I’ve wanted toexplore for a long time. That’ssomething that we’re definitelygoing to get into this year.
Does the mysterious arrival ofNora West-Allen (played by JessicaParker Kennedy) make Ralph wantto use his detective skills? Well, Ralph’s definitely going to get
into that with Nora. He’s definitelygoing to have some questions aboutwhat’s going on there. He’s going tobe sceptical of her but not in a mali-cious way. He’ll be thinking, ‘Wait,I think there’s more here than she’srevealing.’
Are fans going to see more of theRalph and Barry dynamic fromlast season? At first, the two char-acters couldn’t stand each otherbut then a bromance blossomed...We’re not going to see too much ofthem together in the first part of theseason because Barry is going to beup to his eyeballs with his daughter,Nora. Barry and Nora will be busyfiguring out their relationship. Thatwill be Barry’s priority.
What do you think of the relation-ship between Barry and Ralph? It’s been fun to see them evolve.Barry and Ralph can be more self-sufficient now, although I wouldlove to do more scenes with Grant.Unfortunately, everybody can’t
always get loads of time with Barryon the show. It would be nice to seetheir relationship develop and we’llget to see them together this season,but not as much as last year.
If Barry is going to be busy, whowould you like to see Ralph inter-act with in season five?There is going to be a lot of Ralphand Caitlin (played by DaniellePanabaker) in season five. I thinkthey have a really discreet rela-tionship and friendship, which isfun. There’s also going to be a lotof Ralph and Cisco (played byCarlos Valdes), because they areboth bachelors and single. Wehaven’t talked about it, but Iwould love to see Ralph and JoeWest (played by Jesse L Martin)hang out more. There’s a lot thatcould happen there. Joe’s knownRalph for a really, really long time.He knows exactly who he is andwhat he’s capable of doing. Hewas the first person that everdefended Ralph to anybody.
Ralph had a major impact on JoeWest, when he was about to crossthat line...What a great scene. It was so pivotalfor the character. That was some-thing that really drew the line in thesand for a lot of viewers. It also drewthe line in the sand for me as anactor. I felt, ‘Cool, this is going to diginto who this guy really is. There’sa lot more there than just the wack-iness.’ I would love to see more ofRalph’s relationship with Joe. Ialways love working with Jesse. I’dlove to see more of them together.
How new does this season feel?It feels like there’s a natural progres-sion towards this season. I know thetone and the scripts change every sea-son but the reason why this showworks well is because the people inthe cast work well together.
Is that the secret behind the successof the show?These relationships are always there
and that’s why the show worked in thefirst place. These people are all real-ly good. You can see that when youwatch the show. When I watched theshow before I joined the series, Ialways found it cool. When I startedworking on the show, I didn’t expectit to be as great as it was — but it wasphenomenal.
How much have you enjoyed inter-acting with the fans of the show? That’s been really fun, too. I did myfirst convention this past summer andI was super nervous about it — but itwas one of the most incredible expe-riences that I’ve had. It was amazingbecause there were so many peoplecoming up to me saying things like, “Ilove this. I went through this reallyhard time in my life, but the first timeI smiled again was when your face felloff in that first episode.” It’s great tohear things like that. What more canyou ask for? Forget your worries. Tuneit out and enjoy yourself. That’s very,very special to me. My experiencewith the fandom comes down to thefact that they love the show. I grew upas a comic book fan, too. That’s whatI keep thinking about. I love all thisstuff. I’m really excited to be a part ofit.
(The Flash Season 5 airs on ColorsInfinity every Wednesday at 10 pm.)
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Amini revolution is afoot on heels,wheels and mobile phones. Thelgbtq+ community is no longer an
underground culture but is grabbing thebull by the horns and has begun to enterpopular culture. It has also become coop-tive of other social groups. “I rememberthe first time when the drag performancebegan at Keshav Suri’s Kitty Su andViolet Chachki had come, two lawyerstold me that they too do drag but in secret.They wanted a chance to showcase theirtalent as well,” said Mohnish Malhotra,organiser of the Delhi Pride Parade andthe creative head of a public relations com-pany.
Currently, there are many in contem-porary performative artists like MandeepRaikhy’s Gati Dance Forum, VasuPrimlani — an openly gay comedian —and Sushant Divgikaraka Rani Kohinoor, whoare making people sit upand take note. In litera-ture, poet Akhil Katyalwaxes lyrical abouteverything from same-sex relationships toPartition and politics.But this recognition andacknowledgement hasbeen hard-earnedthrough decades longstruggle. Drag, forinstance, was seen asdeviance 10-15 years agobut now Suri works with 30-40 Indiandrag queens who earn a decent living,entertain and have star power. The com-munity has risen up to include all minor-ity rights under its purview and demandsamong the many policy changes, removalof the marital rape exception that affectsboth heterosexual and homosexual rela-tionships.
“Queer is not just LGBT but maps alarge landscape of all minorities whetherit’s trans, adivasi, Dalit, women or Blackpeople. In the past, we have been affirma-tive about making a statement and theseare movements that are growing in tan-dem. They are not alone and we are notalone in this,” said Malhotra. But how doesone make homosexual partners account-able when the marriage is not acknowl-edged by the law?
“We do discuss these issues. When wewere talking about pride, nobody knewthat the Supreme Court would actuallystrike down Section 377. From here, wecan only go ahead. Acknowledging isimportant and we don’t know whensame sex marriages will be legalised, if it’sdone in two years or 10. But are we goingto quit? No. We are going to do it togeth-
er,” said he. Among other demands that the Delhi
Pride Parade would put forward is seek-ing legislation on hate crimes. “What wewould like is that these cases are taken seri-ously in the court of law and whatever thelaw decides we will accept. Most of thecases don’t even make it to the FIR stage.It’s a very common thing,” he said. Andhe doesn’t absolve society from account-ability by putting the onus on the judicia-ry alone. “The Supreme Court advisedthat the judgment should be sent to gov-ernment offices, police stations and hos-pitals. Sensitisation training should beconducted throughout departments, that’sstep number one. Step two is developingcampaigns. That is something I am per-sonally working towards by creating a talkshow format web series — Unfamiliar
Families (UF) — that willbe launched at the WorldDignity Forum, where thelikes of Ted Turner,Leonardo DiCaprio andAl Gore will be present inIndia. The forum willspeak of issues and offerand exchange solutionsabout what the situation isand how we go about sen-sitisation. The web seriescovers real life stories andstruggles of people,” hesaid.
Another demand ofthe community is the creation of equalemployment opportunities. “As a society,the utmost need is inclusion and empow-erment. Even though the third genderidentification has been granted by the apexcourt, the implementation of that has notpenetrated the layers of society. Majorityof trans-people are still beggars and areengaged in sex work, which is why thereis an urgency to create employment withdignity,” he said.
On property and healthcare rights ofsame sex couples, he said, “It’s time welook at homogenous policies for all citi-zens regardless of their sexuality. A lot ofprivate corporates are beginning to offermediclaim policies to same sex couplesalready. It’s time to extrapolate.”
On November 25, the Pride walk willbegin from Tolstoy Road at 3 pm in all itscolourful glory till it reaches ParliamentStreet, where the stage has been set up foranybody and everybody to voice them-selves. To those who find themselves aloneand struggling with their identity, he said,“You’re not alone and reach out. It mightfeel like it’s lonely but spread your wingsand you will find someone to listen toyou.”
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The roots of black magicare lodged in ancientmyth and folklore which
continues to be a part of pop-ular consciousness on accountof superstitions that are ram-pant in the society. Despite theemergence of the horror genre,the idea of black magic, whichincorporate elements of thesupernatural, still remain morepopular in Indian entertain-ment industry, says actorManish Goel who plays PrithviKhanna in Tantra, Colors lat-est series offering. It is anoccult practise that involvesmeditation, yoga and is pop-ularly believed to have negativeconnotations for some brutalrituals.
Weaving in the concept oftantra, the focal point of thisstory is a house — the Khannamansion and its members whobecome unfortunate victims ofthis practice. While the life ofevery member of the family isat threat, there is only one soul,Niyati, Prithvi’s daughter, whocan save her home and fami-ly from incurring the wrath ofan evil curse.
Manish feels that there isno one who can tell you with-out a doubt whether magicexists or not. This question hasbeen debated on for a longtime and people still cannotcome up with a definiteanswer.
“I believe that there arethings which happen and can-not be explained, and it is upto you to decide whether ornot to believe the mysticalexplanations,” says the actorwho has been a part of showslike, Kahaani Ghar Ghar Ki,Kasautii Zindagii Kay andNach Baliye.
Manish’s character is acontemporary one. The showseems to delve in the dark artof witchcraft. The actor says, “Iplay the role of Prithvi Khanna.He is a businessman whobuilds his dream home after alot of hard work. However, thespot they select is cursed bywitchcraft.” He denies that it isan out and out supernaturalshow. “The serial is a socialdrama with supernatural ele-ments. It tells the story ofNiyati and her father. There isan element of mystery, whichwill intrigue the viewers.People will see a special father-daughter bond,” says Manish.
He adds, “The show hasmultiple subplots running par-allel to each other. The maintrack is of Prithvi building hisdream house and then there ishis beautiful relationship withhis daughter. Lastly, there is anundercurrent of black magic.However, there is more oftantra vidya involved in thisshow. There’s an eye constant-ly watching the family. You willsee how everything startsunfolding when we move for-ward. Who does it and why
will be revealed.”Despite definite policies in
the Anti-Superstition andBlack Magic Act ofMaharashtra, which crimi-nalise practices related to blackmagic, there have been a spateof supernatural shows lined upon all channels. The actorsays that the TV industrycaters to the demand and putsout shows that get the TRPs.Manish opined, “I think thereis a definite liking for suchshows. There was a time whenfamily dramas ruled whichwere followed by the serials onsocial issues. This is the timefor supernatural shows.Though I am not in favour ofthis herd mentality, we can’tdeny that there is visible inter-est.”
Despite having done somany shows, Manish doesn’tget affected when it comes toTRPs and numbers. His mainconcern is that one should beappreciated for the work theyare doing. He also explains,“On TV, women constitutethe major part of the audienceand TRPs of a TV show large-ly come from the ladies in thehouse.”
He is a believer that a manhas the potential to make orbreak his own destiny. He hasdone everything on TV fromreality shows to hosting andacting in the fictional shows,but he’s still not satisfied. “Iwant to play Devdas on TV. It’san iconic role. I even haveasked my dear friend Sumeet(Mittal, writer, director andproducer), about makingDevdas for TV. I’ll definitelypropose it to the channel. It’smy dream role, hope I wouldget to play it someday,” he says.
(The show airs fromDecember 3 at 11 pm.)
Her parents knew the dan-gers of sending theirdaughters, dressed asboys, to school under therule of Taliban and yet
they did it. Back then, Shabana Basij-Rasikh thought them cruel but yearslater when she was able to go to schoolopenly and without fear she realisedhow crucial those hours spent in asecret school were. She carries the les-son her parents inculcated in her eventoday and that gave birth to the ideaof School of Leadership Afghanistan(SOLA), a private boarding school forgirls, teaching them how to becomefuture leaders.
What was the turning point of yourlife because of which you set on thecurrent course of educating women?I spent six years studying in secret dur-ing the Taliban years. When theregime was driven out in 2001, girlscould go back to school openly but theTaliban had destroyed all studentrecords for girls, so before any of uscould return to class, we had to takea placement exam to determine whichgrade we should enter.
The day we got our exam resultsback is the day that changed thecourse of my life. I’d been in the equiv-alent of 1st grade when the Talibancame and when I got my scores back,I saw that I was going to be placed inthe 7th grade but all my fellow 7thgraders were six years older than me.
Do you see the significance? I’dbeen able to study for six years underthe Taliban, but these girls hadn’t.They’d been in the 7th grade when theTaliban came, and now, six years later,they were going right back into 7thgrade. They hadn’t had the opportu-nities that I had. I felt so fortunate, solucky but maybe more than anything,I felt a sense of duty. I felt that I need-ed to find a way to ensure that girlswouldn’t ever be deprived of thechance to study. It was still severalyears before I founded SOLA…butcertainly, the seeds of our school wereplanted on that day.
As a child, were you ever scared ofthe consequences if you were caughtdressed like a boy?Oh yes. Absolutely. My sister and Iwould vary our routes so no onewould get suspicious seeing us everyday, and we’d sometimes spend up toan hour walking to and from school.I remember we’d come home intears some evenings. We’d beg ourparents not to make us go back toschool the next day; we’d say we werescared and didn’t want to go. Theynever listened.
People tell me, sometimes, thatthey think my sister and I were verybrave for doing what we did duringthose years. I’m going to tell you exact-ly what I tell those people: I don’t think
we were brave. The brave ones weremy parents. At the time, of course, Ithought my parents were so cruel, butimagine what it would be like to sendyour daughters to a secret school everyday, never knowing when they’d comehome or even if they’d come home.But you do it anyway, because youknow that education will be the keyto a better life for them. My parentstaught me to believe in the transfor-mative power of education; quitesimply, there would be no SOLA with-out them.
What challenges did you face whensetting up SOLA?I created SOLA a decade ago while I wasstill a college student. It’s been my life’swork, and the challenges we faced at thattime are in some ways still with us.
Certainly, back in 2008, our chiefchallenge was convincing our variousstakeholders that SOLA, as an educa-tional model, could work: keep in mindthat there was no precedent in mycountry for a private boarding schoolfor girls. We had to convince politiciansthat our model was effective and scal-
able, we had to convince donors that wecould provide our students an educa-tion like none other in Afghanistan andmaybe most importantly, we had toconvince mothers and fathers thattheir daughters would be safe with us.
Ten years later, we’ve proven thepower of the school’s model. It’s effec-tive. It works and other organisationswithin Afghanistan are adapting ourmodel to their own programmes. Butthere are times even now when I go tomeetings with high-level officials inAfghanistan who tell me that the
school is a remarkable accomplishmentand then they tell me it’s a shame I’mwasting it on girls. We’ve come a longway, but we’re not there yet.
What are your future plans for SOLA?We’re entering a very exciting period ofgrowth where we intend to more thandouble the size of our student body. Wehave 62 girls in grades six to eight rightnow, representing 23 of Afghanistan’s34 provinces. Our model is to add a newsixth grade class annually. We’re in themiddle of recruiting 2019’s class rightnow — so that by the year 2022, we’llhave roughly 175 girls in grades six to12, ideally representing all 34 provinces.Parallel with this expansion, we’removing forward with plans to build anew, secure campus in Kabul where ourstudents can learn safely and grow tobecome Afghanistan’s new generationof female leaders.
How can Asia go forward in giving asafe and nurturing environment to itsgirls?I think the first step is one that soundsquite easy but is in fact quite difficult:we need to make clear that everyonebenefits when girls are given a safe envi-ronment in which to learn and grow.
I feel that many people look at girls’education purely as a women’s issue andI don’t think that’s the correct view. Girls’education impacts women and girls cer-tainly, but it’s profoundly significant inmen’s lives as well. Educated girls bearfewer and healthier children, earnhigher wages, and direct the majority oftheir earnings back into their families— there are enormous societal and eco-nomic benefits to these facts, and theseare benefits that all of society’s memberscan share. There are other benefits thatcross all national borders: recently, aninternational consortium of climatescientists and policymakers ranked‘educating girls’ as the sixth most effec-tive means of reversing climate change,even more effective than rooftop solarpanels or electric cars.
More than 25 per cent of Indiangirls are married before they turn 18;that number is 33 per cent inAfghanistan, and maybe even higher.Those are remarkable statistics, and onesthat should give us pause. Girls whomarry at a young age, and who havechildren at a young age, are extremelyunlikely to complete their education,which means that their societies lose outon the extraordinary benefits created byeducated women. We can start tochange things when we help menrealise how important they are in thisdiscussion, and how much their liveswill improve when they support andencourage the women and girls in theirlives to never stop studying.
(The educationist will speak at the10th edition of TEDxGateway onDecember 2 at the DOME@NSCI
Mumbai)
The words of Indianorigin in the OxfordEnglish Dictionary
span categories such aspeople and places, food,clothing and accessories,society, wildlife and nature,and so on. Some of themost commonly usedIndian words are raita,pashmina, bhelpuri, daland chutney among oth-ers.
The British Council,which is celebrating its70th anniversary, hasreleased a list of 70 wordsof Indian origin in theOxford English Dictionary.The occasion highlightshow the English languagehas evolved with words ofIndian origin ranging froma few words that date backto the pre-independenceperiod and many that havebeen added recently (likebhelpuri, churidar).
“There are manypoints of connection overthe centuries in whichpeople, ideas, language,goods and services havemoved between Britainand India. The British
Council has been one suchpoint and as we celebrateour 70th year, we areproud to say that we havebeen inspired by Indiaeveryday of those 70 yearsand hope that in a smallway, we inspire young peo-ple in both our countriesto imagine what the next70 years could be. Our 70
Words is a momentaryreminder of the layers ofconnection and fluidnature of the English lan-guage,” said Alan GemmellOBE, director India,British Council.
“For the cashmere wedrape and pyjamas wesleep in; the bangles wewear; the shampoo that
cleans our hair; the chee-tahs we watch whose speedwe admire; and, the curryand kedgeree we might eaton a verandah — we thankthe rich languages of India,and the people who havemixed and shared overthe generations of thoselast four hundred years”, hesaid.
Actor Salman Khan went cyclingwith Union Minister of State forHome Affairs Kiren Rijiju in
Arunachal Pradesh to promote an adven-ture festival here.
Rijiju posted a string of photographsand captioned it, “Hearty congratulationsto the winners of Dalmia MTB ArunachalHornbill’s Flight 2018 Cycling Race. Hats-off to the para-cyclists, women cyclists andthe local participants who competed withsome of the top cyclists of the world.”
Salman was attending the concluding
ceremony of Dalmia MTB ArunachalHornbill’s Flight 2018 and the beginningof Adventure at Mechuka in Arunchal’sWest Siang District.
The Dabangg star donated �22 lakh forthe event. The 52-year-old star promisedto shoot his next film in the scenic state.
Mechuka is about 29 km from India-China border and around 500 km fromArunachal’s capital Itanagar.
The actor was first seen cycling in his1989 film, Maine Pyar Kiya.
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�%���������������CLOTHING AND ACCESSORIES Bandana, bangle, churidar, cummerbund, pashmina,pyjamas, shawl
FOODBhelpuri, chutney, curry, dal, kedgeree, mulligatawny, raita
HIGH SOCIETY AND THE STATE Chit, gymkhana, khaki, palanquin, polo, pukka,tiffin
HOUSE AND HOMEBungalow, chintz, cot, lacquer, shampoo, tank, veranda
PEOPLE AND PLACES Blighty, calico, cashmere, doolally, dungarees, Jodhpurs, jungle
PEOPLE AND SOCIETY Mandarin, mogul, pundit, purdah, swami, thug, yaar
RELIGION AND SPIRITUALITY Avatar, dharma, guru, karma, mantra, nirvana, yoga
TRADE AND THE SEAAtoll, catamaran, cowrie, dinghy, godown, gunny, jute
WILDLIFE AND NATURECheetah, langur, lilac, mongoose, myna, patchouli, teak
MISCELLANEOUSCheroot, choky, coir, cushy, loot, punch, roti
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Unheralded Sonia Chahalstormed into the finals ofWomen's World Boxing
Championships by outclassing herNorth Korean opponent Jo Son Hwabut Simranjit Kaur had to settle for aBronze after losing the semifinal bouthere on Friday.
The 21-year-old Sonia, who begancompeting at the senior level onlysince 2016, registered a unanimous 5-0 win over her more fancied NorthKorean opponent, a Silver medallist inthe Jakrata Asian Games, in the 57kgsemifinals to reach the final in herdebut World Championships.
The rookie boxer joins Mary Kom(48kg) in Saturday's finals.
Simranjit lost to fleet-footedChinese Dan Dou, a Silver medallistin the Asian Championships last year,on a split 4-1 decision in the 64kgsemifinals. The 23-year-old Simranjitwas also participating in her firstWorld Championships.
Sonia now faces Wahner OrnellaGabriele of Germany in the final onSaturday. The Haryana boxer canfancy her chances as Gabriele does nothave a big reputation.
Seeking a historic sixth Gold,Mary Mom will take on Ukrain'sHanna Okhota in the 48kg summitbout on Saturday.
Assam boxer Lovlina Borgohainhad won a Bronze in 69kg after los-
ing her semifinal bout on Thursday.For Sonia, who hails from Bhiwani
district in Haryana, it was a stupen-dous achievement to reach the WorldChampionships final with little expe-rience under her belt.
She began her boxing career in2011 when she was 14 and rosethrough the ranks by competing at theschool and sub-junior levels. Shefirst won a senior level medal in 2016.Last year, she won a Gold in SerbiaCup and bagged a Bronze in theAhmet Comert tournament in Turkeyearlier this year.
With two Bronze medals alreadywon and two Gold medal roundbouts yet to come, India has producedits best ever show since the 2008 edi-tion when the country won 1 Gold, 1Silver and 2 Bronze.
That time also, two Indians werein the final and two were beaten in thesemifinals.
India can beat this2008 performance if bothMary Kom and Sonia wina Gold each on Saturday.
India's best perfor-mance ever was the eightmedals, including four Gold, it won in2006. After that, India won fourmedals in 2008, two in 2010, one in2012, two in 2014 and one in 2016.
Sonia was slow to start but soonpicked up steam. She was particular-ly aggressive in the third round andclearly dominated the semifinal bout
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Sameer Verma stayed oncourse for his title defence
while three-time former cham-pion Saina Nehwal too reachedthe semifinals with an easy winat the Syed Modi InternationalWorld Tour Super 300 tourna-ment here on Friday.
Besides Sameer and Saina,Ashwini Ponnappa and SatwikRankireddy too notched uptwin victories to keep India's titlehopes alive in all the three dou-bles categories.
Sameer, who won the SwissOpen and Hyderabad Openthis year, eked out a 21-18, 16-21, 21-11 win over China'sZhou Zeqi and will square offagainst Indonesian Chico AuraDwi Wardoyo in the semifinals.
Saina, who claimed a sec-ond Gold at CommonwealthGames and an Asian GamesBronze this season, beat formernational champion RituparnaDas 21-19, 21-14 to set up ameeting with Indonesia's Ruselli
Hartawan.In men's doubles,
Satwiksairaj and ChiragShetty defeated Chinesecombination of OuXuanyi and Ren Xiangyu15-21, 21-19, 21-17 to setup a semifinal clash withLondon Olympics Silver medal-lists Mathias Boe and CarstenMogensen of Denmark.
The Indian duo haslost four times to the cel-ebrated Danish pair inclose matches.
Satwiksairaj alsopaired up with Ashwinito outclass Indonesia's
Ronald and Annisa Saufika 20-22, 21-17, 21-11 in the mixeddoubles quarterfinals. The duowill face Chinese Ou Xuanyi and
Feng Xueying next.Ashwini too combined with
her women's doubles partner NSikki Reddy to prevail 19-21, 21-8, 21-18 over Indonesia's TaniaOktaviani Kusumah and VaniaArianti Sukoco. The duo willsquare off against Russian pairof Ekaterina Bolotova and AlinaDavletova.
However, there was disap-pointment in store in men's sin-gles as former two-time cham-pion Parupalli Kashyap and2017 Singapore Open champi-on B Sai Praneeth bowed outafter suffering contrastingdefeats.
Kashyap went down 16-21,19-21 to eighth seeded ThaiSitthikom Thammasin, whilePraneeth's fight ended with a 10-21, 21-19, 14-21 loss to sixthseeded Chinese Lu Guangzu inanother quarterfinal.
Young Sai Uttejitha RaoChukka also showed the stom-ach to fight as she went down 9-21, 21-19, 12-21 to formerOlympic champion Li Xuerui.
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Spain's head coach Frederic Soyezbelieves the men's hockey World
Cup will be evenly-con-tested with more thanseven teams vying for amedal but said India willbe among the favourites tolift the championship trophy.
Spain, ranked No 8 in the World,arrived Friday afternoon for the hock-ey World Cup to be held fromNovember 28 to December 16 at theKalinga Stadium here.
"I think this will be a very closelycontested event with more than six toseven teams on par with each otherfighting for a medal," said Soyez.
"Germany, the Netherlands,Belgium, Australia and India will begood contenders for ChampionshipTitle," he added.
Grouped in Pool A along withOlympic Champions Argentina, NewZealand and France, Spain will begintheir campaign on November 29.
"We have had good preparations for
this tournament. We are focused on ourfirst game, and it is important to do wellin the Group stage. We have played atthe Kalinga Stadium last year and theatmosphere here is electrifying," saidSoyez.
China, who are grouped withEngland, Australia and Ireland in PoolB, also arrived early morning.
England and New Zealand willarrive late night the Biju PatnaikInternational Airport here.
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Chelsea great Didier Drogba feelsFrench wonder kid Kylian Mbappe
should win prestigious Ballon d'Or tro-phy this year on the back of histremendous performance at the WorldCup in Russia, where the 19-year oldplays a major role to help France lift itssecond world title.
"It would be nice to see KylianMbappe winning it this time, It wouldbe refreshing," Drogba, who finished onthe fourth spot in 2007 said during thepromotional tour as global ambassadorof Yokohama Tyres, a sponsor of theEnglish Premier League side Chelsea.
However, the 40-year old star strik-er, who announced his retirementfrom football on Thursdayheaped praise on ever soshining Cristiano Ronaldoand feels the Juve man is stillthere and could be one of thepossible one challenging forit.
"I think Ronaldo is stillthere. You know, he is still themachine and has won UCL. Hechanged league to go to Juventus, andstill scoring goals. The man is justUnbelievable."
The Ivory Coast great, who spentnine years at Stamford Bridge in twospells, feels that it was the right timeto bid goodbye to his illustriouscareer, where he won four premierleague titles in England along withChampions League glory in 2012.
Sharing about the best memory ofhis 20 years in top flight, the veteransaid that the Champions League winat Munich against hosts BayernMunich was the finest moment of hiscareer and he wants it to happen everyday.
"Most memorable moment for meas a player, I think was winning thechampions league. It was a totally dif-ferent experience and the celebrationwith the fans when we come back to
London was unforgettable. It was anamazing day for us."
In the final of the 2011-12 seasonat Allianz Arena, the ace striker firstbrings Chelsea on level terms after a lateequalizer in the 88th minute of thegame and then converted the decisive
penalty to help English club win it'sonly European Championship.
The former Blues was also fullof praise for his former Chelseaboss Jose Mourinho, who is fac-ing a lot of criticism afterManchester United's strugglingform in the English top flight.
Speaking about him, he said,"I can only speak well about him.I think if you know me at Chelsea
it is because of him. He decided tosign me and to give me a chance toplay in one of the biggest clubs in the
world."On being asked about, who's bet-
ter among Messi, Ronaldo, andNeymar, he said that there's no com-parison between the three as they have
achieved a lot in their career and hewould like to have them all in his team.
"Well, I would never comparethose three players because they are dif-ferent, they are all very talented. Messiand Ronaldo have won everything andNeymar is possibly going to win every-thing if he continues like this. So I thinkthe best answer is I would love to haveall three in my team."
Discussing his future goals, hesaid that he hasn't thought about it yetbut is open to some interesting projectsin the coming future.
It is widely believed that he maysoon follow the footsteps of his formercolleagues Frank Lampard, StevenGerrard and Thierry Henry's footstep,who are now starring in their secondstint as managers.
However, he has ruled out the pos-sibility of coming out of retirement andplaying in the Indian Super League, say-ing there is nothing left for him toachieve in his illustrious career.
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Atletico Madrid have a chance to takeadvantage of a topsy-turvy La Liga cam-
paign when they host championsBarcelona on Saturday with thechance to take top spot this week-end despite their own patchy form.
Diego Simeone's side are just apoint behind leaders Barca despitehaving drawn five times and lostonce, together as many matches asthey have won. They are battling toovertake Barca alongside Sevilla andsurprise package Alaves, who areboth level on 23 points with Atletico.
Alaves, promoted in 2016, finished 14thlast term but will go top if they win away atLeganes on Friday night, while Sevilla couldpotentially be leaders on Sunday nightdespite languishing in 13th place inSeptember.
Even Real Madrid are in touch, just fourpoints back despite having gone more thaneight hours without a goal at one point andhaving been without a permanent coach fortwo weeks before Santiago Solari was upgrad-ed from interim to full-time boss.
Atletico may have put a miserable startbehind them but last month, they sufferedtheir heaviest defeat under Diego Simeone,a 4-0 loss to Borussia Dortmund. Before theinternational break, they needed two goals inthe last 10 minutes to beat Athletic Bilbao.
The last time Atleti prevailed over Barcain the league was 2010, when they had Spainkeeper David de Gea in goal and Argentinastriker Sergio Aguero up front.
Lionel Messi proved thedifference in March with abending free-kick, and in thesummer too for Antoine
Griezmann, who decided he wouldbe better off in the lead role he holdswith Atletico rather than playingsecond fiddle at Barca.
There will be a battle of oldagainst new in midfield, whereSergio Busquets, 30, goes up againstRodri Hernandez, eight years his
junior.Any result at the Wanda Metropolitano
will benefit sixth-placed Real Madrid, whosefirst game with Santiago Solari as their per-manent coach comes at Eibar early Saturdayafternoon.
Four wins, 15 goals scored and only twoconceded point to nothing less than a trans-formation, which gave Madrid presidentFlorentino Perez an easy solution to fill thevacancy left open by the sacking of JulenLopetegui.
Solari has a kind run of fixtures untilChristmas, broken only by a league clashagainst Valencia and Roma in the ChampionsLeague next week, which gives his side thechance to re-emerge as serious challengers toBarca's crown.
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in the end.Both the boxers showed their attack-
ing intent in the first round itself and theyexchanged quite a few punches. In the sec-ond round, Sonia tried to seize control ofthe bout and threw a flurry of punches butstill the North Korean held her ground.
The third round, however, clearlywent Sonia's way. On the advice of thecoaches, she went all out and the NorthKorean was at the receiving end.
"I have never imagined that I willreach the final. But it is happening and Iam in the World Championships final atsuch a young age. I am doing this in frontof my home crowd. I am very happy,"Sonia said later.
"My coaches said my opponent wonthe first round and it was an even affairin the second round and so I have to beaggressive in the third if I have to win thebout. So I changed my game and playedaggressive in the third round with 1-2."
Asked about her opponent in the finalon Saturday, she said, "My opponent in thefinal is a hard-hitting boxer and I have toplan accordingly. I want to win the goldin front of my home crowd."
For Simranjit, it was a tough job fromthe beginning as she was trailing in thefirst two rounds. She had to go all out inthe final round which she won but thatwas not enough to win the bout.
"It was a tough fight. Chinese boxersare very quick and I was having problemsin catching her," she said.
"The first round was not mine and thesecond round was also very tough. So, thecoaches told me to go all out in the thirdround. I did that but it was not enough."
Asked if she was satisfied with theresult, she said, "Yes, it is all right. Theresult could have gone either way. I haveno issues.
"This is my f irst WorldChampionships and I won a Bronze. Ihave to be satisfied with this." ���������������!����������!���������� �����>�?����)�����!�0��������������� ��
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��?� /�.��C� Indian gymnast DipaKarmakar qualified for the VaultFinals but B Aruna Reddy suffered aknee injury to end her campaign indisappointment at the ArtisticGymnastics World Cup in Cottbus,Germany.
Dipa, who had an injury-marredcampaign at the Asian Games, scored14.100 to finish at the 6th place outof 16 gymnasts in the qualification.
However, Aruna, who had wona Bronze medal in the women's indi-vidual vault event at the MelbourneWorld Cup, hurt her knee during thefirst vault and was ruled out of thecompetition.
"Aruna was going to perform ahigher difficulty vault. In warm up,she was confident but unfortunatelyduring the competition, her landingwas little early and it hurt her knee.So she didnt perform the secondvault," Gymnastic Federation of India(GFI) president said.
Among Indian men gymnasts,Rakesh Patra scored 14.000 points onthe Rings and finished at the 14thplace out of 29 gymnasts, whileAshish couldn't produce his best,signing off at the 24th spot out of 37gymnasts with a score of 13.200.
The second day of the competi-tion will see Dipa on Beam, Rakeshon Parallel Bars and Ashish on Vault.
The Cottbus event is part of aneight-event qualifying system for the2020 Olympics under which thegymnasts will make the cut based onthe their top three scores.
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